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Areas › Your marriage › Knowing your partner
Withdrawing looks like coldness but is usually self-protection from a fear of not being enough. Coming out from behind the wall, naming the fear, and saying you want closeness is how the distant partner re-engages.
Believers are told to speak directly and to good purpose, and God promises reconciliation to a couple who want to put things right. Coming out from behind the wall and naming the fear is both of those in one sentence.
الأحزاب
يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُواْ ٱتَّقُواْ ٱللَّهَ وَقُولُواْ قَوۡلࣰ ا سَدِيدࣰ ا
Believers, be mindful of God, speak in a direct fashion and to good purpose
Qur’an 33:70read it in the library
النساء
وَإِنۡ خِفۡتُمۡ شِقَاقَ بَيۡنِهِمَا فَٱبۡعَثُواْ حَكَمࣰ ا مِّنۡ أَهۡلِهِۦ وَحَكَمࣰ ا مِّنۡ أَهۡلِهَآ إِن يُرِيدَآ إِصۡلَٰحࣰ ا يُوَفِّقِ ٱللَّهُ بَيۡنَهُمَآۗ إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ كَانَ عَلِيمًا خَبِيرࣰ ا
If you [believers] fear that a couple may break up, appoint one arbiter from his family and one from hers. Then, if the couple want to put things right, God will bring about a reconciliation between them: He is all knowing, all aware
Qur’an 4:35read it in the library
غافر
وَقَالَ رَبُّكُمُ ٱدۡعُونِيٓ أَسۡتَجِبۡ لَكُمۡۚ إِنَّ ٱلَّذِينَ يَسۡتَكۡبِرُونَ عَنۡ عِبَادَتِي سَيَدۡخُلُونَ جَهَنَّمَ دَاخِرِينَ
Your Lord says, ‘Call on Me and I will answer you; those who are too proud to serve Me will enter Hell humiliated.’
Qur’an 40:60read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
Johnson treats the withdrawer's re-engagement as one of the two turning points of therapy: the defended partner emerges to say I shut you out because I was afraid of failing you, and I want us close. Putting the fear and the wish into words lets your spouse meet the person rather than the wall.
Susan M. Johnson (2019). Attachment Theory in Practice: EFT with Individuals, Couples, and Families. Guilford
Stage 2, withdrawer re-engagement and blamer softening. Johnson holds that lasting change comes when the withdrawing partner returns and states their needs, and the pursuing partner then asks for comfort from a soft place rather than demanding it from a hard one.
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
A withdrawer who names the fear behind the wall and reaches for contact transforms the cycle, because the partner finally meets the person instead of the defence.
Where this sits: EFT, Stage 2 Steps 5 to 6: Withdrawer Re-engagement.