I need happily married people to speak up more because the internet is making marriage look terrifying

People who have experienced significant loss develop a specific relationship with attachment that is worth understanding rather than simply labeling. Some become avoidant; they do not attach fully because the cost of full attachment followed by loss is a price they have already paid and cannot afford to pay again. Some become anxious; they attach intensely and monitor the attachment constantly because experience has taught them that loss arrives without sufficient warning. Others oscillate between the two. None of these responses is irrational given the information they are based on. All of them create friction in relationships with people whose loss history is different and whose nervous system therefore operates from different assumptions about what is safe.

What has been the biggest disappointment so far in your life?

“Who hurt you?” is what men say when you accurately describe their behavior. It makes them feel better to pathologize you than to admit that you’re right. The goal is always the same: shift the spotlight from his behavior to your tone.

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