Mother Wounds: Can A Man Find It Hard To Attach To A Woman If He Had An Emotionally Unstable Mother?

Over the years, a man may have walked away from a number of women just as things were starting to get serious. Then again, this might have been something that has only taken place on one occasion.

However, regardless of how many times he has had this experience, he might not want to have this experience again. When he thinks about what has happened, he can be full of anger, frustration and regret.

Confusion

He can struggle to understand why he behaved in this way and didn’t allow himself to move forward. What could enter his mind is that how he behaved was irrational.

The reason for this is that he won’t be able to work out why he behaved in this way. Yet, even though he could come to this conclusion, it doesn’t mean that how he behaved was irrational.

A Closer Look

For him to find out why he behaved in this way, it will be a good idea for him to use his imagination. So, he can imagine that he is with a woman and he goes from seeing her to dating her and then being in a relationship with her.

In the beginning, he can feel comfortable with what is taking place but, as time passes, he can start to feel uncomfortable. He can find that he has the need to pull back and create physical as well as emotional space between them.

One Outlook

After this, what he can come to see is that the reason he has pulled away from at least one woman is because he didn’t feel comfortable with the level of closeness that they had. He might also see that he feared that if he hadn’t pulled away, something bad would have happened.

If he were to take a deeper look, he could see that he feared that he would have ended up being rejected and abandoned. Thus, to avoid being left, he ended up leaving the women before this took place.

A Defensive Position

Naturally, as this is what he feared, it wouldn’t have been possible for him to surrender and allow himself to form a strong emotional connection with her. He would have needed to keep his guard up and to pull away as he started to develop feelings for her.

If this hadn’t taken place, he would have started to experience a lot of fear and anxiety and felt extremely vulnerable. By pulling away, then, he stopped himself from having to have this inner experience and was able to keep it together and function.

What’s going on?

Considering this, it is not a surprise that he has had the need to pull away from a woman on at least one occasion. Emotionally attaching to a woman won’t be seen as something that will serve him; it will be seen as a threat to his survival.

After becoming aware of this, he could wonder why he had this experience. He could believe that there is no reason for him to respond in this way when he starts to become emotionally attached to a woman.

Back In Time

Yet, if he were to go back in time and observe what it was like for him during his formative years, he might gradually understand why he is this way. This may have been a stage of his life when his mother was emotionally out of reach and unstable.

Instead of being able to emotionally attach to and bond with her, this wouldn’t have taken place. He would have often been ignored, rejected and abandoned, which would have greatly deprived and deeply wounded him.

A Traumatising Time

What he needed at this stage was a mother who was emotionally available and stable. This would have allowed him to securely attach to her and receive the nutrients that he needed to develop a strong sense of self and be able to securely attach to others.

But, as this didn’t take place and he was greatly deprived and deeply wounded, he would have ended up being forced to lose touch with how he felt and a number of his needs and had the need to keep others at a distance. If he hadn’t adapted in this way, he would have suffered even more.

A Negative Inner Model

How his mother behaved was not a reflection of how all women would behave but, as he was in an underdeveloped state, he wouldn’t have known this. His underdeveloped brain would have generalised his mother’s behaviour.

Not only this, but as he was deprived at this stage of his life, part of him will still be trying to receive the love that he missed out on. This part of him will cause him to be unconsciously drawn to women who are out of reach and will pull away shortly after he has attached to them, in the hope of finally receiving the love that he missed out on.

Moving Forward

What this illustrates is that this part of him has no sense of time and is blind, which is why it is unable to see that this stage of his life is over and another woman is not his mother. For him to change this area of his life, he will have beliefs to question, pain to face and work through and unmet developmental needs to experience.

This will take courage, patience and persistence.

Awareness

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.