As women, we all hate scales. Especially when they tip - for the worse. The scales in a relationship can tip as well, making our burden much heavier than it was in the beginning of the relationship. This can happen when you begin doing all the real work of the relationship - planning your events and outings, picking him up, calling him all the time and more.

Pretty soon, you start to get angry. Even needy. And eventually, it wears you out. Rori Raye termed this "Overfunctioning", which may sound a little silly, but it's a great word when you think about how well it fits.

What overfunctioning means is that you are doing the work of two people - you are functoning both as the man, and as the woman in the relationship. What you don't know, though, is that you don't like it - but neither does HE! Men want to be MEN, not emasculated by being babied and taken care of.

This usually starts out with the opposite intentions - you want to prove that you are NOT needy - you are strong and capable and do NOT need a man to take care of you. So you start taking charge. You start correcting him. And it goes on from there.

When the woman does this, she takes the role of the man away from the man. Doing that will strangle the attraction that the relationship had. So by trying to prove to him that you don't need him - you take away that part of the relationship that was his - the man part.

That does not mean that men like women who have no brain or backbone. What it DOES mean is that he wants you to be you, and let him be HIM. If you take that role from him, it only kills the attraction, but begins putting YOU in the "friend-zone" - which is certainly not where you want to be if you are romantically interested in this fellow because the relationship becomes a male and male relationship, not man and woman.

Fortunately, you can change your behavior. This means that first of all, you must become self-aware. Most of this behavior happens unconciously - you do it and you never even realize it. Start being self-aware, and when you start behaving like the man, step back and relinquish the reigns to the one who wants them.

Then, start noticing when you are feeling any sort of negative emotion. You need to pay attention to this for two reasons. One - because you may take it out on others or two - because you may attempt to make yourself feel better by using attention seeking behavior afterwards. This may be seen as immature or needy to a man.

If you do that, you will also start to notice when you are going to start speaking in a negative way to HIM. You will see when you are going to tell him how to do something, or why, or try to take over for him when he does not want you to. If you can stop this behavior, you can begin to turn your relationship around for the better.

Also start taking your cues from his body language. Your man may not tell you in so many words when you are doing something that takes away his masculine part of your relationship, but his body language will. Pay attention and adjust your behavior accordingly.

If you truly pay attention and start giving your man permission to BE the man, your relationship will start to turn around. You can have the relationship you have always wanted.

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Relationship Advice for women by Rori Raye - Get Your Relationship Tool Kit! Dating Tips for Women by Christian Carter of Catch Him and Keep Him