DiscoverThe Anxiety Recovery PodcastThe Caretaker Wound: Why You Attract Men Who Don’t Lead (and Why Chasing Feels Safer Than Receiving)
The Caretaker Wound: Why You Attract Men Who Don’t Lead (and Why Chasing Feels Safer Than Receiving)

The Caretaker Wound: Why You Attract Men Who Don’t Lead (and Why Chasing Feels Safer Than Receiving)

Update: 2025-11-27
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In this solo episode, I’m diving deep into the caretaker wound — the pattern that keeps so many anxiously attached women stuck in relationships where they’re over-giving, over-functioning, and slipping into their masculine without even realizing it.

If you’re tired of attracting men who don’t take initiative…
If you’re exhausted from always being the one who holds the emotional weight…
If you catch yourself chasing, proving, fixing, or nurturing in hopes that he’ll finally show up…
This episode is going to land in your body.

We break down:

✨ Why the caretaker identity feels safer than being truly seen
✨ How “being needed” becomes an attachment strategy
✨ Why you subconsciously choose men who don’t lead
✨ How caretaking keeps you in your masculine, and why it repels secure masculine energy
✨ The false sense of vulnerability that comes from over-giving
✨ Why receiving feels terrifying — and why your younger parts panic when you try
✨ The deeper nervous system imprint that says: “If he needs me, he can’t leave me”
✨ How this pattern gets created in childhood and reinforced in adulthood
✨ The somatic signs you’re slipping into caretaker mode
✨ How to stop chasing and start receiving in a way your system can actually tolerate
✨ What it feels like to finally put the caretaker down and be met by someone emotionally available

This episode is your gentle, powerful reminder that caretaking is not love — it’s survival.
And you deserve a relationship where you don’t have to earn connection, perform for it, or carry the whole thing on your back.

It’s time to feel safe being seen.
It’s time to let yourself be chosen.
It’s time to come home to the part of you that no longer needs to be needed to feel worthy.

Connect with Valerie on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healwithval/

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The Caretaker Wound: Why You Attract Men Who Don’t Lead (and Why Chasing Feels Safer Than Receiving)

The Caretaker Wound: Why You Attract Men Who Don’t Lead (and Why Chasing Feels Safer Than Receiving)

Valerie Rubin