For when you keep ending up in the same place
Key facts
Different names, different faces, same dynamic. You find someone, it feels different this time, and then slowly, or suddenly, you're back in familiar territory. The avoidant one. The critical one. The one who needs fixing. The one who can't commit.
You've read the books. You know your attachment style, your love language, your Enneagram type. You can see the pattern clearly. And yet here you are again.
Understanding why you choose unavailable people does not automatically make you stop choosing them. Knowing you may repeat something from your parents' marriage does not, by itself, break the repetition. The pattern can live deeper than insight can reach.
Psychodynamic therapy works with the unconscious pull: the part of you that may find chaos familiar, mistake intensity for intimacy, or feel drawn to people who confirm what you already believe about yourself.
Often we choose partners who give us a chance to replay old scenarios, hoping for a different ending. The problem is we usually cast ourselves in the same role.
We meet weekly or twice-weekly and look at the relationships that shaped you. Not to blame your parents, but to understand the template you're working from.
What did love look like in your house? What did you have to do to get attention? What happened when you had needs? The answers to these questions are running in the background of every relationship you enter.
We'll also pay attention to our relationship. The assumptions you make about me, the roles you expect us to play. How you relate to your therapist often mirrors how you relate everywhere else.