How do INFJs process emotions in long-term relationships?

[RestlessJohn]

Hey everyone, I’d love some insight from INFJs about something I’m struggling with. My wife is an INFJ, and we’ve been together for 15 years, but over the last 7+ years, we’ve both been emotionally checked out. We’ve stayed together largely for our children, but I recently had a very sudden change of heart and have been trying to reconnect with her and rebuild our relationship. However, she’s still very withdrawn and hasn’t given a clear answer about whether she wants to try or not. When I ask, she often goes quiet or cries, which makes it hard for me to understand where she really stands.
I’m an ENFP, so I express my emotions as soon as I feel them, but I realise she processes things very differently. The problem is, I’ve become desperate to get back to how things were before we had children, and I struggle with anxiety when I don’t get reassurance from her. I don’t want to push her, but I also feel stuck in limbo.
For those of you who are INFJs, how do you handle emotional overwhelm in relationships? If you’ve ever been in a situation like this, what helped you open up?

Thank you

 

[TomasM]

Like most types, INFJ's have a wide variance in their approach to life. As an INFJ male, I'd say I probably understand some other female types better than an INFJ female because she is considerably more complex.

Given that you are both NF's I suspect there is deep emotional pain within both of you and it is likely that you are both stepping on that pain and perpetually aggravating it. I have an acquaintance that is a PsyD and he has always said that couples only have one fight with different triggers that initiate it. I believe that if you are to get to the root of this problem then you must first understand the origin of both of your struggle (likely from the parental relationship and associated with not feeling safe; hence her crying and your anxiety).

You will have far more information to solve this problem than any of us and your understanding of each other will be incredibly important to finding a balance or common ground. The only way to achieve this is by opening up communication, letting down the walls, and having a large degree of empathy for the pain each suffers. With her being noncommittal, that tells me she does not feel safe enough to let you in to have a real discussion and that means you will have to convince her to go to a place where she does feel protected. Couples therapy is your best option IMO.

 

[RestlessJohn]

Thank you for your perspective—I really appreciate it. I think you're spot on about both of us having deep emotional pain that keeps getting triggered in different ways. I also find the idea that couples only have 'one fight' with different triggers really interesting. If I had to guess, I'd say our 'one fight' is probably about emotional safety—me feeling rejected and anxious when she withdraws, and her feeling overwhelmed or trapped when I seek reassurance.

I completely agree that communication and empathy are key. The hard part is that whenever I try to initiate deeper conversations, she often goes silent or cries.

When she does engage, she talks about her childhood, which was emotionally traumatic. I always listen, because any moment of openness makes me feel connected to her. But this is obviously trauma she has buried for years, and in turn, it makes me feel like I’m hurting her just by bringing things up.

I don’t want to push her, but she never mentions our relationship, and at the same time, I can’t keep living in limbo forever. I think you're right that she doesn’t feel safe enough to fully open up, and I’ve been trying to give her that space, but I also don’t know how long I can wait without some kind of engagement from her side.

I’ve read a bit about the INFJ ‘doorslam’—but we do still talk occasionally, just never about the future. When we do talk about the relationship, it’s always about the past and how we hurt each other, not where we go from here. Does this sound like a doorslam or just emotional disengagement, which we both did for many years?

Couples therapy is something I’ve suggested many times, but she refuses, saying she knows she needs to talk to someone, but is worried she would end up taking on the therapist’s pain. Do you have any thoughts on how I could approach that conversation in a way that doesn’t make her feel pressured?

 

[TomasM]

I don’t believe you’re going to convince her to do something she’s not interested in doing.

If you truly care about her and want her in your life as a friend or partner then you have to show her [with your actions and not your words] that you can be the man she needs (first) and wants (second). That’s a tough mountain to climb given the last 7+ years has been “emotionally checked out.”

My suggestion is to live your life independently and find your own content and happiness. This is the type of man that draws women into his life.

I suspect she’s crying because she feels she has to carry your emotional weight, by reassuring you, while keeping all of the other things moving forward in her life. Of course, she can’t say that because that would only make you angry, defensive and withdrawn.

There are no easy answers to this scenario, there is only the work that must be done. Take pride in your work and personal passions. Go to therapy yourself and see a doctor that might help you with your struggles. Eat healthy and exercise.

Work so much that when you get home you’re ready to crash as soon as your head hits the pillow. If your work is aligned with your passion then you will get up the next day excited and ready to continue your pursuit. If your work and passion isn’t aligned then find a way to start moving towards an alignment and during the interim enjoy the work through the relationships and by helping others.

Doing these things will result in a better life for you and the other things will naturally fall into place.

Above all, keep moving forward because living in the past creates a sedentary state that is akin to being stuck in quicksand.

 

[John K]

Hi @RestlessJohn and welcome to the forum.

I'm sure you appreciate that because you have only said a little about yourself and your wife any thoughts here are about INFJs in general, or about myself.

Something that INFJs do is internalise other people, particularly those close to us: we bring you inside us and relate to you there - in all your glory, but also faults and problems and all. It took me half a lifetime to learn how not to bring others in too far, and internalise their problems as well as my own, and it nearly broke me. We can easily get to the point where we can't separate our own problems from the other's. When we are young, we can feel unlimited internally and that we can cope with anything, but we are only finite like anyone else. We are even more prone to this when we are young adults if we have had emotional struggles because we feel and empathise deeply with the same in others quite instinctively.

It's a bit like when you pick up something that's hot, but not very - or something that's fairly heavy but not very. At first you can hold it OK, but it gets more and more uncomfortable until in the end you have to let go. You think it's OK, but eventually you find it's not. But when an INFJ gets into this situation with another's emotions it's a lot worse, because putting the burden down is a failure in several ways - because it means we risk having to face our own weakness, for example, but most seriously because it is letting the other person down so very badly, and this is a terrible thing for us to have to do. It's more serious than my words may seem to suggest, because we often become in our person an ongoing solution to another's problems - they rely on us to the extent that they may fall apart if we have to eject them from our inner selves.

It's doubly difficult when we have children, who we very much bring within ourselves, and who take up so much of our emotional energy. Do you have teenage children? - they are more demanding in this way at that age than at any other, and it can be hard and exhausting.

We INFJ folks have to learn the hard way how to deal with this - and sometimes that involves falling over an inner cliff that we weren't aware was there. We can have a breakdown at an extreme, or we can simply eject the other person from our lives and bring the shutters down. It's almost like pulling your hand away from a hot pan that you've grabbed by accident, or dropping something heavy that you realise has unexpectedly put your back out. Except that it feels like we've failed big time, even when that isn't our fault and not actually so, and it can be so hard for us to face that we can simply avoid it. And we can get stuck in an emotional doom loop, or just walk away.

So ..... what to do? You won't both be in the same situation as when I faced this in my 40s, and I'm the INFJ not my wife. Is it possible that you have been an emotional burden rather than a support for your wife for quite a time? She'll feel this even more as you try and mend the situation with ever increasing anxiety - she will be very aware of that anxiety most likely, and that will simply add to her emotional burden. She may even feel that you are looking for a rescue from her when she may not have the capacity to provide it.
But all of these are not hard suggestions - just possibilities.

What could help very possibly is for you to back off in the right kind of way and give her space - to be an emotional support rather than a burden. I have found myself that the way to love someone very close to us is not to bring them into our inner souls, and if we do, we may have to push them outside our innermost boundary to love them properly. That can feel to them like a rejection, but it's not - by analogy, it's like not being obliged to carry them physically on our shoulders everywhere, which of course is no good for the INFJ person or their partner. I must emphasise that this is an INFJ subjective view - the other (yourself for example) may well see things very differently, and the actual situation may be very different again.

Perhaps you could try wooing her all over again, and try and give rather than take from her - give in a way suited to her rather than you? As @TomasM suggests, a counselor may be a good help.

 

[RestlessJohn]

I don’t believe you’re going to convince her to do something she’s not interested in doing.

If you truly care about her and want her in your life as a friend or partner then you have to show her [with your actions and not your words] that you can be the man she needs (first) and wants (second). That’s a tough mountain to climb given the last 7+ years has been “emotionally checked out.”

My suggestion is to live your life independently and find your own content and happiness. This is the type of man that draws women into his life.

I suspect she’s crying because she feels she has to carry your emotional weight, by reassuring you, while keeping all of the other things moving forward in her life. Of course, she can’t say that because that would only make you angry, defensive and withdrawn.

There are no easy answers to this scenario, there is only the work that must be done. Take pride in your work and personal passions. Go to therapy yourself and see a doctor that might help you with your struggles. Eat healthy and exercise.

Work so much that when you get home you’re ready to crash as soon as your head hits the pillow. If your work is aligned with your passion then you will get up the next day excited and ready to continue your pursuit. If your work and passion isn’t aligned then find a way to start moving towards an alignment and during the interim enjoy the work through the relationships and by helping others.

Doing these things will result in a better life for you and the other things will naturally fall into place.

Above all, keep moving forward because living in the past creates a sedentary state that is akin to being stuck in quicksand.

Thank you for such a thoughtful reply—I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your perspective. My wife excitedly told me about five years ago that she was an INFJ, but at the time, I took little notice. Looking back now, I can see how much it meant to her to share that with me. Since my 'awakening' a few months ago, I’ve started to learn about MBTI and Enneagram, and it’s been truly enlightening to realise that I’m not the only one who is the way I am—scatty, lost in thought, and prone to extreme daydreams.

I can only imagine how she felt when she first discovered she wasn’t alone. Your responses, as well as the gentleman below (who I’ll reply to next), are so detailed and emotive. I had read that INFJs are deeply introspective, but the depth of your replies has really taken me aback. Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts.

I completely agree that I can’t convince her to do something she’s not interested in, and I’ve been reflecting a lot on how my emotional state might be affecting the dynamic between us. If she feels like she’s carrying my emotional weight, that’s definitely not what I want, and I recognise that it might be part of the reason she withdraws.

The idea of focusing on my own life, passions, and work makes complete sense, and I can see how that could naturally shift the dynamic. It’s difficult after years of feeling disconnected, but I know that staying stuck in the past isn’t going to fix anything. Therapy and self-care are things I’ve been considering more seriously, and I realise that my own emotional well-being has to come first, regardless of where my relationship ends up.

I suppose my biggest challenge is finding the balance between giving her space and still showing that I care. Have you ever been in a situation like this? How did you manage to rebuild emotional connection while still maintaining your own sense of purpose?

 

[RestlessJohn]

Hi @RestlessJohn and welcome to the forum.

I'm sure you appreciate that because you have only said a little about yourself and your wife any thoughts here are about INFJs in general, or about myself.

Something that INFJs do is internalise other people, particularly those close to us: we bring you inside us and relate to you there - in all your glory, but also faults and problems and all. It took me half a lifetime to learn how not to bring others in too far, and internalise their problems as well as my own, and it nearly broke me. We can easily get to the point where we can't separate our own problems from the other's. When we are young, we can feel unlimited internally and that we can cope with anything, but we are only finite like anyone else. We are even more prone to this when we are young adults if we have had emotional struggles because we feel and empathise deeply with the same in others quite instinctively.

It's a bit like when you pick up something that's hot, but not very - or something that's fairly heavy but not very. At first you can hold it OK, but it gets more and more uncomfortable until in the end you have to let go. You think it's OK, but eventually you find it's not. But when an INFJ gets into this situation with another's emotions it's a lot worse, because putting the burden down is a failure in several ways - because it means we risk having to face our own weakness, for example, but most seriously because it is letting the other person down so very badly, and this is a terrible thing for us to have to do. It's more serious than my words may seem to suggest, because we often become in our person an ongoing solution to another's problems - they rely on us to the extent that they may fall apart if we have to eject them from our inner selves.

It's doubly difficult when we have children, who we very much bring within ourselves, and who take up so much of our emotional energy. Do you have teenage children? - they are more demanding in this way at that age than at any other, and it can be hard and exhausting.

We INFJ folks have to learn the hard way how to deal with this - and sometimes that involves falling over an inner cliff that we weren't aware was there. We can have a breakdown at an extreme, or we can simply eject the other person from our lives and bring the shutters down. It's almost like pulling your hand away from a hot pan that you've grabbed by accident, or dropping something heavy that you realise has unexpectedly put your back out. Except that it feels like we've failed big time, even when that isn't our fault and not actually so, and it can be so hard for us to face that we can simply avoid it. And we can get stuck in an emotional doom loop, or just walk away.

So ..... what to do? You won't both be in the same situation as when I faced this in my 40s, and I'm the INFJ not my wife. Is it possible that you have been an emotional burden rather than a support for your wife for quite a time? She'll feel this even more as you try and mend the situation with ever increasing anxiety - she will be very aware of that anxiety most likely, and that will simply add to her emotional burden. She may even feel that you are looking for a rescue from her when she may not have the capacity to provide it.
But all of these are not hard suggestions - just possibilities.

What could help very possibly is for you to back off in the right kind of way and give her space - to be an emotional support rather than a burden. I have found myself that the way to love someone very close to us is not to bring them into our inner souls, and if we do, we may have to push them outside our innermost boundary to love them properly. That can feel to them like a rejection, but it's not - by analogy, it's like not being obliged to carry them physically on our shoulders everywhere, which of course is no good for the INFJ person or their partner. I must emphasise that this is an INFJ subjective view - the other (yourself for example) may well see things very differently, and the actual situation may be very different again.

Perhaps you could try wooing her all over again, and try and give rather than take from her - give in a way suited to her rather than you? As @TomasM suggests, a counselor may be a good help.

@John K ., a deep, heartfelt thank you. You have opened up so much of a world I never knew existed until a few months ago. You know, I used to look at my wife before my awakening and think I was with such a strong, together soul. When she opened up and told me about her excessive thinking and the trauma in her life, I was shocked beyond words and in awe of her strength. It only added to my urgency to get our relationship back to where we were before the children. Yes, we do have a pre-teen and a teenager, so there is a lot of emotion in our house, to say the least.


Your message helps me understand my wife’s perspective in a way I hadn’t even remotely considered before.
The idea that she may have been carrying my emotional weight, even without me realising it, really resonates. Looking back, I can see how she might have internalised my struggles, especially in the years when I was emotionally checked out, and now again as I try to reconnect. It makes sense that my anxiety about fixing things could feel like an additional burden to her, even though that’s not my intention. She told me that she can tell how much anxiety I have and what mood I’m in just from my text messages—I think we are both hyper-vigilant of each other. I used to think that when I shut down, I had done it alone. But now, I feel like I took her with me. Creating a downward spiral of both our beings.


I found your analogy about carrying someone physically on your shoulders powerful—it made me realise that I may have been leaning on her emotionally in a way that feels too heavy for her right now. The last thing I want is to make her feel trapped in a situation where she has no emotional space of her own.


The challenge I have now is figuring out how to step back in a way that gives her the space she needs while still showing that I care. I don’t want her to interpret my giving space as me withdrawing again like I did for years. Your suggestion of wooing her again, in a way that gives rather than takes, is something I will explore, and work on.


Have you ever been in a situation where you had to push someone outside your innermost boundary for your ownwell-being? If so, what helped you feel safe enough to let them back in?
With metta.

 

[TomasM]

Have you ever been in a situation like this?

Similar but not the same.

How did you manage to rebuild emotional connection while still maintaining your own sense of purpose?

Emotional connections are built over time and are aligned with trust and values. Individual purpose(s) are also aligned with your values personally. No two individual are the same in this regard, though there are similarities within a given culture.

Some questions you might reflect on could be:

Why do you want to reconnect when you have been disconnected emotionally for so long?

How will things be different then they have been over the the last 7 years?

Can trust be achieved to a level that is sustainable and what is the risk of harm in the event of a failure.

What will be the impact on the children?

These are the types of things that are discussed openly in therapy with a good couples counselor.

———

Emotions are important to varying degrees within a relationship but there are many other things that must be considered when making a good choice. Good choices generally require looking at the situation without emotions and that’s really difficult when there’s a long history.

When two people separate it generally means that something has breached the level of trust or values to where it is no longer tolerable. This is why I suggest some of the questions above. If the only driver of separation is emotions then the likelihood of a cohesive and balanced family seems highly improbable.

 

[sassafras]

Hey everyone, I’d love some insight from INFJs about something I’m struggling with. My wife is an INFJ, and we’ve been together for 15 years, but over the last 7+ years, we’ve both been emotionally checked out. We’ve stayed together largely for our children, but I recently had a very sudden change of heart and have been trying to reconnect with her and rebuild our relationship. However, she’s still very withdrawn and hasn’t given a clear answer about whether she wants to try or not. When I ask, she often goes quiet or cries, which makes it hard for me to understand where she really stands.
I’m an ENFP, so I express my emotions as soon as I feel them, but I realise she processes things very differently. The problem is, I’ve become desperate to get back to how things were before we had children, and I struggle with anxiety when I don’t get reassurance from her. I don’t want to push her, but I also feel stuck in limbo.
For those of you who are INFJs, how do you handle emotional overwhelm in relationships? If you’ve ever been in a situation like this, what helped you open up?

Thank you

Thank you for your perspective—I really appreciate it. I think you're spot on about both of us having deep emotional pain that keeps getting triggered in different ways. I also find the idea that couples only have 'one fight' with different triggers really interesting. If I had to guess, I'd say our 'one fight' is probably about emotional safety—me feeling rejected and anxious when she withdraws, and her feeling overwhelmed or trapped when I seek reassurance.

I completely agree that communication and empathy are key. The hard part is that whenever I try to initiate deeper conversations, she often goes silent or cries.

When she does engage, she talks about her childhood, which was emotionally traumatic. I always listen, because any moment of openness makes me feel connected to her. But this is obviously trauma she has buried for years, and in turn, it makes me feel like I’m hurting her just by bringing things up.

I don’t want to push her, but she never mentions our relationship, and at the same time, I can’t keep living in limbo forever. I think you're right that she doesn’t feel safe enough to fully open up, and I’ve been trying to give her that space, but I also don’t know how long I can wait without some kind of engagement from her side.

I’ve read a bit about the INFJ ‘doorslam’—but we do still talk occasionally, just never about the future. When we do talk about the relationship, it’s always about the past and how we hurt each other, not where we go from here. Does this sound like a doorslam or just emotional disengagement, which we both did for many years?

Couples therapy is something I’ve suggested many times, but she refuses, saying she knows she needs to talk to someone, but is worried she would end up taking on the therapist’s pain. Do you have any thoughts on how I could approach that conversation in a way that doesn’t make her feel pressured?

I completely agree that I can’t convince her to do something she’s not interested in, and I’ve been reflecting a lot on how my emotional state might be affecting the dynamic between us. If she feels like she’s carrying my emotional weight, that’s definitely not what I want, and I recognise that it might be part of the reason she withdraws.

The idea of focusing on my own life, passions, and work makes complete sense, and I can see how that could naturally shift the dynamic. It’s difficult after years of feeling disconnected, but I know that staying stuck in the past isn’t going to fix anything. Therapy and self-care are things I’ve been considering more seriously, and I realise that my own emotional well-being has to come first, regardless of where my relationship ends up.

I suppose my biggest challenge is finding the balance between giving her space and still showing that I care. Have you ever been in a situation like this? How did you manage to rebuild emotional connection while still maintaining your own sense of purpose?

Hello, it's been a while since I've been here, but I've read through this thread and this is my two cents on the matter.

Respectfully, I don't think you're going to get any insight into the situation by approaching this from a 'personality' angle. I say this, because doing so suggests you're dealing with someone who is on healthy, emotional footing and who hasn't detached from the partnership. Yes, different personality types have different ways of processing their emotions and some may take some time away from their partner to sort out what they're thinking and feeling but, regardless of their strategy, a healthy person will make an effort and come back to talk to you about it. Or at least, come back with a plan or decision to move forward -- even if it's unpleasant or difficult.

However, I think your situation is slightly more complicated than a simple misalignment in emotional processing.

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't sound like you've had much of a relationship for many years. When someone says that they're staying together for the children, my immediate assumption is that the dynamic is more like co-parenting roommates. Which, even on the best of terms, can be extremely traumatic as the mind and body have to find some way to cope with the inevitable feelings of loss, betrayal and grief that come with the end of a marriage while still remaining in the marriage.

The roots of this kind of trauma can run very deep, especially if the struggle to emotionally detach was psychologically costly. When you further couple this with childhood emotional trauma, this can create a very ugly and serious wound. Your wife might've worked very hard to make peace with your relationship as it was, and contented herself with stuffing all her problems into the emotional closet as her chief coping mechanism (as indicated by her resistance to go to therapy, running away from difficult conversations, etc.) Now that you decided you want a marriage again, you're asking her to tear down all the walls she's carefully built up around herself and face the things that she's avoided for so many years just so that *you* can feel safe and secure. Even though that may have not been your intention, that can be extremely invalidating.

Furthermore, depending on just how 'sudden' this change of heart was and how it was communicated, it's also entirely possible she might mistrust it. Why the rush? Why now? What if this is transient? What if she puts in all the emotional work and opens up to you again only for things to fall apart once you 'win' her again? Staying detached by avoiding difficult emotional conversations and couples counselling may be a way to keep herself safe while she figures out where all this is coming from and if she can actually trust you.

Which brings me to ask - have you had a chance to process all this? By your own admission, you've been checked out of the marriage for seven years. That's a long time to grow apart and develop into different people. It's very unusual to make such a switch on a whim. If you haven't done so already, I think this is an important factor to explore for yourself. What exactly changed your mind? Have you fallen in love again? Or is something else at play?

I think taking things slow would be beneficial for both of you.

As for your wife, I agree with the other posters who suggested you focus on yourself and give her the space to figure out her own feelings and do your best to build up that sense of trust between the two of you. If she's running away and not wanting to confront things, just acknowledge that you understand just why things may be difficult for her and verbally reassure her that you're not going to rush anything, that you're going to give her some breathing room by doing your own thing. I also liked the idea of wooing her again. Revert back to the early days of dating again, where you're not asking for deep conversations, but maybe arranging a date once a week or surprising her with flowers. Not too much, too soon, but small little gestures that show her that you're thinking of her and that you're serious about this.

I wish you the best of luck.

 

[John K]

@John K ., a deep, heartfelt thank you. You have opened up so much of a world I never knew existed until a few months ago. You know, I used to look at my wife before my awakening and think I was with such a strong, together soul. When she opened up and told me about her excessive thinking and the trauma in her life, I was shocked beyond words and in awe of her strength. It only added to my urgency to get our relationship back to where we were before the children. Yes, we do have a pre-teen and a teenager, so there is a lot of emotion in our house, to say the least.


Your message helps me understand my wife’s perspective in a way I hadn’t even remotely considered before.
The idea that she may have been carrying my emotional weight, even without me realising it, really resonates. Looking back, I can see how she might have internalised my struggles, especially in the years when I was emotionally checked out, and now again as I try to reconnect. It makes sense that my anxiety about fixing things could feel like an additional burden to her, even though that’s not my intention. She told me that she can tell how much anxiety I have and what mood I’m in just from my text messages—I think we are both hyper-vigilant of each other. I used to think that when I shut down, I had done it alone. But now, I feel like I took her with me. Creating a downward spiral of both our beings.


I found your analogy about carrying someone physically on your shoulders powerful—it made me realise that I may have been leaning on her emotionally in a way that feels too heavy for her right now. The last thing I want is to make her feel trapped in a situation where she has no emotional space of her own.


The challenge I have now is figuring out how to step back in a way that gives her the space she needs while still showing that I care. I don’t want her to interpret my giving space as me withdrawing again like I did for years. Your suggestion of wooing her again, in a way that gives rather than takes, is something I will explore, and work on.


Have you ever been in a situation where you had to push someone outside your innermost boundary for your ownwell-being? If so, what helped you feel safe enough to let them back in?
With metta.

Hi John,

I have had to push someone close to me outside that innermost boundary, but in very different circumstances to yours - my wife was suffering from a severe psychological illness. I didn't let her back within me in the same unconditional way - and that was very much better for both of us because it's a dangerous and silly thing to do. Only the other person can take the essential steps to healing in the end. And I had the children to take care of too. I changed the way I loved them all, made sure I was as stable as possible for them within, spat the devil in the eye, and slowly we climbed out of the pit. I took a wild gamble in doing it - it's only with hindsight I can see it clearly.

But I wouldn't want you to take what I said about INFJ inner life as anything other than some general ideas about how at least some INFJs relate to people very close to them, and myself as an example.

Some other thoughts .....

The foundations of a marriage in the early years lie in your mutual love, attraction and delight in each other, but for most couples this changes as the years go by, and as your children appear and grow. Of course, you are each sharing your love with your children too, but more than that, marriage becomes hard work. It is in these years that many couples find their very deepest lifetime love for each other - in the absolute trust and partnership that is the core of their family. It can be as though you become a single thing, not two separate people. It's no longer erotic love that's at your heart, but pure family love that you create and sustain through all the ups and downs of your life together. I don't mean you stop fancying each other, but this is no longer the only core and the heart of your relationship. This new kind of love is what many take forward as their foundation into later life - look at couples who have been happily married for 40 or 50 years to see what I mean.

In living emotionally apart for 7 years, the kind of love I am talking about cannot have developed as it would have done if all had been well. You are now both 7 years on with all the history that brings - it's almost half of your life as a couple. If all had been well, you would have grown together over that time like two trees that grow side by side - they shape themselves into each other and when you look at them from a bit of a distance they look like a single thing. They support each other immensely because of that and a copse of trees is far stronger than an isolated tree on its own. You and your wife must be lacking that seven years of growing together and shaping yourselves into each other - the way you describe it, it's as though you are just two people. My feeling is that you will have to deal with seven years' lost development of love, trust and emotional partnership in the sense I am talking about, as well as whether you could both still love each other like you used to. Whether you can make a go of it will depend amongst other things on whether you both have a willingness, and the inner resources to accept the risk involved - and that might be bound up with how many times over the years one or the other of you has taken that sort of risk and been let down by the other.

As a footnote - I have had to support someone whose parents broke up when she was in her teens. Some kids seem to cope well with divorce, but it blighted her life. Even if all you and your wife can do is give your kids a stable family life, and love under the same roof from both their mum and dad until they are grown up, that is a very precious gift - as long as you and your wife can do this well.

 

[WhyNna]

Like most types, INFJ's have a wide variance in their approach to life. As an INFJ male, I'd say I probably understand some other female types better than an INFJ female because she is considerably more complex.

Given that you are both NF's I suspect there is deep emotional pain within both of you and it is likely that you are both stepping on that pain and perpetually aggravating it. I have an acquaintance that is a PsyD and he has always said that couples only have one fight with different triggers that initiate it. I believe that if you are to get to the root of this problem then you must first understand the origin of both of your struggle (likely from the parental relationship and associated with not feeling safe; hence her crying and your anxiety).

You will have far more information to solve this problem than any of us and your understanding of each other will be incredibly important to finding a balance or common ground. The only way to achieve this is by opening up communication, letting down the walls, and having a large degree of empathy for the pain each suffers. With her being noncommittal, that tells me she does not feel safe enough to let you in to have a real discussion and that means you will have to convince her to go to a place where she does feel protected. Couples therapy is your best option IMO.

I learned a lot from this advise though it wasn’t my post. I would like to know how IFNJ male structures their day to day routine.

 

[WhyNna]

Hi @RestlessJohn and welcome to the forum.

I'm sure you appreciate that because you have only said a little about yourself and your wife any thoughts here are about INFJs in general, or about myself.

Something that INFJs do is internalise other people, particularly those close to us: we bring you inside us and relate to you there - in all your glory, but also faults and problems and all. It took me half a lifetime to learn how not to bring others in too far, and internalise their problems as well as my own, and it nearly broke me. We can easily get to the point where we can't separate our own problems from the other's. When we are young, we can feel unlimited internally and that we can cope with anything, but we are only finite like anyone else. We are even more prone to this when we are young adults if we have had emotional struggles because we feel and empathise deeply with the same in others quite instinctively.

It's a bit like when you pick up something that's hot, but not very - or something that's fairly heavy but not very. At first you can hold it OK, but it gets more and more uncomfortable until in the end you have to let go. You think it's OK, but eventually you find it's not. But when an INFJ gets into this situation with another's emotions it's a lot worse, because putting the burden down is a failure in several ways - because it means we risk having to face our own weakness, for example, but most seriously because it is letting the other person down so very badly, and this is a terrible thing for us to have to do. It's more serious than my words may seem to suggest, because we often become in our person an ongoing solution to another's problems - they rely on us to the extent that they may fall apart if we have to eject them from our inner selves.

It's doubly difficult when we have children, who we very much bring within ourselves, and who take up so much of our emotional energy. Do you have teenage children? - they are more demanding in this way at that age than at any other, and it can be hard and exhausting.

We INFJ folks have to learn the hard way how to deal with this - and sometimes that involves falling over an inner cliff that we weren't aware was there. We can have a breakdown at an extreme, or we can simply eject the other person from our lives and bring the shutters down. It's almost like pulling your hand away from a hot pan that you've grabbed by accident, or dropping something heavy that you realise has unexpectedly put your back out. Except that it feels like we've failed big time, even when that isn't our fault and not actually so, and it can be so hard for us to face that we can simply avoid it. And we can get stuck in an emotional doom loop, or just walk away.

So ..... what to do? You won't both be in the same situation as when I faced this in my 40s, and I'm the INFJ not my wife. Is it possible that you have been an emotional burden rather than a support for your wife for quite a time? She'll feel this even more as you try and mend the situation with ever increasing anxiety - she will be very aware of that anxiety most likely, and that will simply add to her emotional burden. She may even feel that you are looking for a rescue from her when she may not have the capacity to provide it.
But all of these are not hard suggestions - just possibilities.

What could help very possibly is for you to back off in the right kind of way and give her space - to be an emotional support rather than a burden. I have found myself that the way to love someone very close to us is not to bring them into our inner souls, and if we do, we may have to push them outside our innermost boundary to love them properly. That can feel to them like a rejection, but it's not - by analogy, it's like not being obliged to carry them physically on our shoulders everywhere, which of course is no good for the INFJ person or their partner. I must emphasise that this is an INFJ subjective view - the other (yourself for example) may well see things very differently, and the actual situation may be very different again.

Perhaps you could try wooing her all over again, and try and give rather than take from her - give in a way suited to her rather than you? As @TomasM suggests, a counselor may be a good help.

Wisdom!! Thank you. It’s comforting to come across INFJ who walked the path. Currently, I have hit rock bottom. I have been unaware INFJ for since childhood. The awareness brought awakened me to much pain as I recall all labelling I accepted as true. Questioning my sanity regardless many achievement was a tough path. Now, I am determined to re-define my essence.

 

[WhyNna]

The wisdom broke me and gave me hope to rise up

 

[rainrise]

Hi, just a few thoughts… I think whether or not it works out, communication is so important because you get to be clear on where you stand. If you cannot say it aloud face to face, you can write each other via letter or email. I think in your situation there are layers of buried pain I dealt with that cannot easily be dissolved. I think it’s so important to let people know how you feel about them, where you stand for good especially and if for worse then very carefully mindfully. It’s so easy to guess wrong and hate on something that doesn’t even exist. Also, this might not sound nice but, I feel it’s never optimal to stay in a festering relationship just for the kids because most of the time, kids can understand and pick up on what’s real and what’s not.

 

[Hyacinth]

I second and third everything that Thomas, John, and Sassafras has stated. If everything had been perfect in my own life then my marriage would have bloomed and thrived like the tree analogy so well explained. I love that analogy, it’s beautiful and so well put. I also agree that it shouldn’t be looked at merely by a personality type standpoint as all relationships benefits from seeing the “whole” person rather than looking at them in this viewpoint. I am not sure about other empaths but I know through how I experience the world that my love language is acts of service and quality time, without either I slowly begin to fade away into oblivion because I feel unseen and unheard so I go quiet and I’ve had the exact same experience where I felt neither by my husband until I finally had to strength the utter the word divorce which I knew was my last resort since it meant my family would disown me. Please realize we do everything in our power possible before leading up to this choice but to me it sounds like where your wife is at as it is exactly where I was at. It’s not a doorslam as that is different as much as it is protecting herself and knowing she’s had to rely on her own self for years so we say goodbye to the relationship and disconnect long before it truly ends and if you have been living as roommates for a really long time then I hate to sound depressing but it doesn’t look good. I’d give the exact same advice with asking myself the same questions… why after all this time is it suddenly important? For INFJs… most everyone is important to us until we are brought so much pain that we feel we can’t go on. When I’ve been the emotional crutch to everyone around me simply because I can read the room and absorb all the pain around me since I that is what I have been trained to do since infancy…. Then try to imagine that many of us have been raised by narcisstic parents who didn’t have our best intentions in mind. It made me sob uncontrollably when someone recommended that I take the MBTI test and all of a sudden my whole life made sense for the first time when I have never had someone validate my thoughts or feelings before only dismissed, ignored, or gaslit. We love hard, we love strong and while it can be so very hard to wear our hearts on our sleeves I really wouldn’t change a thing. Sorry to get so personal but I agree that your relationship needs counseling and I was in a different place where I was willing to consider it up until I got to a place where I finally mentally checked out. Once we check out there’s usually not much that can be done. If you truly want to put in the time, effort, and communication to get it back to where it should be, breaking down those walls will be the hardest project you do in your life. Focus on your own self, your own goals, and slowly move away from needing her so much. And then after years of showing you can stand on your own it might just drive the point in that she doesn’t have to carry the load alone while you slowly do things you know she loves, whether it’s building something, making her something, etc. because items given to us from the heart always means so much more to us than store bought items. Just a suggestion, good luck, and I’d say God bless but I’m more spiritual than religious so I guess more like good luck, I wish nothing but the best and that hopefully your relationship can overcome this trial.

 

[John K]

Then try to imagine that many of us have been raised by narcisstic parents who didn’t have our best intentions in mind.

Hi Hyacinth and welcome to the forum.

I picked out what you said here because it’s so very important, though it’s tangential to this thread.

We don’t meet many INFJs in real life so it’s only in a place like this that we can compare notes. Based on comments in the forum over the years since I joined it clearly doesn’t just take dysfunctional parents to mess us up. Often an INFJ child will have parents of totally incompatible type - we aren’t understood and some parents will see what we desperately need as faults. For example, it can be quite bad indeed if our folks and siblings are all extroverted sensors or are xSTJ. None of them can relate to Ni instinctively and can push us into adopting a pattern of type attitudes and behaviours that are alien to us. We go along with this because Fe makes us want to conform with the tribe, but it can bring us into early adulthood without a secure sense of who and what we really are. It’s actually very hard for the parents as well as the child, because they feel they are going wrong without knowing how, and they double down on their own orientation as the best foundation for their child’s life because they know no other. Of course if we have a parent who is narcissistic as well then it’s poison because Fe makes us very susceptible to emotional blackmail from our mum or dad.

I was lucky, as are one or two others here - my mum was INFJ and my dad was INFP probably. Home was a safe haven for me, but others have had a very different tale to tell.

 

[aeon]

I was lucky, as are one or two others here - my mum was INFJ and my dad was INFP probably. Home was a safe haven for me, but others have had a very different tale to tell.

In my family, an ENTJ father and INTP mother produced an ENFP son and INFJ daughter.

The NT – NF clash can be savage when both NT parents are E5, and both NF children are E9.

The Gauntlet,
Ian

 

[John K]

In my family, an ENTJ father and INTP mother produced an ENFP son and INFJ daughter.

The NT – NF clash can be savage when both NT parents are E5, and both NF children are E9.

The Gauntlet,
Ian

That sounds pretty fierce! It was at school I had a hard time. I guess E5 helped me there - to be independent and to get necessary self worth and social status from being good academically. But of course that doesn’t normalise you very well amongst the other kids lol.

 

[Hyacinth]

Hi Hyacinth and welcome to the forum.

I picked out what you said here because it’s so very important, though it’s tangential to this thread.

We don’t meet many INFJs in real life so it’s only in a place like this that we can compare notes. Based on comments in the forum over the years since I joined it clearly doesn’t just take dysfunctional parents to mess us up. Often an INFJ child will have parents of totally incompatible type - we aren’t understood and some parents will see what we desperately need as faults. For example, it can be quite bad indeed if our folks and siblings are all extroverted sensors or are xSTJ. None of them can relate to Ni instinctively and can push us into adopting a pattern of type attitudes and behaviours that are alien to us. We go along with this because Fe makes us want to conform with the tribe, but it can bring us into early adulthood without a secure sense of who and what we really are. It’s actually very hard for the parents as well as the child, because they feel they are going wrong without knowing how, and they double down on their own orientation as the best foundation for their child’s life because they know no other. Of course if we have a parent who is narcissistic as well then it’s poison because Fe makes us very susceptible to emotional blackmail from our mum or dad.

I was lucky, as are one or two others here - my mum was INFJ and my dad was INFP probably. Home was a safe haven for me, but others have had a very different tale to tell.

I agree, however the main difference is in whether or not the parent is capable of seeing you as you being your own separate individual person from them as opposed to viewing me as an extension of themselves. Sadly I recognized the patterns within my own family dynamics as young as 7 years old. I saw the sadness and the worthlessness that my mother displayed at the abuse of her own father and being such a young vulnerable child at the time I absorbed her pain as my own so every insult, every put down, every silent treatment she gave me and that my father gave me slowly chipped away at me until where we are today where I no longer speak to my parents or the rest of my family. Sadly I am not alone in this. Black sheep are black sheep for a reason. We see the pain, recognize why it is the way it is and wish for the change that we know won’t ever come. The most abusive is put at the forefront of the family, in my case my father and everyone becomes him and falls in line in their position inside of the family dysfunction, until you, being the only one at a later age unwilling to tolerate and put up with it anymore are pushed out of the family unit since you can no longer be contained or controlled. We see things as INFJs that many other types are either unwilling or unable to see and as such we go throughout life on our own. The more we see the inner issues within society the more we come to grasps with it and see things for how they are versus how we wish them to be. I am forever an optimist however my way of viewing the world, as not needing to fit in and being comfortable in my own skin is rare. I keep a very small circle of my most trusted friends around me and that’s all I need. I recognize that I value depth over superficial and surface level interactions and that’s ok because everyone is different. I hold no hatred or animosity to my parents as I see the brokenness for what it is and place it where it belongs now, at their feet instead of my own. I have gone through the work, gone through the steps and finally see my own worth and what I bring to the table and I won’t allow anyone to take that from me again. I value positivity, encouragement, and seeing the best in others as opposed to what I’ve been subjected to (negativity, drama, gossip, and seeing the worst in ppl). I’ve been surrounded by that long enough and the best part of being an adult, I have found, is the chance to surround yourself with who you want to versus others making those decisions for you. I love and will always love my parents from a distance but i won’t ever be a part of that environment again. It’s way too draining.

 

[Hyacinth]

Hi Hyacinth and welcome to the forum.

I picked out what you said here because it’s so very important, though it’s tangential to this thread.

We don’t meet many INFJs in real life so it’s only in a place like this that we can compare notes. Based on comments in the forum over the years since I joined it clearly doesn’t just take dysfunctional parents to mess us up. Often an INFJ child will have parents of totally incompatible type - we aren’t understood and some parents will see what we desperately need as faults. For example, it can be quite bad indeed if our folks and siblings are all extroverted sensors or are xSTJ. None of them can relate to Ni instinctively and can push us into adopting a pattern of type attitudes and behaviours that are alien to us. We go along with this because Fe makes us want to conform with the tribe, but it can bring us into early adulthood without a secure sense of who and what we really are. It’s actually very hard for the parents as well as the child, because they feel they are going wrong without knowing how, and they double down on their own orientation as the best foundation for their child’s life because they know no other. Of course if we have a parent who is narcissistic as well then it’s poison because Fe makes us very susceptible to emotional blackmail from our mum or dad.

I was lucky, as are one or two others here - my mum was INFJ and my dad was INFP probably. Home was a safe haven for me, but others have had a very different tale to tell.

And sorry to be tangential, my intentions were pure as I was trying to state how withdrawn INFJ women can become inside of a marriage, I tend to come from a place of relating so that things that may not have thought about coming into play might come into play. My intent was to show how we can disconnect and withdraw shrinking into ourselves versus maybe doing the healthy side and seeking individual counseling instead of coming together inside of a marriage. Didn’t mean to make it seem like it might have been the same case inside of my own marriage however INFJ women typically go through certain steps before we completely withdraw so I was merely trying to provide a second opinion coming from a woman’s point of view. Sorry if I missed the mark completely on this.