Category Archives: Intimacy

“My Husband is Addicted to Texting.”

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"Fly By" by Mimi Stuart © Live the Life you Desire

“Fly By” by Mimi Stuart ©
Live the Life you Desire


“I am separated from my husband because I have reasons not to trust him. Also, despite my complaints, he is online texting with WhatsApp all the time, even when he wakes up in the middle of the night and while he’s driving. Yet he never texts me or lets me see whom he’s chatting with, and he doesn’t have a job.”

Secrecy and social media

Clearly there are several issues at play here:

1. Your husband is addicted to WhatsApp.

2. He has lost interest in you.

3. Worst of all, you are losing your self-respect in this relationship.

1. He is addicted to texting.

Texting can become a real neurological addiction, which is pursued despite the harm it causes to yourself and those around you. Jeanene Swanson writes in “The Neurological Basis for Digital Addiction”:

“So what happens is, you hear a sound [alerting you to an incoming text message], and your brain says, ‘There might be something good there, I’m going to check it.’” At that point, the mesolimbic dopamine circuits are activated, and a small surge of the neurotransmitter is released in the brain. “What you’re getting addicted to is the dopaminergic hit. With texting addiction, there is an added element of waiting for a response,” Karter says. “It is the anticipation that hooks us.”

Your husband’s texting addiction is the number one preoccupation in his life. There may be others but he has not shared them with you. He is allowing this addiction to destroy his relationship with you, and he is endangering others by driving while texting. The time consumed while “chatting” is preventing him from otherwise honoring his primary relationship and getting a job.

Given that he does not admit that he has a problem, I don’t think he will change any time soon.

2. He has lost respect and desire for you.

Your husband isn’t interested in texting and chatting with you much because he knows you are always available, and he is annoyed with your complaints. He is on the defensive with you. Even if you didn’t complain, he would be more drawn to texting with others because of the anticipation of receiving responses from people who are more fun and not in constant pursuit of him.

I recommend that you stop complaining and that you stop or greatly limit your relationship with him. You should pull back from someone who treats you with indifference and with much less interest than he has in his ether-based paramours.

3. Loss of self-respect.

A loving long-term relationship requires that two people cherish and nourish the relationship. Your husband is not nourishing your relationship. Continuing to pursue him despite his indifference toward you is a turn-off to him and is causing you to lose self-respect.

You need to stop obsessing over his texting. Instead you need to invoke the self-discipline needed to move beyond a man who is living for his addiction. Don’t let the fear of being alone misguide you. As long as that fear persists, he has no need to accommodate you in any way.

Rather than focusing on him, focus on your own challenge, which is to avoid wasting your time hoping for an addict to change his ways. You could say something like, “I’m so sorry but I’ve lost respect for you and recognize that your online relationships are more important to you than our relationship. I want to be with someone who wants to do something with his life, and puts me and our relationship first. I wish you the best of luck.” I would then move on with your life.

If you stop all contact with him, he may start contacting you more, which might please you temporarily. But don’t expect too much because he will probably go right back to his addiction to more “exciting” cyber interactions. But you will have regained your self respect and your life!

Good Luck!

by Dr. Alison Poulsen

Read “Pursuit vs. Distancing.”

Read “Does she like me? She doesn’t text me like she did at the beginning.”

Watch “Pursuing Connection with a Distancer?”

Is “playing hard to get” just a game?

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"I'll Give You the Moon and the Stars" by Mimi Stuart ©

“I’ll Give You the Moon and the Stars”
by Mimi Stuart ©

If you find yourself frequently pursuing intimacy and wondering why the person you’re pursuing seems to back away, your friends may give you advice to “play hard to get.” But perhaps you don’t want to play games and be inauthentic within your relationship. You would rather be honest about your strong feelings, even though you are pushing the other person away.

Is “playing hard to get” inauthentic?

Life is a series of adventures, misadventures, and adjustments. One of the adjustments a pursuer needs to make is to resist the conspicuous chase that too frequently ends in disappointment.

At first it may feel like a pretense to try changing your inclination to pursue. It may feel inauthentic to pursue other interests and have fun with other friends when all you want to do is spend every minute with the person you’re pursuing. Yet ultimately you may find the distractions and separation rewarding. In the end it will make YOU more interesting to the target of your affection.

It can be difficult to develop a new quality and try a new approach. It is normal to feel awkward and fake. For instance, saying “no” feels inauthentic when you are just learning to set boundaries. Similarly, not always saying “yes” to the person you’re pursuing may feel inauthentic while you are learning to seek balance in your relationship. Yet eventually this approach will feel natural and will serve to make you more desirable.

“Playing hard to get” may feel inauthentic. Becoming more independent may also feel awkward but it is not a game.

Fostering desire

Desire only flourishes when people maintain their own independent life, spark, and activities. When one person waits slavishly for the other’s attention, the other person loses interest because there’s no more challenge in the relationship.

Ideally you should engage in the relationship enough so that your partner will want to engage with you but remain occupied and independent enough so that he or she will want to KEEP pursuing you. This balance will enhance his or her appreciation for you and the desire to continue the pursuit of you.

So focus on your goal and not your immediate impulse. Your goal is to be in a relationship with someone who respects and desires you. By learning to allow for a little separateness and mystery you can create the groundwork for mutual desire, romance and intimacy.

by Dr. Alison Poulsen
@alisonpoulsen

Read “I always fall madly in love; we do everything together; and then, out of the blue, I get dumped.”

Read “I often feel depressed, anxious and desperate when my girlfriend is not giving me enough attention. For example, if she takes too long to reply to my text messages or is not very affectionate.”

Privacy vs. Secrecy: “My husband has blocked me from his facebook and other social media accounts.”

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"Marilyn Silver Screen" by Mimi Stuart ©

“Marilyn Silver Screen” by Mimi Stuart ©

“My husband has blocked me from his facebook and other social media accounts. He told me firmly that he will not negotiate about protecting his privacy. It’s his private life. The things that he talks about with his friends and whom he talks to are his private domain. His phone, computer and social media and his online attachments are his private world.”

Privacy and secrecy in a relationship

Your husband is trying to defend secrecy, not privacy. There is a clear distinction between privacy and secrecy in an intimate and shared relationship such as a marriage. Secrecy will ultimately destroy your relationship and your marriage.

Privacy

Individuals should maintain respect for each other’s privacy, such as having personal space alone or writing a journal, for example. This differs from furtive relationships and behavior that may impact the primary relationship.

Secrecy

Secrecy and marriage are fundamentally incompatible. When there is no trust, there is no commitment to the relationship. Trust has to be earned, not blindly given.

Keeping secrets and having outside, off-the-radar relationships – male or female – undermine the primary relationship. Even if these relationships are “only” online or emotional relationships, they will still undermine your primary relationship if they remain secret or if they become energetically more powerful than the primary relationship.

Transparency

Trust has to be earned by transparency, honesty, and considerate behavior. When you decide to marry someone, you decide that your primary emotional and physical relationship is with your spouse. You decide to live your lives together and give up some of your freedom. You make this choice because the payoff is a loving, trusting relationship.

It is important to have your own individual pursuits and friends, but not if they are secretive in any way. Each individual should try to flourish as an individual while being considerate, truthful, and open to his or her partner. Secrecy and marriage are incompatible. However, flourishing as an individual and having a good marriage are not incompatible.

If you want a great marriage, you will not want to put your spouse in a position where he or she has to play detective and is otherwise restricted from any aspect of your life. If you want a loving, fulfilling relationship, you will not want to block each other from social networks or have secret passwords to hide things from each other. Instead you will behave in a way that promotes the trust and the love you share.

by Dr. Alison Poulsen
@alisonpoulsen

Read “Creating Trust: ‘Don’t you trust me? Despite my faults, you know I love you.’”

Read “Can I trust you?”

“I often feel depressed, anxious and desperate when my girlfriend is not giving me enough attention. For example, if she takes too long to reply to my text messages or is not very affectionate.”

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"Rocket Man" by Mimi Stuart ©

“Rocket Man” by Mimi Stuart ©

Validation

People who need attention or validation in order to feel secure must step back and learn to cope with that longing without acting on it. Otherwise they create a vicious cycle that will ultimately backfire. The more desperate and insecure you become, the less likely you are to be validated by others or to get the attention you crave.

Even if you do receive validation in this situation, it’s likely to be out of a sense of pity or guilt rather than freely given.

Thus, for your own well-being, you need to resist the urge to pursue validation from your girlfriend. Avoid the use of manipulation, guilt, pleading and covert reciprocal bargains, such as the unstated, “I’ll flatter you if you flatter me.”

Texting

People differ in how effusive they are in emails, texts, and on the phone. There is no correct way to be. Accept your girlfriend for who she is, and give her positive feedback when she is more affectionate or attentive in her texts to you.

When dealing with feelings of anxiety and desperation, remind yourself to resist acting on those feelings in order to avoid pushing her away.

Do something interesting

Instead of getting angry at her or sending a needy text, find other things to do during those moments of anxiety that will make you a more whole and interesting person. Once you focus on another engaging activity you will feel less anxiety. Moreover, you will become more interesting and desirable to her and others around you.

Decide what activities you will do when you feel lonely or insecure–read a book, learn a language, go for a run or a walk, play the guitar, write poetry, watch Ted Talks, or the like. Find a few interesting things to do and then develop the willpower and self-discipline to do them, instead of letting your anxiety and anger get the better of you.

It may be hard at first, and then it will become easier because you will enjoy doing your own thing. The result will be a more interesting, confident, and well-rounded person, who will be more desirable to be with. The bonus will be increased interest and attention from your girlfriend.

by Dr. Alison Poulsen
@alisonpoulsen

Read “I end up arguing with him because he’s usually too busy working to talk.”

Read “Does she like me? She doesn’t text me like she did at the beginning.”

“Whenever I try to talk about where our relationship is going, he backs away.”

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"Improvisation" by Mimi Stuart ©

“Improvisation” by Mimi Stuart ©

Tiresome and trapped

The more you try to analyze and question the status of the relationship, the more he’ll feel trapped rather than desire for you. So avoid becoming a tiresome obligation to the one you desire.

While it is crucial to be able to express important needs and preferences, people who talk too often about the status of their relationship appear needy and end up pushing the potential partner away.

Taken for granted

If you want to talk about the relationship because you worry that you are being taken for granted, then change the patterns that have become convenient and well known to him. People pay attention to actions, not words.

Make more space for both of you, but avoid anger and bitterness. When you understand that accepting mediocrity in your relationship will breed contempt, you’ll understand that creating more space is not playing a game. Creating a little distance while maintaining your self-control will make him pay attention and increase his appreciation of you and the relationship.

Develop and maintain a life of your own.

Don’t drop existing plans in order to spend time with him. Maintain your friendships and interests, and let him plan ahead to see you. When you drop everything to see him, he will sense that you intend for him to fill a void and a need in your life. That is not very appealing.

Good relationships grow organically and take time. Have fun and take pleasure in the process, but don’t drop the rest of your life, your friends or your interests — ever. Who wants to be with a person who makes you their entire world? You want to be with a person because they have their own different and exciting world.

Getting committed

Don’t allow another person to call all the shots. If you want someone to commit fully, then don’t have all the fun with that person before he is more fully committed. If you are there and available all of the time, then desire and the need for bonding are absent. Simply back off and use more discretion about how much time you spend together.

But when you are together, make it enjoyable and exciting – the time should be special. This way he will want to be with you, but he’ll also know that you will only invest yourself more fully with someone who is really serious about you.

by Dr. Alison Poulsen
@alisonpoulsen

Read “Sustaining Desire: ‘It doesn’t matter. Let’s just watch TV.’”

Read “It hurts that my fiancé thinks I am smothering him. He wants me to let him catch his breath after he gets off work. I’m scared that I’m going to lose him because I’m needy or clingy.”

Watch “Seven keys to a great relationship.”