How to Stop Being Anxiously Attached (Part 3/4)

Attach­ment the­o­ry, a con­cept for­mu­lat­ed by psy­chol­o­gist John Bowl­by delves into how ear­ly rela­tion­ships with care­givers shape an indi­vid­u­al’s rela­tion­al growth. In recent years, attach­ment has become an inter­est among many indi­vid­u­als; how­ev­er, what com­mon­ly seems to be miss­ing from these resources is what to do about attach­ment.  In this post, you’ll learn about the impor­tance of address­ing your anx­ious attach­ment as well as strate­gies to mit­i­gate its effect on your rela­tion­ships.

If you’re some­one with an anx­ious attach­ment style, you’ll like­ly find your­self crav­ing inti­ma­cy and approval, often grap­pling with fear of aban­don­ment. If this sounds like you, you’ll ben­e­fit from strate­gies that help you to man­age your inse­cu­ri­ties, boost self-esteem and reduce depen­dence on oth­ers for emo­tion­al val­i­da­tion. Doing so can help you to progress towards more secure attach­ments and thus, bet­ter rela­tion­ships and feel­ing bet­ter about your­self.

How to Fix Anxious Attachment

Rec­og­niz­ing the trig­gers of anx­ious attach­ment is a cru­cial step in mod­i­fy­ing your attach­ment behav­iors. Trig­gers can vary; how­ev­er, they often involve sit­u­a­tions that would arouse fears of aban­don­ment or rejec­tion, such as lack of atten­tion from a part­ner or lack of com­mu­ni­ca­tion from the part­ner. When these sit­u­a­tions occur, they can acti­vate deep-seat­ed vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties linked to anx­ious attach­ment, prompt­ing behav­iors like exces­sive reas­sur­ance-seek­ing or undue jeal­ousy (Pas­cuz­zo et al., 2013; Deng et al., 2023). These trig­gers can be clear­ly mapped through intro­spec­tive tools such as jour­nal­ing or engag­ing in ther­a­py to under­stand a set of dri­ving under­ly­ing emo­tions. This raised lev­el of con­scious­ness is key in break­ing the anx­ious attached cir­cle and giv­ing room for health­i­er rela­tion­ships.

Key strate­gies also include mind­ful­ness or med­i­ta­tion, includ­ing deep breath­ing exer­cis­es and work­ing on your thoughts and actions. These strate­gies have been found to help peo­ple to reg­u­late their emo­tions, find inner peace and per­spec­tive, and reduce anx­ious feel­ings, fur­ther pre­vent­ing the stress from inten­si­fy­ing dur­ing a trig­ger­ing activ­i­ty (Clear et al., 2019; Pace, 2018). More­over, engag­ing in ther­a­py can address the deep­er emo­tion­al issues at the root of this attach­ment style, pro­vid­ing tools for bet­ter emo­tion­al man­age­ment and com­mu­ni­ca­tion

In addi­tion, build­ing a sup­port sys­tem out­side of your roman­tic part­ner can be help­ful. Why? Expand­ing one’s emo­tion­al sup­port sys­tem to include friends, fam­i­ly, or mem­bers of sup­port groups can pro­vide alter­na­tive sources of com­fort and reas­sur­ance, com­pared to just one per­son, who you may be emo­tion­al­ly and inti­mate­ly con­nect­ed with. This net­work can offer a broad­er per­spec­tive, emo­tion­al val­i­da­tion, and prac­ti­cal advice for nav­i­gat­ing rela­tion­ship chal­lenges (McDaniel et al., 2017; Rapoza et al., 2016). Fur­ther­more, these rela­tion­ships enhance secu­ri­ty and a sense of belong­ing. They reduce the pres­sure that lies in roman­tic rela­tion­ships, enabling one not to feel the urge to solic­it reas­sur­ance from a part­ner all the time.

Fur­ther, it is essen­tial to work on build­ing self-con­fi­dence as a part of this process. Estab­lish­ing per­son­al goals can assist in this progress by offer­ing con­crete evi­dence of ones abil­i­ties and rein­forc­ing your self-worth regard­less of your rela­tion­ship sta­tus.

Stud­ies indi­cate that peo­ple with anx­ious attach­ment often strug­gle with self-esteem, which can wors­en their con­cerns about being aban­doned or reject­ed (Shaver et al., 2016). It may also increase the amount of peo­ple pleas­ing that you may do. By par­tic­i­pat­ing in activ­i­ties that encour­age self-aware­ness and self-com­pas­sion like using affir­ma­tions and self-reflec­tion, you can begin to adopt a pos­i­tive view of your­self. This change is cru­cial in reduc­ing the need for validation—a com­mon trait of peo­ple with anx­ious attach­ment.

Engag­ing in inter­ests and hob­bies is anoth­er crit­i­cal piece that can sup­port you on your jour­ney to inde­pen­dence. Involve­ment in activ­i­ties that gen­uine­ly bring joy can boost con­fi­dence. Pro­vide a sense of ful­fill­ment that’s not depen­dent on anoth­er person’s pres­ence or approval (Orth et al., 2018).

Engag­ing in hob­bies, like paint­ing, hik­ing or learn­ing an instru­ment can cre­ate moments of focus and enjoy­ment which stud­ies have shown to have pos­i­tive effects on men­tal well-being and emo­tion­al strength (Stan­ton & Camp­bell 2014). Addi­tion­al ben­e­fits include cre­at­ing a round­ed life where there is more to your life than just your roman­tic rela­tion­ship and reduced pres­sure and expec­ta­tions. It also cre­ates oppor­tu­ni­ties for inter­ac­tions beyond con­nec­tions lead­ing to the for­ma­tion of a sup­port sys­tem that can pro­vide addi­tion­al emo­tion­al com­fort and val­i­da­tion (Zhang et al., 2018).

Healing Anxious Attachment in Adults

In short, the road to recov­ery from an anx­ious attach­ment styles will require a blend of self-aware­ness, ther­a­peu­tic inter­ven­tion, and prac­ti­cal strate­gies tai­lor-made to actu­al­ly help build health­i­er rela­tion­ships and cre­ate improved sat­is­fac­tion for your life. Those with an anx­ious attach­ment style can ben­e­fit from iden­ti­fy­ing trig­gers, devel­op­ing effec­tive cop­ing strate­gies, and expand­ing their sup­port net­work to reduce depen­dence on a sin­gle rela­tion­ship for emo­tion­al sat­is­fac­tion.

That said, if you feel like you could ben­e­fit from addi­tion­al assis­tance in cre­at­ing, imple­ment­ing, or nav­i­gat­ing this road to greater self-esteem and improved self-con­fi­dence, reach out, and let’s get you work­ing towards where you want to be

Reach Out Today!

References

Clear, S., Gardner, A., Webb, H., & Zimmer-Gembeck, M. (2019). Common and distinct correlates of depression, anxiety, and aggression: attachment and emotion regulation of sadness and anger. Journal of Adult Development, 27(3), 181–191. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10804-019–09333‑0

Deng, T., Guo, Y., Hu, B. Y., Wang, S., & Dieker, L. (2023). The relation between adult anxious attachment and mental health among Chinese pre-service teachers: The role of negative coping style and social support. The Asia-Pacific Education Researcher, 32(6), 769–782. doi:10.1007/s40299-022–00693‑y

McDaniel, B., Drouin, M., & Cravens, J. (2017). Do you have anything to hide? infidelity-related behaviors on social media sites and marital satisfaction. Computers in Human Behavior, 66, 88–95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2016.09.031

Orth, U., Erol, R., & Luciano, E. (2018). Development of self-esteem from age 4 to 94 years: a meta-analysis of longitudinal studies.. Psychological Bulletin, 144(10), 1045–1080. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000161

Pace, R. (2018). 10 tips for overcoming anxious attachment in relationships. Retrieved May 7, 2024, from Marriage Advice — Expert Marriage Tips & Advice website: https://www.marriage.com/advice/mental-health/overcoming-anxious-attachment/

Pascuzzo, K., Cyr, C., & Moss, E. (2013). Longitudinal association between adolescent attachment, adult romantic attachment, and emotion regulation strategies. Attachment & Human Development, 15(1), 83–103. doi:10.1080/14616734.2013.745713

Rapoza, K., Vassell, K., Wilson, D., Robertson, T., Manzella, D., Ortiz-Garcia, A., … & Jimenez-Lazar, L. (2016). Attachment as a moderating factor between social support, physical health, and psychological symptoms. Sage Open, 6(4), 215824401668281. https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244016682818

Stanton, S. and Campbell, L. (2014). Perceived social support moderates the link between attachment anxiety and health outcomes. Plos One, 9(4), e95358. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0095358

Zhang, X., Ran, G., Xu, W., Ma, Y., & Chen, X. (2018). Adult attachment affects neural response to preference-inferring in ambiguous scenarios: evidence from an fmri study. Frontiers in Psychology, 9. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00139