Detaching With Love a.k.a Holding Space for Loved Ones in Addiction Recovery

Okay Bookenders…time for a pop quiz.

I’m going to share a moment from my healing journey, and I want you to see if you can tell where I went sideways.

Shortly after disclosure, my ex-husband made a list of things he wanted to work on. These were important to me, especially because they were related to broken promises during his addiction.

• Check-in conversations.

• Reading the book our counselor suggested.

• Getting to bed earlier.

At this point I was in counseling, so I thought I was doing great. I had learned about something called detaching with love (also known as holding space)…and lemme tell ya, I ran with it.

We had even talked about it ahead of time. I explained that when I stepped back, it wasn’t rejection, it was me protecting myself. That part? I did that part good. Especially because rejection was an emotion I knew he struggled with.

But here’s where I went wrong.

I started treating detaching like I was wearing a badge of honor. Like I had finally figured it out.

I told myself:

I’m doing this the “right” way.

I’m calm.

I have boundaries.

I’m handling this perfectly.

Meanwhile…I was emotionally and physically pulling away.

Not gently. Not with connection. Just pulling myself away from him completely. Basically throwing up a wall between us.

And if you’re cringing a little reading that? I’m cringing writing it. And if you can relate…don’t worry. It’s common as we’re trying to navigate our way through what we’ve experienced.

What I didn’t realize at the time was:

I hadn’t learned how to detach with love. I had only learned how to detach.

Where I Went Wrong

I swung from one extreme to the other.

I went from being completely wrapped up in his addiction…to stepping so far back that there wasn’t much connection left.

I understand why I did it. I was scared. I didn’t want to get hurt again and I didn’t trust what I was seeing yet. I was still filling my recovery and healing toolkit with tools that worked for me. But I hadn’t gotten enough of them in there to trust myself yet. Or to learn that delicate balance between distance and enmeshment, so I defaulted to distance.

What Detaching with Love Actually Is

Detaching with love means:

You step out of the chaos without losing yourself in the process.

You stop trying to control…but you don’t stop caring.

You allow them to be responsible for their choices…while you take responsibility for your peace.

Totally easy, right? I wish. But we can take steps to get there even when we want to:

• Fix it aka help

• Call it out immediately

• Control the outcome

• Or avoid it altogether

I did all of those. I tried to control him…telling him what to do and how to do it. Or help him by giving him unsolicited advice.

And when that didn’t work? I avoided it. I’d see the signs. I’d feel it in my gut. And still, I wouldn’t say anything because I didn’t want to deal with the conversation. Not having yet another conversation was so much easier when I already had so much on my mind.

So, I bounced between control, fixing, and avoidance and they aren’t detaching with love.

The Shift That Changed Everything

It didn’t happen in some “aha” moment. It was a series of events that led me to realize that I wasn’t responsible for his choices or his actions. That I didn’t need to rescue him from himself. I needed to show up for me. I was the one who had the body sending out SOS signals…and those needed my attention.

I no longer felt responsible for his:

• Actions

• Recovery

• Setbacks

• Moods

Not my monkeys, not my circus.

And that meant something else too, I didn’t need to tie my emotional state to what he was doing.

That was a big revelation for me.

Because I had spent so much time feeling like:

“If he’s okay, I’m okay.”

“If he’s not okay, everything falls apart.”

Detaching with love broke that pattern.

It allowed me to say:

“I love you…and I’m not stepping into this tornado with you.”

I often imagined my emotions swinging on a pendulum. I had to keep a steady eye on my emotional pendulum and make sure it didn’t swing too far into detachment mode. Just as I had worked hard on keeping that pendulum from swinging too far into being enmeshed with him, I was learning how to keep a healthy middle emotional center and not detach without the love he still deserved.

What It Looks Like in Real Life

It looks like choosing calm when things feel overwhelming.

It looks like pausing instead of reacting.

It looks like saying:

“Hey, can we check in later?”

instead of:

“We need to talk right now.”

(It turns out…starting a conversation with “we need to talk” is not the winning strategy I once thought it was. Who knew?)

It looks like expressing concern without accusation.

And it looks like letting go of the need to win the conversation.

Because let’s be honest…those back-and-forth arguments?

Nobody wins those.

The Hard Truth

Sometimes your partner won’t be in a place where they can hear you.

That’s hard.

That’s where detaching with love becomes less about them…and more about you.

That’s when you turn inward:

• Ground yourself

• Regulate your emotions

• Remind yourself you can get through this

And you turn outward:

• Support systems

• Trusted people

• Healthy outlets

Not isolation. Because isolation? That’s where both addiction and emotional burnout thrive.

A Piece Most People Miss

Detaching with love also means…

You need something to detach into.

When I stopped focusing on his addiction, I realized something uncomfortable:

I didn’t know what to do with myself.

So I had to relearn what made me feel like…me.

What brought me peace.

What brought me joy.

What made my heart feel full again.

Because if all you do is step away from them, but don’t step toward something healthier for yourself…you’re just sitting in the space where the chaos used to be. And that space feels overwhelming real fast.

The Bottom Line

Detaching with love is not:

• Shutting down

• Pulling away completely

• Ignoring what’s happening

And it’s not:

• Fixing

• Controlling

• Rescuing

It’s the middle ground. It’s staying connected…without losing yourself.

It’s saying: “I care about you…and I care about me too.”

And if you find yourself making some mistakes along the way, that’s okay. It’s part of the journey and it’s how we learn and grow.

Remember, detaching with love allows your loved one to be responsible for their behavior while you have healthier options to take care of you. You can still love them and treat them with the dignity and respect that they deserve, but you don’t need to get wrapped up in their unhealthy behaviors or their unhealthy decisions. Only they can fix themselves, just like only you can fix you.

I had to figure out what made my heart happy and invest my time there rather than spend it on things that made me sad or angry.

Where do you notice yourself right now…leaning more toward control, or pulling away?