Latest / The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten / The Martyr And The Ice Queen: Couples You Meet In Counseling #2

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The Martyr And The Ice Queen: Couples You Meet In Counseling #2 · The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten

• 0:05
  Hi everybody, and welcome to the doctor psych mom show.
• 0:09
  Today, we're going to be talking about one of my couples you meet
• 0:12
  in counseling. This is number two.
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  The Ice Queen on the Martyr. And I wrote These back in 2014,
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  a serious and I just added to them recently with the lien and
• 0:22
  wife and the overachiever and the CEO, and the resentful
• 0:24
  employee. So, but before that, I just had
• 0:28
  five of them. So, you know, you could go back
• 0:30
  to my original posts but also I'm doing them all on.
• 0:34
  In fact, tomorrow, the subscriber episode coming out
• 0:37
  tomorrow is going to be number three, mr.
• 0:41
  And mrs. Not feeling it.
• 0:42
  But divorced in spirit. So that's more of a Loveless
• 0:46
  marriage situation and how people get into that.
• 0:49
  So, definitely subscribe. There's about close to 75
• 0:53
  subscriber episodes. Female sexuality, female hypo
• 0:57
  sexual disorder, female arousal, oral sex, on women.
• 1:03
  Everything you ever wanted to know about, Bout a vagina.
• 1:05
  I don't have one titled that that was just a summary
• 1:07
  statement so you should definitely be, you know,
• 1:11
  subscribing. Anyway, so let's move on to this
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  couple say this couple is a lot of who the guy is that descend
• 1:20
  into internet rabbit holes looking for ways to make their
• 1:23
  wife loved them again. So this is also you should refer
• 1:27
  back to the preoccupied attachment husband podcast.
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  These are the guys that say I do everything and she still doesn't
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  Love me. These are the guys who say that
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  the avoidant wives podcast? I did resonates with them.
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  These are the guys that have low self-esteem.
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  They were frequently late bloomers or feel that they were
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  in terms of an early sexual experiences or lack thereof.
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  And they just do not feel like they are very sexy.
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  They do not feel that they are men that women ever wanted for
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  their looks or for their Charisma.
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  But rather because they can do so much so that's what they try
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  to do. Do they are the Workhorse type
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  and they try to just do and do and do.
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  And so do most of the chores they do most, or of the
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  childcare or at least half on both, sometimes more.
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  These are the guys that literally get so angry when
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  people when women say that like men don't do enough there like a
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  fucking do so much, are we joking?
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  Like men, do everything but most men don't do everything.
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  You know, most women are the primary care.
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  Baker. As you know, statistics show and
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  the primary person who does more housework, although that
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  shifting men are doing more and more, but the preoccupied
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  attachment martyr husband does the most.
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  He does more than his wife, and he does more and more and more
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  than everybody. So this is the guy that really,
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  really does not understand what everybody's talking about, but
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  it's not because there's something wrong and what most
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  people are talking about is because he himself would be too
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  anxious, telling his wife to do. Anything or even sometimes even
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  allowing her to do anything. So what does this look like?
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  In terms of the, the woman, the ice queen, this is an avoidant
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  attachment woman who is uncomfortable with intimacy and
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  really has been throughout and frequently.
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  The man will be like, oh, they were such change from the
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  beginning. There was not a change from the
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  beginning. If you control for the variables
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  of age and childbirth and honeymoon stage, it was a woman
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  who acted kind of low commitment low.
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  Low intimacy at the beginning, compared to her cohort of women
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  of her age and stage and has continued to be in the same
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  relative ranking compared to other women of now her current
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  agent stage now, right? So she was a low libido woman
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  during dating which meant that you never had sex every day.
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  God forbid and instead it was like a couple times a week Max
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  and you know, maybe she didn't seem that into it but you just
• 4:00
  put your head in the sand about it.
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  And now, you're basically never having sex Because now she's a
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  hell of a lot older. And she's had kids, and she has,
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  you know, no honeymoon, stage hormones, flooding her system.
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  So, who gets into these relationships in terms of, what
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  did they see growing up? They saw the same thing.
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  They usually see, one partner, one parent pursued by the other
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  one, who is always, you know, a victim and some way the victim.
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  Well they're both victims. One is constantly feels
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  harassed. Irritated the avoidant, one.
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  And the other one always feels lonely and tragically
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  misunderstood, and not loved, and cuddled enough.
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  And this is pretty easy for kids to pick up on, you know, it's
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  the dad trying to reach out to kiss, the mom who pushes him
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  away or in the gender inverse, which can also lead to this
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  same, you know, people don't just go like a girl acts like
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  her mother boy acts like his father.
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  You could act like whichever parent.
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  I've talked about that before in my podcast on mommy versus daddy
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  issues. But anyway in terms of a Woman,
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  it looks like the woman who's always like coming home and
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  saying, oh, hey honey. Like I bought this like cool
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  thing and the husband barely looks up, and we'll give her any
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  attention. So if you grow up, seeing that
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  one parent, never gives the other one, any attention.
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  Well, guess what? You're going to be drawn to
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  Dynamic, where one person never gives the other one, any
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  attention. So, in this case, the Ice Queen
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  ever gives the attention to the Martyr.
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  So the martyrs dancing around doing all these things, the
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  child care, the chores, the providing It didn't used to be
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  childcare and tours and older couples.
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  It's just a hell of a lot of providing and more childcare and
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  chores than the average man does, which still may not have
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  been very much, but was more than average and the woman
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  frequently does less than most women do more focused on Career.
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  If she doesn't have a career, then she's focused on social
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  life. She's focused on involvement in
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  the PTA or in, you know, the church or whatever, the case may
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  be. But she's certainly not putting
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  her energy into the Marriage. She finds intimacy to be
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  stultifying and she's scared of it.
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  It didn't go very well for her parents.
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  She didn't see a very happy marriage growing up.
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  Neither did the guy and so they were both drawn to each other.
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  As Imago theory state, you're drawn to people who remind you
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  of a caregiver. And then you spend your life
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  trying to get them to change in ways that you could never change
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  your caregiver. So the man, very obviously the
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  Martyr is trying to change his wife.
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  Make her more More attentive and the woman is trying to change
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  the man to leave her the fuck alone, really?
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  She and that's why frequently you know there's all these if
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  ways that men and mail websites, try to advise other men in this
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  situation to make their wives change, and one of them is go
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  work out and start your own life and and become more attractive.
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  And then she's going to be drawn to you, a new, not with an
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  avoidant woman. No, she won't.
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  No, she will not. I mean there's there's many men
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  who can bear this out. They are relieved.
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  They don't care. There are so happy that you're
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  not up there. S any more to hang out.
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  They are thrilled. They would love honestly on some
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  level for you to have a completely separate life or tell
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  you that you know you got to tell her that.
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  You got a job on an alternate coast and that you're going to
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  be going there. Six months out of the year, they
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  would be so supportive. It lets so younger women.
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  Now that believe that they ought to have help with the childcare
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  etcetera, etcetera, but certainly older women were of
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  this type were ones that were very into the man being his best
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  self at work, getting promotion after promotion.
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  Especially if that meant, he did a lot of work travel because
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  then intimacy is not even on offer, it's not even a
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  possibility. And I don't even just mean
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  sexual intimacy. I mean emotional intimacy as
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  well. So if the man is literally not
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  there, then he cannot. Not be trying all the time to
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  touch you, and hang out with you and talk to you and whatever,
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  whatever. So when people are in this
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  Dynamic, certainly couples counseling can help, but it does
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  not change a person's innate wiring.
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  Yes, you can learn to kind of resolve empathic ruptures and
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  grow closer. But your expectations need to be
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  moderated by the boundaries of the attachment style of each
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  partner and really how they are wired.
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  And Always were so the ice queen can certainly learn to grow less
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  cold especially if she values the marriage but it's not going
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  to come. By the way, from seeing him
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  working out and getting a hobby. She's thrilled that he's working
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  out and getting hobby, she finds this to be zero threat.
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  This is great. You know, instead it would come
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  literally from the man saying I'm going to leave.
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  You know if, if we are not closer like this is not a
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  sustainable situation for me, And then she may literally be
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  like, I don't want to break up the family.
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  I do love him, you know, or I care about him.
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  And so, therefore, I want to work on potentially spending
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  more time together in bed, out of bed, whatever.
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  So that may work. But if you are trying to make a
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  woman who is this ice queen avoid and type love you more by
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  being more independent. She is thrilled that you more
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  independent. She could not be happier if you
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  are. It's not like I think so he goes
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  to the gym and other women want to have sex with him.
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  I better mate guard. Not at all, she think so.
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  It goes to the gym. Great great.
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  I get to watch my TV tonight and it's good for him to Sure great,
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  you know, but she does not in any way have this dread or
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  whatever, that's a different kind of woman.
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  That would be a preoccupied attachment woman.
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  Or at least a woman who used to be more preoccupied attachment
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  before monogamy and and the, you know, libido killing effects of
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  that. Said it, or sometimes, even,
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  Just a younger woman, really younger?
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  Really then I work with may say, hmm, we're not married yet but
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  he's going to the gym and stuff. Was he looking for another
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  woman? I guess, I better kind of make
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  guard a little bit more. This would not be articulated,
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  but but just there and but I've yet to see a 40 or 50 year old
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  avoid and woman a woman who is in this role, where the husband
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  is, always wanting more intimacy where and she doesn't and has no
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  desire for it. Where him do?
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  Something on his own, is anything more than a very
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  pleasant relief for her. So instead you would have to
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  really talk about your needs and what you will, and will not
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  tolerate in a marriage more explicitly.
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  Such as I feel that we spend more time together.
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  We're basically living parallel lives, and if this doesn't
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  change, you know, I don't really see a point to be married, so we
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  can try couples counseling to work on it and or we could just
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  separate, but I would like to try couples.
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  Counseling first. And if the woman really values
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  the marriage, then she met a dress, she made a dress, the
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  problem if it is put to her more explicitly.
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  But there's so many men that are trying to like be more
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  independent and stuff and work on their preoccupation
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  attachment. But it doesn't do anything
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  because the woman is, is happy about it because she gets to
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  maintain her own life, and he is then separately, living his,
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  which is pretty much her goal. You know, is to co-parent.
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  But just to, you know, to have a happy intact family.
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  Not to have much overlap in the internal world or the desires or
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  really the interests of the Romantic Partners In The Family
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  them, the parents, which is how she, by the way.
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  This is how more avoidant women who are moms think about the
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  role of the couple, they are the parents that is their role.
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  It's like those old fashioned. People are call each other Ma
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  and PAs, like, it's like that except she knows not to do that.
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  But the way that you view things as we are A parenting.
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  These kids of course, of we're going to prioritize them.
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  Why would we be doing date night again?
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  I don't understand. And so, that's a real key thing
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  to realize is that in these situations the way that the
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  partners of you being a couple is so disparate that they
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  basically, they have to conclude that the other one is being
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  purposefully obtuse and difficult because they can't
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  imagine. They think about things so
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  differently, yet they do. So the man in this situation,
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  things doesn't, she see how I'm like, doing everything I do so
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  much, she must be just trying to be a bitch by not saying what a
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  good job I'm doing and not coming over and like, you know,
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  hugging me and like, saying, wow, like thanks so much for
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  planning this romantic dinner or for buying me an anniversary
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  present, or whatever. But in reality, it just does not
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  even like, hit on her radar because she doesn't care about
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  things like that. And when she used to a little
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  bit during the honeymoon stage, a lot of it was it was because
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  she thought she was like, supposed to kind of, you know.
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  And also there is a very big difference between people's
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  responses, internally and externally.
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  So well two, women may get flowers and both say thank you
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  so much. That's so sweet.
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  The internal worlds of those women may be totally different,
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  you know? And one may mean like oh my God,
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  flowers us. Ice wonder why he spent that
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  money. I hope he doesn't do that a lot,
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  but, I mean, okay, maybe he thought the house needed some
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  flowers, so it's nice. We have people coming over.
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  Oh, I know, we have people coming over and so it can
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  double, you know, we sang, it's for me, but makes sense, it's
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  because we're having guests. This is not a joke, this is
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  actually how the avoidant attachment woman May view this
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  and then the other woman may be like oh that's so sweet.
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  He's he thought about me that's so romantic, that's really cute.
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  That's nice. What a nice guy, right?
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  What? A good husband, like, so the
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  responses may be equivalent, but the internal narration, which
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  again is not verbalize, but is the internal subconscious
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  narration is wildly different. So a lot of a couples counseling
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  does is it helps people, verbally narrate, these
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  subconscious, you know, unarticulated streams of
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  Consciousness. Such that people stop having
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  such Ma City to really judge other and start to realize that
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  they just start really different from one another about stuff.
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  And then on the other end, the woman who would never be up
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  anybody's ass to like, talk about their day or like any
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  bullshit like that. She thinks the guys really just
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  trying to fucking annoy her honestly, and which is such a
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  mindfuck for the preoccupied attachment martyr guy.
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  Who is soon as the woman comes in, he's like, hey how was your
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  day? How was your day?
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  How is this? How is that?
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  You know what I did? I did this and that and she's
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  thinking, you kidding me. Like I don't want to, why would
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  I want to talk right now? Is he trying to like make a
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  point? Is there like some kind of Point
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  that he's making about that? I don't talk enough or wise?
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  He just is he trying to brag about like his day, like is he
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  trying to tell me something? And then a woman who was wired?
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  Similarly to the man would be like, oh my God, my day was this
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  and your day, was that. And now we're talking about our
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  days. Of course, we are, because this
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  is how people Bond. So the more dissimilar people
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  are why Third in these attachment related domains and
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  and the more different Love Languages they have from one
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  another, the more likely these tremendous misunderstandings.
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  And even, you know, this this giving of malicious intent,
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  literally malicious intent, where there is none can happen
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  and that's something that couples counseling helps with
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  because you have no idea. If you're a man listening to
• 15:58
  this, there's women that think that you're trying to initiate
• 16:02
  sex for bad reasons, bad. Reasons and that's crazy to you.
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  Because, you know, you're trying to initiate it to be close to be
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  loving because you're thinking about her because you're
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  attracted to her and she thinks he just wants to get off.
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  And he doesn't even want to go masturbate.
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  He's making a point to show me. He shouldn't have to go
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  masturbate and instead he's allowed to just use me for that,
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  when he knows how little I want to do that.
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  All he needs is a release so he just make it a point and being
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  an asshole to ask. Need to have sex when we both
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  know, it would be the same for him to go masturbate and leave
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  me alone. When I'm exhausted, that may be
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  a mind-blowing for you to think about it.
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  How in the world could a woman impute malicious intent to me
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  initiating sex? Well that's how because she is
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  wired so differently. And so grievously misunderstand.
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  How men feel about sex that she thinks it's exact equivalent to
• 16:59
  masturbate. So therefore, why would you be
• 17:02
  asking her to do it? It's as, though you woke her
• 17:03
  from a dead. Sleep.
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  And you said, can you open this bag of potato chips for me?
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  Please. I need a snack.
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  That's how she feels about it. So anyway, hopefully that
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  analogy if anything was worth the price of admission, which,
• 17:13
  of course, was free. So certainly got to be odds are
• 17:17
  good. That it was and this Dynamic can
• 17:22
  be worked on a marital counseling.
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  Again, I'm not a personality changer but people who
• 17:29
  understand one another, and who thereby can empathize with one
• 17:33
  another. Can often come together in a
• 17:36
  more emotionally close way than they ever had before from just
• 17:40
  understanding where each other's coming from the origin of why
• 17:44
  they act how they do. And how often shockingly, they
• 17:49
  have misunderstood each other's intentions over the years.
• 17:51
  All right. Hopefully, you enjoyed this and
• 17:53
  I will talk to you soon. Please do subscribe.