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The environment around us is a swirling vortex of chaos, but you can navigate it when you have an anchor that can keep you steady. Each episode, Liz Herl dives into data driven strategies and real world tactics with Dr. Tim Caldwell to help you become more grounded and centered in a world that is constantly shifting and changing. Learn to effectively navigate family strife, career challenges and handle the anxiety of the unknown that the news is constantly bombarding us with. Liz is a Licensed Clinical Marriage and Family Therapist and Dr. Caldwell is a retired primary care physician and personal trainer. You can lean on their decades of experience to find stability and peace without having to control circumstances or people around you. You can be anchored in chaos.
AIC_Ep16
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Liz Herl: ~ ~ [00:00:00] First off, hello. I'm just going right into it.
Tim Caldwell: Welcome back, that's what people, all the introductions I think people can get past once they've heard it once or twice.
Liz Herl: Well, we just kind of did a quick recap of it, so I'm ready to go right back into it.
Tim Caldwell: Let's do this. This is a really good topic. Very topical. It applies.
Liz Herl: I hope it's the goal of this topic is to always inform and then Give insight and encourage [00:01:00] others to look at some factors that are going on in their lives, right? I was looking back at the title of this is a little bit kind of wordy like the psychological and behavioral points regarding females To desire and acquire male security in a relationship.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah
Liz Herl: That's a little bit wordy.
Tim Caldwell: It is a little wordy. But when we discussed this before, it's, this ongoing thing that we see especially in social media. It's inundated in social media. But it's this like women's expectation of men. And it's got a little at hand.
Liz Herl: Well, yeah, and I think that is really what kind of drew me towards this. Now, I want to share with listeners and viewers that we're doing today the view for female to male and the potential of an absent male role figure for them, or father figure, I should say.
Tim Caldwell: Right,
Liz Herl: and then our next episode is going to be over just so everyone gets their turn.
The flip side
of what , the male perspective is of seeking a female.
Tim Caldwell: [00:02:00] Yes, so put another way is what the women of today expect or want in male figures in the absence of no male figure or a poor male figure in their upbringing.
Liz Herl: Correct.
Tim Caldwell: Right? Because that's where, well we know statistically and empirically, that's where, Relationships get tainted and contaminated.
Liz Herl: Correct. And that's where it all starts. Everyone says it goes back to childhood because that's where we learn everything.
Tim Caldwell: That's right.
Liz Herl: One of the things I want to really quickly go back to is something you said there. This viewpoint that you're talking about of women to the aspect of what men's traits and Aspirations should look like in their eyes. It's really social media driven right now. It's like, here's my outline of the, the male that's going to earn me or get me or whatever.
That is a limited view because not all women have that viewpoint. I think this is just drawing on how that can be unhealthy and unhelpful to [00:03:00] a female that is seeking and maybe what drives me in that way? What pulls me in? I was sharing with you earlier, how many times has an individual ever said, Why do I keep dating the same type of person over and over again?
Like, you know, the horrible sayings, if I got a bad picker, or something like that, and it's actually none of that, it's the absence of things that we are missing and that we're looking at fulfilling and we think the next partner is going to do that in some capacity because of our unmet and unhealthy.
And that there is seemingly an almost innocent, naive portion of you that allows this grace period, well, he didn't mean that, and hopefully it gets better. I'll fix this. I'll fix this as time goes on. And that doesn't happen.
Right. The ability to say that, you know, I'm going to love them enough or change them.
Tim Caldwell: Change them.
Liz Herl: I'm going to show them what healthy love is or I'm going to prove my value or [00:04:00] worth to them and they're going to be like light bulb, like this is the most amazing person in the world and that's really not how it works.
Tim Caldwell: At some point it becomes screamingly obvious that it isn't going to happen.
That change that you thought would happen, either you thought you were going to install or change, it doesn't happen. And what you saw is what you got, and now you're just learning that all these points of acceptance, they just don't line up.
Liz Herl: So we're going to start with attachment theory for insecure attachment and what does that look like?
When, what we know about understanding attachment theory from adolescence. The caregivers that are in our life give us the understanding of what stability is, what security is, how language is used, how tone is used, and that kind of gives us feedback around how we feel.
Tim Caldwell: And you're describing the role model, right?
Liz Herl: And specifically this case, since we're talking about the male role model, but this goes for either
Tim Caldwell: Absolutely. [00:05:00] And it doesn't necessarily have to be the biologic father. Right? It could be a grandfather. It could be kinship, anywhere in the kinship. It could be an uncle.
And that, they learned, good or bad, from one of those people, right? And that began to foster this ideal that, Well, he's a good guy. I mean, compared to other, this is a good guy and he's a model now.
Liz Herl: It turns into that from that adolescent view of this is the norm, if you will.
Yeah. Well, that's going to fall into potentially manifesting the anxious or the avoidant attachment around the behaviors that role model was exhibiting. So if I walk into the room and I spill a glass of milk and I'm screamed at by that male role model of like, what the hell is wrong with you? Like, oh my God, go clean this up.
You're so stupid. You know, it's like, okay, internalization. I'm at fault. Especially if that becomes like the language used in the home, like this is just how it is. As we [00:06:00] grow in that and we start encountering that, and then we start seeing that not happen in other places, it's just like, well, what's wrong with your family?
Tim Caldwell: Well, and two, it's not necessarily conversely to that, but the message is given wrongly. It can be a corrective action by saying, okay, now we talked about this, and this is what happened. That was a teaching situation that got blown up because of ego, temper, emotion.
And now that role model is dangerous. Right? That's, That's a red flag.
Liz Herl: So that's the anxious avoidant piece. So my, my, my When this person starts coming into the room through adolescence, I'm a little on edge.
Tim Caldwell: Absolutely.
Liz Herl: Because I'm not certain. So we're starting at that, acquiring that.
Tim Caldwell: Trust. Trust begins to erode.
Liz Herl: Correct. Or the avoidant attachment. So the desire for secure attachment specifically with adult females who lack the malpresence in childhood, they begin to seek that out. Generally, understandably, in romantic relationships, that makes the most amount of sense. [00:07:00] And they compensate all the unmet needs of protection, stability, and emotional support.
Sometimes they either shoulder that or ~they don't know how to articulate that to a male, ~to a potential partner because they didn't know a healthy experience in that.
Tim Caldwell: Now when you say shoulder,
They begin to act out in a way that they think I should act if I were a man.
And that's a bit off putting maybe to a man, but also to a woman too. Why are you so
Liz Herl: Meek.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, why are you meek? Or, why are you so aggressive?
Liz Herl: Right, that's what I'm saying. It's going to go either way. It's all over the place, so, you could be overly aggressive and not be like, you know, the whole, I don't need a man, kind of mentality.
Like, I can take care of everything. Versus being able to say, you know, there's not a healthy perspective there due to this lack of role model for yourself. The psychological needs for that malvalidation. First off, that is, I think and I have to cautious, like, did I share this earlier? But innately, like, [00:08:00] there is this sense of wanting to feel that we are secure and that
we're a value to this. Now, when I say innately, if that was never anything that you experienced as a child, of feeling like you were precious and this was something I will protect. Then, there's this, An idea of like, I think I'm supposed to mean more, but I'm not really sure what that looks like.
And so then I'm going to start desiring, how do I get that validation? You know,
Tim Caldwell: And it's interesting because we tiptoed around this before, this is where the vernacular comes in. Well, you're a daddy's girl. And you're chasing a daddy figure. You have daddy issues.
Liz Herl: The reason why people have mommy or daddy issues is
Tim Caldwell: Which, by the way, , does not necessarily mean anything sexual.
Liz Herl: Right. And that's the very twisted Freudian idea of that. I know I want to feel safe. I know I want to feel cared [00:09:00] for, but I'm not quite sure what that feels like.
And I may have had glimpses of what that might look like in childhood, other people's homes. And so I'm collectively creating something that I'm going to put together as the persona of this partner that I'm desiring. But I don't know what that is.
Tim Caldwell: In that creative aspect, as they create this model of who it is, we're amazingly complex in that we, the emotional part of this would be, well, what benefits me, right?
So, is he going to give me stuff? Are they a spoiled daddy's girl? Are they a tomboy? I don't know. He showed me how I'm independent or that I'm the victim you have to do it for me so I'm roughly breaking things into What does this as this person develops this model?
Are they gonna fall into the victim side of it? Are they gonna fall into the I don't need you at all side of it? Are you gonna be basically strong and independent. That's a spectrum, right?
Liz Herl: [00:10:00] Sure, which what kind of goes into the psychological needs for the malvalidation of without that, they're searching for the security of the feeling worthy, the significance, feeling protected.
Like, I have this idea, these are things I would like to feel. And so I'm going to seek those out. And how I get those validated is where we go into the issue of self esteem and self worth. And how do I attract, you know, the male, and educate them, these are the things that I want.
Or I expect like these, unless you're really emotionally mature. Mm-hmm .And saying, hey, these are kind of the aspects that I'm looking for. .
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. So, and then this is where we get into the reels. We see this female who says. A man is going to pay all my bills, he's going to keep me fed, he's going to pay for my apartment, he's going to buy me a nice car. He's going to give, give, give, give, give. And when he doesn't give to my liking, [00:11:00] that he's a zero. And I'll start all over. I'll find somebody else who does that.
And we know that is not only realistic,
Liz Herl: it's unhealthy,
Tim Caldwell: it's completely unhealthy and in all likelihood it will absolutely self-destruct.
Liz Herl: Right, I'm searching again for that validation of me. I need to know that you. Find My Value, You Find My Purpose, My Need, and in this case it's through a monetary, you know, lens.
Versus I think that another popular reel of a woman that gave receipts in an envelope to a gentleman going on a first date of saying, these are, these are the charges of, you know, me being prepared to go on a date with you, which was pretty bizarre. And he was kind of like, I'm not paying for your hair.
Tim Caldwell: She is literally billing him for hairspray, makeup, mascara.
Liz Herl: Right.
Tim Caldwell: This is what it took to make me look like this for you.
Liz Herl: Correct.
Tim Caldwell: You owe me this now.
Liz Herl: And these, that unrealistic and unhealthy, way of approaching someone like I don't . Actually, Phillip, I have a little bit of [00:12:00] empathy for men.
What am I supposed to do with this? Because then again, they'll get the backlash of like, I'm not paying this, then I'm the bad guy, right?
Tim Caldwell: And I can absolutely tell you from a man's perspective. Get in your car and go home. And don't call that person. That's bizarre. That's bizarre behavior.
Liz Herl: It is, but it is being, I would say, incentivized through social media. Like, this is a norm. This is what you're worth.
Tim Caldwell: A level of expectation.
Liz Herl: And I'm not saying that How we show our worth is everything. Do you know your worth? And I don't want to segue off of where we're going, but that's a whole other understanding here.
We're talking about sometimes why we engage with The same type of traits within a partner over and over again when we're seeking, well, we have to see what we're missing. That's what I'm actually talking about today is like, we're not taught to seek out what we missed. We're taught to just to seek out what we feel is missing and with whatever fillers we believe it to be like, yeah, [00:13:00] I don't feel safe enough.
I don't feel. Secure enough or I don't feel protected enough. Yeah. So how do I okay, so I'm gonna you know, go find somebody that Has some sort of I don't know jiu jitsu or they're gonna you know Be some sort of law enforcement or military something of it.
Tim Caldwell: Why do you do that? What do you look at me and go. Anyway,
Liz Herl: Get over yourself. So what I'm saying is because you're looking for the type
Tim Caldwell: Yes
Liz Herl: of what would it take to be in the secure mold of a man? And so they perceive that it's probably one of these.
Tim Caldwell: And so what I hear you're saying is you're looking, we want to focus on how we got into this predicament and the why.
And it's, you should always come down in science to the hows and the whys.
Tim Caldwell: The mechanisms and all that stuff, they can explain themselves. But the psychology behind the, why are you like this again? And this is an answer and this is an answer and it's not pick one. It's all of them.[00:14:00]
Right. And my biggest stress point here is to share with individuals especially women in this. instance, like the self compassion around this, understand that the internal feedback that women give themselves when they're looking for men of like, what is wrong with me? And all these things, it's to understand the little girl that was never protected, that you're now trying to protect constantly.
That's one model you're, and I appreciate that, and maybe we'll explain that more on my side. But I'd also like to understand where the entitlement comes from that we see women actually go out on a date and order a bunch of food for their friends, oh and my baby's back home.
On the first date. And you're going to pay for that.
No, I'm not.
And where did that entitlement come from? So, we'll answer that as we go on.
Liz Herl: Well, that's from corrupted Well, those are all areas of trauma that was never addressed or ever healed. And so it's, when we talk about the word entitlement versus like, I'm operating from a trauma wound over and over [00:15:00] again of how terrible the world has been to me and I'm going to show the world something.
And it's not representing a true healthy self because of just you know, The unintentional corruption of trauma that has happened to me. It's like corrupted my view and my actions and my behaviors and circling back, why and how did I get here? How do, how do I address it? The next thing is seeking stability.
That's the perfect thing of saying, I've kind of segwaying back into this of when we're looking at I, I hear and I see these reels and I see this feedback that it is seeking stability. It's like, but it's my perceived stability of whatever I experienced. If lived in a very impoverished upbringing.
I want someone that's going to be able to take care of me and I never have to worry about being poor again. And I have to do that with whatever means possible through language, through body, through image, through whatever it is going to take for me [00:16:00] to present that imposter to, and to my potential mate, because I need them.
To provide those levels of stability. Now, yes, it's all unhealthy, but it's all explainable.
Tim Caldwell: But, you know, and something comes to mind as you describe the situation and what we're hoping to focus on is that it's not incremental. I can't find a man who makes 50, 000 and provides security as a mechanic or has a good stable job. He's got to be, this guy's got to be a baller. He's got to be, he's got to be rolling in it. If he's not making a one and a half mil, he's not my man. How does that materialize? Again, this comes from the social All of these ideologies around social acceptance
you gotta, offer everything you have, including my body, and I'll find that man who will take care of me. He'll give me everything. No.
Liz Herl: Well, nothing [00:17:00] of, I would say, healthy love. ~Yeah. ~And when you were talking about that, like how do these jumps go so dramatic from a trauma lens.
An individual is saying it. This isn't going to meet it like whatever parameter it is. It's gotta go to the highest scale.
Tim Caldwell: Right.
Liz Herl: Because I'm so fearful that this moderate level will not be Yeah. What I need to take care of me. 'cause I can see all the ways this could fail. So I have to go.
And then the great old world that we live in, the validators of social media. Girl, you should be able to get this and Oh yeah. So then I feel like, oh, well then I'm not unreasonable when I am. So then I feel like I'm validated in my sense of this idea.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah you know, he was making 1. 5 million.
Well, great, but this guy's got a Lambo. He makes 1. 7 million. Oh, jump ship. All of a sudden, I'm in love with this guy. It's very sad.
Liz Herl: Well, it is very sad. And it is just always seeking that, idea of [00:18:00] protectiveness or assertiveness. And so going into those factors that I was talking about earlier of when we want to feel an individual has, a male individual can carry themselves with responsibility and assertiveness and security of them, The Mel role that they are.
Well, the one thing that's great about that is we all live in imposter land all the time, and I share that with you, and what a Mel may present at and you might say, oh, wow, he's, he's checking all the boxes of, he's, he's showing me that he cares about me, he's saying very nice things, but the fact that he doesn't seem to manage maybe his finances very well or speaks a little edgy to his parents and all of those things.
I mean, everybody has bad days, right? So there's when we start getting into this what I will, compensate, like when I hear some negative things from that male figure, Well, it's okay because this makes up for some of those unfavorable traits. And so then we start doing this balancing act of [00:19:00] boxing up the ideal man.
Like he's still going to hit all my boxes here. But versus actually see, and then once you get into a longer term relationship, you start seeing other factors.
Tim Caldwell: It's a trade off. It's compensatory.
Liz Herl: Yeah. That's what I'm saying. Compensatory. And then it's like, oh, well now I'm really kind of in it now because ~it's,~~ ~well, you know, he doesn't really mean to speak that, you know, sharply to me.
No, he's not really, he doesn't mean to call me names like that.
Tim Caldwell: Pretty soon
the scales have tipped.
Liz Herl: Right.
Tim Caldwell: And despite all of your acceptance, all of your allowances,
Liz Herl: Correct.
Tim Caldwell: You're not getting the scale to tip back.
Liz Herl: No.
Tim Caldwell: And now you're maybe compromising more things, including your own.
Sexuality, your own safety, security, you're doing some different things now.
Liz Herl: And your mental health.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, and your mental health.
Liz Herl: Your mental health.
Tim Caldwell: Quite far, yeah.
Liz Herl: So when we go into overcompensation of when someone is, our partner, is lacking something, how many times do you kind of do that for friends?
Like we rescue people all the time in a conversation. They're like, oh no, what they mean by that is, [00:20:00] or oh no, no, versus like why do we tend to do that in just regular conversation with people, but excessively do that in partnerships? Being able to understand why we do that is because, again, now that we're in this relationship now, I have lost myself in, I've locked myself into it.
Tim Caldwell: You're having to perpetuate this facade through apologies and stuff like that. This is an age old thing. Why do you stay with him?
Liz Herl: And that's really,
Tim Caldwell: We'll get into that,
Liz Herl: That's a not a very unfair statement that people, make because the thing I was getting ready to go into of over compensating mm-hmm . Compensating. Mm-hmm . There is,, there is a desire to have the perceived idea of assertiveness. that is actually more dominance and control. And when someone, a male specifically, gives you that indication that they are in control and like, you know, like they're the alpha in the room and they give off all of [00:21:00] those vibes of like authority.
Tim Caldwell: This quality of this guy can handle himself.
Liz Herl: Yeah. Well, especially
if it's like, well, if anyone talked to you that way I'll tell you what I'm gonna do, you know, then it's like, oh, oh my goodness, you know, my Prince Charming.
Tim Caldwell: Well then and we'll talk about this on the male side is we're tripping into this narcissistic
Liz Herl: And that's where women go towards narcissists not on purpose yeah, because they are really beautifully caped in a lot of allure to wounded, unhealed women, it's not like you're seeking out a narcissist.
They're very clever. They're very provocative. They have the language and the ability to, until you're kind of like, wait a minute, I feel like this is kind of,
Tim Caldwell: I just, bought a car from this guy for illustration.
Liz Herl: Yeah, exactly. And just knowing that then what are these identifying factors is another thing I'm trying to share with individuals is that again, be kind to yourself when you're like, I just [00:22:00] seem to always date narcissists.
You know, it's like, well, not maybe everyone's a narcissist. Let's not do that. But the imposter that males tend to present, it's like they do generally want to embody a secure protector to females. And if they feel like they're needing something, I can take care of that.
If their ego's not in check, I mean, their ego has to be in check. Those are all the things that you develop in a relationship. Then you start discovering if they've got an ego driven issue.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. Are those qualities of chivalry, are they genuine? Or are they, you know, first date, fake it till you make it, score cut thing?
Those are typically guys that are way over the top. You can smell them out easily. Let's keep going. I want to keep going on what you're talking about here.
Liz Herl: Okay. One of the things I had written out, I was just kind of reviewing the delayed emotional development.
Growing up without a male figure may hinder a development of a well rounded understanding of male emotional behavior if they are not getting a [00:23:00] healthy example in front of you. Females might seek relationships where their partners take on roles of both emotional and practical caretakers. , they're taking on two roles versus, and that's my expectation that you would do that.
Tim Caldwell: Right.
Liz Herl: This might be displayed behaviors that reflect a delayed maturity of seeking parental figures. So here comes the daddy issues, right, or the mommy issues.
Tim Caldwell: Right,
And from a layman's point of view, we already know that statistically kids, a child or children raised in a household, in the absence of a male figure are significantly more predisposed towards lower education, perhaps even incarceration or problems with the law. Some sexual deviation from what would be considered modest. But I guess it's important to point those things out is sometimes even bad male role models at least [00:24:00] provide the simple fact that males don't usually deal with the emotional part of things like this.
That's mom's deal. Mine is problem solving, defense Strength to do these things that a woman can't and that's not a slight , on women. That is, shovel the driveway, go cut firewood, kill the raccoon in the attic. Those, types of things. A girl growing up in a household that has both male and female role models is that, you know what, I'm having a really bad day.
This is something I would talk to my sister, my mother, my grandmother. This is not something I'm going to take to my dad. I'm getting teased because of my skin or development of my breasts or any of these things that have to go along as we age. Dad doesn't deal with that. There's a guy over there who's being mean to me.
Dad, what do I do? Dad handles that.
Liz Herl: Right, and what you're explaining there is that the idea of the role of a male. If they have those factors, let's put it that way.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, if they have those qualities.
Liz Herl: So [00:25:00] obviously if you've, are being given an example of security, you're already going to develop a fear of abandonment.
I'm easily not seen or, you know, unprotected. So, those, those natural developments start happening. The absence of a male figure in childhood may create unresolved fears of abandonment, of inadequacy. Females may be more prone to clinginess, which some males find unattractive, or emotional dependency in relationships, seeking constant reassurance from their male parts to alleviate their fears.
Like you want me, you love me, you love me, you love me. And tell me I'm beautiful, tell me I'm these things, tell me. Because I'm fearful the moment that stops that then you're done with me. That you're leaving me. You're over or whatever it is. Yeah, and that creates a lot of conflict in relationships Like that's a lot of responsibility for a male to always first off God help him know what's going on for a woman's [00:26:00] wants needs and desires in their mind in a woman's mind they're over there just like gambling.
It's like I have no idea.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. really trying to roll over a giant glacier there because there's so much to that.
Liz Herl: Yeah, I know. There's a lot
more to unpack there.
Tim Caldwell: The male mind is not like the female mind.
Liz Herl: Not even a little bit. We've talked about this and we'll use this as a great example.
And that is, what are you thinking?
Tim Caldwell: A guy typically, nothing. And guess what? He's not thinking about anything. It's just a down time where he's not really thinking of anything in particular. Versus, 10 minutes, you know, right when I get up out of this chair, I'm going to have to deal with this auto repair that I've never done before.
Or it's really expensive. Or how do I this? Or how do I that? Something He hasn't asked a woman and doesn't expect a woman to know. Versus while I sit pondering something, a problem I may be working on, Hey honey, what do you think of this new room color? It's great. Should I go with this?
Should I go with this? What about the trim? [00:27:00] Whatever.
Liz Herl: You just don't care.
Tim Caldwell: It's not that we don't care. It's just not on my radar right now.
Liz Herl: It's like first world problems. If a bear is attacking you, I'm right there.
Tim Caldwell: Tell me when you catch on fire and I'm going to be in that room in a heartbeat. But in the meantime, this is a bit more important to me. Now, you may not think so, but until we agree on how we're going to decide which is more important, The guy's focused on what he's focused on and he doesn't mean to be rude.
He's just focused on what he's focused on. If you want me to talk about paint colors, give me 10 minutes. Deal.
Liz Herl: Sure. I understanding that women are more emotional beings and they are. And men their critical thinking skills are on resolving problems. Right. And that's just where they kind of revolve constantly is like what is on my list and when you're like, do you remember the dress I wore on our first date? And I'm like, I have no idea.
And [00:28:00] how could, how, you know, and to be fair, there are a lot of men and women and of sorts that can recall certain events of that nature. But not to internalize and personalize that when that expectation is there, then that's an That's an equivalent to you not caring about me or caring for me deeply because you didn't acknowledge these parts about me.
It's like, okay that's not the intention. And then that's where a male kind of falls into like, okay, now I'm in the doghouse. How do I get out of this? And that's really unfortunate because they're not really in the doghouse. It's just a misunderstanding.
Tim Caldwell: Even a simple, comment with somebody who would make comment about what I ate all the time.
Cause I eat steak and rice all the time. It's either steak and rice or chicken and rice. One person said what are you eating? And I said, steak and rice. Of course you are, you're such a man. And, okay, thanks. That's how I take it. But I know that the, she's kind of poking me at, man, you are one square dude, right?
You [00:29:00] can eat the same food all the time. Yeah. I can
Liz Herl: Mm-hmm .
Tim Caldwell: I'm not in love with pasta. I'm not in love with any food. It's just fuel.
Liz Herl: Yeah. Well, that's the difference between you and I.
but over dependency, so moving forward the lack of this male role figure can lead to over dependency of relying on them.
Tim Caldwell: So the woman's become overly dependent,
Liz Herl: Right
Tim Caldwell: Okay.
Liz Herl: Now they're relying heavily on the male counterpart for him to be both emotionally and financially stable. So you need to take care of all my emotions. That is never going to happen. It's really unfair for both parties the male and the female, because they can do everything under the sun to try and navigate and manage all those emotions, because they really want to prove, no, I really do care about you and ~I ~love you, but I just can't read your mind, and it's like, when someone's saying, what are you thinking about, and it's like, sometimes, it is, it's funny to me, because Men can literally sometimes say nothing.
I'm sitting here. I'm not thinking about anything. I'm not like in deep thought and [00:30:00] women are over there like, oh my gosh, I'm thinking about, I have to get the kids to this and then did I call the dance studio and did I do this and I go to pick up groceries and did I do this? Because your brains operate completely differently in the expectation that your partner's over there doing this whatever list that they have going on.
And it's a negative back in the whole dynamic versus it's for them to be over there not thinking about anything.
Tim Caldwell: I always hear the comparative analogy to us and computers. You know, I'm on there playing a landmine, and you have 700 tabs open.
Liz Herl: Always, yeah, 800.
Tim Caldwell: It's not far from the truth. No.
But I, I will say, This too, a comedian once said when the good lord took my rib, he took away my psychic ability to read a woman's mind. And I would go, yeah, okay, that's maybe true. But that's where the power, or at least the strength of our communication can help resolve some of these things.
And the overcompensation in a man, [00:31:00] you're in the wrong neighborhood for the emotional part. Now I think every man has the capability, but it's not in his wheelhouse. I don't think you can expect a man to be really good at it.
I don't want to type men. There are men who are more sensitive but I don't think that, in general, men are as good at dealing with emotion. Now if you want to fight, we'll fight.
Liz Herl: You're definitely not wrong.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, I know I'm right, and it has nothing to do with the love of the conflict. It has to do with this is something I'm not comfortable with, and the more you push it on me, the more uncomfortable I get.
Now something else rears its ugly head, and that is, now I'm avoiding you.
Liz Herl: So, perceived roles in the relationship. I'm going to create a perception of how you need to demonstrate being a male provider in a family dynamic and all the features that I require from that.
There's a heavy responsibility shifted to the male of upholding all of these roles. I talk a lot about that with [00:32:00] understanding the roles in a relationship, like what are the agreed upon understandings and what are the expectations that no one else is sharing.
That is so massively huge. When there is an individual over there in the other side saying, well, my expectation was you're going to do this, this, this, and this, and you have failed in all of those areas. So my demeanor and my actions and my body language and my tone is going to give you a clear indication of just how unhappy I am with you.
First off, I never knew these were your expectations. This was not, previously discussed with me. and that's really important.
Tim Caldwell: This doesn't have to happen in the first month. This is going to be 20 years down the road. Oh, easily, easily. We still haven't really disclosed What's mine? What's yours?
Liz Herl: What's the roles and expectations? Absolutely, and with that misunderstanding that's continuously you're bumping up into you're growing a big deficit of distance in the relationship and the unhealthy factors, but that's another piece of this so that [00:33:00] It's a manifestation of what I believe could be versus doing a true healing of self of saying here's a deal I have a lot of experiences growing up that I didn't know, what the male role was really about.
Society tells me this, you know, the church tells me this, you know, my family tells me this, or my friends tell me that, and so I'm collectively trying to create a healthy man role, right?
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, and that gets parsed into more and more segments, my rich girlfriend tells me this, the one who is married to a really wealthy lawyer, she may advise totally different from the person who is living a modest life with a very humble and meek man, in an arrangement where they're very much in love, and the advices could be so different.
Varied even among our own genders, our own age brackets, our own socioeconomic levels of [00:34:00] income, and the social circles we're in. All of those things can vary, vary, vary. Who are you listening to?
Liz Herl: Well, and that's very significant in the fact that when you get feedback over trust me, you could have it worse.
You've got this, this, and this taken care of. You're not going to find that somewhere else. You've got it really good, so you better just stay put, right?
Tim Caldwell: You really did well to get into this bracket.
Liz Herl: Right, which is all just insecure talk.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, sure,
Liz Herl: to cover that, versus saying, what is it I want to do with this individual to grow a relationship but, if you get into that fear mindset, fear of abandonment, I'm going to go back there a second. It's like, well, I do have it pretty good and I have all these things. I am so provided for in a lot of these areas. If we look at an individual, and here are the 10 attributes and traits that I really want this person to have. And then we start negotiating those out. Well, they're really high in affection. They're really high in compliments and really high in, you know, [00:35:00] giving me gifts. And so I'm going to give those like they're 100 percent value, but the area of security, like if I felt like we are going down an alley and some other people were going down that was a little, you know, suspicious.
I don't know if you've got my back here. Yeah. But that's okay because the likelihood of us going down an alley of, you know, so the compensatory, like I'm going to make, put all of this
Tim Caldwell: It doesn't, it doesn't have to be something that extreme. I'm no mechanic, but can you change a flat tire?
Right. And this isn't a criticism of a man. This would be a criticism of a woman. He's not a mechanic, I get it. But can you change a flat tire? Can you shovel my sidewalks? Well, he's not that. But he's this. He's rich.
Liz Herl: He has money, so he can pay for someone that'll do all those things, right?
Tim Caldwell: And that's usually the answer in those situations
Liz Herl: right.
Tim Caldwell: Have somebody do it.
Liz Herl: So with all of those factors, that leads us right into You can have all the money in the world, and money never makes anyone happy, even though they perceive that it will, the difficulty with trust and emotional intimacy.
So, you may have all the [00:36:00] money in the world, and feel lonely in that relationship because you're missing really significant factors around emotional intimacy and trust I again kind of going back to I don't know if you'll be able to fulfill this and I've shouldered so much of the responsibility of managing whatever it may be.
I don't trust that you are going to do the oil change. I've asked you four times to do the oil change and you still haven't done the oil change. I finally figured out, either did it myself or had someone else do it. And so, this unreliable, feedback that I'm getting leads to trust issues.
It's actually when one would think that it's not so much about other relationships in that trust ~of~ infidelity and things of that nature. It's actually about, I can't trust that you'll follow through with what you say.
Tim Caldwell: And the longer that goes on, the more independent you'll actually become.
And, and quite frankly, I'm not going to ask you to do that. I'll just do it myself. And then here comes the hurt feelings. Well, I said I would. And then we're back and forth. [00:37:00] No. I've stopped asking because you're not, and now this is where we, this is where we've stopped brokering and understanding or any compromise.
I'm just not going to ask you anymore. I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it myself. Now, that fosters resentment.
Liz Herl: Right, which this can lead to a pattern of the lack of that emotional dependency. And without that it's going to be really hard to have a secure attachment with you in, in bonding with your partner, because I don't really believe you're going to be able to do these things.
And the more that happens, the less that you're able to close that gap of distance.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. Well, that is unfortunate. And it's definitely generational. I am in the last year of the boomer category.
I didn't see this much. In my time, I didn't, I still didn't see it much. A long time ago. I didn't see it, I didn't see this much in the Gen X, because they became very self reliant, I'll learn how and do it myself. But now we have this big swap up in power and skills, [00:38:00] where the older folks can't do what the younger folks do.
And that's about as far as that argument needs to go generationally. But in today's, generations that have followed, and whatever generation we're in now, I see a great deal of improperly trained, informed, educated, knowledgeable emotionally equipped people, and they all seem to have congealed into this.
Mass of questions and answers and expectations and it, it's, it's very hard to describe. It's hard to explain but we, we have, we have a generation now, not to wander too far off the point, is that we expect more than he knows. He can't provide what you think I should. And, by the way, that's twisted both ways.
I now want a woman who doesn't know how to cook, who's never cleaned a house, who has no [00:39:00] idea about being around babies, and when you have your first, it'll be the first child you've ever held in your arms. A lot of things have changed, and I'm happy to keep talking about stuff like this to help people understand that the power of our communication is what's going to help us heal this hole. If you can understand, this is what I'm looking for and if you can provide it, great. If you feel like you're weak at it, let's work on it.
Liz Herl: Mm-hmm.
Tim Caldwell: Both of us . Me and you. And we'll learn how to change a tire and we'll learn how to change the oil.
And I'll show you, so you know too maybe you can't do it, but at least you know how.
Liz Herl: Mm-hmm .
Tim Caldwell: I think that's probably as far as I'll go on that.
Liz Herl: I think you're hitting some great points. And that it kind of goes into the next line item here of challenges in emotional expression. Exactly what you're referring to. Women may tend to struggle to communicate their needs emotionally clearly to their male partner. They may look to their male partners to help them bridge the gap expecting them to lead in emotional matters like the [00:40:00] majority of the time. Because there's such a heavy dependency on that now that when you take over all the decision making process, it's such an alleviation for me.
Tim Caldwell: Oh, sure.
Liz Herl: I have heard many a times and I'm sure this is familiar to you. The whole, where do you want to go to dinner thing? And it's like, nobody wants to make a decision.
Tim Caldwell: But when you make a decision
Liz Herl: It's a decision.
Tim Caldwell: And that's not what I want to do.
Liz Herl: That's not what I want to do. Right. So like, okay, where do you want to go to dinner? Okay. Let's just go and have fajitas. Well, I wanted Italian, you know, so it's not really where do you want to go to dinner?
Versus saying well, what would you like?
Well, whatever you think, I just don't care. Yeah. Well then I've given you four options and all four have failed. But I still expect you're going to eventually hit on what I want and that's your responsibility, which it is not. That's the dynamic that is created with that false understanding and belief.
Tim Caldwell: And again, speaking as a card carrying male, my approach to that would be, let's go over, how about if we go over, here's your choices, here or here, which would you rather? And then, [00:41:00] we've taken away all the decisions of all the restaurants in town, and now you have a choice, but which one would you rather that?
Okay, great. Now next time we'll do what you want to do. That might be the ultimate compromise to get. We'll both enjoy that. At least I picked. Now, if you don't like my choices, what are your choices? Why don't you pick one of those? But let's take away all of the variables and let's just concentrate on two.
Which one would you rather? It's not this one this week, it's that one next week. Whichever it is. I think that's a solution that's being offered up.
Liz Herl: Right, I think it's an understanding from both parties, again, that you both are doing a lot and that it's not a competition of who's making more decisions that day, but we get lost in our own anxiety, frustration, feedback of the day.
Like you don't know what my day's been like, and it's like, true enough however, you don't know what my day's been like, right? And let's not get lost in that. But if you have a significant reliance on, yeah, I've had a really bad day and it is now [00:42:00] your sole responsibility to make it better. And you're failing at every aspect because my expectations of you are unrealistic and unhealthy because of other unhealed trauma.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. Well, you know, interesting enough, Liz, even if we did the mail site, we might offer something that gives people tools. This is a tool to option out of making a decision. And that is, I, every time I pick something you don't want, so you pick. Well, I'm not going to pick.
And then, and I'm not going to pick because you're not going to like what I want. Okay, how's this? And, we provide just a bit of some mock role playing. If you left it up to a man who was raised without a mother, he'd eat cereal. He'd, lay around in his underwear that it hasn't been unwashed for a week and it eats cereal all day.
Versus a woman who's not been brought up in the presence of a man. She may be extremely fragile or she may be extremely aggressive. We don't know. [00:43:00] Speaking as a man, I can tell you men seem to always whittle down into this similar character, and that is. We're very simple, we're very lazy, we're very, I'm not, I'm not picking on men, I'm just saying, you're gonna meet a guy who doesn't open your door, you're gonna meet a guy who, nobody taught me how to say please or thank you, and they grab their spoon like a caveman and they, whatever's in front of them is gone in five seconds and let's get out of here.
Liz Herl: For the record, all of that is unacceptable.
Tim Caldwell: It is unacceptable.
Liz Herl: You should have hopefully some male peers in your life telling you some appropriate things.
Tim Caldwell: But it exists.
Liz Herl: Right. Oh, 100 percent exists. I see that all. Yeah, absolutely. The last point I'm going to make before I go over the overall of this,
Tim Caldwell: yeah, yeah
Liz Herl: is that the understanding of the fear of rejection or disappointment residing within yourself. This is just how I'm going to operate. This is what I have and I'm going to make do with what I have because I fear what I don't have would not have if this didn't happen. This is where people stay in a lot of [00:44:00] unhealthy, emotional, or psychological, physical, I mean all the gamut of emotional abusive relationships because I don't know what else.
The fear of without this scares me more than the fear of staying in it. And I've now made it work. I've grown Acquired a new norm. It's fine to accept what I receive from this individual and this is all I'll ever get.
And it's that I want to be cautious. It's not a victim mentality. There's something that is wavering here of exhaustion And fear that I just don't I don't know what else I can't think past. Yeah what is on the other side of this mountain?
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, you you literally have blinded yourself to other options because
Liz Herl: Of the traumatic relationship.
Tim Caldwell: And this
is the action reaction to, why do you stay with him? I don't have anything. I don't have a place to go. Right.
It's his car. He makes the money. I've only got babies and the clothes on my back.
Liz Herl: Correct.
Tim Caldwell: And where do I [00:45:00] go?
Liz Herl: I have a lot of empathy for individuals in that situation, both male and female, but in this situation.
Tim Caldwell: I think you'd agree that that type of decision making would prominently always be geared towards the females.
Liz Herl: Absolutely, 100%.
Tim Caldwell: It doesn't happen much with men.
Liz Herl: And one of the things that really locks a woman into place is children.
Tim Caldwell: Oh yeah, that kinship with children.
Liz Herl: I won't be able to provide. I mean, just understanding the fear of the disappointment even in, I don't want.
To fail in my marriage. I don't want to fail in a relationship. People fall into dynamics even when they are raised with a male role figure of, well, no one in my family has ever divorced. So it's not an option to divorce. And I have, seen a lot of that. And that's just a lot of unhealthy misunderstanding around that.
The overall perspective here to when a woman's desiring to have male security in a relationship is when there is the absence of a male role model in a childhood that's multifaceted in the little girl in this [00:46:00] case can result in a mix of emotional, psychological and social factors. So what I'm trying to say there in layman's terms is that we are little beings, both, you know, girls and boys of our environment and the dynamics and the relationships that we see.
And the interactions and the language used and the tones all of that we're acquiring and it's you're just building this dynamic and this is how we talk to one another. This is how I feel whatever that feeling may be this is how I feel scared. This is how I feel nervous. This is how I feel safe and this is how humor is in my family and that becomes like your area of function Which now we're learning areas of dysfunction within what we've normalized as functioning within a family system.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. If there's one thing I've ever learned, I love the mind of a humorist. A humorist is someone who may tell you something that's funny, [00:47:00] but it really catches up to you later, how deep that is. That is, somebody tells you something, it kind of makes you chuckle later. That's more of a humorist.
But something that has always stuck with me is the idea that nothing's funny when someone's mad. When you're mad, you can say all you want, but you can't get past mad. And that sense of endearment or just teasing and having good fun. That can go sour when there's not an appreciation for reading the room and that things are not good.
Liz Herl: Right. And if you grew up with that dynamic, then that kind of verbal assault. You know how that feels, but you've normalized it. Well, that's just you know, and then what could talk comes from there? I'm just an idiot. I don't get anything and you're constantly just assassinating yourself but that's normal So if then, you know not to segue off of this as we're coming to a close but when we start looking for friendships in adolescence that when our friend says, oh, you're so stupid for picking that up.
Well, that makes sense. Cause I am [00:48:00] stupid. Yeah. Right. So then again, you're just collectively building this little person and they don't understand that that is being normalized. I was sharing with someone the other day that I love my children's stories. They are storytellers. Don't know where they get that from, but anyways my daughter, who is 10 years old, she'll be 11 next month will come up to me and I've been always trying to be mindful of like when she's going into the story of what is first world problems in her life.
And I'm so intent on giving feedback and having her feel like her little story and her and her life right there really matters. Generationally, that's a very bizarre because children are kind of be seen and not heard. I bring this up because when we're kind of circling back to what we're talking about, what we, know in that moment, I experienced a mother that intentionally listened to me and would be like, oh, that seems like that would really bother you.
That would hurt your feelings or whatever it [00:49:00] is. And I know what that did. Like it made me feel valid. Like, yeah, it did bother me. You're right. Versus, you know, you're being overly sensitive. Stop being a whiner. You're like, you know, bad things happen to good people. Get over it. That is normal terminology, generationally, because it's like you had to toughen up and move on.
We're understanding now, psychologically, what that does to individuals. Which is what leads people to having partners or desiring a partner that is missing some healthy traits.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah. I have nothing to add to that, Liz, but you are absolutely right. My youngest son is a storyteller too.
If my son has something to tell you, you better get yourself a cold beverage and sit back because it's gonna be a while. He likes to tell you every detail, but that's the charm.
Liz Herl: Yeah, absolutely.
Tim Caldwell: Of youth and in that, it's interesting, you have a son and two daughters, and I have two sons, and I'm from a predominantly all male family.
All military, so as we talk, I want people to understand that this is our [00:50:00] opportunity to discuss some of the things that are upsetting. They're upsetting to watch, and they're even more upsetting because how ridiculously simplistic the answer seems to be, but nobody wants to do the work, and
Liz Herl: Or knows how.
Tim Caldwell: Or won't give up the opportunity to be offended by something bizarrely innocent. And it's, you know, protection, correction, direction. The Good Book gives us stuff like that in a means that the answers are there. We need to fall back on very basic type things. A very basic type of life and not to be simplistic, not to dismember or depart from any means of how people live or their ideologies, but it literally has to be with Could you put yourself in their shoes?
Would you treat them like you'd like to be treated? [00:51:00] Like that golden rule and you help me, Jerry Maguire, you help me help you, right? But you gotta tell me, and you gotta be honest. And those are important qualities. Those are things that need to happen in a discussion.
Liz Herl: And all of the things you're stating there is the final, you know, thought for me.
For individuals listening or watching, viewers, is that in all the information we've provided today, it's just an understanding that when we're missing important parts of roles and we are deducing and collectively putting a puzzle together that has, a lot of missing parts to it, be kind to yourself as to why you do what you do.
And this is just to provide understanding, is this something I want to, you know, really look at this isn't a negative attack on a person, or a male or female for that [00:52:00] matter, and that if I want to understand why I choose and do and act and respond and be the way I am, I have to really take a real good look in the mirror of what I was missing at some point in my life and what I started filling it in with.
And now that I know that, now what do I want to do about it? And that's the healing journey. As people go through that it's my hope that they find that healthy resolve of better understanding of self, better communication healed partnerships, healed relationships, friendships. This isn't just with partners.
This is in any capacity. Just like I said earlier when you're going in, why do I naturally go in to rescue somebody? Like it's my responsibility. Where did these traits come from? And it's just an examination of them.
Tim Caldwell: Yeah, well, that's my hope and prayer too, is that we're shining two little flashlights on a very big problem.
And hopefully people [00:53:00] understand where we're coming from. And if they would just take the time to try to take stock in where they are in their life and maybe in their relationship what can be expressed that provides answers and some type of solutions. It harms us the least but impacts us the most, right?
I think that's important. Thanks for this. This is good.
Liz Herl: Well, everyone, please stay tuned. We've got some the next one coming up. We'll be doing the counterpart.
Tim Caldwell: Man, man you can do man stuff.
Liz Herl: The man's view of a woman. Potentially.
Some ideas and go ahead and like us on Instagram, Facebook, all the great socials, and of course our website.
We are back in action there. You can go there and listen to our episodes there.
Yep, cool. Thanks Liz. Appreciate it.
Thanks everyone. Have a good day. [00:54:00]