The Thrill Of The Chase

Relationships aren’t black and white. Peter was able to share that in childhood he was punished for being afraid or sad. Straighten up and act like a man, he remembered his father saying when he was as young as three. The look of disgust on his father’s face made Peter sick to his stomach and avoidant of anyone having tender and vulnerable feelings. When we tried to work through these issues, Peter would get upset, literally breaking out in hives and struggling with a strong desire to call off the relationship with Lauren. If dealing with these old excruciating wounds was the price of the relationship, he was ready to leave. Instead of being able to help his Little Me, he protected himself by worrying that Lauren was too needy and that this was a sign she wasn’t as smart as he was. While Peter was able to understand that a lot of his responses were protections at work, his fear of his inner world led him to focus on Lauren’s flaws, building a case against her in his head any time they got closer to real intimacy. His body also shut down to the point that he sometimes fell asleep because he could not handle the feelings inside. He remembered doing this as a child, going into his closet for hours at a time to escape his father’s scorn. For her part, Lauren fell back into her childhood patterns with her mother, believing that she needed to fix herself in order to make him love her. It never worked with her mom and couldn’t work here, either.

After The Fall

As her anxiety increased, she started losing weight and having trouble sleeping. At each level of desperation, both of them became more entrenched in the old patterns. Perhaps sensing the end was near, Peter found somebody else during one of their breakups. From the outside, it was a sad outcome, as I could see that the connection between them was genuine. There were more adult aspects of Lauren and Peter, who had developed a healthy care for each other, but as intimacy increased, they were both thrown back into childhood experiences that meant they were now wounding each other on a daily basis. She was also learning some important lessons about what she actually needs in a partner. Sometimes a relationship with an extremely avoidant person can light up your attachment system in a way you haven’t experienced before. By touching childhood wounds, the intensity of those early needs rises to the surface and, coupled with whatever genuine affection is there, lights a neurochemical fire that feels compelling, enchanting, and even intoxicating. And even if we do, our greater clarity in a solid sense of self and easier access to the voice of our Inner Nurturer helps us get out sooner. In Lauren’s case, the hardest thing was accepting that her intense attraction and love for Peter were not enough. Each of us wants so much for our love to be received by another person, but she gradually came to understand that nobody was at fault. Both of them needed to do a lot of healing on their own before they could be available to each other.

No Easy Way Down

If you are in love with someone who doesn’t love you back the way you need and loving them more only results in you completely losing yourself, the most profound lesson lies in letting go and realizing that love alone is not enough. So many of us find ourselves in relationships that don’t provide a safe haven in which to heal. Lauren started to understand why she had become selfless in this dynamic. Her personal growth came from choosing to move forward from a relationship that was filled with turmoil. It was the only path back to herself. Those of us who are anxiously attached have a particular vulnerability. Everybody could feel a little bit avoidant to us. Some people’s protections have a tinge of avoidance in them because that’s how they learned to protect themselves on occasion. It isn’t a predominant feature of how they relate but crops up from time to time. Even this much of a tendency to pull back can activate us. This is what makes it so important to begin the healing practices for Little Me’s core wounds and then make them lifelong practices. As long as our Little Me is caught in old pain and fear, we will always see with eyes that are colored by these earlier losses.

All Fired Up

This means there’s a chance we will also have to learn to work with our anxiety in relationships with people who are fundamentally secure but might have turtle protections. Over time, these interactions become part of our healing, and our partner’s voice and actions part of our Inner Nurturer community. This in itself is part of learning about a kind of love where each partner is allowed to express his or her needs and experience having them met. We are becoming what is termed earned secure in our attachment patterns. It is called this because we didn’t get this inner sense of security from our early caregivers, but through our own hard work as adults. Still, for anybody who has ever identified as anxiously attached, when somebody is unavailable for whatever reason, we will likely still be sensitive to their pulling back. It is like feeling the scar tissue from the earlier injury. We will know we are moving into more healing when we have a different response to the old feelings arising. Now, we recognize their origin, and no longer have to act on them in the same dramatically protective ways. I am not worthy of love, attention, and support. They have probably left you feeling frustrated and heartbroken by their apparent nonchalance in the face of your burning need for reassurance and connection. Deep trust and intimacy are impossible in these conditions. The thrill of the chase wears off, and you are left feeling exhausted, confused, and used.