Welcome to another episode of Thy Truth.

What is zoning out?

Today we’re going to talk about zoning out in a relationship. Have you ever heard of that? Have you ever been in a relationship or are you in a relationship where you find yourself constantly zoning out? It means you disassociate yourself or disconnect yourself from the relationship mentally.
You do that because it has taken out a lot from you. So when you zone out, you’re trying to protect your feelings. You’re trying to guard your feelings. You don’t want to become overwhelmed. You don’t want to become depressed. You don’t want to become anxious. You just want to block out whatever is going on in front of you, around you, mentally.
Have you ever been in that situation. Well, some of us have been there. I know what it means. I know what it feels like to get overwhelmed about certain things in our relationship. And sometimes you, knowingly or unknowingly, just give up. You know that you’ve passed the fight mode. You’ve passed the flight mode. Now you are reaching the end: the zone out mode, or freeze mode. And this happens when you talk to your partner or you try to communicate with your partner about how you feel, about how certain situations make you feel. You’ve tried to let them know that they hurt you when they keep doing this over and over again. Imagine being in a situation where your partner keeps hurting you.
Maybe they know that they hurt you. Maybe they don’t. But you’ve tried to communicate how you feel. OK, I’m going to give you an example. Maybe it’s a man and he comes back from work tired and you know, he just needs his partner to understand what he’s going through. He’s trying to communicate how he feels. He wants her to take interest in what he’s in, what he’s going through, but she has her own issues. You know those misunderstandings. She is nagging and in trying, you know, trying to make him understand, well, you’re not. I’m also going through a lot, you know, so and you try to communicate how you feel to your partners. You know, you’re trying to tell her, well, this is not the right time to talk about this.
And if you even if you want to talk about it, there’s a certain way those certain methods to set it as a certain time for it. Not right now, OK? And then on the other hand, maybe it’s a woman who feels OK. I don’t like the way you disrespects me. I don’t like the way you talk to me in front of the children. I don’t like how you talk to me in front of your friends, your family, or you keep going out. You keep cheating on me, you keep hurting me this way. I’m tired of it. Most times when things like this happen in a relationship, you get into that fight mode. So you’re fighting about it, arguing about it, yelling about it.
And sometimes you go into flight mode. You just avoid the situation, you avoid talking about it, you avoid getting yourself in that situation, in that same place where you don’t you know, you’re not happy in that situation. You just don’t want confrontation.
Now, if you’ve been in that situation, in that place where you’ve been trying to talk about it, it gets to a point where you are tired. It gets to a point where it’s exhausting. It has gotten to a point where you no longer see it solving any problem. You no longer see the fight mode working. The flight mode isn’t working either. You have become numb to your hurt.
You’re numb to your abuse, you’re numb to your manipulation. You’re numb to everything. Then you zone out. And I know some people who actually tell themselves for me to cope in this relationship I have to take out my feelings from this. I don’t let it bother me anymore. I don’t let it get to me anymore because I need to be saying I zone out of the relationship.
So that’s why you find a lot of relationships that are emotionless. You see them and you just know that there’s no emotions, there’s nothing going on between these two. They just create this facade, like, OK, we’re in a relationship, but it’s without emotions. There are numb. Nothing your partner will do or does matters anymore. It feels like you’ve become immune to the pain, you’ve become immune to the hurt. It’s the only way you can survive, the only way you can let go, the only way you can move on. I would call it a coping tactic. It is the only way you can cope, what helps the stress or the Walhala go away – but only for certain time.

Zoning out, does it help?

Which brings me to the question: Zoning out, does it help? Does it help in a relationship? A lot of people use it as a coping tactic. To help with the stress, with the problems you’re facing. It helps them cope. It helps them to deal with it, you know, for that moment. But in the long run, zoning out of your relationship, be numb to what’s going on, not talking about it causes more strain. It makes it difficult to communicate, it makes it difficult to deal with challenges. It makes it difficult for you. Your relationship is no longer fun. It has become emotionless. There are no emotions. What is a relationship without emotions? It is like a body without a heart. Nothing is beating anymore. Nothing. It’s not alive.

So does it help when you zone out? No! In the long run it doesn’t help. One thing you should understand is that no one will just zone out without a reason. There is, of course, a reason for everything. Maybe the relationship is falling apart. And there is no way out, you know, they’ve tried all they could to revive it, but they feel like it’s not working.
If you want to make that relationship work, there is also no way you can revive it if you keep zoning out. If you keep spacing out. Yes, granted, there are situations, something happened or things have been happening and you’re tired and exhausted. You’re unhappy. It’s important to understand why your partner is zoning out. If you want to work things out, you need to understand where it’s coming from.
Is it that, they’ve tried to communicate their feelings to you to no avail? So one thing I know is getting out of that phase of zoning out in a relationship would take a lot of work. Personally, I think you cannot solve a problem or sort the situation when they’ve mentally blocked you. Right?
If your partner has blocked you mentally, it’s hard, especially when it comes from a woman. Then it is even harder.

Commit To Making Changes

So for you to help, for you to make it work, your partner would need to see changes. Words no longer mean anything. Saying, “Oh, I would work on it or I’m going to do it! I will try my best!” I am sorry but those are just words. They mean nothing. The best way is to have a meaningful conversation. The partner would need to see genuine changes and then rekindle what you have. If it’s important to you.

Give Each Other Space

Once a relationship gets to a phase where one of the partners has zoned out, giving each other space might be able to fix it. Giving each other space doesn’t necessarily mean you have to separate and go your separate ways. It doesn’t mean that one person has to move on to another person and start a new relationship and look for a substitute. No! It requires that you both understand why give each other spend time apart, but still do that in a loving way. It might just give you both a chance to reconnect with your own values and desires. And maybe you can clearly see what’s going on and on the how your actions or inactions are affecting your partner.
Giving space to each other when you’re married might be a bit difficult. You don’t want to drift apart more. And that’s why if you can avoid get into a situation where your partner zones out because when they’re no longer emotionally connected to you emotionally, mentally, it’s quite difficult to fix that.

Other Things You Can Do

But there are a few things you could try out. Hopefully it helps because start with reflecting on what drew you together. Why did you connect with this person? Although most times we do connect with people for the wrong reasons. However, not all connections are just for the wrong reasons. So reflect on what drew you together and try to work things out recognize where the problem is because that’s the most important thing.
Understand and recognize where the issues are coming from and be kind, you know, be empathetic, put yourself in your partner’s shoes, be respectful, do it respectfully. And know this, you cannot just snap your fingers. You can just say, oh, you know, I am. I’ve tried. I am tired. If you don’t want you know, you have to actually make it work. Snapping your finger would not fix a broken relationship. You need to be more empathetic. You need to have mutual respect. You need to talk about it. And the other person or both of you need to listen. Cool off! Give each other time and space to cool off and then reflect and hopefully you’re able to reconnect and move in the right direction.

I wish you all the best
Sincerely Efemena