Terence A. Rozzell, PhD

We all have that person, either friend or family member, who is in a relationship with someone, who continually hurts them.  No matter what they take from them, no matter how much pain they cause them, no matter how many times they cheat on them or lie to them, they decide to remain in the relationship.  These unhealthy relationships usually last for years! Of course, these relationships create profound confusion for the person remaining in the unhealthy relationship, as well as confusion for the people that love them.  So, in this confusion we seek answers about a situation that we simply don't understand.  So we work up the courage to ask them, "Why do you stay in this relationship? Why do you let them continue to hurt you? And the answers is usually the same, "Because I love them".  And we stand in amazement! "LOVE?" what kind of love is that?  And this statement reveals both the problem and the solution.  This statement is evidence of an extremely distorted, confused, and unhealthy concept and attribute of love.  This is at the very foundation of the unhealthy relationship.  The defining dynamics of psychological and emotional mental mechanisms are intrinsically associated with the person's concepts of love and intimacy.   The unhealthy relationship and the distorted concepts of love are directly associated with a history of events, experiences, and traumatic experiences.  Through consistent, professional skilled counseling and with a willing patient, these events, experiences and traumatic experiences can be acknowledged, faced, and processed, so that a person can make peace with these experiences and move on to experience a new form of love and intimacy with better relationships outcomes.  Please, let's talk about it together.