Episode 9: The Dynamics of Adult Romantic Attachment

In this episode of 'Love Liaisons', Kathryn and Marina dive into the complexities of attachment styles in adult romantic relationships, with insights from licensed therapist Lana. They discuss how early life experiences shape our intimacy and how different attachment styles—secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized—manifest in relationships. The conversation touches on recognizing patterns, the impact of childhood trauma, and strategies for moving towards emotional security. The episode also explores the difficulties middle-aged men face with commitment and offers practical advice for dating and self-reflection. Emphasizing the importance of personal growth and self-love, the hosts encourage listeners to understand their own attachment needs and to seek healthier connections.

*For more information or relationship coaching contact Marina at marinaismindful@gmail.com or Lana at lana.lip6@gmail.com for couples therapy.

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For more information about assessing adult attachment styles see:

THE RELATIONSHIPS QUESTIONNAIRE (RQ)

Bartholomew, K. & Horowitz, L. M. (1991). Attachment styles among young adults: A test of a four category model. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61, 226-244.

https://labs.psychology.illinois.edu/~rcfraley/measures/rq.html

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For more information about relationship and mindful life coaching  or speaking engagements contact Marina at marinaismindful@gmail.com

Transcript

Kathryn 0:14

Welcome to Love Liaisons, the ultimate deep dive into the highs and lows and hilarity of modern relationships. I'm Kathryn

Marina 0:25

and I'm Marina. And we'll be your love liaisons. So pour yourself a nice glass of wine

Kathryn 0:32

or a hot cup of tea, and let's dive in.

Marina 0:35

Today we'll be talking about attachment and adult romantic relationships. So we're definitely gonna need something to drink for this one. So what are you drinking, Kathryn?

Kathryn 0:46

I am drinking some rose hip tea. And the reason I'm drinking that is because, when I think about going on a date or in a relationship, I love it when a gentleman comes to my door with flowers. So some roses always, will start the date off, right? So tell me, Marina, what are you drinking?

Marina 1:06

So today I'm drinking a special glass of wine. It's a Cinsaut that I got from Adelaida Winery and I thought it fit well with today's topic because I recently took an amazing trip by myself to Paso Robles and went to this wonderful winery that was like one of their first estate wineries. And so I'm having a lovely glass of this so, cheers.

Kathryn 1:33

Cheers. And Lana, what do you have there today? We have wonderful Lana here today. We're gonna introduce her.

Lana 1:40

Thank you Kathryn. Today I'm drinking some sparkling water because I need to be able to articulate all of this attachment struggles that we go through. And as much as I love wine, I think that. Or today I'm gonna do the sparkling water so that I have all my brain power. That sounds good. Today's episode is all about attachment issues in romantic relationships. Why do we cling, avoid, overthink. I do that a lot. Overthink when we love how do our early life experiences shape our adult intimacy?

Marina 2:18

So we're gonna explore how insecure attachment can show up in our lives. How to assess our own attachment styles. There's quite a few questionnaires I like to use the RQ or the relationship questionnaire, and also ways to move towards a more secure connection. We'll talk about therapies we'll talk about some clinical cases and our own experience of course from a variety of perspective.

Kathryn 2:49

Wonderful. And as I mentioned we are joined by the amazing Lana, a licensed therapist with a background in psychodynamic therapy. So Lana, welcome.

Lana 3:00

Thank you Kathryn. So glad to be here. Thank you so much, Marina. So when I think about relationships, and I've been doing this for probably 15 years now, and I've worked with hundreds of couples over the years. And when I conceptualize relationships I try my best to look at the couple as a system. Yes, they're two separate individuals, but they're really creating something else that is larger than the two of them together. And how attachment styles and attachment theory basically goes into this dynamic of the two becoming one is with the triggers. So each person is going to trigger each other in the relationship. And if you think about it, that's what a relationship is supposed to do because ultimately we want to grow as individuals and we also want to heal. The whole idea of being in relationship is unconsciously to heal our childhood wounds because we get wounded in relationships with our caregivers. And that kind of wounding sometimes is even preverbal. It could even be in utero based on certain studies, and it can even be, with epigenetics becoming a important topic, it could also be generational. So what does attachment have to do with all of this? It's that we get wounded in relationships with our caregivers. Maybe a caregiver wasn't available because it was your mother and she suffered from postpartum depression, so she had to focus on her own internal state and she couldn't be there for the child. So grandma had to take over or the father had to take over, but the child knew that something was wrong because the mom was emotionally unavailable. So that child grows up. He already has the blueprint of seeking an unavailable caregiver. And what does he do? He finds an unavailable female or male to attach to and then comes to therapy because his relationships aren't working out. He's feeling defeated and depressed and anxious, severe anxiety, and he doesn't know why. When we find out that his attachment style, for example, is anxious/preoccupied, that means he's fearing abandonment, seeking constant reassurance, and he's in a relationship with an avoidant, unavailable female. Then here is the problem, the unit is broken, and we try to fix the unit in couples counseling. So this is how I look at all of my couples. And of course, we're gonna dive more into this topic. It's a good time to go over the four attachment styles right now.

Marina 5:47

So you really gave us a good sense of what that may look like in this system. That's a relationship rather than just looking at it an individual. But let's start back from the basics. Maybe some people are familiar with attachment theory, some people may not be. So I just wanted to mention that attachment theory comes from the work of John Bowlby and was later expanded by Mary Ainsworth with the research she did and the strange situation. And it really tells us the ways that we were cared for as infants. Whether there was consistency, whether there was attunement or neglect, and that really shapes expectations for intimacy and safety for many of us into adulthood. So like Lana, you mentioned already an example of an anxious attachment style and most researchers talk about there being four adult attachment styles. So there's secure attachment, there's one secure, and then there's three insecure ones. So definitely I think there's like a negative bias to this. So there's one way to be secure and that's pretty much if you feel comfortable with closeness, you feel comfortable with autonomy. And then like you mentioned, there could be like anxious or preoccupied where you have fears of abandonment and you need reassurance. Then you could be avoidant or dismissive and these are folks Like really value independence and downplay their emotions or the need for this kind of intimate emotional connection. And then finally there could be a fearful or disorganized where, a lot of these folks maybe had abuse in their early relationship and they may want closeness, but are afraid of it due to this kind of unresolved trauma due to inconsistencies in their life. And we'll put a link in our podcast here in our notes. But the RQ, the relationship questionnaire is really one thing that I use to, help assess and figure out how to describe and how to classify. If you wanna figure out what do you think your own attachment style is.

Kathryn 8:00

I know, I'm curious. I've done this many times, but who knows? I wonder if even it changes through time or through relationships that you have. And so I guess, what are the root causes of attention seeking behavior in people who lack internal security, would you say?

Lana 8:18

When you think about different styles of interacting with others how does someone come across socially? There are people that want to be the life of the party. They need constant attention. They talk to everybody. They need to. Exert their energy onto the world. That's one type of person. Then there's someone who likes to sit at a party in the corner waiting for people to come to them. And then there's people who morph into what other people need in the room. So they're gonna judge the room and then become what someone else needs. So Kathryn, with attention seeking individuals, they might have not gotten mirrored by their caregivers, so they feel empty inside, perhaps, or unaware that they have this need to get validation from others. And how they do it is by appearing to be confident, outgoing. And it can look as confidence, but it really is them trying to self-regulate their emotions because they didn't get enough of that perhaps when they were young. So they feel anxiety inside and getting attention helps them feel more real. Now, if a person like that wants to grow, they might try to find a therapist or some kind of modality to heal that inner child. And this is what I use attachment theory for. I think it has a great purpose in a private practice because it lets you know what parts of that person need to be healed. So we identify what their style is, and then we work on the most important thing, which is how can they give themself that. What they did not get. A famous mentor of mine his name is Paul Haly. He wrote it several books and he said to me that after childhood, after you're 18, 17, you cannot expect to get any of these needs met from another person. It is now your job, your childhood is over, and this is where you have to meet that for yourself. Of course, we can heal in relationship and we can find a partner that can mirror us, but the true job of healing attachment is ours and ours alone because part of being an adult is learning to rely on yourself. And what we find that the most difficult part of being in a relationship with someone is when we have these expectations. So when an individual who needs constant attention. And is trying to get that from his or her partner. The partner becomes exhausted. And the partner can never give enough. So the partner's exhausted. The partner's depleted and always feels like they're failing because even if they gave attention 24/7, it still wouldn't be enough for that individual because that's a need that did not get met in childhood. So we help that attention seeking individual meet that need for themself. And one way that they can accomplish this is by starting to get grounded in their body coming out of their mind. And starting to feel feelings in their body and then self-soothing through grounding work or, other things that help ground a person walking barefoot, certain modalities to help them feel connected to something other than their mind. Because it is in the mind that all of these problems exist. And I know Marina does a lot of work with mindfulness, it is in the mind that the problems exist. And when you're grounded in your body and aware of your space and time, you're more present to your reality and maybe out of fear that normally exists.

Kathryn 12:18

I guess my question is, how does the partner in the relationship that's dealing with someone who needs constant attention and the other partner doesn't need constant attention? You mentioned the person getting exhausted. How would be the best route that you would say to this type of couple to handle this? In a relationship?

Lana 12:38

My advice would be we have to go to the source. We have to take each discussion down to the source of the problem. Usually a couple with this dynamic will argue over maybe not spending enough time together, not having enough emotional intimacy or physical intimacy, because for the fearful partner, it's always not enough. So they're arguing about the time not spent, the things not done. They're in a power struggle essentially. But if we bring it down two levels, we will see that it's actually the need that's not met. So they have to start communicating with each other based on old wounds that got triggered in childhood. And there's scripts for this. They're dialogues. It's a Gottman dialogue. So how do we do this? We talk about look, I know this is that time right now that you feel like you're alone. Do you feel like you're alone? Do you feel no one's with you in this space? And maybe the partner will say, yes, I'm feeling very neglected when I can't, Cuddle with you for two hours in the morning. I know it sounds like a lot, but maybe that's what they need to get regulated. But you don't. You can't because you have to go to work. So talking about that fear and this is a lot of work, bring this fear that is brought up in them, that you are still there even though you can't cuddle for two hours, that you are still there, even if you can't spend this much time with them. And this will slowly, hopefully start to sink into their unconscious and start reprogramming that fear that nobody's there for them then also using touch, so them touching you until they feel that you are real enough. You telling them that you're here, that you're present for them. So you see we're working on the unconscious, we're working on the childhood wound. We're not talking about the actual facts of the relationship, which are okay, you didn't go to the movie with them or you Didn't give them what they needed in that moment. We're trying to do this on a deeper level, and even though it takes time and effort, there are some rewards to this because eventually when the healing occurs, you have a much deeper connection mimicking a connection and this is not in a maternal, paternal way, but a early caregiver way., You're feeling seen, the lines start to blur between partner and caregiver it's a very healing process and it starts with coming to a therapist that can facilitate that and then you practice these tools at home.

Marina 15:11

So it seems like this kind of emotional security, as you mentioned, really develops over time in relationships where feelings that partners have are acknowledged and respected, and separation doesn't threaten that bond and conflict doesn't threaten that bond when it moves towards a secure attachment. I wanted to mention one thing that I do believe that is somewhat contrary to a lot of our Western popular belief is that when we're adults, I think we still have serious attachment needs. And. It's not just the case that boom, we're adults and we could live on our own and completely rely on ourselves. People still have attachment needs. They differ from when we're children, but they're still there. And I see that present in a lot of people. And insecure folks often don't have that kind of history where they have a chance to have a secure relationship.

Kathryn 16:17

So when we speak of secure and insecure. I could talk even a little bit about myself. And I know that there's certain things that make me feel very secure in a relationship. Like when, the partner is being transparent with finances, because of what I've been through with my ex, all of that. And it's really a pain point for me, a trigger point, if you will. If someone I feel is not being totally transparent with their finances, I don't wanna. Find out later on that they have, a hundred thousand dollars in credit card debt But before even getting to a relationship, dating experiences, I know it makes me feel very insecure when someone talks a lot about their ex, or talks a lot about physicality. You would think it'd be wonderful if someone says, oh my gosh, you look so hot. It's a turnoff for me. It's fine if they wanna say that I'm beautiful, something like that. But if they're focusing on a first date, all the physicality, I. It's not gonna make me feel secure wanting a second date with that person. There's so much more to talk about, and especially as I'm getting older I want someone that's going to be by my bedside caring for me and, bringing me watermelon because I like to eat watermelon. The simple things. I don't need someone spending two hours in the gym and he is spending two hours telling me how he's working on his muscles. And, it's gonna be a turnoff. It's gonna make me feel very insecure in accepting a second date with this person. So about you, Marina? What are some things that make you feel insecure? We can get into the secure part, that's the good stuff. But what are some things that make you feel insecure? And I'm sure our listeners are gonna be able to resonate with this.

Marina 17:59

Absolutely. I actually wanted to first read a summary of what is the description of a secure attachment style and some of the insecure ones. So in general, from the relationship questionnaire a description of a secure attachment style would be: It's easy for me to become emotionally close to others. I'm comfortable depending on them and having them depend on me. I don't worry about being alone or having others not accept me. So for me, I'm gonna go backwards towards your question. Feeling secure would be like, even if the person's not there with me, I. Hey, I'm busy. I'm a mom. I have a career. I travel. Even if, and they are too. Even if they're not there with me, I still feel like we're together. It doesn't feel like if we're not able to see each other for a week, it threatens the relationship for me. And there's something that maintains the bridge. We talk on the phone. We text, maybe even share memes, There's some sort of connection so it doesn't feel there's distance and then I don't know where they are and. A more anxious kind of an attachment would be described as a preoccupied or anxious attachment. That's when I wanna be completely emotionally intimate with others. I often find others are reluctant to get as close as I would like. I'm uncomfortable being without close relationships, but I sometimes worry that others don't value me as much as I value them. I can't say that I'm like a hundred percent secure. Even though these things are categories, I feel like I'm on a spectrum. Yeah, some things do make me feel insecure, where sometimes I may have this negative self view or positive view of others of I want to attain something. I want to feel like I'm an important part of their life. So what makes me feel insecure is when I'm not made a priority, and it doesn't mean that I have to be number one. I understand people have children, people have caregiving roles, they have professional roles, but it's you wanna feel like if you're somebody's partner, you're at least in the top three. They'll get to you. So when it's like they never get to you, you feel like, do I even matter? And that's what makes me feel insecure. I don't even make your top five list. Okay, where are we now?

Kathryn 20:32

Yeah. Next. What did we say on one of the episodes? He is just not that into you. For me and Lana, you can comment on what Marina and I said, But. For me, I talked about the insecurities, but as far as securities are concerned having adult conversations, I think that I've discussed this with you Lana a few times, that's one of the things, the main thing that makes me feel attracted to someone, knowing that I can have adult conversations deep connections. That's honestly more important than really most things. Even just sending a text message in the morning. Good morning, sunshine. I'm looking forward to seeing you tonight. That just makes me feel good. It starts my day really well. And how much time does that really take? Just to send a little text message like that, just letting me know even, Hey, I had such a good time on our date tonight, just wanted to let you know. I'm looking forward to hearing from you. Take some minute to do that, and it makes someone feel so special, and I don't think it's over the top, but for me, that's gonna make me feel secure going on a second date, with someone entering an exclusive, serious relationship, if you will, how you may call it. All of that applies. But being able to partake, in activities together, we don't have to have all the same similarities, but, I'm looking for my rock, so it's someone that can lift me up when I'm down and vice versa. Because my whole life, I've been the rock for myself, for everyone in my life. And so I'm looking for someone to take on that role. And so if I feel like someone is doing that I start to feel, more secure

Marina 22:11

And now I had a minute to think about it while also listening to you and I think one of the main things for me to feel secure is that if I can feel like I can count on somebody, that they're there for me when I need them. They're, some people are there like, they wanna go on the dates, they wanna do all the fun and sexy stuff. But will you be there? If I have a problem, will you be there? If I'm hurt, will you be there to help me fix something or put something together or listen when something happens are they there for the tough moments? Are you there? That's what makes me feel secure if somebody's there, if I feel like I can count on them in the good and the bad.

Kathryn 22:55

That's the way it should be. Unfortunately in this day and age, and maybe once again, we're from California. We live in California, so maybe it's a California thing, I'm not sure. But it's nuts that that's just not the norm. But it's not, we talked about in another episode how someone says, Hey, what you doing? WYD mean, that's completely ridiculous in my opinion, especially at our age. But even if you're in your twenties I don't wanna hear that. Lana, what do you think about, what we're saying about the insecurities. Insecurities that we feel moving forward or not in relationships?

Lana 23:29

I think that. I call it relationship poker. When you sit down and play poker, you don't know what cards they're holding. You know what you have once the cards are drawn, so you're going on a date, one date, two, date four, date five. You still don't know what cards they're holding. They're sending their representative, whether it's male or female, but I can focus on the males because I'm female. You are seeing their representative. You don't know that they have, say, a card that has debt. They have lots of debt. You don't know that they have a card, that they have a connection to an ex-partner that they're friends with. You don't know that they're telling you they're looking for a relationship, but really they're not sure and they just want to see what kind of variety they can, find and the different people that exist. All of this is completely unknown because. You are just meeting the person's representative. And this is why taking things slow is so important. I know that anytime I rushed into something, the skeletons came out couple of months in and I got to see who the person was. But already we were committed in a relationship talking about future and then it's hard to put the brakes on because you've already told your mom, your friends, and everybody that you found the one. So that's one thing. And then the other thing is I think that especially in middle age, it's a numbers game. There are many more women that want to be in committed, monogamous relationships in general, just from what I observe with friends and clients that want to be in committed relationships compared to men. Why? Because middle aged men. Some of them do wanna be in a relationship. They find the women pretty quickly if they wanna be in a relationship, because there are so many nice, kind, empathetic, beautiful women, especially in California. If they're on an app or they're out for six, seven months, they wanna be in a relationship. They find somebody and there you go. They're off the market. So who is on the market? The men on the market are the men that are just shopping. I say, anybody that's on the app for more than like a year and a half, unless they've had some trauma happen and they're dealing with their life, then they're shopping. And you have to identify the shoppers right away because the shoppers wanna shop because there's variety and there's so many women like us that want to be in a relationship. That they know it's a numbers game and all they have to do is show up well for the first couple of months, get what they want, and then say, oh, I don't think I'm ready. Oh I just, I have too much, work or whatever. But in, in the beginning, they were all very ready. So what do we do what do you suggest?

Kathryn 26:18

And I think we brought up the whole bread crumbing, right? How they were talking about men in their fifties. You were telling me about this. Did you wanna share about what that would be?

Lana 26:27

Sure. There's actually a Bethany Frankel video and she said that she's dated everybody, every age group, and the worst are in their fifties because a guy in his fifties he's had the career he has some savings, he has the house, he's had the kids. The kids are grown. He wants freedom and he wants a pen pal, because a real guy who wants a relationship is gonna communicate. And like Marina said, he is gonna show up when you need him. When you have a dog emergency, a kid emergency, he is gonna come and he is gonna be prepared to go and help you. But a lot of guys who've already done that for 20 years, they're exhausted. They just finished dealing with all their problems. And maybe they still have problems like alimony and kids in college to pay for. Do they wanna take on. More responsibility because taking on a woman, believe it or not, whether she's self-sufficient, we come with emotions and we come with needs. And we need a guy who's gonna be responsible for a little bit of that. We're not asking them to be responsible for everything, but for a little bit. Yes. And they know that because they've been married, they've had long-term relationships, they know what they're getting into. So when they say they're committed, they know it's committing to helping you solve the problems. How do they not commit? They breadcrumb. What is bread crumbing? They'll send a, Hey, what are you doing? You wanna get dinner? Okay, let's get dinner. What are they hoping that they get dinner and then they get something after dinner and they wanna see how often they can get the something after. And the dinner. Without investing anymore, what would the anymore be? It would be a commitment, it would be a title. It would be introducing to friends. It would be everything. And eventually, hopefully, a ring on your finger. So bread crumbing is the way to. Have somebody to listen to them. They're getting their oral and narcissistic needs met. Whether or not they're a narcissist is besides the point, but they're getting your eyes and ears and the eyes and ears of a beautiful woman in their eyes is, it's priceless. It's the thing that makes them feel alive. You've been on a date with a nice guy. He orders two, three glasses of wine, and all he does is talk about himself. And notice he's talking about the past because they know, when they talk about the past and how great they were in college and how great their business did in 2009 or 10 it's all about the past. Why are they talking about the past? Because they don't wanna talk about the future. Because if they talk about the future, they need to talk about you. So when they're not talking about you in the future and they're talking about the past, that's a sign that they just want an audience. And right now you're the pretty girl giving them attention. I get passionate about this because as you can tell, this has had happened over and over again.

Kathryn 29:07

I wanna break this up a little bit. When I think of what you're saying, Marina, and when I think of what you're saying, Lana, it really makes me think of the song by Adele, Someone like you. Because this whole song reflects the anxious desire for connection and the fear of being forgotten. So I'm gonna do a little song here. Probably not gonna sound like Adele, but that's okay. But it goes into, I've heard that you've settled down, that you found a girl and married now, I hate to turn up out of the blue uninvited, but I couldn't stay away. I couldn't fight it. I had hoped that you'd see my face and that you'd be Reminded that for me, it's not over. So that says a lot. When I listen to this song, I think, oh my gosh, she has issues. But but it's true that a lot of people, even with a breakup, it's hard to move on. And even in dating they're thinking, okay, is this person gonna text me again? And it's very prevalent.

Marina 30:08

Great choice, Kathryn. Great choice of song. And sometimes I've wanted to find someone like you or someone like him, but I really, one thing you said, Lana, that I really liked was first of all this idea of the relational poker where you don't know what cards they have and you don't know what red flags they're holding. And I was really struck by this idea that, men around 50 or in their fifties are actually the hardest to date. Because I myself had this experience that I've shared with people. A couple of years ago I dated who I thought was a great guy, early fifties, successful, owned his home, good career, made, quite a bit more than me. And I kept thinking about like a future. Now I still have a school aged kid, and we went and, he was so generous with me. Took me on vacation, even took me and my kid on vacation. And then lo and behold, his youngest child graduated high school boy was gonna go off to college or the army. He was like, son, you pick it, college, military. But I'm washing my hands of this whole thing. He bought a boat, wanted to move back to the Bay Area and one fine day just told me I got a job offer back in the Bay Area. Me and my boat are sailing up north. You know where my family is? I'm done with the kids, and I was like, what about me? Where do where do I fit in, into this? I can't just up pack a bag and move to San Francisco as much as I'd love to'cause I've got responsibilities here. That really resonated with me when you said that, Lana.

Lana 31:48

I've heard this so many times, Marina, because it's basically a question of why didn't he tell you that he had this plan for freedom? He probably knew about it on some level, and we don't know, but we know the side effect of that, which is how you were left holding this reality. Were you the only one in this relationship that you were sharing this with him? How in there was he with you? And there's no way to know because he was holding the cards and he didn't reveal all of that. I'm sorry that happened to you. Because it does shatter some of. Our own trust in ourself at times. How can you not know, and there's no way to know.

Kathryn 32:33

And I think this goes back to the theme, the Kathryn theme that I've been saying throughout these episodes is, you gotta live your life. If someone's gonna come into your life and add to it, great. The way I look at it is, Marina got fabulous vacations. Her son got to experience in that. So I try to focus on the positive. It's unfortunate what the end outcome was, but you still had that amazing time at that time. But I think if people start to focus on, okay, now, instead of focusing on like this Adele song, how she's so upset, I'm still here, I'm still thinking of you, instead of being able to move on. And everybody handles things differently. But if people go into things thinking, okay, I'm gonna enjoy in the moment and whatever happens, I'm living my life, I have my career, I have my family, then you know what, if it works out even better, that's the cherry on the cake. But if not, but we do want, and I think you'll respond to this, Lana, we do want to feel like we can trust the person and feel confident that they're moving forward. But guess what? There are no guarantees in life.

Lana 33:38

Yes, Kathryn. That's true. There are no guarantees. My question is how to enjoy this, but not give too much of yourself. Because I've seen women that in a relationship, the reason they get hurt is because they're literally pouring their energy into the guy. They're giving him attention. They're providing physical intimacy, they're providing emotional connection. They're providing a meal, perhaps, or care. And this is the problem that I see is that when women give all of that it skews the scale because. Men they're just, they're providing time and maybe finances, but there's a YouTube video of the sociologist saying some women can live less than men because they're literally pouring years of their life into the man and into the family. So I don't know how to do this yet, but I think the key is, like you said, Kat, don't. Live their life. Live your life and learn how not to pour everything into them. Because when they leave on their boat and you're caught by surprise, then you still have more of yourself. And we are biologically programmed, I believe, feminine women to pour into the man.

Kathryn 34:56

And I've always said that, if you're gonna do something, do it out of the goodness of your heart. If you're doing it because you're expecting something in return, then you're already setting yourself up for failure. Once again, the goal is that you hope, if that's what you're looking for, to get into that serious, committed relationship. But at the end of the day, if you just go into it enjoying life, and I even need to work on this, instead of thinking, okay, but if I'm doing something, making cookies for him or cooking him a meal, I need to do that because this is. What I feel in that moment, that is something that I wanna do. If I go back later on and say gosh, I cooked him a meal every Wednesday. I did this, then I'm already not thinking about this the right way. Do things that you want to do that you feel comfortable doing, and if you are doing things that you do not feel comfortable doing, then guess what? Something's already amiss. Something's already a red flag. It should come naturally that you're want to be giving. And that's the man and the women. I know a lot of men that are extremely giving, maybe even more giving than the women in their life and they look at it as, you know what I was happy to do? So we had a great time. It didn't work out moving forward.

Marina 36:05

I had a moment to reflect upon what you asked me. Did I know in my situation that he wanted just to be independent when he was an empty nester. And yes and no. Yeah. He had shared with me that he wanted to travel. He wanted to go back to Europe and travel.'cause he had lived in Germany for a while. Interestingly enough but he owned a home here. And I was under this impression that,, this was his home and he wanted to have a home with me, and we were going to join together. And when I started verbalizing, this was when we started having some tension some conflict. When I started talking about okay, how are we going to have a home together, because this wasn't a short-term relationship. We were together

Kathryn 36:54

you hit it right on the nail once you started, and I'm not the therapist here, I'm just Kathryn, but once you started I don't wanna say pressuring them, but start bringing it up more. Okay, what about our future and thinking of future goals? Then they start to go, okay, wait a minute. And they push back and say oh, okay, this is getting serious. So it really goes down to, Lana, maybe you can answer this, but why do they all of a sudden go in their shell if they've spent six months or however many months together, to me that's now a serious relationship. Why would they go through all of those months to just not want to go further? Is it fear of commitment? Is it something from their past? Why would someone do that all of a sudden?

Marina 37:34

And I just wanted to say that, really Exactly Kathryn. In my experience in the past when I've been quietly unsure about somebody and I haven't said anything, I haven't said anything about wanting to be serious. I haven't said anything about wanting to move forward. I've been aloof doing my own thing because I really, I'm half in, half out. That's been when these men are extremely serious, extremely interested, start proposing to me, actually propose,

Kathryn 38:05

they're playing hard to get.

Marina 38:07

But I haven't been playing. I've really been unsure. And when I am honest and when I am sincere saying Hey, let's see a future together. You know what I got was, I don't see how you really add anything significant to my life. I am financially well off. My kids are grown. I have a home, I have a boat, and I want to sail away.

Kathryn 38:32

It's all about fun. Let's just have fun. I wanna have fun. And this is a whole California attitude. So they're just like having fun in the moment. You take away their quote unquote fun. And now you're talking about serious about being an adult and having a serious relationship. You go, whoa. Now we're not having fun. Now we're getting serious. And why? And Lana, hopefully you can answer this. Why does a grown man, whether it's 30. 50 or 60 all of a sudden want to hold back and now have this fear of commitment moving forward.

Lana 39:03

It's been my experience that the men that pull back they may value freedom over relationships. Now you're thinking he got into one marriage or two marriages and he committed to those people. Yes. Because when they're younger, maybe it's to have children, maybe it's'cause their parents are pressuring them,. Maybe it's because they need to have a wife to move up in their career. There is a certain kind of stability and societal pressure for men to marry. And if that's the case, now that they're free, freedom becomes the goal and. Because when they have freedom, their finances are not at risk. Their time is not being taken away. And this is one type of man we're just talking about the ones that are out there because they're in the dating pool, because they're not committed. The ones that wanna commit are committed. They're in relationship. We don't hear about them. We don't talk about them. We don't know who they are. They're living in their beautiful little houses and apartments with their partner and they're happy. But the majority of the dating pool at any given time are men who are not able to. They're able to give you attention, affection, and experiences, but when you start talking about a more serious relationship, that's when. They pull back and it has rarely, in my experience, been anything to do with the female or the partner. It's just inside them. There's the wall that comes up and they are suddenly aware that they're gonna be trapped. And what is the reason to be trapped in middle age if they don't want children or marriage? For them it's not even close. They're looking for experiences. So what do we do? How we do, we identify these people sooner so that we don't get hurt. There are several ways. The first way is there's a saying, how you do anything is how you do everything. So watch how they communicate. The patterns of communication, how they talk about their friends. Are they talking about their party friends that go on boats and do fun things And boys night, do they really value their male friendships? It's good that they have male friendships, but do they over rely on their relatives, on their sisters, on their moms, on their families? Are they always with their family or their friends or their kids? Because then their life is full. If they are really overlying on other people in their life is quite full. How do you come into that? Is there space for you? That's one kind of guy. So when their life is full, there's not a lot of space for the female. The second one is somebody who has addiction. Addicted to substances because that's their third party relationship. They're using addiction substances to manage their internal anxiety. They haven't found ways to manage their stress. So they need that at the end of the day. And then that does not leave room for you because they're in a different state unless you're using the amount of substances that they are at the same time. So that's another one. And the third thing is if you say, Hey, where do you see yourself in five years? Where do you see yourself in 10 years? And that could be a benign question, if we talk about manifesting, we're manifesting everything every moment of our day. Let's see what they tell you they wanna manifest. Because if they tell you a story verbally. They see themself in five to 10 years doing, they're telling they're unconscious, that's where they wanna be, and then somehow they're gonna try to get there. So if it doesn't include a lovely relationship with a wonderful woman, then what are we really doing there? We're living in their world. We're helping them not building something.

Kathryn 42:47

That definitely makes sense. And it makes me think of somebody that I had dated previously that really enjoyed his freedom. And so for me, I'm such an independent person and I do a lot of alone time. So for people out there that are in a relationship, whether it's with a man or a woman, and this person does like their freedom, that doesn't necessarily mean that they can't have some sort of a relationship. But just being aware of it, not being in denial and understanding that this person is. Potentially gonna take trips on their own, potentially, going to be talking to other people of the opposite sex So you have to ask yourself if you're okay with that. That doesn't mean that you can't continue a relationship, but this is a person that, like you said, really likes their freedom. So it's not right or wrong, and we're definitely not saying that's right or wrong, but it's just knowing that and accepting that and not trying to change the person.

Marina 43:45

It's also, it's a little bit surprising to me, Lana, when you said that, you notice a lot more women especially mature women wanting to be in long-term relationships than like middle-aged men because men benefit so much from being in a relationship. Literally, they live longer at the expense of women. You mentioned that for sure, but also on the flip side, I've known personally and also, through my work more and more, financially stable, you don't have to be rich, but just financially stable women that have already, maybe been in a relationship, maybe had kids that are not looking for a partner just happy on their own or maybe widowed. They don't want that. They don't want to take care of another man. For example my aunt, She's been a widow for 30 years. She could have very well met another person, another man. And what she would always say was, my ex-husband was a, good looking guy, but also, he was a womanizer and you know what? I'm not gonna meet a younger man. I'm not Madonna. I'm not gonna meet a hot young man. I'm not Cher. Why do I wanna take care of some old crusty Russian guy, where I have to wash his stuff and make him food and, I don't want that. Why? I'm just gonna go hang out with my ladies.

Kathryn 45:12

Maybe to have companionship to have goes back to me. Those deep conversations, and being able to have that connection because while all your friends, as you get older, have their lives, their partners, and I hate to say it, start. Dying off and you're left there, who are you talking to? Yes. You can get, an animal, you can get a cat, a dog. So you have that attention. But being able to have someone to share your life, and that is part of it. You might have to wash his drawers, you may have to clean up after him. He's, drooling out of one side of the mouth, but you do it together. That's someone that's holding your hand and caring for you while you're in a hospital bed. So you're not alone. I have a friend who says her biggest fear is that she literally is going to be in a hospital bed and no one will be there to come in and check on her or anything. And that's not to say that you get into a relationship and that person will be your forever more until the day you die. But sometimes people do want that. But like you were saying, Marina, she was a widow, just like my mom, my mom really liked. The pleasure of her own company. She thought, no, I don't wanna be with a man. You know what? Just so he can cheat on me, lie to me, what have you. Of course, she was a whole nother person altogether. She was very vocal. But everybody, first off, needs to understand who they are, what they can give, and what they need. And either way, I think it's fine if you want to be alone, because ultimately you're not alone. You still have yourself. And always remember that people out there, you're never alone. You always have yourself. And if you love yourself enough. That could be enough. Other people need a little more, and that's maybe why they need a partnership or companionship to have those deep connections, to have someone to support you and be your biggest cheerleader at the end of the day. So I think going back to this, as we self-reflect thinking about, the choices you've made and the choices that you will make to come, and maybe this might alter that self-reflection is key. And so I think talking about that, one of the questions is, how do we know where we fall between needing attention and being emotionally self-reliant? What do you think Lana?

Lana 47:27

How do we know where we fall? So balance I think a question of how can we self-reflect? The question before that is does the person want to know how they come across and who they are? And in order to answer that, they have to be able to be connected enough to their internal self to even pose that question. And a lot of people are in fight or flight, so they don't have the ability to do that because they're in survival mode. Either they had a traumatic childhood or they witnessed other traumatic events growing up, or they. Grew up in a society where emotions weren't valued. So they are constantly in fight or flight and to start asking those questions, they have to want to grow personally. They can take a personality test, they can seek a therapist, they can ask a friend how they come across. They have to be able to have the awareness to even have that thought. And I think a lot of people are sadly traumatized by life. So they're just in survival mode, trying to feel better day to day.

Marina 48:42

And I would say also just for folks to start noticing your own patterns. How do you act when you're in a conflict with somebody? Conflict is inevitable in relationships. Do you shut down? Do you clinging to them? Do you fear that they're gonna abandon you if you have a disagreement? All those things are telling of attachment styles. And healthy relationships can allow for both holding somebody's hand and for you being held as well.

Kathryn 49:19

Aw. Wonderful. I think that really does it. Thank you so much. Lana, for all of your wisdom today and remember your attachment style, it's not your destiny, it's the starting point.

Lana 49:32

Thank you ladies for having me on. This was very interesting to be part of your podcast.

Marina 49:37

Thank you so much Lana. And for folks out there that are curious about your own attachment style you could contact myself or Lana for more information and remember also to follow us on Facebook and social media, on Instagram, love liaisons.

Kathryn 49:58

So everybody be kind to yourselves. Know that change is possible and thanks for tuning into love liaisons. So keep sipping,

Marina 50:07

keep loving,

Kathryn 50:08

keep laughing

Marina 50:09

and cheers for now. From your love liaisons.