Can Guys Sense When A Girl Is Insecure?
Insecurity is a bit like turning up to a funeral dressed as a clown – it’s very obvious, and everyone will notice. Your insecurity sticks out like a sore thumb, no matter how covert you think you’re being.
Being the more sensitive of the sexes, women tend to suffer more from this invisible affliction, but that’s not always their fault. More importance is placed on a woman’s physical appearance than it is on a man’s, so she has much more to feel insecure about.
For men, dating insecure women can be a real pain in the butt, the kind of thing they avoid (unless they suffer from their own invisible affliction of megalomania, and get off on knowing they can destroy her self-esteem with one unkind comment). They might be the Gods of Patience, but sooner or later a woman’s insecurities will start to grate on them.
As a woman, you should be aware of the glaring red flags you’re giving off, so you can hide them (and trick prospective lovers into thinking you’re not a basket case).
8 Signs a Girl is Insecure
1. You’re Overly Defensive
To a certain extent, everyone is defensive. If bees had knees we’d totally be them; we couldn’t possibly have any flaws.
Well, the majority of insecure women take this defensiveness to its extreme. They take everything anyone says about them as a criticism, prompting them to lash out and turn into Medusa.
Note: Launching missiles at someone’s house just because they said the yellow dress suited you more than the green one is not an acceptable reaction.
2. You’re Super Jealous
While a small amount of jealousy is expected – and even admired – in a relationship (it shows your partner that you actually give a damn enough to feel threatened by other women), there is such a thing as overdoing it.
Your jealousy might stem from past encounters with cheating men, and that’s understandable, but you can’t punish your new man for that. He’s probably surrounded by women all the time, some more attractive than you – you’ll just have to trust that he won’t cheat.
Note: Sending death threats to the female bank teller whose hand accidentally grazed his while she was giving him money is not okay!
3. You’re a Control Freak
Most people have accepted that they can’t control all aspects of their lives, and don’t lose any sleep over it. Not you, however. Just like most of your insecure brethren, the inability to control external things that affect you drives you nuts.
To compensate for this, you focus your attentions on the things you can control, namely your unfortunate partner. Whether you’re telling him what to wear or how to chew his food, dictating everything makes you feel a false sense of security.
He won’t see it that way, though, and he won’t take kindly to being micro-managed (he gets enough of that at work).
4. You’re Hungry for Compliments
You know you look great in that mini skirt, and that those jeans don’t make your butt look big, but you can’t be sure unless someone else confirms it for you. This someone is usually, though not always, your partner.
It’s all about measuring your worth, because being insecure, you don’t think there’s much of it at all. Getting validation from your partner and others who love you is the only thing that keeps you going.
Your boyfriend will smell a rat sooner or later. He’ll recognize that you’re fishing for compliments because you don’t value yourself enough; and if you don’t, why should he?
5. You’re Easily Offended
Ever heard the concept of “growing a thick skin”? No, I don’t expect you have. Insecure people have the thinnest skin when it comes to criticism and insults – real or perceived, harsh or tame.
When someone makes a playful joke or insult at your expense, it’s enough to ruin your whole day (and whole relationships). While you should absolutely shut down constant ridicule from your loved ones, if no one can “have a laugh” with you once in a while, they won’t want to be around you.
What’s more, any halfway intelligent man will realize that your lack of a sense of humor is behind your lack of self-confidence.
6. You Compare Yourself to His Exes
There’s always one ex that makes you wonder why he ever broke up with her. On paper, she seemed like the perfect woman. The fact that they did break up shows she wasn’t the perfect woman, but that’s not enough for your insecure alter ego. You’re too busy drawing comparisons, trying to one up a woman who has no idea she’s in competition with you.
Your insecurity is glaringly obvious here, and your boyfriend will pick up on it immediately, especially if there are stark differences between you and his exes. Hair color, dress size, career choice etc. He’ll see that you’re in a one-sided battle, and it will eventually frustrate him.
Why? Because he’s with you now, not with them. So cut it out.
7. You Want His Undivided Attention
Another word for this is “needy”; and needy and insecure usually go hand in hand.
If you’re not constantly on his mind, and he’s not solely focused on you, you start to feel unwanted. It doesn’t matter if you spend all day, every day together, the second that attention is refocused on something other than you, you lose your mind.
Additionally, you’re one of those women who can’t go five minutes without hearing “I love you”, which is a sure sign of your low self-esteem. When other people say it to you, it makes up for you not loving yourself; and when no one says it, it takes away your self-worth. A man will quickly grow tired of a woman like this.
There are lots of awesome things in the world that aren’t you – let him enjoy them!
8. You Constantly Criticize Other Women
Okay, so by nature, women are catty! It’s something they pride themselves on. If criticizing other women were a career, women would hold all the major positions. So you’re not alone when it comes to being bitchy.
Where the insecure woman (you) differs is in the frequency and reasons for her attacks. If you keep insulting women for no apparent reason in order to make yourself feel better, you’ll come off as mean – a bully.
You’ll also be pretty transparent, as most people understand that bullying is used as a ruse to cover up the bully’s crippling low self-esteem.
So, sure, Meg with the nice legs who works at the gym looks hideous without makeup, but you pointing that out all the time isn’t going to change the way you look, or the way you feel about yourself. What it will do is turn your boyfriend off you, because no one wants to date the mean girl.
Conclusion
There may be other signs that let guys know they’re dealing with an insecure woman, but these 8 are the most unsubtle.
Now that you know the cues that betray your insecurity, your first step might be to practice concealing them. However, you should really work on tackling the underlying issues that made you this way, then spend some time healing old wounds.
Unless you do so, you’ll likely remain stuck in this position, which will make it difficult to forge a long-lasting relationship with any man. Men don’t like insecure women because they’re emotionally draining. Sooner or later, when their patience has run out, they’ll walk away.
