Insecure in Love: How Anxious Attachment Can Make You Feel Jealous, Needy, and Worried and What You Can Do About It by Leslie Becker-Phelps Read Free Book Online Page B

highlight a pattern by thinking about how these questions apply to all of your previous intimate relationships.
Do you frequently feel that your partner is emotionally distant, or worry that he or she will leave you? Does this thought make you feel crushed and desperate to keep your partner close (primal panic)?
Even though you might not do it consciously, can you see how you protest against being left alone? What are examples of this?
Protests often backfire, causing people to feel more upset or overwhelmed. For each example you gave, explain how it made you feel and possibly even led to more distress.
Do you struggle with feeling helpless, incompetent, or flawed? Think about how your attachment style and protests are related to this.
For some people, being overly emotional leads to maladaptive ways of coping, such as smoking, drinking, using drugs, or overeating. Do you have maladaptive ways of coping? How have they been a problem for you?
How does your panic about being left alone (if you do panic) influence your relationship in unhealthy ways, such as by creating conflicts around trust and—purposefully or subconsciously—making it difficult for you to relax and enjoy your partner’s company?
     
    Emotions? What Emotions?
    Children with a more avoidant style of attachment block their emotional reactions to threats, including their primal panic about the unavailability of caretakers. With time, they learn to keep their attachment system deactivated, and they no longer try to connect with their parents or struggle with separation. Later in their lives, they are similarly disconnected from their partners.
    It’s important to understand that the tendency to distance oneself from emotions does not prevent emotions or physiological arousal. It only obscures them. Stress hormones still surge while oxytocin (“cuddle hormone”) levels remain low. So, although ignoring, suppressing, or denying emotions can often help to handle minor stressors, this approach is seriously flawed.
    When people with avoidant attachment styles can no longer ignore their feelings because their stress or relationship problems have become so severe and persistent, they often don’t know how to handle their emotions. This puts them at risk for using unhealthy ways to cope. Their emotions are also likely to leak out despite their apparently calm demeanor. For instance, an avoidant man might calmly talk about his girlfriend being “such a bitch,” all the while denying any anger, unaware that his chest is tight and his heart rate is up. You might consider whether this common dynamic is what’s going on when you think you are calm but are uncharacteristically saying or doing hurtful things. (If your partner tends to be the avoidant one, this dynamic might also explain why you are upset at times when your partner seems to be calmly talking about serious problems.)
    The Chemistry of “Secure and Happy”
    Some children are fortunate enough to have parents who consistently nurture and calm them when they get upset. The more this happens, the better they learn to turn to their parents—and the more they produce the hormone oxytocin, which gives them a sense of trust, safety, and connection. When children (and adults) are upset, oxytocin also brings down their levels of stress hormones, adrenaline and cortisol. Over time, these responses help them to become comfortable with the full range of their emotions and integrate them into their lives. They grow to be securely attached adults who are capable of managing their own emotions, addressing personal problems, and effectively dealing with conflicts.
    It can be heartening to learn that, as an anxiously attached person, you can “earn” secure attachment—along with all of its benefits. This is something I will address more later in this chapter. You can also lessen your attachment-related anxiety and other distress by choosing a securely attached partner.
    Exercise: Understanding Yourself in