Dating An Avoidant Woman

Foreign.

Team, welcome to the Man Talk show. Connor Beaton here today we will be talking about the keys to dating avoidant women. Now, this is a topic that so many of you have asked for. So many men in the alliance, the online membership that I run, so many guys on Instagram, here on YouTube have said, how, what, how do I date an avoidant woman? What do I do? She shuts down, she pulls away. You know, how do I operate? So where do we begin? Well, first and foremost, no, don't run. No, avoidant women are not damaged, they're not dangerous. They're, they're, they're not an issue. Uh, it's been very interesting to see the, the commentary and the narrative about avoidant attachment styles online, men or women alike. It's been very interesting because anxious people don't generally get demonized for their anxious behaviors. However, avoidant attachment styles get demonized like nobody's business. They're called all kinds of things. And it was very interesting to see this, this dichotomy, this polarity emerge because I was once an avoidant person, but that, you know, this, this language wasn't really around. And so no, they're not damaged, no, they're not broken, no, they're not dangerous. They are deploying. And this is really important. I'm going to get into what creates an avoidant woman. This. They are deploying a very specific protection strategy that kept them safe in their upbringing, in their primary attachment system, AKA their family system. And they learned some version of the following. Okay. In their attachment system, in their family system, avoidant women learned something like the following. In order for me to be okay, I need to be alone, or I can only be safe on my own, or the only person that's going to meet my needs is me, or I am the only one I can really trust.

That's a big one, right? So that's what's going on in the world of an avoidant woman. She's not broken, she's not damaged, she's not defective. She just learned to protect herself by prioritizing. And this is super important for what I'm going to describe later by prioritizing self protection and.

Self protection and self strategies, meaning I will take care of my own needs above relationship connection, okay? Self protection over relational connection. And we have to have a healthy balance of both. But for avoidant women, they have over indexed the self protection part. So these are some of the experiences that will have created that. And one of the markers that you'll notice in avoidant women in the relationship is that they seem to cut off emotionally and even sometimes sexually. So it's quite common that more avoidant style women are a little bit emotionally disconnected. So whenever an emotional conversation happens or whenever there's an opportunity for them to express or expose. I'm gonna use that word specifically, expose themselves authentically. Say what they want, say what they need, say what they desire, they retract and contract from that opportunity. So where more secure people are going to lean in and say, yeah, here's who I. Here's what I want, here's what I desire. It can sometimes feel like with avoidant women, you are only getting like 40 or 50% of them and there's this big part of them that you're just like, I don't really know, like, you seem like an enigma. And for a lot of men, that actually becomes part of the dysfunctional draw. You know that because for. And here's what I want to say about this that I think I haven't seen anybody else talk about. Avoidant women tend to attract savior oriented men who perceive her to be a damsel in distress, but in a different way. Right. We often think about the damsel in distress as the woman locked up in the tower, right? The, the woman who's anxious or she's afraid or, you know, she's. She needs to be saved in this very direct way. Now, it's going to play into the strategies that I'm going to teach you in just a few moments because I'm going to break down three things that ladies, you need to do and guys, you need to do. So let's get into that. First, what I want you to know is that as a couple, you need to have a conversation and some agreements about how you're going to lean into this because it's not one person's responsibility. Okay? Whenever we're with somebody who has an anxious or an attachment or a disorganized style, it's not just their responsibility to fix it or figure it out. The healing happens in relationship, right? My mentor, Dewey Freeman has a great saying. He says we are hurt and wounded in relationship and we have to heal in relationship. That means that both of you, both parties have some responsibility to remedy and reconcile with the dance, with the avoidant dance. Okay? So have a conversation about how both of you are going to deploy some of the things that I lay out. So ladies, let's start with you. Number one, the thing that you probably do not want to do, communicating your needs.

Now, you probably hear that and you're like, oh, I just want to shut this off immediately. But I'm going to give you a very specific strategy, because what happens for a lot of women is they hear that and they're like, well, that's terrifying. That's the thing that I couldn't do growing up and the thing that I kind of have known that I've had to do for a very, very long time. But I don't really know where to start. So you have to look at all the things that feel like the other person is going to reject you for, or punish you for, or abandon you for. Those are the things that need to start being shared. But you have to do it in a way that is incremental. So where a lot of avoidant women go is, oh, I need to share the deepest, darkest thing. Like, I have to share this big giant need. And that feels overwhelming. Next, shifting from self protection to relational connection. This is number two, ladies, shifting from self protection to relational connection. You learned very early on in life that relationship is done best when you protect yourself over the relationship. That usually means things like ignoring conflict, avoiding it altogether, not having the hard conversations, not saying what you want or need. It usually means that when a partner is upset with you or disappointed that you shut down, that you judge them, that you criticize them, that you make them wrong for it. And you will generally over prioritize the things that keep you safe versus the things that will foster the relationship and allow the relationship to really thrive. Number three is lean into conflict and not away. Okay. Lean into conflict and not away. And I know that this is a hard one. I know that a lot of your upbringing has likely conditioned you to believe that conflict is dangerous, unhealthy, pointless, useless, not productive, whatever else the narrative is, and that you are better off by not engaging with it. But the reality is that there's no change without confrontation. No change without confrontation. And the real big thing that I want you to know is part of repairing your. Your relational, sorry, your attachment wound is by going through conflict in a healthy way. This is the thing that most avoidance do not understand, and most people who work with avoidant attachment issues miss out on entirely. Part of healing your avoidant attachment wound is about learning how to do conflict effectively. Because when you did conflict or saw conflict growing up, it was not done effectively. It was not resolved, it was dangerous, it was harmful. It was all of those things. And so you learned either not to engage with it at all, at all. Or you learn that when it starts to spin up that you disconnect entirely. So you have to choose to lean in when conflict happen. So start to use more statement oriented language with the woman that you're dating who's an avoidant and what you'll do over time. And it might ruffle her a little bit at first. It might be a little like, no, I don't want to tell you about that. Or, you know, she might be like, I don't want to talk about that right now. If she says no or she says, I don't want to talk about that right now, don't take it personally. Just say, okay, well, I want to hear about it. So tell me when you're ready to talk about it. Okay, again, I want to hear about it. So tell me when you're ready to talk about it. You are creating structure, solidness, and you are building trust that it's safe for her to communicate how she's feeling and that you genuinely care. Remember, most open, avoidant women are walking through the world with the perspective that nobody genuinely cares about their experience, what they're feeling internally, and it's not safe for them to divulge those things to the people that they love. Super simple. Be very clear about your expectations.

For a lot of women who are avoidant, they never really knew what the expectations were. They didn't really have a sense of like, well, if I do this or say that, is dad going to be pissed? Am I going to get yelled at? Am I going to get abandoned? Am I going to get chewed out, you know, or am I going to get neglected again if I express what I want and need? And so the expectations are often very, very unclear. So the more clear that you can get on your expectations, hey, I expect us to address this conflict. Or hey, I expect us to have a conversation about our finances. Or, hey, I expect us to have a conversation about our sex life. Hey, I expect us to go on a date once a week. How do you feel about that? The more you are clear about your expectations, the more that you give her an opportunity to communicate where she's at. Does she agree with that? Does she feel like that's too much? Is she on board with that? Like, how does she relate to those things? If you are ambiguous or you try and criticize her to meet your expectations, you will reinforce the original wound and she will stay stuck. Your work is to create the opportunities and the openings for her internal reality to be invited into your relationship, to give thanks when she does. Create connection emotionally, mentally, physically, sexually or otherwise. And be clear about where you stand. Right what is okay. And what's not okay with you? If she's shutting down and, you know, there's like, a little disagreement and she blows up and she's like, I can't talk to you right now, and she leaves, or she acts in a way that is out of alignment with the relationship, you need to be clear that that is not okay. Right. So one of the things that you can do is around being clear about your expectations. You can say, hey, my expectation is that when we get into conflict and you don't go radio silent on me for five days, that's not okay. So expectations stand for. They're kind of like the boundaries in the relationships of what's okay and what's not okay. And it'll let her know where you stand. So man it forward. Share this episode with somebody that you know will enjoy it. Share it with your partner. Listen to it with them or separately from them. Take notes, have a conversation about it, and comment below. Let me know what you thought. What would you like me to address next? And don't forget to subscribe. Hit the bell notification on YouTube or on whatever channel that you are on so that you do not miss these episodes. I don't want them to get lost in the algorithm. All right. Until next week. Connor Beaton signing off.

Sam.