Relationships are places where you can let down your guard and show your true self. Relationships are places where you can open your heart and let love in. But relationships are also places where you can be hurt… Where you can experience betrayal. That’s why you need relationship self-defense. Even in Love, You Need Protection Relationship self-defense  is based on the premise that in love, just as in life, we’re going to get hurt. So it makes sense to learn to protect ourselves. This doesn’t mean anticipating the worst. It doesn’t mean acting aggressive or hiding behind thick armor. It’s simply about knowing how to protect yourself emotionally if you need to. When you take a self-defense class, you hope you’ll go through your entire life never needing those skills. But you can take comfort in knowing that, if you  do  need them, you’ll have them on hand. Relationship self-defense skills are there for when you need them. You may not use them often, but you’ll always have...

There’s not a woman alive it hasn’t happened to. You think it’s going so well— Until he pulls back. He stops calling. He doesn’t reply to your texts. You have no idea where his attention has gone. If you’re lucky, he shows up one day, acting as if nothing happened. When questioned, he just shrugs. “I’ve been busy.” Busy? So busy he couldn’t call you? So busy he couldn’t answer your texts? Of course he must be lying. Maybe there’s someone else. Maybe he’s having doubts. Whatever it is, you won’t rest until you get to the bottom of it. And that’s the beginning of the end. He feels like you don’t trust him, or accuses you of suffocating him, while all you want is a guy who keeps in touch and lets you know what’s going on. That’s reasonable, isn’t it? There are a lot of reasons this dynamic can occur, but one of the most interesting comes from  attachment theory. Understand it, and you’ll see why a man’s distance may just be due to his attachment style. Attachment theory proposes that ...

You’re dating an emotionally unavailable man. Is he unavailable because: He’s still not over his ex? He’s just not that into you? All men are like that? You haven’t said the magic words? Okay, so maybe there isn’t any “magic spell” that turns an emotionally unavailable man into a romantic superstar… But wouldn’t it be great if it WERE that easy? Say these words, and  kapow ! He’s sharing a story about the time his pet kitten died when he was eight and he vowed never to let his heart get attached to a pet again. You won’t often hear men share emotionally vulnerable stories like that. The “guy code” forbids it. Men aren’t supposed to let anyone see their soft, gooey side. There’s even a name for this:  masculine gender role stress. It’s the conflict men experience between the way they’ve been socialized to “be a man” and the skills their real life requires of them. In  real  life, women want emotionally available partners. But men often learn that showing emotions is u...

You THINK you’re compatible with him. You like the same things. You can hang out together and have fun. You have great conversations. But you do have your differences. Maybe he’s more introverted than you are. He doesn’t like to spend as much time with other people. Maybe he doesn’t treat money in the same way. He spends too much, or not enough. Which kinds of compatibility matter most? Is it okay not to be compatible in some things if you’re compatible in others? Compatibility is in the Eye of the Beholder There have been a lot of studies done on what makes relationships last , and some of them come up with interesting findings… Like the fact that it helps if you and your partner share the same  chronotype,  which means you’re both either “morning people” or “night owls.” If he sleeps in until 10am and wants to stay up all night, while you’re going to bed at 9pm because you’ve been up since the early hours, you can end up losing out on quality time together. But more often co...

It happened every time. Angelika would meet a man with potential. Someone she really, REALLY liked. She’d feel so full of hope. She’d see signs they were meant to be. Then she’d find out he wasn’t the man she thought he was. He had issues he hadn’t told her about. He was no longer as attentive as before. Angelika realized he wasn’t so extraordinary after all. He was just a guy, like every other guy who’d let her down. When Angelika came to me, she wanted to nip this pattern in the bud. She wanted to know how to spot an amazing man who would STAY amazing, rather than disappoint her. I admired Angelika’s determination. I appreciated the fact that she’d taken time to reflect on her past. But the answer I gave her was one she wasn’t expecting to hear. “What makes a man special is how you see him,” I told her. “So if you want to meet an amazing man, it’s up to you to see what’s amazing about him.” “But I  do !” she said. “I always look for the best in everybody. What I get mad at is whe...