Hmm, I don’t want to go to that party either.
But the good news is that your man is trying to communicate with you — you are just missing it and he is shutting down.
The next time your man does one of the following 3 things, recognize that he is trying to communicate something to you:
1. He starts offering you lots of solutions.
To him, this is the same as saying “ I love you.” Your man wants to be the Knight in shining armor who swoops in and saves you from all your problems.
But if you get hurt and frustrated because you didn’t want a solution, you wanted to be heard and validated or maybe you just wanted to vent, then you just missed it. He feels like he failedand he shuts down. And you wonder why he just grunts when you talk?
Next time, tell him what you want before you even start venting. He will happily give it to you and be relieved that he knows just what you want (yes you have to tell him because he’s not the mind reading kind of alien).
And in the future, when he does start offering solutions, thank him for it and start a dialogue about it. He will be thrilled that you value what he has to say and he will open up more.
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