87: Why You Can’t Stop Thinking About Him (It’s Not What You Think)

You’re not just thinking about him.
Your mind is racing. Your body is activated. And no matter how much you try to figure it out, you can’t seem to let it go.

So you tell yourself you just need clarity.
You just need to understand what’s going on.

But that’s not what’s actually happening.

In this episode, I’m breaking down why women ruminate when it comes to emotionally unavailable men — and why it has nothing to do with not understanding him.

It has everything to do with what you already feel… and don’t want to face.

I share my own experience of being in a relationship where inconsistency, silence, and emotional withdrawal kept me stuck in a loop of anxiety, overthinking, and trying to make sense of behavior that didn’t feel right.

We talk about:

•  why inconsistency activates your nervous system 
•  how rumination becomes a way to avoid what you already know 
•  the deeper patterns that keep you stuck in the loop 
•  why overthinking gives the illusion of control, but keeps you from making a decision 

Emotionally unavailable men create confusion.
Emotionally willing men create clarity.

This episode is about understanding why the spiral happens — so you can start to see it differently.

Connect with Darla Ridilla: 

Book a Magnetic Connections Call: https://www.highvaluewoman.info/call

3 Keys to Magnetizing Emotionally Available Men masterclass: https://www.highvaluewoman.info/masterclass

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Send me an email: highvaluewoman7@gmail.com

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Emotionally unavailable men create an environment of confusion. They want you to ruminate because it keeps you in that loop. And then they give you the small dopamine hits and it keeps you attached just enough so you won't leave. Welcome to You Have the Power, The Road to Truth Freedom and Real Connection. This podcast is for women who are done asking why emotionally unavailable men keep showing up and are finally ready to change the way they relate. The chemistry is always there, the potential looks promising, but the consistency, death, and emotional presence just never fully arrive. You are in the right place. Here we work through the magnetic connection pathway. Agency empowerment. Because emotionally unavailable men aren't the problem. They're the feedback. And when you stop managing relationships that require you to disappear, emotionally willing men are magnetized to you. Let's begin. You're not sitting there calmly waiting for his call or his text. You're not calmly thinking about what he does or he doesn't do. Your mind is racing. Your chest feels tight. Your heart is racing. And the more he pulls away, the more you chase him. The more you try to reach him, the more you try to understand him. But you're you're not overthinking because you don't understand him. You're overthinking because you know something isn't right. And you just either can't put your finger on it, or maybe you just simply don't want to. And what you're often thinking is, I do need to understand what's going on. I just need clarity from him. I need to be more compassionate. And if I think this through and figure it out, I'm gonna feel better. So I do know how that feels because I've been there. When I was with my second ex-husband, he would often disappear for several hours. He would either not answer his phone, his phone would be off, or it would take repeated calls and texts from me to get him to react. Inside my body, I was spiraling, I was freaking out. And because I couldn't face the truth of what was really happening, what he was really doing, because deep down subconsciously, I knew he was cheating on me, but I created another story in my mind to avoid that reality. So I told myself, hey, surely he wouldn't be ignoring my calls. I'm his wife. Why would he do such a thing? He has to be hurt. He must have wrecked his car or his motorcycle. What if he's dead? And the panic that came up in me was so unbearable in the moment. The emotions on the surface were so strong that I went into full-blown panic mode. And I started repeatedly texting, repeatedly calling, doing crazy making things that weren't even really who I was before I met him. So I do know what that panic feels like. I was so desperate to get that dopamine hit of hearing from him that I was willing to piss him off to get it. And of course, it doesn't take much to piss off a narcissist because that's their whole goal is to piss you off so you react. And that whole act of being gaslit drove me to behaviors that were totally out of character for me. But when he would go dark on his phone and I couldn't reach him, I just couldn't face the reality that maybe the reason, the real reason he's not answering his phone is because he's with another woman. And because my body knew something was wrong, it chose the easier explanation that it could handle because I wasn't ready to face the truth of what was happening. I didn't want to really admit that he was cheating on me because then that meant our relationship was over. It meant that he didn't love me the way I thought he did. And the person I was then couldn't face that. So, as women, why do we do this? Why do we ruminate? Why do we overthink when it comes to emotionally unavailable men? It's because emotionally unavailable men are often unpredictable. I've said many times that the only predictable thing about an emotionally unavailable man is their unpredictability. They do a lot of things to get you to feel safe in the beginning. They love bomb, they pay you a lot of attention, they future fake. And then when they start to withdraw it, you'll do anything to get it back. Whether it's with an avoidant personality or a narcissist or someone who's playing games, gaslighting, or just once, just simply once access without earning it. They'll create this confusion to keep you in a loop. It's like I've said before about the slot machine at the casino. They have it, so you'll get winnings just enough to keep you putting coins into that machine. And that's what emotionally unavailable men do. And this is what creates that rumination pattern. Because when there's a lot of inconsistency, your nervous system just can't relax. It can't feel safe. It wants to. So just like I couldn't admit to myself that my ex was cheating on me, I created this whole story in my head of why he would do such a thing to hurt me, to make me feel bad. And what I created was a cycle of emotional whiplash. So when he would finally call, when he would finally text back, even if he was angry, it was that dopamine hit. It was that winning money on the slot machine. But then when he withdrew again, I would go through the cycle all over again. And I have to say, every time I went through it, it got worse. The anxiety increased, it came on faster. The unbearable feeling of I have to make this feeling go away right now came on stronger and faster every single time. I didn't trust what I felt. I didn't trust I could face the truth of what I felt. So I leaned into uncertainty. It was what felt familiar to me, and it's what gave me the justification to stay in the relationship. And I will say that I often ruminate in many situations, not just romantic relationships when I feel out of control. My mind starts to race. I start to go over every single detail. What did I do right? What did I do wrong? Why is he upset with me? Why isn't he texting? What did I say to upset him? Because your mind is trying to fix it. You just keep feeling like if I can just figure out the problem, then I can figure out what the solution is. And if I know what the solution is, I won't lose him. He'll want to be with me. This will feel good. This will feel safe. Because rumination actually gives you the illusion of control when the reality of it is you don't have control at all. In fact, in your mind, you've lost control. The other connection for me when my ex would go silent on his phone is it it was deeper than me being upset with him. There was a deeper core wound inside of me because when I was a child, my mother would use silent treatment as a form of punishment when she didn't get what she wanted. So if I didn't do exactly what she wanted me to do, she would ignore me for days, not make eye contact, not talk to me, refuse to acknowledge me if I approached her. And I've heard people say that silent treatment is just the same as creating a physical pain in your body, because I would feel it on my chest, like a tightness. This is why solitary confinement in jails works so well, because as social creatures, when we are ignored or separated from connection, it creates this deep wound or panic inside of us. And so when my ex-husband would ignore me, it was like I was 10 years old all over again. And it was my mom refusing to acknowledge I existed. So when you feel that anxiety, when you're trying to regain control, when you're ignoring the signals that your body is sending you that something is off, and maybe subconsciously it's also connecting to a story from a past experience. It is your mind and your body trying to feel safe in a situation that isn't safe. It might feel familiar, and that's the crazy thing about our nervous system is sometimes what is the worst thing for us? It actually tells you, like a con man, this is good. This is what you're used to, this is what you're familiar with. It's when we give into that rumination that we give into the chaos and anxiety. And for me, if I created a story and I just kept overthinking it and explaining his behavior, that I didn't have to admit that I made a mistake by marrying this person, that I needed to leave this relationship, that I couldn't face being alone at that point in my life. I didn't know how to do that. So the pain of leaving for me in that moment was worse than the pain of the rumination and the anxiety that I went through on a daily basis. I had a narrative in my head that he was the love of my life. And I never loved any man like him. I couldn't live without him. And so, in order to support that narrative, I was stuck in that rumination loop. And what I didn't know at the time is that the longer I kept overthinking about him and his behavior, the longer I was delaying making a decision about him based on that behavior. And in those moments, what I also didn't know is I gave away all my power. He was in control and he knew it and he thrived on it. He got off on it because he liked making me feel bad. And I didn't know I was playing right into his hands, that everything depended on whether he reacted to me. And I had a dream last night about this, and all those same emotions came up about when he didn't answer my phone call. I hadn't felt that in a long time. It was so real. I know it was my brain processing now what I couldn't do many years ago. If you don't hear anything else in this episode, hear this emotionally unavailable men create an environment of confusion. They want you to ruminate because it keeps you in that loop. And then you give you the small dopamine hit and it keeps you attached just enough so you won't leave. It's a lot of mental effort, it's a lot of emotional labor. But the difference is that an emotionally willing man will not do that. He doesn't play games, he doesn't want you to be anxious. He wants you to feel safe in the relationship because he also wants to feel safe in the relationship. And if there's anxiety, chaos, rumination, neither one of you are gonna relax into being your full authentic self, connecting on a healthy level. He wants to be honest, he may have boundaries on when he can answer the phone. Maybe he's at work, but he'll say, Hey, I'm gonna be in a meeting for a couple hours, I'll call you back as soon as I can. He makes good on his promises. So even in the times, if he does accidentally forget to return your phone call, because he is a human being, we've done it, you won't feel that anxiety. You'll be able to sit back and say, I don't know why he hasn't returned my phone call when he said, but there must be a good reason. You're not gonna spiral, you may be concerned, you may be frustrated, but you're not gonna get into that rumination loop. And when you do, and that emotionally unavailable man gives you a bunch of crap, remember his inconsistency has nothing to do with you. It isn't that you're too much, you're not crazy, it's just your nervous system responding. Your body all these years has been trying to protect you, but you didn't know that. So overthinking was your coping mechanism, it was your strategy, it was what soothed you. And as you go through your week, I'd like to invite you to really be more in touch with what your body is saying to you when you are talking to that man, whether you're in a relationship or dating or you're just getting to know each other online, what is your body saying about what he's doing or not doing? And just listen to that. Just be aware of it. Because the episode for next week, we're actually going to talk about the distinct difference between what is rumination and what is clear thinking. If anything in this in this episode touched something in you, felt familiar, you know, realized, well, I have been ruminating and it's it's really uncomfortable, and I really don't want to do this anymore. I have a pattern with emotionally unavailable men, and you know what? I'm ready to do what's necessary to be with an emotionally willing man. Let's have a conversation. I'm gonna invite you into the Magnetic Connections call. It's a 30-minute conversation where we're gonna talk about what the patterns are that you've been experiencing and what your next step is into attracting that emotionally willing man. Keep listening. And remember, you have the power. Now it's time to act like it. Thank you for listening to You Have the Power, the Road to Truth, Freedom, and Real Connection. If something landed while you were listening, pay attention to that. Emotionally unavailable men aren't a mystery to solve. They're information. They show you exactly where you've been waiting, minimizing, or tolerating what doesn't actually work for you. This podcast isn't here to teach you how to manage that dynamic better. It's here to help you stop participating in it. Like it, share it, and subscribe so you stay connected to my connect too much. You're just done betraying yourself.