I think the opposite side of things are generally harder on a relationship, particularly a new one where you`re both deciding what you’d like from each other. Certainly there are going to be some people who’ve been around and maybe had bad experiences with needy partners and have learned to run for it when they smell neediness.
But generally speaking - if you imagine two hypothetical partners who are equal in all ways except one is a standard deviation in the direction of emotionally dependent and needy and the other is a standard deviation in the direction of emotionally unavailable and too independent. Assuming you kind of like them both, do you get more attached to the one who annoyingly needs constant validation or the one who’s not even emotionally available?
That’s true, Fuzzy Dunlop, particularly at the beginning of a relationship - I’m not sure about later on. Actually, my fellow who I mentioned earlier as being, as you put it, perhaps one standard deviation towards too independent, was probably the *more *needy one in the relationship when we first got together. (Using ‘needy’ in the broad sprectrum sense, not the extreme emotional vampire sense!)
My theory - in the very early stages of a relationship, there’s often a tendency for the parties to be slightly disparate in how ‘into’ each other they are, which evens out into a more natural balance over time. Maybe this doesn’t hold true for all - but in a lot of new relationships I bet there’s one party - obviously not necessarily the male - going ‘Omg yay I’m finally with her! I’m onto a good thing, I’d better hold onto this!’ while the other party is more like ‘hm, he is a cool guy, I’m really content to give things a chance and see how we go’.
So, speaking from my own experience (as the second person in the example ;)), early in the relationship both parties probably prefer the other to be needing a little validation rather than emotionally distant, because it reaffirms that yes, we like each other, yes, this is a good thing. Of course later on, once you’ve established that you love each other and want to commit and all that, excessive emotional validation is perhaps seen as a bit unneccessary, you know?
You know, one of my most successful relationships began at a time when I was dealing with an extremely stressful family situation. Evidently it takes my entire family structure collapsing for me to be genuinely and unaffectedly emotionally available to my romantic partners.
It’s easily the most challenging part of relationships for me. I just try random things because I honestly still can’t define exactly what my goal should be.
Things are especially difficult for me because unlike many very private people, I have an extremely easy time getting other people to open up to me. People typically are quick to assume I’m sincerely interested in them and whatever is going on with them. I imagine it’s very “therapeutic” to have a friend who is always very interested in your problems and feelings but reluctant to share his own frequently. Either way, I the result is that I have many personal non-romantic relationships that I consider “close”, so I don’t have an incentive to be more open in my non-romantic life.
Unfortunately all the stupid women I have sex with actually want to know how I’m feeling.
I had a friend who was a bottomless well of neediness; she had a slew of mental health issues and, unfortunately, got fixated on me before I knew she was so crazy. Anything I did or said (or she thought I did, said, gestured, or thought) was open to hours of scrutiny and processing. A mild example of this is when we went out to dinner once and she called me four hours later, sobbing. Apparently, she felt that I disliked her because I had moved the salt shaker over to my side of the table from hers and had not moved it back when I was finished.
This friend had a domestic partner with whom she had been for 10 years. Keep this in mind during the following example:
Friend and her partner and I drove to Palm Springs (about 150 mile trip) to stay the weekend in a nice little resort. The first day we were there I sat in the armchair to chat with crazy friend and then left to lounge by the pool. Crazy emerges two hours later, her eyes nearly swollen from crying and with her luggage. Turns out that she felt rejected when I sat in the chair to talk with her instead of on the edge of the bed, closer to where she was lying down with Partner. This outrage I committed sparked two emergency long-distance calls to her therapist about how I had rejected and disrespected her.
Crazy’s partner ended up paying the entire resort bill and renting me a car so I could drive myself home the next day. Partner was a world-class enabler and emotional doormat for the ex-friend and probably still is . . . I dunno, 'cuz that was the end of this particular experiment in neediness.
Neediness is calling your SO at work when you’ve been told it’s making them self conscious.
And especially if you want them to use cute nicknames as their coworkers snicker.
There’s a third option, which is that the needy person is the controlling one, and wants to get certain things out of the other person. They whine, cajole, guilt trip, or downright demand what they want, and if the other person doesn’t comply, that means s/he doesn’t love me! I think this is more often the case than the needy person wanting to be controlled.
