When obsession encounters alienation: In the relationship, one party wants to communicate, and one party always resists and avoids. What should I do?

Recently, there have been similar users in the live broadcast and background: one party in the relationship is obsessed with anxiety, the other is alienated, and two people can easily enter a typical negative cycle.

The obsessed party feels that his emotional needs are not met, and the response given by the alienated party is always relatively not timely and fully.

The obsessed party began to raise this as a problem, hoping to be discussed and responded. The alienated party is unwilling to discuss, and the response gives further reduction.

The obsessed party was in pain and came to KY for help.

Today we will talk about "when we are obsessed with alienation and one party wants to communicate, one party always resists to avoid".

There are many possible meanings in the silence in the relationship

"I have said this, can you say something?"

We may have seen such a person in life: your communication may be good, but once you want to communicate with TA important but difficult communication, TA will start to deal with silence. When trying to communicate, no matter how you ask TA to speak, I hope that TA will express his thoughts, and TA will still only be silent.

Slowly, you feel that you are getting more and more angry, but the other party is unmoved, and even makes the silence more thorough, and the communication is in a deadlock.

Silence may really be the most puzzling and most misunderstanding of human interaction. It is sometimes a strategy of active choice, and sometimes it may be a passive defense mechanism. Let's talk about these two situations below.

Case 1: "Silence is a weapon, I use it to hurt you"

Silent Treatment is a common emotional control method and a form of passive attacks. Clinical psychologist Harrow Braredr believes that such silence is a punishment for the other party. When silence is used as a strategy, the silence of the TAs has a clear purpose -to obtain power, express anger, and attract attention, and the TAs also know the consequences of their doing this -including damage to each other.

At the moment when the other party is eager to communicate, the side that keeps silent is usually in power compared to the emotional excitement. At least in that specific communication. Because compared to each other, the TAs have more information and feel more certainty. The TAs basically know what the other party feels, what they want, and what reactions they expect, but whether the power they responds to it is in the hands of the TA themselves.

At this time, silence is a sense of unablerTaint that TA deliberately created for each other. This uncertainty is a torture for anyone.

Case 2: "Except for silence, I don't know what else can I do"

Sometimes, maintaining silence in a specific communication situation is also an instinct for self -protection, relationships and protection of the other party. When silence is used as a defense mechanism, there are usually three cases:

1. A performance of helplessness

Before the words were said, the silent person had already "invalidate" his own words. The TAs preset that each other would not listen or understand themselves, and felt that they said it was meaningless. This pessimistic expectation of communication results is often not produced out of thin air, but has something to do with the previous negative communication experience.

2. Because of the anxiety of emotions entered the state of frightening (freeze)

If you encounter silence, it is often a scene that will make people feel stressful. For example, talk about serious topics, or the other party is very emotional.

For a long time, the public and researchers believe that people will make a "Fight or Flight" choice in stress, or invest in battle, or turn around. Researchers have gradually pointed out in recent years that in addition to "war or escape", people will also have a reaction called "Freeze" (Heaney, 2017).

This is a stress response when people face tremendous pressure. In a state of death, people's performance is different from the reaction during war or escape. At this time, blood pressure decreases, action and sound are suppressed, and it may look like stun (Schmidt et al., 2008). This is one of the most difficult cases. In this case, the silent person may really be "blank and can't say anything" due to excessive tension and anxiety.

Since childhood, he has not learned the ability to deal with conflicts and cope with other people's emotions.

3. Avoid quarrels

Some people have a misunderstanding of communication: quarrel is the worst situation. As long as they keep silent, the two sides "at least no quarrel." Even if the other party leaves because of his silence, it will be better than quarreling.

If you have such a myth, TAs will even feel silent as a good strategy, at least let the other party "calm down" first.

A negative loop that needs to be avoided:

"Requirement-Return" communication mode

In one party's silent communication, the other side is often in a state of trying to break the silence, emotional excitement, and eager to let the other party speak. Two people have formed a communication mode called "requirement-retreat" in psychological research. It usually appears at a time when the two have contradictions or conflicts (Christensn, 1988). Requirements-retreat models are most often placed in intimacy and marriage for research. In this model, one party plays the role of "demander", and the other is the silent "withdrawer". The request is the person who seek to change, discuss, or want to solve the problem; the retreat is the person who wants to end or avoid discussions about the problem. In such a communication situation, the request and retreat are a pair of fixed matching (Papp et al., 2009).

In a relationship that presents such a communication model, the request is almost always the one who wants to change. Whether it is to change this model, or the opponent (Heavey et al., 1993; Klinetob & Smith, 1996; Holley et al., 2013). From this perspective, the request is usually the more painful party in this relationship.

Although the retreat in it is not painful, silence and retreat are indeed an effective self -protection mechanism for TA -at least short -term. The TAs seem to be affected by the emotions and accusations of the request, but the TAs will not be as confusing, helpless, and unpredictable as the request. As mentioned earlier, the silent person has a relatively high position in this scene.

Researchers believe that once one of the important reasons for this model is difficult to change, it is that both parties in communication tend to think that it will become a problem of the other party. It is mainly that the behavior of the other party has contributed to this model. Regardless of whether it is a request or a retreat, they will say that they have to do so "do this" and "only to do this" (Schrodt & Witt, 2008).

Requirements-A retracting model is easy to evolve a vicious circle. The more requests one party, the more the other party avoids; the more anxiously the other party wants to let the other side speak, the more difficult it is to speak.

In this cycle, the emotions, negative reactions and unresolved contradictions of the two parties will continue to accumulate. The request is increasingly confused, angry, and impatient because the requirements have never been met;

For such partners, such partners will only become more and more nervous, anxious, and fear, and further be trapped.

Gradually, the request will show more and more criticism and grievances in communication. TAs will make a variety of interpretations of retreat retreat, and attach to silent criticism on the basis of communicating the original contradictions (Eldridge & Baucom, 2012; Eldridge et al., 2017). In this way, the only result is that the retreat will only want to escape.

Obsession and alienation

How to avoid entering the "Requirement-Return" communication mode as much as possible?

SCHRODT and Witt (2008) summarized and analyzed the research on the "requirements-retreat" model of more than 14,000 people in the sample. They found that those partners who showed this communication model were lower satisfied with the relationship. The degree of intimacy and trust between partners is lower, more prone to contradictions, and less communication.

In addition, the request often produces a sense of abandonment and rejection. This toxic communication model continues to have some physiological effects on the two parties for a long time, and some of the physiological effects will also damage the quality of sexual life between the two.

The combination of obsession and alienate type is very easy to enter the communication mode of "demand-retreat". Even the last period of the intimacy of many combinations before the rupture of this combination is to repeat this communication mode.

Avoiding this communication model is essential for the intimate relationship between obsession and alienate combination. If you want to do this, there are some Tips:

1. For obsessed type, you need to realize that your needs for intimacy are higher than average. In other words, your demand for intimate response in the relationship is often too high. At the same time, you need to recognize the alienated partner you choose, and the natural response ability is lower than the average. The needs of TAs for independence and distance in relations are expected to be too high. Accepting this fact is the basic prerequisite for your relationship to work and can continue for a long time.

2. If you want to get more responses and closer to each other, the method that should be adopted is exactly the opposite of "request". You should make the alienate feel relaxed, instead of facing questions and requirements, and feel a lot of pressure. When you feel that there is a problem in the relationship, or if your needs are not met, don't rush to propose it. You can ask the other party to "talk". You can mention it once in a relaxed moment. If the other party cares about you, it will naturally make adjustments.

3. For the alienate type, if you are willing to admit that you love someone and admit that you also want to maintain the intimate relationship with TA, you need to realize that your demand for independence is too high, so it is easy to make you love you to love it.People are painful.For you, when you promise to love, it means that you promise to overcome some of your uncomfortable and pay more emotional response for the other party.4. The alienation type needs to be recognized that the other party makes you feel that the pressure and requirements are greatly stressful, which is also your silence and not responding to inspiration.It is your own behavior that inspires the unsafe side of the other party.You have a part of the responsibility of the other person's performance -completely blame the responsibility on the other party, and it is unfair to TA.

5. If the other party's request and questioning, you feel uncomfortable with the alienate type, you need to try to take responsibility.You have to realize that further escape will make the other party's status be more out of control.Only by overcoming discomfort can we stop such a negative cycle.

I hope today's article is helpful to you.

References:

Christensen, A. (1988). Dysfunctional interaction patterns in couples.Christensen, A., Eldridge, K., Catta‐Preta, A. B., Lim, V. R., & Santagata, R. (2006). Cross‐cultural consistency of the demand /withdraw interaction pattern in couples. Journal of Marriage and Family, 68(4), 1029-1044.Cummings, E. M., Davies, P. T., & Campbell, S. B. (2000). New directions in the study of parenting and child development. Developmental psychopathology and family process: Theory, research, and clinical implications, 200-250.Eldridge, K., Cencirulo, J., & Edwards, E. (2017). Demand-withdraw patterns of communication in couple relationships. In Foundations for Couples 'Therapy (pp. 112-122). Routledge.heaney, k. (2017). When stress makes youfall asleep. Science of us.heavey, C. L., Christensen, A., & Malamuth, N. M. (1995). The Londititity Of demand and withdrawal during marital conflict. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 63 (5), 797.klinetob, n. A., D. A. (1996). draw communication in marital interaction: Tests of interspousal contingency and gender role hypotheses. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 945-957.Noller, P., & Fitzpatrick, M. A. (Eds.). (1988). Perspectives on marital interaction (Vol . 1). Multilingual Matters.Papp, L. M., Kouros, C. D., & Cummings, E. M. (2009). Demand‐withdraw patterns in marital conflict in the home. Personal Relationships, 16(2), 285-300.Schmidt, N. B., Richey, J. A., Zvolensky, M. J., & Maner, J. K. (2008). Exploring human freeze responses to a threat stressor. Journal of behavior therapy and experimental psychiatry, 39(3), 292-304.

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