Dear Lo,

What advice do you have related to rejection from a grown child? My daughter and I have been estranged for 6 years. She tells me I was a bad mother and I was never there for her. I have a drained bank account and battle scars that tell a different story. I am codependent so her rejection is very painful. I truly enjoy your classes and I'm learning a lot about myself. Since I no longer cater to my daughters demands, I'm too angry for her to deal with so I've been written out of her life and she keeps my grandsons from me, whom I supported for the first years of their lives. My daughter remarried a wealthy man and no longer needs my bank account or me. Where did I go wrong? Thanks in advance for insight to my issue.

Dear Lo,

I feel so stuck. I fell for a man that I got to know online during Covid. It was the first time in about 20 years that I opened myself up to someone (having been in a violent relationship then in a relationship with a married man, both leaving me with a huge sense of shame and feeling unwanted). After we met in person, he went cold and then didn’t want to continue contact. After about 6 months, I got back in touch to “be friends,” but I think in hindsight I wanted to understand what went wrong and I thought that by getting to know him as a friend, somehow my questions would be answered. A better closure. Long story short, he was very attentive and sexual, making me think he was interested. Then 6 months later, he told me he was in a relationship. Two years in and we are still in touch and off/on with intimate contact. I feel disgusted with myself. Please help.

Dear Lo,

Thank you in advance for taking the time to reply to my question (or two!).

My first question was a result of your webinar about people pleasing. You mentioned that we often get frustrated because we expect people to read our minds about our wants and wishes, but if we are always asking someone to do things that we would like, how do we know that they do them because they want to rather than being forced to do it?

Irrespective of people-pleasing, I have caught myself being codependent with my current partner of 7 years. Do you think that it is still possible to work on my codependency issues while being with him or do you think that it's not possible to do that and if I want to work on these issues I should end the relationship?

Thank you!

P.S. Your webinars are amazing and you are a great communicator!

Dear Lo,

I recently came across your webinar on codependency and it opened my eyes to a lot of things. I loved your other webinars on perfectionism and people pleasing too. Thank you for doing the work you do and for showing up with so much enthusiasm and positivity. You're really helping a lot of us :)

I've (28/f) been in a relationship with my partner (31/m) for 2.5 years. He is a great person who is very kind and sensitive. I came to realize that I've been badly hurt in my past relationships and as a result, I carry trauma from that and from my childhood (the feeling of being unwanted). It is only recently that I'm coming to terms with it. I find it hard to communicate with my current partner because I don't know how much of it stems from my issues and how much of it is from our issues. I will also add that I felt mistrustful and maybe hold some resentment for being hurt in this relationship. Although I think a vast part of it is due to misunderstandings and my own codependency. I would like to feel more comfortable communicating and feel more intimate. But I also have my own journey to make, one which involves believing in my self-worth first. Would you have some advice for me? Thank you!

Dear Lo,

I’ve been in a relationship with the same person off-and-on for the past 3 years now. Throughout our time together, there have been 3 times that he emotionally cheated on me, which really hurt my trust and self-esteem. Also in the beginning, things were perfect and then over time, he slowly started doing less and less. He wouldn’t treat me poorly, just not as good as before. I felt needy and ungrateful for being upset by this change.

We broke up for a bit last year and then got back together this January. He’s someone who has worked hard to re-gain my trust and build back with me. But he’s slowly stopped doing the same things as before like bringing me little surprises and writing me long good morning texts. We work together and it gets hard because I see him talking to our other girl coworkers and this really makes me angry. I tried talking to him about that, but he’s someone who is outgoing and likes to talk to others so he doesn’t want to stray from his morals. I just want to be able to deal with all of this in a healthy way that isn’t taking it out on him or controlling him.

I get really anxious that he’ll get feelings for someone else again or that he’s never going to treat me like he did in the beginning. It makes me put him first before myself to the point where I basically only live for him. When I get anxious, I feel crippled - I can’t eat or get out of my room or do anything for myself. I’s frustrating and makes me feel so bad about myself. He’s doing his best to meet all my needs, but I can tell it’s starting to drain him and it’s making me panic. I feel like I am not enough and that I have to be perfect. I feel like I just want to fix and control and perfect our relationship all the time. Everything makes me anxious and I just want to be happy and mentally healthy. I don’t know how to cope and I don’t know what to do.

Dear Lo,

I want to start off by saying that I attended one of your webinars on codependency and it was a breath of fresh air. I recently had a huge heart-to-heart with my partner regarding how they think my mental state in this relationship is unhealthy…which hurts, obviously. I know that I do not have the healthy mindset and emotional awareness that my partner has, which he has worked on through his own journey. He said we are in two different spots, but there is always room for growth, right? He wants me to be my best self, love me for me, communicate my feelings more, and be more vulnerable. I spoke with my therapist regarding the antidepressant I am on, and how I feel like I am "blocked" 95% of the time regarding my emotions and reactions, which is very frustrating. I am still raw from this conversation with him. I don't want him to have resentment toward me and how I am trying to grow on my journey and take the necessary steps. I am worried that he won't see the effort. He wants me to be happy and express my needs and wants, but I am afraid he'll get tired of waiting for me to become "healthy" in my journey. How do I cope with these anxieties?

Dear Lo,

I just went through a break-up with my boyfriend that left me feeling blindsided. From the moment we met, we both felt a strong connection and we both knew that we were dating with the intention of getting married. We were together for a year and a half, and in that time, we spent almost every day together. He was living with me, and we started to build a life together. He changed careers so that he could have more time for us, we traveled, and started making long-term plans. I always felt that we had such a strong and loving relationship, and I felt like we both put a lot of effort into the relationship. Over this time, we had a handful of arguments where I got very mad, but he didn’t. Generally, I’m a much more emotional person than he is, and I even expressed to him at times that I wanted him to open up more. After the arguments, we talked about it, I apologized, and he always assured me that we were fine.

About 2 months passed after the last argument we had, and everything seemed great. We spent the holidays together and even vacationed out of the country with our families. But then last month, he suddenly asked me for space, saying that the arguments from the past hurt him and he couldn’t get past them. I felt blindsided and hurt because I had no idea he felt like this, and I told him that he should have talked to me about how he was really feeling. Still, I heard what he had to say, I apologized for hurting him, and we discussed what we could do to fix this issue. Things felt like they went back to normal and we both said we felt better after talking. However, a couple of weeks later, I went away for the weekend, and when I came back home, he had packed all of his things and told me he was breaking up with me because those arguments hurt him, and he was upset that I never brought up his request again for space. However, I know that I had suggested several ways that he could get some space from me if he felt he needed it, and I asked him multiple times to let me know how he was feeling. He said that each of these arguments left him feeling like a piece of him was gone and I had insecurities I needed to work through. I again told him that he should have talked to me, but he thinks that because I felt guilty for those arguments that that should have prompted me to bring it up and talk to him about them.

I truly had no idea that he felt like this, and it hurts me that he would think I would ever purposely ignore or dismiss his feelings. He also said multiple times during the breakup how much he loved me, and because of that, he brushed these arguments under the rug. But now I’m left feeling so guilty, wishing that I would have never gotten mad in the first place. I feel like everything is my fault although I feel that I always tried my best to be the best girlfriend I could be. With everything that we had been through together, I truly felt that we had a stronger relationship than this and that he would be able to see that our relationship was mostly happy and good, aside from these arguments. Was this all my fault? Should I feel this guilty?

Dear Lo,

I am normally an interdependent person, but in my relationship, I found it was much harder. How do you talk to someone who wants you to be codependent on them and believes this is the goal to a successful relationship? How do you explain the importance of interdependence?

~STEFN

Dear Lo,

I watched one of your boundaries webinars, and I need some help with those for emotional, mental, and financial. I’m not sure how or where to start with setting boundaries in my marriage of 10 years.

My husband broke my trust. I tried to talk to him about it, but he didn't want to talk. I told him I want to work on our marriage, and he has ignored all of my ideas. We don't even hug or show any affection anymore. What kinds of boundaries can I even set?

I work full time from home, but had to take a huge pay cut so I pick up side jobs to make ends meet. He has a high-stress full time job. Even though we both work full time, most of the household responsibilities fall on me. He is also maxing out our credit cards and gets frustrated when I try to set up a budget.

So he won't work on our marriage, he helps out very little around the house, and we can barely make all our bills each month. I feel stuck and not sure where to even start with setting boundaries.

~Anonymous

Dear Lo,

I have a question from your boundaries webinar about stating the consequence. When I am setting my boundaries, should I tell the person what would happen if they decide to disrespect the boundary again in the future?

~Oluwadara

Dear Lo,

I am in a relationship with a person I truly love, but they just can't consistently show up how I need them to in our relationship. I have expressed what I need and don't feel that my expressed needs are too much to expect in a relationship. If anything, I have probably set the bar very low in what I feel I need for this relationship to work.

Anyhow, when I express what I need, I do see an improvement, but eventually things go back to how they were. I become frustrated internally. I take a mental break to honor my wants and needs. I find articles, therapy sessions, activities, etc. to help me feel better. And, then once I feel better I seem to not be so upset at what I once was before so I resume the communication as if nothing was wrong to begin with or that I have handled what I needed to do internally.

I guess my question is how do I bring up my feelings of neglect in this relationship after the fact and after I have done some healing? I seem to not have the courage to bring it up at the time it occurs, yet it feels odd to bring it up afterward. I don't get what I need from my partner a lot of the time, so I bring it to myself. I do this because I truly want peace and happiness within, but I would be lying if I didn't say this is also because I don't trust/believe that my partner will show up for me. And I don't want to confront that because it might mean that I either have to accept this relationship as is or choose to end it. I feel scared of the latter coming to fruition.

How do express what I need at the time or even afterward in a helpful way? And, more importantly, what can I do to believe in myself that I am strong enough to handle the fallout?

Dear Lo,

I met someone a few years ago online, and we had great connection. He is a great person on a human level. On the second date, we got intimate, which was nice. I started to have feelings for him. After a while, I had to leave the country for a few months, but was away for a couple of years. I was clear about being away for some time. He said he was not looking for anything serious anyways and didn't believe I had feelings for him because we knew each other for a very short period of time. We were in touch when I was away, and we met after a few years when I was back. I could not forget him, but he doesn't believe and thinks this is unrealistic. He offered me to date casually and was honest that he's seeing other women for physical gratification only. I cannot accept it, but I still want to see him. What do I do?