Connor Beaton describes anxious attachment as a dependency where your sense of being okay depends on someone else being okay. This creates hypervigilance about their feelings and an urge to solve their problems before you can feel secure yourself.
I'm not okay unless you're okay or I need you to be okay in order for me to feel okay. So there's this dependency that has emerged for the anxious person that says I need to make sure I'm constantly hyper vigilant on how you're feeling, what you're thinking, what you're doing, how you're relating to me. How you're doing will predicate and dictate how I'm doing. Behind the anxious person is this impossible situation of I have to solve something or figure something out for you, so make sure that you're okay before I can be okay. And that's at the very core of it. And when I say okay, it can mean a number of things. It can be safety, security, worth or value worthy of being loved, worthy of being happy. I have to make sure that everything's okay outside of me so that I can get my needs met.
How to Raise Strong, Unshakable Boys in Today's Culture, with Dr. Shefali Tsabary
