Over the Shock and GALing 5

[Thinker]

But, "fixing" that "overtly" is out of your control... You can't point that out to her, but what can you do to make her "feel" emotionally safe?

Hi AlexEN,

Right - I can't fix her, but I can fix me!

It sounds like a trite, DBing truism, but the only thing I can do is:

1) Fix me. Root out the root causes of my own unhappiness and insecurity, and then change the habitual defenses that I have that were causing her pain.

2) Take one sided risks - like Coach said, It's up to me to disarm, open up and start sharing. If I don't do step 1 first, then it only comes across as needy insecurity, but after step 1 is done right it's self-confident openness.

And I have to do it knowing that my W will not reciprocate at first.

3) Be patient. It'll take time for her to trust that these are not temporary changes. (and it will take time for me to really make them not temporary changes...)

Not much else I can do.

So that's my strategy.