At a glance
Idealization and devaluation describe a swing in how someone holds you, not a judgement they have reasoned their way to. You are the best thing in their life one week and a disappointment the next, with nothing in you changed between the two. This article looks at what the swing is doing, why closeness so often triggers it, and how to stay yourself while it passes.
Clinical insights from 22 years in psychotherapy
I’m Mark Colclough, MA, psychotherapist in Copenhagen. Qualified at the Psychosynthesis Education Trust and the University of East London. 22 years of full-time, face-to-face clinical practice.
- The drop follows closeness more often than conflict. Clients describe the cold turn arriving after a good evening rather than after a row, and that is the part they cannot make sense of.
- The two people remember different events. When clients repeat what was said to them, their partner often recalls a mood rather than a verdict.
- Being idealised is not the easy half. Clients who are told they are perfect usually report pressure rather than pleasure, because they can feel what is coming.
Clinical notes: My observations are anonymised and compounded from my session notes since 2004.
What is happening in them when the warmth goes?
Two feelings about you that cannot be held at once get separated, and whichever one is live takes over the whole picture.
From outside this looks like a change of mind. It is closer to a change of state. Your partner is not weighing evidence and reaching a harsh conclusion about you. The warmth has gone somewhere they cannot reach, and in its absence the only version of you available is the disappointing one.
That is why reasoning rarely lands. You are offering evidence to someone who has temporarily lost access to the feeling that would make the evidence mean anything. It is one form of all or nothing thinking, with the difference that here a whole person, you, is what gets sorted onto one side.
Why does it follow a good weekend rather than a row?
Closeness is what sets it off, not distance.
This is the detail that confuses people most, and it is usually the one that convinces them something is wrong with them. You had a good weekend. You were talked to warmly. By Tuesday you are being handled like a stranger who has done something, and because nothing happened in between you start hunting for what you did without knowing it.
The research is less tidy than the word splitting suggests. In one small study, 51 people rated film characters, and the ratings were not clean divisions into all good and all bad; what stood out was that the harshest readings came when a character was caring and the situation was intimate.1 It was a small sample responding to characters on a screen rather than to real partners, so I would not stretch it far. It does fit what I see, which is that for some people being cared for is the moment of highest risk, and the cold turn is what the risk gets converted into.
How much of this is actually mine?
Your behaviour usually sets the timing, not the pattern.
Something real of yours is often in there. You were short on a call, you forgot something that mattered. What is out of proportion is what that small thing is then taken to mean about you, and that part was waiting before you arrived. Nobody learns to split the good and the bad of a person in a relationship that started two years ago.
That cuts both ways, and I would hold both. It frees you from the search for the exact wrong word, which never produces an answer. It also stops short of saying none of it is yours. The honest position is that you are responsible for your half and cannot repair the other half from the outside, however carefully you behave.
Why is being idealised so hard to enjoy?
Praise that has nothing to do with the real you is a promise you will eventually fail.
Clients describe a strange discomfort during the good weeks. They are admired for qualities they do not recognise, and they can feel that the admiration has not met them. Some perform to keep it. Some withdraw to make the fall shorter. Both are ways of managing a drop you can feel approaching without being able to date it.
- The editing. You choose words by how they will be read rather than by what you mean.
- The monitoring. You check their face for the turn before you have said anything at all.
- The quiet. You stop bringing them what matters to you, because that will be graded too.
What can I do while I am on the cold side?
Stop arguing the verdict and stay recognisably yourself until the state passes.
- Do not take the case to court. Defending yourself point by point in that hour hardens it, and the hour is not where the decision is being made.
- Say the one true thing. That you are still here, that you can see they are far away. Short, and not a plea.
- Keep your own version of yourself. Write down what you actually said and did, for you. The swing does most of its damage when you start agreeing with it.
- Trust the bracing in your chest. It usually arrives before you consciously register the cold turn, and it is accurate.
These are ways to hold your ground rather than a repair. If the swings are widening, if you have begun to believe the bad version, or if the cold periods now carry contempt or anything that frightens you, waiting it out is no longer the right answer. Two people can work on this together, and one person can work on it alone, which is often where it starts when a partner does not yet see a problem.
If you recognise this from your own relationship, you can book a video session from wherever you are, or begin with a free 30-minute call.
Questions people ask
Can therapy help if my partner will not come?
Yes, and that is how a good number of these pieces of work begin. You come to understand what is happening and to stop losing yourself in it, which changes the pattern more than waiting does.
Should I tell my partner I think this is splitting?
I would not lead with the word. Naming the pattern as a diagnosis tends to become another thing to argue about, whereas describing the effect on you is harder to dismiss.
Can we do couples sessions by video?
Yes, and it suits couples living apart or in different countries particularly well. I work with couples using Emotion-Focused Therapy, which goes at what each of you is feeling underneath the position you are defending.
What if I am the one who does this?
Then you are in a better position than you think, because you have noticed it. The work goes to what the swing is protecting you from feeling rather than to the judgement itself.
What happens in a first session?
You describe what happens and I ask closely about the moments where it turns. Nothing is decided in the first hour, and booking one commits you to nothing further.
If you are the one living on the receiving end of the swing, online couples therapy alone is a place to look at it without your partner in the room, or online couples therapy if you both want to.
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Sources
How this article was written: I choose the subject and the angle. An AI assistant researches and drafts. I read the draft, correct and improve it and stand behind every clinical statement. The professional and clinical judgement is mine.
