Women with rejecting, aloof parents or other close family members might be drawn to bad boys, says psychoanalyst and psychotherapist, Nina Savelle-Rocklin, Psy.D., who’s had “countless patients” fall for men who fit this archetype.
“We don't outgrow our wish to convert that person into a loving, accepting person,” she says. “Instead, we unconsciously transfer that wish onto new figures in our lives, hoping to get from this new person what we never got from the original person, as if that will heal the original wound. Unfortunately, it never works because rejecting people don't suddenly become accepting. We keep playing out the same drama, putting new people in old roles.”
