It’s easy to lose yourself in the lighthearted nature of dating and blissfully avoid any and all red flags. However, it’s important to ask hard-hitting questions while you’re still casually dating so that you’re not surprised by the character of your partner later on, or even worse, their tendencies to emotionally fade when things get tough.
To avoid this outcome, social psychologist Dr. Sarah Hensley suggests asking your partner one particular question.
There is one question that reveals whether someone will emotionally fade away over time.
The psychologist, who has been studying the science of attachment and attraction for nearly two decades, explained that one attachment style in particular tends to become emotionally unavailable — dismissive-avoidant.
“Dismissive avoidants are individuals who grew up with emotional neglect in their lives, in their childhood, and they were usually pushed into hyper independence too soon for their development,” Hensley detailed.
“They don’t know how to feel their own feelings,” she added, “and the emotions of other people tend to overwhelm them.” As a result, they retreat rather than invest, something Hensely dubbed “the four to six months bait and switch.”
At the beginning of a relationship, dismissive-avoidant people appear secure and available. They often seem like they are really into their partners, which makes it all the more troubling when they begin to withdraw and fade away.
On a third or fourth date, the psychologist said to ask your partner how they recovered from the ending of their last relationship.
“Say, ‘So I’m curious. Tell me about what you did to get over your last long-term relationship,’” the psychologist advised, explaining that their answer would be very telling if they possess dismissive-avoidant tendencies.
Secure people will “have a very predictable answer,” she said. They will explain what they did to heal from the pain of their heartbreak, whether they went to therapy, leaned into their faith, or read a self-help book.
These actions “demonstrate that they thought about the relationship and their role in its demise and they wanted to use that pain to help them grow to help them learn the lessons they needed to so they can be a better person for the next partner,” Hensley explained.
If they avoid answering or give a vague response, it’s a red flag.
Dismissive avoidant people, on the other hand, will demonstrate far less self-reflection in their response.
They will say things like “I don’t know what I did,” “It is what it is,” and “I just kinda got over it.”
“Translated,” Hensley said, “that means I did absolutely nothing to reflect on my role in the breakup. In fact, I attributed the breakup to sheer incompatibility, and I am confident that I’m just gonna meet someone in the future that’s more compatible with me, and it’s eventually gonna work out.”
Instead of self-reflecting on the role that they played at the end of the relationship or even sitting with the pain of the breakup, they suppress their emotions.
They prefer distraction to healing and often shift all of their energy to work — or even a new relationship in which they inevitably repeat the same toxic patterns.
Zayda Slabbekoorn is a staff writer with a bachelor’s degree in social relations & policy and gender studies who focuses on psychology, relationships, self-help, and human interest stories.
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