commitmentphobia

Long ago, ten years in fact, I recognised I struggled with intimate relationships.  In the wake of having my heart well and truly broken, and on the verge of sliding into what became a drawn out depression, it was clear to me that something wasn't right and I had work to do.  Although I knew I was looking for something to fix, I had no idea what it was and in the years that followed fixing my intimacy issues became secondary to negotiating the unholy depression and run of disappointments that plagued me. 

Five years ago, I found a name for that struggle with intimacy.

I was spending a few month in New York, ostensibly to work on my PhD, but primarily it was an opportunity to live for a short time in a city upon which I had an unrequited crush, developed vicariously through the magic of various novelists, New Yorker contributors, and makers of film and television.

One day feeling flat, I found myself in the Barnes & Noble at Lincoln Square.  Obviously drawn by the desire to salve my mood, I ended up browsing the self-help section.  I started reading a book called He's Afraid, She's Afraid by Steven Carter and Julia Sokol and there it was, the name. 

Commitmentphobia. 

This book, and another that followed Getting to Commitment, have remained on the top of my self-help list.  I can't do justice to the comprehensive and articulate work of these authors by trying to summarise it in a few short sentences here.   What I will do is borrow the opening paragraph of Getting to Commitment, which introduces the commitmentphobe situation beautifully:

Let's not be embarrassed about admitting who we are. We are the men and women whose relationships (or even marriages) never seem to work out. We fall in love, but we don't seem to be able to stay in love. Sometimes it's because the people we want are unable to love us back in the same way, and we are left with broken hearts and destroyed dreams. Sometimes it's because we are the ones who fall out of love; then we are the guilt ridden rejectors instead of the disappointed rejectees. Either way, typically we once again being the search for new partners, hoping against hope that the next one will be the "right one". More than a few of us have had our hopes dashed so many times that all we want to do is sit home with our computers, television sets, CD players, or our loving cats and dogs.

Reading He's Afraid, She's Afraid I recognised so much of myself in their profile of the commitmentphobe, particularly in the passive mode.  Choosing and falling for people who are unavailable, be it emotionally or physically, to love me fully.  Finding fault with those who are open to love.  Mourning failed romances for protrated periods.  Chasing after people who are rejecting or indifferent toward me.  Spending inordinate amounts of time fantasizing about idealised relationships or unavailable people.  Getting exhausted and having long periods of no intimacy peppered occasionally by one night stands. 

Carter and Sokol's books focus on helping people recognise their problem and providing strategies to deal with it.  They only touch lightly on the origins of commitmentphobic behaviours.  Schema theory and adult attachment theory fill this gap for me. 

However as we well know, while understanding provides a valuable foundation; the real work comes in the doing.  That's the challenge.  To stay aware, make changes, and keep doing so.  Over and over and over again.