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Anxious attachment

Cause

  • Around 20% of people, originates in childhood, often from unpredictable or insensitive parenting.
    • Emotionally distant caregivers
      • e.g. silent treatment instead of conforting
    • Inconsistent parenting
      • sometimes parents are caring, other times cold
    • Caregiver’s emotional hunger
      • when caregivers seek emotional or physical closeness for their own needs.
        e.g. a mom who wants to be involved in all activities of the child.
    • Anxious caregivers
      • children with an anxious attachment style are likely to have parents who are also anxiously attached.

Signs Of Anxious Attachment In Adults

Clinginess

  • Needing constant contact and support from others
  • A constant need for reassurance that you are good enough
  • Hypersensitivity to rejection and abandonment
  • Using physical closeness, like hugging or holding, as a tool to gain reassurance or reduce anxiety

Fear of abandonment 

  • Worried your partner might leave you (even in the absence of actual signs of relationship problems)
  • High emotional reactivity when someone isn’t available
  • Afraid or incapable of being alone
  • Sudden changes in a partner’s behavior or mood might be perceived as signs of dwindling love or an impending breakup
  • Feeling insecure or threatened by a partner’s independence or time apart

Trust issues

  • Due to fears of being rejected or deemed unworthy, you might become overly dependent or clingy in relationships.
  • Experience heightened jealousy or perceive threats to your relationships even when there aren’t any, leading to constant reassurances.
  • Even if your partner is consistently loving and supportive, you find it hard to believe that this behavior will consistently continue long-term
  • Difficulty letting your guard down with your partner due to trust issues

Emotional neediness (Dependence on Others for Self-worth)

  • Craving for intimacy, while simultaneously fearing emotional rejection from a partner
  • Needing regular affirmation and validation that you are loved, wanted, and not going to be abandoned
  • Overly dependent on your partner for emotional support
  • If my partner seeks independence or alone time, I might misconstrue it as a lack of interest or love
  • Having difficulty setting and respecting boundaries

Feeling unworthy

  • Negative self-view or self-worth
  • Feeling unworthy of love and not good enough to be in a relationship (thinking you don’t deserve your partner)
  • Doubt your worthiness in a relationship, leading you to question why anyone would want to be with you, and fear your partner will soon recognize their “flaws” and leave
  • Due to fear of negative outcomes or triggering conflicts, you might avoid honest conversations, even about your own needs or feelings.
  • Small behaviors or comments from your partner might be overanalyzed, leading you to jump to negative conclusions
  • The impulse to fix things and solve other people’s problems at one’s own expense
  • A positive view of others
  • Ruminate over and overanalyze small things
  • Tendancy to blame yourself or feel responsible for problems in a relationship

source

relationship