Here are some of the common psychological reasons for avoiding or failing in relationships:
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A person who had a cold, distant parent and is again fearful of rejection.
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Someone who is too passive and unassertive on their own behalf fears being taken advantage of, i.e., becoming a love slave.
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A person who feels guilty about being happier and more successful than a parent or sibling who had been miserable in a terrible relationship.
Duke was on the way out of his 4th marriage when he consulted with me about his dilemmas with women. Women were attracted to him because of his wealth, glamorous lifestyle, and career prominence.
He had always acted receptive and responsive to women’s advances and would do everything to please them. Women would get swept off their feet, and these early exciting connections would quickly evolve into powerful, passionate affairs. In fact, when these women asked for more commitment, Duke would oblige with engagement rings and four marriages.
They never lasted because Duke became uncomfortable with intimacy and would, early on, increasingly create distance that ultimately led to separation and divorce.
Duke was befuddled by these repeated relationship dramas and failures. What was behind this pattern?
His parents divorced when he was 8, and he remained mainly with his mother, who was very adoring. Her self-esteem seemed strongly connected to his accomplishments. She admired his academic performance and would constantly brag about him to everyone.
Duke was driven to please her in every way, especially by being a standout in school, career, and with later displays of wealth.
Duke confessed that “her life was me” and that he felt trapped having to please her. I explained that he similarly repeated this pattern with women in his life. On one hand, pleasing them by indulging their material desires, but at the same time resenting it. He said that “being a caretaker was a great burden, it was suffocating.” In response to what he felt was the burden of a woman’s “neediness,” he would create distance, hoping that this would diminish her expectations of him. Instead, it made him feel so guilty that he would again accommodate her. The cycle repeated until neither could stand it any longer. Duke would then repeat his pattern with the next one.
Haley came to me because she was miserable but “stuck” in a terrible relationship that she couldn’t end. She was a 26-year-old MBA worried that being smart or assertive would hurt people’s feelings. She didn’t stick up for herself or fight back with her less educated boyfriend when he was bossy, critical, and provocative.
Haley’s mother, unhappy in her marriage, complained continuously about Haley’s father. Her mother’s self-sacrificing and victimized behavior made Haley feel sorry for her and also guilty because, unlike her mother, she had a good relationship with her dad.
Haley subconsciously felt that it was unfair for her to be happier with her dad than her long-suffering mother, and so by selecting a boyfriend that she could be disdainful of, she would be no better off with her man than her mother had been with her dad. In this way, she appeased her sense of guilt toward her mother.
Robert, a young lawyer, consulted with me because of terrible anxiety when meeting women. His family story was complicated. His mother, a college graduate, appreciated Robert’s good grades, intellect, and ambition to go to college.
However, Robert’s dad was an insecure high school graduate who compensated for a sense of inadequacy with an inflated sense of his smarts. He acted competitively with Robert by always upstaging him in discussions, often with falsely knowledgeable boasting. As a result, in family discussions Robert often withheld his opinions, thinking that they would threaten his father.
When Robert intellectually shined, his mother was pleased and his father acted threatened and competitive. When instead he held back to allow his dad to have center stage, he disappointed his mother, who enjoyed intellectual discussions with him.
Robert felt that engaging successfully with his mother was at his father’s expense, a pattern which operated subconsciously when dating women. His worry was that to be successful with them was connected with pleasing his mother but at his father’s expense.
Thus, his anxiety with women was not about failing with them, but instead succeeding with them and hurting his father.
Irwin Gootnick, MD is a board-certified psychiatrist with a private practice in Kentfield. To schedule a consultation, call 415-722-9783 or visit www.zocdoc.com/doctor/irwin-gootnick-md-28784
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