Double Deactivation!

i understand this.
it's fear and habit.
have you communicated with him?
i'm asking, to understand whether or not you have reached out and not had response.

a dual avoidant couple will be challenged to understand and tolerate the very real instinct of deactivation, in themselves and the other.

i know what it's like, the thoughts you are having and the accompanying sensations in your body make good sense to you as you survey your surroundings. I totally get this. when i deactivate, before i know it, i'm in a place of questioning everything i thought i knew. it's a hindrance to intimacy because it urges me to not participate, to invest my time in everything but the risk of vulnerability.

deactivation is suffering, you know it well! how can we reduce this suffering for ourselves, and the other?
communication with my partner has been key. not just words and ideas traded for clarity- hearts offered for sharing.
This is the work of building connection and learning as you go.
it's the work of dismantling a prison.
if your communication was poor for six years, that isn't necessarily a predictor of the future. You can view it is an illustration of precisely what you would like to transform.

deactivation denies connection, it disallows a collaborate solution to your very real pain. if he is your friend, you are obliged to ask him for help to be the helpful one without asking for help is not the correct path to friendship, trust, and emotional availability.

I'm sorry you're in this space, i know it so well. it's very sad and alienating and a place of disillusionment.
Every time it presents itself, you have an opportunity to soften some sharp edges, work with it, learn how to touch it, learn how to let it be and let it pass.

when i deactivate its very helpful for me to read the threads anne posts about healing dismissive attachment. it reminds me what i need, what i fear, what is going on.
it gives me a manual to understand myself when my mind thinks instinct is the blueprint i need to work from.

he is vulnerable too. deactivation makes us forget that.
whatever is going on, we are part of it, and we have the power to influence the direction. it takes two working together in ways they haven't before- learning it together, facing it together, trying, the best they can, together.

it's not what we are used to ocarina. hugs!!

Yikes I have been rumbled Juniper!!!!

I can't tell you how useful it is to have you as a  wise sounding board.

My first instinct is always to withdraw - like a hand put into the fire and a reflex recoil. I do have the time and I will make it - it's that important and if we are not careful, we will together fall back into the trap of distance and trigger each other over and over. 

I can feel it as an old habit - feel its familiar grooves within my thinking and just by giving myself some space from the thoughts, I can begin to realise it's not a truth and that I do have the power to do something different - but boy, how familiar and easy it is to fall back into old reality.

He reached out - although I would have done otherwise - and I made space for and was open for him with a warm heart and we're going beach playing with family this evening. All my children are at home which is a wonderful and rare thing nowadays, the sun is shining and the summer holidays nearly over, so some sea, food, a fire and wine will be wonderful.

The other thing to celebrate hugely is that I have cut back my work considerably - by choice as of the beginning of this month. Life had become unmanageable and a boundary was needed. That and a trip in the near future with my eldest daughter for some yoga, swimming and walking. So life is good.

Final thought is that this is what happiness is - not an eternal state of bliss but a real experience of ups and downs, emotionally and situationally which are fully experienced and allowed in order to make way for life as it flows. 

ah, what a disappointment!!
it really does take two making the time.
will you be able to express all of this to him openly, with a mind toward resolution?
of course this is triggering, and very understandable.
your history is pained because of this unavailability.
given a new chapter, perhaps with new tools for communication progress can be made.
perhaps not, only the open and curious, desiring and authentic conversation and subsequent actions will tell.
hugs, that must have been very heavy on your heart.

your hope for resolution to the deactivation was thwarted.  i know your pain.
you really are in the emotional trenches of vulnerability and disappointment right now.
dont lose hope, i say this because the new steps of conflict resolution have not been trod and made into clear paths, yet.  only the stepping will reveal the outcome of course.
take your heart in your own hands but ask him to hold it with you. 
he may very well be deactivated and less aware. i deactivate when under logistical pressure, as i shared in the deactivation thread. 

it takes real real courage to try new things in the face of old pain.  so just keep going and all shall be well, no matter the end.  honor your best self and be mindful of what you are creating or blocking in each moment- all shall be well no matter what if you do this.

I will tell him I am afraid - I haven't yet felt ready to really discuss his proposal - it takes me time to really process change and in particular emotional change.

So all is not lost - whatever the outcome I get to practice compassionate honesty towards myself and to him. I know he deactivates under pressure - and that organisation is difficult for him logistically - but my heart is precious and even carelessness towards another can cause harm. I know that I am loved and valued - but I need to be able to love and value myself in the relationship too - and being accepting of behaviour that hurts, just isn't loving towards myself if that makes any sense.

My first inclination when you initially posted was also to suggest you tell him how you're feeling. My second was to wait for juniper to respond since she understands DA a whole lot better than I do

And I like what you said here. It does take making the choice to take loving action over and over, even if it continues to feel counter to your attachment style habits and prior conditioning from the old relationship you had with him.

I'm sorry he wasn't able to join you, but hang in there.

I am doing fine - and I recognise that at some point along the way the reasons our relationship didn't work last time were likely to resurface. He is hyperfocused on work to the expense of pretty much all else in life. He had just been away for a week and for the first time in his working life had actually told his clients not to contact him - after 20 working years of never saying no.

I think this was a big step -I also recognise that work/alcohol/distance got in the way of our relationship and I recognise that for me, an intimate relationship needs the presence of a partner who's really willing and able to show up. I don't know if he is able - but I know it's a conversation to be had and it's also something that will become clear over time.

We don't have another date scheduled and he hasn't been in touch today - and that's fine, it is part of his pattern to immerse in work and resurface exhausted with very little to offer. I am not demanding of him - but nor am I willing to settle for a relationship with anything less than full engaged presence - whatever this means for a pair of avoidants.

I will talk to him openly - I am abroad for 10 days later this week on a yoga/ swimming retreat somewhere remote. After the most hectic summer imaginable it's just what I need.