Relationships: Is A Man Destined To Sabotage His Relationships If He Experienced Developmental Trauma?

A man may have recently been in a relationship, only for it to primarily end due to the fact that he kept pulling away. He would then have been available or somewhat available in the beginning but as time went by, he found it hard to emotionally and then physically show up.

Now that it has come to an end, and the weeks and months have passed, he could wonder what happened. It could seem as though in one moment, he was in a relationship and in the next, it was over.

A Slow Realisation

Therefore, it will have been over for quite some time, but it might have only just started to occur to him that it is well and truly over. There is the chance that after he had broken up with his partner, he didn’t feel a great deal.

This could also be a time when he will blame himself for what has happened, questioning why he behaved as he did. Additionally, he might believe that the woman who he was with was right for him and be grateful that their paths had crossed.

Another Element

However, along with this, he may see that this was a time when he felt trapped and smothered and felt a strong need to keep his distance. Getting away and creating some space would then have been his priority.

What this will show is that it was not that he couldn’t stand the woman he was with and simply cast her aside. No, it was that he felt as though his very survival was under threat and needed to get away.

A Patte
At this point, he may see that this was not the first time that this has taken place, with him behaving in this way on at least one other occasion. If this is so, he could be well and truly fed up.

He could feel totally helpless and wonder why he feels this way after he has been in a relationship for a little while. He might even believe that this is just what he is like and that he will always be this way.

A Bleak Place

If he blames himself for what happened and perhaps what continues to happen and he feels totally helpless, he is not going to be in a good place. He won’t see a way out and this is going to take a lot out of him.

Now, while he can take everything on his shoulders and be in a deep hole, what he will need to keep in mind is that he didn’t consciously choose to feel smothered and trapped and then get away. This was just how he felt and how he behaved was a consequence of this.

Self-Compassion

With this in mind, it will be essential for him to be kind to himself; to show himself the level of kindness that he would how another who was going through a challenging time. He deserves his kindness just as much as anyone else does.

Most likely, how he felt when he was experiencing a level of closeness that was too much for him, was the result of what took place during his formative years. This may have been a time when he missed out on the love and attunement that he needed to grow and develop in the right way.

Way Back

From the moment that he was born, he may have been neglected and when he was given attention, it might have largely been misattuned care. This would have stopped him from being able to bond with his mother and start to form a sense of self.

Instead, this would have been a time when he ended up losing touch with his true self and felt overwhelmed. To handle the pain that being left and not having an attuned mother would have caused him, his brain would have automatically repressed how he felt and he would have gone into a shut-down, collapsed, frozen and disconnected state.

No Option

Ultimately, as he was a powerless and totally dependent infant, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything about what was going on. The only thing that he could do was to adapt to it.

Many, many years will have passed since this stage of his life, and since any of the other traumatic events that he may have experienced during his formative years, but the pain that he experienced will still be held inside his brain and body. This pain will be unlocked whenever he ends up getting close to another.

A Natural Outcome

By having this understanding in place, he will be able to see that how he has behaved in one or a number of relationships was destined to happen. It won’t have mattered that the woman he was with was not his mother as this is how she would have been seen at an unconscious level.

When some of the pain and arousal inside him was unlocked, his conscious mind would have been overwhelmed, preventing him from being able to see clearly. His thinking brain would have ended up going offline, with him being controlled by his feelings and instincts.

Awareness

If a man can relate to this and he is ready to change his life, he may need to reach out for exte
al support. This is something that can be provided with the assistance of a therapist or healer.