What To Do When Male Partner Has Many Female Followers

This is an episode recorded for my instagram Wednesday live. These are the questions I answered for my followers there👇👇👇

1. My avoidant treats me like he’s a bf even we are not longer together for months. We have been on and off but he always treats me like his bf when we are together 
2. Does avoidant experiences physical symptoms when their relationships feel too much?
3. What do you think of the opinion that avoidants generally cheat (emotional/phyical/leave doors open, etc)
4. Why do DA cheat?
5. How to deal with silent treatment from a fa partner? 
6. Husband is avoidant, he gets extreme stressed about the future and shuts down for months?
7. My boyfriend has mostly female followers on instagram. It triggers my anxiety. What should I do? 
8. Are avoidants who don’t do the work usually emotionally immature? 
9. Is it okay to tell an ex you know would need therapy/ counselling to let them know? 
10. I have been in no contact with someone for 10 weeks. He then asked to meet then went missing again. Checking he sill had access.
11. Can avoidant heal/break patterns without therapy? 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello and welcome to today's live, which is being held on Instagram. It's where every Wednesday we're well, we're now resuming the live, but this is also going to go up on the podcast, which is called Decoding Attachment Styles. It's where you're allowed to send in your questions, or you can ask me questions right here when you join, and I will try to answer them as quickly as I can possibly get to them. There are many questions that came in last night, so I'm going to answer them as they were asked. If you're joining me on the live, just let me know where you are. And there's a question that I want to ask you guys, and you get to answer it here. What do you think the difference is between a dismissive avoidant and a fearful avoidant? I'm seeing across social media a big, big misunderstanding between the dismissive avoidant and the fearful avoidant. A ton of people are showing up and they're saying my dismissive avoidant attached person does a push and pull. That is not a dismissive, avoidant, attached person, and we're going to discuss it a little bit here. But yeah, let me know in the comment section what you think. And if you're listening to this through the podcast, feel free to comment as well or send me an email. Let me know what you think the difference is between a dismissive avoidant and a fearful avoidant. And of course, let me know where you're coming in from. I'm just going to give this another minute or so for others to join, and then I'll get to your questions. We haven't done a live in such a long time. Um, but I promise this is something that I really, really want to keep doing. I find that the lives tend to help you somehow. Not sure how that's doing it differently than the podcast. Again, if you're joining, let me know what you think the difference is between a dismissive avoidant and a fearful avoidant. You get into a relationship with a dismissive avoidant, it looks very differently than if you get into a relationship with a fearful avoidant. Majority of the people are experiencing the push and pull, and because that person shuts down, they think that that person is a dismissive avoidant when they might actually be a fearful avoidant. Dismissive avoidant attached people don't chase, they don't do the push and pull, they don't come around, they do exactly that. They dismiss, they end the relationship or they let you move on. But they they don't do the push-pull, they don't circle around three months after with a high text. Okay, so let's get to your questions. We have been on and off, but he always treats me like his boyfriend when we are together.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

One of the things that I teach here is the importance of the words that we use. Words are magic. They're magic.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

They can create a feeling, they can create disturbances in our relationships. They're powerful, and we want to be really, really careful of the words that we're using. So saying something like my avoidant, you're taking on the identity of an avoidant attachment. And you don't have an avoidant attachment when you're saying my avoidant. Someone asked, can we get back to dismissive avoidant? We will. I just want to know what you think is the difference between dismissive avoidant and fearful avoidant, and then we'll discuss it a little more in details later on. But let's answer this question for now. My avoidant. You don't have an avoidant. A person has an avoidant attachment style. It's like saying, My fever, I have a fever. It's a part of the person, it's a thing that's happening, it's a part of their personality that can be changed. It's not who they are. My name is Annalisa. I am Annalisa. That is taking on an entire identity, right? If I say, I am being, I'm upset, it takes on the entire feeling of upset. I can say, I'm feeling upset in this moment. And my body knows, my body and mind knows that it's just a temporary feeling and it is going to pass. So we want to be really careful about this. The next time you have to address that you're dating someone or you're with someone who's got an avoidant attachment style, it would be helpful for you to separate the entire human being from this attachment style. It is not who they are. Attachment styles can be changed, and we're going to talk about that as well a little later. So I'm going to rephrase this for you. Someone I know with an avoidant attachment style treats me as though they're my boyfriend, even though we've not been together for months. We have been on and off, but he always treats me like his boyfriend when we are together. A breakup, a separation doesn't mean that the person stops feeling what they felt for you before. All it says is that this person does not feel like the relationship can continue in the direction they had hoped for or in the direction that you were hoping for. It does not mean that they don't love you, they don't like you, they don't like spending time with you anymore. So if they're still behaving like a boyfriend or a girlfriend, it would mean that they still have feelings for you, but it does not change the fact that they want the relationship to end. Now it is your responsibility to you to put a pause on the relationship. A lot of us, we get into these relationships, they end and we stay friends or we try to meet up with them, accommodate them with the hope that they're going to change their mind. And what you're doing there is setting yourself up for pain and failure. We want to be able to start listening to what people say. And when we find a hard time letting go, that's work that we need to do for us. When we have a hard time listening to what someone says and walking away and trying to make assumptions on the hopes that things will get back to the way it used to be or the way we envision it, that is work for us to do. Are they misleading you? Probably. Is it unfair? Yes. But we cannot expect people to be looking out for our feelings, especially if we're not looking out for ourselves. And this is, I promise you, I wish someone had really sat me down in my late 20s or mid-20s when I was open to listening and say, hey, it's your responsibility to take care of your own feelings. Because if you keep depending on people to do it for you, chances are they won't or they can't. Right? So if you're hanging out with this person and you've broken up, and they're treating you like a partner, but they have no intention of providing what you need in a relationship, then that's just what it is. It's best for us to look at the reality of our lives and then decide, do I want this or not? And I know that's painful. I know that's not what you want to hear. Usually, when you send a question like this, you're hoping that I would say, oh, well, you know, if he's treating you like a boyfriend, then maybe that's what he's saying, but he doesn't want to use the label. Well, you deserve someone who is going to find the strength, do the healing work, find the strength to push through and say, hey, you know what? I am scared right now. I'm afraid of losing using the labels, but I do want a serious, committed relationship with you. And I'm going to find the help that I need so that I could learn to be a little more vulnerable. That's what you deserve. Because if you're with someone who cannot find a strength to build a relationship with you, then that's what you're probably going to be dealing with in the next 10 years or 20 years. You need to be able to see some sort of effort, effort to push through fear. I'm guessing you're the person who sent this message because you're saying I assume he is an avoidant because I guess the runaway is because I insisted on getting married. It it doesn't really doesn't matter. I think we should be able to have a conversation, even if you know you're not ready for marriage, should be able to sit and say, this is not something that I envision in the near future, or I want to get to know you a little more, or whatever the reason is, we should be able to have a conversation about it. Uh if you're dealing, okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna that that's a totally different question, but let's get back to the original question. If someone's treating you as a boyfriend but you've broken up and you still don't know if you're working on the relationship to move forward, then chances are you're still broken up and that person misses you and likes hanging out with you, and that's just what it is. Now you have to decide what you want in the future from this person. Sit with them, ask them, or tell them this is what you're hoping for, and listen to what they say. If they can give it to you, if it's anything like, oh, I'm not sure, let's just see how it goes. You have to decide if this is making you comfortable and this is something that you could continue with. The next question is for all the questions coming in right now, I'll get to them after I get through this list. I feel like, you know, I've given 24 hours for people to send their questions in, and I do appreciate the questions that you're sending because I know it's going to help a number of other people. So I will get to them. It's just going to take me a few minutes. The second question I have is: Does avoidant experience physical symptoms when their relationships feel too much? You know, I'm not sure if I love or hate these questions about avoidant attached persons, because it makes makes them sound like an alien from you know a different planet or or or robots, machines. Does avoidant experience physical symptoms when their relationships feel too much? This is not an avoidant issue. This is an every human issue. And avoidant attached people, or people with avoidant attachment styles, they are humans. They feel human emotions like the secure attached or the anxious attached. Physical symptoms, yes. An anxious attached person will start to feel anxious, an avoidant attached person will start to feel anxious, and a secure attached person will start to feel anxious when their relationship starts to feel too much. Nobody wants pressure. As human beings, we can only handle so much. We feel fear, we feel sadness, we feel overwhelmed. So, yes, avoidant attached people will feel physical symptoms like anxiety. And especially, you know, for the avoidant attached person who doesn't really show their emotions and they're keeping it inside, that's a very uncomfortable feeling. Think about it. If you've ever been in a space where you felt so uncomfortable and you were angry or frustrated, you wanted to cry, but for some reason the circumstance didn't allow you to express those emotions, what did it feel like on the inside? What we don't hear a lot of is the avoidant attached person. What I've found is especially those leaning, the fearful avoidant leaning more on the dismissive spectrum. What I've found is that they've they keep their emotions within. If they're at work, they show up for work, they don't let people know what they're going through. They could hang out with their friends and laugh and smile, but on the inside, it's crushing them. And when they get home, that's when they break down, that's when they cry. You don't see it. Why don't you see it? Because they don't want to appear weak. They don't want to appear as a burden to anyone. So they keep it stuffed inside. And one of the patterns that I'm seeing based on the number of avoidant attached persons I've spoken to, is that they tend to suffer from anxiety more than the anxious attached person would. Now, I don't know if there's a study out there, and I'm not a therapist, I'm a coach, I just do these researches on my own. I've got a number of people that I talk to. But I find that the anxious attached, while they feel anxiety, like every human being does, the avoidant attached person feels anxiety on a different level. And I think it could very well be because they're holding it all inside. They don't share with their friends or family members how they're struggling in relationships. They keep that all to themselves. They try to process. And suppressing something doesn't mean that it doesn't affect you. In fact, keeping bottling things up within us, it starts to show up in our physical health. These are people that I find will report having migraines, panic attacks, anxiety attacks, heart palpitations, you know, they're symptoms. The body holds so much pressure until it cannot. And if we're not talking about it, we're not crying about it, then it's going to find the body's going to find different ways of exhibiting or getting that stress out. Why do I think this is an opinion, that those with an anxious attachment style may not feel the physical symptoms as much? It is because we talk, we share, we're on social media making comments about it. We talk about it over and over and over, and that is one way of releasing stress. That's why therapy works for so many people. We have a space to talk and talk and feel understood and heard. The avoidant attached person doesn't do it. And anxious attached people are not afraid of crying in public. So that's just my opinion on it. So to answer the question, yes, avoidant detached people, they also feel physical symptoms when the relationship feels too much. Their only difference is that they do not know how to communicate about it. And one of the things that I try to teach is if we understand how human beings work our makeup, then we can empathize by putting ourselves in that position. We may not, we may think, I know I remember, you know, years of being an anxious attached, I thought that I knew how to communicate because I talked. But a lot of what I said, you had to read between the lines, you had to figure me out, you had to be a magician to know what I was thinking. And if you didn't, I thought something was wrong with you, but my sentences weren't clear. There were sentences like, what if he doesn't do this? That's not a full sentence or a statement. So, you know, I mean, those are things that we we need to look at when we're if we want to have healthy relationships. We have to be able to communicate. And that is where the problem is with both anxious and avoidant attached persons. The anxious attach because they speak, because they use words, and a lot of them, they believe they communicate. Listening is also a big part of communication. We have to be able to listen to understand. But most of the times, and I'm talking again, you know, someone who was anxiously attached, it was more important for me to be understood, to get my story out, my words out so that I could be understood. I didn't realize the importance of listening to understand. The goal wasn't to understand so that we could make the relationship better and also appreciate my partner. The goal was to be understood so that a partner can fix my problems and I can be happy. And we've got to be able to sit with ourselves and reflect upon how we're showing up in relationships as well. For the avoidant attached, you've got to learn how to speak up. And I know, you know, sometimes you may say something and it comes across in a way that you didn't intend. It might be hurtful, it might be crass at times. You get to say, I need some time to think about the best way of saying what I need to. It's little tweaks in how we communicate would help greatly in relationships. The third question. What do you think of the opinion that avoidants generally cheat emotionally, physically, leave doors open? And another question from someone else that I added on to this is why do dismissive avoidant persons cheat? Every human being who needs validation, who is insecure, who feels like they're lacking something, or who feels like there's a part of them that is unable to get out, will meet another human being who either gives them the validation that they're looking for, or eases that insecurity within them and they will cheat. This isn't something that only avoidant attached people do, it's the timing that I find in which avoidant attached and anxious attached people cheat. They both cheat. Avoidant attached persons, and again, I like to talk about the nuances. There's nothing like a secure attached person and anxious attached person and avoidant attached person and full stop. Secure attached people can act avoidantly at times because if you're a partner and it's just too much pressure, you're texting all day, they're at work and you're they're getting upset, they're gonna call you up and say, Hey, let's talk about this later. I'd appreciate it if you don't call me again for the rest of the day. They're very firm people. They're not people who are like, oh, treat me however you feel like, and I'm just gonna sit there and be like, oh, but why are you doing this? How can we work through this? No, no, no, no, no. They have strong boundaries, right? And they could, they may act like an avoidant attached person if you don't know what you're dealing with. You see, anxious attached and avoidant attached people are not used to boundaries, they think it's harsh, right? However, a secure attached person will set boundaries, which may appear to someone who's anxiously attached as someone who is avoidant attached. And when it comes to avoidant attachment, we have a fearful avoidant, we have a dismissive avoidant. Now, when it comes to human beings, including the anxious attached person, we have emotional intelligence, we have emotional maturity, emotional awareness. So a fearful avoidant, leaning more dismissive, but emotionally aware, emotionally intelligent and emotionally mature will more than likely not cheat. An anxious attached person who is those three again, emotionally mature, intelligent and self-aware and mature, they more than likely will not cheat. Someone who is emotionally immature, not intelligent enough to have a good idea of what their future should look like. I'm talking about the kind of person who's got an amazing partner, but instead of focusing on how amazing their partner is, they start nitpicking and finding all the things that they don't like, will be the one who cheats, or the person who thinks that, oh, you know, there's always a better option, or the one who cannot. Sit and work through discomfort or an uncomfortable conversation may tend to cheat. So it's not an avoidance generally cheat. It's a particular kind of individual who will. Now, how does this look like when an anxious attached person is cheating? Initially, they are focused on their relationship and the partner that they're they're with. So they're not cheating, they're not looking out. In fact, they will find it quite annoying if someone flirts with them because they're absolutely loyal. However, after some time, if that partner starts to, if they start to feel resentment because they're giving and giving and giving and they're not getting what they're hoping for from their partner, they might start to look elsewhere. They may do it one, two, for the validation, of course. They also tend to do it to get the other person upset. They may hint, they may hint that, you know, this person's been looking at me, or I heard from this ex. And that really is to provoke insecurity in the relationship with the hope that if their partner knows that other people are showing interest, the partner may just step up and give them what they want. So both individuals can cheat, or both attachment styles can cheat depending on the emotional maturity of that individual. Does that make sense? Let me know. Let me know in the comment section. How to deal with silent treatment from a partner. I did a post recently on silent treatment and what a cruel act it is. And let's talk about a possible, one possible why this happens. Now, again, this person asked how to deal with a silent treatment from a fearful avoidant partner. Again, you know, one of the things that I've moved more towards in the recent months, I believe, is talking more about the nuances here, because I'm seeing these blanket statements, these generalized statements thrown out there. And, you know, I've been thinking a little bit more about my 27-year-old self. If my 27-year-old self had read what is being said, especially, I mean, it was a time when you know we didn't have AI and I couldn't find help for therapy and stuff back then. And I so wanted to be validated. And if I had seen the stuff written about avoidant attached people, man, that would have slowed up my healing. So, in a way, I'm grateful that I did not have the filter of people who don't do the research on attachment theory influencing how I think, because I'll tell you one thing: you could be angry, and your anger is valid. It's it is unfair. It is incredibly unfair because we grew up hearing, believing that humans should have connection. But again, the nuance, we missed it. People don't talk about the nuances. What does it mean that we're humans and we need connection? Think of it. We're tribes, we're we're human beings that, sure, we need connection, but we cannot possibly expect one human being to be everything to us. We grew up in tribes where people took care of each other. You know, I'm from the Indian culture, grew up in Guyana. It really took a village to raise us. You know, we couldn't be seen lurking around neighborhoods after school. Somebody was going to report to our parents. Somebody was going to, a random stranger would see us in uniform and ask, hey girl, what are you doing out here? Aren't you supposed to be home? So we had a number of people in the community taking care of us. And that's what it meant by needing connection. We need human beings to look out for us and we look out for them. But in today's world, especially in developing countries and cities, and I use the word developing loosely, we're now looking at one human being to be our therapist, to be our best friend, to be our mentor, our supporter, our child, our parent. And it is too much, and relationships are falling apart. So what why did I run off on that rant? Oh, the silent treatment situation. So the the fearful, avoidant attached partner, and talking about silent treatment, I'm more talking about nuances now when we're just using these blanket statements. So a fearful, avoidant, attached partner, how do I deal with a silent treatment for from a fearful, avoidant, attached partner? I'm gonna I'm gonna say that the anxious attached partner also does that silent treatment. How do they do it? Piss off an anxious attached person, and you ask them, hey, is everything okay?

SPEAKER_00 27:21

What do they say? Yeah, I'm good. I'm fine.

SPEAKER_01 27:25

And they're slamming doors in a way that is interpreted to the other person as a silent treatment. You're ignoring me, you're you're lying to me, you're gaslighting. That's a fun word that we use on social media. You're gaslighting me. Now, how do you deal with it when someone gives you the silent treatment, whether they're fearful, avoidant, dismissive avoidant, or anxiously attached? Wait for the moment to pass and then sit them down and have a conversation. And you're gonna tell them your truth. If you're afraid of telling them your truth, that's a great indicator that there's something there that you need to work on.

SPEAKER_00 28:17

Your truth might sound something like this. I'll give you my version. If my partner ever tried that crap with me, he's never done it. I'll sit him down and I'll say I would like to be in a relationship with someone who is emotionally mature enough to let me know when something is bothering them. I can appreciate that you may need some time to collect your thoughts to have that conversation.

SPEAKER_01 29:06

However, I will not be dealing with any tantrum of any sort. That's pretty much what I would say. You find your language, but let what you want to let people know is you know what you want in your life, and you're not gonna settle for anything less. And you're giving them a chance. You understand that human beings need some time to collect their thoughts, to you know, formulate what they're going to say, but that is what your expectations are. And if they keep doing it, then you've got to ask yourself, am I willing to do this for the rest of my life? Or you would choose to walk away as painful as that is, and find the partner who can give you what you want. A question, a follow-up question to what I just said. Best way is to stay silent. Best way is to say silent, I think, if something is bothering you. Yeah, that is the silent treatment. And what happens is you think that it's the best thing to do by staying silent, but the other person is feeling ignored. The other person is feeling like they're not valuable. And a person who stays quiet when something is bothering them, that is someone who is afraid of confrontation. And we should not be afraid of having a conversation. Because I'll tell you something about the silent treatment. We think it's grown up, we think it's mature, we think it's safe, but what we're doing is we're building this lovely thing called resentment. And what happens when we can't hold that resentment anymore? We become pressure cookers, it blows up. And not only in our relationships, but it shows up in our workplace, it shows up in all the other relationships. We snap. When you see someone do an act and you're like, oh my gosh, this is this is not this person, they don't usually behave this way. No, it's because they've been holding something in. So the silent treatment's never a good idea. Yes, let pressure pass and speak calmly. But of course, we have to remember that there's another person in this relationship, and we want to be able to at least say to that person, I need some time, and I will come back to this conversation. Sorry, and give them a time. I'll come back in an hour, I'll come back this afternoon, I'll come back tomorrow. And then you follow through on it. You make sure that you do the thing that you said you're going to do. My husband is avoidant. Again, we're going to correct that. My avoidant has an avoidant attachment style. He gets extremely stressed about the future and shut down for months.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

Now, this is an unfortunate thing.

SPEAKER_01 32:11

Again, this is this is the kind of question where I need to have a full conversation. Like, what happens? What is he stressed out about? If it's finances, okay, I understand. What does shutting down look like for months? No talking at all, but or not talking about the situation that's stressing him out. When we think about the future, it is, it could be very, very stressful. We don't know what's coming, right? And we want to be prepared for it, and a lot of times we don't feel prepared for it. An avoidant attached person grew up taking care of themselves. Yeah, I was thinking about my baby boy today. He leans, he leans avoidant. Well, he is he is fearful avoidant, but he leans more on the dismissive side. And I think he does so much for himself. You know, he's grown to get his homework done, and he goes out and he buys food with his friends, and he comes home and he'll either have a dinner with his dad, or and if he's with the dad, that you know, it's not sitting at the table. And my ex is a wonderful person. This isn't to say anything about his parenting, he's an incredible parent. But it's what it's what our son has been learning. He's been learning to take care of himself. And, you know, all of the studies that I've done in avoidant attachment style, I know at some point he's going to think about the future. I remember once I asked him about investing. I said, you know, are you interested in starting investing now? I said, the only thing about it is I would advise you if you start investing now, he he was 14 at the time, you can't keep looking to see if you know what your gains are and your losses, or it's going to stress you out. And he said, Yeah, it's not going to be for me because I'm going to keep looking and I am going to get stressed out. So he's a very, very little darling self-aware boy. However, he is someone who is growing up, like all avoidant detached persons, believing that it is their responsibility to take care of themselves. And when you grow up with that mindset, when you grow up believing that you really can't depend on someone else to be there for you, or you start to see other relationships falling apart and you gather information like I can't depend on people. People make promises and then promises and then they break those promises. So the avoidant detached person grows up seeing that. They know relationships end, they know people get married, and those relationships end. And so they learn that they have to look out for themselves. And you grow up with that mindset. Guess what? You're worried about your future because you start to believe that something happens. You can't really depend on human beings to be there. Now the anxious attach grows up believing that humans should be there for each other, which is true. But if you look at your past, I'm gonna bring up something really painful here. If you look at your past, it's something I did. That relationship that you thought was going to last, it didn't. And the second one that you thought was going to last, it didn't. The third one you thought was going to be forever, it didn't. So when are we going to get that yes, we can be connected to people, but also learn to be a little independent and allow human beings to do what they need to, and at the same time, we know that should they leave for whatever reason they have to leave, we are going to be okay.

SPEAKER_00 36:02

That was a huge, huge wake-up for me.

SPEAKER_01 36:06

That really kicked me into a more secure attached person because now I know I don't have to be afraid of losing people. I could still love them, have a connection, and be open to whenever they leave because I know I'll be okay. It's gonna hurt, but I'll be okay. My boyfriend has mostly female followers on Instagram. It triggers my anxiety. What should I do? It triggers your anxiety? Of course it does. Of course it does, because while we're human humans, human beings, we're also territorial beings. The knowing that you could really feel it when someone's in the relationship with you. You could feel when they're committed. Something is just something changes. I think they're more patient and understanding, and you could tell that they really give a hoot about uh your thoughts and your feelings. But you just know they may have a female friend, they don't hide it, and you don't feel uncomfortable. As human beings, we feel how other people feel about us. It's not something that you you can quite articulate. You know, there's so many senses. I think they just they discovered we have 38 different senses. There's this knowing, and we're all so connected to each other. You know that feeling you get when you just think of someone and then they call you or they text you, and you're like, oh my gosh, I was just thinking about you. That is a sense that we don't talk about. You could be far away from your partner and you just have this feeling like, oh, something's off, or oh, I'm feeling this person pull away, but they haven't said anything. So human beings, and if you look at babies, they're very good at tapping into that feeling. They know who to go towards and who to pull away from. We have learned from our adults how to ignore those feelings. And you hear it when parents say to their kids, go hug that aunt and and or uncle, and and I'm talking about my culture here, and a child's like, No, I don't want to. And what do we adults say? Oh, you're not being nice. So we teach our children to ignore their instincts. And now we've got to get back to it. And the more you listen to it, and this is something that's greatly helped with my healing, when you start to listen to that feeling and do the thing the feeling says, if if if it's an ex who reaches out and you have a feeling I should not talk to this person, no matter how much you want to, the more you listen to that feeling, the stronger the intuition becomes. We call it an intuition, but the stronger those senses become. And you start to move with those senses, and I promise you, your life becomes so peaceful, but it is not an easy thing to do. And we call it setting boundaries. It is not an easy thing to do. If you could, you know, I was asked once how what's the easiest way to set boundaries? Listen to your feelings. If it doesn't feel good, don't do it. Just don't do it. Don't question it, don't try to understand it, just don't do it. So, yes, to answer the question, it is not the female followers on Instagram that bothers you about your your boyfriend, your boyfriend having female followers. It is the all the other things in the relationship that's happening that makes you feel unsafe and uncomfortable. You are able to pick up from this number mostly female followers on Instagram.

SPEAKER_00 40:43

You're able to pick up his insecurities, his need for validation.

SPEAKER_01 40:53

Based on the the the kind of based on how you judge a woman that he follows, based on how you judge the women that he follows, you are picking up certain insecurities, his mindset from it, and that's making you feel unsafe.

SPEAKER_00 41:11

You're you're picking up something that I would encourage you to pay attention to. Are avoidants who don't do the work usually emotionally immature? Let me think on that for a second. I would say there there's definitely a lack of awareness.

SPEAKER_01 41:51

However, this is where I'm stumbling a little because I'm also thinking about the anxious attached person here, the person with the anxious attachment. I find a lot of anxious attached people, and again, I was one of those. We do a lot of research and reading and learning, and we think we're doing the work, but we're not changing patterns. First of all, we're unable to spot the patterns within us. So we're in a way, we're doing all of the research, learning, understanding so that perhaps we could feel a little more validated. Like, oh, I'm on track, I'm doing the stuff here, I know what I'm talking about. Yes, I'm finding in this article that it's my partner's fault. They need to do some work.

SPEAKER_00 42:46

And there's another thing that just slipped my mind. My goodness.

SPEAKER_01 42:54

Oh, and there's also the anxious attached will look for information so that they could start molding themselves into a person that their partner is going to like. So the anxious attached will do that, and that is some level of emotional immaturity that comes from insecurity. Now, avoidant attached persons may be afraid of someone else pointing out things about them that makes them look flawed, and they may not want to do the work.

SPEAKER_00 43:37

That would be to some degree emotional immaturity, to some degree lack of awareness.

SPEAKER_01 43:50

But yes, it's generally people who are insecure and afraid of looking inwards that would not.

SPEAKER_00 44:01

Want to go to therapy.

SPEAKER_01 44:06

I've had people reach out to me and anxious attached persons reach out to me and say, Yeah, I know I'm not the problem. It's my partner. They're definitely the problem. And I ask, have you been in therapy? No, but I don't need therapy. What do you call that? That's not an avoidant attach. That's an anxious attach. Oh, I'm anxious. I'm anxious attached, but I don't need therapy. I've read the book unattached, or I've read the book called Attached, so I'm okay, I'm good. The book Attached just helps like it skims over attachment theory. You really want to learn about attachment theory, get into the textbooks. And that's when you start to really see the nuances. And there's still so much work being done. Is it okay to tell an ex you know would need therapy or counseling? Okay. Is it okay to tell an ex that you know they need therapy or counseling? Let me help you to understand this. I'm gonna use an analogy or a different story. Imagine we care about someone and they are overweight.

SPEAKER_00 45:17

We know they're overweight.

SPEAKER_01 45:21

How do you tell someone, hey, you're overweight, you should really go see someone? It comes over as a little um inconsiderate. And usually if you say that to someone, I would imagine they think like, what the F, who the hell are you to talk to me about that? It's offensive. Or imagine we don't agree with someone's religion, and we start preaching on them that they should change and turn into, you know, take on our religion. It's offensive. I know we want to help people. I know we see them making the same mistakes sometimes over and over and over, and we really want to help them. But when we're telling someone that they need to go to therapy, we're telling them that they're messed up. We're telling them in a way that I'm better than you, that I could diagnose you, I'm smarter, I'm just better, and no one wants to feel like someone they loved and care for see them as less than or broken. So, how do you approach a topic like this? I will generally wait. I just listen to people for the most part. They they talk, people want to be heard. I've learned this a long time ago, and I give them space to do that. So I'm gonna use my partner again, for example, who is in therapy and has been for decades. Should he talk to me about something that's stressful or pressing, anything, anything emotional, I would ask. Like, are you looking for an ear or do you need my take on this? Most of the times it's understood, I'll just shut up and just listen. And then he may ask for an opinion. And if he asks for an opinion, I'm very well aware I'm not his therapist and I'm not his coach. So I'll say maybe this is something you want to discuss with your therapist. Or I may say, if I was in that situation, I would probably deal with it this way. However, I'm not in your situation. Okay. One thing we want to know is if we're in a relationship, what is our role in that relationship? I'm my partner's partner. I'm not his therapist, I'm not his parent, I'm not his child, I'm not his colleague. Okay, so know the position that you're in. And it's best to let people figure out who they are. Our job is to take our time getting to know them, and then we decide: do I want this person in my life? Do they fit into my future goals and plans and vision? And if not, I've got to find the strength to let it go. And that is what securely attached people do. It's not that they break up because it's easy or it feels easy, it's painful, but they know that what they envision in their future is not, they're probably not going to find it with this particular person. I've been in no contact with someone for 10 weeks. He then asked to meet and then disappeared again. As you check in in to see if he still has access. There are people who are very aware that life is a game and they play the game. However, a majority of the people, they're not playing games with you. They're not waking up and saying, you know what, today my intention is to just check in and see if I still have access to this person. Or today my intention is to gaslight this person. Majority of the people are not doing that. Majority of the people, they have this childhood trauma that acts like a puppet in their body and their mind, and it just makes them do stuff. Someone says, however, it's painful to love an avoidant. I am so coming back to that one. I find it to be the most beautiful thing to love the avoidant attached people in my circle. The anxious attached as well. It's painful. Here's what I'm going to come back to that, but this one here is pulling my attention. And I'm like a cat with one of those, you know, lighty things. Here's what's painful. It's not painful to love an avoidant attached. And for avoidant attached persons out there listening to me, it is not stressful to love an anxious attached person. What is painful is when we can't communicate our needs. And what is painful is when we're trying to make someone do something to make us happy, when we are in trying to be in control. What is painful is when our ego gets in the way and we don't learn how to quiet it. And we can only quiet it. It's kind of like Jacqueline Hyde. Jackal allowed people or didn't have the strength to set boundaries with people. And Hyde would look at Jackal and say, okay, fine, you can't handle this. People are walking all over you. I've got to step out. It's a Jacqueline Hyde that's going on. So your ego, Hyde, is going to go quiet when you, the person with your identity, know that it can step up for itself. That's how you quiet the ego. But it is not painful to love and avoid a detached person. You have to find someone who is in alignment or who shows up for you as you need in a relationship. Trust me, I drive someone crazy in a relationship. I like my space and my independence, and I like, you know, my undivided attention with my children when I'm with my children. And I'm not sure how many people would be like my partner who can respect that. And he's also not someone who needs me constantly. You know, he knows that, you know, he's winding down his career, and I'm the one who's building my career, and he supports it. So you've got to find someone you're more in alignment with. No one in my past would have been able to be with this version of me. So it is not difficult to love an avoidant attached person. What I would say right now is perhaps you haven't learned how to love yourself just yet, so that you could look at that avoidant attached person and say, you don't fit into my life. And I wish you all the best.

SPEAKER_00 52:13

That's just something that I would ask you to consider. Where was I?

SPEAKER_01 52:22

I was uh I've been in no contact with someone for 10 weeks. Okay. Been in no contact. Do they want to just check to see if they have access? I find that many times when people just reach out to you, it's a memory they've had, or they miss you. They miss the friendship, but not the relationship. They may want to reconnect with you, or maybe you want to explore the relationship again, and then they meet with you, and something happens, and they remember why it couldn't work out, or in some cases they meet with you and realize that they still have a whole lot of feelings for you, and then they back off again because they don't want to be hurt again, or a number of reasons. Again, you have to decide. I know I keep I keep trying to give you agency and independence, right? I try to let you know that you can make choices for yourself. You are a powerful being. You have to decide: do I want to be with this person again? When someone breaks up with you, when we are going through a breakup, it is the best time to just sit there and reflect upon the relationship. And as time moves on, you stop seeing things as rosy and beautiful as you saw it just after the breakup. You start to see where the holes and the cracks really were. And now you could ask yourself, is this the kind of relationship that I want for the rest of my life? Someone who pushes and pulls and someone who, you know, is inconsistent, someone who says things but don't really mean it. You get to see all of these things. Um, you know, I've had people reach out and say, I was dating this avoidant attached person, and they were just so boring, I just didn't realize until I got out of the relationship, and life got exciting. Space in relationships, it's great. It's great. Now, Larry and I, we still do space in our relationship, not the space where you break up, but you know, we live in different places. You have to call me all the time because we're going to see each other. But it's wonderful to have your alone time. When we're so consumed by the relationship and the other person, we don't get to see what life could be like without them. And it's nice to know what life looks like without your partner, so you can either realize that it's not the partner for you, or you can appreciate that person some more. It's our love which makes them different, otherwise, they're ordinary. Avoidant attached people are not ordinary, they're brilliant people. If you look in society, the shakers and the movers are generally avoidant attached people. Why? This isn't to say that anxious attached people are not smart. What I'm saying is when you look at it, who is more obsessed with making sure that they're going to be financially okay in the future? Who is afraid of not being independent in the future? Avoidant attached people. And secure attached people know how to balance it. So you'll find securely attached people also very successful. It drives them. There are a few things. Let me get into this a little. An avoidant attached person grows up believing they must take care of themselves. They also get validation from excelling. So they excel in school, they get that tap on the shoulder from their parents, and they want more and more and more. They have to prove themselves. There's a lot of people pleasing. I have to people please with my parents, get the good grades, they see me when I get the good grades, and now I'm gonna get a good job, and I'm gonna get the validation there, and I'm gonna become more and more and more successful, anxious attached people. They lift everyone else up. They are always supporting, they're helping you to grow. And unfortunately, they don't pay as much attention to themselves as they should. Secure attached people know how to balance the two. But avoidant attached people are not ordinary. I'll use personal examples. People I know, incredible chefs. Larry plays the guitar, writes some incredible songs. My son started playing the piano when he was two and a half years old. My daughter could read attachment style, one of my daughters can read attachment style like it's nobody's business. Picked up the guitar, taught herself. She's incredibly charming. Everyone just absolutely loves her. And it's just a few in my circle. Clients I have, they're all incredibly talented people. One of them just picks up languages and learns them like nobody's business, travels the world. So they're not ordinary people. They're people who, just like anxious attached and secure attached, they're looking for a space they can feel safe in.

SPEAKER_00 57:53

So I hope that clears it up.

SPEAKER_01 57:56

Can avoid and detach people heal and break patterns without therapy? It is going to be difficult, but it is possible. It is possible for anyone to heal their patterns and break their patterns if they are determined to do so. First, you have to recognize the pattern. The thing is, the avoidant detached person, if they can recognize their patterns, they can very well break them, heal them. It's not going to be easy and you've got to do it consistently. I've used the analogy of I've used the analogy of working out to build muscles. You know, you've got to go four times, five times a week to the gym and do it consistently. Watch what you're eating, you know, watch it, watching your diet. If you want to build a physical physique, if you want to, if you have a goal, a physical goal that you want to achieve, you've got to be consistent with it. You've got to be mindful of all of your actions that's going to lead you to the results that you want. It's the same thing with emotional healing. You've got to be consistent with it and you've got to watch what goes into your mind, filter things out. It is work, but I promise you it is going to be worth it as long as you can do it. So, yes, you can heal patterns. It's something that I did to a degree, but having a therapist working with a therapist surely helped a lot more.

SPEAKER_00 59:31

But yeah, it can be done.

SPEAKER_01 59:37

Alrighty, let me just run through, get your questions here that you just sent in.

SPEAKER_00 59:45

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 59:46

Curious about the difference between dismissive avoidant and fearful avoidant. It takes so much mindfulness to not take that personally. Buddhism helped me. I'm not pushing that on anyone, and it's not a religion, just to clear that up. I assume he is an avoidant because I guess the runaway. Oh, that is wanting to know the difference between fearful avoidant and dismissive avoidant. All right. All right, let's let's deal with that for oof just just a minute, and then I'm going to talk more about it on the podcast. The difference between a dismissive avoidant and a fearful avoidant is a dismissive avoidant does not need a relationship. A fearful avoidant wants to have a relationship, but they do not want to lose their independence and autonomy. That means fearful avoidant, they want a connection, they want to be with someone, but they don't want that person controlling their every moves or sharing opinions. Now, make this simple. And then I asked, have you written any songs? And he said, No, I can't write songs. I said, Of course you can. So he started writing. To date, it's over 60 songs, beautifully written. I call him my new Beatles. Now, regardless of what the songs are about, if he's writing about an ex, he's writing about his life. That's none of my business. I support his art and his talent. That gives him a safe space. If I talk about a project in my life, I'm starting a new project. The most he'll ask is this not too much? And I say no. He's like, okay, you got this. And that's it. We're looking for people who are supporting us and safe spaces. Now, as someone who's fearful avoidant and in therapy, if he met with someone else and that person's like, yeah, you shouldn't do that because that's not good for you, or you should leave, you shouldn't leave your job and take on music, that doesn't make him feel so good. As human beings, we're looking for support. We're looking for someone who's got our back. So avoidant attached people, fearful avoidant attached people, they're looking for the freedom to live life and enjoy it without someone trying to stop them and steer them in the direction that person wants them to go. A dismissive avoidant, they don't need a connection. They've built a life, they've learned on their own that they could survive without human connection and they're fine. So a dismissive avoidant attached person, if they do finally get into a relationship, you will find that they either will get into one or two relationships. The first one may not have lasted a long time. The second one is a deliberate act to try this thing again, but they don't, if that relationship ends, chances are they won't get into another one. They don't do the chasing. Again, they don't need a relationship. A fearful avoidant, they may feel pressure in the relationship, pull back, and then they'll, after some time, they'll miss the good times with you. They may try to rebuild, but if they get reminders of why the relationship wasn't working in the first place, they're going to try to detach, but they're caught between wanting their independence and wanting to be with you. They just don't want to lose it. And a secure attached person will not give up either. They will want connection, but they also want their independence. And but the difference is they can communicate about it. And then there's the fearful avoidant that leans more anxious, and the one that leans more on the dismissive side. You find a dismissive avoidant or the one that leans more dismissive.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:48

They're more respectful, they're not very opinionated.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:59

They're because they're more, they're a lot more on a quiet side, they listen a lot more, they're very good at reading people. Those with the leaning more anxious, very opinionated, can be controlling, appear to be more insecure. They will talk more about bring up stuff on your exes, stuff like that. And both can be healed. It might be a little harder to heal those with a dismissive avoidant. If you if you're here and you're listening, then yes, that's a step forward, but generally they don't want to because again, they don't need connection. Those are the ones that you will find don't really entertain therapy or any coaching, any help. That's it for today. This recording is going to be on the podcast. The podcast is called Decoding Attachment Styles, and until next Wednesday.