And guess what: Men want to make you happy.
Perhaps we're afraid of expressing ourselves in relationships because deep down we fear that the men we're with don't want to be with us. We worry that if we make a peep, we'll wake the sleeping giant and he'll suddenly realize, "Holy crap! I'm dating someone! Run!" First of all, good riddance if he's that squirrelly.Second—brace yourselves—"guys enjoy and seek out relationships," says Niobe Way, Ph.D., the author of Deep Secrets: Boys' Friendships and the Crisis of Connection. The 1,000-plus men I've interviewed back this up: Most don't want just a hookup; they want a partner.
Another reason we should banish the term "high maintenance" from our vocabulary: It implies that men look at relationships as obligations or chores (like the dishes!). Yes, they take work. But most men get this and are happy to oblige. "A guy who cares about you," says Davidson, "isn't going to be turned off by having to make a bit of an effort."
Finally, being high maintenance means being you.
One reason showing your high-maintenance side can be scary: To get what you need, you have to say what you need, and that means being vulnerable. But what's scarier? Pretending everything's peachy all the time, because then you'll end up with a guy who treats your feelings the way you do—as if they don't exist. "Finding someone who is right for you means being you, and that means expressing what you need to be happy," says Davidson. "When someone dazzles us, it's easy to lose sight of that truth."
Erin, 30, a publicist in New York City, says she recently "made a pledge to stand up for what I want and don't want. I don't settle for behavior that is unacceptable." Her tactic is working: "When a guy I was seeing went to hang out with his friends one night after we'd been out together," she recalls, "I didn't play it cool. I told him it made me feel awful, and we talked it through. It didn't work out with him, but my pledge stayed in place, and now I'm with someone who listens. Every woman deserves that."
Amber Madison is the author of Are All Guys Assholes? (BTW, she says the answer is no.)
