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Post by tnr9 on Feb 4, 2021 3:41:35 GMT
In my experience, and anecdotally among IRL friends who have been in similar situations with avoidants withdrawing from sex, unfortunately yes. Something is deeply wrong in this situation, usually related to fear of intimacy but it may also be subconscious incompatibility. It doesn't mean she doesn't care or it's impossible to address and move forward with, but it probably will take a lot of focused and mutually committed work to get through it. The couple times I've been in the situation (it's happened with multiple FA exes...), they eventually said outright they were not committed to doing that work (but effectively were looking for perfect and effortless connections without considering their own role in their relationship history). I haven't had any sexual issues like this with partners without insecure attachment styles. So I guess you're saying its time for me to walk away knowing its a futile attempt despite my ex not giving me a definite answer on whether she wants to carry on or not.  Having said that, FA/DAs are looking for the perfect and effortless relationship, which Jeb mentioned that no human is capable of and are all discarded. Do you know of any FA/DA having successful relationships being so rigid with their requirements? Soooooo...I think all insecure attached individuals are looking for something that is unrealistic....it isn’t just FAs or DAs. That is why insecures end up attracted to other insecures...because the attraction is to a potential rather then a reality. |
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Post by anne12 on Feb 4, 2021 3:51:04 GMT
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Post by alexandra on Feb 4, 2021 4:21:52 GMT
Agree with tnr9 about all insecure types having these issues manifest in some way (it's related to issues with vulnerability, intimacy, and nervous system triggers that they all share but can look very different) and with anne12 suggesting a deadline (within your own head). When my FAs would not give me clear answers after deactivating, it was due to bad communication skills and boundaries and wanting to people please. It was not necessarily because they hadn't made up their minds, though they were disconnected from themselves and honestly didn't know they'd made up their minds until well after the fact in their own retrospect. It is hard to process and know what you really want when you're disconnected from yourself. If she continues to go to counseling with you and on her own, and she says she needs more time while showing you she's not just SAYING it to make you feel better and her words and actions align as she takes ACTION to also address these issues, then it can be worth hanging in there. But if you're looking for hope in her words and she's not also reflecting her words in her actions (and right now her actions are to withdraw from sex and also to break up), then you are better off focusing on yourself. Mourn, heal, and become a better partner for someone. If she changes and becomes more secure and wants you, she will let you know, and these talks will be much easier, less circular, and you'll observe her words and actions aligning over long time periods. Or, the compatibility simply wasn't right and she wasn't secure enough yet in her journey and process, and you can find a better situation for yourself with better timing after you put in your own work to get through some of your past trauma and increase your faith and trust in yourself. It's very difficult to have a healthy and lasting romantic relationship with anyone if you define all your happiness by how they make you feel. Learning to trust myself more and not abandon myself helped a lot with healing my own AP style and becoming secure. |
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Post by anne12 on Feb 4, 2021 5:08:06 GMT
"....Over the weekend, she finished her uni assessment...."
You went to her workplace, and talked to her, when she was sick at work....?
Could she be stressed out - it is always a good thing to have in mind, if theres a lot going on in the other persons life at the moment - and maybe wait to have serious talks and not be pushy at theese times - (expecially if she is fa).
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Post by dullboat123 on Feb 4, 2021 5:12:48 GMT
"....Over the weekend, she finished her uni assessment...." You went to her workplace, and talked to her, when she was sick at work....? Could she be stressed out - it is always a good thing to have in mind, if theres a lot going on in the other persons life at the moment - and maybe wait to have serious talks and not be pushy at theese times - (expecially if she is fa). Yeah that was my AP activating and the usual man issue of "got to fix this now". Ok we are meeting up on Saturday for a show. It's an hour's drive each way. Any word of advice on how to talk to her and convincing her to work on us? She admitted some time ago that she needed help and went for couples therapy with me so I think convincing her isn't that hard. |
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Post by alexandra on Feb 4, 2021 5:35:02 GMT
You can't convince anyone to do anything. Trying to do so will backfire because there won't be progress if it's not her own idea that she's committed to doing. Putting pressure on her to ease your own anxiety won't help the situation -- this is where you need to pause your own thought patterns and self-soothe.
Within healthy relationships, you communicate what you want / need and how you feel and give your partner time to respond. Then you decide if their response meets your needs on an appropriate timetable for you. She already knows you want to get back together. You can tell her you'd like to continue going to counseling with her as you felt it was improving your communication with each other, and that you're continuing therapy on your own, for yourself, no matter what she decides.
She's asked you for space, so just enjoy the show and time together. Don't pressure her by trying to convince her of anything as that's exactly what she's said she doesn't want.
If the idea of seeing her triggers you this anxious, then your body is actually telling you you're not in a safe space. But the AP style is to try to control the environment around them and influence other people to meet their needs, as they're afraid asking directly will scare them away. Fear of abandonment is talking right now, and you're desperate to quiet it through reconnection with her. This won't work with an avoidant whose nervous system tells them to distance when THEY get triggered -- your needs don't mesh. So instead, you take the pressure off her by not abandoning yourself. Self-soothing isn't minimizing your own needs, but instead learning to be more comfortable with yourself (and comfortable with what you can control, instead of creating an illusion that you can control the choices of others). If you can get to a point with your therapist where you're not abandoning yourself, then no one else can abandon you either, and your protest behaviors and need to spend excessive time together will diminish.
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Post by anne12 on Feb 4, 2021 6:07:10 GMT
Relaaaax !!!!! Show means having fun and having a good time together, right ? Convincing her to go to therapy, is scerious talk, right ? You can ask but not convince...:maybe you just need to have some fun together right now. Fixing things right now - is more a ap behavior, than a man fixing behavior, even if men likes to fix things. AP men can lean into the feminine....  You write that she is fa, right ? Give her time to get her prefrontal cortex back online ... - and make sure that she is not sick, stressed out and check out where she is in her menstraul cycle before having serious talks .... |
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Post by anne12 on Feb 4, 2021 6:31:31 GMT
Ground yourself, be a rock that she can trust and lean on. A man who is grounded, is very sexy to the feminine  jebkinnisonforum.com/post/37984/- Your value as a masculine sexual partner is in the freedom of your consciousness expressed through your body, by becoming still, finding length in your spine, breathing deeply, and grounding your energy - Your consciousness is not felt as free to the feminine if it is stuck in your head and bound by thought - The yoga of taking your energy from your head, into your heart and your groin, and down into the earth, allows you to be felt by the feminine as grounded in consciousness - In John’s first year doing this work, his voice dropped a couple of octaves because he opened his diaphragm and learned to breathe more deeply into his belly. He also had to learn how to speak slowly because if he didn’t, no one would trust him. - If you slow down, the feminine nervous system will relax and they will feel more of your depth - If you move fast with a highly feminine being, it’s like creating a nuclear reactor of energy, and your partner may find herself slowing down to find more ease in the moment - By contrast, if you slow down, deepen and ground, your presence becomes like a soft caress to the feminine nervous system - A masculine being who is slow and still in his body while expressing and feeling a deep emotion, like heartbreak, is sexy and desirable to the feminine You can bring significant amounts of emotion, personality and expression through a grounded, still and deeply breathing masculine presence and this will not only relax your feminine partner, but it will also become highly valuable in your relating and your sex. Listen to John Wineland www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=6ay4BMK4zbQ&feature=youtu.be |
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Post by dullboat123 on Feb 4, 2021 6:38:34 GMT
Relaaaax !!!!! Show means having fun and having a good time together, right ? Convincing her to go to therapy, is scerious talk, right ? You can ask but not convince...:maybe you just need to have some fun together right now. Fixing things right now - is more a ap behavior, than a man fixing behavior, even if men likes to fix things. AP men can lean into the feminine.... You write that she is fa, right ? Give her time to get her prefrontal cortex back online ... - and make sure that she is not sick, stressed out and check out where she is in her menstraul cycle before having serious talks .... Thing is we've broken up right now but she has not cut me off so she is not done done. However her leaving me hanging isn't right and certainly isn't right to have me hanging while she finds another man, then cut me off after that. I guess "fixing things" mean we re-establish contact on a more frequent basis. As in we see each other more than none at the moment other than the show and Valentine's day (she agreed to hang out). You're right on the AP men leaning into the feminine. She certainly commented that she likes that side of me. Go figure. Her prefrontal cortex back online? What does that mean? I don't think she is sick but I am not too sure if it coincide with her "that time of the month". |
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Post by anne12 on Feb 4, 2021 7:18:47 GMT
Prefronatal cortex back online: When stressed out, being sick, doing uni assessment, having pms (women are 4 different women each month), having stressors in our private life, or when the fa is experiencing loving contact, their old triggers from the past can get activated -they can want to be close and far away at the same time. They can get situational triggered and then they can "flip the lid"=their prefrontal cortex can go off line - they can then use their reptilian brain instead and they can be in survival mode - fight, flight, freeze mode. We are not able to think clearly, when we are in survival mode, or when we are very stressed, there is no room for love, when we are in survival mode. Being in their threat responce can be very painfull and sometimes they cant even remember themselves, what has happend, what they did, how they reacted or what they said when their threat responce is activated. It can take some time to come out of their discossiation/fight/flight/freeze/collapse mode. When we got brain fog, we are not able to see or think clearly. Fa can lean more ap or more da. or they can switch. It also depends on the person they are interacting with. Dan Siegel calls it the low road www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=WkEcpBU3TpEImo fas are more sensitive to stressors in their life. |
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Post by anne12 on Feb 4, 2021 9:15:32 GMT
FA and love: jebkinnisonforum.com/post/24584/jebkinnisonforum.com/post/24518/"The VAL method: One of my friends has a dog called Valdemar. It has trauma and acts nerve-wracking to anyone other than my friend. Even she had to treat him carefully so as not to scare him away. We went for a walk in the park and I pretended that Valdemar was not there, otherwise he would die of fear. At one point my friend would give me a treat I could give to the dog. I went there and held my hand as I walked, pretendend that the dog wasent there. After a while the dog came gently to me and took the treat. And I could also pat him. I wanted to give the dog another treat and forgot to move carefully. I turned around and saw the dog into its eyes as I stretched out my hand with a treat. The dog was getting a heart attack, so scared it became. The dog jumped away with a kneejerk reaction. It was too dangerous with my direct way. This was also how it worked with my boyfriend. Every time I reached out to him, he jumped away. My method was to let my boyfriend come quietly to me. My friend claimed that this method worked for most people. The method was to be there without making demands. Neither inside my head. The method was to rest in myself, just to be me. I was curious about, what my boyfriend did without me having any projects on his behalf about what to do or not to do. The more I practiced this method, the more it looked like love. Wanting his best and my own best at the same time and giving freedom. There was no sacrifice in this method and it did not require a lot of energy. It was just different from my auto pilot, that would be at the forefront of everything and have control. My boyfriend became more attentive and he gave everything that I had longed for: closeness, enthusiasm, ease. Laughing together and having fun together at all |
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Post by tnr9 on Feb 4, 2021 9:27:11 GMT
"....Over the weekend, she finished her uni assessment...." You went to her workplace, and talked to her, when she was sick at work....? Could she be stressed out - it is always a good thing to have in mind, if theres a lot going on in the other persons life at the moment - and maybe wait to have serious talks and not be pushy at theese times - (expecially if she is fa). Yeah that was my AP activating and the usual man issue of "got to fix this now". Ok we are meeting up on Saturday for a show. It's an hour's drive each way. Any word of advice on how to talk to her and convincing her to work on us? She admitted some time ago that she needed help and went for couples therapy with me so I think convincing her isn't that hard. Hi there....I am an AP leaning FA but I would advise you to not raise it at all. I know you want her to work on this with you....the thing is....it is going to feel like “pressure” in a place that she has no ability to leave (car). If you can’t go out with her as a friend right now with zero expectations...do not go. |
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Post by tnr9 on Feb 4, 2021 9:38:00 GMT
FA and love: jebkinnisonforum.com/post/24584/jebkinnisonforum.com/post/24518/"The VAL method: One of my friends has a dog called Valdemar. It has trauma and acts nerve-wracking to anyone other than my friend. Even she had to treat him carefully so as not to scare him away. We went for a walk in the park and I pretended that Valdemar was not there, otherwise he would die of fear. At one point my friend would give me a treat I could give to the dog. I went there and held my hand as I walked, pretendend that the dog wasent there. After a while the dog came gently to me and took the treat. And I could also pat him. I wanted to give the dog another treat and forgot to move carefully. I turned around and saw the dog into its eyes as I stretched out my hand with a treat. The dog was getting a heart attack, so scared it became. The dog jumped away with a kneejerk reaction. It was too dangerous with my direct way. This was also how it worked with my boyfriend. Every time I reached out to him, he jumped away. My method was to let my boyfriend come quietly to me. My friend claimed that this method worked for most people. The method was to be there without making demands. Neither inside my head. The method was to rest in myself, just to be me. I was curious about, what my boyfriend did without me having any projects on his behalf about what to do or not to do. The more I practiced this method, the more it looked like love. Wanting his best and my own best at the same time and giving freedom. There was no sacrifice in this method and it did not require a lot of energy. It was just different from my auto pilot, that would be at the forefront of everything and have control. My boyfriend became more attentive and he gave everything that I had longed for: closeness, enthusiasm, ease. Laughing together and having fun together at all I think another way of phrasing this is....being ok and calm within yourself and giving lots of leeway and time to the other person.....but it cannot work with any expectations..and a dog, although scared, will be treat motivated whereas a human being isn’t going to have the same motivation. It really does require a lot of self work to release the need to control the outcome. **. They do this method in the rescue world a lot. If a cat is under the bed scared...you don’t go after it...you sit at the end of the bed and read out loud with some treats near you. When the cat makes an appearance, you calmly try to pet it...but you let the cat come to you. When I got my cat, he hid behind my oven for 9 hours the first day. Things have greatly improved since then....especially because I try to associate things he doesn’t like with treats....nail trimmings, brushings...he is very treat motivated....but he still is very skittish and I just give him a ton of space. |
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Post by dullboat123 on Feb 5, 2021 2:02:07 GMT
FA and love: jebkinnisonforum.com/post/24584/jebkinnisonforum.com/post/24518/"The VAL method: One of my friends has a dog called Valdemar. It has trauma and acts nerve-wracking to anyone other than my friend. Even she had to treat him carefully so as not to scare him away. We went for a walk in the park and I pretended that Valdemar was not there, otherwise he would die of fear. At one point my friend would give me a treat I could give to the dog. I went there and held my hand as I walked, pretendend that the dog wasent there. After a while the dog came gently to me and took the treat. And I could also pat him. I wanted to give the dog another treat and forgot to move carefully. I turned around and saw the dog into its eyes as I stretched out my hand with a treat. The dog was getting a heart attack, so scared it became. The dog jumped away with a kneejerk reaction. It was too dangerous with my direct way. This was also how it worked with my boyfriend. Every time I reached out to him, he jumped away. My method was to let my boyfriend come quietly to me. My friend claimed that this method worked for most people. The method was to be there without making demands. Neither inside my head. The method was to rest in myself, just to be me. I was curious about, what my boyfriend did without me having any projects on his behalf about what to do or not to do. The more I practiced this method, the more it looked like love. Wanting his best and my own best at the same time and giving freedom. There was no sacrifice in this method and it did not require a lot of energy. It was just different from my auto pilot, that would be at the forefront of everything and have control. My boyfriend became more attentive and he gave everything that I had longed for: closeness, enthusiasm, ease. Laughing together and having fun together at all Thank you for that analogy. It makes sense. I believe my attachment style was secure as I was single for half of my life so far. **Not trying to blame** However my marriage of 16 years was as toxic as it comes due to the fact that my ex wife is a narcissist. The abuse wasn't sudden and abrupt. Instead its subtle and over time, its normalised. My ex wife totally engulfed my life - isolating me from my family and friends while keeping those that she "approved" only. So practically my life revolved around her. Gradually, I lost my friends and I lost my life thinking its normal, just doing my husbandly duties. However it was still not enough. The issue compounded as we are immigrants and we have no one other than each other. This obviously brought forward to my now ex relationship where I thought being with her 24/7 is the norm. I know I can be alone and enjoys being alone sometimes. However losing my circle of friends and having no family here, the loneliness is sometimes too much to bear. |
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Post by alexandra on Feb 5, 2021 3:43:21 GMT
dullboat123, have you ever actually taken an attachment assessment? This test is helpful: dianepooleheller.com/attachment-test/ Results about 60%+ secure are secure. Results that are under 60% secure with the biggest portion of the rest in AP are AP, or the biggest portion of the rest in DA are DA. Results that are showing each attachment styles in quarters (all four styles come up around 25%) are FA. I'm very, very sorry you endured a long relationship with a narcissist. Being in a romantic relationship with someone with NPD is full of abuse and can easily make you lose yourself. However, being secure does not mean staying with someone abusive for a long time trying to make it work. It means having healthy boundaries (which NPD folks do not have or respect in others), being comfortable both being independent and interdependent, trusting both self and trusting others (who demonstrate they are trustworthy and consistent, but not assuming ill of someone until they give reason), and having good coping mechanisms for stress that allow you to fully process emotions over time instead of getting stuck. That's not what you're describing with a marriage to someone with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. In my experience, when someone is drawn to unstable partners (personality disorders, insecure attachment styles), it is generally because one has an insecure attachment style themselves and unstable partners remind us of someone close to us in our childhood and feel familiar, while lighting up attachment wounds of an inner child seeking to replay these dynamics in order to somehow change them.
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