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Lonely Women; Rebound Relationships

Written by: Gunborg Palme, certified psychologist and certified psychotherapist, teacher and tutor in psychotherapy.
First version: 22 Jul 2008. Latest version: 20 Aug 2008.

Abstract:

Some men have a need to get away for a time, but will then come back to their women.

Question:

I have been in a relationship for one year, every time after three months and when we are the closest in our relation my boyfried breaks up and goes away. This has happened 3 times and he has gone on a trip for several months. He says he gets claustrophobic, that he feels trapped as if he was buried in a coffin. The only solution that makes him feel better is to break off the relationship. Is this rebound relationships? I think this is a phobia, perhaps philophobia. /Lonely women

Answer:

Web4Health has two answers to this question, written by different experts. Here is a link to the other answer.

Most men have the following peculiarity: when they have been for a while close to the woman they love, they need to go somewhere else. During the stone age, men left their caves to hunt, and came home with meat for their families. Families of men who stayed in their caves and did not go out hunting, starved to death and did not have any chance to spread their genes to future generations.

Due to this fact, a man who has been at home for a while feels a strong drive to leave. When he has been away for a while, he feels lonely and wants to come back home. If you understand your husband's behaviour, you will not be so sad when he leaves.

Most men deal with this "commuting impulse" in a less drastic way. They go to work, take a business trip, go out and work in the garage, go hunting or fishing, become sailors or even go to war. They do it when they feel that they must go away. When they are away from the women they love, they feel a longing that makes them come home again.

You have to think whether you can accept him as he is. Many men have more or less the same "feelings" towards their women, so you cannot skip this problem just by choosing a new man.

Several years ago I read a book called "Men who are not capable of loving". It was about men who disappear. After talking to men who react in the same way, I can say that they surely love their women. They have a strong feeling towards their women when they get back. However, they desire to leave again, once they have gotten really close to the women.

Karen Blixen loved a pilot who always came back to her until that day she demanded that he stay with her all the time. Then he flew away and never came back.

You could try to go away from him from time to time, and thus make him long for you to come back. Perhaps he would not need to be far away for a long time, if you had spontaneous "time-outs" in your relationship.

Web4Health has two answers to this question, written by different experts. Here is a link to the other answer.

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