Mother Wounds: Can It Be Hard For A Man To Speak Up In A Relationship If He Had An Emotionally Unavailable Mother?

Now that a man is in a relationship, he may find that he has the tendency to swallow his words and not to express how he really feels when he is with his partner. In fact, he might not even be aware of how he feels a lot of the time.

As a result of this, it is not going to be possible for him to fully show up and his true self will spend a lot of time in hiding. This could mean that he will spend a lot of time feeling frustrated and helpless.

Covered up

But as his feelings and thoughts will often stay inside him and won’t be expressed, how else would he be? In all likelihood, this is something that will take place automatically and thus, he won’t consciously choose to be this way.

At this point, he could wonder why he is this way and why it is so difficult to express what is going on for him, when he is with his partner. He may see that he was this way in his previous relationships, that’s if he has had any.

An Act

By being this way, his partner will seldom know how he really feels and what his thoughts are. Due to this, he is likely to go along with things that he would rather not do and agree to things that are not in alignment with who he is.

What he will probably find is that he is more concerned with saying and doing what will please his partner. His attention is then going to be primarily on what is going on externally.

Out of Touch

When it comes to what is taking place inside him, it will typically be a mystery. He could find that tuning into the needs of others, while ignoring his own, is how he has been for a very long time.

What is clear is that how he is behaving is not truly serving him and the sooner his life changes, the better. Right now, he could be desperate for his life to change and feel the need to look into what he can do.

A Different Experience

If there have been moments when he has spoken up in his relationship, this may have often been a time when his thoughts and feelings were dismissed. Or, if they were not dismissed, they might not have been given much weight.

He would have come to the conclusion that even if he does speak up, it doesn’t have much of an impact. By having these moments, he might believe that there is not much point in him expressing what is going on for him.

An Exercise

Irrespective of if he has or hasn’t had moments when he has spoken up and hasn’t got very far, if he was to imagine that he was to express his thoughts and feelings, he could end up experiencing a fair amount of fear and anxiety. If he was to go even deeper, he might end up feeling rejected and abandoned, with this being a time when he feels helpless, hopeless and worthless.

Taking this into account, it is not going to be much of a surprise that he has the inclination to keep his thoughts and feelings to himself. To be connected to and express himself when he is with his partner, will be seen as a threat to his very survival.

A lot to lose

How he is will cause him to abandon himself around them, but it will be seen as a way for him to avoid being left. And, if he is not left, he will believe that his partner will pull away emotionally from him.

It will then be a case of him being physically and emotionally abandoned or emotionally abandoned, and keeping a lot to himself will be seen as being a far better option. What is clear is that he will associate connection and closeness with hiding himself and being disconnected and isolated with revealing himself.

A Closer Look

If he was to think about why he is why this way, he could struggle to understand what is going on. Most likely, this will show that his brain has blocked out the information that would shed light on what is going on.

This will have taken place to protect him from pain, not to undermine him. As to why he would be carrying a lot of pain, this can be the result of what took place during his formative years.

Back In Time

At this stage of his life, he may have had a mother who was unable to truly be there for him and provide him with the love that he needed to be able to grow and develop in the right way. When she was physically present, she might have rarely been emotionally present and there may have been a lot of moments when she simply disappeared.

Therefore, it would have been more or less impossible for him to connect to her when she was around and when she wasn’t around, he wouldn’t have been to connect to her. To try to receive the love that he desperately needed from her, he would have lost touch with himself and become the person who he thought she would love.

A Cruel Time

To handle the pain of not having a mother who could truly love and be there for him, his brain would have automatically repressed how he felt. This would have caused him to go into a shut-down, collapsed, frozen and disconnected state.

Along with carrying a lot of pain, he would have ended up staying in a developmentally stunted state. His body and mind would have grown but at an emotional level, he won’t have been able to move forward.

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