# Episode 32 - Attachment Styles and Relationship Dynamics

- Podcast: GenX Adulting Podcast
- Published: 2025-05-14T02:00:00.000Z
- Audio: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2398379/episodes/17155555-episode-32-attachment-styles-and-relationship-dynamics.mp3
- Page: https://genxadultingpodcast.com/transcripts/podcasts/genx-adulting-podcast/episodes/episode-32
- Source: https://genxadultingpodcast.com/episodes/genxadultingpodcastepisode32.html
- People: Brian Barker (host), Nicole Barker (host)

## Summary

In Episode 32, the hosts explore the concept of attachment styles and their impact on relationship dynamics. They discuss the four main attachment styles—anxious, avoidant, fearful avoidant, and secure—how these styles are formed in childhood, and how they can evolve over time based on life experiences.

## Key takeaways

- There are four main attachment styles: anxious, avoidant, fearful avoidant, and secure.
- Attachment styles are rooted in childhood experiences with caregivers and can change throughout life.
- Anxious attachment is characterized by a fear of abandonment and a strong desire for closeness.
- Avoidant attachment involves a preference for independence and discomfort with intimacy.
- Fearful avoidant attachment combines traits of both anxious and avoidant styles, leading to chaotic relationships.
- Secure attachment is the healthiest style, allowing for healthy emotional regulation and intimacy.
- Understanding your attachment style can help improve relationship dynamics.

## FAQ

### What are the four attachment styles?

The four attachment styles are anxious, avoidant, fearful avoidant, and secure, each with distinct characteristics and behaviors in relationships.

### How can attachment styles change over time?

Attachment styles can evolve based on life experiences, such as trauma or healing, allowing individuals to shift from one style to another.

### What is the impact of attachment styles on relationships?

Attachment styles significantly influence relationship dynamics, affecting how individuals connect, communicate, and respond to emotional needs.


## Referenced links

- [Watch on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-D5pflfz6hw)
- [Listen on Apple Podcasts](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-32-attachment-styles-and-relationship-dynamics/id1764838823?i=1000708398810)
- [Listen on Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/episode/4dydKpIs3kB9g4nmq8URdu)
- [Listen on Buzzsprout](https://www.buzzsprout.com/2398379/episodes/17155555-episode-32-attachment-styles-and-relationship-dynamics)

## Transcript

[Music]
Welcome to GenX Adulting and today we are
talking about attachment styles.
There are four attachment styles.
There's anxious attachment.
There is avoidant, which
sometimes is called dismissive.
There is fearful avoidant, which is
sometimes called disorganized.
And there is secure attachment.
And your attachment style starts off
based on it's rooted in
your childhood and your
experiences with your caregivers.
And it's not necessarily anything your
caregivers did intentionally.
It can be, obviously, if there is abuse
involved or neglect.
But it also definitely can result from
things that your
caregivers did not do on purpose
or with intent.
So you kind of start off with a certain
attachment style, but that
attachment style can change
based on different
experiences through your life.
So you could be shifted to a totally
different attachment style
based on if a trauma happens
in your life or if
healing happens in your life.
If you go on a healing journey, you can
completely adjust and pivot your
attachment style depending
on what happens in your life.
So I think we're going to do a brief
overview of the four attachment styles.
Just to be clear, we are not experts.
We are not doctors.
We are not therapists.
This is just us having a general
discussion about it.
And then we are going to share our
personal thoughts on our
own attachment styles and
possibly even delve into how those
attachment styles have
affected our marriage over the
last almost 31 years.
While we're discussing the general
overview, we may put up
some graphics on the screen
for those watching on YouTube.
You'll be able to see those.
But should we start
with anxious attachment?
Yeah, we could.
There's a really cool resource out there
called the attachmentproject.com.
Worth checking out.
It's very interesting.
Yeah.
Those would probably be some of the
graphics we put up just to...
It's all about going from childhood all
the way through adulthood
and in a very interesting
history on the guy who started that.
Right.
Go ahead.
So for anxious attachment, anxious
attached people crave closeness.
They crave intimacy.
They have a strong fear of abandonment.
They think...
This is all in general, but they think
less of themselves and
more highly of others.
So their self-worth is lower than how
they see other people.
They're always afraid that their partner
may leave the
relationship or that their partner's
feelings are not as strong as theirs.
I think that they have issues with
trusting and that a
partner is going to stay.
And that ties back to
that fear of abandonment.
Yeah.
And then just the negative self-view.
These seem to be an
external locus of control as well.
What I was reading is that they tend to
be the pursuers of relationships.
Okay.
So they're anxious
about the relationship.
They're pursuing making sure everything's
good, possibly
overcompensating those kinds
of things.
Yeah.
I think that they're highly codependent
in a relationship and
they are hyper aware of
their partner's feelings and how their
partner feels to the
detriment of their own feelings
and their own experience.
One of the bullet points here is they
elevate their partner above themselves.
Right.
Yeah.
I mean, you could almost say, I'm sure
there's times with anxious,
attached people that they're
martyrs.
Potentially. You know, and maybe they, I don't know,
but maybe they think that
they will find and secure
someone if they just constantly put that
person up on a pedestal,
that person will want to
stay with them and never leave them.
And as long as they don't do anything
wrong, like, and they
may view demanding and not
demanding, but setting a standard for
themselves that they require
a certain level of respect.
They may view that as if I demand that
from my partner,
they're going to leave me.
So I'm going to make things as easy for
my partner as possible
so that I'm going to put
no demands on my partner because I don't
want them to leave me.
Because I think with anxious attachment,
it really always is
rooted in fear of abandonment.
Yeah, probably.
So is that kind of what
you found in your research?
Is that is that line up?
I guess.
Yeah.
Worries about being
disappointed or abandoned.
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're the one pursuing
making sure everything's okay.
You know, you're losing the relationship.
Yeah, they're probably, I would think
people pleasers big time.
So so then if we switch to avoidant or
dismissive attachment, so
they have have very little
interest in intimacy or closeness.
They view themselves higher than others.
So they're the opposite of an anxious.
Their self worth is higher
than how they see other people.
They, they're uncomfortable with, with
closeness and intimacy.
They do not like conflict.
And when conflict
arises, they tend to shut down.
Hence avoid the situation or anything.
It's a deep emotional situation, which
obviously conflict is they hate conflict.
They have difficulty.
They prefer independence and have
difficulty with trust.
And I think that ties into the intimacy
and closeness because
you have to have trust in
order to be close with someone.
So this is an interesting one.
One of the bullet points here is views
dependence as a sign of
weakness, not the skip ahead
or get, but we've seen some of that in
some of the commentary
from the men that get that
light up some of the things,
you know, yeah, absolutely.
They're super independent,
especially on an emotional level.
Like they, they, they're a
hard nut to crack emotionally.
Yeah.
They do not share their emotions easily.
Yeah.
They do not want to depend on others.
And they also don't want
others to depend on them.
So they don't do well in a
codependent relationship.
They also do not look to outside sources
for approval or support.
And that ties back to they have a high
self worth, but that
could be a detriment too,
because you, if you don't really have
decent self-awareness
and if your ego is so, so,
so high that you're with a, with an
avoidant and their self worth is so high.
And then we get into narcissism.
That's a totally different topic.
You could be living in a completely
disconnected relationship,
a disconnected life because
you're totally
self-sufficient in everything.
So you're never really
connecting to anyone.
Yeah.
Like they avoid connection.
Yeah.
If that makes sense.
Yeah.
And I think that's everything.
And then, um, well, there's one other
bullet point on this
thing I'm looking at is they
challenge diverse perspectives.
Okay.
Which is kind of interesting.
They don't necessarily
want input from others.
Okay.
In this, you know, the,
the psycho analysis of it.
So they don't, um, they, it's like their
way and they don't
want to hear it criticism.
Potentially.
Or any input.
But that could be go along with they want
to avoid conflict or
debate or having to open
themselves up.
It's almost like, I don't really care
what other perspectives are.
I've got this figured out.
I've got my ball, my box and
walls around me type of thing.
But that's kind of avoided.
Yeah.
So it's like, I wonder how
avoidance, um, are at work.
Like if they're in charge of people or if
they're not in charge
of people and need to
be trained or guided how
they handle that input.
Well, I, you know, we're kind of skipping
ahead because I think
all these things operate
on a spectrum.
Yeah.
But I have a feeling in the technical
world, uh, avoidance
probably are the predominant
screw.
Yeah.
So we'll, we'll touch on that as we're,
cause right now, again,
we're doing the general
overview.
Yeah.
So then there's the fearful avoidant.
Uh, they can also be called the
disorganized avoidment avoidant.
They're a mix of the two.
I feel, I think the
fearful of wean it is chaotic.
Well, actually the first two bullet
points here are
negative, insecure view of self,
negative, insecure view of others.
Right.
What's yeah.
They have it.
They do have a history of trauma or.
And avoids closeness.
Yes.
Longs for love and rejects intimacy.
Right.
Yeah.
Okay.
So, and that could be that push-pull
tendency people do in relationships.
That disorganized.
That disorganized.
The disorganized or fearful avoidant
The disorganized or fearful avoidant
could definitely do the
push, push pull in a relationship
push-pull in a relationship where they
where they give you a bunch of love or
they love bomb you a bit.
bomb you a bit, but then when you react
But then when you react to that, when
their partner reacts to
that, they pull away and
they become distant.
And so it's a game of, I'm going to push
And so it's a game of, I'm going to push
you away and I'm going to pull you back.
And I wonder if the fearful avoidant, if
that's their style,
because they want the love, but
love, but then when they, their partner
then when they, their partner comes
towards them for more intimacy, they
reject that intimacy.
So being in a relationship with a fearful
avoidant or a
disorganized avoidant has got
to be completely chaotic.
got to be completely chaotic and, um, you
And you never, you, there's no trust.
You could never trust where
that person is coming from.
Depending on each day, you could be with
Depending on each day, you could be with
in a different situation
with your relationship.
relationship.
Cause how could you trust what, what, how
they're going to act each day?
Yeah.
You know, and that can just be, and that
can go on and on and on and draw out.
Yeah.
You know, I'm looking into it.
This could be, I have these tenants, some
of these tendencies.
Oh, well, we're going to get to that.
I hadn't thought of it that way, but I'm
looking at this and I flipped to this
other info graphic I have.
And I'm like, whoa.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No, we're going to get to our personal
attachment styles in a minute.
Um, they have difficulty forming stable
attachments and this is the fearful
disorganized avoidant.
Um, and again, they may have both
avoidant and anxious tendencies.
Um, so the partner and relationship are
both, okay, this is interesting of the
fearful disorganized and avoidant.
Their partner and the relationship
represents both their
desire and their fear.
Yeah.
So coming from the disorganized fearful
avoidant, it's being with someone is that
person is their
desire, but also their fear.
So you're never, you're
never committing to anything.
You're just constantly in,
in fluid motion with this.
It's there's never any stability.
There's no stability.
It's completely unstable.
So yeah, it is.
Um, they want closeness and intimacy, but
they have trust issues.
So that one sounds fun.
I don't, I mean,
yeah, this is interesting.
Yeah.
Some of these things definitely I can
relate to or identify with, but others
definitely not any in
that particular box.
Yeah.
Okay.
But we're not getting to that yet.
Okay.
Um, cause we'll get to
narcissism another time.
Okay.
So then there's secure attachment and
they are just doing awesome.
They are comfortable with intimacy.
They don't have trust issues.
Um, they have no problem with conflict.
They have no problem with
emotions, um, with commitments.
They're, they're just great.
You know, they're, they can
manage their own emotions.
Um, you know, they can depend on their
partners and have no problem with their
partners depending on them.
And, um, they can either, they can thrive
in a relationship or
they can thrive alone.
So they don't need a relationship or, but
then when they have one, they do great.
Yeah.
So they're just secure attached people.
They have a positive view of themselves
and they have a positive view of others.
So they just are doing great in life and
in their relationships.
And, um, they, like I said, they can
regulate their emotions and, and they can
help their partner
regulate their emotions.
So they can regulate their own emotions
and they can help their
partner regulate their emotions.
So I think, and they, and from what I
researched, that's the smallest
percentage of people securely attached.
And that makes sense
because you think about it, right?
You're looking at Gen X and millennials,
which were raised by boomers.
Um, so I don't know how Gen Z's come in.
Gen Z's raised by Gen X.
I would be curious how many Gen Z's if
they're going to raise the percentage of
secure attachment statistics.
Because Gen X in general, in general has
put so much time and effort into.
Parenting their children, being present,
giving them the childhood that they
always wanted, being, being the person
that they needed when they were children.
Kind of being helicopter parents or fully
being helicopter parents.
But because of the way Gen X raised Gen
Z, I will be really curious to see if Gen
Z comes out as more securely attached in
their relationships.
I don't know, but it makes sense that
they're the lowest percentage right now
in what's been studied because they're
probably studying Gen X and millennial
people more than the
young group, you know?
So, and if you think about where we came
from and how it all starts in your
childhood, that makes sense.
So, so that's the general overview.
And like you said, it's a spectrum.
Yeah.
Um, and it ebbs and flows depending on
what's going on in your life.
So now we'll get personal.
And I'll start with myself.
Um, I think I 100%, 100% spent at least
the first 30 years of my life as an
anxiously attached person.
I think that when I, um, I had a huge
fear of abandonment, I feel like I did.
And I'm, I'm going to get in trouble for,
um, cutting you off, but I don't think
when you look at this, these, these, you
know, infographics, I don't think you
fall into that category as a parent.
No, no, no.
This is the interesting, but 30 years
you've been a parent for
longer than, well, right.
Yeah.
We had kids before 30 years.
I was 26.
Yeah.
And I don't, I don't think, and if you
think about your own background, right?
You can, and I want to take it in a
different direction,
but you probably healed.
You've talked about it.
You healed once you had your heart,
Nathan, our first, right?
Isn't that probably cured some of that
anxious attachment you felt you had?
Because one of the signs of an anxiously
attached parent style would be parents
tend to over-involved the child in their
own feelings and emotional needs.
These parents usually worry about their
caregiving performance,
which may be lead to frustration.
Um, and high expectations can cause
conflict with the child.
That's not happening.
No, not at all, but the secure parenting
capable of regulating their emotions.
They create compassionate environment for
their child and they view their child as
a separate person, but they also
empathize and with
his or her experiences.
That sums up your
parenting style extremely well.
Yeah.
Okay.
So that makes sense.
Yeah.
So, you know, I wonder if you can be
secure, if you can ebb into like how I
said it changes throughout your life.
So I transitioned into, I do, I was going
to say then I believe I transitioned into
securely attached, but that was based on
life experience, not
childhood, obviously.
So yeah, I had Nathan at 26 because I was
still anxiously attached
when we got married at 23.
I was still struggling.
I was struggling with trusting that the
marriage was going to last.
I still thought at any
point you could leave.
Yep.
Um, and I honestly, and I've said this
before, so that's why I said till 30, I
probably didn't fully trust that you
weren't going to leave for the first,
till we hit our 10 year mark.
I think it took me 10 years of our
marriage before I truly in my bones was
like, okay, so we're doing this.
Yeah.
Right.
Well, I think you're not leaving.
You know, it's funny to say that that's
sort of the genesis of our name.
Gen X adulting is all of a
sudden we're fucking adults.
Yeah.
Right.
So it's like life's happening while
you're busy making other plans.
And to your point, it's
like, right there goes 10 years.
It might've been longer.
Might've been less.
No, I, I, no, I kind of remember when it
happened, you know, I was like, I just,
it was around the time my dad died.
Um, so, and that it wasn't connected.
I just remember around that time is when
I'm shortly at probably within a year
after that is when I realized, okay, so
you aren't going anywhere.
Like you're in this type of thing.
So, um, and, and not that marriage is
easy, not that our
marriage has always been easy.
We've gone through ups and downs
together, but I think it took those 10
years because I was coming from such
trauma, such an unstable
background, such abandonment issues.
Like every boyfriend I had, I didn't have
a lot of boyfriends.
I had long-term boyfriends.
So I had my high school boyfriend, I had
my college boyfriend.
And so, but I had huge abandonment issues
in those relationships.
You know, I feel bad for those guys.
Even though, you know, I love them very
much and we had a lot of fun together,
but they also had to deal
with my abandonment issues.
And so as a teenager
and then you did right.
And so, um, but what's interesting, so I
think as I ebbed into secure attachment
as a parent, so I became a securely
attached person when I became a mother
because that's who my children needed.
And I was not going to
project my issues onto my children.
I was determined not to do that.
And I think that's very Gen X.
I think that's very Gen X.
We're very conscious and self-aware.
Try to stop the cycle.
Yeah.
Try to break that cycle.
Yeah.
So I think I became securely attached as
a parent, but I think it took me longer
in our marriage and our relationship for
me to transition to a
securely attached partner.
If that makes sense.
I was almost writing two different
attachment styles through my twenties and
to my early thirties.
And then I think they blended into, they,
they solidified into secure
attachment in my thirties.
I don't know if that makes sense.
No, it does.
And that's where, you know, when I say
this is on a spectrum, when I'm reading
through some of this stuff and I've, and
I've read through it for the couple of
days now and we've been going to, we're
going to talk about this.
I've looked into this and
it's been thinking about it.
The spectrum is not only over time from
when you're a child to when you're say in
your teens, your early adulthood, your
early midlife thirties, whatever.
It changes over time.
Yeah.
But what's fascinating, and I'm curious
if you can relate to this, is it changes
too by the relationship.
So you're absolutely
securely attached to your kids.
I would say you're probably securely
attached to be at this point.
Yes.
You're probably securely
attached to your mom at this point.
But then if you think about other
relationships, they fall, I bet some of
them fall on different slides here as
different parts of the spectrum.
Yes.
Right.
So that's the fascinating thing that I'm
finding here is that, because I was
thinking going in, I'm an avoidant, but I
came from a securely
attached environment.
So it's got me thinking, okay, when did I
get kind of screwed up here?
Because I was secure.
Now I'm tend to be avoidant.
Okay.
So, yeah, going into you.
I'm not taking it to me quite yet, but
I'm giving you an example to maybe
reflect back on, because with our kids,
I'm definitely in the secure space.
But there's also some avoidant where I
don't totally honor all of
their emotions and feelings.
Right.
But at the same time I do, but I'm not as
quick to do it as you.
So it's fascinating to me that this is a,
this is, and this is psychology, right?
Yes.
That's where this stuff comes from.
Psychologists wrote up these different
buckets to describe behavior and it's
never a perfect science, right?
It's a social science and it's not a
whack or criticism of psychology.
It's you're dealing with the mind and
emotions and behaviors.
But I give you, I'm
going to turn it back to you.
I was just kind of giving you that
framework that I've been mulling on as
far as how you, it
applies to different things.
It applies to
different areas of your life.
It applies to different relationships.
Yeah.
It can apply to, absolutely.
I would say that at least coming from
someone who was anxiously attached
because of childhood, probably the people
that were in my
childhood, I only am secure.
I'm not really attached with the ones
that I, um, unpack trauma with.
So like my mom and I have gone through a
lot of work together.
My mom has been incredibly gracious in
allowing me to heal my childhood trauma
that she was involved in
some of it, not intentionally.
My mom's entire desire was just to try to
give me a normal childhood.
All right.
Yep.
But, um, so she, I know it's pain was
painful for her to rehash things and to
have to hear things that happened to me
or how I felt about things at the time.
Very painful.
And especially I'm a mother, I can only
imagine, but she gave me that space.
She gave me the space to listen to what I
needed to unpack so that I could heal as
much as it probably hurt her at the time
to have to go through it again or to even
learn certain things
she didn't know happened.
But as a result of her giving me that
space, I was able to then be completely
healed and securely
attached to one of the main care.
Like the main caregiver of my childhood,
not that I wasn't securely attached to
her, my childhood, I never doubted my
mom's love or commitment, but it was
more, I guess more of an authentic secure
attachment, an authentic secure
attachment, not a secure attachment
because, oh my God, I
have to hold on to you.
You're the only stable thing in my
childhood, but just coming from a very
positive secure attachment, the secure
attachment changed from survival to an
authentic positive secure attachment.
And as a result, we have a
really great relationship.
She lives with us.
The only way that could happen is if we
had gone through, if I was able to go
through this where it's an enjoyable
living experience, right?
Cause there's a lot of, there's a lot of
Gen Xers who are now faced with having to
care for their elderly parents and they
have not impact their trauma from those
parents or from their childhood.
And some of those parents were either
neglectful or abusive, mentally,
emotionally, physically, whatever, or
unintentionally caused trauma.
And these people, these Gen Xers have not
had a chance to resolve any of that and
are now being forced to care for these
people and their parents.
And so a lot of times it rehashes all
this trauma for them, but they can't do
anything with it because the parents
aren't at the point
anymore where it can be resolved.
Or the parents wouldn't, won't create
that space for them.
So that's a tough one because a lot of
Gen Xers are going through wanting to
resolve past trauma, but at the same time
are being forced to care for the, their
abusers or the people that
unintentionally caused that trauma.
Yeah.
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
No, what I was thinking about for your,
even for your own self, you look at my
upbringing and your
upbringing, and we've talked about that.
I was stable, two parents, two and a half
dogs, whatever, you know, all
that you're all you're moving.
You've got your life
was quote unquote crazy.
I have to all blank this.
I was kind of fucked up
compared to mine, right?
Yeah.
But your mom was the one consistent.
Yes.
And she always provided you with love and
always you, you may, you know, you
probably doubted some of her decision
making and actions she took, but at the
end of the day, you knew she loved you.
And that's evolved into your adulthood.
I do think that's probably why you're
able to be a securely attached mom that
probably maybe, maybe not.
I don't know.
Yeah, but it's probably, you know, it's
helped you at least do better, right?
You want to be better, right?
And you're smart enough and you've done
enough self introspection to say, I want
to be better, but I, I'm,
I don't want to go too far.
I want to make my entire, my, I'm not, my
kids are not my healing vessel.
Right.
Right.
So, so I think that's good.
I, but I think your mom provided a crazy
upbringing, but it over time, it became
secure, like you described, but also
partly because you guys
were able to talk through it.
She was on the podcast.
We had some sensitive topics that were
probably, you know, rehashing some old
wounds for both of you guys.
Um, but what I find interesting about
this is, and this is what I mean about
the spectrum of fluidity of all of this.
Every, with everything I just said, there
are still times where she triggers you
and you go back to some, one
of these other boxes, right?
You're leaving that secure box and you're
going into the something.
Yes.
I don't know whether it's disorganized or
whatever it might be.
Yeah.
It's just a, that's why
I find this fascinating.
This, this topic fascinating.
And it doesn't happen a lot and it's
completely unintentional on her part.
Um, yeah.
And when I'm sure when I'm startling for
you, when I'm triggered, um, it's
completely unintentional on, on, on her
part, but it's, yeah, it's, it's almost
like you're humming along and then
something happens and it brings you right
back to that emotion.
You were feeling at that time, that
chaos, like the gut punch.
Yeah.
And you're like, now I actually,
thankfully in general, I
find humor in a lot of that now.
I am able to laugh about it, but there
are times where I'm like, oh my God, you
know, and I have to have my moment, but
it's still, it's really my moment.
It doesn't really even
have anything to do with her.
It's just a, she, her
action triggered it.
But again, it's just a trigger.
It's a trigger, right?
But it's really still, it's just
bringing, it triggers that
unreason and it's resolved.
That's the thing, but even resolved crap
can still show itself.
Oh yeah.
And that's what catches you off guard.
If you're someone that comes from
childhood trauma or abuse and, um, which
I guess that's redundant, but all
childhood trauma does
not mean abuse is present.
Um, and you've unpacked and you've
resolved and you found closure with
whoever you need to find closure with.
Um, and then something happens that
triggers you and brings you right back.
It's startling because you really are
functioning as a securely attached
person, as a healed person, um, as a high
functioning, you know,
person you're doing well.
And then it brings you back so hard that
it reminds you how you stood on no ground
and how chaotic you were inside the chaos
that was inside of you.
And, um, how reactionary you were to
things and how much pain you were in.
It brings you back like a light switch
and that can be startling to your nervous
system when you've been
living in a healthy way.
Um, and you got yourself out of fight or
flight and then that
trigger triggers you right.
You're nervous system right back in and
you're like, Oh my God.
There's one time when that has happened
to me and it's, it's,
it's not just like, okay.
So we did mention my, my mom, like there
was like maybe at different times that's
happened, but, um, there's other people
in my life that also do that.
And when that happens, it's like, you're
it's, it's, it's a shock to the system
and it makes you realize though, the
positive of that is it really makes you
realize how far you've
come and how healed you are.
And, um, you're not
even that person anymore.
And it actually, I always
feel bad for that person.
I always kind of, I immediately have some
empathy and I'm like, wow.
That's how that person felt.
That part of that person, I was felt like
that 24 hours a day, seven days a week
with no break and how
much pain I was sustaining.
It just, but this all
happens in like 30 seconds.
Yeah.
It can all, all that stuff, everything I
just said, you could
feel it all in 30 seconds.
Yeah.
Like a flash in the pain.
Yeah.
It's a shock to the system.
So, but, um, to go
back to securely touch.
So yeah, like with my mom, I'm completely
securely attached
with you, with the kids.
Um, but there's relatives from my
childhood that I have, there, there are
things not resolved.
And so I, I'm definitely not
anxiously attached to them.
I might be avoidant.
I'm not attached to them at all.
I'm gonna, uh, I'll open back up my thing
here because there's, there's.
Got to be an ambivalence.
Where does ambivalence fall into this?
I see it because it
would seem like avoidant.
Yeah.
It would seem like avoidant.
I probably go into avoidant when it comes
to certain people in my life.
Um, I don't know.
I don't know if it's
even an attachment style.
If it's just, I didn't see it jump up.
That's why I'm going back real quick.
These are great bullet points.
I do.
I don't see a, an
ambivalence section here.
I feel like avoidant is kind of a synonym
to that a little bit.
Somewhat.
Yeah.
I will say this, there are some people
still in my life that have at times
triggered my anxious attachment.
And I'm going to be honest, it's really
been until this year where I have made
the conscious decision where I really
realized, wow, I'm being anxiously
attached about this and I made the
conscious decision to stop.
I'm like, these people don't
deserve my anxious attachment.
What am I doing?
And it's, it's almost like they trigger,
um, feelings that people, my
childhood triggered in me.
And when you're an anxiously attached
child, you're constantly trying to get
approval from the people in your life
that won't give you the approval there.
Because that's what's causing the trauma
in the childhood, right?
So you're just constantly
trying to please love me.
Please accept me.
Please choose me.
Please make me a priority.
Um, please approve.
And so I realized this year, there's some
people in my life that have triggered
that and I've, I've spent a lot of my
life trying to be an anxiously attached,
trying to, you know, all
those things, please accept me.
Please love me.
Please, uh, you know, choose me.
Please make me a priority.
And this year I was like, I don't know,
just slap me in the face.
Like what?
So even if you unpack, even if you have
self-awareness and I'm not, you're
always, it's always work, you're always a
work, especially if you come from a
background like mine,
you're always working.
But even if you were, if you really are
on top of the world and you're like,
you know, I'm, I'm doing great.
Like you don't even think about it
because you're functioning so well, but
there you'll still find
those skeletons in your closet.
You still have to acknowledge them.
I'm still unpacking trauma because I'm,
when I say recently, it's probably
in the last six months, I was like, Oh my
God, I'm anxiously attached about this.
Stop that.
Yeah.
Stop that.
Even if I have to go to
avoidant about these people.
Yeah.
What do you, what do you think is, um,
that's the level of consciousness that
allows you to recognize that, right?
Acknowledge, recognize that I've got this
unhealthy behavior with this thing.
Thing it can be, it can be a, probably a
thing, a person, whatever.
Right.
What do you think what's happened there?
Because there's been things done or said
that triggered me into feeling
exactly the same way I did when I was a
child and I finally correlated it.
But that's what I mean.
How, what, how does you
come to that correlation?
Would you say, or that understanding is
it just, we're getting old and maturing
and there's some genetic
thing happening with us or.
I just kept questioning myself.
Why, what is this?
Why do you care?
And I kept trying to
get to the root of it.
Why do you care?
Cause these people have no, they should
have no, this, not this much control
over how you're feeling.
Why do you care?
And then I just, I just thought about it
and thought about it.
And I finally was like, Oh my God, this
is how I always felt with these other
people that were in my childhood.
It's the same thing.
And there's the people in my childhood
that made me feel this way have very
similar characteristics to the people
that are currently in my life.
They're making me feel this way.
Or you could reverse that.
The people that are currently in my life
that made me feel this way are very,
have some very similar characteristics to
the people in my childhood
that made me feel that way.
I recognize the connection.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I just, I just did.
I just recognize the connection.
There's some maturity thing.
Yeah.
And then I was like, okay.
Now that I see it, once you see it,
you're like, Oh, and it
takes away all the power.
Yeah.
Like they don't have power anymore.
Yeah.
So now I'm like, and it's amazing.
Cause then you don't realize how much
energy, how much
thought and emotion you've
been putting into certain people until
you finally see reality.
And then you get that time and energy
back and you're like, Oh my God.
Wow.
I was, you didn't realize how much you
were, you were energy.
You were putting into it.
Yeah. So yeah, but I would say
overall, um, securely attached.
I don't think I have any
more anxious attachment.
I think that was the last
of my anxious attachment.
And it's probably because again, those
people triggered the same stuff that was
triggered in my childhood and I didn't, I
didn't realize it was going on.
And that's, that also is interesting to
me is how did I not see that?
But I think it was just, again, so busy
living my life, raising my children, you
know, and finally it got to the point
where I had to face it and I was like,
what is this, what is going on?
Cause it was just so unusual.
So I was, I led to and have settled into
secure attachment, you know, and I could
say, I feel like I finally
am there even with friends.
I'm very choosy about the
friends I give my time to.
Um, and there's no, it's
totally secure attachment.
Yeah.
There's, I've never been anxiously
attached to friends actually, even when I
was a kid, I was never a big anxious.
It's so weird with boys.
I was, but with my, well, no, in middle
school, elementary school, middle school,
I was anxiously
attached about girlfriends.
And then in high school is when I was
started getting securely attached to my
girlfriends in my
life and then in college.
So middle elementary school, middle
school, highly
anxiously attached, try and
try and try and try and try and try.
And then I just, I think I just met the
right people, the right girls in my
school and, and college, you know, I also
had a boyfriend, you know, so, and he got
a lot of my energy and time there's, if I
could go back, I would be single, single,
single, but I was trying to
fulfill those abandonment issues.
So you can't, yeah, I understand why I
had the boyfriend, but, um, I, I, I
remember always wondering how my friends
could be single and not want to not have
a boyfriend and be just fine.
It just, it didn't make any sense to me,
but that goes back to that abandonment.
So anyways, that's where I'm at now, but
with you, I find it very interesting
because as you said, you came from a
very, well, I mean, we
shouldn't say typical.
Um, childhood, cause there's a lot of
people who had trauma in typical homes.
So just cause you have two parents and
you live in what seems
like a normal childhood,
there's a lot of abuse that
goes on in those homes too.
It doesn't mean that everything's great,
but in your
situation, that's not the case.
Yeah.
Right.
So, but yeah, I, I don't want to say
like, oh, if you have
divorced parents, you
automatically have trauma and if you have
married parents, you automatically don't.
Absolutely not the case.
You know, but you started out, I'd say
secure attached, right?
Yeah.
I think I did.
And I, I've even thought about it cause
I'm not going to go too into it, but you
know, as a kid, I was brought to my
aunt's house and, and,
uh, and left with relatives.
I had my, um, spent a lot of time under
the care of other relatives.
And, but I have no, I was thinking, I'm
like, there's gotta be something bad.
There's gotta be, right?
Everybody has some weird shit and it's
like, I didn't really have any bad
experiences with any of those people
taking care of me and stuff.
Right.
Right.
So I think that you had any though issues
with the fact that your parents weren't
there because you were having to spend
time with these other relatives and your
parents weren't able to be there during
those years, I'm not saying in your
whole childhood during those years where
your parents had to give their
attention to your sibling.
Um, and so as a result, you spent your, a
lot of formative
years with your different
aunts and uncles and
cousins, which was all positive.
But if you look at it from the outside,
um, do you think that during those
formative years that had any effect on
your attachment that your parents weren't
there during that time or no?
I don't think so.
And I've, I would love to find the
nugget, but I've not
been able to find one
because I can't think of it because
everybody made it okay.
Yeah.
Everyone made it okay.
And, and, you know, which is great.
No, it is.
It means that there was
a strong village there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So it was all, even in that situation, it
was, you were able to
still have a healthy
environment and have a secure attachment.
Yeah.
To the, cause it says to
the caregivers, it's related.
The attachment style is related to the
care experiences with the
caregivers in your life.
It doesn't say parents.
So during those years, cause what age
would you say we're
talking for those years of you?
Gosh, I don't even know.
It's my earliest memories.
Okay.
So let's say three, four,
like probably like little.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I would assume so.
10, 12, like 10 years of your life.
Yeah.
Maybe, maybe, maybe I honestly don't know
because it's, and I
don't think I'm blocking
it out per se.
I almost had to go back because, you
know, going from
little kid, then I became, I
played sports and that became my focus
and it was in school and there was no.
Okay.
So when you think back on your childhood,
your childhood is the spending
time with your aunts and
uncles and that's a block.
And then the next block is sports.
No, I don't know if I'd go there.
I mean, I'm not, no, no.
I mean, we lived in one
house and moved to another house.
We were a family unit.
We'd get in the car, the four of us and
go drive to relatives in the next town
over or the same town, there were family
parties we'd all go to.
We'd ride home together in the car.
There were, we would
make trips to West Virginia.
I would spend time there with family.
Yeah.
So no, no.
I mean, that's all a big continuum.
Right.
So then this part where you're talking
about where you spent most of your time
with your aunts and uncles, were those
experiences you just talked about
intermixed with that time?
Yeah.
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
So, so it was like, there were times when
you were only with your aunts and
uncles, and then there
was normal family time.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
That's what I mean.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
And to your point, that's
the caregiver part of it.
Yes.
When I was with my nuclear family, the
four of us and our dog, right?
Everything's fine.
When my parents needed to tend to my
sister really, and, um, I would be at one
of my aunt's house and
everything there was fine.
Right.
Truly was to find something because
well, no, it seems uncanny that there are
people that are securely attached.
Yeah.
That did not have
trauma in their childhood.
Yeah.
Um, but what would you say?
Like, cause you're a Gen X man, right?
And we touched on this
briefly in an episode.
Um, and it's funny cause we had some Gen
X women come in and say they, they
were treated the same way.
But would you say that your emotional
maturity in general was, um, given the
attention it should have during your
formative years so that you would be able
to see that your emotional intelligence
could grow and evolve to where it should
be by the time you were an adult?
I would probably say no, but I don't, I
think that feels more generational to me.
That's what I'm talking about.
That's what I'm asking you this not to
put the blame on anyone.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm not defending anyone.
Okay.
Okay.
I'm just saying generationally as a, as a
Gen X guy, would you say that that,
that, that part of your personality was,
um, what's the right word?
Shush.
I feel like that's a generational thing.
Probably.
Yeah.
Right.
Right.
What we talked about this where we
couldn't, it wasn't
cool to cry per se, but
it was fine to be angry or it was fine to
probably get in the fight.
Oh boys will be boys.
They'll fight.
Right.
Right.
So sure.
I don't, you know, yeah, I wouldn't say
that my generation was, it was not
facilitated to, you know, to explore your
emotional side, nor your emotional
intelligence, if that's
what you're asking me.
No, I don't think so.
So as a result of this generate, not
everyone, I'm sure there are many healthy
men, Gen X men whose parents were of a
different sort and actually like were
in touch with their son's emotions and
help them understand their emotions and
identify their emotions and express their
emotions and all that, but in general.
And again, this could happen to Gen X
women too, but we're talking, I'm
talking about Gen X men.
Would, would you say that as a result of
that, a lot of Gen X men maybe ended up
looking to ourselves as opposed, embarrassed girls or
thinking, okay, I really was
a securely attached person.
Truly was.
But as I've gone throughout life,
I've definitely have levels of mistrust.
Mistrust across the
broad spectrum of things.
I don't trust public institutions.
I don't trust groups of people.
I don't trust groupthink.
I don't trust certain people, right?
So I have mistrust.
But I think that's all
natural and it could be explained.
I definitely avoid certain situations.
I don't like to get into conflict,
but I'm not afraid of
it, as you know, right?
I'm fine with conflict,
depending on what the conflict's for
and what it's all about, right?
The lady speeding yesterday at me saying,
"Slow down, that's conflict."
I'm not afraid of that.
You get into, you have two,
I have two sons and a daughter, right?
And boy, I've learned a lot,
learned a lot just by
having to be their parent,
be their dad, right, their caregiver.
So they've certainly brought out
a more emotional, softer side of me
than probably what would have been
facilitated naturally
as my upbringing, if
that makes sense, right?
Especially a daughter.
But at the same time, having two boys,
there's an age difference there.
I've definitely was more of a Gen X dad
towards our older one
than our second one.
So I've certainly evolved, right?
And that's sort of
that spectrum of things.
Am I answering your question here?
You found, you
definitely gave our younger son
more grace than our older son.
Probably, yeah.
So you answered it on the broad spectrum
of how things in society affect you.
And as a parent, how would you say,
not how, how would you say though?
I gotta avoid this.
You're avoiding, how would you say
your emotional intelligence development
affected your interpersonal
relationships like your marriage?
What do you mean?
So do you think, see,
cause we see that there
seems to be a lot of conflict
between men and women from
the feedback we're getting.
And a lot of these, the age of the men
and women are Gen X.
And there's a lot of butting heads.
Like they, the women
feel like they have been
used for labor, used for sex,
used for being a mother
to these men's children.
And the women feel, I mean, the men feel
that the women have used them for money
and to do things
around the house, basically.
So neither side feels
appreciated, obviously.
And I'm wondering how much
that ties back to the stunting
of the emotional
intelligence of Gen X men
and Gen X women in certain situations.
But I'm gonna speak about Gen X men
by their emotional intelligence.
You know, no one talks about anxiety.
No one talks about social anxiety.
No one talked about feeling overwhelmed.
You're feeling overwhelmed right now.
No one helped Gen X men
when they were children
identify what they're feeling.
And so it could just, it
ends up going to anger.
Cause if you're feeling anxious,
if you're feeling
overwhelmed, if you're feeling sad
and it's not being dealt
with or you're not being guided
on how to cope with it, it ends up
settling into anger.
So then as you become an adult
and you get into a
relationship with a woman
and you might be having,
she may be trying to
express something like,
I need this or could you do
this or I'm feeling this way.
They're feeling overwhelmed.
They don't feel equipped.
They're feeling defensive.
I'm failing in some way
because she's coming to me
needing something.
I'm obviously not meeting that need.
I don't understand
exactly what she needs.
I'm defensive because I
cannot meet this need.
I don't think I'm feeling overwhelmed.
I have anxiety.
It's going to turn to anger, avoid.
It's a breakdown in the marriage, right?
And that builds resentment.
Then the woman doesn't feel heard.
She feels pushed aside that
her feelings aren't valid.
That what she is bringing to him
is not being honored or acknowledged
and doesn't matter to him,
but it doesn't necessarily,
that's not necessarily
where he's coming from.
He's just not equipped and to handle it
because nobody taught
him how to recognize
what emotions he's feeling.
So I'm wondering if the stunting
of the emotional
intelligence of Gen X men,
and I'm only speaking about Gen X men
because that's my generation.
I'm sure Boomer men also
have gone through this,
but Gen X talks about stuff.
So I'm wondering how
that's played into the breakdown
of relationships and marriages
and why you're seeing such vitriol
when it comes to right now,
how they're talking about each other.
And so that brings me back to my point.
Did you think that your
emotional intelligence
was fostered in a productive way
to prepare you to being a marriage?
I'm going to avoid that direct question
because I think you've just said a ton.
You really did say a lot.
I'm surprised at the vitriol as well.
I'm in the camp of if I'm scrolling
and I see something that,
you don't have to comment on everything.
And you certainly, you can refrain
from attacking other people,
especially people you don't know.
So I'm shocked at the response
of women sorting things out
for the first time in
certain cases and celebrating it.
I think that's great.
Believe it or not, I'm
a huge fan and advocate
of women, women's rights and everything.
And maybe having a daughter allowed,
really pushed me there on an
emotional intelligence level.
But I'm 100%, I think it's great.
I think it's great.
Because we've talked a lot about it.
The Gen X women are really the ones
it feels like that are discovering this.
But as we've talked
about the generation of women
behind us are probably much
stronger right off the rip.
Yeah.
Which is great.
I think it's great.
It's a human evolutionary thing.
I think it's wonderful.
The one thing that's
interesting to me though,
and we've joked about this,
but you kind of summed up
maybe our lives or marriage.
Maybe arguments we've had, right?
Definitely hits home and I'm not perfect.
But the emotional intelligence,
I've said this before
in your like whatever,
where I say I know
everything or I feel everything.
I feel everything.
And I do believe, I don't
know if I feel everything.
I certainly don't know everything.
But I feel a lot and sure, it's
overwhelming I think.
And I think I probably am
representative of my generation.
The world's fucking crazy
and we're living within it.
And we're trying to
provide for our family within it.
And we're trying to
interact with people we care with
and not be assholes.
And so it's a lot.
And we probably didn't, but who does?
How do you get equipped to
deal with all of this stuff
unless you talk about it, right?
But you don't talk about
this in our generation.
And I think, yeah,
maybe I'm making your point,
but it blows me away that like,
Nathan and his buddies will
talk about certain things.
My buddies and I, we
don't really talk about stuff.
You'd be like, "Hey, you okay? I'm good.
All right, cool.
Let's go get up here."
You know, that kind of thing.
So maybe I'm making your point
and it's probably not
that you're making a point,
it's a question, it's an observation.
No, you didn't answer.
Do you think that the
emotional intelligence,
the lack of acknowledging and honoring
and supporting your
emotional intelligence growth
affected how you approach
some things in marriage?
Do you think that if
things would have been,
and again, this is not blaming anyone,
this is a generational thing.
Do you think that if
your emotional intelligence
would have been given as much attention
as your athletic performance or your
academic performance
or your expectations as a son, as a
brother, as a friend,
if your emotional
intelligence would have been acknowledged
as much as those things,
then you would have been more equipped
in an interpersonal
relationship with a woman?
Of course, but that wasn't happening.
And it took that to not happen
and the world to evolve for us
to be able to do that with our kids.
Because I absolutely feel
like I do that with my kids.
But I also, I have a psych degree.
And so I kind of have
an affinity to this,
I kind of got into that stuff.
I'm Freud and Jung and Skinner and Pavlov
and all these different
behaviorist and stuff like that.
So I learned about that out of interest.
But then again, that's
still an external thing.
You can learn about that intellectually
and even sometimes
maybe apply it to yourself.
But when it comes to a relationship,
do you think that
you've been more avoidant
and men in general your
age may be more avoidant
when it comes to conflict
within their interpersonal
relationship, their marriage,
because they're not
equipped to handle it?
I don't know if they're, it's a
fascinating question.
Just to go back and put a bow on that
last statement though,
the reason I'm able
to do it with our kids
is because of you as well.
And you setting a,
you're very good at that.
And you've educated me on how to
communicate with them
and when to not be an
asshole probably, right?
Or not to push, but to set
step back and create space.
Listen, maybe they're going through this.
So you get a ton of credit for that.
I'll give myself some credit for
following it, I guess.
Yes, yeah.
But I think when it
comes to, you know, men,
it's fascinating because
we've talked about this.
You fall into roles and
the roles get probably deeper
and deeper the further you go along
without any course correction, right?
And so at the end of the
day, I think for my generation,
we just don't feel like
dealing with a fucking argument.
You know what I mean?
So it's like, I don't
wanna fight about this.
So I'm just gonna go out in the garage
and puffs around or whatever.
And that's an avoidant, right?
It's 100% avoidant,
but it's also to
maintain peace and harmony.
There's a strategy behind avoidance.
And it's not the worst thing.
Okay, so you just brought up an interesting thing
because it is the worst thing.
And because it only brings peace.
Temporary peace.
Temporary peace is not the worst thing.
To the man, I'm not gonna
say to you, to the man it does.
Because I'm here to tell you when a man
has that attitude of,
I don't wanna have
this argument right now.
I don't wanna talk about this right now.
I'm gonna go out in the
garage and a man thinks
he's diffusing the situation.
All that's happened there,
I'm educating men right now.
Mark my words.
You have lit a match.
And she was at level
five, but you walking away
and saying, you're not
talking about it right now.
And I'm speaking,
wait, I'm speaking to men.
I'm not speaking to you.
I'm speaking to men.
Because I'm not making this like a
personal thing, right?
Now she's level 10
because she feels invalidated.
She feels that the man
doesn't care about her feelings,
about what she brought to him.
She feels undermined and belittled.
And the resentment that
is the planting the seeds
of resentment and every
time, it also creates distrust.
Because every time a woman comes to a man
with something that is
hurting her or bothering her,
she is trusting him with that
vulnerable part of her heart.
I'm going to take a
chance and share with you
what is hurting me or
what is bothering me.
I trust you enough to bring that to you.
And when he's like, I can't
talk about that right now.
I don't want to get in this argument.
We're not doing this.
She literally feels like he
stepped on her heart, right?
Like that he's like,
I don't care about you
and how you feel.
I'm not saying that's how it is.
I'm saying that's how she feels.
And so you do that enough.
The seeds of resentment
grow and build a fricking wall.
And also she will stop trusting you.
She will stop bringing things to you.
And then you get divorced.
This is how it happens.
No, no, it's
fascinating because honestly,
what you just described
to a male of my generation,
I will represent as very dramatic.
We did not step on your heart.
We did not step on your emotions.
There's just something going on.
And here's where it's problematic.
I'll give you this.
If that becomes the norm,
then that's not okay, right?
If this happens 10
times, nine out of 10 times,
it's like I'm going to
the garage or whatever.
That's what I'm saying.
90% of the time is not good.
If there's some ratio in
between there that, right?
It's got to work for everybody, right?
These are dynamic situations.
It's a relationship.
It's two people.
Of course.
And so it can't be 90% of the
time you're like, all right,
let's talk and how are you?
Tell me everything that's going wrong.
Let me make it, you
know, let me just listen.
Why not?
Because it's a lot, it's a lot.
Okay, so that though, okay,
but that brings me back to
the emotional intelligence
of Gen X men because I
think it feels like it's a lot
because Gen X men were not equipped
with how to deal with emotions.
And so their first emotion
with that is feeling overwhelmed
feeling ill-equipped,
feeling anxious, and it's a lot.
I can't handle this.
I think that's, I don't
think they're feeling,
I don't love you.
I don't think they're
feeling, I want to hurt you.
I think that they are like,
I don't know how to do this.
I'm going to avoid this and hope that
she'll just like settle
down and simmer down.
And then life will just
kind of get back to normal.
And we'll just start being normal again.
And what they don't realize is that sure,
she seems normal, but
dude, no, it's damaging.
And it's over and over again.
And eventually the relationship is
damaged beyond repair.
Let me ask you a question.
Do you think the behavior
of Gen X women is similar
or comparable to these
younger generation of women?
Meaning we've talked
about emotional capabilities
of younger men.
It feels like younger
women have similarly advanced
development of their own
emotional control, right?
You see where I'm going here.
Advanced development of
their emotional control.
Compared to a Gen X woman.
So here's where I'm going.
(laughing)
What makes you think
you girls are not a lot?
From a Gen X guy, you're
saying it's the Gen X man
is ill-equipped to deal with this.
Why do we need to be
equipped to deal with it?
And again, I'm asking
for the masses, right?
No, I understand.
Right, yeah, okay.
Cause it's not complicated stuff, right?
Okay, so when people get, let's say
they're getting married.
I'm going to bring marriage into this.
I know not everyone gets married,
but let's say they get married, right?
And so back for Gen Xers, no
one ever talked about roles.
No one ever talked about a man helping
on the domestic front.
That was not talked about.
What was talked about is
a woman should go to work.
A woman should have children.
A woman should raise those children.
A woman should cook
dinner, do the laundry,
clean the house, plan everything,
all the doctor's appointments, drive
everyone everywhere,
basically do everything.
The man goes to work.
The man takes care of
the lawn and all the leaves
and the gutters and
all that stuff, right?
So that is how Gen X was sold.
Boys and girls were sold that.
You boys were sold that and
us girls were sold that, right?
Now in there, no one acknowledged
emotional intelligence
at all, even in the girls.
And then the emotional development
of both Gen X boys and Gen X girls
was not acknowledged
on either front, right?
So we just were kind of like,
all those things Gen X went through,
but let's just focus on
emotional development.
That was not acknowledged really in
general, in general.
So then we grow up
and we marry each other.
And in our minds, we
have two different ideas
of how things are gonna go, right?
Us Gen X girls think, of
course a woman can do everything
because that's what we see on TV.
And those are the
commercials and the TV shows.
And we see our moms
and our aunts working,
sometimes our grandmas,
single moms, married moms,
everyone seems to be fine.
So that's what we're gonna do.
We're gonna do it all.
And then the men are like, yeah,
she's gonna do it all
and I'm gonna go to work
and take care of things around the house.
And no emotional
development happened, right?
So then as the women are humming along,
doing 90% of the domestic load,
in addition to working a
full-time job and handling,
same stuff that men are
handling at their job.
I'm not saying literally the
same, but the same pressures.
Why is it different?
It's the same shit.
So handling the same
stuff, 40 hours a week,
give or take, whatever.
And the second job of the
domestic load and the children,
a human being can't handle that
emotionally and mentally.
They get burned out,
they become disconnected.
They go into fight or flight.
They go into autopilot because it's a
grind that never ends
because you never get a break.
Women were not coming home from work,
sitting on a couch,
turning on the TV and chilling
while someone's making
dinner in the kitchen.
The men were.
The children were not going to the men
asking for help on this, help on that.
The mothers assault.
This is how it ended up
for us as Gen Xers, right?
So then she comes to him and she's like,
I'm upset about this or I need this
or can we talk about this?
And it could be the smallest thing.
Like, I can't handle, I
need the bathrooms cleaned
or I need you to take me out on a date
or I need you to help
Jimmy with his homework.
It could be anything, right?
She's asking for help.
And she's coming, she's
probably been grinding so long
that by the time she comes to
him, she's at her wit's end.
So there's a chance it
could be coming intently
and in an intense way.
Like, dude, whatever, I need help.
Because his emotional
development wasn't acknowledged,
he's feeling completely
overwhelmed with this reaction.
He feels defensive.
He feels like she's saying
he's doing something wrong.
He thinks she's acting crazy.
Where's this coming from?
Everything's been fine.
Where's this coming from?
Why all of a sudden
are you acting like this?
We've all been fine.
When really she hasn't been fine.
She's been falling apart.
And then he's like, I
can't deal with this.
I'm gonna avoid.
I'm going in the garage,
I can't deal with this.
She feels pushed aside.
She feels like he's not gonna help.
She feels like she's invalidated
and that happens over
and over and over again.
And eventually she
either, the marriage falls apart
when the children are
young or she hits menopause
or she hits midlife
and she's like, I'm done.
I can't do this anymore.
You don't hear me.
I've had done this for 30
years or 25 years, whatever.
I'm gonna go spend the
rest of my life for myself.
And then the men are mad.
I think though, I think what you just did
is you backed into
taking it off men's plates
as a sole source.
And what I mean by that is, as you know,
I'm very much an evolutionist in that
I think the world continues to evolve
and we get better and better.
That's the wheel of turns.
And the younger generations
are doing better emotionally
than us, right?
So I believe that that's evolution.
What you just described is new or was new
in that the
generations before us, in the US,
I don't know elsewhere,
I'll just speak for the US,
but I feel like at a
global, not a global level
because we're the richest
nation in the world, right?
So I'll keep it as a US-based thing.
But it was typically
the guy would go work,
mom would stay home and that's not even
accurate too, right?
But for certain parts of the story.
In general, yes it is, it is.
So then all of a sudden,
and that's what we grew up with modeled.
That was modeled behavior for us.
That's what I saw my
uncles and aunts and everybody,
that's what they did.
That's what you saw.
Yeah, that's what I saw.
I saw the opposite of that.
Yes, but my point is, in general,
we grew up with the beavers, right?
No, no, in general, we grew up
as the first children of divorce.
Yes, yes.
So it depends on where
you were, you had both.
You had either leave it to beaver life.
We were the part of where they melded.
Some were leave it to beaver life
and some were children of divorce.
You're kind of making my point.
There was a paradigm
shift in our generation.
Gen X was the paradigm shift from,
generally speaking, there
wasn't divorce as much as,
there wasn't daycare, right?
Gen X is on the
forefront of divorce, daycare.
You can bring home the
bacon and make it too,
whatever the hell it is, right?
So yeah, we didn't have
that model of behavior as men.
And now all of a sudden,
and you had used the word,
I'll go back to you, you
said women are humming along,
working outside the home,
taking care of the kids.
They weren't humming,
because then you came
back to the reality,
they were grinding.
Grinding.
Yes.
With slow, when
you're grinding as hard as,
women would be grinding like that.
It's slowly, it's not cool.
It eats away at you.
It eats away at your soul.
Yes.
Yes, I get it.
So, but there was no
preparation for this,
for any of us, not men or women.
What's finally happened, I think, is,
maybe women, they're, they've,
I don't know, maybe you
can explain it better,
but it feels like they've had enough,
because they've had enough.
And men, we were,
we've had model behavior
that was different.
So you're coming to us now,
because you're grinding,
you're, it's a lot, right?
You need some support.
And we're like, what's wrong?
Dinner, I'm chilling,
I just worked all day,
gonna put on the game, you
know, that kind of thing.
And you're like, oh.
Yeah.
Yeah, no, so I get it,
but it's, I don't think,
we've been oversimplifying it,
saying that it's men, an
emotional lack of maturity,
or lack of emotional development.
I think you just hit
it on the head though,
you guys didn't have that
emotional preparation either.
You were thrown into this
media created environment
that we all were, right?
We all grew up, I grew up
in the generation of like,
you know, cosmopolitan, playboy,
thought we're all marrying
models that could do it all,
right, we all thought we
were marrying that woman.
Right, right.
So, you know, I think
that's more it than,
I don't think it's
completely picking on men,
that they couldn't deal with it.
But what I do see, and I
don't think this is a bad thing,
women your age, your
generation, Gen X women are saying,
fuck this, we've had enough.
And men are not,
they're not hearing that,
they're not getting ahead of that enough
to prevent the nuclear option,
which is the divorce, is the pure hatred.
And we see it, right?
We've seen plenty of
comments from men that it's like,
guys, just keep moving.
You don't need to come
in and attack these women,
it's unnecessary.
Well, but I think also their reaction,
I think women are saying we've had enough
and their reaction is
indicative or an example
of the whole thing.
So I think women were
coming to the men in their lives
repeatedly saying, please, I need this.
Can you hear me about this?
I need you to
understand this, la, la, la, la,
over and over again, push
aside, push aside, push aside,
avoid, avoid, avoid,
the men were avoiding.
And so now the women are
like, okay, I'm leaving
because I can't do this anymore.
And then the men now are
having a reaction to that
because they didn't
acknowledge any of these conversations
up to this point.
And so they're
completely taking it personally.
That's one thing I've
realized is they're taking it
as some sort of like, I
don't even know if it's personal
because that would mean that they're
taking accountability.
It's almost like they're
taking it like the woman
is putting herself past her family.
That's how it is.
They're viewing it as
she's putting her needs
and her happiness past her
family when she's saying,
I've just spent the last 30
years giving everything I have
to this family and you never
heard me when I needed help.
And I'll say it again,
I'm absolutely pro woman.
Good, good for the
women to finally put it,
their needs above the
rest of what was going on
because at your age,
your kids are probably,
not every case, right?
But the kids are
probably in an okay spot.
You've hit this point in your life
where you probably
are able to spend less,
we've talked about this.
You're not having to cook
for five people right now.
Right. Right?
Yes, I've been able to
let go of some of the things
I was doing. Yeah, there's
some of the responsibilities.
Yeah, yeah, but
what's unfortunate though,
and I agree with you, good.
And I think it's amazing and I love it.
I love it, I love it, I love it.
But what's sad is that
so many times these women
that are reclaiming their energy
and moving on into the
next phase of their life,
they're having to
leave their marriage behind
because their marriage was part of what
was destroying them.
And that's what's sad.
And that's where I go back to the
emotional development
because I feel like some
of it ties back to that.
If the emotional
development, the emotional maturity,
emotional intelligence,
whatever you wanna call it,
if it had been dealt
with and acknowledged
for Gen X in general as children,
we probably would have
been able to communicate
with each other better in marriage.
And then you may not be having
so many midlife divorces right now.
And I think you brought this up.
The millennials have
already evolved in so many ways
when it comes to communication.
In general, the men, the millennial men
are way more in tune
with the needs at
home, the childcare needs.
I don't think as many of them view it as,
I'm babysitting my
kids, whereas Gen X men,
it was more I'm
babysitting while she's getting
her nails done.
And again, I think Gen Z
will keep going with that.
So it is evolutionary.
It's an evolutionary thing.
But I think what we're
seeing now is there are a lot
of divorces happening right now.
And I think if you go back
and it brings us back
to attachment styles,
I think that a lot of
the Gen X men were avoidant
or fearful avoidant.
And maybe you have a lot of Gen X women
that were anxious attachment.
And when you put an anxious attachment
and an avoidant
together, it's not gonna work
because she's the more she's trying,
the more she's trying,
the more he's pulling away.
Yes, we've done that ourselves.
You tried to get my attention.
I'm like, ugh.
Yes.
So I'm not, we are not innocent of it.
Oh no, no, no.
And I'm a huge component of it.
There's two of us.
Yes.
And, you know.
No, no, no, we, I mean,
I am here to say that,
you've definitely been
an avoidant attachment
or a fearful attachment
at parts of our marriage.
And I've been anxious
attachment in parts of our marriage.
And a lot of people think you can't have
a successful
relationship with an avoidant
or a fearful avoidant,
that you almost have to give up yourself
in order to do that.
But I'm here to say that's not true.
Well, I think you--
But I am here to say that it's not easy,
and it's not easy to be with
an anxious attachment either.
And that's why it's important
that at least within
the marriage, as you grow,
your goal should be to
become securely attached.
I would say 100% agree,
but think of it this way,
or a way to think about it.
You know, I'm a big young yet.
And he's very much into the development
of the individual and individuation.
And marriage isn't easy.
Relationships aren't easy,
especially something that spans decades,
and children, and financial cycles,
and jobs, and buying homes,
or selling, whatever, right?
There's the world's fucking crazy.
Yeah.
I think in this
attachment style conversation,
you float in and out of different things.
That's what I found
most fascinating about it,
looking at it, there's four boxes,
but there's variations of each.
The most important thing I think to do,
and the way to
prevent divorce is probably,
you have to continue to
develop as an individual.
And you forced me to
develop as an individual
by holding me accountable.
The kids have forced me
to develop as an individual
by holding me accountable.
There's just certain
things I can't do that,
or say that are innate to
me being from Gen X, right?
That shit that's probably inappropriate,
and they'll call me on it.
Or that's just weird,
whatever, in my sense of humor.
So it's like, you've gotta continue
to evolve and catch yourself.
Yes.
And then I think at the end of the day,
you have to do what you can to bring that
to the relationship.
And the other person has to do the same.
So it's not a he or a she thing.
What you're describing, I think,
what we've tapped
into or discovered here,
and shouldn't be rocket science here
to figure this shit out,
but these divorces are
because they've grown apart,
or one's individuated, or
one's developed individually,
and the other hasn't.
One's had stunted growth, one hasn't.
Yeah, and I think there's resentment.
The communication of
resentment and all that.
Resemmon has a big, big part of it.
So no, I think that another thing
that I don't think
it's talked about enough
when it comes to relationships is that
if a man can
facilitate the woman in his life
to be in her feminine more,
then there's true balance.
And I think the
relationship works better.
So women do a lot, men do a lot,
but women do carry the
emotional baggage of the family,
and so many other little
things that are always in her mind
is constant,
constant, constant, constant.
And so if a man can relieve
some of the stress baggage
from her and allow her to soften,
because the more
stress and the more baggage,
mental baggage and emotional baggage
a woman carries from
caring for the family,
the more harder she's gonna
get because she's so stressed.
So try to re-explain that in a way that,
because what I heard you,
but it almost feels like,
I'm not taking it this way,
but I could picture someone,
especially with some of the juvenile
commentary we've seen.
It almost sounds like you just said,
take the problems off her plate.
And I don't think
you're 100% saying that,
you're saying more share in that, right?
I'm saying-- But you mentioned
at the beginning that it
would help her be more feminine.
What does that mean? And
let her be in her feminine.
So I think with the whole
women working too and all that,
which by the way, I wanna be clear,
I'm totally for women being able to work
and having financial
freedom and all that,
and growth and chasing their dreams.
So I wanna be very clear.
But with them having to take
on working outside the home
and their other job,
because working in the
home domestically is a job.
I also believe that 100%.
Stay-at-home moms are working a job
and working moms are working a job.
Working moms are working both jobs.
So it's almost like,
men need to work on creating the space
to give the women in their lives
an opportunity to be in their feminine.
What does that mean?
So I'm gonna explain.
It can be very simple.
She's grinding.
She's doing what she wants
to do, chasing her dreams,
working, raising
children, cleaning the house,
all those things, right?
So she's working hard.
Balance it.
Open her car door.
Open the door at the restaurant.
Pull out the chair for her.
If she's carrying bags, go get the bags.
Unload the car, the groceries.
Bring her flowers.
And I know it sounds simple,
but this is what will
help her feel like a woman.
And I'm not even talking
about as a relationship thing.
Let her, it helps her be in
her feminine in that moment.
And it helps her downshift a bit.
It helps her soften.
And as a result,
those little things
that are just for her,
as a result, she will be more
open to the man in her life,
if that makes sense.
What's interesting is it makes me think
that what you're describing
is keep reminding the woman
from a man's perspective,
why you got together in the first place.
Because at some point it wasn't a grind.
It was infatuation that led to love,
then the rest of its
history type of thing, right?
True.
But it's also, and
this is some people may,
this may trigger some people,
but it's also being the man in her life.
This isn't a competition.
A lot of men get
competitive with their women partners,
which it baffles me.
This isn't a competition.
And this could be for not just,
this could be for homosexuals too.
I'm not talking about men and women,
I'm talking about roles, right?
So the masculine
person in a relationship,
and I'm gonna speak
in a heterosexual way,
the man, there's
times he just needs to be
the man to the woman,
because it allows her to
not be all the other things.
He's creating space for
her to just be a woman.
And then she can be in her feminine,
because it's almost like
when she's doing all that stuff,
she's in her
masculine, if that makes sense.
And so it's like, one of
the things I think men love
about women is their femininity.
It's the opposite of men.
You love the
softness, you love the curves,
I'm just speaking physically,
but you love the sensitivity, the
nurturing tendencies,
the ability to make a
home look beautiful,
ability to listen and
relate and be there for you
as a friend and watch them,
women, raise your children
and love on your children
and all the different things
women do that are magical.
So help her hold onto that part of her
and not become
completely in her masculine.
Because so many women, so many women,
that's the first
thing they have to let go
in order to grind as hard as they do.
And so the men in their life need to,
not need to, but should want to say,
"I got you, I got you.
"I'm gonna get you a
drink, I'm gonna order for you."
It's the smallest things,
take away her decision fatigue.
You do it.
Take away her decision
fatigue or she shouldn't have to,
she can carry that bag, but
she shouldn't always have to.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, no, 100%.
And as a result, it balances out
that male masculine feminine in a woman.
And I think then it also creates balance
in the relationship.
Yeah, I'm thinking too though,
could you answer it the same way?
Could you provide an
answer for what women could do
for men to relieve some of whatever?
I can't even think,
because I understand you,
but I don't totally relate.
In general, they do.
Because they, in general,
they're the ones who
do the grocery shopping,
do the cooking, all that stuff
that men don't have to think
about, women already do it.
But that's not true,
because that's not true.
There's some men who do it all too.
And we've seen it,
some of these guys that,
some of the commentary you
can tell that they don't,
they can't identify with certain aspects
because maybe they're doing more.
Sure, I'm sure there's situations where
there's a man that does all the things,
and in that situation, I
100% think she should step up
and start doing some of that stuff.
That's a given.
Like I don't understand women
who would just sit
around the house and not,
if they're home, you need to be
maintaining that house.
That's your job.
Like you clean the
house, you plan the groceries,
you cook the meals, you plan the meals,
you take care of the job.
If you're staying home long,
that's what you're
doing, that's your job, right?
But if you're a working mom,
then he needs to also
be helping on the state,
on the domestic front,
and you're working together as partners.
But okay, so in that situation,
let's say they're both working,
and then they're both
working well as partners,
and then he should also be
doing those little things
to help keep her in her femininity,
but then she should also do those things
to help him feel good about himself too,
because men have egos--
That's where I'm going, what are,
I don't know what those things are.
I mean if I had to guess.
What, sex or
something? I think it's sexual.
Its sexual.
I think it's sexual.
Am I wrong?
Um, no I think that,
But you can be honest.
Yeah that's what I'm trying to think of.
Maybe that is the main thing.
I think for women it's a
bunch of little things,
and I think for men it's
just kind of one thing.
I mean other than you know listening,
and whatever they want to talk about,
and you know, and in their
interest, like we do all that,
you know, you want to talk
about fishing and it's like,
oh, that's
interesting. Not that, you know,
but you should do that for us. Like you
don't really care about certain things,
but you're going to
listen. Um, but I think, okay.
So the way, the way,
I'm not going to say the way that sex
makes men feels how women feel about
all those little things.
That's how it makes us feel. Um,
I think men, I think men get validation through sex.
In addition to pleasure. Um,
I think it's the way men
feel wanted by their partner.
And I think the way women
feel wanted sexually to women,
want their partner to be sexually
attracted to them. Don't get me wrong.
But I think these other ways
are another way, like showing,
oh, doing all those little things I was
talking about a women,
a woman also feels, um, that the man in her life wants her and
values her with those actions.
Right. Does that make sense? All those
little things I said,
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That, but that doing all
those things, when I say habit,
then that helps her being her femininity.
That leads to usually leads to sex.
See a woman needs things like that.
And then she's like, see a woman needs things like that in
order to want to be intimate with
someone. Yeah. And I think that's a
disconnect with men and women.
Men honestly can just be intimate with
someone and there's nothing wrong with
that, but they can. Women for them to
fully want to be intimate with,
I'm talking about their partner. There's
not a one night stand. You,
there has to be something there. Um,
a feeling like that you're cared for,
you're valued some
tenderness to lead you to that space.
I do think there's more than sex though.
I'm really pondering it while you've said
it and there definitely is more than
sex, but you know, it's,
it's funny cause as creatures,
probably sex is definitely number one,
right? For all men. Yes. Um,
so that's no shocker,
but I do think there's,
I'm trying to think of other things like
I, for us, I'll make it about us. Okay.
Our walks are when we walk in the morning
and we're talking and shooting the
shit and stuff like that. I
think that's good and healthy.
Yes. There's gotta be other things
though. Oh, well,
doing things together. I,
I mean travel, people
travel together. Yeah.
People like to go out to eat together.
Um, maybe like how
people play pickleball,
you know, all those different hobbies,
common interest in hobbies.
And I think doing those things together
does continue to bond the relationship.
Yeah. Yeah. And, um,
and we'll as a result make
the sex life healthy too.
Cause the sex life, but see,
here's the other thing when women go into
menopause perimenopause affects a
women's libido. And so there could be a
period where a woman is not as into sex.
And she doesn't even know why. Cause,
cause for gen X women,
we didn't know what was going on. So
we're all learning this now, right?
So when they hit like 45 or 43 and all of
a sudden they're not wanting to have
sex as much and they may
think, Oh, it's cause I'm tired.
It's because we have so much going on,
even though there was still stuff going
on in your thirties and twenties and you
wanted to have sex more, but for some
reason, you're just like, Oh,
I'm just getting older.
Yeah. And then you learn, Oh,
it was my hormones. And maybe if people
would have talked about it,
I could have gone on hormone replacement
therapy and my libido would have stayed
normal. So then you're playing catch up.
A lot of these women are playing catch
up, trying to get their libido back. Um,
and so that that can
affect the relationship.
Cause if you were having a regular sex
life and then all of a sudden you're not,
and then he takes that personally and he
doesn't know why, but neither does she.
So there's a breakdown there.
Honestly, I mean,
I feel like we covered some ground here
because started off with these
attachment styles,
but I really think we got into some
dynamics around relationships and I feel
better for the men because
we're not the evil, you know,
ogres of emotional
development. I think we certainly are,
but I do think women are
culpable at this as well. Also,
you just touched on a huge point.
There's biological events happening at
the female level at the male level too.
Yeah.
The female level that you guys didn't
talk about it because you were raised by
silent generation or boomers
or whatever. Yeah. And so it's,
it's new to everybody. And again, I go
back to the evolutionary tale.
We're talking about it. There was no
podcast 20 years ago talking about that.
Right. So now the people
below us, the kids below us can,
there's just more information.
Well, it's one of the
reasons we're doing this, right?
And it's one of the reasons I continue to
want to talk about some of this stuff
because I want there to be resources for
millennials, Gen Z, Gen Alpha,
whatever, you know, as
long as these podcasts are up,
some of this stuff I
want it to be talked about.
So if somebody goes to search about this,
cause they don't know
what's going on in their life.
There's at least somebody, a couple here
talking about it, saying,
this is normal. Yeah. Um, yeah. Honestly,
there's just so many things,
again, that Gen X was ignored about. And
so I, but like, we'll talk about it.
We're not scared. That's one thing. We're
not scared because I know the boomer,
the boomer women, it wasn't talked about.
And some boomer women are proud of that.
They're like, I just got through it. I
didn't talk like that's being stoic about
it. Or I just worked and took care of my
man. And that's, it's like, that's not,
I'm sorry, that's not heroic for women.
Like women deserve more than that.
And women deserve to have a voice. And
so, um, but you're right.
It's not all on the
emotional development of men.
I think it was an emotional lack of
emotional development on a generation.
And then we got married and
you said it, we got married.
And it was the first time where there was
a paradigm shift in that both parents
were working and nothing, and then
nothing changed in the domestic front.
We were really sold such
a bag of crap. And, um,
it was almost like destined for failure.
I mean, and I know there, there was,
I know there are, you know,
statistically, I don't know this.
I don't think you know this,
but what is the divorce rate of Gen Xers
versus boomers versus whatever, right?
I don't know. I'm curious.
Yeah. Maybe if we find a graphic,
we'll put it up on the screen for you to,
um, but I don't know,
but I do know there's a lot of midlife,
uh, divorce is happening right now.
And there's a lot of gray
divorces and that's the boomers.
There's a lot of gray divorces too. Um,
and I think most of them statistically
now, like it used to be the men would
want to get divorced because they found a
younger version, right?
They go through their midlife crisis. It
seems like now it's the women that are
leaving. So it's very interesting, but
that's something to look into more,
yeah. You know, but I think that, um,
it was destined for failure in some ways,
but I think that there were definitely
couples that did have good communication
that I think there
were men that stepped up.
There were people that have saved Mary.
There were people that had great
marriages and the dad
helped and things went
well. So we're not
saying like all Gen X, uh,
parents ended up in the all Gen X kids
ended up in these nightmare marriages.
That's not what we're
saying, but we probably had
a highest,
a higher percentage of different
variables than other
generations. Because again,
it was the shift of the culture of women
are leaving the home and working.
It's really the first time that's
happened on that level.
I'm not talking about a war time. I know
women did that at war time.
And I know there were
women who always worked.
I'm talking about a cultural shift.
The, and the cultural shift was leaving
the house to get a job,
to continue this concept of an American
dream where you would have a
car, two cars, dogs,
house, be able to eat, right?
Have healthcare. And it's now
very much a two income society.
Oh, well that's the other thing is
capitalism. How does
that play into it? Um,
that to be able to afford to do that, did
you need two people?
I mean, a lot of people,
there's conspiracy theories on this that
the government wanted more tax money.
So they, they set it up so
women would go to work. Um,
wanted to break up the home to have more
control over the people. You know,
there's a lot of that that goes into it
and you can, you can research that.
But, um, do I think,
I think women going back to work was such
a wonderful thing for women to be
able to do as an option.
But I think it's really crappy that it
ended up where women had to go back to
work to afford this lifestyle. I think it
should have stayed an option.
And I think it should have,
I think women it should have also be
where women have the potential to make as
much as men. So if, if they want the man
to stay home, you know,
if you're going to do that,
then you make sure the men,
the women make as much as
the men. And then as a couple,
they can decide who stays home.
There's a lot of things
that should have happened here.
You should have had women,
if they're going to work,
you should have been paying them the same
as you were paying men so that that
couple, I know, but I'm just saying there
was a whole bunch of stuff.
I'm going to get shit on.
I think so. So, but anyways, but as far
as attachment styles,
um, I do think Gen X men in general,
a lot of them are avoidance or fearful
avoidance and a lot of the women,
a lot of the women though could have been
too and anxious attachment.
And I feel like my
perspective is, but I could be skewed.
I feel like my
experience a hundred percent,
my perspective experience
that I'm in, it's not gospel,
but I feel like women definitely were
more the anxious attachment a hundred
percent. And I do think it's partly
because of a higher divorce rate.
I do think it's because of mom's working
as well, right? The whole,
the nuclear home shifted
from dad's work. Mom stays home.
Mom raises the kids. Now
dad's working. Mom's working.
Probably a little tension there.
And dad's approval of young
women is harder to come by.
Maybe they're out on sales guys drop jobs
and they're gone five days a week.
They're traveling a lot. And so there's,
there's a lot there.
There's a lot there.
Also we, um,
we're the generation where we were told
we have to have a man and we were the,
we're the generation that
we were told we compete.
We were taught to compete
with each other for a man.
So we had anxiety about that, that you
need to get a man and all that,
where, you know,
the younger generations are really
enjoying their single
time and honoring that
and don't have, not saying they don't
have anxiety about finding their person,
but it's just, I feel it's different. It
seems different. I could be wrong,
but we, we came out
of college, most of us,
I'm not saying all of us,
but like we need, you know,
finding our person and as,
and need to find a man. So,
I don't know. I think the attachment
styles are interesting. Um,
and I'll be curious to see how our kids
attachment styles are. Um,
because if it's rooted in your
experiences with your caregivers,
and then did we mess them up in some way?
Well, you know, it's
interesting. I never thought about it,
but I I'd be willing to bet each one will
have a different style.
Probably.
And it's just because
they're unique creatures.
Well, yeah, but it also goes back to your
experiences with your caregiver.
And yet you have to remember,
like they each had different quote
unquote childhoods
because of what age they
were. So different things were going on
in our lives at different times.
So they moved and we
moved. So there was different,
and that could create different
attachment styles. So
I'll be curious to see,
hopefully they're all fine
and okay. And we'll be good.
Be the first to know.
I do think that Gen X works so hard that
I think a lot of their are Gen Z kids
are, are going to be overall be fine when
it comes to their attachment styles.
But I don't know. I don't know.
Cause I know there's a lot of anxiety in
that generation. So I don't know.
I have a question totally different. Um,
what do you think the fate of our
generation is here
with all of this, with,
with all of this, um,
the divorce, the great,
I don't know if we're a great divorce, I
like, I'm great. Um,
but women reaching this point
claiming their energy,
moving on, not being dependent,
the men kind of overreacting in some way.
And I don't know if overreacting
overreacting is the right word.
That's not the right word, but you know
what I'm going. It's the dynamic.
They're kind of being taken off guard.
There's this shift. What
do you think? Um, well,
I definitely think there's Gen Xers that
are going to stay married and go into
God willing. They're, they're old age
together. Um, speaking about us in
particular, but we know other people that
are married and are happy and all
that. The ones where the woman has, um,
started her new, that's
our dog started her new life.
I think you're going to have,
um, a bunch of golden girls.
I think you're going to have a lot of
women that live together or live in
communities together and travel together
and enjoy their lives together and
support each other. And I think for some
women, it'll be the first time,
and it'll be the most glorious time of
their life. And, um,
they say there's a lonely man epidemic, a
loneliness epidemic.
Yeah, that's a trend. So, um, I think I,
I don't know what's going
to happen with Gen X men, um,
who've gone through divorce. Uh,
we may have a lot of older guys that
sugar daddies. I don't know. I don't, I
think maybe just alone.
I think, you know, unless you
make a lot of money nowadays,
you're not a sugar daddy.
You have to make a lot
of money now to be that.
So there definitely will be
Gen X sugar daddies, but, um,
I think the women are going to be fine.
And I don't know if the men are going to
be, they may be, they may be just fine.
I don't know, but I think the women are
going to be fine. And, and they may, um,
I think the women will meet other
companions if they choose,
but I don't see them in
general getting married again.
You know, it's a fascinating thing as I
sit here and listen to your answer as
men, you have to be, you have to do it
all. I think there's been a shift.
Men have to do it all now
in some respects in that,
in the, the, the, the thing
that comes to mind is just,
you've got to be masculine
yet you need to be sensitive.
And that's a fine line. That's more not
programmed for that per se.
Our generation is that the men, the men
in our generation isn't,
but the millennial men. So
that brings up a good point.
There were some comments under, um,
where men were saying
about showing their emotions.
Why show your emotions when a woman can
use them against you?
Yeah, that's amazing. And
I don't understand that.
Can you explain from a man's perspective
where some of those men are coming from
that they feel that if they're vulnerable
and show their emotions to a woman,
she's going to use it
as a weapon against them.
Oh man. I don't know.
I, I don't know. Um,
I wish I had a little
more time to think about it,
even though I have thought
about it. I think it's sort of,
maybe by showing your
emotions were programmed.
That's a weakness unless it's anger and
rage, then we're strong. Right.
But if we have to show
your emotions and cry or
empathize, I don't, we should all be
empathetic to everything.
So it's more as maybe that next level
down of, of empathy or,
or a vulnerability of I'm afraid of
something or I'm afraid of this,
or I'm afraid of that, or maybe it's
professing your love. So I don't know.
Right. What are the, what is that
vulnerability there
they're talking about? Um,
but there, I could certainly see, you
know, a woman who might be like, Oh,
you're so weak. You, you get upset
watching this or when this, you know,
whatever. I could see a woman doing that
if for whatever reason,
people in general can be
crazy and wacky, right?
So it feels like that
would be more on the fringe.
But for seeing that a
lot of men had said that,
that means that there's a lot of women
out there doing that,
or maybe their moms did that to them.
But what's an example? Do
you think, what are these,
what are they talking about?
Maybe in the heat of an argument,
the woman throws it in their
face about a time that they,
that's the only thing I can think of
showed vulnerability,
but what level of what's
type or level or instance of
vulnerability? Would you be
able to throw back on someone?
I don't know. I mean,
other than crying, but I, I,
when I say when men sharing emotions, I'm
not thinking about crying.
I'm more thinking about being open, being
vulnerable, sharing, you know,
like you also, there you go.
When I think of it, my five,
represent my generation
to me, it's more crying.
So they may think crying. Maybe they're
just thinking crying. Yeah.
Yeah. So, and then some
of the men said that, um,
there that it's their
job as men to, you don't,
when you're in a situation, you don't
experience your emotions.
And if you need to, you
experience them alone,
you go to a place and
experience them alone,
but it's your job to manage them.
And that showing emotion in a
situation is a detriment to,
um, trying to resolve
whatever's going on, that,
that emotions, um,
are a weakness and we'll get in the way
of fixing a problem.
So, and I think that's probably accurate.
If you were sitting on a park bench
crying and a man was sitting on the park
bench crying, which is more acceptable,
which would be more common,
which would be more like
less out of the norm. Right.
So the society in general
is not set up to let men cry.
I'm not saying we need to, I don't,
right? And if you do your week, um,
but it's not set up for that. It's not
facilitated to that degree.
That's not our cultural norm. Yeah. It's,
you know, it's true.
But then I think that Gen X men look down
on millennial men and Gen Z men,
because they feel like the ones that are
more empathetic and more in touch with
their emotions, because we
did get comments about, um,
we were the last real men were the last
generation of real men and the men after
us are weak.
I honestly can relate to that and
identify with that at a certain degree,
whether that's right or wrong.
I cannot relate to younger men who are as
emotional or sensitive as they are.
And that's a problem for me, right?
That's my problem. Right.
So I don't hold that against them.
I don't view it as my own
flaw, but it is what it is.
But you know what we've talked about how
millennial men and I think Gen Z men
wound up being like this are much better
communicators in general and their
relationships and help on the domestic
front more than Gen X men did and more
in tune with the
women, what the women need.
And so I think it takes being in tune
with that sensitive part of your
personality to be able to be a full
partner for the woman in your life.
It's my evolutionary thinking, right? Men
evolve, women evolve,
society evolves and you know, you kind of
hope it's all for the better.
But here's the thing. Even those
millennial women, I
think women in general,
in general, um, I think women in general
are attracted to high masculinity,
but want sensitivity along with it.
So I think the ideal man for a woman for
in general is the guy who's a man very
masculine, kind of, you know, rough
around the edges, all that takes,
gets shit done, takes care of everything.
But then she wants him to be sensitive
and empathetic on the
domestic front where
she needs him. And that is, that is what
can be challenging for men.
Yes. Well, you just summed up some of the
commentary that men are feeling that
women want it all. What else can I do
now? She, you know, this and that,
that's what's happening.
Right. Right. But I don't
know. Are they talking about,
I feel like they're talking about
literally what they want us to keep doing
more. I don't, I'm
talking more, um, just,
I don't know, emotionally or, um,
what they're bringing to the table
characteristically, I guess,
if that makes sense. What
do you mean? Like be a man,
but also still be able to be sensitive.
Yeah. That's what you want from me.
Can you be a little more
sensitive? You asshole, you know,
that may be the timeless problem.
Timeless tension. Yeah. Yeah. It's that,
but I mean, I think there's so much,
we, everything we've talked
about is valid, but I think,
but I think men want
women to participate,
hold their own, do things
around the house, if possible,
bring some money. And if not,
if they're fine with them being home,
taking care of everything on the home
front, but also be
feminine and be sexual.
It's almost, I was, you know,
it's almost like be Mary Poppins in
public and a hooker in the bedroom.
That's the man's dream, right? And then a
woman wants like a mass masculine man
who can fight if needs to protect it. She
wants to protect her,
but she also wants someone
who's going to do the dishes,
cook dinner once in a while,
give the kids a bath and not complain
about it and not act like he's doing her
a favor. That's the thing is when a man
does stuff like that,
it's a favor, but when a woman does it,
it's viewed as her duty.
I think you're just summing up a
dysfunctional relationship though,
or at least a phase in a dysfunctional
relationship, right?
It where the man thinks
that he's doing her a favor.
I think that's a generational thing.
You think so? I mean,
would you say there was a time in our
early marriage when if you did something,
like let's say if you, I
don't know if you ever did this,
but let's say if you would
have given one of the kids a bath.
Of course I did.
Or did something you would have thought
you were helping me out and be,
really think about it.
No, I'm trying to think about that.
Or like, let's say you went grocery
shopping that you were helping me out.
I think the most tangible thing would be
like doing the dishes.
Okay. I would definitely was a,
I feel like I was definitely actively
involved with the kids of that.
And that maybe not so much baths. I'd
take a bath with them type of thing,
you know, but not a nut.
When they were very, very little to be
clear, very little babies, babies.
Um, but now I'm not a
wash the dishes type of guy.
I'm not a clean up
the kitchen type of guy.
No, no.
Yeah. Okay. I'm talking about
though, in our early marriage,
I'm talking about now
when we were in the trenches,
if you would have done the three or post
kids, we have the kids,
everything's going on. Let's say you do
the dishes. Yeah. Honestly,
don't you think you kind of would have
viewed it as you're helping me out?
Uh, you know, I'll throw you
one. Sure. I don't know if I,
I don't remember doing
the dishes, but you didn't.
Yeah. But like, but you never mowed the
lawn. You never shoveled the driveway.
We've talked about that in our episodes.
And for anyone who doesn't know,
I was a stay at home mom. I did have a
couple of jobs part time briefly,
but we decided that before we got married
on the rolls. And, um,
we are Gen X and we went way traditional
and then things have shifted.
I'd say in the last five years, for sure.
You know, and midlife,
cause cause as I went through menopause
and went through different things and
then us just our kids
getting older and, um,
more time in the home, like more time
between us and stuff,
things I wanted some change
and I, to give you credit,
you listened to me,
you heard me and you continue to try to
do things to be understanding and
supportive. Um, especially when it comes
to like health stuff and menopause,
like you, and if I'm having
this, if I'm like, uh, you know,
I'm feeling emotional, like you have not
belittled me, you've been there. And so,
and that's what it takes. It just takes
evolving with your partner.
I think it takes evolving. I'm not
perfect, but I, you know,
and I don't even try to
be perfect. You know that.
Oh, I know. I know. At least try. I try
something. You do, you do.
And you, yeah. And, but you, that's,
if that's one piece of advice to the men,
just evolve with her as she's going
through this huge phase, just,
just be patient and, and,
and try to be supportive.
But I think too, to your credit, you
started researching
this shit a while ago.
Yes. And you were trying to
get yourself prepared. Yeah.
So you've done various
things to be proactive.
I try to be proactive. And so my advice
to women is take care of your own
business too. Right. Oh, absolutely. You
can't put your head in the sand,
but a lot of women don't
know. And to be honest with you,
this started for me. I,
I've traced it back around 42.
So I didn't really start doing anything
for a good eight to nine
years. Cause I didn't know it was
happening. My forties were rough.
Oh, you're saying you
think you hit menopause.
I was in perimenopause at 42. Yes.
And that's a whole nother thing. Cause I
was going through thyroid disease and
perimenopause. I didn't
know I had perimenopause.
I thought everything that was going on
with me was just thyroid disease.
I was also going through perimenopause.
So I got more educated in the
last like few years, but no,
I didn't know what was happening. And
that's, I want to do an episode on that.
That whole journey of, you know, but no
women perimenopause can hit at age 35
for any women listening
that are younger, research,
research perimenopause, because you may
start having symptoms and you may think
what's happening to me
and it's perimenopause.
And I could have done different things,
taken different supplements, maybe done
HRT. I could have done different things
in my forties that would have made my
life so much easier if I would have
known. So yeah, but
now that I know, yeah,
we have communication, but we
had rough times during that.
Oh, it's going to say so. I'm literally a
saint. I made it through that.
No, no, no, no, no. I'm a saint. You had
your own stuff, dude.
We won't get into that in this episode.
We've talked enough about ourselves,
but anyway, so that's,
that's attachment cells. I mean,
a brief synopsis of it. Yeah. And then we
brought it into ourselves and all that,
like our own attachment
styles. But I encourage anyone,
if you're interested in this to research
it more, because it is fascinating.
There are quizzes you can take to figure
out what your attachment style is.
And also if you're a
parent, you can kind of, as they,
your children grow and become adults,
you can maybe recognize what their
attachment style is.
I think too, one thing you said that I
think is interesting is,
and this is probably a way to apply this
if interested is if you're feeling weird
about a relationship, maybe ask yourself
why go to one of these little charts.
It's fascinating stuff. Like you said,
you were anxiously attached to certain
people and you're like,
what the hell is going on here? Yeah.
You want to definitely move on from that
type of thing. Oh, for sure.
I think as you get involved
with someone for a relationship,
if you know your
attachment style to begin with,
and then as you get to know them and you
can figure out their attachment style,
I think that can only help your
relationship or it
can help you figure out,
this isn't going to work. But I think for
sure, the more knowledge, the better.
Self-awareness is key. 100%. So, so
that's that conversation.
Hopefully you enjoyed it. We
kind of went all over the place,
but we stayed within a little bit of a
realm here of relationships and
attachment styles. Yeah. And I would,
I would say take it easy on each other
out there. Yes. Right. Give each other,
give each other some
grace. You know, when, when,
I'm not talking about though, abusive
situations. I always say that not,
not unless it's an
abusive situation. So yeah,
but so hopefully everyone enjoyed this
discussion and we
will probably be putting
up some graphics, I know,
and maybe even some links in the
description of that can
take you to some further
research about attachment styles. And
we'll see. Google it,
Google attachment styles and there's a
whole world out there. Oh yeah.
And we'll see you next time. Bye.