If your girlfriend has gone cold and distant on you then you need to read this article to understand what’s going on before it’s too late. This article will show you how to deal with a girlfriend who is distant and cold and it will also show you how to recapture her interest.
The following is based on real incidents (names have been changed): Peter had been dating Jane for about six months when all of a sudden he noticed that Jane was becoming more and more distant. Jane used to be really into him. She was always affectionate and wanted to be intimate with him. She always answered his phone calls and always responded to his text messages. However, in the last couple of weeks, Peter noticed that Jane was becoming less affectionate. She wasn’t picking up her phone as much, and he would often have to wait hours or days before his girlfriend responded to his text messages. In short, Peter’s girlfriend had started to become distant. Peter wasn’t a stupid guy and he wasn’t clueless, he knew something was wrong and that Jane was withdrawing from him. But he didn’t know why.
Signs Your Girlfriend Is Distant and Cold
A man who has been dating his girlfriend knows without doubt when his girlfriend starts to act distant. It’s not difficult to read the signs. But just in case, I’m going to list the main ways that women act distant in a relationship below:
- She’s suddenly difficult to talk to.
- She takes her time responding to messages.
- She doesn’t respond to your messages at all.
- She doesn’t answer your phone calls.
- She doesn’t seem interested in anything you say.
- She doesn’t laugh at your jokes anymore.
- She doesn’t seem happy when she’s around you.
- She’s often distracted and not paying attention to you.
- She doesn’t want to spend as much time with you.
- She doesn’t touch you or want intimacy with you.
- Nothing you do or say makes her happy.
- The relationship feels like you’re doing all the work.
Reasons Why Your Girlfriend Is Distant
Before you panic about why your girlfriend is behaving the way she is, you first need to understand why your girlfriend might have started acting distant.
It’s also important to understand that if your girlfriend is distant just as a one off thing; for example, she doesn’t respond to your text messages or calls just once in a blue moon, then you shouldn’t sweat it. You only need to worry if you feel that your girlfriend has been growing more and more distant over time.
She’s Losing Attraction For You
This is one of the main reasons why a girl starts acting distant. She’s losing or lost attraction for you. This sudden withdrawal hits most men like a dagger through the heart, even if their girlfriend’s withdrawal is subtle. And unless you’re completely blind, you’ll pick up on the fact that she doesn’t seem that into you anymore.
When your girlfriend starts to lose attraction for you, it’s going to feel like nothing you say or do can interest her anymore. Unfortunately, the reason why it feels like this is because it’s true, whatever you say or do is not as interesting to your girlfriend anymore.
She’s losing attraction for you and it won’t be long before your girlfriend starts acting completely cold and withdrawn… and from there it’s almost a guarantee that she’ll break up with you unless you make the right moves to increase her attraction for you again.
She’s Doesn’t Want To Get Hurt
A lot of the time women are scared of being hurt in a relationship. They’ve had their heart broken before and they don’t want to go through that again.
If your girlfriend starts to feel that your behavior could potentially hurt her, or, your behavior reminds her of an ex boyfriend that previously hurt her, then there’s a good chance that she will withdraw her feelings and emotions from the relationship.
When your girlfriend doesn’t want to get hurt by you and starts acting distant, she is also telling you that she doesn’t trust you completely and that she is protecting her emotions and her heart.
She’s Genuinely Busy
There’s a good chance that your girlfriend is simply acting distant because she is legitimately busy. Life can be difficult and stressful sometimes, especially if your girlfriend is an active person, she might want to achieve things and do a lot of things, but she might not feel like she has enough time for all this.
If your girlfriend has a job, wants to workout and stay fit as well as socialize and see her friends, then it really doesn’t leave her much time to focus on a relationship. It can be very difficult in this situation to find balance in the relationship.
Your girlfriend might have been very close and affectionate to you in the beginning, but it’s entirely possible that she feels like she has spent too much time on the relationship and now she needs to balance it out and focus on other areas of her life.
It’s important not to get too upset if you find yourself in this situation, you simply need to understand that your girlfriend is trying to find balance in her life—this doesn’t mean that she wants to leave you, even if it might feel like she is growing distant.
She’s Angry With You and Punishing You
If your girlfriend is angry with you and wants to punish you, she might act distant and withdrawn. This is simply her way of telling you that she isn’t happy with you.
One girl I knew told me that she was on a date and her boyfriend at the time spat his food out on the floor. The girl became upset about this and didn’t actually say anything about it, she just went quiet and distant. Her boyfriend, completely oblivious, thought her silence meant she was suffering from bi-polar and didn’t understand how his rude behavior had forced his girlfriend into a state of distance and withdrawal.
When a girl is angry, it’s very common for her to act distant and appear cold. It doesn’t necessarily meant that she wants to terminate the relationship, it simply means that she is angry with you and wants to make you suffer. How you deal with this situation, however, will ultimately determine whether or not your girlfriend will come back to you or grow even more distant over time.
She’s Testing You
If your girlfriend is testing you, she might appear to be cold and distant. Your girlfriend might be testing you for any number of reasons. Her tests might be real or fabricated, it doesn’t matter. What matters most is how you react to your girlfriend’s tests.
If you react in the wrong way and don’t deal with your girlfriend’s tests the right way she’s going to pull further and further away from you until she eventually loses all attraction for you and breaks up with you.
If you’re being tested and your girlfriend suddenly goes cold on you it means that you’re failing her tests and not doing things right.
She’s Interested In Someone Else
This one happens time and time again: a man’s girlfriend starts seeing another guy behind his back and, at the same time, his girlfriend grows more and more distant towards him.
No man wants to accept the reality that his girlfriend might actually be seeing another man behind his back. One of the first signs that this is happening is that his girlfriend starts to become less and less interested in him.
She stops responding to her partner’s messages, she stops wanting to be intimate with him and she doesn’t find him interesting anymore.
If your girlfriend is growing distant because she’s interested in someone else, then it’s very important that you do something about this ASAP—if you don’t take action in this situation then there’s a very good chance that your girlfriend will soon leave you. The writing’s on the wall, you have been warned!
She’s Thinking About Breaking Up With You
The first sign that your girlfriend is thinking about breaking up with you is that she starts acting more and more withdrawn and distant.
There will always be a time-lag from the moment when your girlfriend starts thinking about breaking up with you and she actually does break up with you.
During this time your girlfriend will start to push you away and become more and more disrespectful towards you. The most disrespectful and hurtful part of this situation is that your girlfriend doesn’t tell you how she’s really feeling, she simply decides to withdraw her emotions completely.
When a woman withdraws her emotions the end result is that she ends up becoming more and more distant. Women can’t conceal their true emotions and if they’re not emotionally into you (or their emotions are dying) they will physically pull away and become distant.
She Has An Avoidant Personality
If your girlfriend has an avoidant personality, then this means that your girlfriend will have trouble forming close attachments and showing intimacy.
Having a girlfriend with an avoidant personalty type means that your girlfriend won’t desire closeness and intimacy with you or anyone else for that matter. You don’t need to take this personally, but you do need to realize that you won’t be able to get close to this kind of girl without her pulling away from you dramatically at some point in time.
A girl with an avoidant attachment personalty style will always be like this and you won’t be able to change her. But this kind of attachment style is rare and it’s not something you will usually have to worry about.
If Your Girlfriend Grows Distant Don’t Do This
Jane had been pulling away from Peter for a week now and Peter knew she was getting more and more distant. Peter was upset and scared by Jane’s behavior. He tried calling her more and texting her more, but the more he did this the more she pulled away.
It didn’t make sense. Jane used to be so into him. She used to call him all the time and love being around him. Now, nothing he said interested her anymore.
Peter was desperate. He tried asking Jane what was wrong and she kept on saying, “Nothing’s wrong.” Peter tried to touch Jane and she kept pulling away. He tried to make love to her, but she said she was tired. But Jane wasn’t tired, she just didn’t want to be close to Peter anymore… she didn’t feel it. On top of that, she’d met another man who she found extremely attractive and interesting (just like Peter used to be). A month later, Jane left Peter to be with this other man.
Peter didn’t know what he’d done wrong. He was so kind and attentive towards Jane, but she still left him anyway. Peter was heartbroken. He didn’t understand that if he’d done things right, Jane would have come back to him with even greater attraction than ever before.
The Solution
If your girlfriend grows distant and starts to pull away, a man’s natural reaction is to chase and try to win her back through force of action.
What most men don’t realize, however, is that a woman is like a cat. Sometimes she will want to be close to you and want stroking, and other times she will want to go off and do her own thing. And when a cat wants to leave, it’s impossible to try and stop it unless you want to get your face clawed.
One important principle to understand is that whatever you are doing with your girlfriend at this moment in time is turning her off and causing her to act distant. As a result, you need to start doing exactly the opposite of what you’re doing and what your instincts tell you to do.
Your girlfriend pulls away from you and you, in turn, must mirror her actions and pull away from her too; your girlfriend wants to be close to you, then let her come close and show her affection in return.
Two years after she broke up with Peter, Jane started to date Paul. Paul had now been dating Jane for about six months when all of a sudden he noticed that Jane was becoming more and more distant. Jane used to be really into him. She was always affectionate and wanted to be intimate. She always answered his phone calls and always responded to his text messages. However, in the last couple of weeks, Paul noticed that Jane was becoming less affectionate, she wasn’t picking up her phone as much and he would often have to wait hours or days before his girlfriend responded to his text messages. In short, Paul’s girlfriend had started to become distant. Paul wasn’t a stupid guy and he wasn’t clueless, he knew something was wrong and that Jane was withdrawing from him. But unlike Peter, Paul understood women…
Paul immediately cut contact with Jane and started being distant with her as well. Of course, Jane didn’t message or speak to Paul for a couple of days, but he didn’t care. In fact, Paul was enjoying himself, he was hanging out with his friends, doing exercise and even chatting to a couple of female friends that liked him as well.
Jane had been upset with Paul and decided that she wanted to pull away from him to punish him. However, she noticed that Paul didn’t seem to care. He was out having fun, and when she finally contacted him to question him about this, Paul didn’t apologize for his behavior and just laughed it off.
Jane quickly realized that if she walked away from Paul, he wouldn’t even care. He would simply move on and find another girl. Paul’s value suddenly soared in Jane’s eyes. He seemed so confident and sure of himself and when Jane pulled away from him he didn’t get rattled. Paul wasn’t like all the other guys in her life who got freaked out when she went cold and distant… he was a strong and sure man.
Now as a psychologist I always like to back up what I say with strong scientific evidence based on valid empirical research. And it’s been scientifically proven that women are actually more attracted to guys who appear to be more selfish and bold (University of Amsterdam).
This means that if your girlfriend starts acting distant, you shouldn’t go into super caring and loving mode, trying to fix all her problems. You can’t fix her emotional state anyway, only time can do that. The best thing you can do is to simply walk away and let your girlfriend come back to you when she’s ready.
It’s also shown that playing hard to get seems to work as was quoted in the European Journal of Personality.
“Less available people are seen as more desirable romantic prospects.”
This is an interesting study. It shows that “scarcity” and “lack of availability” really does make a man more desirable and attractive to his girlfriend when he walks away from her.
It’s also important to let your girlfriend feel all of her emotions, including sadness. Understand when she feels sad or angry she will also want to be distant for periods of time too. However, if you also mirror her emotions and back away from your girlfriend you will put her into a state of anxiety and uncertainty—and when your girlfriend is in this state it’s been scientifically proven to increase a woman’s attraction for a man (University of Virginia).