Revealing Signs of Insecure or Anxious Attachment: How CBT Can Help

Hey there everybody, and welcome to this video on 10 Signs of Anxious attachment and ways to address them. I'm your host, Dr. Donnellice Snipes. In the past few months, I've done several videos on attachment and secure attachment, but we haven't really talked about the different types of insecure attachment. The first type that we're going to talk about is anxious attachment. Now, people who have anxious attachment, guess what? When they're in their relationships, they feel. Drum roll please. Anxious. So the title makes sense. People who have anxious attachment often are plagued by a constant fear of abandonment. They have a high level of rejection sensitivity and they're also hyper vigilant. That means they're constantly scanning for any micro expressions that may indicate that they are getting ready to be rejected. And some of those expressions or some of those signs that they think they see may come from what their caregivers did or what somebody else did in a prior relationship. And those things serve as triggers in the present for their abandonment anxiety. They often have a constant need of validation and reassurance. People who are anxiously attached don't feel lovable for who they are. Lot of times they don't even know who they are because they have always focused on doing what they think other people want them to do. So they constantly need external feedback telling them, yes, you're doing the right thing. You are pleasing me. People with anxious attachment are often clingy or some may call dependent in their relationships. They have difficulty making decisions and they have difficulty being sexual separated from the person that they are in a relationship with. And when we get down to talking about the parenting styles that contribute to anxious attachment, you're going to start to understand why this might be. And I encourage you. Whatever your behaviors are in relationships, if they are not what you think is healthy, get curious. Ask yourself, why might this have developed as a result of my childhood? Fawning is the next sign of anxious attachment. A lot of people who have abandonment anxiety when they start to feel like they're going to be rejected, when they start to sense that rejection might happen, they start doing whatever and we call this fawning. They are are trying just randomly to do whatever it is to appease this person. So please don't leave me. The people with anxious attachment may inadvertently violate boundaries. Now, they don't do it generally in an aggressive way. A lot of times they violate boundaries because they're not willing to take no for an answer. If somebody says, I don't need anything right now, the person with anxious attachment doesn't feel Secure, unless they're doing something for that other person. So they're like, sure you do. What do you need? I'm sure there's something you need that I can do for you. Or the other partner may say, I. I really don't want to talk about it right now. It's not you. I'm just, I'm in a bad mood. And the person with anxious attachment can't let it go with that. They have to know why the person's in the bad, in a bad mood. And they may even go so far as to try to fix it for them. All of those are boundary violations. But all of those develop as a way that the person with anxious attachment tries to make sure that the person they're in a relationship with needs them, loves them, and is okay. People with anxious attachment often lack close friends. They get into a relationship and they pour their entire self into this one relationship. So very rarely do they have other people that they're spending time with. They are so afraid of being away from their one significant other that they don't have time for their friends. And they devote all their energy to being whatever this person they're in a relationship wants them to be. Unfortunately, as the saying goes, that kind of puts all their eggs in one basket. So should this relationship end, then the person is left with nobody, so to speak, because they have not nurtured any other relationships. So that you can see how that might be a, a little bit intimidating to anybody. They're unwilling to take chances or explore. People with anxious attachment are wanting to make sure that they are good enough, that they are loved by the person they're in a relationship with. And if they take chances, if they go outside their comfort zone, guess what? They're risking failure. And failure may mean rejection. And rejection means complete, complete disaster. A lot of people with anxious attachment and insecure attachment in general experience what we call emotional dysregulation. They have difficulty identifying their emotions. They're so focused on what everybody else is feeling and trying to keep everybody else happy, they don't even pay attention to what's going on inside until it bubbles over. And they go from not noticing much of anything or feeling kind of flat to feeling terrified or feeling furious. And there's very little mid ground additionally, and you probably picked this up if you watched my video on the HPA axis or any of my videos on trauma. When people experience constant or persistent ongoing stress, their stress response system stays on. Our stress response system is not supposed to stay on. So as a result, the Brain undergoes actual structural changes in order to deal with the hypervigilance and the ongoing stress. So it turns down people's stress sensitivity. Things that would have triggered them, they may have noticed in the past. They don't even have the energy to notice right now. So they stay kind of flat, kind of numb, until something comes along and triggers them. And then when they're triggered, it's a tsunami of stress hormones. So we see a double whammy. Their emotions start to bubble up, and then they bubble over before they even notice them. But that bubbling over isn't just a gentle cascade. It is a tsunami of stress hormones. And as a result, the person with anxious attachment may have impulsive or aggressive behavior. When they dysregulate, they're going from flat or numb to furious or frantic. So what are they going to do? They are going to frantically try to regain some control. They may yell, they may scream, they may throw a temper tantrum. Hopefully, they don't become aggressive towards themselves or others, but it's not uncommon to see that. So it's important to recognize the signs of anxious attachment and get curious about why they're happening. What causes it, though. Generally, the research has found that people with anxious attachment had insensitive, inconsistent parents. Now, insensitive is something of a pejorative word or a critical word in many cases. But sometimes it's not that the parents were intentionally insensitive. They just didn't recognize, for example, if they have a child who is neuroatypical. And that's not just people on the autism spectrum. That's also people with adhd, people with schizophrenia, and a variety of other issues may contribute to people being either hypersensitive or hyposensitive to stimulation. So as an infant, the child may have perceived things as burning hot that the caregiver perceived as very lukewarm or mild, or the child may have perceived a particular garment as being very rough and scratchy and painful, where the caregiver may have not even recognized that it was uncomfortable. As a result, the child was in pain. The child was uncomfortable. The child recognized that this caregiver was doing things, bringing things that were causing discomfort. The caregiver was oblivious. The caregiver did not realize that the child perceived it differently. The caregiver did not realize that the child was uncomfortable. So I encourage you, if you are a caregiver and your child is reacting to something, get curious about why they're reacting strangely. If you think they're behaving oddly, my son, when we used to bathe him. He was hypersensitive to getting water in his ears. And when water would get in his ears, it really hurt him. And he would just. When we started to wash his hair, if water would get in or on his ears, he would just start shrieking. And you know, my knee jerk reaction is, what's your problem? Water's not going to hurt you. Get over it. But the therapist in me said, let's get curious. I wonder why he's having such a strong reaction to getting water in his ears. He so the sensitive parent is going to notice. Even if the child's reactions are different than what they expect, the caregiver is going to notice this and adjust. Insensitive parents just keep on doing what they've always done. Telling the kid to suck it up or assuming that the child is just trying to not go to bed or they're just colicky or making some other excuse instead of getting curious and trying to really figure out what's going on. In children with anxious attachment, the caregivers were also inconsistent. Sometimes they would respond lovingly and try to attend to the ca to the child. Other times they would become angry that the child was causing them problems. And still other times they would just ignore the child. It's just like, oh, whatever, I don't have time. Just let them cry it out. So the characteristics that have been identified as common to children who end up developing anxious attachment include parents who are inconsistent in their awareness of or responsiveness to the child's needs. So they may or may not even be aware that the child has these needs. But once they become aware that the child's hungry, cold, unhappy, crying, whatever, they may or may not respond to those needs. So the child is feeling very unsafe. The child's like, this is uncomfortable. I don't like this and nobody's helping me. Think how that must feel to a 6 month old or a 11 year old or a 2 year old who's still pre verbal and they're ha. They can't communicate that hey ma, this is really painful. Parents of people who develop anxious attachment often lack the ability or the desire to give positive attention to their child. The attention comes maybe sometimes if the child does something really, really good, but the rest of the time, negative attention. Attention is about the only attention that the child is going to get. They don't encourage the child to try new things. They don't encourage the child to take steps like when the child's learning how to tie their shoes. If the child doesn't get it right away. They're just like, fine, just stop, let me do it. Instead of helping the child, they get frustrated and do it for the child. Communicating to the child, you're incapable and your incompetence makes me angry, which makes me, you know, potentially rejecting of you, which creates a situation in which the child does not feel safe or comfortable. They don't feel like they can do right. They are afraid of abandonment, which creates that constant anxiety, what do I have to do to be loved? And when I don't do right, does that mean I'm going to be abandoned? Now, I cannot possibly go over all of the things that might be addressed or need to be addressed in people with anxious attachment, but there are a few tips. Begin mindfulness, mindful journaling about the facts in the present context. So if you're in a relationship and you start feeling anxious, you start feeling like this person is going to abandon you. Journal down what's happening, what are you seeing and what are the facts? What do you know? Not what are you assuming, not what are you thinking? Not what did other people do in this situation, but what are the facts with this person in this context? Become aware of your triggers and begin processing them. If somebody in your present acts a particular way and it causes you a lot of anxiety or it causes you to start feeling guilty or ashamed, that is probably coming from messages from your childhood that said you weren't good enough and you were always in danger of rejection. It's important to look in the present, in the current context. Are you being shamed or are you being in a, in a situation that's not safe? Or is this triggering something from your past? Distress tolerance skills are also important and this is going to be true for every type of insecure attachment. Because insecure attachment leads to emotional dysregulation. Distress tolerance skills can help you learn that how to tolerate emotions so they don't feel like they're going to overwhelm you. Distress tolerance skills can include thoughts that are distress tolerant, that say I can do this. That unhook from the thought. They instead of saying I feel like I'm going to be abandoned, say I'm having the feeling that I'm going to be abandoned. And actually hold your hands out like this so you can envision yourself holding this feeling or holding this thought. Then you can decide what you're going to do with it. Activities For a lot of people, square breathing, slow deep breathing can help trigger the relaxation response. For some people, it actually worsens the dissociation. So engaging in other grounding exercises like five things that you see, four things that you hear, three things that you smell, and two things that you feel. If you identify things that are in your present environment, it can help you get grounded. And by looking for those things, you're turning your attention away from what's causing you distress to something that is theoretically benign. Guided imagery can also be helpful for people who feel anxious or for people who are disregulating. Envisioning yourself in a cocoon, in a bubble, in a fortress, or somewhere safe in some sort of situation where you are safe and protected. Some people like to envision their adult self protecting their child self and S stands for sensations. If all else fails. Sometimes holding ice cubes or splashing cold water on your face, or even doing 50 sit ups can cause you to focus on something else besides your anxiety sensations. Gradually increasing space is another intervention for anxious attachment. But this is something that the person with anxious attachment has to decide that I want to do this, I want to feel more secure, I want to start overcoming my separation anxiety. The person with anxious attachment needs to be empowered to set the pace for these things. So maybe they start gradually increasing space by spending 30 minutes while they're both at the house, spending 30 minutes doing activities that aren't together. For for some people with anxious attachment, that may be a huge step if they're not in the same room with their significant other constantly and then move on once they can do that and they don't feel anxious and they're like, okay, this isn't so bad. Maybe going shopping without the significant other and then coming back or having the significant other go out and, you know, play around a golf or something. Golf's probably a bad example because golf usually takes like four hours for for a round of golf. But having the significant other go out, do something they want to do, and come back to prove to the person or the so the person can prove to themselves, I guess, that their significant other can go away, do something they want to do, and they are going to come back. Increase Love Language Communication this is another important tip because a lot of people who are anxiously attached don't feel loved and don't feel lovable. So communicating to the person using their love language is the most efficient way to do this. But in order for the significant other to communicate with you in your love language, you gotta tell them what it is. Don't make them guess, tell them what it is. A lot of people aren't even familiar with love languages, so this can be another thing that you need to educate yourself on or educate them on so they know what it is. And even if they don't completely buy into it, they recognize that it's important to you and they're willing to do it. Take steps to start developing friendships. That way all your eggs aren't in one basket. This can be support groups, this can be volunteer activities. This can be anything. And I don't mean you've got to find another bestie. I mean just go out there and start connecting with a couple of people and try to find other people that you feel like you can talk to and so you're not relying on one person to make you feel like you are worthy to live. And finally, respect boundaries while getting reassurance. It's not rejection when your significant other comes home and or calls you or whatever and sets a boundary. Whether it is something's bothering them and they don't want to tell you, or they want to spend some time just by themselves. They want some me time, whatever it is. Encourage open communication, but also respect their boundaries. If they're not ready to talk about it, then set a time. Okay, I respect that you need your space. Maybe when can we talk about it? Or maybe in an hour tomorrow we can revisit it. If they need space, okay, that's fine. Let's define what that looks like and that will help the person who feels anxious know, you know, is this just the person needing a little time to themselves or is this evolving into something else? If they say, you know, I just, I want to have the afternoon, okay, you know, that is very different than I need some space and I'll let you know. Now I have in in quotes here Best Relationships Ideally, people who have anxious attachment will work on their issues so they can feel more securely attached and they don't maintain this undercurrent of anxiety henceforth and forevermore. However, not everybody wants to change their attachment style and that's cool, you know, if you are fine how you are and you just want to have a relationship. Anxious people who are anxiously attached tend to do better with other people who are anxiously attached because they can both. They both have the similar needs and they can work with each other. Sometimes people who are anxiously attached can get into relationships with others who are securely attached who can help them start moving towards becoming more secure in their attachment. But a lot of times people who are securely attached can recognize that the anxious attachment can recognize the anxiety and can adjust to compromise and try to meet that person's needs while still getting their own needs met. If the videos on this channel have been helpful for you, please support us in our mission to make high quality, practical content available to everybody. You can donate@doc snipes.com donate. You can join the YouTube channel@docsnipes.com join or you can purchase a thanks for any video that you find particularly helpful. Anxious attachment is one of three types of insecure attachment that may develop as a result of insensitive, inconsistent, or rejecting parenting. The person who is anxiously attached often feels overwhelmed by their emotions and the emotions of others. They've also never felt safe in their own skin or in the world, and as such, they never took initiative to see what they liked. They never developed a sense of self. They never figured out what they were good at or capable of, and this led to dependency in adult relationships because they don't feel capable of getting outside that that comfort zone. Changing anxious attachment requires that the person feels safe in the present context. They need to feel empowered. They need to feel loved. They need to feel heard. They need to recognize how their relationship behaviors developed as a result of trying to survive a chaotic environment. That's where I talked about get curious how did this behavior develop as a way to help me survive? How did this behavior develop as a way to make that my caregivers were going to stay around and meet my needs until I could meet my needs on my own? The person also has to learn to recognize their own capabilities and develop emotional awareness and regulation skills, and learn to set and assertively maintain and respect other people's boundaries. If this video is helpful, consider watching some of my other videos on abandonment anxiety, developing secure attachment, complex ptsd, adverse childhood experiences, or improving your relationship with yourself.