Latest / Beyond the Facade with Choose Recovery Services and Blueprint Institute / 96: How to Spot an Emotionally Shut-Down Man

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96: How to Spot an Emotionally Shut-Down Man · Beyond the Facade with Choose Recovery Services and Blueprint Institute

• 0:00
  Hey everybody. So an emotionally shut down man
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  doesn't always look broken. Sometimes he looks very
• 0:06
  functional and I've seen this all the time.
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  He goes to work, he solves a bunch of problems, he handles
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  his responsibilities, He's successful often he's physically
• 0:15
  present in his relationship, but there are parts of him that you
• 0:19
  can no longer access because he is not emotionally present.
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  So we're going to get into that today.
• 0:27
  Welcome to Beyond the Facade podcast.
• 0:29
  I'm your host, Luke Gordon, and I'm thrilled to have you join me
• 0:32
  in the space today. What we're going to be doing is
• 0:34
  diving deep into the trials and triumphs and truths of seeking
• 0:38
  authenticity. Becoming your true self isn't
• 0:40
  about a single action or a moment.
• 0:42
  It's a relentless pursuit, a commitment to self that reveals
• 0:46
  a rich connection and meaning that our life has to offer.
• 0:49
  So whether this is your first time tuning in or you're a
• 0:51
  regular listener, know this. What you're building here goes
• 0:54
  beyond a conversation. You're here to challenge, to
• 0:57
  change, and to celebrate the incredible journey of becoming
• 1:00
  your authentic self. Because when you dare.
• 1:02
  To show up fully. The rewards are immeasurable, so
• 1:05
  welcome to Beyond the Facade. Let's get started all.
• 1:10
  Right, everybody, Alana's back. Yay.
• 1:13
  I can say that because I love it when you're here, Alana.
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  It's so much fun to go back and forth, bounce back and forth
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  with you on this topic. So this is where this one comes
• 1:20
  from, Alana. I know I talked about this
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  before, but we have a friend of ours and a colleague of ours and
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  she reaches out to me and she says, hey, can I get some
• 1:28
  resources? Because she, we invite her into
• 1:30
  intensives and other places to support and help.
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  And she's like, can you just tell me where I can go read up
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  on what is it like for a man who's shut down emotionally?
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  What is the experience inside of his body?
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  I don't, you know, what's the science behind it?
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  Where can I go research? So, you know, I was like, yeah,
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  here's some thoughts for us, here's some resources.
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  But hey, this is an important topic because partners can't
• 1:54
  reach him. Again, general population of me
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  working with men. And I want Alana to be here
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  because I like the way her brain works and she can also speak to
• 2:05
  ones like when you can't reach your partner.
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  What? So, Alana, from your
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  perspective, what does a shutdown man look like?
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  I'll speak from the outside, externally for a lot of the
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  partners, they feel very alone in the relationship.
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  They may be able to go do things together, some can't, but they
• 2:29
  may be able to go to the movies, go out to dinner, but there
• 2:33
  isn't a deeper connection that it feels like they can only go
• 2:39
  so deep. There's only certain topics we
• 2:41
  can cover that we are together, but we're not actually
• 2:46
  connecting. And like you said, from the
• 2:49
  outside, people might look at them and think that they have a
• 2:54
  quote UN quote normal, what's normal but normal relationship,
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  when really the partner feels like the deeper parts of him are
• 3:04
  unavailable, that they can't access it.
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  And I see a lot of partners go to great lengths trying to
• 3:11
  figure out how to breakthrough those walls and how to access
• 3:14
  him. And for some, it's even worse as
• 3:17
  they access him in moments which then go like, Oh my gosh, he's
• 3:21
  capable of it. But then those are only moments.
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  And so then they live for those moments.
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  I almost think of it like getting a drink of water.
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  They're like dying of thirst. And then they get that water and
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  they're like, Oh my gosh, yes, this is exactly what I want.
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  OK, now I can stay a little bit longer.
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  I'm good now. And then they go back to just
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  waiting for that next drink of water.
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  It's funny because all you like T talking about it, they doesn't
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  work as a I'm trying to think of how I want to phrase this
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  question. Just yeah, hold that thought
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  right there. Like, does it work?
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  Well, I would say that to the women who are listening, Does it
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  work? And most of them would probably
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  have a strong like, no, I don't like this.
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  It's hard, it's difficult. I don't want this and sometimes
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  I see a lot of sadness and pain and anger come from that.
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  Let's go back to her question when I asked her some follow up
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  questions and I was like, OK, what do you mean when you say
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  what is an emotionally shut down man?
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  What's the experience I say look like?
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  But maybe can we talk about what it's not what people assume
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  emotionally shut down men look like.
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  They look, it looks cold, they look detached, maybe stoic,
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  maybe they're just avoidant. But I want to highlight in the
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  emotional shutdown what they are.
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  And this might surprise you guys, I don't know when you tell
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  me, but many emotion, many emotionally shut down men are
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  high performing. They're super successful,
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  they're productive, they're charismatic, They're actually in
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  social settings, very engaged, right?
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  Well, this, I think I love where your brain is going with this,
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  Luke, because you, I'm going to way oversimplify this, OK?
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  And we can totally play with this, but I think there are many
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  in the world who are cold and stoic and shut down and visibly
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  avoidant. I can think of multiple people
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  who fit that who are very emotionally shut down.
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  And so I don't want to throw that category away because that
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  is a real category. Yeah.
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  But this category that you're looking at and you're exploring,
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  I actually think for whatever reason, you and I see a lot more
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  of those in our office, which is the people pleaser that
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  desperately wanting to perform in a certain way for their boss,
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  for their spouse, for their friends.
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  They want to look a certain way. They want to be a nice guy even
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  though they're not making nice choices.
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  So yeah, like that one who is funny and charismatic and social
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  and responsible. Yes.
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  And there's more than one type of shutdown man.
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  And I think that one is confusing because he doesn't
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  look shut down. And so he doesn't often even
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  believe he's shut down and that she's confused because it's,
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  well, he'd feel so unavailable. But then he is also so present
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  and available. He's physically here, but he's
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  not actually present. He's really good at functioning
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  but he's but functioning isn't the same thing as emotional
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  connection. So I'm thinking about from the
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  aspect of maybe they go out to a social event, like maybe there's
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  an experience and he's connected but he's not really emotionally
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  present in their relationship. Like can I take this super
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  personal? Yeah, that's always the best.
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  We do have the ability to edit, so you know.
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  I just think over the years how many times you and I have been
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  at a family dinner and you as soon as we're with a decent.
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  Hold on. It just went red.
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  It went red. Hold on, Hold on.
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  Don't lose that thought. OK, Go ahead.
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  OK, that was funny because for those of you who don't know,
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  Luke's camera just went and I was like, the universe doesn't
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  want me to share the story about you, Luke, or maybe Luke's like
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  quick abort. I just.
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  Turned off my camera. No, but with Luke, many times in
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  years past we've sat at a dinner with all of We have a lot of
• 8:02
  kids. We have 5 kids and while you
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  were physically there you maybe said two sentences the entire
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  meal where I found myself overcompensating and asking each
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  kid individual questions and making sure the conversation
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  flowed. And because you weren't
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  emotionally available to anyone at the table, I would step into
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  that over fixer role to make sure I was available for both of
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  us. And then we would get home and I
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  would feel a exhausted from caring that for both of us, but
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  also disappointed because I wanted my kids to have a
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  connection with you. I wanted you to engage them and
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  I couldn't do it for you. The thing, the reason for this
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  podcast is to help men or people that are shutting down from
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  their emotions, that don't realize it, be able to see it
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  and go, oh wow, that does apply. So I think I can access it
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  through this. We would go to those
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  environments and you would say to me, you're like not connected
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  to us. And I'm like angry because I'm
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  functioning. I'm functioning in that
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  experience, but I'm not emotionally connected and I'm
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  just like alone. What do you want me to do?
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  I don't. How do you want me to?
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  I'm not even, I notice that I'm fatigued.
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  I notice it's difficult. I notice it's hard, but I'm not
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  actually aware of what's happening inside of me.
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  I'm not aware of what I'm experiencing.
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  So just that's the deal. Functioning is not the same
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  thing as emotional connection. Can I and I, can I slow you down
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  there? Like what are you experiencing
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  for those who are listening and going like because you just said
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  I'm tired. I'm realizing I'm not firing on
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  all cylinders, but also unaware of how not present you are.
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  So what is during that happening internally?
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  I can remember one time this was a in our story, very painful.
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  I'd always invite Alana to go to work functions with my
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  colleagues and be like, hey, Alana, we got mandatory,
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  mandatory work fun, right? We're going to go do some tea
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  and think. And I would so not be connected
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  to her through these experiences.
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  So not connected to her. I would just over perform and
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  over function. And I was so tired.
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  I was just like, I don't want to.
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  I feel like I'm an introvert stuck in an extrovert supposed
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  to be experienced and I would just be surviving that that
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  environment, right? And I would just be on as I can
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  be. And I leave Alana on her own.
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  Just leave her out there and leave you on your own out there
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  just by yourself and expecting you to function the same way
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  that I do, expecting you to put on a face and act all act the
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  same way. I was of lack of the
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  authenticity just to perform for other people.
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  And then we would just get in these spirals after because I
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  would not be a connected partner in that experience, not aware of
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  what I'm feeling and experiencing through that.
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  Not noticing the pressure that you were under, adding more
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  pressure to you. And it was just, and I was so
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  shut down. And then if you attempted to
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  even talk about your experience, I would just gaslight the hell
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  out of you. I would just and I would
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  gaslight is even not even gaslight once shut down didn't
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  work once I tried to just defend and I just there wasn't an
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  emotionally present partner in that experience.
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  Well, I think about even you going to your families, there
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  was a period where it was so emotionally challenging for you,
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  but for you to see going home as emotionally challenging wasn't
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  an option in your own mind. I'm not.
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  Supposed to fill that I'm not supposed to.
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  And so you would go and I would be like, you feel like a
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  different person. And that would be really hard
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  for me because I got one Luke at home and then a different loop
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  when he was at families. And it was either you performing
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  for your family, being who you felt like they needed you or
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  wanted you to be, or you being a zombie.
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  And both of them were you surviving your experience.
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  And I want to pause right here for any partners listening.
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  I'm not excusing the behavior because sometimes when I say
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  that you were surviving your experience, that can feel really
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  dismissive to a partner of yeah. But just because they're
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  surviving their experience puts me where now I have to survive
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  my experience. So I want to honor all of that.
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  And the reality is, is because there were still so many
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  unhealed parts that you were surviving your experience and
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  that lack of awareness didn't allow you until you got that
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  awareness, you weren't able to do the work around that.
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  Yeah, I like that a lot. There's some signs of an emote
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  because I want to tie that in Hiroana with signs of an
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  emotionally shut down man. One of the things he'll do is
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  he'll explain events but not emotions.
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  So I could all day long talk about explaining facts and
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  logistics in going to a family's and in fact being mad at you for
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  you feeling like another person that didn't think I was showing
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  up the right way. So I would explain facts and
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  logic to this, but I couldn't identify my emotional
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  experience. I couldn't identify that I was
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  struggling. That was difficult.
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  But I did feel pressure. I didn't want to go without
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  deaths out of the 10 foot pole. I think you touched on that a
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  lot, but that wasn't allowed for me within myself, which was to
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  feel what I was feeling and to be able to be able to be
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  transparent about what I'm feeling and.
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  You didn't even then at the time, know what you were
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  feeling. No, I did.
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  No, I did. Yeah.
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  I'm shut down so much to survive that experience so.
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  And and that really quick, that shutdown to survive.
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  This often starts in childhood. This what we're really talking
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  about is an avoidant attachment, right?
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  Somewhere, at some point, you learned that doing big feelings
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  wasn't safe. It wasn't acceptable, it was not
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  allowed. And so it was easier to just
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  shove them down, not touch them. And it could be that you
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  witnessed an overly emotional person or you were a child who
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  had big emotions because all kids do.
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  And adults in your life went no, no, no, we're not doing that.
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  Shut it down. And so for those of you
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  listening, knowing that these survival techniques, mechanisms,
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  coping mechanisms start in childhood and often are needed
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  in whatever environment or circumstance we're in, but they
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  carry into adulthood. And what we're talking about
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  today is they often get masked in a way that's funny.
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  That's a hard word for me to say anyway.
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  Masked in a way that can look OK, we learn what's socially
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  acceptable, but underneath that is deeply avoidance.
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  And we see a lot of avoidant people in the work we do who
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  have acted outside of their values.
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  Absolutely. Can you share what you've
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  noticed as you've worked with men on?
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  Because if you bring this out in the part signs of emotionally
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  shut down men. First one is he explains events
• 15:30
  but not emotions. Second one is he lives in logic.
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  So what do you see where men intellectualize emotions?
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  So where they can, what do you? What do you notice there?
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  Whenever I do a group and I ask them like how does that make you
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  feel? They will talk about the
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  feeling, they will explain the situation around the feeling,
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  but very rarely is it AI experienced this and I'm feeling
• 16:01
  this. It's more of talking.
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  It's almost like the feeling. I'm trying to think of an
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  analogy with it. It's like the feeling is in a
• 16:14
  box. And I imagine, you know, in the
• 16:17
  movies where they have a diamond and it's in the box and the box
• 16:20
  has the alarm around it and you can look at it.
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  But if you try to open up the box and pick up the diamond, all
• 16:26
  the alarms will go off. And the trapdoors, they're not
• 16:30
  trapdoors, but the doors would come down and like all hell
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  would break loose, right? You look at the diamond, you
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  don't touch it. And that's what I think about
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  with emotions, is that intellectual intellectualizing.
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  It is. I'm looking at it.
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  I'm saying like, yeah, it's got pointy edges and it shines.
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  And if you hold it just right, so even that can make you feel
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  like you're experiencing the diamond.
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  But it's still locked up over there in the box.
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  We're actually not letting anyone in.
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  It's very protected and that's what they do with feelings is
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  we're not actually touching them.
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  We're talking about them, we're looking at them, but we're not
• 17:08
  actually allowing ourselves to feel them.
• 17:10
  So there is that barrier in that wall.
• 17:13
  Yeah, and gosh, this is such a learned experience.
• 17:18
  I'm thinking of a parent with a child and thinking about
• 17:20
  attunement. It's the work that wasn't
• 17:21
  already done. It's the part.
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  It's the child that's upset because if something's going on
• 17:26
  and that parent that slows down and says, hey, you look sad.
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  I noticed you look sad. Is that what you're feeling?
• 17:32
  Do you feel sad? And I feel emotionally even
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  saying this, by the way, all I think about the child that feels
• 17:38
  out emotion so strongly and goes, what am I feeling?
• 17:41
  What is that like to fill that? Yeah.
• 17:43
  And they're not intellectualizing that.
• 17:45
  That's not that experience that a parent is slowing them down,
• 17:47
  saying, what are you feeling? What are you noticing about what
• 17:50
  you're feeling? How does where does it feel?
• 17:52
  How does it feel? And it's so for those of us who
• 17:56
  didn't have that experience, for somebody to say, hey, what are
• 18:01
  you feeling? It makes sense that we
• 18:02
  intellectualize. It makes sense that we don't
• 18:04
  have. The only way to identify is to
• 18:05
  talk about but don't feel it and experience it.
• 18:08
  I, and this is actually one reason that I really love
• 18:11
  therapy if done well, is that slowing down and going hold on
• 18:17
  what you just said there that that statement holds a lot of
• 18:23
  power. What are you feeling right now
• 18:25
  when you say that? And bringing them back into the
• 18:28
  moment and brack into their body and helping them be able to feel
• 18:31
  that because this is sometimes we have to relearn it.
• 18:36
  I was going to say it's a learned behavior, but I think
• 18:39
  what's learned is the safety needed to really feel.
• 18:44
  Yeah, the safety needed to really feel.
• 18:47
  I love it when men and my the environment that I'm in cry when
• 18:54
  they tear and experience it and then I normalize it and validate
• 18:58
  it and appreciate it and all that stuff.
• 19:00
  And it's just still that and it's they feel different when
• 19:04
  they're. Done The amount of people who
• 19:06
  apologize for tears, men and women alike, as soon as they
• 19:10
  start crying, they go I'm sorry, I'm sorry and I'm like, why are
• 19:13
  we apologizing for that? The fact that you are allowing
• 19:17
  yourself to feel a, especially when we're in a group setting,
• 19:20
  you're giving permission for everyone else in the room to be
• 19:23
  authentic and to feel thank you. And then you yourself are being
• 19:28
  real and authentic to what you're experiencing.
• 19:30
  Thank you. I remember with you saying I
• 19:34
  don't want to cry, I don't want to cry because it feels ugly,
• 19:38
  felt ugly to cry. And I just remember so being so
• 19:42
  scared to cry in front of people and not kind of cry like real
• 19:47
  cry, like really be seen, but just it's level of vulnerability
• 19:51
  and it's true strength like it's, it's amazing.
• 19:55
  Do you want to hear how amazing a body is?
• 19:57
  Yeah. They have found that tears when
• 20:01
  we instantly wipe away tears, we are actually removing a natural
• 20:08
  thing that our body does to help us.
• 20:09
  So they have found that our tears chemical balance.
• 20:15
  Changes depending on the feeling that we're feeling.
• 20:18
  So when we cry tears, those tears are antidotes.
• 20:25
  Not the right word, but an aid in whatever feeling that we're
• 20:29
  feeling. So when those tears go past your
• 20:32
  nose and if, especially if they drop in your mouth, you
• 20:36
  literally get that extra support for whatever feeling you're
• 20:40
  feeling. But when we quickly wipe away
• 20:42
  our tears, we don't get that opportunity for the tears to
• 20:46
  drop the note beneath our nose or go into our mouth.
• 20:50
  And I was just fascinated by how our bodies are so created to
• 20:56
  support us. And that message of wipe away my
• 20:59
  tears and don't let them be seen and try to hold them in is the
• 21:02
  exact opposite of literally how our body is trying to help us.
• 21:06
  Yeah, that's cool. That was cool.
• 21:08
  That was fun. I'm planning on going into
• 21:10
  crying like that, but it matters.
• 21:12
  It's so important. We're going to take a quick.
• 21:14
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• 22:18
  Let's get back to our episode. OK, so signs of emotionally shut
• 22:22
  down, man. He explains events but not
• 22:24
  emotions. He lives in logic.
• 22:27
  Here's the third one. He stays constantly busy.
• 22:31
  Oh, the amount of men who have work addictions or work
• 22:34
  compulsivity. Yeah, Compulsory.
• 22:37
  Yeah, Work, phone projects, sports, sexual, compulsive
• 22:42
  behavior, social media achievements.
• 22:45
  Here's the stillness often feels unsafe for a man that's trying
• 22:51
  to navigate this journey. That's emotionally discomfort.
• 22:54
  OK. And can we expand that word
• 22:56
  unsafe? Because a lot of times if you're
• 22:59
  not. Stillness feels.
• 23:01
  Stillness. Often feels uncomfortable.
• 23:05
  Yeah. Yeah, stillness often feels
• 23:08
  uncomfortable. And it is like really at its
• 23:11
  core it is emotionally unsafe, but often it takes a while to
• 23:16
  get there, so uncomfortable is great.
• 23:19
  Yeah, yeah, it's it's especially so much of our so much of
• 23:24
  wonderful people I'm around you have a lot of them experience
• 23:27
  ADHD and so to stop and be still is feels it's very
• 23:32
  uncomfortable. But this for me, here's the 4th
• 23:35
  1 he only feels. I don't know, do we move on too
• 23:38
  quickly? For me it feels constantly busy
• 23:39
  because it feels like that's a big one.
• 23:41
  But it's pretty self-explanatory, so I'll leave
• 23:42
  it alone. I fear we won't get through our
• 23:45
  episode because so we'll just say though, take time to explore
• 23:51
  that because even when you have different treatments with a
• 23:56
  therapist, inpatient treatment, out of patient treatment, I
• 24:00
  don't think we look at that overstimulation and busyness
• 24:05
  enough. Yeah, so if you take a look at
• 24:10
  this 4th 1, I love this lens. So as a human, you still need to
• 24:17
  fill there still need to be this opportunity if you are shut down
• 24:20
  to access that intensity. OK, so shut down men can often
• 24:26
  feel alive through really intense things.
• 24:29
  OK, not all of these. No, I'm not giving you a list of
• 24:32
  there everybody, one person that lives in new intensity to be all
• 24:35
  alone, but through anger, through lust, through risk,
• 24:40
  through competition, through secrecy.
• 24:43
  Just notice these things. It's high feeling activities,
• 24:47
  intent and all over the top through achievement, through
• 24:50
  conflict, through adrenaline. So because what happens here,
• 24:54
  this is compulsive behavior is often tied to be able to access
• 25:00
  emotional parts of us that we can't really buried.
• 25:03
  I need to fill. I need to be able to fill.
• 25:05
  So what do I do? I have more intense ways of
• 25:07
  feeling. Do you remember what you used to
• 25:10
  do? You used to watch videos that
• 25:14
  were either really upsetting or you would watch homecoming
• 25:19
  videos from people in the military or the Navy.
• 25:22
  You would purposely seek out really emotional or really
• 25:28
  intense videos online. Yeah, you know, I totally the
• 25:32
  ones that were just there was car crashes, car wrecks.
• 25:36
  By the way, if I'm listing some things that you do, it doesn't
• 25:38
  mean you can't ever do these and not be out the person.
• 25:41
  But there was it was finding I even.
• 25:44
  Noticed, but you would it was different and I think This is
• 25:47
  why my brains honing in on this is it was different than what
• 25:50
  you do today right? You would seek it out and you
• 25:53
  would watch sad video after sad video after sad video because
• 25:57
  that was the only way and this isn't a conscious thought right
• 26:02
  it's not I feel sad. I need to go watch sad video so
• 26:05
  I can release it It was just like I'm bored I'm going to look
• 26:08
  at YouTube. Oh, there's a sad video.
• 26:11
  Oh, there's another one. I'm going to watch this one.
• 26:13
  OK, I'm going to look this up. It's that type.
• 26:17
  And so it's those healthy needs trying to get met in unhealthy
• 26:23
  ways. OK, that's good.
• 26:24
  I'm glad you brought that up as an example.
• 26:27
  In fact, I'm thinking about today, I had a little shame pop
• 26:29
  up with that one when you said that because I noticed like
• 26:32
  there's areas still today that I think I access.
• 26:36
  I access that and because I'm maybe not taking the time to
• 26:39
  slow down and notice my emotions.
• 26:41
  Yeah. Anyway, appreciate bringing that
• 26:43
  one in. OK, here's a fifth one.
• 26:46
  He says. I don't know frequently.
• 26:48
  So there's difficult identifying emotions.
• 26:50
  And this one can, it's almost, I don't know, it's kind of like
• 26:53
  almost weaponized in a way. I don't even know what to use
• 26:56
  it. A lot of you call it the stupid
• 26:57
  card, but. Not to my clients.
• 27:00
  I called the stupid card with. You I do good job clarifying
• 27:04
  that. So I used a lot of the, I used a
• 27:08
  lot of the like I'm not going to put the effort in.
• 27:10
  So I don't know, right. And not a lot of like you're,
• 27:13
  you're an intelligent man. You can't just use that all the
• 27:16
  time. So I did identify struggling.
• 27:19
  It's it's a top out. It's absolutely, it's just a
• 27:22
  wall. It's a shutdown, right?
• 27:24
  It's shut down. It's a wall to keep from doing
• 27:27
  that work. Like it protects from
• 27:29
  discomfort. It protects from uncomfortable
• 27:32
  thoughts, feelings, conversations.
• 27:34
  Yeah. And it's interesting because it
• 27:37
  doesn't go away. That's where ownership, maybe
• 27:40
  you got to that part with your partner where you finally go, I
• 27:42
  am disconnected, I am avoidant. And you own that.
• 27:46
  And for a period of time that is satisfying to your partner that
• 27:49
  you're owning that. But it will evolve into
• 27:53
  something else. So you have responsibility now
• 27:55
  that you've owned it to now become a more emotionally aware
• 27:58
  human. OK, here's the 6th one.
• 28:01
  An emotionally shut down man, often he struggles to receive
• 28:04
  care so. This is a good one.
• 28:09
  He minimizes pain, OK, He lead in a group of men where he can
• 28:13
  of the opportunity to fill, have the opportunity to cry and it'll
• 28:17
  shut it down. But even physically, how many
• 28:21
  men won't go to the doctor, won't go do that care that they
• 28:26
  need, and I'm fine, I'm fine. I'm fine.
• 28:30
  Yeah, it's not as tough, but it's totally a part of being
• 28:35
  emotionally shut down. Were you just say anything else
• 28:37
  on that alone? No, no, I realized I used a
• 28:41
  voice of rah rah. And I was like, I probably
• 28:44
  wasn't great and I don't want to be shaming when I use a male
• 28:47
  voice that sounds gruffy. But what I picture is this older
• 28:52
  gruffer guy being annoyed that he has to go to the doctor.
• 28:55
  And anyway, I was analyzing in my own head if that was poor to
• 29:00
  me. That's what happened today.
• 29:02
  That's what happened. Yeah.
• 29:04
  Here's some parts of these troubles.
• 29:05
  He struggles to receive care, so there's a minimization of pain.
• 29:09
  I'm fine. I'm fine.
• 29:10
  But just stuck. He deflects support.
• 29:13
  So same thing. And I want to do it on my own.
• 29:15
  And then he feels uncomfortable with somebody being soft with
• 29:21
  him. Not partner, OK, not partner at
• 29:25
  all. So just notice this, but other
• 29:28
  men being connected and close the shutdown person obviously
• 29:32
  off in the will. And even when they experience
• 29:35
  that there's a tolerance that's a tolerant, a window of
• 29:38
  tolerance per SE that doesn't really can't stand that
• 29:42
  closeness for too long. They pull away after a little
• 29:45
  bit, OK, because it's uncomfortable, those vulnerable
• 29:49
  and it is, but it's healthy. Yeah.
• 29:53
  OK, last one, last one of the seven.
• 29:57
  He confuses numbness with peace. Many men think that they're calm
• 30:01
  when they're actually disconnected, All right?
• 30:04
  And this is they're sensing there's this calmness, but
• 30:07
  they're really just numb, right? They're just, they're just void
• 30:11
  of emotion, right? A lot of what's going through
• 30:14
  your head, I really want to know.
• 30:16
  Are you watching my facial expression?
• 30:18
  Yeah, I was actually deep in thought about your aura ring and
• 30:22
  how with your aura ring in some of the times that should have
• 30:26
  should have been most heightened, it showed you
• 30:29
  physically very calm. And I was just thinking how as
• 30:35
  you explore that more. Oh, I got a story.
• 30:39
  OK. I got a kind of that with a
• 30:41
  story. Yeah, let me finish the thought
• 30:43
  so people understand what I'm saying with the ring.
• 30:45
  But your ring reads physical sensations and it would show you
• 30:50
  in this relaxed state and when things the worse it was, the
• 30:55
  more relaxed your body got. And I think I know which story
• 31:00
  you're going to tell, but I'm this to me in a way that I've
• 31:04
  never seen before. Highlights disassociation and
• 31:08
  emotional shutdown. Oh man, I learned about that
• 31:10
  word disassociation. When I was ready to tackle it, I
• 31:14
  was like, holy crap, disassociated.
• 31:18
  And I was like, where's the books on it?
• 31:19
  I got to read about this. But anyway, so when I went to
• 31:22
  treatment, y'all, this was bad. This is a story that y'all
• 31:25
  thought I was going to share. OK, so when I went to treatment,
• 31:29
  it was in Tennessee and they had a big old huge ice storm.
• 31:33
  But it was like they called in the what is that what they call
• 31:35
  natural disasters? State of FEMA When they call
• 31:38
  FEMA because they're they call they call it and say this is bad
• 31:43
  and everything was shut down. And I'll make a long story
• 31:46
  somewhat short to not extend this podcast, but it was
• 31:49
  freezing temperatures, roads were closed.
• 31:52
  We were in isolated place, limited, limited food, really
• 31:57
  cold, I'm dangerously cold and people were scared.
• 32:00
  It was scared. It was scary.
• 32:02
  I'll have to go more into the story sometime.
• 32:04
  It was the whole thing was fascinating, but people started
• 32:08
  to you got a chance to see not not judgements.
• 32:11
  You get a chance to see what how people responded in survival and
• 32:16
  people showed up differently. There were some people their
• 32:18
  survival state was to give everything away, like to show up
• 32:22
  for other people. And I wouldn't even necessarily
• 32:24
  say in the most healthy way. They forgot to take care of
• 32:26
  themselves. And there was other ones that
• 32:28
  just turned to themselves and we're kind of like we watch some
• 32:31
  the stuff that are good good with these shows.
• 32:34
  Now that you dark with these live shows where you watch all
• 32:37
  the drama happen. Reality TV reality is like
• 32:40
  reality TV. It was pretty juicy watching
• 32:41
  people show up and but not in the moment.
• 32:45
  People responded in really selfish ways.
• 32:47
  And I remember as we went through this experience, I
• 32:51
  remember one guy showing up. He's like, he's like, wow, Luke,
• 32:54
  you're so calm. Like, how are you so calm
• 32:57
  through this? And he was actually giving me
• 32:59
  credit and kudos. And I did get a chance to talk
• 33:02
  about it later, but I was shutting down.
• 33:05
  I could communicate with people and I could say, hey, this is
• 33:09
  what I need or want or whatever to be in that experience.
• 33:13
  But I wanted to sleep. I did sleep.
• 33:17
  I won't, you know, but I could. My body would just go to a place
• 33:20
  of survival and it would shut down where I came across really
• 33:24
  cool, calm and collected. But I was surviving.
• 33:27
  And it, I learned a lot about me because I thought about
• 33:31
  relationally how I engage in conflict.
• 33:35
  And I think somebody farther outside that would look at me
• 33:39
  would look really like kind of regulated and kind of more of
• 33:42
  kind of got my wits about me, but not for the person that's on
• 33:46
  the other side of intimacy with me.
• 33:47
  I feel for them because I'm not able to engage in that way.
• 33:52
  So just remembering and. Can I speak to that?
• 33:56
  Because I think a lot of partners do this?
• 33:59
  I was very in tune with when you were present and when you
• 34:02
  weren't and what I did over time as I began to train myself on
• 34:08
  what worked to keep you engaged and what didn't.
• 34:11
  And I would walk on egg shells trying to emotionally keep the
• 34:15
  environment. So you would stay present with
• 34:17
  me or not say things that would rock the boat or I would feel
• 34:21
  you starting. To on a tip toeing.
• 34:24
  Yeah, I'd see you start to pull away and I would want to either
• 34:27
  pull you back in or I would want to get mad and push you away.
• 34:31
  And so I was very, I want to say attuned, but I was very hyper
• 34:37
  aware of where you were. And I was constantly trained to
• 34:42
  manage myself, to manage your feelings and manage your
• 34:46
  experience. And so we got into some really
• 34:50
  bad, bad patterns around this. This is where I want to do
• 34:55
  another podcast, Alana, because guys, as soon as we started to
• 34:59
  break those patterns and Alana stopped realizing what she was
• 35:02
  playing into the word it. Got way worse.
• 35:05
  The one of the words you needed to individuate, you needed to
• 35:09
  step out of that and out of all the patterns.
• 35:12
  And for me, it just felt complete.
• 35:14
  And I'm sorry for the betrayed partners because this sounds
• 35:17
  like a sob fest, but that was really scary.
• 35:20
  I was watching you step away, find yourself get out of the all
• 35:24
  the old time patterns and all I could censor Phil was like I was
• 35:28
  being abandoned and let go. And then my survival parts got
• 35:32
  activated in different ways. So just through recognizing.
• 35:37
  Ways right? Yeah, in in more extreme ways,
• 35:40
  in different ways to maintain and hold on to the relationship
• 35:44
  that was really intense and can. I can I just say to partners, I
• 35:50
  want to highlight this as I didn't have any power and
• 35:55
  control to make you not shut down.
• 35:57
  It didn't have any power and control to make you not
• 36:00
  disassociate. I did at some level of a lot of
• 36:05
  shutting myself down and a lot of ignoring my own needs and a
• 36:09
  lot of self sacrifice. But ultimately even that
• 36:12
  couldn't last. And then when I tried to break
• 36:16
  the patterns, then I couldn't control your sense of
• 36:19
  abandonment and I couldn't control.
• 36:22
  And so I highlight this to partners because ultimately I
• 36:28
  finally had to get to the place where I went.
• 36:31
  This is Luke's work. I can't manage it, I can't own
• 36:36
  it. And when I gave him the
• 36:39
  responsibility to handle that himself, it was scary for me
• 36:45
  too. And there was a lot of unknowns.
• 36:48
  But ultimately, those breaking the patterns for me allowed me
• 36:54
  to get to a place where I could be healthier in a whole
• 36:56
  different way and allowed you space to finally tackle some of
• 37:02
  these pieces that were coming up that you couldn't fully tackle
• 37:07
  as long as I was managing your experience and not allowing you
• 37:10
  to feel the full extent of them. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 37:16
  You know what? It makes me sad.
• 37:17
  I wish I would have said so many times earlier in this journey.
• 37:23
  Anyway, that's mine to manage. That's not yours.
• 37:26
  And not in the way of like, get out of the way along in a way
• 37:29
  that I was waiting for you to be healthy.
• 37:32
  I was waiting for you to tell me what to do next.
• 37:36
  I was waiting for you to help me navigate it.
• 37:38
  And we had to step aside, both of us in those situations.
• 37:43
  And anyway, my old point, even bringing that up was is if you
• 37:46
  feel your partner individuating and finding them, going back and
• 37:51
  believing some of those patterns, I just notice
• 37:56
  everything that comes up for you with that, noticed all the
• 37:58
  feelings associated with a feeling, notice some don't put
• 38:02
  them on your partner. Don't break free of those
• 38:04
  patterns yourself of how you would normally respond and then
• 38:07
  get connected and close to the people that are going to support
• 38:10
  you and laser empower you to be healthy.
• 38:13
  But the thing that I'm trying, the thing that I'm trying to get
• 38:16
  to is it's taking a while is empower her in that individual.
• 38:20
  Empower yourself. Good things are on the other
• 38:23
  side of it, really good things. And there's a, there's a,
• 38:26
  there's definitely a period of pain.
• 38:27
  What were you going to say, Lana?
• 38:28
  I was going to say, can we give depending on where you're at,
• 38:33
  this may be really far away and I want to put this out there to
• 38:37
  plant that seed to show what it can look like.
• 38:40
  But when we when healing and reconnection actually happens,
• 38:46
  it's that the individual who has gone outside of their values
• 38:51
  really is stepping in to their own work and having awareness
• 38:57
  and then starting to feel feelings again.
• 38:59
  What that can look like for a couple is deeper connection.
• 39:04
  It can look like a rewarding back and forth of sharing of
• 39:08
  experiences. It can create safety for the
• 39:12
  partner because their significant others walls are
• 39:16
  finally down. And so the partner who's been
• 39:19
  betrayed feel safe enough to start taking their walls down.
• 39:23
  It can allow for such deeper connection to happen.
• 39:28
  But we can't get there with without that individual work
• 39:33
  being done. Yeah.
• 39:36
  So I love that we did this episode where we really slowed
• 39:39
  down what that shutdown looks like and what it can feel like
• 39:43
  internally. And what I want to say is if you
• 39:48
  can learn to face that discomfort, if you can learn to
• 39:51
  stay in the discomfort, there is deeper connection than you have
• 39:56
  ever had waiting for you. But it's similar to, I just did
• 40:03
  this on my own podcast, this analogy.
• 40:06
  But like when we, I would assume that most people have this
• 40:10
  common belief that if you go to the gym and lift weights, that
• 40:14
  there is a belief that we will get stronger.
• 40:17
  But if we never lift weights or we only lift 5 LB weights.
• 40:21
  We're not going to actually get any stronger.
• 40:23
  We have to increase those weights and we have to have that
• 40:26
  physical pain if we want the physical growth.
• 40:30
  And it's the same thing with the emotions.
• 40:32
  If we're constantly avoiding the hard and we avoid the
• 40:36
  uncomfortable and we're not willing to do difficult
• 40:38
  conversations or to sit in our own difficult emotions, we won't
• 40:43
  ever grow in them. There is the same as that
• 40:47
  physical growth that happens with stretching our muscles and
• 40:50
  allowing for that discomfort and pain.
• 40:52
  That's what we have to do emotionally, to have that that
• 40:57
  greater strength for emotions and that deeper depth for the
• 41:02
  relationship that you want. That's so good.
• 41:06
  And you're just last piece and they can conclude with this,
• 41:11
  which is OK. So if you don't feel emotions,
• 41:14
  if you haven't let yourself, it's going to be chaotic.
• 41:15
  When you start to allow yourself to feel emotions, it's going to
• 41:18
  feel raw and it's going to feel whatever.
• 41:20
  So here's if you're relational or if you're the the training
• 41:24
  partner. So don't weaponize this
• 41:26
  information. Yeah, when you start to feel
• 41:29
  it's going to be chaotic and hard.
• 41:31
  Don't put that on your partner. You develop safe spaces to be or
• 41:36
  not only say the word erratic. That's almost like shaming, but
• 41:40
  to feel really intense things you haven't felt before.
• 41:43
  Find those really safe environments.
• 41:45
  But so often the person you hurt the most do you betray the most.
• 41:49
  You start to learn to feel and you start to identify it and
• 41:52
  have that voice. Don't just hurt them with it and
• 41:55
  find that safe place to feel. Because then all you can do is
• 41:57
  you can show up after that experience and talk about that
• 42:00
  experience and be more vulnerable.
• 42:02
  So how long do you want to clean that up at all?
• 42:05
  I just see sometimes that we pendulum swing.
• 42:08
  We go from really shut down to overly expressive to shut down.
• 42:13
  And I think, yeah, finding safe places to do it and not turning
• 42:17
  your partner into your emotional trash can because they're trying
• 42:21
  to heal from all of their own betrayal.
• 42:23
  And so putting all of your emotions on them and expecting
• 42:27
  them to hold that, carry that handle, that is a very unfair
• 42:31
  expectation. So yeah, definitely, that's why
• 42:36
  coaching, therapy groups, those type of places that you can
• 42:41
  explore and process. I always like the analogy of
• 42:44
  instead of dragging your wife through the mud, do the work,
• 42:49
  figure it out, and then come later in that vulnerability and
• 42:53
  be able to then let down your walls and talk about it and
• 42:56
  share, but not in the place where you're still driving
• 42:59
  through the mud. Yeah, yeah.
• 43:01
  You don't drag her through it. She can be aware that you're in
• 43:03
  the mud, but you don't drag her through it.
• 43:05
  OK. A lot of thanks for hanging out.
• 43:06
  Yeah. OK, everybody.
• 43:09
  It's good to spend time with you, and we'll talk to you next
• 43:12
  time. Take care.
• 43:16
  Hey, thanks for joining us today.
• 43:17
  If this is something. That you connected with.
• 43:19
  I'd love to meet with you more and talk about it.
• 43:22
  So what you can? Do is go to
• 43:23
  chooserecoveryservices.com? Or check the show notes.
• 43:26
  And there what we can do is set up a quick conversation with.
• 43:28
  Me. Thanks so much for listening to
• 43:30
  Beyond the Facade where we unmask the authentic self.