How Your Attachment Style And Personality Types Influence Romantic Relationships? with Tami...

This is not a podcast about being broken, although you may have been. This is a podcast about strength for women who find themselves in difficult relationships, including that sometimes difficult one with yourself. We'll look at your relationship through a lens of psychology, faith, and a little dash of my own kind of feminism. We're not fixing them. We're fixing you. And that changes everything. Welcome to Stronger in the Difficult Places. Save yourself, heal your relationships. Listen in. Hello, I'm your host, Dr. Zoe. Welcome to Stronger in the Difficult Places, where we talk about all things difficult relationships. So today's topic is how does attachment style and personality type influence your romantic relationships? And I have a guest today. Her name is Tammy Kiecoffer. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. I will ask her when we do the interview. But she is a licensed clinical social worker. She's operated successful psychotherapy practice since 2002. She's a certified yoga instructor, and she weaves concepts of holistic therapy into her clinical work. She combines a mind-body-soul approach, addressing every angle for crucial stability and peace. Her first book, which we'll talk about today, called Preparing for the Jungle: Avoiding Snakes and Pitfalls on the Path to Healthy Love, provides hands-on tools required to work through the past, stabilize the present, and prepare for loving relationships. She's experienced her own share of heartbreak, and her compassion with real life adds to the richness of her writing. But first up before the interview, my win and my fail. My win is that you guys have been on this publishing journey with me. We subbed to publishers. I think I told you about that, and we have multiple publishers interested. I've been so busy in meetings with publishers, and it's just a huge win for a lot of work that has led up to this point. And I'm excited to share this book with you that will come out in a year at least because that's how this process works. So my fail, guys, I have a big mom fail. I feel like a lot of my fails are mom fails. I have had such a busy week that I just told you about and my son had called me early. I think it was yesterday and he needed some money to Uber and asked me to transfer money into his account and I told him I would do it. He wanted to tell me early to make sure I had the money in there before it was time for him to go where he needed to go. And I plum forgot. I got busy, forgot. I missed his call because I had silenced my phone when I was in one of the meetings with the publisher. After I got out of the meeting, I realized I forgot, and it was past the time that he had to be at this class that he was taking, and I felt like the worst. Mom ever. The worst mom ever. I was caught up in my own work and forgot to send my son this money, and then I was stressing thinking, oh my gosh, maybe he didn't make it. He got late to the class. It was his first day of class. Long story. Um, I messed up and felt really guilty about it. I was finally— I put the money in his account right away, and I was able to look and see that he had actually transferred the money from his savings account. And so I was thankful that at least he took care of that and wasn't stranded and not able to get to his class. And I was able to talk to him afterwards. He told me it was okay. And, you know, we made arrangements to make sure that doesn't happen again. But yeah, big mom fail. I promised him I'd transfer the money and it immediately flew out of my brain because it was that kind of day. And it happens, right? And despite our failures as parents, We can repair our mistakes by going to our children and having those conversations, apologizing, accepting your deficits. And of course, my loving Sage was so gracious in telling me, Mom, it's okay. I'm good. I got there on time. Everything's fine. Okay. Onto the real topic of the episode. So I'm looking forward to talking to Tammy today about really how our attachment styles and our personality can sometimes get us caught up as we're trying to have a healthy Relationship. Tune in, Tammy. Hello. So glad to have you here today. In the intro, at least for the YouTube intro, I think I pronounced your name incorrectly. So it's Tammy Kaefer. Got it.

Kaefer, correct.

Kaefer. Yep.

Okay.

Very good. So we're going to be talking today about how personality styles and attachment styles affect. Getting Healthy Love. And you've also written a book called Preparing for the Jungle. I'm going to ask you about that. But first, can you share a little bit about your own painful love journey? You mentioned that you had some, some experiences, as we all have. Yes. Share that with my audience just to get an idea of how you got to this place.

Sure. So I, you know, I think probably had 3 main relationships in my life that really kind of redirected the way that my, that my life went. And, um, and I, I look back now and I can be grateful for them and thankful for them. Um, but of course, at the time, getting your heart broken and, um, it's devastating.

Mm-hmm.

Um, so I think that the, the last relationship that I had, I was married, um, for about 12 years, and we've got 2 amazing kids. And, um, and we actually We actually get along pretty well. We're more, we're better as co-parents. Um, but we, um, yeah, it was, I think we just sort of grew apart and, and I know our communication was probably the main downfall, our lack of communication. And, um, and we just sort of grew apart. So there wasn't a whole lot of fighting. There wasn't a whole lot of, you know, there was no abusive type stuff, no negative things like that. It's just kind of grew apart. And after that, I was like, Oh my gosh, what? I've got to— I've got to get my act together. Here I am as a couples counselor, and I'm going through a divorce. And it's like, holy cow. Oh, just don't do what I do, but do, you know, let's talk about it. Yeah, it's very, very awkward. Yeah. And so, um, so after that and during that divorce process, you know, I started really taking a look at myself, and I was like, I I think it takes 2 people to make a relationship work, and it takes 2 people to make a relationship not work. And as much as easy as it can be to point the finger at the other person, I had to figure out what I was doing because my past relationships hadn't worked out and I'm the common denominator. So I just had to think like, what am I contributing to the relationships that are making them not work? And so that's kind of where I came up with the idea behind the book that I wrote, Preparing for the Jungle. as a step by step by step all the way through of what is important to, to do for yourself to feel confident, to feel empowered, to know what you're looking for, to know what you're negatively contributing and positively contributing to a relationship, and really what's required to be available for a healthy relationship.

I love that. I love that. You know, it's so important, especially after a breakup, or divorce to take that space to really go, okay, yes, he was whatever he was, or yes, she was whatever she was. But let me— now the relationship is over. Let me focus on myself. Right. And I do agree with you that in the majority of relationships, it takes 2 people to obviously get together, that's for sure. And it takes 2 people for the relationship to fail. But there are some exceptions. And I do work with a lot of women in toxic and abusive relationships. And sometimes hearing that can make them feel like, oh, okay, I just need to work harder. But it does— you know, the reality is that sometimes there's nothing that you can do to fix a relationship. Although certainly what you can do is figure out why were you in it to begin with? What drew you into it? That's it. Yes. What did you contribute in the relationship for whatever discord was going on? But also recognize that sometimes one person, right, by themselves cannot save a relationship.

And I agree with you 100%. And I do thank you for pointing that out because it's not meant to have one person say, well, you have to try harder or put up with more negative behavior, or you've just got to hang in there. Absolutely not. I think that That looking at it, you know, when you're in a very toxic relationship, abusive relationship, the first thing that takes a hit is your confidence.

Absolutely.

And then you feel like you can start second-guessing yourself and you can start thinking, well, maybe a bad relationship is better than no relationship, or no one else is going to want me, or now I'm broken and so I might as well just stay. I mean, all those just you know, very degrading, self-deprecating thoughts come into your brain, but you start to believe them. So yeah, I think that, that your power is trying— is understanding what can I do to help myself right now? And sometimes it's just talking to someone so that you can get some support, so that you can pull your confidence back up again, so that you can realize, wait a second, maybe I don't have to stay. Maybe I don't have to keep putting up with that behavior. Maybe I can. What if I could do it by myself for a little while? And

just gaining some clarity, just gaining some clarity sometimes in those conversations. And so here we are about both helping a woman understand how to get healthier in a toxic relationship and then maybe sometimes figuring out if you need to get out of one. So I want to talk about— I love the topic of your book, Preparing for the Jungle. Can you tell me about that jungle metaphor? Because that's— I thought, okay, so tell me, how did you come up with this jungle metaphor when it comes to essentially finding love or getting healthy love?

I think it is kind of a jungle. I talk about there's pitfalls, there's snakes, there's things out there that are There's booby traps. There's things that if you're not prepared and aware of what you're dealing with, it's going to get you.

Absolutely.

So to me, it just, it does it kind of. And I think a jungle, like there's so many environmental activities and aspects that you don't have any control over. But the one thing that you do have control over is your preparedness. So if you walk into a situation and you feel prepared, you know, what you're looking for, you know what your non-negotiables are, you know what your communication style is, you know why you're attracted to certain types of people. When you know these things ahead of time, you could actually do something about it. And, and you can make it work for you, or you can make it not work for you, but at least you're aware and you're prepared.

Right.

And, um, so it kind of started out as a book to help people get out there and find healthy love, to be prepared to date before you get on the dating site and swipe left and swipe right. But it's kind of morphed also into if you're already in a relationship and you're having communication problems, or you're, um, or, you know, we all have to figure out how to handle conflict because there's no perfect relationship out there.

Right.

And so it, it kind of morphed also into if you're in a relationship And you feel like there's areas and aspects to improve on, then it's a whole workbook, basically. So I think that anyone could benefit from it. I think I benefited from it. I kind of wrote it because I had to live it first, and then I wrote the book.

Isn't that how so many books get made? Yes. And that's why I think books are just full of so much wisdom, because we get to learn from other people's experiences. Let's talk about that. Let's first, for a listener out there who might not be aware of attachment styles and what are you talking about attachment styles, can you describe and explain the different attachment styles?

Sure. So I definitely subscribe to that attachment theory. And without the whole long, boring explanation of it, there's a period between 0 and 3 years old when you learn how to trust the people around you and you learn how to trust your environment. And it has so many aspects to deal with your caregiver and the specific place that they were in at that time, where you were, what your coping mechanisms were, what your support system was like, that kind of lead us into different ways that we learn how to trust people around us and trust our environment.

Mm-hmm.

So there's 4 basic ones. So there's secure attachment. And that's when you're just kind of like, I'm good. Like, if a conflict comes up, I trust myself. I know how to handle it. I can, I can regulate my emotions. I can trust people, but I don't overly trust people. So just kind of that secure space.

Basically because your parent was appropriate and met your needs and you, you kind of got all your needs met. And so you learned to be a little secure, a little toddler. Right. And it unfortunately projects into the rest of your life. Yes. Go ahead.

Yes. Yep. And, and you were lucky enough to have that support. And, you know, there's sometimes when— and when I talk about caregiver, you know, it could be both parents, it could be one parent, it could be an aunt or uncle, it could be a friend, a grandparent, an older sibling. Like, it doesn't matter who that person is. It's just that was your person that you looked up to and said, can I count on you?

Yeah.

And then the, the another one is anxious attachment. And, and that's where your You can be preoccupied with relationships, kind of just having a lot of anxiety, a lot living in the what-ifs, living in the worst-case scenario, and maybe prone to going into a situation not trusting yourself right off the bat. And you might have, in my book, I have little statements that go with each attachment.

Wow.

And in this one, it's, I need you. So in the secure one, I put, let's just hang out and stay a while. Like, if it works, it works. If it doesn't, It doesn't, but I'm good. In this one, it's I need you because there's that anxious, like, you're going to complete me and I need to have you in my life.

And you feel that neediness in a relationship and it increases your anxiety because you're feeling needy. And then the other person feels the neediness in you too, which can actually sometimes make them pull away, which creates more needy and more neediness in you. It can just be this vicious, vicious cycle. And You know, I wonder, I haven't, I haven't looked this up, but what is the most common attachment style? Do you know?

I would probably think it's the, it's the anxious one, or maybe the, the fearful, like the one that's afraid of intimacy. So there's a little bit of anxiety, like come closer, but go away. Come closer, but no, go away. You're too close. Like a push pull.

Yeah.

I think, I wonder if those are 2. I haven't really looked into that either.

Yeah, I just thought about that this second. But my guess, especially when I, when I'm just like thinking about myself and I'm thinking about the population, but of course my population might be a little bit skewed, but I feel like that is probably the case too. It might be more anxious.

Leaning towards anxious.

And I wonder if it even is different in gender. You know, I wonder if gender has, has it has something to do with it.

I bet. I bet because maybe women, huge generalization, but women tend to talk more about their feelings and are more emotionally, like we feel all the feels. And sometimes men, again, big generalization, but are just like, I'm fine. I'm angry. I'm, you know, just here. So maybe there, it could be where there's a higher percentage where they're more on the avoidant side.

Mm-hmm.

Kind of shut down.

We're just making this up as we go, but we're just totally making

it

up. We're speculating, though, based on— I mean, you're a licensed clinician. I'm a licensed clinician, and this is definitely what I see in my practice. Okay, so we have the secure attachment. We have the anxious attachment. What are the other 2?

The next one would be the fearful one, and that's where there is a lot of dysregulation growing up. Couldn't really count on, um, I don't know, just the basic needs. Like sometimes they'd get met and sometimes they wouldn't. Sometimes they'd be on time. Sometimes it was overboard. Sometimes it wasn't enough.

Yeah.

So just a lot of like unknowns and which can kind of create a lot of anxiety also. I think of the anxious attachment as almost like the helicopter parent who just was on you all the time.

Yeah.

Where in the fearful one, it's kind of like, They were there and then they weren't there.

Right. Yeah. Thanks so much.

Um, so there's a lot of, of, there could be a fear of intimacy, but almost a need for intimacy. And that's where it's like, I want you so bad, but now you're too close and you're freaking me out. And so I'm gonna sabotage and I'm gonna do something, throw a monkey wrench in to make you go away.

Mm-hmm.

Or I'm gonna test you and test you and test you. And are you done? Are you gonna leave me? Are you gonna leave me? You're still here? Oh, okay. Well, this feels good. Mm-hmm. And then that anxiety picks up again and testing. So a lot of very, a lot of ups and downs.

So true. Or, oh, I tested you and I tested you and I tested you and now you go away. See, you're just like everybody else. See, it just— I knew you were going to do it. Yes. Yes. I see. I see that so much. Anybody recognizing themselves in any of these? I think I tend to be more towards the— I think I vacillate. I would say in my least functional state, I think I vacillate between anxious and maybe avoidant. But anyway, that's the next one we're getting ready to talk about. Let's talk about that.

That's the next one. Yeah. Is the avoidant one. And, and that might be where your caregiver just really wasn't available at all. And, and it could have been where it was a single parent and they had 3 jobs. Like their intention was, was the best intention, but they just weren't available. Or maybe it was someone who, I don't know, just is really kind of incapable of closeness themselves. So it was like, okay, just go do your thing and I'll see you later, or whatever. There's a million reasons for that. But basically your caregiver wasn't there as they should have been for you. And so you were up to your own devices to get your needs met.

Right.

So you pretty much had to rely on yourself. And it was like, I don't trust anybody because I can't count on you. I don't know if you're actually going to be there. It's all up to me. So, so the personality type that goes with that could be very self-centered or some narcissism.

Mm-hmm.

Um, and, and getting, you know, uh, with the avoidant attachment in very, very, very extreme cases, but when there's a lot of physical, sexual, emotional abuse in these, in that early stage,

a

lot of times that's where you see the antisocial, You know, scary. Yeah. Psychotic kind of sociopath is what the word I was looking for, type behaviors that come out of that. So, yeah.

And I think it's important to recognize that we can, you know, we don't always all fit perfectly into a box. You know, there can be sometimes when we feel very much of a secure attachment and then other times where, you know, we have some traits of others. Um, some people will fit very securely in some of those boxes, um, but some people won't. And I also know that in relationships, if you're get— if you get into unhealthy relationships, it can kind of trigger or create these kinds of, of attachment issues even later in life if this is like a long-going thing. So I think it's important to know what your general— because you can probably, as, as Tammy has just described, you can go, oh, okay, I recognize that in me. So then the question is, so now what? What does that mean about me and love?

I think that's so true. There's, there's really, I mean, I don't know how you look at it, but nothing stays the same. You know, everything is always changing and, and your stages in life change and you go through these different transitions with your perspectives and your priorities. And, and I think that's such a good point. You know, you could be You could have had secure attachment growing up, and then you get into a really abusive relationship and you're like, I don't know how I got here in the first place, but now I'm this dependent person and, and I don't know why I can't get out of this thing and what's wrong with me. And then maybe you finally get out and you're like, you know what? No more relationships. I am done. And now you go away and you go away and you get this kind of protection that goes up. So now all of a sudden you're flipping into some of the avoidant. Mm-hmm. Type stuff. Yeah. And, and I think that awareness is key, whether as you go through all of these stages and transitions and fluctuations in your life, the one thing that you can do is have an awareness of what you're doing and why you're doing what you're doing. And I think that that's where you can just kind of really find your stability.

That makes a lot of sense. So if there's a woman out there who goes, oh, you know what, I noticed that I am very needy and I kind of know where that comes from, I remember I remember when I was a child feeling that way, feeling like maybe a little bit of neglect or just like I needed more from my mom. And of course, temperament also plays a big part of that. We're not necessarily going to go into temperament today, but that definitely plays a part in developing your personality and attachment style.

Yes.

So what would you say to maybe the women in each of maybe these attachment styles of how can she focus on finding healthy love now that she understands, oh, okay, I've got an attachment style and this affects the way that I love or the way that I seek love?

Look at all 4 of those. The only one where your confidence is going to be thriving is in the secure. In the anxiety one, in the fearful one, in the avoidant one, all of those, your confidence is going to take a hit. And it's almost like when you continue to be in relationships like that, You're compromising yourself. Maybe underneath all of that, you know how you want to be treated. You know what's right and wrong. You know when something doesn't feel right, but when it goes on and on and on, you end up compromising yourself. So I think that when you find yourselves like leaning into any of these other types of attachment, awareness is key because you can't change something if you're not aware of it. And then the second part is, what can I do to try to boost up my confidence? How can I listen to myself? How can I trust myself, my gut feeling, my intuition? And I, and I go into what do you do with that? You know, it's setting like some short-term realistic goals for yourself. What are you doing to rely on yourself and, and not depend on someone else to make you happy? So I think that, that there's a million ways, but one thing is to focus on confidence and what can I do to pull up my confidence so that I have worth for myself so that I'm respecting myself. Because then I think that you put out this different energy and when you're respecting yourself, you almost don't put up with people who don't respect you or, or people don't really have the option to not respect you because you don't give 'em the time of day. If they're not respecting you because you have so much self-confidence and worth and love for yourself.

Right. So I think it all comes down to self-talk. So many things come down to self-talk. So when I think of someone, let's, let's say maybe someone who's anxiously attached and she's texting her partner and he doesn't respond. Right. And so what does that do for, for the anxiously attached person? It just creates so much anxiety. And then she wants to text and she wants to check and then she wants to find out what's going on. Right. And maybe a woman who's in that place, she can sit and go, okay, I see this behavior. I feel this urgency. I feel this, this fear and this drive to text him again and again. Right. Or to confirm or make sure that he loves me or make sure that he's going to be there. What is that about? And maybe— and I often talk with my clients about this. Yeah. Okay, so sit with the feeling, because often what we're doing is trying to push the feeling away by getting that confirmation. Right. So we get the confirmation and then we feel better. But what you're doing is you're looking external. You're looking outside of yourself to try to get that comfort when what you really need to do is go internal, right? Yes. And sit with the feeling and say, okay, I know this feels really bad. I know this feels really scary. I know I feel like maybe I'm being rejected right now. And I remember what that feeling used to feel like when I was little. And I know I have this drive to fix that. How can I love myself in this moment? How can I tell myself that I'm valuable? whether he texts me back or not, right, that I am loved, that I am cared for. And what can I do instead? Maybe I can text a friend who I know, you know, cares for me, or maybe might know what's going on in this relationship. And let me send the text over here instead. But really, it's about learning to regulate, right, that emotion and that feeling when you're in the midst of acting based on that attachment style need. You think?

I love it, love it, love it, love it. Yes, that's exactly— I mean, I think that external versus internal sense of self is so important. Again, have that awareness of because you can look for that external thing. And you're right, as soon as you get the text back or a phone call, it's like an immediate instant gratification. I'm okay.

Yeah.

But you're dependent on it. And so then you're just kind of looking for the next one or the next one, and it's never enough to really fulfill that because it— because you're lacking it internally. So yeah, to that internal dialogue, that little voice that just not— it's just there waiting for you to access it. It can take you down in a nanosecond. Absolutely.

Um,

it can. It's so powerful and Sometimes I look at it and I'm like, that's kind of a cool thing when you can recognize that because it's all you. So you're, you're creating it. And guess who is the only person who has 100% to make it go away? You do. You don't even have to depend on anyone else. You have, you're creating it. You can do something with it. Um, and, and part of it is just understanding and telling yourself like, I can fix this right now. I can do something about this.

Beautiful.

And that's an empowering feeling.

It is empowering. It is. And I hope that that gives some hope and encouragement to a woman out there who might recognize herself in some of these attachments. You know, when I think of the avoidant, I think of clients who want so desperately to be loved, and yet push away everyone that's trying to love them. And sometimes what sometimes I see in avoidant personalities is they will find people who are emotionally unavailable to be in relationships with because it feels a little more— on one level it feels safer. But then what happens is they're not getting their needs met in the relationship and they're not happy. They're complaining about it. But yet someone who is emotionally available, they're likely to push away. And so for a woman who sees that pattern, pattern in herself, who recognizes that she does that sometimes, You know, I'd like to encourage her to pay attention. Again, we're going back to paying attention, right, to what's going on with you. And when you feel the need to say, no, I'm okay, no, I got it, or no, you know, refusing an emotional connection in a moment because it feels scary or uncomfortable, do the same thing. Sit with that and say, okay, what— why am I scared to connect? Mm-hmm. with this person? What is this about? Let me go back to, you know, foundationally, back to my childhood when maybe my needs weren't getting met and I convinced myself they never would, so I have to meet them myself. You know, let me look at my, you know, family of origin and what was going on in that family. And what do I need to remind myself of now? I need to remind myself of those same things that I think the biggest thing for someone with avoidant personality is to recognize that if someone rejects you, you won't die. And the value, the value of reaching out and possibly having love is way more valuable and the possible connection than the, you know, risk of being rejected and hurt. And if we can hold the reality that, oh yeah, you know what, I might be rejected. Oh yeah, if I love someone and get close, That vulnerability also means that they could hurt me, but I know that that won't kill me because now I can care for myself. I couldn't when I was little, couldn't care for myself.

Right.

So I had to create this wall, but now if that happens, I can care for myself. And so I encourage you to go ahead and take that risk. Right.

I love that. Yeah. And I think it's recognizing what's, what's comfortable isn't always healthy. What you know from your past isn't always the best option. And but you don't know that until you do sit with yourself and ask yourself, how am I doing? Where is this stuff coming from? Oh, this is, this is why it's familiar. So I'm drawn to it. But it doesn't always mean that it's the best choice for you right now.

I love that. You made such a great point. I was just talking to a client about that this morning, is that that concept of But it feels good, right? If in the moment it feels safe and it feels good to do whatever those behaviors are, because they reinforce you, they make you feel that way. But just like eating a piece of chocolate cake feels great in the moment, you know, you can eat half the cake. Half the cake feels great in the moment. But the consequences of that to you long term are not what you want. And so, you know, even emotionally, we can't always pay attention to just what feels good in the moment. Because we're doing those things for reasons, we have to recognize, but how does that affect me long-term? Is it serving me long-term?

Is this serving me? And just, and trying to make it simple for yourself, not going into a whole dialogue about, you know, the scientific method and whatever. But I love that. Is this serving me right now? And you don't know that until you take a pause and you don't know you need to take a pause until you find the awareness. So it's sort of the sequence of just almost just creating a new habit. You know, if you think about the habit to go to your worst-case scenario or no one, no one wants to be with me or I'm damaged goods or what, that's just a habit that you've created of a, of a, of a train of thought. So creating a different habit that's going to serve you better is going to help you in the long run.

Yes, I love that. So in your book, you talk about those snakes and pitfalls. What would you— what are those?

Or do we already know what those are? Oh, so many.

Yeah.

I think that the, you know, okay, now I just am kind of thinking about this. At the beginning, I was thinking snakes and pitfalls are the people out there. But you know what? Maybe the snakes and pitfalls are your way of thinking that no longer serve you. They're always available for you to compromise your non-negotiables, to To allow the anxiety and your coping mechanisms to come in that are supposed to protect you but are actually a setback for you. Mm-hmm. Justifying and rationalizing why you should stay in an unhealthy relationship, taking on too much responsibility and thinking that you can change somebody. Maybe those can kind of be the snakes and pitfalls that are available to you. And when you can clear those out and have that awareness, You're creating a path for yourself that provides so much confidence and stability that helps you become even more available for healthy relationships.

I love that. All of that. That's so true. Those snakes and those pitfalls in terms of men or women are out there in terms of the people, but it always comes back to ourselves. If we can recognize that, then we don't need to worry about them. We just need to focus on ourselves, right?

Yeah.

Get out of those situations if we are recognizing it.

Beautiful.

Yeah.

So I've never thought about that, snakes and pitfalls being more of an internal thing than an external, but I don't know, that almost makes more sense to me today. So thank you.

You're very welcome. Um, so you have a Facebook group for women or what? Tell us about your Facebook group.

I do. Yep. Um, it's called the Women's Empowerment Toolkit. And, um, there's, it's, you know, I, I post in there as often as I can. Sometimes we'll do some drawing, sometimes we'll do some challenges. Um, but But it's all a private Facebook group and I monitor everything in there. And I just, I wanted a place, a safe space for people to come in that weren't going to get spam, that weren't going to get, um, you know, that you could, you could talk about something that's going on in your life.

Mm-hmm.

And, and the support and the comments. And when somebody puts something out there to say, oh, I'm struggling with this or whatever, the support of, of other women Is it just— I don't know, it's, it's like, this is why I do what I do, you know? It's just so cool to me because it's— you don't know the other people who are in there. I think there's, I think there's about 1,000, a little over 1,000 people. But, um, you know, the people who are active is a lot smaller. But I've, I've met maybe a handful of the women in person, you know, but there are people who I don't even know. And sometimes it's easier to talk to someone. Or put something out there when they don't know you, they don't know your family, they don't know your job, they don't know your coworkers. You're just— it's this place where you put something out there and someone comes around and says, I've got you. And so, yeah, so I wanted to create that. And, and what I'm gearing into is for people who have purchased the book, or this book is actually— it's an online course as well. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Um, 'cause I couldn't decide if I wanted a book or a course or whatever, so I ended up doing both. But the course is a lot more in-depth and it has videos that go with each module and it's a go-at-your-own-pace kind of a thing. But I did, um, eventually wanted to have like a VIP kind of group for people who have done the book and the course, just if you've got questions or, um, eventually I'll probably do like a, an in-service type thing and talk about it. I haven't gotten there quite yet, but the Women's Empowerment Toolkit group is on Facebook and you just have to answer some questions, and then I monitor it and, and, uh, and allow you to join.

Wonderful, wonderful. Well, thank you, Tammy, so much for your wisdom and conversation. Is there one last word you'd like to give to a woman out there who might be in the jungle or, uh, recognizing that her attachment styles might be affecting her relationship?

You know, I think that it is, is just don't sell yourself short. I think that there's so many times that we make concessions and allow people to treat us in a way that we don't want to be treated because we don't want to be someone who's high maintenance, or we don't want to be the complainer, or we don't want to be, you know, the problem causer or whatever. And it's like, it's okay to be assertive. Mm-hmm. You know, assert yourself. You can be assertiveness to me is being firm. But do it with compassion. And when you can speak your, your, um, your truth, when you can speak what you need, when you do that in an assertive way, you really can't go wrong. So I think, um, just know your worth, get support, ask for help, build your team. There's— it's available for you out there, but you don't have to do this whole thing by yourself.

I love that. Thank you so much, Tammy.

Yeah, thank you so much for having me on here. It was wonderful.

Take care. Thank you for listening to Stronger in the Difficult Places. New episodes go up mostly on Tuesdays. Subscribe to my email list so you don't miss an episode and you get some weekly encouragement from me. And have a strong week.