Gabriel Mizrahi

Yeah.

By which I mean, in this dynamic you've created with your boyfriend, where he essentially melts down, lashes out, creates messes, drives people away, undermines himself at every turn, seemingly.

And then you generally clean up those messes,

Manage his moods, calm him down, know when to engage, when to retreat, patch things up.

In that dance you guys seem to do over and over again, what does that give you?

What feeling or what experience does that leave you with and why?

So when I ask you why, what I mean is...

A, how did your childhood, probably this mom, whatever other early experiences you had, how did they prime you for this relationship?

I think those are important forensics to do, although really they're only half the equation.

The other is why exactly does that feeling or experience continue to be so important to you now?

So let me just be a little bit more specific because I know that can be abstract.

You and your boyfriend clearly have this dynamic we just described.

I imagine that managing this guy, keeping things on an even keel, calming him down, winning him over, challenging him, but not challenging him too much, all of that, smoothing things over with people like the landlord and his wife, everything that comes with this process.

I imagine that feels, among other things, pretty gratifying.

But what is gratifying about it, really?

Is it the feeling of rupture followed by repair, or what seems like repair?

To be honest, I'm not totally clear on how meaningful these conversations are, but it sounds like it's a lot of chaos and a lot of instability followed by calm and a return to baseline, and then it's like, okay, we're good again.

I did it.

And crucially, that process happens in large part because of the way you architected it or the way you managed it.

So I can imagine that that experience might leave you feeling like, yes, great.