How to Ask for Connection Without Pushing Your Partner Away
You’ve always harbored the fear that you care more about your partner than they care about you.
Sometimes you can sit quietly with this fear, keeping it to yourself or talking it through with friends. But sometimes the pain flows over, and you lash out, desperate for connection, asking your partner for some kind of reassurance that they still want to be with you.
But instead of feeling heard, your partner gets quiet. Or defensive. Or walks away. Ouch.
Even if your partner is stable, supportive, or reassuring, you can’t seem to feel at ease in the relationship. Whenever there is a moment’s disconnection—they seem distant or take a while to respond to a text—your whole body goes on high alert.
“It’s over.”
“They don’t love me.”
“I’m too much.”
You’re Not Too Much: Why Your Longing Makes Sense
If this sounds familiar, you might be the pursuer in your relationship, according to Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), an attachment-based, emotionally responsive therapy that helps couples break the cycle of disconnection and feel more deeply understood by their partners.
If this is you, know this: you’re not too much. You’re just caught in a painful relationship pattern that many couples experience. This pattern may feel especially pronounced if your partner is a withdrawer, someone who might pull away to keep the peace.
What It Feels Like To Be The Pursuer
If you’re the one who moves toward your partner during conflict, you might feel:
Desperate for answers, closeness, or reassurance
Worried that you care more than your partner does
Afraid of being too much, but unsure how else to get through
Frustrated by being the one who always initiates repair
Hurt that your efforts are often misunderstood as criticism or control
Why It Feels So Urgent to Fix the Distance
When you feel your partner pulling away, the fear kicks in at lightning speed: What did I do wrong? Are they upset? Are they leaving?
This urgency may be rooted in anxious attachment, past experiences of disconnection, or feeling like emotional safety has never been a given. It’s a response to emotional unavailability, not a flaw in who you are.
But if your partner doesn’t know how to respond—or feels overwhelmed by intensity—they may shut down. And that triggers the cycle all over again.
The Cycle That Keeps You Stuck (and How It Starts)
Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) calls this push-pull dynamic the pursuer/withdrawer cycle, one of the most common causes of relationship conflict.
The more you push to connect, the more your partner may withdraw. And the more they shut down, the more desperate you feel.
You’re not reacting this way because you want to fight. You’re reacting this way because you want to matter.
And your partner isn’t pulling away because they don’t care. They may be feeling overwhelmed, afraid to get it wrong, or unsure how to meet you in your vulnerability.
This happens to couples that deeply love each other and are simply trying their best to manage their emotions and protect the relationship from further disconnect.
How to Ask for Reassurance Without Pushing Them Away
Change can begin with you. You don’t have to shut down your needs, you can try to reach out differently.
Try these EFT-informed approaches to asking for connection or reassurance:
Use a soft start-up: Begin with something gentle and clear. Instead of "You never talk to me," try "I miss you and I want to feel closer."
Name your feelings, not their failures: "I'm feeling disconnected lately," lands better than, "You don't care."
Invite, don’t demand: "Would now be a good time to talk for a few minutes?" instead of "We need to talk now."
Take a breath before you reach: Give your nervous system a moment to settle. The connection you're seeking is more likely when you feel grounded.
Name the pattern out loud: Try, "I think I might be going into pursuer mode again—I want to connect, but I don't want to overwhelm you."
These small relationship shifts create space for emotional safety so your partner can stay in the room with you instead of shutting down.
Should You Start This Work Alone—or Together?
Perhaps you’ve tried to make some shifts, and it’s not helping. You might be wondering: Should we go to therapy together? Or should I start this work on my own?
The truth is, there’s no wrong place to begin.
Couples therapy—especially EFT—is designed to help both partners understand and shift the dynamic together. If your partner is open to attending, it can be a powerful way to reconnect.
But individual therapy is also a meaningful choice, especially if:
Your partner isn’t ready for couples therapy
You want to explore your own patterns and attachment history
You’re unsure what’s yours and what’s part of the relationship
You have an anxiety disorder or OCD that impacts the relationship
You’re not sure if you want to stay or leave the relationship.
Whether you’re working solo or together, you can begin to interrupt the cycle and start moving toward more connection and closeness with your partner.
What If We’re Rebuilding Trust After an Affair?
When trust has been broken through infidelity, the pursuer/withdrawer cycle can become even more intense and incredibly painful.
As the partner who tends to pursue, you may find yourself urgently seeking reassurance, closeness, or repair, yet feeling repeatedly shut out or met with defensiveness.
This response is completely understandable. After a betrayal, the stakes feel higher. You may want answers and emotional information, but your partner might be flooded with shame, fear, or avoidance, making it even harder for them to stay emotionally present.
In this context, Emotionally Focused Therapy can provide a structured path forward. EFT allows both partners to process what happened, explore emotional impact, and begin rebuilding safety through vulnerability and responsiveness at a pace that honors both partners’ needs.
How Anxiety or OCD Can Intensify The Pattern
If you live with an anxiety diagnosis or OCD, the urge to pursue can be amplified x10. Anxiety heightens sensitivity to threat, especially relational threat. Thus, you might find it harder to tolerate uncertainty or emotional distance, making your partner’s withdrawal feel absolutely catastrophic, even when it’s not intended to hurt you.
If you have Relationship OCD (ROCD), even reassurance may never fully settle you, leading to a constant loop of doubt and pursuit.
Working with a therapist who understands both anxiety disorders, OCD, and attachment-based therapy can help you untangle what’s happening within.
You’ll learn how to shift communication and relationship patterns and discern which signals from your partner reflect real disconnection—and which are old fears being activated.
Your Longing Is Not the Problem
If you take nothing else from this post, know this: Wanting closeness and reassurance is not wrong.
It makes you deeply, wonderfully human. You are wired for love and connection, and especially attuned to your closest relationships. This is something that makes you you. Your desire to feel emotionally safe and understood is valid.
Over time, you don’t have to chase it through panic, protest, or emotional labor that leaves you drained and resentful. With the right support, this cycle can shift. You can learn to reach in ways that feel honoring to both you and your partner.
Give Your Heart The Care It Deserves
At Heights Couples Therapy, we work with both individuals and couples navigating relationship conflict, communication breakdown, anxiety, and patterns of emotional disconnection.
Whether you’re the one who always reaches out or the one who pulls away, you deserve a relationship that feels safe and connected.
Let’s work together to shift the pattern and help you build the kind of closeness you’re longing for.