How to Find the Right Relationship When You Have an Anxious Attachment Style
You often feel like you're unworthy of love. It's very hard for you to put yourself out there because you tend to have a fear of rejection. Dating apps, first dates, and relationships don't come as easily for you as they seem to for your family and friends.
Even though finding someone is hard for you when you do find someone, you tend to fall for them quickly. It's almost as if you're happier and more fulfilled in a relationship. If only finding a relationship was actually that easy.
This is how to find the right relationship when you have an anxious attachment style.
What Is an Anxious Attachment Style?
First things first, what exactly does it mean to have an anxious attachment style? People who have an anxious attachment style often experience stress or fear of abandonment in their relationships, which can often come hand-in-hand with low self-esteem and clinginess.
What Causes an Anxious Attachment Style?
The anxious attachment style is usually caused by feelings of insecurity or a fear of abandonment in early childhood due to an inconsistent parenting style. For instance, a parent may be hot-and-cold—attentive to a child's needs at some times, and dismissive at other times.
This makes it hard for the child to comprehend the mixed signals and thus unable to determine what kind of response to expect in the future. Other times, this attachment style derives from an overly attached parent. The parent may seek emotional or physical closeness with the child to serve their own needs rather than the child's.
Signs of Anxious Attachment
There are common signs that people who have an anxious attachment style share. These are some of the most common signs:
Critical of self, partner, and the relationship
Constantly seeking reassurance
Strong feelings of jealousy or suspicion towards a partner's fidelity
Overly preoccupied with the relationship
Frequently seeks intimacy and closeness
How to Form Healthy Relationships with an Anxious Attachment Style
Having an insecure attachment style like anxious attachment is very common. It may feel like you're alone, especially if you're having trouble finding or maintaining a relationship, but you're not the first person to experience this type of relationship style and you certainly won't be the last either!
You may not be able to change the way that you were raised, but you can work toward healing and a more secure attachment style. Here are a few different ways you can work to form the right relationship when you have an anxious attachment style:
Go to therapy
Learn more about what triggers your anxiety
Maintain a schedule and routine
Make a list of what you're looking for in a relationship
Practice coping mechanisms
Seek someone with a secure attachment style
Start journaling
Try to be less reactive
If you're already in a relationship, there are a few ways that your partner can do to help you and strengthen your relationship:
Avoid judgment
Be direct with one another
Don't make threats or disappear, especially during a fight
Keep an open and honest line of communication
If there's conflict, talk it out with one another first, especially before involving outside third parties like family or friends
Next Steps
It didn't take one day for you to form your anxious attachment style, which means it's going to take a little longer than a day before you can overcome some of the associated thoughts, feelings, and behaviors associated with it.
Despite how you may feel, you're not alone. There are many different people who suffer from different attachment styles based on their past. Help is available to you when you're ready to ask for it.
Working with a therapist is a great way to get to the root cause of your anxious attachment. A therapist can work with you to form healthier patterns for yourself and in future relationships.
Your anxious attachment style does not define you. Take control of your life again by reaching out today to set up a consultation. Codependency therapy and anxiety treatment can help you.
