Did you sabotage that relationship or was it doomed to fail?

hi camper78,

i am earned secure/DA in a successful and rewarding intimate relationship over two years, with a partner i truly love.
i do experience deactivation with him, (he is a fellow dismissive ) but we are open and have trust and support each other and work with it, it's manageable and i continue to heal up as we go. he is very understanding.

The difference i notice, is in my regard for him, which is based on trust, respect, real care, and my own commitment to continue to love and support him and our relationship through any difficulty.

I was confused at first about what was what- like you:
but over time, i recognized that i wanted to be a better person in order to love him well, as i believe he deserves: My focus expanded from doing what is protective of me and my interests and wellbeing, to protecting him and his interests and well being the same.

we are equals. our combined well being and happiness is a priority. deactivating from this is about a fear of loss and pain, not just being turned off and wanting to go away.

i know that i love him. and i know that i love myself. this capacity has evolved over years of working on healing my own issues, and more recently, working on attachment issues.

i hope this is helpful, it would have been hard for me to grasp this before i experienced it incrementally over time, working through things with him.

epicgum the huge awakening came for me when i realized i wanted to protect him and his feelings and inner self by making the choice to try hard to resolve my attachment issues and fears.
i needed to stop abandoning him and pushing him away and hiding.
so in that sense, love is very much a choice and and action.
also, i want to protect his body by making him healthy and delicious food. it isn't that i feed him all the time, it's just a small gesture i can do to love him so i do it consciously.

and i want to protect his well being by nurturing his body, with massage or just nurturing touch. this has a big impact on him and reduces his stress in a matter of minutes.

as a fellow dismissive, i know he sometimes doubts my devotion to him simply because of his own insecurities, so i make sure to show him consistently by initiating contact even when i am deactivated. i used to be unable to do so but i would say my main purpose in doing that is for him and not for me, as it's really against my deepest urge to disappear at that time.

so those are all ways that love grew from an attachment into action.

i think those two things work together to become more perfect, i don't think they need to be totally separate.

camper78
it's ok to take time with this, and i encourage you to release an outcome and strive for authenticity along the way and let that lead you, instead of trying to figure it out.
my partner is dismissive also and i learned about attachment theory in order to try to make sense of why i felt i loved him but felt so blank sometimes and able to cut and run in spite of that. so, i learned i am dismissive.
we share the same rapport you speak of. i believe it is precious. the tenderness is important and real i have no doubt.

i have done a lot of inner child work, it was key to helping heal me. i have had a terrible struggle with deactivation and i was very destructive to the relationship time and time again, i could not understand or see my way through it, for quite a while. i am now very aware and even if i can't always help myself, i am very clear on the pattern and the feelings and thoughts. i don't get hijacked as often, or for as long, or as intensely.

my partner forgave me each time i hurt us, and listened when i described my conflicts and my struggle. he saw himself in them. he doesn't deactivate so deeply or strongly. but we are simpatico and understand each other.
i am much more severely wounded but he is dismissive and does empathize.

i read the posts by anne12 in the general forum, on healing dismissive attachment, regularly and when i notice that i am deactivated. they are like a bible to me.
it's a discipline, and i just try to keep these things in front of me and they often help me to endure and stay somewhat connected which brings me cofort even tho it is still sometimes very difficult to feel like myself.

So, read and study all of the threads she made for healing your attachment style, and it's also very helpful to work with your nervous system in the exercises she gives.

it is critical to be able to override the nervous system responses.

and, when i have deactivated and come back to surface i talk openly to my partner about it so we can repair. we don't get separated by it any more, sometimes we are able to talk and prevent things from going too deep in me. he seems to have a knack for recognizing my pattern and he is very sneaky to reach out with covert reassurance. he helps me a lot. sometimes i deactivate privately and he never knew. it's not because i want to hide it, it's because i want to learn to ride it out and stay consistent and heal this because i want it to stop being a part of my life. it's very sad and painful for and it also exhausted me.

i don't know if i will ever be totally free from it, but i can assure you that i have come very far and our relationship is strong because we worked together to grow and heal ourselves and each other.

it adds a nuance and dimension to our relationship that is extremely meaningful and if i say more about that right now i will cry, i'm at work admthat wouldn't be good. haha.

but check out anne's posts!!

I think another thing to consider is that the "sunk cost fallacy" does not apply to relationships...it really does gain value as you invest more, so even if this is not the most perfect person for you, the fact that you have built a deep knowledge of this person and a deep connection should feature into the equation.

It is comforting to see someone else make all the same mistakes and some out ok. I'm guessing gicen you are straight DA they were shorter and you didn't have quite the idealization though.

On the same current it's interesting how basically all the dating advice you see advises you to cut your losses and run, (and glamorized the people "strong" enough to walk away) while all the marriage advice says any relationship can work with enough knowledge and tools.

the important thing is, IT TAKES TWO.
I don't agree that any relationship can make it.
only a relationship that involves two individuals healing themselves first- eyes on their own issues, FIRST!!!
then, you can work together.
i have hardly ever thought about what he is doing or what is on his mind- i keep my eyes on myself and taking care of what's going on in me.
i see a lot of couples blaming each other and that's just foolish, isn't it?

I think focusing on yourself and not your partner is a little more nuanced, because it can be easy to use that as an excuse to maintain distance and be selfish if you're looking for one (like if you get into the trap of not taking responsibility for how your possibly legitimately hurtful behavior affects your partner and end up saying, "it's your problem, not mine"). It's more about finding the right boundaries of being considerate but not taking on someone else's personal issues, while always stepping up to be responsible for your own and not expecting someone else to save you. But it involves also not ignoring reasonable requests from your partner for help that aren't intrusive to the healthy boundary line and not outright dismissing your partner if they have communicated needs or feedback (even if it's not something you agree with).

There's a skill to being able to recognize when something is bothering you because of past baggage, and it is yours alone to address, versus when something is truly bothering you about the relationship and the other's behavior towards you and you need to talk it out together.

And yes, it's so very important that you and your partner can trust that the other is taking full ownership of their own individual personal baggage for a serious relationship to be functional. If there's real trust in yourselves and each other and you each have healthy boundaries, it leads to acting with good intentions out of mutual care (versus out of fear or acting out triggered behavior), to not manipulating or trying to fulfill a personal agenda of outcomes, and to each person being both able and willing to communicate their needs (essentially, secure behaviors).

For those times you should consider how your actions are affecting your partner -- it's still about good communication and trust being key, much more than worrying about what's going on with your partner. Hopefully they have already communicated if something is bothering them, but if you're picking up on cues that something is wrong, it's worth asking. If your partner still can't communicate ("nothing, I'm fine," when they're not), then it's not up to you to take further responsibility to draw it out and worry about solving their issues. You can respect their process and decide if it's something you can live with or not, and not direct your focus past that extent. I've found it critically important to learn not to take things personally in those situations, so I can then consider the best course of action for myself with a clear head and not project or speculate about what they need.

I agree that there's so much junk advice out there on this stuff. It really seems to present that only a very limited set of intentions exist and doesn't allow that sometimes it actually is more complicated and requires a step up on patience and communication before you assume and project on your partner. Plus, it doesn't encourage enough honest self-introspection.

Welcome to the board. It's a great place to learn and get support on your journey to healing!