Are You Addicted to Drama? (Part Two)
By Nina Atwood
If the following checklist looks familiar to you, you may be a drama junkie. In essence, it means that you are drawn to people and situations that get your adrenaline flowing both in the positive and the negative. The positive highs in relationships are primarily associated with the earliest enchantment phase of love, so those feelings are not sustainable at a high level over time. Once the initial enchantment period fades, the drama junkie has to find other ways to get his or her “fix.” The following are examples, behavior patterns, that indicate you or someone you love may have this issue:
- Inability to handle stress without acting out (i.e., drinking, calling ten friends to complain about what happened, overeating, binging/purging, etc.)
- Rapid, knee-jerk reactions when other people say or do things you don’t like; i.e., he says he’ll be there by 7:00 and shows up at 8:00; by then, you’ve left the house and gone drinking with your friends OR the minute he gets in the door you go into a tirade
- Feeling compelled to escalate in relationships when you feel wounded in some way; i.e., she says it’s girls night but stays out until 2:00 a.m. and comes home drunk; you immediately toss her out on the front lawn
- Compulsive behavior when under stress in a relationship; i.e., she won’t answer her phone, so you text message her with angry words for the next two hours, trying to provoke a response
- Automatic negative assumptions about other people’s motives without checking them out; i.e., he cancels a date because of work overload and you assume he doesn’t care or isn’t invested in the relationship; you escalate the situation by going out and flirting with other guys at a bar or, better yet, kissing his best friend
- Feeling consumed with other people’s drama; talking endlessly about other people’s dramas; reacting to other people’s dramas; at the end of the day, little was accomplished in your life plan because all the focus was on your toxic relationship(s)
If you’re dating someone who fits any of the above profile, you too, may be a drama junkie. People who really want serenity in their lives and relationships are so turned off by this behavior that when it appears, they quickly move on. If you feel hooked and stay connected to a chaotic person for more than a couple of weeks, then you have the same issue.
What can you do about this? First, take a giant step back and look at your life. Get real about what you want and where you are currently headed. Be willing to sacrifice some excitement in favor of stability. Put your focus on what you want to accomplish in your life: create a vision, have goals, have a plan. People who are focused on making a real contribution in the world, whether it’s through a professional vocation (i.e., doctor, nurse, attorney, etc.), a career (helping a business grow), or creating something meaningful (i.e., write a book, paint a picture, act in a play, perform or create music, etc.), have little time or energy for the cycle of drama.
Entry Filed under: Personal Growth,Relationships
