9781529032178

feelings. In a study conducted together with Steve Rholes from Texas A &
M University, they set up an experiment to examine whether people with
different attachment styles differed in their abilities to infer their partners’
thoughts. They asked individuals to rate the attractiveness and sexual appeal
of opposite-sex images in the presence of their partners. They then asked
them to assess their partners’ reactions to this rating process. Avoidant
individuals were found to be less accurate than anxious individuals at
perceiving their partners’ thoughts and feelings during the experiment. It
was common for avoidants to interpret their partner’s reaction as indifferent
if they rated someone as highly attractive, when, in fact, their partner had
been quite upset by it.
John Gray, in his enormously popular book Men Are from Mars, Women
Are from Venus, starts out by describing the aha moment that made him
write the book. Several days after his wife, Bonnie, gave birth to their baby
girl in a very painful delivery, John went back to work (all signs showed she
was on the mend). He came home at the end of the day, only to discover
that his wife had run out of painkillers and had consequently “spent the
whole day in pain, taking care of a newborn.” When he saw how upset she
was, he misinterpreted her distress as anger and became very defensive—
trying to plead his innocence. After all, he didn’t know she had run out of
pills. Why hadn’t she called? After a heated exchange, he was about to
stomp angrily out of the house when Bonnie stopped him: “Stop, please
don’t leave,” she said. “This is when I need you most. I’m in pain. I haven’t
slept in days. Please listen to me.” At this point John went over to her and
silently held her. Later he says: “That day, for the first time, I didn’t leave
her... I succeeded in giving to her when she really needed me.”
This event—the stress and responsibility of having a newborn and his
wife’s highly effective communication—helped to invoke a secure working
model in John. It helped bring him to the realization that his wife’s well-
being is his responsibility and sacred duty. This was a true revelation for
him. From someone who was busy looking out for his own needs and
responding defensively to his partner’s requests and dissatisfactions, he
managed to shift to a more secure mind-set. This is not an easy task if you
have an avoidant attachment style, but it is possible if you allow yourself to
open up enough to truly see your partner.