Today we’re going to take an in-depth look at one of our success stories.

Heather, a long time member of our private facebook support group ended up cracking the code on how to get her ex back.

Of course, she had one of the most difficult situations you can imagine with her ex exhibiting fearful avoidant tendencies.

So, without further ado I’d like to introduce you to Heather and how she got her ex back.

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How She Got Her Fearful Avoidant Ex Back

Heather:
All right.

Chris Seiter:
All right. Today, we have another really interesting success story. We have Heather here who … Her and I were going back and forth on how to define her success story. Ultimately, settled on this really interesting medium between if you have a military breakup that occurs where your boyfriend or girlfriend is going overseas, and they breakup with you right before, or if they’re going to study abroad, and they breakup with you right before.

Chris Seiter:
There’s any forced departure. This is the success story to listen to. I’d love to introduce you to Heather, who is going to take us through her entire situation. How are you doing, Heather?

Heather:
I’m doing great. Nice to be here.

Chris Seiter:
All right. Let’s go hop at the time machine, start back from the beginning. How does this breakup occur? What goes on here?

Heather:
Yeah. Breakup happened almost two years ago. It was back in March 2020, which is a very familiar date for a lot of people.

Chris Seiter:
It’s uncanny how many breakups came into our phase around March of 2020.

Heather:
In March 2020. This happened before, before the big event, before COVID. My boyfriend was getting set up to deploy overseas. I will admit that things had become a little bit strained before not in an argumentative way, or anything like that. But definitely, I started to have insecurities in the relationship, and I think I was projecting that a little bit. But it was still a very good relationship. He was very loving and clearly still in love with me.

Heather:
I had gone down to his place, his parents’ place. He invited me down to his parents’ place that weekend. Then on the way home, I got back home and that’s when he let me know that he just didn’t see it working. This was after being together for two years. I was completely floored. He was also leaving for overseas in less than a week. It’s a week before his deployment. While it had been not as good as relationship had been before, it was still a very big 360. I was really, really surprised.

Chris Seiter:
You basically … This is happening in the car right coming back from the visiting the parents?

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
It’s like there’s no way to escape to? He’s got you. Who’s driving the car?

Heather:
Me.

Chris Seiter:
I mean, there’s a time when you breakup with someone, maybe not when they’re driving a car, though.

Heather:
I think that’s when he got the courage, I think, because it was a long drive. I think he got the courage to do it. I clearly had been on his mind. That’s might be why there have been a bit of distance that I’ve been sensing.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Yeah.

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Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
You notice … You visit his parents. You’re both there to visit the parents. Do you notice anything during that trip that makes you feel something’s off?

Heather:
I noticed that before. But actually during the trip, he was more touchy feely than he had been in a long time, wanting to hold me a lot. But I now know that that was probably him last chance to hold her kind of thing.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. That’s really interesting how that work. What was his reasoning, this breakup talk happens while you’re driving a car, which is dangerous? If you cry, you’re not paying attention to the road. There’s all sorts of things that can go wrong. But what does he say?

Heather:
I did cry, by the way. I pulled over. I pulled over.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Thank goodness.

Heather:
He just had that classic thing that he just didn’t see this being a forever thing at this point anymore. He just didn’t see a future. He didn’t know how there could be a future. He hadn’t for a little bit. No matter what I said … Obviously, it was an emotional state. But I was very devastated. But that was his reasoning. But neither of us could really talk about it anymore at that point, because I was crying. That’s what we talked about more the next day, is when the big conversation happened.

Chris Seiter:
What was the living situation? Did you guys live together …

Heather:
No.

Chris Seiter:
… at that point? You live separately. You just went on this trip together to his parents’ house. On the way back from the trip, he breaks the news. This is a weird question to ask, but I’m just naturally curious. I’ve never heard of a breakup happen this way. You’re in the car. Does he do it like 25% into the drive home, or does he do it like right as you …

Heather:
Nearly at it.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. There’s not that awkwardness like, “We still have two hours to go together.” Okay. His reasoning basically is like, “I don’t see this being a forever thing,” which almost implies to me that he feels pressure for a next step.

Heather:
Yes.

Chris Seiter:
I don’t know. You mentioned in your Facebook post when you post the success story a few months ago that you were not the one to pressure him. It was actually maybe the other outside extra forces that were …

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Do you feel like that had a huge impact on his decision?

Heather:
I would say so. Definitely his parents were really, really keen on me.

Chris Seiter:
What those grandbabies?

Heather:
It came up a lot.

Chris Seiter:
I know. I’ve been in that situation, too.

Heather:
But I mean, definitely, he knew that that’s what I wanted. I never pressured him. But he knew that … We talked about it. That’s the thing he’d brought up in the past when we live together, when we have kids, this is what our kids names will be. This is all competition we’d have had. But I definitely never pressured it. I didn’t pressure him to move in. He actually did talk about that the next day was that we were moving towards that direction.

Heather:
I personally think he got a little bit scared like, “Let’s put the brakes on.”

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Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Heather:
But yeah. I didn’t necessarily pressure him. I never gave an ultimatum. I was very happy in the situation we were at. But he definitely was feeling the pressure from his family. He did mention that.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. I mean, the only really experience I’ve ever had to draw on is when I was going to move in with my wife before we were married. I was started looking at apartments, because to me, it’s this nice thing to say and fantasize about, but until you’re actually there and experiencing it, you’re like, “Oh, this is a real thing. This is going to happen.” It freaks you out a little bit. I’m wondering if maybe that occurred.

Chris Seiter:
But, obviously, there’s more to the story because you have this X factor of him leaving on this departure to go overseas. How did that factor in?

Heather:
What I knew at the time or what I know?

Chris Seiter:
Let’s go with hindsight. Now, what you know now?

Heather:
Yeah. Honestly, I think he thought he was going to be very sad missing me. He didn’t deal with emotions that very well. I think, judging on some conversations we’ve had even coming up to that point that it was easier and less painful for him to do a breakup than to spend six months missing me.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. It’s fascinating how many people have that black and white mentality, which is the mature things to do. It’s like, “Okay. I’ve got her back home and it’ll suck, but she’ll be there.” Instead you’re saying he’s basically like “No, it’s easier for me to just breakup with her and not have to think about it anymore.”

Heather:
Yeah. Also, I mean, there was again still that distance that had happened. He had been for it away for several months. The more he pulled away, the more insecure I became, and the more subservient I became, which I think just fed into a little vicious cycle.

Chris Seiter:
Now, you mentioned that you became insecure and subservient. What are some examples of how that manifested in the relationship?

Heather:
Oh, everything. I would be like, “Oh, what do you want to do this weekend, or where do you want to eat?” It was never me giving suggestions.

Chris Seiter:
Got it.

Heather:
I was trying so hard to please him at that point, which was never a relationship before. But I was trying so hard to make his experience with me be positive. It was always trying to please him.

Chris Seiter:
It’s funny how that fear that you have losing him manifests itself in odd way it causes you to lose him. Okay. Let’s get to the actual stuff that you did that worked here. He goes overseas. You’re broken up. You’ve obviously been through all of the emotions, the grief and everything like that. What is your first step?

Heather:
Actually, can I fast track back for a second?

Chris Seiter:
Yes. Track that. Yes.

Heather:
The day after the breakup, we did talk as well. This time I spent the whole night saying, “No. I’m going to put a emotions aside and be super logical about this.” I actually had a very logical talk with him said, “What would you like a break, or would you like to see other people, or let’s talk about this rash? You think we maybe take a break while you deploy, when you come back, let’s reconsider.”

Heather:
The more I gave suggestions, the more he dug in. I did do the logical emotional list thing. Strangely enough he got emotional during that. But I did try to be logical. It didn’t work.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Well, so that’s interesting. Because when you approach … What woman … No. Seriously, what woman offers up like, “What would you like to date other people after that?” I mean that would throw me for a loop and it’s like, “No.” But if you really think about it, you want to get mad about it, that’s what the true secure woman would do. She would have enough confidence to be like, “Yeah. Find that other woman. She’s not going to compare to me.”

Heather:
Well, yeah. That’s what I was thinking. I was like, “Go out there. See what you think you’re missing, then when you come back.”

Chris Seiter:
Well, okay. Now that you had the logical conversation, it didn’t work. He dug in.

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Heather:
Dug in hard.

Chris Seiter:
Then he leaves.

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
What happens next?

Heather:
I was devastated for a good week. Good week after that. I told very few people that this has happened. Then a week later is when COVID hit hard. Not only was I not telling people, but then suddenly we were going to work. I wasn’t allowed to see my friends. For a long time, nobody knew that this breakup happened. They just assumed he’s deployed and at I’m at home, because that I was actually home …

Chris Seiter:
They’re sense you’re sad, you’re sad because he’s deployed?

Heather:
Yeah. Well, they couldn’t sense I was sad because I wasn’t. I had excuse not to go anywhere. I had an excuse not to see anybody.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
I was at home with COVID. But at the same time, I didn’t have anyone to talk to. That’s when I started to be a little bit more proactive, because then I’m stuck at home. All I can think about this, I have no escape. Instead of being sad, I said, “What can I do about this?” That’s when I started doing the online search about, “All right, is there any kind of breakup program?” That’s how I learned about No Contact. I did admit in the Facebook group. It wasn’t yours. It was not the first program I found.

Chris Seiter:
Shame on you.

Heather:
But I learned about No Contact. I started doing 21 days was this program. It was always 21 days. It’s all you do. I started doing the 21-day no contact, but I was very scared because he was deployed and I’ve been with him when he’s been deployed before. Military men really tend to compartmentalize. When they’re there, they’re there, when they’re home, they’re home. I wasn’t quite sure how much effect No Contact was going to have on someone over there. I do think it didn’t have much effect at the time.

Chris Seiter:
No. That’s fine …

Heather:
I really do believe.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah.

Heather:
I know that what happened when he came back. I assumed the 21 days no contact. Then during that time, I wasn’t quite getting the support I wanted from other coaches. It would have been too expensive to have a coach on call every day.

Chris Seiter:
Shame on you for telling to those other coaches.

Heather:
I know. That’s when I found your … I can’t remember. I think it’s your website I found.

Chris Seiter:
Probably.

Heather:
Yeah. It was the Facebook group. Instantly appealed to me, because I thought, “Oh, this is great. There’s these moderators there, they’ll be able to answer my silly questions, and there’s other people going through the same situation as me.” Again, I hadn’t pulled anyone. I was almost like … Actually, I noticed. I was scared if I told people it would be real. It was just, “If I’m going to do this, I’m going to get him back. I don’t want people to know, because I need to do this.”

Heather:
The Facebook group gave me a place to talk to people about it and about the issues I was having and also have a moderator there who could answer my silly questions. Then I would get a coach for the big faces and that’s my plan of action. That gave me …

Chris Seiter:
Then you coached with Anna, obviously.

Heather:
I did, yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Anna said, “What?” to you, specifically about fearful avoidance.

Heather:
I talked about everything that had happened. She, I think, I hadn’t even done introducing the situation. She’s a fearful avoidant which she has personal experience with. She warned me right off the bat that of all the kinds I could get, this guy is going to take.” Yeah. She said minimum a year to [crosstalk 00:13:40].

Chris Seiter:
I’m telling you, it’s hard to hear. Anyone who’s listening to this that thinks they have a fearful avoidant, there will be a part of you that says, “That can’t be right.” Heather, it’s right. It takes longer.

Heather:
That’s right.

Chris Seiter:
It takes longer. Well, I think in your case is going to take a little bit extra longer, too, because you have the military aspect of him being overseas. You can’t really do too much.

Heather:
Yeah. But even so, even counting out six months out of there, it’s a basically …

Chris Seiter:
It takes a while. If you think about, I mean, the average success story is going to happen between three and seven months. Fearful avoidance take longer naturally. I mean, but that’s what normal situations. Arguably, the hardest situations that you could have, but I think it’s a testament to how smart and amazing you are that it worked out really well. Let’s figure out. What did you do that was smart and amazing? Obviously, something went right.

Heather:
Well, okay. Well, I took Anna’s advice to begin with. I did …

Chris Seiter:
First steps, you took people as she bought coaching … No. I’m just kidding.

Heather:
I did. It is true though. It gave me a plan of action, which is for me I needed a plan. I had a general plan. But I needed specific. I knew the No Contact was coming up. I was freaking out, to be honest. It’s funny, so many people have issues with No Contact. In the Facebook group is the hardest thing. I did not find that the thing. That was my regrouping time. The hardest thing for me was when the texting phase started.

Heather:
It terrified me before and I was right to be terrified for me. With Anna, she gave me really like, “All right. This is what you’re going to do. But because he was a fearful avoidant, it wasn’t quite the regular texting program. It had to be a bit longer. If there was no response or anything like that, I had to give it more time than a regular person would.

Chris Seiter:
When they pull back, you pull back? Yep.

Heather:
Yeah. That was hard. It was really hard. But I did it. He’s very polite [inaudible 00:15:39] super polite, super quick. I never once got a no response. But he never engaged. He never furthered the conversation. It was always very different. It was dragging stuff out. Even on his favorite things, I could not get him engaged while he was deployed. I’m going to caveat that while he was deployed.

Chris Seiter:
Well, I think that really hearkens back to that compartmentalization that you were mentioning. How long is he deployed? I’m going to go out on a limb here and say you didn’t see any serious success until after he got back from deployment?

Heather:
100%. Yeah. It was completely neutral, low positive, consistently the exact same thing for the time he’s deployed. Didn’t matter if I gave him two weeks, one week, whatever, it was the same until he came home. That’s when things started to change.

Chris Seiter:
I’m actually going to ask you a series of questions here that maybe seem they’re off topic. But I think they’re super relevant to anyone who’s in this situation. How did you cope with that? Because he’s going to be … How long was he deployed, for like six months you said?

Heather:
Six months. Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
All right. He’s deployed for six months. Nothing major happens in those six months. It feels you’re a little bit a hamster on a wheel just doing the same thing over and getting the same results. How do you cope with that, emotionally, internally to get through that period of time?

Heather:
It was tough for me, especially because I’m seeing on the board people having success after three months, four months, from a few weeks, and I was, “What am I doing wrong that they’re doing right? Maybe he really doesn’t want to come back.” But at the same time, I also knew about military guys being very compartmentalized when they’re deployed. I had a little bit of faith. Let’s just see what happens when he gets back. That’s what I kept telling myself. We’ll just wait. We’ll see.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. That served as your North Star to like, “Okay. I’ll make my ultimate decision on whether I need to just find someone new or continue doing this once he gets back and we’ll see then?”

Heather:
Yeah. Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
He gets back.

Heather:
He gets back and initially it is the same where he’s … I knew he was back. Actually, that hurt a lot when I knew he was back.

Chris Seiter:
Oh, he didn’t say anything?

Heather:
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t come to see me. In my mind, you put these little things, “Oh, he’s going to change his mind. I’ll come running back.” He didn’t. He didn’t say anything. It hurts. That hurt more. What I’m saying it hurt just as much as the breakup had. I would still do a little reach outs. I get that same polite response, but nothing major. Then what changed was I got a message from his best friend, who knew I was going to be in a nearby city and said, “Oh, hey, let’s go hang out for the day. We’re going to have this fun thing.”

Heather:
I’m like, “Okay.” I mean, we’ve been friends before. But we weren’t super close. But I was thinking, “Oh, this is a way to get to his inner circle. I’m going to do it.”

Chris Seiter:
Sphere mental. I got it.

Heather:
It’s fearful. I got it. Also get some insider information of what’s going on. But what ended up happening was at the end of the day, his best friend admitted to me that the real reason he asked me to meet up was that my ex had been very sad since he’d come back, not while he was away, but since he’d come back. He was worried about him. He was wondering if I would consider taking him back. Which was funny because I was who got broken up with, but it turned out everyone thought that I broken up with him.

Chris Seiter:
He really compartmentalized to the point where it’s almost like his friends didn’t even realize they knew the breakup went down, but they didn’t realize the exact circumstances around that.

Heather:
The good news of this, it gave me some renewed help. The bad news of it is that it lets me forget that he’s a fearful avoidant, so I did want to rush ahead a bit, which I can kind of warn about later, doesn’t work. But yeah. Concocted this plan that we’re going to go camping and I would arrange it and then I put out the filler and invite him and see if he wants to come. He immediately responded, “Absolutely. Sounds great. Let’s go do this.”

Heather:
It was the most response I’ve gotten from him since he’d left. Again, in my mind, I’m thinking, “This is great. I know he misses me. I know he’s sad. He’s going to want me as soon as he see you.” This didn’t happen, by the way. But the camping trip did happen. He was so communicative. The few weeks leading up to the camping trip, it felt amazing. But then when we got there, we were on pleasant terms. It was great, but there was … We didn’t get back …

Chris Seiter:
His friend make a move? Your friend a make move?

Heather:
Yeah. Exactly.

Chris Seiter:
You’re in the stalemate? No one knows what to do?

Heather:
Yeah. But I also now …

Chris Seiter:
Does it anything interesting happened at all during the camping trip, or was it literally you’re afraid to do something, he’s afraid to do something, you just live in that place?

Heather:
I don’t know. I don’t think he would have been in the right space yet to make a move, because I don’t think he knew what he wanted at that point. But I was definitely afraid to make a move. I think I went a little bit meek again. I don’t think it held me back. But it definitely … Because the longer the weekend went, the more surprising was that it wasn’t progressing. Then it was over.

Chris Seiter:
[crosstalk 00:21:21] get frustrating on level two, because you know, he likes you. His friend basically told you as much. But you’re not getting that immediate reaction from him.

Heather:
Yeah. To be fair to myself, though, is it that he misses me, or is he just misses having someone and he was done with me. I didn’t know. He start to have this self doubt again. But it didn’t change as much as I thought it would. But what did happen, the benefit of this trip was that it opened up the communication floodgates. Now, I could text him and actually get communications. This is when I started to do the real texting phase, so to speak, the way that it’s meant to be done and doing the push and pull, and I was able to do it properly this time.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
That was the camping trip allowed me to do that. I want to point out to everyone listening. It was not a solo camping trip. It was with a group.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
There’s a bit of safety net there.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. You mentioned you do kind of get back into the texting phase here. You start seeing some positive feedback from that. How quickly do things progress at this point?

Heather:
Not quickly. I would say we went the push-pull thing and there was few times where I had to go like two weeks … I had to do a few many No Contacts and few more coaching sessions with Anna. Then the next big breakthrough was Thanksgiving.

Chris Seiter:
2020?

Heather:
[crosstalk 00:22:46] year. Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
2020, almost, yeah.

Heather:
Yeah. Thanksgiving 2020. I couldn’t go home because of COVID. He couldn’t go home because of COVID. It was a just crazy idea. I was like, “No, I’m going to invite him over and we’ll see what happens.” He said, “Yes.” I said, “Great.” He came down for the weekend for Thanksgiving. I ordered. I didn’t make it. I’m not going to lie. I ordered a Thanksgiving meal.

Chris Seiter:
Those were the best.

Heather:
We had it. Nothing happened.

Chris Seiter:
But did you say you made it to him?

Heather:
No. No. He know [crosstalk 00:23:22]

Chris Seiter:
That’s unfortunate. He’d be like, yeah [crosstalk 00:23:23].

Heather:
But it was fun.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Nothing happens?

Heather:
Nothing. No. I mean, it was fun. It was enjoyable. We hung out. We watched TV. We ate. It was really, really nice. We sat on the couch by my side.

Chris Seiter:
But no holding hands?

Heather:
No.

Chris Seiter:
No kissing? Nothing like that?

Heather:
No. No. But there wasn’t …

Chris Seiter:
It’s like teenagers.

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
No one knows how to make that first move.

Heather:
But there wasn’t tension this time. It wasn’t like, “What’s going on, Heath?” We just enjoyed each other’s company?

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
But I thought this is great. He’s remembering how great we are together. Yes. He did. But it didn’t have me not knowing how these things work. Didn’t realize that this would cause the opposite reaction. When he went home I didn’t hear from him for two weeks.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. He got really scared, because getting real at that point, you’re physically there, well, maybe nothing romantic technically happened, sometimes emotional intimacy is just as powerful as physical intimacy. I’m assuming emotional … You’re opening up and he’s opening up and becoming vulnerable that can be scary for a fearful avoidant.

Heather:
It is. But I will say, once he did reach back to me, he admitted that. He goes, “Sorry, I haven’t been communicating, it’s just that I really enjoyed spending the weekend with you.” I went home and I just was sad that it didn’t continue. That was his first emotional slip up.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
Slip up. I game. He slipped up. He slipped up. Yes. But we’re still were together and then we went back still that texting push and pull. It’s a long process with these guys.

Chris Seiter:
Texting phase here is lasting a lot longer than the average success story. But fearful avoidance are different than regular avoidance.

Heather:
Yeah. Then a similar situation happened at Christmas. Except this time I went back to his …

Chris Seiter:
Holidays.

Heather:
Oh, actually this one’s even better. He invited me, again, to his parents’ house for Christmas.

Chris Seiter:
It’s literally go back to the scene of the crime.

Heather:
I know. But again, we didn’t get back together. It was …

Chris Seiter:
But is anything progressing, physically at this point, kissing, hand holding, anything like that or he’s still a little too afraid to do things like that?

Heather:
During Christmas, yes. But it was why we’re at his parents’ during Christmas is we were playing make belief that we were boyfriend, girlfriend again. But we both knew it wasn’t real, if that makes sense.

Chris Seiter:
It does, actually, because do you think that … Okay. This is a weird question to ask. But I do think with this guy, it’s definitely worth asking. Do you think that pressure, to me, he seems he really cares about what his parents think. That seems to be a huge thing. Do you think the pressure of having to see them and bring you there add to that dynamic at all, the fakeness dynamic, you’re together, but not really together?

Heather:
It’s very possible. I guess the way I refer to it at the time as to why it didn’t freak me out was it was just try before you buy.

Chris Seiter:
That’s a great …

Heather:
That’s how this feel.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
But I think he just need to see how it felt for him to be [inaudible 00:26:45] because he’s clearly scared to go back into this phase. I think he needed to know is this like … Because he’s a type of person, fearful avoidant, that when they jump in, they’re all in. I think that that’s why it took him so long. But I want to be clear, we did not get back together Christmas.

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Holiday was not what pushed him over the edge.

Heather:
No.

Chris Seiter:
But you became … You kissed, or you do make some progress in that realm but you’re not together yet?

Heather:
Yeah. Physical got crossed. That was the first time that it happened. But it didn’t mean we were back together when we got home.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
He did the same thing. He did a Thanksgiving where he pulled back again.

Chris Seiter:
Two weeks.

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Two weeks. Well, at least he’s predictable at this point.

Heather:
Yes.

Chris Seiter:
You know exactly what’s going on.

Heather:
Yes. But at this time it was quite devastating. I had another one-on-one with Anna. During Christmas break, I think it was. She was like, “This is it. Success story. This is great.” Then it didn’t happen and he pulled back really, really hard to the point where … My birthday was a few weeks later and I got …

Chris Seiter:
Okay. Maybe that crossing that physical barrier, I think maybe the first time he pulled back you have that emotional barrier that’s crossed. He pulls back and freaks him out. But above the emotional barrier to him maybe is the physical barrier and that begins to get crossed and he really maybe pulls back. He’s like, “I got to think about this.” Do you think that’s what happened?

Heather:
Yeah. I think so. But I will say so, when I talked to Anna at this point, by this point by the way had been on … Almost a year.

Chris Seiter:
Almost a year. Yeah.

Heather:
Anna sat me down and she said, “Because I was so sure that what you had back in December was it.”

Chris Seiter:
She told me.

Heather:
Yeah. She’s like I don’t …

Chris Seiter:
I don’t know if I told you that. She said, “I got one, fearful avoidant success story. It’s happening.” Then I didn’t hear anything from her.

Heather:
No. I had another coaching session with her after I think three weeks I panicked, I had another session with her. She said, “I’ve got to be honest. You have to accept this might not happen,” which was so hard for me to hear after all this time. She just said, “You tried your best but you can continue.” She says, “There’s a possibility. But you have to be realistic that this might not happen at this point, because you’ve tried everything.”

Chris Seiter:
You don’t want to waste your time on a situation, too, that can become untenable no matter what you do.

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
Obviously, was that how it worked out?

Heather:
No. Two, she doesn’t say it wasn’t going to work out, but she was being really realistic at this point.

Chris Seiter:
She’s trying to protect you so that you don’t go all in on someone that’s going to break your heart. That’s not what we want. We want that transformation where you’re like, “You know what? I can find someone just as good.”

Heather:
Yeah. I told her this time I said, “It’s COVID right now.” I had started dating again. I did declare. I did the whole Trinity thing, work, I renovated my house, I got promoted. I know I did all this stuff. I was dating. But at the same time, it was still COVID. It wasn’t I was really meet a lot of new people. I thought, “You know what? I’ve got nothing going on for the next few months until this COVID thing starts down, because it was a second wave happening.”

Heather:
I’ll give him to the end of this. We’ll see how it progresses. But I’m not done yet. I still think there’s hope. But we’ll see. She gave me a new plan. Again, back to that whole texting, push-pull. I went back to that phase so many times. But we’re back to that again. It was like that. Quite a while.

Chris Seiter:
You’re in the testing phase constantly. Were there any progressions up that value ladder up to phone calls? I mean, you had gone to in-person. I mean, I don’t know if I classify the meeting the parents as a romantic type of a date. But was there any sprinkling in of talking, or is he’s just strictly text message?

Heather:
Strictly text message, but that’s because that’s cheap it. He did call me on my birthday.

Chris Seiter:
Interesting.

Heather:
That was, which he doesn’t … He’s not phone call person. That was interesting. But we were talking more. Now, it wasn’t that awkward. I could text him and it wouldn’t be weird and I could message. But it wasn’t that same when we were dating, talk about everything daily, kind of thing. I still had to respect the mirroring and the rules of the text messages.

Chris Seiter:
Yes. Sometimes even … Because if you really think about it, you go back to the beginning of your relationship, everything’s so new, you can talk everything, you’re learning. Sometimes that can shoot you in the foot, because then you run out of things to talk about, and things to keep interesting, especially when you’re going through a breakup like this. They feel they already know everything about you.

Heather:
Yeah. Yeah. I didn’t talk about this before. But when I did try to speed up the text messaging, because I am only human, I did try to make that happen a few times. It backfired. That’s when I would get him getting less close enough. He’d close up or not respond as much. That was when I would try to speed up the process and get too personal or try to hit him up every day. It never worked.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
It always backfired.

Chris Seiter:
Something’s got to give here. You’ve been through … You said your birthday is a little after Christmas. You’ve been through the Christmas thing. He pulls back, and then the birthday thing happens. What happens, something’s got to turn it?

Heather:
He got deployed again.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
I don’t I mentioned that before.

Chris Seiter:
Another six months.

Heather:
I didn’t mention that in the Facebook group. But he got the deployed again, is what happened. Just a mini one, just a mini one. But he got deployed again.

Chris Seiter:
Okay.

Heather:
We were having … But this time we were talking. Well, I was doing the text messaging thing. But this time I was communicating with him, as opposed to the no contact last time. Honestly, I just think at this point with the text messaging me … Just the text messaging, and respecting those boundaries and doing the mirroring, it gave him the time. He knew the process, what he wanted to do, and the proof that I wasn’t pressuring him.

Heather:
I think that’s what I needed to be doing the whole time, which is the whole point of the program. At no point was I pressuring him, but I was showing them how good it could be. But at the same time, I want to let you figure this out. I truly believe that’s what, finally, got into his head. I missed this. She’s not pressuring me. It’s right there. Then when we will get away again, he really missed it. It was while he was away, that’s when he just said it one day, in a message.

Heather:
He’s like, “Yeah. When we get back together … It’s one week, when we when I get back home, we’re going to do this and this and we’re going to go do this and vacation.”

Chris Seiter:
Future phase. All right. Okay.

Heather:
Future phase. It literally it was a day, he just started using future terms, and he never went back.

Chris Seiter:
Because sometimes people make a huge deal about the talk, did that ever happen for him? Was he a little too afraid to take that step? It just almost naturally unfold, is the point we’re just back together?

Heather:
It naturally. I let it. I purposely didn’t have the talk. Because from everything I’ve seen with him …

Chris Seiter:
I think you figured correctly that would push him. There’s that emotional thing. Then there’s the physical thing, that is up there, putting a commitment on it. You’ve been together for a while now, because you posted that success story in June, I think.

Heather:
Yeah. It’s actually Anna gave me inspiration not to confront him. She never told me not to. But she told me her story and how she had just after … She just naturally migrated back together. Then after so many months, she was like, “Oh, here’s my boyfriend” and he didn’t correct her. Basically that’s what happened with us. I did it specifically because I remembered her story, and it worked.

Chris Seiter:
That’s actually what happened with my wife. I’ve got a very similar story, which is we were out at some bar that had a band playing. It was during a July 4th. She was wearing an outfit that had the American flag on it. They called her up because they wanted her to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. I don’t know. It’s this dumb bar thing. But the guy asked my permission, first.

Chris Seiter:
He said, “Hey.” We were just dating at the time. “Is it okay if I asked for your girlfriend to come up on stage?” I go, “Sure.” That’s how it went. Sometimes letting it unfold naturally is beautiful, if you get cool stories like that.

Heather:
Well, at this point, I knew him well enough. It did take this process for me to learn.

Chris Seiter:
It did. Yeah.

Heather:
It truly. I didn’t know before that I couldn’t push this. He had to make that decision, and he did. Again, once he was in, he was all in. That was good. But definitely, I don’t think that conversation would have worked well for him.

Chris Seiter:
For you, I think the key really was understanding that fearful attachment. But most importantly, when they pull back, you need to kind of pull back. To me, that requires an immense amount of discipline. What would you say to someone who … Because to me, there’s also a huge difference between understanding and doing. A lot of people understand. A lot of people don’t do. How did you reconcile the two?

Heather:
Well, I did have my moments of doubt. I’m not going to say that I didn’t. But I would say for the most part, I had to console myself saying, “I really truly think this can work out. I have to stick with this.” I remember thinking several times, I think it told us to Anna, “Is that I can go through a year.” I told this the very, “I can go through a year if I know it’s going to work out. What I don’t want to do is go through a year to find out it’s not going to work out.”

Heather:
Because I had this belief that I truly think it could work out, I kept at it. It looks it wasn’t till that December conversation I had with her … We’re both of us. It wasn’t just her. I thought, “Oh, my God. This might not work.” It’s funny because that was the last big hurdle before he said, he’s like, “Yeah. We’re back together.” But he really had to pull back hard to make that final decision.

Chris Seiter:
I’d say in Anna’s defense, she’s used to getting results a lot quicker. Your guy was a tough one. Usually, it’s the emotional thing. They’re more than okay with the physical barrier getting breached. But I guess for him, he was really uptight about that. Which is a beautiful thing, because it really goes to show how much he does care about relationships, especially if he’s all in. How have things been since you’ve been back together?

Heather:
It’s been amazing. Yeah. He’s over all the time. Actually, I didn’t mention this. But I have a dog. Actually, that was one of the first things … I mentioned this in the story. That’s the first way I knew that he was missing me for how I started … Actually, it’s one of the ways that I kept my hope alive, was he would say, “I missed the dog, and give him a cuddle for me. I miss him. I can’t wait to see him again.” I didn’t realize.

Chris Seiter:
That’s a clever inception way of putting it in there. Like, “I miss you.”

Heather:
Exactly. I realized that even when he said it the first time, I was like, “No you don’t. You miss me.” I realized that. That when he would say I missed the dog, that’s what would give me hope that, no, it’s actually me he misses. But anyways, we are back together. He still jokes about that with the dog. When he goes away now, he’ll be like, “Oh, yeah. I really missed the dog. You’re fine. But I missed the dog.” I think he knows that he was doing that now.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. Well, maybe this is an aspect that you didn’t think about. But maybe that was his subtle hint.

Heather:
Maybe.

Chris Seiter:
I get the sense that he’s a little too afraid to make the first move. The only reason I say that is because men who aren’t afraid to make the first move are usually the ones that breach that ask question like, “Hey, are we going to be boyfriend or girlfriend again?” But he just let it unfold naturally. You’re smart to let it unfold naturally, because now look at you. You’re just this ultimate, awesome situation.

Chris Seiter:
But I’m just wondering if maybe a lot of this is because of a lack of communication on his part on what he needs. Because I think fearful avoidance are really afraid to tell you what they really need.

Heather:
Yeah. I would agree with that. Again, me not being fearful one, I didn’t understand that. I 100% believe I needed this process to understand him better. I really do understand him better than I did before. Even now, there’s a few times where he’s pulled a little bit. Sorry.

Chris Seiter:
No. I’m sorry to interrupt you. I was just going to say that’s huge. Because if you really think about it, instead of thinking this girl is like crowding my space, he’s going to think this girl knows exactly when I need space. That shift gives you advantage over every other woman he could possibly meet. Don’t tell him I said that.

Heather:
But he knows exactly and that’s what I’m saying. Even though we’re back together and I’m not doing a texting favors for him, there’s a few times where he was really stressed and I could sense it, because now I recognize it. I just gave him the space. Then after a day or two weeks ago, blah, blah, blah, back to normal. I now know he needs that. He needs sometimes just to be in himself and not have me nagging him. What’s the term you use?

Chris Seiter:
Net.

Heather:
Net.

Chris Seiter:
But I would say … To me, I don’t look at it you nagging him or nabbing him. I mean maybe that’s how he looks at it. But I look at you like you want to fix the problem, because that will make him feel better. Is that the intent behind why you would push too much in the past?

Heather:
Well, because I want to help if he says, “Yes. I feel what can I do to help? This will help. This is not helping?”

Chris Seiter:
I can be the hero here.

Heather:
Exactly.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. Well, that’s beautiful. I’m blown away. A lot of insights that I learned personally from this, probably the number one thing is the compartmentalization aspect of the military thing. I’d actually never heard that before. It makes so much sense now that I think about it where they get deployed, they compartmentalize. The No Contact rule may not be as effective. I mean there’s not really much you can do.

Chris Seiter:
But I think what you probably did for yourself during the No Contact rule was an essential part of the process, even just understanding how attachment styles work and diagnosing him is like he sounds like a fearful avoidant, here’s how you handle that when he gets back. But also the texting phase and how that … If you got a fearful avoidant it’s going to take some time.

Heather:
Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
What would you say looking back was the most important thing for you?

Heather:
That I get from himself personally or to get back with him like that?

Chris Seiter:
Let’s go both.

Heather:
Okay. For me, personally, I think … I actually mentioned this before. I didn’t mention it during the podcast. But I needed to get that confidence back and that bring back that dynamic of where I wasn’t being meek and trying to make him happy and scared he’s going to leave, but actually be a partner where we have that banter.

Chris Seiter:
That’s equal.

Heather:
If he … Yeah. Exactly, very equal. I truly needed that back in the relationship for it to work. He knew that. Now that that’s back, we’re both so comfortable. I needed to get my confidence back up so we could have that feeling of equality back in relationship, which he wants, too. He didn’t like it when I was meek. This was really good. I can’t tell you how much I needed that.

Heather:
Then I think the most important thing for the relationship was what we just discussed was me learning that he does need to process things a little bit differently than I do, and that’s fine, as long as I can recognize it. I’m more than willing to give him that time.

Chris Seiter:
Yeah. I think that both of those things are so essential, I think especially because we didn’t really touch on it too much in the podcast. But basically what she was talking about is how she found herself in the relationship the first time almost afraid she was going to lose him to the point where she starts trying to please him, and everything becomes about him. She loses herself a little bit, and then go through the breakup. You realize like, “Oh, my God. I was doing that” Now, you don’t do that anymore.

Heather:
No. No. Yeah. I feel happier, too.

Chris Seiter:
Heather, I’m really … This is a great episode. Thank you so much for coming on. I just am super grateful that you took the time out of your day to do this.

Heather:
Yeah. No problem. I’m so excited that I got to the point where I can do a podcast and talk about this. We’re both very happy now. I do owe it to the program. Not just saying that to, “Oh, all you should buy his program.”

Chris Seiter:
There you go.

Heather:
It definitely, without question, I would not have gotten him back had I not gone through that, for sure.

Chris Seiter:
Well, thank you. You can just continue the call. We should also praise Coach Anna, because I think Coach Anna helped a ton.

Heather:
Yeah. She was amazing. Amazing. Yeah.

Chris Seiter:
There you go. Buy the program, get Coach Anna. You should be good.