How to Stop Getting Pulled Back Into the High Conflict Drama

You told yourself you were done stepping in. So why do you keep ending up in the middle of the drama again?

Something is keeping you emotionally tethered to this – and once you understand what it is, what you're doing starts to make sense.

In this episode I'm going to show you exactly what's going on and give you something practical you can use today to start to change it.

This is Part 2 of my series (Part 1 here) on disengaging – not from your partner, or your family, but from needing something to go a certain way in order for you to feel okay about it.

And once you learn that skill, you'll be able to step back from the high conflict drama without the guilt or the resentment.

Why you keep getting pulled back into the drama – even when you don't want to

Whatever you've been doing – stepping in, managing, fixing – there's a reason for it. You're still emotionally engaged in the outcome. And the reason you have trouble stepping back from is because nothing’s changed inside of you. You’re trying to step back, but the reason why you were stepping in in the first place hasn't changed. There's a thought running underneath that creates a feeling, and that feeling is driving you straight back into doing the action you were trying to stop.

Why trying to step back from the high conflict drama feels so exhausting

When you try to step back but the feeling driving you hasn't changed, you're working against yourself. It's like trying to hold a beach ball underwater – you can do it for a while, but it's a huge effort and eventually it comes back up. The guilt creeps in, the anxiety builds, and you end up right back in it. The only way to make stepping back sustainable is to address the thought and feeling driving what you're doing in the first place. Then the action of stepping back is aligned with the way you feel, and it's not exhausting anymore.

Why you can't just stop reacting even when you know you should

Because knowing you should stop and being able to stop are two different things. Understanding that you need to step back doesn't change the feeling driving you back in. There's a sequence running underneath your behaviour – circumstance, thought, feeling, action, result – and it runs almost automatically. You can't interrupt it by trying to change the action alone. You have to go further back in the sequence, to the thought and feeling creating what you're doing in the first place.

How you start to actually change this

Start by getting it down on paper to understand why you keep stepping back in. Write down the circumstance – just the facts of what happened. Write one thought you have about the circumstance. Then write down how that thought makes you feel. Then what you do when you feel that way. And finally, the result that creates in your life. Don't judge what comes up. The goal is just to see what's happening clearly. Once you can see it, you can start to change it.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FOR STEPMUMS

• You keep getting pulled back in because the thought and feeling driving your behaviour hasn't changed

• Trying to step back without addressing that thought and feeling underneath is exhausting and unsustainable

• The sequence running underneath everything is: circumstance → thought → feeling → action → result

• Understanding how your thoughts and feelings are driving your behaviour is the practical first step to changing it