For a long time, I toggled between thinking I kept picking the wrong men and thinking there was something was wrong with me (and I was terrified that other people knew what it was even if I wasn’t quite sure). I couldn’t understand why I struggled so much to create relationships that felt reciprocal, secure, sexy, and spacious.
I had done so much work on myself. I was SO ready. I was SO available (or so I thought).
Therapy, years of meditation, functional medicine, somatic work, so much spiritual practice. I even became the practitioner helping other people heal.
And yet, when it came to romantic partners, I would somehow find myself right back in the same painful places:
Working too hard for the relationship. Feeling invisible or feeling like there wasn’t room for my needs. Choosing people who couldn’t quite meet me, and making myself smaller to try to make it work. Or convincing myself I was the problem and I just needed to heal more before I would be ready for the relationship I wanted.
Anyone else? Ughhhhhh.
I remember feeling so much shame. Why did this seem easier for other people? What was my problem?
What I couldn’t see then was that I wasn’t making conscious choices, I was making protective ones.
And you know what? It makes so much sense.
My heart had been through the ringer. From a childhood marked by emotional neglect, years of overriding my body and using sex to try to find love, a devastating breakup of a 7-year relationship at 31, then the next man I fell in love with died tragically when I was 33… no wonder I had some armor around my heart.
The crazy part is I genuinely thought I was 100% ready and available for true love and partnership. I wanted it, I’d done therapy… ready.
Wrong.
My mouth might have been saying “available!” but my energy and nervous system were not, even when I was in committed relationships.
Learning my own patterns and working with thousands of clients has allowed me to narrow down some primary protective archetypes I watch block the love we say we want.
Meet: The Good Girl, the Alpha, the Romantic, the Island, and the Achiever.
🐆 Each one with it’s unique way of trying to keep me (and you) safe.
That these protective strategies existed wasn’t so much the issue, it’s that they were making my relationship decisions for me.
Every time love started to feel real and therefore vulnerable, one of them would take the wheel.
And while each strategy was trying to protect me from pain, they were also keeping me from the connection I wanted most 💔.
🌹❤️That’s why I created the Love Armor Quiz.
It will take you 3 minutes and it is WILDLY ILLUMINATING!!!
It will help you identify the protective strategy your nervous system reaches for most often in relationships today.
Awareness is power. Without it, we can’t take effective action**.
I don’t believe that the woman you’re becoming needs better dating advice or sex tips.
She needs to stop letting old survival strategies choose and rule her relationships.
I hope this helps you as much as it has helped me!
Love,
Caite
**P.S. Ready to take off some of that armor that is blocking the love you want? That’s exactly what we do inside my women’s program Becoming the Muse.
You’ll learn how to recognize your love armor, understand how it shapes attraction and intimacy, and begin creating more space for presence, devotion, and desire without abandoning yourself.
About Me
I’m Dr. Caite Gordon: intimacy, sex, and relationship coaching, Doctor of Chinese Medicine, and feminine embodiment teacher.
For more than a decade, I’ve guided women and couples through the landscapes of healing, intimacy, and eros. My work draws from eastern medicine, functional medicine, somatic healing, spirituality, and years spent sitting with thousands of people in life’s most vulnerable and sacred moments.
I’m fascinated by what allows us to become more fully ourselves: to unwind old survival strategies, trust our bodies, create nourishing relationships, and build lives infused with vitality, meaning, and pleasure.
This Substack is an extension of that exploration—a place for conversations about embodiment, intimacy, spirituality, women’s health, and the art of being human.
If these words resonate, I’m glad you’re here.
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