Partner goes to ground when a major disagreement happens

[therightedit]

can he turn this around?
It is not manipulative behaviour. He literally does not have the skills to manage conflict, as patronising as that sounds . I could talk all day about his childhood and there is no doubt that this is deeply ingrained behaviour but do any of you have men in your lives, like this and is there any resolution.
He is very self aware and feels terrible afterwards but could go days without contact and just sleeps through it all.
I've never met anyone like that, not to mind had a relationship with a person who does this!
In previous relationships, the women(who I know) would pursue contact relentlessly until he reconnected with them and then there would be screaming and shouting about it, when he would head back to his cave again for another period of silence.
In our case, I left him off and refused to follow him, as he was at fault.he was regretful and remorseful when he came out but it is the first and last time that this will ever happen to me, as it felt awful adn disrespectful and frankly immature.
I like to discuss issues/niggles and just move on fast with lesson learned.
Any thoughts on all of this please?
Ps I want to give him one chance.

I truly don’t understand what there is to process. Someone is upset by something you’ve done, why does a person need several days to think about it?

To be fair if you hadn't just had an argument then 2 or 3 days no contact wouldn't be a big deal. Its perfectly acceptable to take a few me-days. It would annoy the arse off me if I had to talk to someone every day xD

But it sounds like they had a proper bad disagreement and then he fucked off without resolving it. So that's obviously going to have played on ops mind for the time he was gone. Also looks like op tried to get in touch but he had just vanished off the face of the earth.

A trauma response gets you so far in life and then....you become a nightmare in your relationships and its his business to deal with it. I had a flight response so bad I would literally say I was going to the bathroom and drive home at 2am (this was several years after an abusive relationship) It was an overwhelming urge to flee and avoid any kind of conflict. It made me impossible and a nightmare to deal with. It had to be figured out (myself) and was totally unfair to the people I did this to. It was blazingly obvious this was my problem to solve (therapy did it). A simple compromise would be him saying 'I need a bit of time to calm down and process my feelings, I hope thats okay'. It at least extends respect and courtesy. Ultimately going through life saying 'trauma' as an adult has a limited shelf life

@Chichimcgee

I really want to agree with this... but I can't. Because you're right, if it's a genuine trauma response, then of course, he deserves sympathy and support. But if this has been going on for years…

It’s my response and no matter how much counselling or help or support I’ve had, it’s still my response.
I would rather go and hide for 3 days than deal with something. I have managed to turn this into a few hours, a day at most to collect myself, get my bearings and process what is happening.

I think a compromise is for OP to leave him to it for a few hours and then for him to make the effort to talk about it.

I honestly don't understand this. You have a trauma response so you are sympathetic to him. Okay... except then you go on to explain how you've sought help and worked on it. And I think it would be very very few people would consider a few hours a problem (barring, for example, totally abandoning responsibilities such as kids or whatever). So my argument stands - he can and should make the effort to improve. He doesn't have to be perfect, but disappearing for 3 days!? Screw that, I'd be out of there so fast his head would spin.

@Triffid1 it wasn’t made clear from the original post how long he disappears for. I have since said that for 3 days isn’t right and they need to compromise in that she gives him a few hours space and he then comes back and they resolve the issue

It is not manipulative behaviour. He literally does not have the skills to manage conflict, as patronising as that sounds

I am diagnosed with bipolar and ADHD. I didn't have great behaviours modelled to me growing up either: This affects my natural ability to manage some situations. As an adult, it is up to me to proactively seek out, test and act on coping mechanisms and learnings in order to not negatively impact those around me unfairly.

It's just part of being an adult.

If he genuinely wanted to improve this and make your relationship more stable, happy and healthy then he would have proactively made a real effort to learn and grow. He hasn't.

He's not done anything proactive. It may not be consciously manipulative in the sense you take that word to mean, but it is manipulative because it's a repeated behaviour that he knows gets a certain response from you that he continues to do with an excuse (he can't cope with managing conflict) he knows is a get out of jail free card to you.

This sounds harsh but I don't think someone completely unable to manage conflict can be in a genuinely healthy and happy relationship. I know that before I had therapy, medication and a real desire to change I had no business being in relationships.

If he's completely unable and unwilling (he's this, too, as he's made no proactive efforts to change) to manage conflict, he's unable to manage interpersonal dynamics enough to be in a relationship.

He was totally wrong, accepted that but took himself off initially to avoid the conflict. Yes he hoped that I'd come running after him I'm sure.

How can you say that this isn't manipulative? It's textbook.

Ps I want to give him one chance.

Don't even bother. What a collosal waste of your time.

What you see is what you get. This is who he is.

He's not changing, not for you, not for anybody. Save yourself the inevitable drama and just walk away.

⬇️

My x did this..it doesn’t get any better

I do this too, not to the extent of taking to my bed but I do retreat and wait for the other person to speak to me.

I do have diagnosed CPTSD and complex trauma due to childhood emotional and psychological trauma so please don't be too hard on him.

Some of us have been treated in such a way that arguments be them big or small really do drive us back into whatever feels like a safer space. Most likely it's not immaturity or being disrespectful it's a traumatic response he can do little or nothing about.

@ComtesseDeSpair

At some point I think we all have to stop pissing on about “our childhoods” and using them as excuses for poor behaviour which affects others.

He isn’t “very self aware” if this has been a pattern in previous relationships and yet he has not done anything to address why this is his response to arguments or to develop healthier responses to arguments. If he’s very self aware then his response to immediately following his argument with you should have been to acknowledge that he does not react healthily to disagreement and that he knows he has a tendency to behave inappropriately by “going to ground” and is committed to sorting himself out because he knows it’s unacceptable to expect a partner to put up with it.

I don’t have a man in my life who is like it because honestly, I wouldn’t put up with it. It doesn’t matter how much he tells you that this is about his childhood and isn’t intended to be manipulative. His reason and his intent doesn’t change the impact and affect on you and on your relationship, and what he’s doing is really just a kind of sulking and silent treatment, regardless of whether he prefers to name it processing and going to ground. It needs nipping in the bud now, or you’re looking at many years of resentment towards him because he has this convenient way of opting out of the two of you having difficult discussion and of conflict resolution because “childhood.”

Wow ain't you a treat.

I'm glad you've never had the experiences some people have had but please don't diss people who have been abused and/or neglected and bear the after effects and still manage to function to some degree every day. They're stronger than you'll ever know.

@Mo1911, it's very difficult to have a relationship with someone who can't work through conflict. Not communicating with your partner breaks the connection and trust. It can also feel manipulative.

Sounds exactly like my ex. Reader, it did not end well. (Seriously though, if his surname begins with a K and you’ve met him in the last 6 months, run!)

Honestly, it ends up being an absolute head-fuck. If you think this is bad, imagine the end with a person like that.

Not to be dramatic but since mine moved out, I have had that Maya Angelou quote in my head: ‘when someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time’. Because the red flags were always there.

Life is too short to put up with this bs.
He knows he's like this but has done nothing about it tells you all you need to know.
Sure you like him, but like yourself more.

I do this too, not to the extent of taking to my bed but I do retreat and wait for the other person to speak to me

What do you do if they don’t speak to you?
What do you do if you are wrong?

@Mo1911, I don't agree that you can't do anything about it. It's a coping strategy that can be changed, like any negative emotion reaction. Stonewalling is judged to cause relationships to fail as no conflict will be resolved.