Iyanla welcomes two new callers this week, and listens in as they each look for the answer on how to have healthy relationships given their toxic situations. The first woman is trying to figure out how she can continue having a relationship with a partner who is attracted to substance abuse. The second caller is a woman who is trying to attract better relationships and stop ending up with guys who have mother abandonment issues. Iyanla dives deep into both of the underlying issues, guiding the callers toward how their circumstances all turns back to themselves. She asks them both to pay attention to their bonding patterns in order to find answers. Do you want to be on the podcast? Follow Iyanla on social media for the latest call-in information! instagram & twitter: @IyanlaVanzant facebook: @DrIyanlaVanzant
Executive Producers: Sandie Bailey, Alex Alcheh, Lauren Hohman, Tyler Klang & Gabrielle Collins
Producer & Editor: Vince Dajani
Associate Producer: Akiya McKnight
I Amiamlah. I had a baby daddy relationship. I spent time in a relationship with a married man. I had to learn the skills and tools required to make my relationships healthy, fulfilling and loving. Welcome to the Our Spot, a production of shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. One of the things that we want to be mindful of when we are creating relationships, going into relationships, not just romantic relationships, but really friendships, social alliances, is why and how we bond or connect with certain people, because all of us have a bonding pattern, a pattern that we engage when we create relationships, and that bonding pattern, more often than not, is going to be based on what we saw, experienced, were called to do in our family of origin. Really a very complicated concept, but it's really very active in our lives. And one of the things that really underlines most bonding patterns is the belief that we cannot have what we want or we cannot have what we want without hard work, and so we'll do the hard work and it doesn't work, and then we wonder why we can't get what we want. It's because the bonding pattern is to attract people that cannot give you what you want. Interesting. So my guest today is smack dab in the middle of her bonding batter. But the good news is it's early enough for her to fix it, change it, or make another choice. Let's hear what she has to say. Welcome to the arts, About beloved and what is the relationship challenge, issue dilemma that you're bringing to the table today. First of all, I want to say thank you for accepting my call. I am recently dating somebody and I was waiting for him to come home from work. I got a phone call to pick him up from the police. He got arrested for a DUI and he's probably gonna lose his job, and he definitely needs to go to rehab. But he is, I guess, going in a different spiral, and I want to be there to support him. But I don't want to allow myself to be sucked into all of it, or I don't know that I necessarily believe that he's ready to stop drinking. How long have you been dating? Only two and a half months? Oh so y'all are just barely friends? Yeah, you've only known him two and a half months, Or y'll have been dating for two and a half months, same exactly the same timeline. Oh but I don't know. You don't know what. I don't want to turn my back on him. I don't want to turn my back on him if he's going through this. I think he's a really good person. But I know logically people need to want to work on themselves and not be forced to participate in programs. Let me just say this to you. If you were married and you had a house, a dog, three fishing, a kid, I could see, So what is your investment here? I just think he's a good person, and so are you. No, I know, I know, you know what. Nothing. It's more about potential or what could be. So it's not even real. I don't know. Yeah, but he's a good person that's worth it. But I don't know that I want to put up on it. It's very new. Like you said, it's not Yeah, there's no real investment. You don't have to turn your back on him. You could just not choose yourself and choose not to invest time in a relationship that could take years to evolve into something more. If you want to know the end, look at the beginning. So you are at the beginning of a relationship with a person who has a substance abuse problem, be some emotional stability, and see it's requiring an investment that may not be in your best interests. It's just a simple you're not turning your back on him. Yeah, but is it your responsibility two and a half months in, when you don't have a house, a dog, three goldfish, and a kid? Is it your responsibility to lift somebody up? And then what's the payoff? What's the payoff? What is your question? Let me just say, Okay, how do you be supportive and not? Yeah? I guess just I don't want to say f you goodbye while you're at your lowest, so I guess healthily be there, but I don't really need to be because it's only yeah, I don't know. I want you to stop saying I don't know, because you absolutely do. I think he's worth it, but I don't think he realizes that, and I don't know that. I want to put in the time and effort for him to realize that. This isn't my first rodeo with this. What does that mean? I've had many male family members with alcohol problems going to be used and eventually die basically from it. Yeah. So maybe my question is why am I picking you people? Or better question, that's a good question, little mocking bird, that's our good question. So let me ask you this, Why are you choosing men that are addicted to substances, or men who can't be there for you fully, or men who don't show up in a way that you would desire, or men who need more from you than they have to give. Why would you choose men like that as I have more work to doing it? Possibly I have more work to do my father, all right, yeah, possibly? Or maybe you're a rescuer, Oh that's for sure. Yeah, Okay, is that working for you? Yeah? I mean that's what I do for work. That's what do you do for work? I work with people with developmental disabilities, make sure they're mescate in order. But you get paid for that, yes, correct. So your bonding pattern, or how you bond with people in relationships is to caregive, but really basically to rescue, which is a deeper pattern than just caregiving. As rescuers, that means they've got to have something wrong, they have to be in danger, they have to pose a potential danger to you and then you can get busy changing it or fixing it. Yeah. So the question that I would ask you is really very simple, what do you want? What do you want? I would like to be in a healthy relationship. That's a giant elephant in the room, and it's a giant problem. It's more than a red flag. It's it's a lifelong sentence. I would saying, yeah, is that what you want? No? I think my problem is the potential. I always look at the potential that's not the truth as a matter, the potential that you can rescue them from hurt, harm or danger and draw your value and meaning from that, which doesn't necessarily guarantee you're going to get what you want. So I asked you what do you want? You said, I want a healthy relationship. Is this a healthy relationship? No? So why do you want to be in it? Probably because I have? Yeah, I want to rescue or save or be there and hope that they change. So is there a possibility that you can detach from all romantic involvement and allow yourself to be a friend or a supporter. Yes, okay, so then there you are. Yeah. Yeah, it doesn't mean you have to turn your back on him. But you have to have clear boundaries, right. See. One of the things about a rescuer, you know because I watch Law and Order all the time, and when they're going to rescue somebody that like jumped off the bridge or has been kidnapped, they have to go down into where the person is and pull them out. That's what rescuers do. They pull them out of the water, they pull them out of the cave, they pull them out of wherever they are. But the rescuer has to go down in and pull the person out. Now, if you want to be a productive supporter, you don't go down to where they are. You stay where you are and call them up. Okay, So there's a possibility that you could say to this beautiful soul that yours have so much interest in, in order for us to be in a relationship, it's got to be healthy. And that means you've got to get your drinking under control and then watch what he does. And until that happens, we can proceed with this relationship on a romantic basis. We can't proceed and see what he does. Okay, how in the blazing but Jesus, as somebody you barely know, you don't even know what his favorite color is yet, gonna call you to come pick them up from the police station. Yeah. Yeah. When you know that you are a rescuer and that you will bond with people that have things they need to be saved from. As soon as you see the person needs to be saved, you get your hat because you in your pattern and patterns are hard to break. Yeah, okay, you want a healthy relationship, you have to let him know, right, tell me what you heard me say, to put up boundaries, let him know, yeah, this isn't a romantic thing, and to help be productive on my side, and to call him up to me, not to go down to him, to him. Yeah, are you willing to let it go? Yes? Because it's not I know it's not healthy for me. Yes, logically yes, I'm sorry. Logically yeah yeah. So what's the other part that's not willing? The part that does like to help people and see the best to them and think, oh, if only you can't You can't do that for people. They have to do for themselves. But you do that at work every day and get a check for it. Why would you do it for free and have to give up the huha in the process. You do that for work, get your check and keep on moving. You don't have to do that at home. Yeah, okay, it's not that deep, darling. I could see even if it were two and a half years. When did you find out he had a drinking problem? Oh? Probably early on, you know how hindsight clearer. Yeah. I knew there were some issues, but I didn't know they were this bad. I guess not to make excuses, but growing up with it sometimes are normal? Is it normal? But it's a comfort? Yeah, it's familiar. Yeah, and that's why it becomes your bonding pattern. That's how you bond with people. But the universe is giving you an opportunity to say, how am I going to respond this time? Am I going to act like I have to be in it? So you had to be with your father, You don't have to be with this man, that's true. Are you going to act like it's your responsibility to fix it? I'm sure you wanted your dad or your whoever it was in your home to get better, but that's not here. Y'all don't live together, do you? No? No, okay, I'm not that crazy. Yeah. I want to say, belove it. You deserve so much more. But you have to believe that. Thank you, you can be a supporter without being a rescuer. Okay, I want to encourage you to get on your perch high up in a tree and call him higher and if he doesn't right up, oh well next cha. Yeah, because you're talking about alcohol, that's a hard one to work through. Yes, just be happy that you don't have kids, a dog or three goldfish. There you go. Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Good luck to you. Thank you alrighty bye bye. As a child, I was usually the healthiest person in the room, so I had a tendency to bond with people who were unhealthy. They were just unhealthy in all sorts of ways. Because as a child I had to keep everything together. My job that I've volunteered for. Nobody hired me or assigned me to this position. My job was to keep everybody happy, to make sure everybody was okay. So as an adult, I bonded with people who weren't okay in one way or another, and my job was to take care of them, to carry them, not even to fix them, but just to keep the situation manageable. Once I realized my bonding pattern, I flipped all the way over to the other side and attached myself to people that I made up were healthier than me and left it up to them to make everything Okay. Let me just say neither one of those patterns worked. Most of us have no idea that we have a bonding pattern and that we hold it in our heart and in our soul and we attract people that fulfill our need to bond in a certain way. After the break, we'll come back with my second caller, who has a similar issue, but for a very different reason. Welcome back, I am yan Lane. This is the our spot today. We're talking about a little known fact, and that is that we all have bonding patterns. The way we attract, the way we call in things that we experience in our lives. In no place to our bonding patterns show up more than in our relationships. Now, listen, you may not know what your bonding pattern is, you may not even recognize that you have one. But here's what you do know. If you are involved in a relationship that is not giving you what you want and the prospects of getting it are not present in that relationship, it might be time for you to make another choice, because clearly you have bonded to something or someone that does not have your best interests at heart. And you don't have to run around trying to name your pattern. You just have to ask the very simple question, what do I want? And am I getting it here? Just ask those two questions. My next guest has a very interesting bonding pattern that we have to really dig into so that we can get to the heart of the matter. Just listen, greetings for love and welcome to the our spot. Thank you for your patience. And what is the relationship challenge, issue, dilemma, problem that we are bringing to the table today. My relationship issue or problem is that I've noticed that I attract men who have mother abandoned issues, and some starting to wonder wit is inside of me that's attracting those type of men. How do you know they have mother abandoned an issue? They tell me. So, since I was about sixteen seventeen, I've dated a man who mother was on drugs, so she went to jail. I dated another man whose mother had him when she was twelve and she was basically too young to take care of him. So he went to live with family members, but that caused some types of abandon the issue there. I've dated another man that I've been in and out out of relationships with for about eighteen years whose mother also went to jail, and then along the way, I've dated other men that, like their mother just physically was not there. So tell me about your mother. My mother had me when she was forty five and a wonderful lady, love her to death. She passed away when I was seventeen. So you've got abandoned, as I do. But even before that, I was, like, even in my teenagers before she passed away, were I was attracting men of that caliber? Yeah, because it's how she bombed it. Probably. What do you know about your mother's story as a woman, because forty five is kind of late to have a child, it is. I don't know much. She had me in the eighties. She didn't speak a lot about her story. The only thing that I really know is that her mother passed away maybe a year after I was born. Her parents got divorced, probably like in the seventies, and she met my father. They had three kids. I'm the youngest. Other than that, the only thing I know is that she dropped out of school when she was sixteen seventeen. Did your mother mother? Was she like a mother hen sitting on for you. No, she did not. Mother was very more in the past aside, and my father was more of agressor. Okay, we all have a bonding pattern how we attract people, and we attract them really based on what we hold in our heart. And I was asking if your mother smothered, because maybe you have a bonding pattern of being with people who need to be mothered. So if you were over mothered, then you will over mother. M I wonder that when my mother passed away or when she got sick, my sister stepped in. Then my sister is more on the mothering side, smothering. Yeah. You know there's a pork shop, then there's a smothered pork shop. Yeah. Yeah. So when how old were you when your mother got to say? But you know what, this goes back earlier. This goes all the way back to birth to five, or even how you were in the womb. And see you're looking at the men. You're looking at the men your mother had to when you were forty when she was forty five, what's the gap between you and the one before you? Any years? Ten years? Okay? Wow? Yeah I have a brother. Yeah, okay, so how old was your mother when she got married? See my inkling here is to say this isn't as much about you attracting men as it is about you connecting with them, marrying them, getting married, being married, that kind of thing that seems to me to be the underbelly of this, But I could be very wrong. Are you married? Yeah? Have you ever been married? No? Oh? Do you want to get married? I used someone to get married and now I don't. I don't think so why not? I don't think it's for me. I think that the commitment and the sacrifice that I think women have to go through, I don't want to do so. I've believe with somebody, but I would never been married. But because of the commitment and the sacrifice. Yes, So of course you will attract men who can't make a commitment or a sacrifice because that's what you're holding. That's true. And if they have issues with mom, it's gonna be hard for them to commit or sacrifice or make the attachment because mother is the heart. So you attract men with a heart condition and the heart. Condition that they have is abandonment. This don't have nothing to do with their mother. It's the abandonment. Does that make sense to you? It does make sense to me. So what's inside of me that's attracting that you don't want to commit or sacrifice? Now what you said, that's something fairly new. No, it maybe it's new to your awareness. But if it's been going on since you was sixteen, that's an issue. I want to ask you a question because it's coming up, but it's very personal and I want you to know. I want you to feel safe. You do not have to answer this question. Okay. All you have to say is I'd rather not respond, and that way you know you're safe. Okay. Have you ever had an abortion? Yeah? More than one? Okay, there you go, take a breath. Yeah. Commitment and sacrifice. And I want to say you might have been pretty young when you're a j reversal. Would that be accurate? Yeah? I want you to understand what the core issue is here. Okay, it's the story you're telling yourself about the commitment required and the sacrifice you'd have to make to be in relationship. Now you're looking at men, but it's across the board. Okay, the issue here is not that they have a mother issues. The issue here is that they have a condition in their heart that hinders them from making a full commitment or making the sacrifice required to be in relationship. Because that is your issue. Maybe not who knows, could be, but I just want to help you understand. This is how it keeps showing up as mother issues because mother represents the heart, Okay, she represents the emotion. So you are attracting men with a heart issue or a heart condition that prohibits them from making commitments or sacrifices because you have an issue with making a commitment or a sacrifice. Okay, how does the abortion are your part in it? That would have been a commitment and a sacrifice to have a child. Okay, I do have two children now, Okay, but I'm talking about when this decision was made. Okay. It's not bad, no heat, no judgment, I'm promising you. I'm just trying to get to the core of the issue. Okay. So maybe later on you made commitment and sacrifice, but they're bubbling up in there that has created the way you bomb with men, and we may never know the origin what we do know now is that you are aware of and no longer willing to attract men with a heart condition. Forget mother, it's not mother, it's their heart, their emotional stability, their ability to connect emotionally. That's what you are attracting men with heart conditions. Okay, okay, does that make sense to you? Do you understand what I'm saying? Yeah, I don't understand what I'm saying. How would I feel that part or not attract their anymore? Well, we'll talk about that right after this break. Welcome back to the our spot. Let's get back to the conversation. How would I feel that part or not attract that anymore? Well? Are you willing to make their commitments and the sacrifices required as a woman that you tell yourself, what are some of those commitments and sacrifices that you think are associated with a long term relationship? Because that's all marriage is. It's just saying I'm making a long term relationship. I'm making a long term commitment. I think that whenever you before you make a decision, you have to make sure that your decision is going to be okay for your relationship as well. And there can be anything okay. So you like freedom, I like freedom independence. Yes, have you ever been accused of being selfish? I have ask me how I know? How do you know? None of your business? You want to be free, You want to be independent and interdependence because that's what's required in a relationship. Inter Dependence feels to you like oppression or slavery, or you're being some way hampered or restricted. First of all, know that you're okay. You're okay, and it's not so much that you need to fix or heal anything, as it is. You have to be okay with where you are and who you are. I want my freedom, I want my independence, and I can have that and still have a healthy, loving relationship. There doesn't have to be anything wrong with the men so that I could cast them off. I can't commit to them because they broken and defected. I love my freedom. You love your freedom and your independence, and you can still have a strong, healthy man or a relationship with a strong healthy man. You don't have to bond from the brokenness. Somewhere in there you're judging or have some story about that commitment to sacrifice the interdepend end. That's where the story is, and you don't have to have that story and just say Okay, you know, I'll have play dates and maybe some money will come along. They don't have to be broken or defective, and I can still have what I want in a relationship. Okay, that's a lot, that's a lot. It is what it makes sense. Yeah, but are you okay with where you are? Because you're looking at the men they have mother issues? Are you okay with where you are and who you are just as you are? Or do you think there's something wrong with you that you keep attracting these men. I think it's something. I think it's something wrong. I guess because I've been on a spiritual journey by the last ten years or so, and as I'm getting older and I see other people like getting married or having these relationships just progressing, I am wondering, is it something with me? Even though I know anything that somebody does or doesn't do doesn't have anything to do with me. That's their journey, don't take anything personal. I still wonder is it something wrong with me or something not wrong with me? There's something in me that's attracting these type of men. How do I fix it? Or how do I you don't want it. Let me give it to you. Let me give you the reader's digest version. Okay, there's a part of you that does not want a committed relationship in which you would be called to sacrifice your freedom, your independence. You don't want that, and in this world we think that's what we gotta have. So what you do, brilliant, You're brilliant. What you do is you attract men to whom you cannot commit and will not make the sacrifice because they have issues with their mother. That's what you've created. You're just brilliant how you did that. And now you're saying, okay, Now you're saying, okay, wait a minute, there's something wrong with me that I keep couldn't attracting them. No, it's just that you've got to be okay with the fact that your freedom, your independence is okay, and that you don't have to be bonded and you're not required to make a commitment if that's not what you choose to, and that you choose not to make the necessary sacrifices required to be in a long term committed relationship and be okay with that. Right now, I'm single by choice. I get little whistles and stairs and you know what they're called winks and all of that kind of stuff. I ain't interested, and I'm okay with that. Okay, it's nothing wrong with me. I ain't anti relationship. I just am this time in my life choosing that's what I want and I'm okay with it. And everybody I know is trying to hook me up with something I want that. Can you be okay with the fact that you are self full, self full, independent, aspiring to experience more and more freedom that you may have to sacrifice if you were in a long term, committed relationship and you're not willing to do that, that's not your choice, Okay. Can you be okay with that? I can get okay with that. I think there's a certain unlearning to do yes, And the unlearning is I no longer choose to attract men who have issues with their mother. I choose to maintain my freedom and my independence and still be and a loving, fulfilling, satisfying relationship. I like that they don't have to have something wrong with them so that you can't commit. You can just choose. I don't. I'm marriage is not for me. That level of commitment is not for me, and that's not what I want. I just want a healthy man or a healthy partner who I can have fun with. Companionship. Okay, I like that. You want a steadment, you know, opening steadment. Have been together for how much you know, since God left Chicago? And she's real clear, we don't have to get married and the ain't nothing wrong with him. I was just thinking about it yesterday when I was driving about their relationship. What are you okay with that? Okay? If I would be, I would. But when I tell man that I don't want to get married, it is because you are attracting men who have a heart condition, so they're looking to be mothered, which requires a level of bonding and connection and commitment that you're not willing to give. Okay, but you're not willing to give, and that's okay. Did you see the Woman King? I have not seen yet. Oh you go see it. Go see the Woman King. Okay, and you're gonna have a whole different perspective about how women can be because in this Western society that we live in, we think that we have only one model of a way of being woman. And that's not true because as the King is very different than the queen, and she was a woman king, not a woman queen. Okay, make sure you see that movie. I am. And as you're on your spiritual journey, ask your higher self, your guardians, angels and guides to reveal to you your bonding pattern so that it can be healed and released. That you're just attracting men with a heart condition. It does. Mother just seems to be the issue. But mother is the heart. Okay. Tell me what you hear me saying, or tell me what's going through your brain. I want to make sure that you're settled. What I hate saying is that I don't want to commit and sacrifice, and I need to be okay with that. In the way women are programmed in condition to commit and sacrifice for a relationship. That's not what you choose for yourself. Right. Your freedom is important, Your independence is important, and relationships require an interdependence that you're not choosing for yourself. Okay, thank you so much. Thank you. Be sure to go see The Woman King. Yeah it's streaming now, and watch it several times so that you can start seeing how to be a woman king, not a queen, but a king. Okay, okay, all right, thank you for calling. I wish you all good luck. Okay, all right, thank you, bye bye. Ma. It's interesting when we understand or recognize how we bomb with people and what's under that bonding, but we'll never recognize it as long as we're looking at the other person. Your bonding pattern is about you. It's about your heart and your desires. So if you're looking out wondering why is this coming to me? As opposed to looking at why am I calling this? In chances are you going to miss the mark. Everybody has a bonding pattern and as long as we don't judge it or make ourselves or anyone else wrong, we'll be okay. I hope this has been helpful to someone, And if you have a question about this or any other relationship issue, you can call me live at seven seven five three zero seven seven seven sixty eight. Now be sure to follow me on social media for all of the calling in times, and until then, stay in peace, not peaceless. The R Spot is a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,