Women are often seen to be more dependent and invested in long term committed relationships than men, yet there are also women who repeatedly seduce men and then reject them. Some men are happy with this seduction and the short term nature of the encounter, but many men have suffered deep emotional pain at the hands of such women. These women have mastered the art of seduction and know how to win a man’s interest. She can now enjoy the thrill of winning a man’s interest, the pleasure she finds in hurting him and at the same time avoid her own fears of getting hurt in relationships. The price she pays for all of this is that she never enters a secure and deep relationship.
The person who chases or seduces the other and then abandons or rejects them has the control. It creates a high when you chase or seduce another person. It is great to feel interesting and powerful and wanted and to have control over the other person. If you do not seek a long term relationship you are not at risk. Then nobody can hurt or reject you. If you have been severely let down by a parent it can feel very empowering to now be the person who does the hurting.
An example of this would be a girl who was her father’s favorite child. This girl child knew that she was even more special to her father than her mother was. If something traumatic happens in her relationship with her dad causing this girl to feel rejected or replaced it can trigger later relationship problems. Typical causes can be that after this girl’s parents get divorced this special father-daughter bond continues for a while until her father gets a new girlfriend. If this new girlfriend is very jealous of the close father-daughter bond and actively creates a distance between the father and daughter and the father allows this, the daughter feels utterly betrayed and rejected. This is a very traumatic event in the girl’s life. Particularly if she has never been close to her mother the loss of her father to his new girlfriend leaves the girl feeling very alone and hurt. There can also be other reasons why a girl can feel traumatically rejected or replaced by her father. Some fathers struggle to cope with their daughters growing up and reject them when they are not little girls any more. As an adult this girl (now a young women) might enjoy seducing men (symbolically winning her father’s interest and attention). Once she has seduced a man she might enjoy doing to him what this girl’s father did to her (loose interest or reject the man). She will then reject this man or cheat on him. Now she has had her revenge on men and at the deepest level on her father. This young women can repeat this acting out for years, enjoying the seduction and the revenge. This can make her feel very wanted by men without the risk of ever getting hurt. She can experience intense gratification from hurting men.
Yet, underlying this she will feel very alone and depressed because her true need for a secure relationship is not met. Her deepest fear can be that if she really loves someone again as she once loved her father history will repeat itself and she will end up loosing her boyfriend’s love or even risk her boyfriend choosing another women above her (as her father has done). This young women will have to feel very safe to risk entering a relationship where there is a deep bond. To her the risk of getting hurt might feel too great and the thrill she gets from hurting men might be too gratifying.
There are many scenario’s where childhood trauma is acted out in different ways in adult life. Men also act out scenario’s where they chase women only to reject them. The underlying dynamics can be similar to the one discussed in this article. There can however also be other underlying reasons why men and women chase/seduce and reject.