Alexis Fernandez-Preiksa

But when I start putting my walls up, it's because I feel like this relationship is not heading in the direction it needs to be headed.

I'm starting to feel threatened and once I feel threatened, bang, the wall's going to go up.

If you felt safe and that the relationship was heading in the direction that it needed to be heading in, you would likely start to be able to pull your walls down, especially if your partner was able to see and detect these behaviors in you and intercept them sooner.

So it's not to say that your ex...

Was the right person for you or the wrong person for you?

I don't know.

I don't have insight into your ex at all.

But I think for almost any issue in a relationship, communication is the key.

Most of the things that break down a relationship is due to a lack of communication.

How well did he know this about you?

How did he interpret you?

bringing your walls up and shutting him out?

Like, what did that look like?

And do you think it could have played out differently if he knew exactly what your trigger points were and when you would start to kind of like ice him out of the relationship, you know?

Cause like you said, like once you start going down that path and once you start picking up momentum, it is very hard to turn that around.

It's very hard to turn that around because of the narratives you're telling yourself.

You're like, this is your defense mechanism.

There's nothing stronger than the need to protect yourself because

So once you go down that path, it's hard to be like, oh, it's nothing.

I'm not a threat.