Latest / The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten / Feeling Your Spouse Rescued You Is Behind Most Romantic Feelings

Transcript

Feeling Your Spouse Rescued You Is Behind Most Romantic Feelings · The Dr. Psych Mom Show with clinical psychologist Dr. Samantha Rodman Whiten

0:05
Hi everybody, and welcome to the dr.
0:07
Psych mom show. Today, we are going to be
0:10
talking about how feeling that your spouse rescued.
0:13
You is actually at the root of many romantic feelings, and for
0:16
people that don't understand what their partner means by
0:19
Romance, when their partner wants romantic Behavior or, you
0:24
know, feelings. The, this may be a very
0:26
instructive episode and a lot of people struggle with what that
0:30
means, and I'll get into who struggles and why.
0:33
Before that please do subscribe. I have many Any more subscriber
0:37
episodes, It's a larger percentage moving into session.
0:40
It's not session season 3 and the most recent subscriber
0:45
episode was your window to change is before your wife hits
0:49
40. And if that sounds kind of write
0:52
to you that then you will get a lot out of listening to that
0:55
episode, whether you are the man or the wife anyway, so what are
1:00
we talking about today? I've forget as I talk.
1:04
So, Is at the root of most romantic feelings.
1:08
There has to be the idea, the illusion that there's only one
1:10
person in the world for you and that that you have found your
1:13
person. People say that I have found my
1:16
person and yes most intelligent people understand that there are
1:20
many people who could be your person but it isn't everyone and
1:24
it isn't a majority either. And you know in order there are
1:27
different levels of compatibility and if you or your
1:31
partner with 100 different people, there is you would like
1:34
to think Think that you would at least be a no above the 50th
1:38
percentile in who they would pick, you know, and this idea of
1:43
specialness is behind most love feelings.
1:45
So women in particular feel very in love with their babies, and
1:49
they usually think it's the best baby in the world.
1:52
The most special baby, the most smart baby, definitely the most
1:55
cute baby, you know, and and that is normative and it's
1:59
healthy. And that illusion of specialness
2:03
allows the mother to sacrifice all of Self for the baby and to
2:07
be happy to do so, because this is the best baby in the world.
2:11
And, you know, you got to feel a little bit like that about your
2:14
partner, but you can't just feel like they're the best person in
2:17
the world because it has nothing to do with you.
2:20
So a lot of times we're less romantic and by romantic, I mean
2:24
emotionally expressive. And really highly sensitive.
2:28
So high sensitivity is frequently a proxy variable for
2:31
romantic people. That feel deeply often feel very
2:34
deeply in the Romantic sphere as well.
2:37
And when women who are highly sensitive or partnered with men
2:40
who are not highly sensitive, they tend to yearn for romance,
2:43
you know? And this more deep feeling to be
2:47
expressed by the man, and he doesn't really even know what
2:50
she means. So, I'm trying to tell you what
2:52
she means to help you. And what she usually means is
2:56
she, you may tell her that she's like smart, and pretty and
2:59
funny, and like all of these things.
3:01
But so are literally millions of other women and she's not an
3:05
idiot. She knows that she's certainly
3:07
not the most beautiful woman in the whole world.
3:09
I mean, who would be? I mean, you know, that's
3:12
subjective. Also, you may think that she is,
3:14
if you're telling her she's the most beautiful woman in the
3:16
whole world regularly though. You probably don't need this
3:18
podcast. So the, the what is the average
3:22
woman? Mean who feel starved for
3:24
romance. She wants to know that there is
3:26
a special connection between the two of you that you feel that
3:30
she uniquely helped you out of being lonely.
3:35
Only and that you were lonely before her.
3:38
Even if you were with another partner or in another marriage
3:40
or or you slept with women constantly, she still wants to
3:44
think that there are some special way that she
3:47
specifically transformed your life and rescued you made.
3:51
It better made your life better by virtue of being in it.
3:55
Rescued you from feeling not understood and not connected or
3:59
not, not as happy or not as something.
4:04
So it's like the fantasy here, needs to be something that you
4:08
verbalize. And if you don't really feel
4:10
like this because you have a lot of resentment, it's going to be
4:12
hard for you to say it, but, but at least you can understand what
4:16
she's going for. And there are plenty of guys who
4:18
actually don't have a lot of resentment and love their wives,
4:21
but just don't really understand what their wife means by, you
4:25
know, like talking on a deep level or emoting or, you know,
4:30
being expressive or whatever. The case may be guys with a
4:34
void, Attachment struggle with this.
4:35
But also guys, obviously on the Spectrum, struggle with
4:39
expression of verbal romantic feelings frequently and guys who
4:44
are more ADHD kind of constructal with that.
4:47
In my practice, from what I've seen, they can't kind of
4:50
concentrate and focus as much in the absence of a crisis or some
4:53
adrenaline rush to tell her things that they may even be
4:56
feeling anyway. And also guys that were just
4:59
raised in very emotionally in expressive homes.
5:02
Now, on the other end, a lot of women struggle, Cool with this.
5:04
Well, of course, as well. And these are more avoidant.
5:08
Attachment women, women on the Spectrum.
5:11
I mean, it's very similar, the same sorts of things.
5:14
But because women generally have watched more romantic, movies
5:18
and are more verbal and more talk about emotions more
5:22
frequently, in their friend groups, and go to therapy more
5:24
frequently. They usually can say more things
5:27
like this and kind of at least know what it means.
5:30
Although some women kind of don't know what it means and
5:32
these are the women that also struggle in bed Frequently to
5:35
where the man feels very lonely and disconnected in bed and the
5:38
woman is just phoning it in the women also seemed to struggle
5:42
with verbal expression of emotion because they just
5:45
struggle with intimacy. So, in these cases, it's the man
5:49
wants to know the same thing like that, you fixed their life
5:53
and that you that he fixed your life in some way that you were
5:57
lonely in some way before him, that there was a need that he
6:01
filled that there was some sort of space.
6:04
Made that that was empty before he showed up that you that you
6:08
felt rescued in a way and that's kind of the best way that I can
6:12
put it show kind of the emotional import of it.
6:17
You know rescue is a word that many might think is dramatic but
6:22
there has to be a little bit of drama in an emotional
6:25
relationship. You know of any sort like you
6:28
have to love your partner so much that you would quote do
6:33
anything for them. Have a post about that about how
6:36
women when women want the man to just say, he'll do anything for
6:39
them. That is a level of dramatic, you
6:43
know, rhetoric, but you have to feel that it's true.
6:46
Just like a child has to feel that a parent would do anything
6:49
for that. Even if push comes to shove,
6:51
maybe your partner, wouldn't give you a kidney, I don't know.
6:54
But you have to feel like they would in order to feel like they
6:57
truly love you, you know, and most people thankfully are not
7:00
put to the test in that way, you know, when that they have to
7:03
like, Choose whether or not to save themselves or save the
7:06
partner or, you know, and I can income car is coming, like most
7:10
people don't live in action movie.
7:13
But, you know, you got to think that your partner might push you
7:16
out of the way of the oncoming train.
7:17
A, even if it meant that they got in the way other.
7:19
And, you know, women have to feel like that most men don't
7:23
think. Oh, I would want my wife and the
7:25
mother of my children to push me out of the way of an oncoming
7:28
train, maybe they will start to think that more as the senses.
7:32
The sex is equalized and Generations.
7:34
I have never in my life, heard a man say that he wants his wife
7:38
to be more physically sacrificing unless it's in bed,
7:42
of course, unless it's like, can't you just cuddle me ever?
7:45
You know, can't we ever have sex?
7:47
That is a physical sacrifice, but not in the way that I'm
7:49
talking about about, wouldn't you run back into a burning
7:52
building and saved me, it's like know, you'd stay out here with
7:55
the kids, so, okay. But either way, the man wants to
7:59
feel like there was a space in your life that only he could
8:03
fill. you know, and if he doesn't feel like that and he
8:06
then he is at risk of feeling like the ATM or or the, you
8:10
know, childcare or the sperm donor, all commonly things that
8:14
I hear from men who don't feel special and don't feel like the
8:17
wife has any romantic feeling toward them and women, also then
8:22
when they feel that the husband doesn't feel anything romantic
8:24
toward them, feel that he sees them as the child care or, you
8:28
know, the birthing womb or you know, whatever else, the dinner
8:31
maker good, the cleaner, the cook, whatever, And even when
8:35
they don't do anything, because I see a lot of people who have
8:37
money enough that, they Outsource many, many things they
8:41
still feel like the person just wanted me because of, basically
8:44
my resume, maybe how I looked or because I had an impressive job
8:49
of either, either, you know, the power couples.
8:52
I'm talking about, quote power couples.
8:54
Well, you know, I looked good on paper, we were in law school
8:56
together. We were in med school together.
8:58
You know, we got along, but does he really have any sort of
9:02
romantic feelings Toward me, I don't know, you know.
9:05
And so this is something that I hear a lot.
9:07
So I, you know, obviously in my Facebook feed, I'm going to see
9:11
lots and lots of shit from other people.
9:13
Coaches psychologists, whatever. And so one of the things I saw
9:17
was like something. So just reminded me and I talk
9:20
about this all the time about like if you seem too happy being
9:24
single, that may be why you're still single.
9:27
So there's this like kind of ridiculous perspective, nowadays
9:30
that like you have to be completely happy with your life
9:32
in it. It'll just so happy 100% a plus
9:37
and then you can welcome someone into your life with the fuck.
9:40
You going to be welcoming someone into a life that's
9:41
perfect, it's perfect man, don't change it.
9:44
If anybody is 100% happy being single, that is a wonderful side
9:50
to stay single because obviously, you are living your
9:53
best life. You are only going to end up
9:55
worse. There's no more than a hundred
9:57
percent, you know. So it's only going to get worse
10:01
if you partner. So if you and I talked about
10:03
this in in the in my podcast not all avoidant attachment is
10:06
avoidant attachment. You know, some people just
10:09
really don't want to get married.
10:10
They want to live a life of adventure and freedom and they
10:13
don't want to be tied down, it's just used to be called like you
10:15
know perennial Bachelor or something you know and now you
10:20
know a woman could be that way too.
10:22
Now that it isn't socially necessary for a woman to have
10:26
kids. People could just decide that
10:28
they like to be single like the characters, Samantha and Sex in
10:30
the City. So anyway if you're completely
10:34
happy TB and single. Then what the hell are you
10:35
adding this person in? They're always going to feel
10:37
Superfluous and they're not going to feel like there was
10:40
really any need or yearning on your part to have a soul made a
10:45
partner, a connection, you know, it's not like a friend
10:48
relationship, romantic relationship.
10:51
It should be a best friendship tour, could be, but it's
10:53
something supposed to be even deeper than that.
10:56
You have other friends. This is supposed to be somebody
10:58
that on some level. You feel like you can't live
11:01
without even if of course as a functional.
11:04
A human. You could if God forbid, they
11:06
died, get up. Take care of your children, you
11:09
know, deal with the calling out of your job.
11:11
Make funeral arrangements. Of course, you could do all of
11:13
this but you have to on some level feel that you would be
11:17
devastated beyond what you would feel with other people.
11:20
And when people do not feel like the partner would feel this way.
11:23
It's a very common thing that I hear women say, specially
11:26
younger women in couples counseling and with more avoided
11:30
men because it's interesting I talked about in my bonus, Load
11:34
the most recent one about how women change between their 30s
11:38
and their 40s. So in their 30s, I see a lot of
11:40
preoccupied attachment. Women dragging a void, an
11:42
attachment husband's into therapy, and this was a lot of
11:45
what I wrote about when I was younger, my blog started in
11:48
2014. You know, that was a lot of the
11:50
people that I was seeing at that stage and I was also in my 30s
11:53
and the 40s though, I see a lot of preoccupied attachment men,
11:58
bringing avoidant attachment women into therapy.
12:01
So it's interesting a lot of women by By then have just kind
12:05
of you know, not they always were avoiding attachment but
12:11
with the decrease in their hormones are like kind of not
12:13
even in it anymore at all. They remind me of the avoidant
12:16
attachment men except that they have no sex drive which is the
12:19
one way that the preoccupied attachment women in their 30s.
12:22
Get their husbands to be loving and connected and whatever is in
12:26
bed. Well if you can't even do that
12:28
because your avoidant attachment 40 year old 45 whatever your old
12:31
wife doesn't really want to have sex with you.
12:33
Then you have like nothing So, there's like no connection at
12:36
all, no intimacy, you know, and so I see this in both sides.
12:40
But a big thing that the women say, the younger women, when
12:43
they come into therapy is, I think that if I died more than
12:46
one woman has said, I think that if I died, he really would just
12:51
get up and go to work the next day and they say this and it's
12:55
it really shows me what women are looking for.
12:59
And in a relationship is somebody who would not get up
13:02
and go to work the next day. Of course, these men have
13:05
children, they would not just get up and go to work.
13:06
They would have to, you know, do the things I said, navigate the
13:09
funeral arrangements. Call everybody deal with the
13:11
children, you know? But but the feeling that
13:14
somebody would just be able to get up and go to work.
13:16
The next day is not a pleasant feeling and so what a romantic
13:21
feelings come from the idea that the partner would be unable to
13:25
do this, you know, and for people that are scared of
13:29
intimacy there like what in the hell that would be the most
13:32
reassuring thing in the world that they could.
13:34
Up and keep ticking in my absence because everything is
13:36
about the children anyway and I would need him to get up and
13:39
take care of the children etc. Etc, etc.
13:41
Well he would you know, unless you have really married some I
13:45
don't even know what sort of person that would let your
13:48
children starve and unusual sort of spouse.
13:51
But you people that like the idea of intimacy and connection
13:55
want to think that the partner would be, you know, pretty
13:59
devastated. If you drop dead and in this is
14:03
like I'm big. A big thing.
14:06
It could be a good thought, experiment to let you see.
14:08
Are you doing that? Are you letting your partner
14:11
think that you would be devastated if you've never said
14:14
it, then they likely don't think that you would be.
14:16
If you've never said something, you don't have to get into, you
14:19
know, grisly details of their potential demise, you know.
14:22
But you could say, you know, if I ever lost you if you ever left
14:26
me, I would be devastated. That's a romantic thing to say
14:29
that many people who struggle with romance don't even know
14:31
would be a romantic thing to say or People I can coach guys to
14:35
see this in there because they really would be, you know,
14:37
devastated if the woman left. But they never thought that they
14:40
should say it. Some of them just never think on
14:42
that level at all to verbalize that.
14:44
And some of them think that that's like being a pussy that's
14:47
being weak, that's being a simple whatever we call it now
14:50
and they shouldn't say something like that.
14:52
Oh, contraire, you should say that. 100%, then if the woman
14:56
left you, you would be miserable.
14:58
And the wife should say that to her husband to not every second,
15:01
because then that goes over into borderline T territory.
15:04
If everyday you wake them up and you stare at them and you say if
15:07
you ever left me, it would ruin my life.
15:09
Well, shit, that's like out of, you know, a horror movie, we're
15:13
not going to say that. But you know, I don't know,
15:15
every year would be nice or, or something like that, you don't
15:20
even have to say, the left me part.
15:22
You could say, if anything ever happened to you, even that level
15:26
of stuff does not make the person feel like you would be
15:29
completely. You know, just cool with them
15:32
just dropping off the face of the Earth.
15:34
Which is something that people think when they are married to
15:37
these less romantic more avoidant, less emotional people.
15:42
So, again to recap, the idea is that your partner.
15:47
If they've always wanted you to be more romantic, male or female
15:50
wants to think that they're you weren't 100% happy.
15:53
When you were single, you were, in fact, waiting for someone
15:55
like them. And if you really weren't and
15:58
that seems like a big ask because it's a huge lie.
16:01
Then it's the very very least. This podcast can help you deeply
16:06
understand and empathize with why your partner so damn upset
16:09
all the time because this is a usual thing.
16:12
And unusual feeling conveyed in romantic relationships that are,
16:17
you know, healthy and happy. That there was a deficit before
16:21
the partner came along, which the arrival of the apart of the
16:25
partner remediated. And if this is not a known
16:28
factor in your relationship or even in an unhappy marriage, you
16:32
feel that your partner is Happy that you came along and in fact,
16:36
never really wanted to be with you was always ambivalent and
16:39
has been criticizing you from go.
16:41
Well, then you can see then why it's been so hard between you
16:46
because particularly women, understand that, this alternate
16:50
way of communicating is something that is done in happy
16:52
relationships, and she is seeing and hearing friends, say or or,
16:56
you know, seeing on TV, or, in message boards, or whatever that
17:00
people do say, oh, my husband sent me flowers.
17:04
Hours and said I couldn't live without you, you are the best
17:07
thing in my life and they think, what the fuck nobody's ever
17:10
said. That to me, why?
17:11
It doesn't my own husband say that.
17:12
And then of course you catch some shit later on and this can
17:15
explain why. If you really, truly do not
17:18
think that this is in any way representative of your
17:20
relationship, and it would be a bold-faced lie.
17:22
Then you can either have more empathy for why your spouse is
17:25
so upset. And, or you can use it as a
17:27
catalyst to get into couples counseling because it is
17:30
possible that there are agreements empathic ruptures,
17:32
which are prohibiting or both of you from feeling this way.
17:36
And this way is kind of a necessary feeling in and, and
17:41
expression verbal expression in relationships where at least one
17:45
person wants, quote, more romance.
17:48
So hopefully this helped, you understand more of these crazy
17:51
romantic people that exist in the world, which you may be
17:53
married to, and I will talk to everybody soon.
17:57
Thanks again for subscribing by