I am an FA man and my behaviors diverge markedly from those exhibited by FA women, and I think this applies to mist FA men (mostly not freaking out, I withdraw and become distant. We're men....we don't show fear if we can help it, even if we *are* actually afraid).
Insecure attachment *can* be fixed, but just like an addiction it requires an admission of the problem and a sincere wish to come clean and repair.
There are several people out their dedicated to fixing insecure attachment. Adam Lane Smith is a good one in general, check out Paulien Timmer for FA specifics. She used EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) to heal herself. That's what I am using now and have been making pretty rapid progress.
Also, Avoidant attachment can be partially hidden by alcoholism, so if you know a "functional" alcoholic, they might just be avoidantly attached. This is how I stayed married for 15 years. Now that I am sober, all this shit has popped back up like a damned whack-a-mole and now I have to deal with it for real.
There's a little magic trick that actually works pretty well. It comes out of Eastern meditation techniques. All you do is sit still and focus on nothing. When an emotion comes up, you just breathe and let it happen. You accept it, let it flow through you and observe as it will inevitably weaken and then vanish. All you have to do is breathe, be accepting, and take your time.
The reason why this is the key is manifold. I will explain:
First of all, all fears start with a certain kind of belief, and all beliefs start with experiences (usually, but not always, in childhood). The reason why the belief is set deeply into our brain is because the experience was profound and usually threatening. The issue is that upon reliving a similar experience, strong emotions will come up which are never resolved, only evaded. Over time, this will compound emotions in your subconscious. Like a smell that's connected with a feeling, your brain will strongly connect the experience to the bundled up emotions. So now even if you KNOW something is wrong, you can't get rid of it because as soon as you try to access it, you are flooded with emotions, and emotions shut down your rational mind. So you can't solve it and the next time you have a bad experience (which with avoidants is often self-fulfilling) you will make the whole situation worse and compound more emotions. Think of it like you feeling worse after hurting multiple people than after hurting only one person, as an example.
That's why ultimately, the only way to get over this kind of thing is to do a kind of low-level exposure therapy where you slowly release those pent up emotions - and then unearth more and more of the actual intellectual background as its wired in your brain about the situation. Only then can you truly solve it. This can of course take a while, because a lot of that emotional stuff builds up over years or even decades.
So basically all you do is: identify your fear. Face your fear in small ways. Feel your fear and let it engulf you until it passes. Keep doing this. Step by step you can free yourself.
Well first of all I applaud your genius in learning to deal with the avoidant tendencies of your wife. That's no small feat really.
I am not sure though if what you describe is a full-blown avoidant person. I would say she is a securely attached person with avoidant tendencies. Maybe avoidance is just her mode of action when she is under intense emotional stress. But it sounds like she has resolved it in a large part.
The reason I say this is because in my experience, with an avoidant you won't get a relationship working. They'll sabotage you not in small ways, but in large ways. For them it's all about power, and everything makes it worse. If you're unattractive, they lose respect and treat you like shit. If you're attractive, they're jealous and feel like they're justified in attacking you. They will undermine your trust without you even knowing it, and then tell you when it's way too late. And it's not just two or three days, it usually doesn't ever stop. Not until the relationship is dead, and then you'd be a sucker for going back in.
Nothing will change until the person genuinely wants to change, and they will never want to change for you - that's a trap many men fall into, but it has nothing to do with their SMV. It has everything to do with the person's willingless to work on their issues. Whether they are willing or not probably depends on age - when they're somewhat below 30, that could usually work, since their personality is still forming. But if they're over 30, they have often destroyed so many relationships and hurt so many people that their patterns become entrenched and it would be very costly to admit to them. Plus, the older a person is, the less mentally flexible they generally become - after the formative years have ended, change becomes much more costly for the nervous system, as brain rewiring takes more effort at that stage. Though of course - just like learning a new language - it's still perfectly possible if you put in the effort. With the caveat that dealing with attachment issues isn't just work, it's also painful and humiliating and can, to a degree, even require you to destroy your identity.
It's the same with anxious people, only the other way around. They will destroy the relationship by smothering you and making you hate them. And there isn't much you can do.
Both are connected to low self esteem and a weak personal identity, by the way. It's funny because when women say they need to "find themselves" they have no idea how badly they actually would need to do that. Except of course they're just booking a trip to an all inclusive resort.
I am an FA man and my behaviors diverge markedly from those exhibited by FA women, and I think this applies to mist FA men (mostly not freaking out, I withdraw and become distant. We're men....we don't show fear if we can help it, even if we *are* actually afraid).
Insecure attachment *can* be fixed, but just like an addiction it requires an admission of the problem and a sincere wish to come clean and repair.
There are several people out their dedicated to fixing insecure attachment. Adam Lane Smith is a good one in general, check out Paulien Timmer for FA specifics. She used EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) to heal herself. That's what I am using now and have been making pretty rapid progress.
Also, Avoidant attachment can be partially hidden by alcoholism, so if you know a "functional" alcoholic, they might just be avoidantly attached. This is how I stayed married for 15 years. Now that I am sober, all this shit has popped back up like a damned whack-a-mole and now I have to deal with it for real.
Good luck!
There's a little magic trick that actually works pretty well. It comes out of Eastern meditation techniques. All you do is sit still and focus on nothing. When an emotion comes up, you just breathe and let it happen. You accept it, let it flow through you and observe as it will inevitably weaken and then vanish. All you have to do is breathe, be accepting, and take your time.
The reason why this is the key is manifold. I will explain:
First of all, all fears start with a certain kind of belief, and all beliefs start with experiences (usually, but not always, in childhood). The reason why the belief is set deeply into our brain is because the experience was profound and usually threatening. The issue is that upon reliving a similar experience, strong emotions will come up which are never resolved, only evaded. Over time, this will compound emotions in your subconscious. Like a smell that's connected with a feeling, your brain will strongly connect the experience to the bundled up emotions. So now even if you KNOW something is wrong, you can't get rid of it because as soon as you try to access it, you are flooded with emotions, and emotions shut down your rational mind. So you can't solve it and the next time you have a bad experience (which with avoidants is often self-fulfilling) you will make the whole situation worse and compound more emotions. Think of it like you feeling worse after hurting multiple people than after hurting only one person, as an example.
That's why ultimately, the only way to get over this kind of thing is to do a kind of low-level exposure therapy where you slowly release those pent up emotions - and then unearth more and more of the actual intellectual background as its wired in your brain about the situation. Only then can you truly solve it. This can of course take a while, because a lot of that emotional stuff builds up over years or even decades.
So basically all you do is: identify your fear. Face your fear in small ways. Feel your fear and let it engulf you until it passes. Keep doing this. Step by step you can free yourself.
Great post. For me, it's easy. Why in the hell would I put up with this when I can find better girls
It's a choice every man needs to make. Some wait until they have a mortgage and a kid ot make it.
Well first of all I applaud your genius in learning to deal with the avoidant tendencies of your wife. That's no small feat really.
I am not sure though if what you describe is a full-blown avoidant person. I would say she is a securely attached person with avoidant tendencies. Maybe avoidance is just her mode of action when she is under intense emotional stress. But it sounds like she has resolved it in a large part.
The reason I say this is because in my experience, with an avoidant you won't get a relationship working. They'll sabotage you not in small ways, but in large ways. For them it's all about power, and everything makes it worse. If you're unattractive, they lose respect and treat you like shit. If you're attractive, they're jealous and feel like they're justified in attacking you. They will undermine your trust without you even knowing it, and then tell you when it's way too late. And it's not just two or three days, it usually doesn't ever stop. Not until the relationship is dead, and then you'd be a sucker for going back in.
Nothing will change until the person genuinely wants to change, and they will never want to change for you - that's a trap many men fall into, but it has nothing to do with their SMV. It has everything to do with the person's willingless to work on their issues. Whether they are willing or not probably depends on age - when they're somewhat below 30, that could usually work, since their personality is still forming. But if they're over 30, they have often destroyed so many relationships and hurt so many people that their patterns become entrenched and it would be very costly to admit to them. Plus, the older a person is, the less mentally flexible they generally become - after the formative years have ended, change becomes much more costly for the nervous system, as brain rewiring takes more effort at that stage. Though of course - just like learning a new language - it's still perfectly possible if you put in the effort. With the caveat that dealing with attachment issues isn't just work, it's also painful and humiliating and can, to a degree, even require you to destroy your identity.
It's the same with anxious people, only the other way around. They will destroy the relationship by smothering you and making you hate them. And there isn't much you can do.
Both are connected to low self esteem and a weak personal identity, by the way. It's funny because when women say they need to "find themselves" they have no idea how badly they actually would need to do that. Except of course they're just booking a trip to an all inclusive resort.