Avoid (or Get Out of!) Yo-Yo Relationships

You broke up ... or maybe you never even started dating. But for whatever reason you can't get out of a relationship that is going nowhere.

Meet Sarah and Tom. They met on an online dating site, and they immediately struck up a fun and friendly correspondence. As the weeks progressed, Tom and Sarah started talking on the phone, and, although they were long distance, even met in person.

As their friendship progressed, Tom began pouring his heart out to Sarah. He told her how happy she made his life, and how he was truly beginning to feel that she was "the one." Tom seemed like the answer to Sarah's prayers, and her hopes began to soar.

Afraid of commitment

However, after several months of talking, Sarah and Tom's friendship took a different turn. Tom had met someone else online, and was wrestling with which woman to pursue. In his orbit of confusion, Tom confided to Sarah his struggle of bouncing back and forth between feelings of interest in her and the other woman. He continued to call, text, email, and even asked to occasionally meet. Tom told Sarah that he needed her friendship in his life, and would miss her horribly if she went away.

It was at this point that Sarah emailed me.

I could read the angst between the lines of Sarah's email.

She truly cared for Tom, and was hurt that he had chosen to pursue interest in someone else at the same time he was pursuing her. To add insult to injury, Sarah was bombarded each day with messages from Tom begging her to stay in his life and be his friend.

Unfortunately, Tom is an individual who struggles with "yo-yo" feelings.

He cares for Sarah...yet he cares for the other woman.

He doesn't want to lose Sarah...yet he also wants to pursue Woman #2.

In reality, he is confused to the point that he cannot truly care for or commit to either of them.

This type of back-and-forth emotions and intentions is highly hurtful and unhealthy, to all parties involved.

Avoid The Player

In his book How to Avoid Marrying a Jerk, Dr. John Van Epps labels Tom's behavioral type a "player." He warns:

"Players have an insatiable appetite for attention and the intoxicating excitement of infatuation. For a player, living within the fences of one relationship is both boring and unfulfilling. ... But don't expect them to extinguish the old flame. The irony of players is that they often try to keep one relationship burning while they ignite another" (p. 18).

After talking with Sarah, we both were very sure that she ultimately didn't want to be involved with a man who could not focus or commit to one woman. And yet, the reality was that Sarah still had feelings for Tom, and Tom was still calling Sarah.

I encouraged Sarah to cut all ties with Tom: block his emails, his phone calls, and not return any messages he'd already left.

Sarah and I both knew she needed time and space in order to heal and move on from her disappointment. A few weeks later, I heard from Sarah again:

"He has continued to contact me through text messages. He wants to still pray together and I am having such a hard time telling him how I feel about things. My head is telling me to run, run, run...but my heart is telling me to stay and hang in there. I am sure these questions are pretty self-evident, but I feel that I have lost my head in all this."

Untangling a Yo-Yo

Sarah is in a very draining and difficult situation. While it's best to avoid yo-yo relationships in the first place (if you can recognize them), it often turns out that it's only after you're involved with someone that you discover the problem.

Once she recognized that she in a yo-yo relationship, Sarah did several things right as she disengaged from the situation.

1. Prayer

Sarah immediately recognized that she needed heavenly wisdom to help her figure out her relationship with Tom, and that she needed strength to do the right thing. She not only spent significant time praying herself, but she also asked her parents, siblings, and close friends to pray for her.

2. Acknowledge head vs. heart conflict

In her email to me, Sarah admitted that her head and her heart were telling her two different things.

That's a huge step!

If you can admit that your heart is entangled in a bad situation, it will greatly aid your ability to do what you rationally know is right. Acknowledging emotional cloudiness is half the battle.

3. Ask for help

This step is extremely significant. After acknowledging her weakness of not being able to cut things off with Tom, Sarah reached out to others to help her through the process.

She called her sisters and asked for their accountability and encouragement. Sarah emailed me and others for our advice on the situation. While she could have easily said to herself "This is my problem, I can fix it on my own," Sarah took the brave and prudent step of asking others to assist and advise her.

4. Get out and meet new people

Shortly after cutting off all communication with Tom, Sarah knew that it was important for her to "get out there" and meet new people instead of sitting on her couch with a mopey attitude, dwelling on her disappointments.

She got back online, spent quality time with family and friends, and even attended a Catholic conference with a large population of single Catholics. She did not allow the past to prevent her from engaging in new social opportunities.

These four steps that Sarah followed greatly aided her emotional detachment from Tom, and serve as a positive witness and example to anyone who may find themselves in similar circumstances.

Finding out someone is a player or a jerk is by no means a fun experience. And yet, being able to recognize a "yo-yo" relationship in its early stages is actually a blessing.

You have the opportunity to disentangle and detach from a situation quickly, instead of discovering it later in life, potentially when it could cause you a lifetime of unhappiness.

God gives us the responsibility of discerning with both our hearts and our heads.

Learn from Sarah's example that with God's help, and the aid of friends and loved ones, you can make the wise yet difficult choice to move on.