Hi , this is Annette Vinedetti , your hostess for a locker room talk and chocks , the podcast that likes to think of itself as the queer NPR of raunchy women's sex talk . You are about to sit in on the kind of conversations women have on their girls' nights out or behind closed doors , while enjoying delicious drinks and dishing about sex , think fun , honest and feminist as fuck , and always with a goal of fighting the patriarchy one orgasm at a time . Welcome to the locker room . Today's locker room talk and shots topic is Relationship Attachment Style 101 , your locker room guide to anxious , avoidant and secure love . Listeners .
Speaker 1It's been quite a year and I've shared a little bit with y'all about my relationship journey this year and throughout my life , and if you are on TikTok or online anywhere , I'm sure you've been hearing all about attachment styles in relationships . I'm talking about anxious attachment styles , avoidant attachment styles , secure attachment styles and how they are leading to your troubles , your woes and finding your true love or being with who you believe to be your true love . Now there's a lot to unpack here for people to use this new information that's out on the internet in a way that can be useful to them in finding or maintaining the relationships they care about . I know that most of us have relationship goals and want to find ourselves in healthy relationships , so I thought now was a great time to dive into attachment styles and relationships where we will be having , hopefully , amazing sex with people we love , and so I sought out a professional to help us all understand more about our attachment style the attachment style of the people we're dating , maybe talk about our relationship patterns that keep us in places either we don't want to be or are standing in the way of us achieving the kind of relationships we hope for in the upcoming years .
Speaker 1And my guest today is licensed professional counselor , andrea Aragon . She has been on my podcast in the past and she is going to guide us through the different attachment styles and help us understand them , how they show up in relationships and what we can do about hours in order to maybe heal some of the wounds that have led to our particular style if we have one that's not secure and start having the kind of relationships we want to in 2024 . Andrea , can you reintroduce yourself to my listeners and tell them a little bit about your background ?
Speaker 2My name is Andrea Aragon and I am a counselor . I have an LPC and I have been in the field for I realized recently about 20 years . Attachment theory has actually been around since the 50s . It's come a long way just even in recent years , I would say and it's becoming more and more popularly talked about .
Speaker 1Can you work with people in relationships and couples ?
Speaker 2Yeah , I'd say a relationship problem is the number one reason people come into counseling . I mean it's usually either it's individually or as a couple or in a family , and it's not always romantic . Some people are there because they're having problems with their child or their problems at work are relationship focused . I mean it really all boils down to relationships .
Speaker 1And once we dive into this topic , friends , what you're going to find out is your attachment style . It's definitely affecting your ability to find that true love , that partner , that next awesome fuck that you want to have . These relationship attachment styles also play out in your relationships at work and your friendships , in your familial connections , so the information you get here today is going to help you in all areas of your life . Now I want to encourage you to stay to the end , where we're going to sum up and give you takeaways that are basically going to help you identify your attachment style and then know what you can do about it and with it in order to manifest the connections and relationships and happiness and joy that you want in the upcoming year .
Speaker 1Even more importantly , scroll down . You are going to see a link to my newsletter , because I will be delivering information just like this straight to your inbox if you sign up for that newsletter . So make sure that you do that , andrea . I am so ready to dive into the attachment styles and relationships , and how to fucking fix whatever's been going on in my life .
Speaker 1So let's raise our glasses . We are having coffee , starbucks Cheers . Let's talk about relationships . Look , relationships and sex go hand in hand , folks , and in order to have really good sex , it really helps to have really good relationships . And so we're going to dive into the attachment styles First of all . Let's just for people who've heard about attachment styles but they're like I don't really understand what they are . Andrea , can you define ? What are these relationship attachment styles ?
Speaker 2Well , they stem from a theory , so there is attachment theory . It provides a psychological framework that helps us understand how we form bonds with other people , and they tend to develop in childhood . I think that's an important thing to acknowledge . They are based on the quality of the interactions that we have with our caregivers , and there are four basic attachment styles that are identified , and they are secure , avoidant , anxious and disorganized . So those are the four basic categories .
Speaker 1You are likely one of the four . Is that right , Andrea ? Can you be more than one of the four ?
Speaker 2Okay , yes , I think this is not set in stone . I think that we all probably can fit into one of these categories . If you do an exploration , you will find you are mostly one , or you may have a leaning towards one , or you might identify . You know , I used to be like this , but now I feel differently . I think that , depending on the relationship you're in , you might start to feel or exhibit behaviors in one category in response to the partner that you have . That , I feel , has happened to me . I don't think this is something that is immobile . You can be in any of them , you know , or you can go back and forth or around the options that are there . People tend to find they have a pattern , though People tend to identify that they tend to repeat over and over again more consistently , even one of the attachment styles .
Speaker 1Right , I would like to define each of
the four attachment styles and sort of the traits of each of the styles , and let's start with secure , because my understanding is like secure attachment styles what we're all striving for , or hope to be , is that correct , yeah , and in the original theory that I think that is very much the case .
Speaker 2I think that there is a lot out there where there's a lot of people working to help people who can't just shift right away have more success in relationships they're already in with people who might be anything but secure , and how to help them get to secure or understand your partner better , as they are anxious or avoidant . There is a lot of that out there . I think it's fair to say , though , that secure is the goal we want to strive towards having secure attachments . That's where our healthiest relationships are going to happen .
Speaker 1Right , okay , so what we're going to talk about is to find secure and
talk about the key traits of the secure attachment style .
Speaker 2Well , I think it starts with I mean your individual self being secure with yourself . You have confidence , you are good at communicating , you are well regulated within your emotional expression . Trusting is something that is associated with a secure attachment style .
Speaker 1And so the secure attachment style stems from having secure attachments in your youth , feeling safe with your primary caregivers Is that correct ? And having your needs met . So people who had secure attachments with primary caregivers in their childhood most often end up with a secure attachment style . Yes , that's sort of what we're striving to be in relationship , correct ? Having our own ability to emotionally regulate , to problem solve with our partners , not have extreme reactions to issues that arise .
Speaker 2Yeah , absolutely . I think that you know it did start with studying . You know children as they attach to their caregivers and watching them and the way that they behaved in response to their caregivers as they were left and reunited with them , and it is a part of the childhood development process is learning how to attach and trust and feel safe and secure within those attachments Right .
Speaker 1So let's move on to anxious attachment . Let's just head right into it , my specialty . What is anxious attachment ?
Speaker 2Let's start
with kind of where it stems from People with anxious attachment , have dealt with abandonment and loss in their life , and fearing loss of someone that they are attached to is something that follows them into their relationships , or they may have just never even been allowed to securely attach in the first place . That can happen if they were neglected , not paid attention to . This is , you know , one of the responses to surviving a situation like that is you kind of attach with fear .
Speaker 1Yeah , and I think that I do identify as having anxious attachment in relationships , although to what degree that comes out definitely depends on who I'm in relationship with . Something that really resonates for me is the fear of abandonment , the constantly reading my partner's emotions , reactions being hypersensitive to their mood changes in some ways , have feeling almost at the mercy of my partner's moods , emotional ups and downs , how they present themselves .
Speaker 2Attachment is scary . I mean , if we fall in love it's scary . An anxiety has a purpose and so there's a lot of normalness or normalcy to having anxiety in relationships . You know , if your partner is clearly having an issue and they're not talking to you about it , then that's going to be anxiety provoking and that is a normal response . And if this goes on extensively and then that's going to aggravate the anxiety . If you're feeling anxious around somebody , that might be a sign that they are not communicating effectively . It may not just be well , I'm just an anxious attachment person and so it's all my problem . You know there are many ways . I mean knowing that you're anxious and how bad it is and what , and can you talk about it , or just trying to talk about it result in arguments or just things getting worse
.
Speaker 1In relationships , I think , with other partners , especially if I'm in a relationship with someone who's avoidant , we'll get to those hallmarks as an anxious attachment person , like you're constantly reaching for the person and trying to pull them closer , trying to fix things , trying you cling to the relationship , you cling to trying to make it work . And that leads into another hallmark of anxious attachment , which is being a people pleaser trying to people please , overextending , breaking your own boundaries to meet someone else's needs . So , which also brings me to another hallmark , which is poor boundaries , meaning you have the boundaries , but in an effort to keep the person you're in love with or someone you care about happy and from leaving you , you're willing to I like to call it self-abandoned in order to meet their needs . And of course , the result of that is that then you break trust with yourself .
Speaker 2Well and you see this a lot in relationships where we feel like we're responsible for another person's emotional processing . This happens so , so much . And you know , there's this extreme to it which is like , well , no , another person's feelings are not my responsibility , and that's true . Now , there is a cause and effect in relationships always in play , but it's up to another person to manage their own feelings . So , let's see , you've got that scenario again where it's like I can tell my partner is angry and upset with me , but they're not talking to me about it . I asked about it . They said nothing . At that point , you know , you have to let them work it out and completely kind of divorce yourself from needing to help them process and then communicate whatever it is that is going on with them .
Speaker 1Yeah , and I think , as an anxious attachment person , it's really hard to do that .
Speaker 1It's hard to be like okay , I've asked , I've done my work , they're not responding , so I'm just going to go , take care of me and do my thing until either they do respond or I had a breaking point and I'm like I'm done , like I've tried to fix whatever is going on and it's not happening .
Speaker 1You aren't responding , so I need to walk away from this . What an anxious attachment person will do is they will just keep trying and keep trying and change tactics and give more and put more energy in and hold on harder , instead of saying no , here are my boundaries , here are my needs , you're breaking my boundaries , or I'm breaking my own boundaries to meet your needs and you're not meeting my needs , and so this is not a working situation for me . So if you are someone who has experienced that , then and this resonates for you you may have an anxious attachment style . Now , if you want to juxtapose that to the secure attachment style , a person who has a secure attachment style well , hold their own boundaries , well , insist on their own needs being met and be able to let go of trying to get someone to respond to them and self-soothe their way through that , yeah , it is letting go .
Speaker 2And I mean you illustrated it sounds so harsh . We're also taught like well , no , you're supposed to try . You're supposed to . You know , go out of your way to try to help . You know , go the extra mile .
Speaker 2There's a lot out there . You know the whole for better or for worse thing , and you know people who really care about you will try to break down your walls . You know a lot of that is not good boundaries . It's like no , if you've got an issue , you need to say so , and it might be hard and good communication is yeah , but I'm not ready to talk about it even is better than pretending nothing is wrong or acting like something's wrong and then saying everything is fine and watching your partner clearly see that there's something going on . Maybe you're even noticing they have anxiety about whatever is not being talked about .
Speaker 2The secure person will say you know what ? Okay , you say it's nothing . I'm trusting you . There's the trusting . I'm trusting you that it's nothing because you said it's nothing . So I'm going to go take care of myself right now because I'm not feeling comfortable and my feelings are mine to take care of . They're not for you to fix . So there is the security there is the secure attachment response to someone withholding and avoiding addressing something that might be going on .
Speaker 1Right , well , and so maybe another good example for us we talked about this before we recorded is how does since we've just given you an example of how a secure person reacts to avoidant , and we'll get to it but how does a secure person react to someone who's anxious ? So another common hallmark of an anxious attachment person is looking for constant reassurance . One way in which I do that and oftentimes I do it without even knowing , like I won't even know , that I'm needing reassurance , but my partner will bring it up and one of the things I do is I'll say I love you repeatedly , and often looking to hear it back for that just reassurance that everything's okay . So how would a secure person noticing that their partner , who's anxiously attached , respond to someone like it's been an hour and I've said I love you like I don't know five , 10 times ? I don't know .
Speaker 2Well , yeah , I had an anxious partner before and I would see that as a bid for connection that is not going away after five I love yous in a short period of time . So it's time to stop everything and care about your partner's feelings and create awareness . It's like , okay , I would probably . I mean I would just drop everything and make eye contact with my partner , probably physically , show some affection and say , hey , babe , I love you too and you know , are you okay today ? What's going on ? Because it feels like maybe you're needing more than you're getting from me this morning or whatever time of day it might be . I think it's not about me if they are really . I mean , it might be a little bit about the relationship if they are needing something from me . But this is what being in a relationship is .
Speaker 1Right , Stopping acknowledging what's going on and asking like what can I do ?
Speaker 2Yeah , and don't take it personally . The secure person knows this isn't a criticism of me if my partner needs something of me , the secure person is observant , communicative , calm , regulated and open to hearing whatever is going on with a person that is bidding for connection with them .
Speaker 1Doesn't that sound lovely to all my anxious people out there Like I don't know , like right now you know how , during different times of year , different , different architects of people will be considered hot , like sometimes it's the I don't know . Can you think of an archetype of ? You know everybody wasn't on TikTok , was into white boy winter , which I didn't get at all . I'm like , for me , I think , secure attachment folks . Right now they are like top tier . We should be fighting for those motherfuckers out there Like those are the people I want to be dating . That sounds so lovely . All right , let's move on to avoidance ,
the avoidant attachment style , which is very different than anxious . Where does avoidant attachment style stem from ?
Speaker 2Well again , I mean , it all stems from the same place . What happened to our , with us and our primary caregivers when we were young , and how long of a duration did those problems happen ? If there were problems , you know neglect it can you know . It's the same origin really and it's just a different response to surviving that the avoidant decides well , rather than attach fearfully , I'm just gonna not attach , I'm gonna try not to attach . That feels like the safer place to be and avoidance will then withdraw . I mean , that's kind of the first thing they do and they become emotionally unavailable and they because of this , because they never do the connecting , they struggle to empathize , they struggle to know what they feel , they're compartmentalized and disconnected from that . They struggle with intimacy , they struggle with it a lot .
Speaker 1Well , and from my personal experience over and over and over again , because I've been really into avoidance most of my life , when someone reaches for them , they're more likely to pull away . When someone tries to be intimate , intimacy almost like , pushes them away . Is that correct ?
Speaker 2Yeah , I mean , in a way we're kind of recreating what feels familiar . So it makes sense if you developed an anxious attachment style in childhood because your caregivers were withdrawn , that that's what's gonna feel most familiar to you . So you're going to be drawn to the avoidant later in life .
Speaker 1It's not uncommon for anxious people to be drawn to avoidant folks .
Speaker 2No , or it's the same theory . It's like , oh , who did you grow up to marry ? Was it your mom or your dad ? And it's like , well , if dad was avoidant and mom was anxious themselves , then I mean it really could be either one , but if both parents were avoidant , chances are you're not going to be as drawn to another anxious and none of this is for sure . Everyone's different . We all have different journeys and sometimes we find ourselves in a really healthy relationship despite the mistakes our parents made , and it changes us Suddenly . We do develop secure attachment through that and then it's not a recurring problem . But it is one way to explain a recurring pattern to say , well , I know I'm anxious , or I know I'm avoidant and I tend to be attracted to the opposite of that , or sometimes they are attracted to a secure person . That can happen .
Speaker 1Right , well , so can we go back to the avoidant attachment style ? I'd like to dig into the avoidant attachment style and how they look in relationships , Because obviously they crave connection and they'll pursue connection , but it's once they get connection and intimacy where things seem to fall apart . Is that ?
Speaker 2right Sometimes . I mean , if you've never had it , you don't know it , and so you're just kind of spinning your wheels . It's different . Some avoidants do experience connection and will attach , and then they might freak out for a number of different reasons and pull away . Some never get there because they're so busy avoiding it constantly that they never actually experience the connection . And sometimes it's hard to tell what's happening with an avoidant . Like you think they're attaching to you and then , I don't know , maybe it turns out they didn't , or maybe they did and then they got scared and it's hard to say .
Everyone's personal emotional processing again is their own to know and to communicate to people and partners . It's really important and a lot of people are not doing that work . Like you go on a first date with someone and there's a lot of tell me about yourself , what do you do for work and how many relationships have you had ? And we're getting to know each other and no one's like do you know your attachment style ?
Speaker 1Do you know it . That is now my top question . In fact , I try to suss that shit out before I even get to a first date .
Speaker 2I mean to be oh fuck , I have fucked that .
Speaker 1No , I want to know .
Speaker 1I am to be transparent at this time completely off the market doing my own self-work .
Speaker 1But yeah , it was like after my last relationship ended , there was news hit the street that I was , you know , technically a single lady again .
Speaker 1There was the influx of texts , you know , and I toyed with it for a second and it was literally the first thing . The only thing I knew coming out of that relationship was I don't want to be in this anxious , avoidant dynamic ever again , which means one of two things Either I have to really work towards a secure attachment style myself , which I have so much confidence in myself being able to do that but or I need to absolutely make sure I'm not going diving back into an avoidant who has not done the work to fully understand their attachment style , how that affects others in a relationship and how to , you know , not do that shit . And so it was literally the first question , the minute someone would start chatting with me and I was like , oh , is this someone I want to entertain ? It was . I brought up attachment styles and you can fucking bet that , once I am back fully on the market , it's definitely going to be something I will be looking for up front .
Speaker 2Yes , and when you ask for people who take this advice , when you say , do you know your attachment style ? And they say yes , it's secure , they do Ask how they found out Because if they took a little online test , it's not good enough . I know some people who clearly are not securely attached in their behavior and they test secure A test secure for everyone who takes it . There's an online test that you can just look up . Take it . Everyone who takes it test secure that I've known and they are not all secure . So if it did not require an , a questioning and a thorough investigation of their entire life story , like if they didn't go back to childhood and think about what were my parents like , what was childhood like , what was my first relationship like , if they didn't do a full exploration of their self and their actual history and things that have happened to them they probably still don't know , People put secure on their online profiles .
Speaker 1I know if someone's put securely attached on their online profile it's a red flag . I think probably a better way to find out and what I have done when talking to people to find out their attachment style is we've given you some traits of anxious attachment , avoidant attachment , of secure attachment We'll talk a little bit about disorganized attachment in a minute Is to kind of look for ask them about their history . I ask about the relationship history . I'll ask oh , what happened ? What led to the end of your last relationship ?
Speaker 1Or people will very freely often talk about their exes and I can tell by the things they say about their exes . If they say , oh , she was crazy , she called me all the time , she always wanted to talk about her , really Things like that , I can start to kind of suss out . Like this person sounds avoidant , this person , I'll say the hallmarks I can tell when someone is my own kind , we can sniff each other out . I feel the anxious attachments out there . I'm like I see you . I don't know how we do together , but maybe we would just cling madly to one another for the rest of our lives .
Speaker 2I think it just looks like happy codependence .
Speaker 1Yeah , which sounds a little fucking dreamy . So you know , don't be afraid to reach out .
Speaker 2As looking substance use could be a sign of avoidant attachment or avoidant behavior . If there is a history , it's . Another thing to ask about is something people gloss over and normalize a lot . It's hard to know if that's really happening , but it is commonly mentioned in a number of resources as a symptom of someone who might be avoidant to someone who is drinking or using drugs excessively or frequently . It is a way to avoid dealing with things .
Speaker 1And I think , on top of that , what you can add to that is so it could be alcohol , it could be drugs , it could be using some other form of addictive behavior that helps you avoid .
Speaker 2It's just one way you can avoid . I mean , there are so many ways to avoid , it's just , it's an easy way to avoid . And it's not necessarily everyone who has an issue with substances is an avoidant person , an avoidant attachment . That's not what I'm saying , but it's just one way . So if you are looking for red flags , if you're like I , wanna avoid an avoidant , then that's one thing to look for , because that's not necessarily something someone might see as problematic but could be .
Speaker 1I mean , could an avoidant and an avoidant be happy together , I wonder . I bet you , those relationships tend to last longer . Then they just hook up together and they live happily ever after like pushing each other away .
Speaker 2I certainly do not think so . I think to avoidance . I think that does happen , but that they are not happy To avoidance , are not happy , they're not talking . There is no intimacy in that relationship . And I don't know couples who are actually happy with that . Even avoidance want intimacy . They believe they want intimacy .
Speaker 1In my last relationship , which I have anxious tendencies that are definitely brought out in connection with avoidance . My experience was and I've definitely heard this spoken to a lot when it comes to avoidance . Attachment is a push and pull right . So my partner would pull me to him and then I'd like get on board and I'd be like , oh , we're gonna love each other . And then it would be like pushing away okay , wait , I don't know if I'm ready for this , it's too much , I need space . And then I'd be like all right , well , like fuck off then , and I'd pull away , and then I'd be pulled back by this person and then I'd be put . And so I got into this like heavy push pull pattern .
Speaker 2That sounds more disorganized than truly avoidant . And avoidant doesn't pull or love bomb , in my opinion , unless they've got a personality disorder , in which case it's not their attachment style that's making them do that , it's something else . But a disorganized will do that . They will vacillate between those two extremes of extreme neediness and then complete pushing away . A disorganized will do both of those , go back and forth .
Speaker 1All right . Well , let's talk about disor , let's talk about the disorganized attachment style . I'm here to learn , we're all here to learn . And something I do wanna say none of these attachment styles are inherently bad . They don't make people bad people . They come from trauma . This is to inform everybody of the way people engage in relationships and like hopefully , we do tend to look at the other in relationships . Right , we look at the other person when a relationship goes bad and a lot of what we think and say is it was them , they were bad , they did this , they did that . But you can do that all you want , but until you look at yourself and you understand how you're attaching to people , why you're feeling the way you are , why you have the patterns you want , what patterns you do , you're not going to be able to find a relationship and sustain a relationship that's healthy .
Speaker 2Yes , and I think that the key is like I love what you said . It's not that these are bad people or good people or whatever . Really , I think the hallmark is do you know yourself and are you trying to be the best person you can be ? I mean , we're talking a little bit before we completely branch into disorganized . We were talking about avoidant . I meet a lot of avoidants who are really just comfortable staying avoidant . They don't want to be secure . They would never word it that way , but it's really clear . It's like nope , I'm just emotionally unavailable and that's where I'm gonna stay . Or and there is contradiction there because they want intimacy in their life but they're not really wanting to risk what it would take to get it .
Speaker 1It's not a priority . It's not a priority , and I would agree with you . I've actually heard that a lot . Some things from avoidants and I have avoidants in my life who I love very much . I'm not going to fuck them , but I love them very much and things that I will hear from them are like yeah , I'm just content , I don't need to be in a relationship . Or if I'm in a relationship , I'm not going to be with someone who is high maintenance , what they call high maintenance . I have a lot to say about that , but I mean they basically are only willing to engage in relationships where the person is willing to be good enough with whatever it is they're going to put in . That is not the priority in their life . I've heard avoidants say things like you know , maybe I'm happy just being on my own , I'm happy being a loner , like that's maybe how I work best , that's what I'm gonna do . I heard an avoidant say well , you know , I don't really have a sex drive anymore anyways , so I'm fine not being in a relationship anymore .
Speaker 1Yeah , if you're not trying to be in relationships , I think that that's perfectly valid and fine as long as it doesn't affect your other relations , because your attachment style will play out in your work relationships , your familial relationships and your friendships .
Speaker 2I suppose , depending , though , on the quality of the relationship , you know being avoidant . You can have friends and be avoidant , and the expectation that you be emotionally available is not gonna be there , but you can do a lot of damage to a person who is signing up to be your partner if you think it's okay to just stay emotionally unavailable . Yeah , yeah , I mean . Yeah , I think that that is harmful .
Speaker 1Let's talk about the disorganized attachment person .
Speaker 2This is hallmarkedly characterized as poor emotion regulation . So someone who seems to be really moody might be , you know , having some issues in terms of having disorganized attachment , really angry , volatile , pushing away one minute and then desperately needing time and attention the next , going back and forth . They tend to be very suspicious . Dissociation is something that happens a lot in this too . These are things to look for in terms of wondering if you might be attaching to someone who has a disorganized attachment style . And you know you talk about the origins of where this starts you . When I hear all of these , when you list a disorganized attachment , it just sounds like the post-traumatic stress disorder Symptoms you know . So chances are there was a lot of trauma in childhood
. Something probably pretty significant is resulting in a manifestation of disorganized attachment .
Speaker 1Hmm , interesting , and so that's how they show up in relationship . It's just like whoever's with them , regardless of like . If they're with another avoidant , then they're probably going to be more anxious with them .
Speaker 2No , they're gonna be disorganized . They're gonna be all over the place with that , because , since there is a vacillation , I mean if they're avoidant they're avoidant , then they're really not attaching , they're working to be detached , you're avoiding attachment if you're an avoidant and you might still find yourself attached somehow .
Speaker 2I'm not sure how that happens with extreme avoidance , but you know , anxiety is a sign that you are attaching in a situation that doesn't feel safe . So that's where the anxiety is coming from . And so the disorganized is like it starts to sound . I mean , if I think about it , like I really want this intimacy , I really want the relationship and I'm anxious about it . Oh , now I'm getting it and I don't feel safe and I'm gonna withdraw . So they kind of go back and forth .
Speaker 1Do we have anything else to say about it ? Disorganized , but yeah , anything else to say about it Not really .
Speaker 2I mean it tends to not be looked at as much as anxious and avoidant . I mean those tend to be the two that people focus on , because if you're disorganized , you're technically , you're doing both at different rates and in different ways , and so so might a disorganized attachment style person be mistaken for avoidant at time and then anxious at other times ?
Speaker 1Yes , depending on who they're attached to . Yeah , and the situation Right . Okay , that makes sense .
Speaker 2Yeah , I mean , even the individual would be like well , I'm feeling anxious and I'm acting anxious , and they'll just connect with the anxiety they're experiencing and then just ignore the avoidant behaviors that they exhibit as a way to cope with the anxiety . I mean that , I mean .
Speaker 1Right , right , all right . So there we are . There we are . Those are the four attachment styles , and then we've given you some of the interactions that happen between them . And so that brings us to now . You guys know what the attachment styles are . You know some of the hallmarks . We've given you examples of how they've shown up in our own personal lives . We've given you examples of how they interact with one another and then sort of falling back on , like what does a secure person do in the same situation ? So now let's start with . Let's start with the anxious person . I'm anxious attachment style . Andrea , what would you say if I were coming to you as a client and I was like I know that I'm anxious attachment style ? You know I've been working on my anxiety . I want to move towards being able to be more securely attached and I want some tools to have so that , regardless of who I date and my next relationship , you know I'm not repeating some of these behaviors .
Speaker 2Wow , well I would , I'd ask you , how is your self-esteem right now ? How well do you know your value as a person ?
Speaker 1Yeah , yeah , I mean , I feel damn good about myself when I'm single .
Speaker 2So it sounds like I mean , you're telling me you feel really good when you're single and you tend to be attracted to avoidance who , in essence , are rejecting you repeatedly , over and over .
Speaker 1Yeah , then I feel bad about myself .
Speaker 2Which is an understandable response to rejection . So let's go to how you respond to rejection . Let's try , you know , turning away from people who reject you .
Speaker 1That sounds simple , it sounds simple .
Speaker 2It's well , it starts with . Okay . I mean , in the moment , you know you feel it , you feel the anxiety go up . Let's add so did I just get rejected on some level ? I mean , maybe they didn't mean to reject me , you know , but see , that's exactly what . I do .
Speaker 1I do that . Well , maybe they didn't mean it that way , or usually , cause I'll tell you what . I'm not gonna lie to you . I can .
In this last relationship and every relationship before that was similar I can pinpoint the first time that some form of rejection or pulling away or shutting down , like the first time that flag went up , and I'm like that was the moment . That was the moment I should have stood my ground and said this isn't acceptable in like this isn't acceptable in the kind of relationship I want to be in .
Speaker 2Yeah , and what did you say instead I ?
Speaker 1listened to that . Well , I stopped in this last relationship , when that moment happened , I stopped and I was like wait , you know , I physically reacted to it and of course the person doesn't say yeah , yeah , like you know , they don't lean in the instant they give you an explanation .
Speaker 2They rarely will lean in . You'll be surprised . Sometimes they will be like oh whoa , I didn't mean to do what I obviously just did , which was completely alienate you from me . That is the last thing I want . So everything , everything , stop . There are people who will do that .
Speaker 1Yeah , but I mean , I guess that's kind of the reaction I did get was like this sort of like oh , I didn't mean it that way , I'm acting weird , you know . And then I so then I was like , oh , they really . You know , the minute they gave me a thread like a thread of like while I wasn't really rejecting you , or that's not what I meant or of an excuse , I grabbed onto that thread and I kept going right , which then , of course , led to the next time and the next time , and then a pattern of like , this rejection , and then an excuse that would bring me back into the situation , instead of just like , does that make sense ? Yeah , and so you know , my self-esteem would then get built back up a little bit and then it would get knocked back down a little bit and instead of just saying , you know , like I'm worth more than this , clearly you don't see my worth . So I'm gonna like move along until somebody , until I find somebody who does I just , you know , I also I'm a driven bitch man , like . I'm like . I'm like , god damn it , sit your sights on something . I can make this motherfucker work , god . And I'm like . I think of that as , in fact , one of the traits in myself that gives me good self-esteem is like I will like work on something and stay the course longer than most people , and it's how I have achieved a lot of the things I've achieved . This might be a situation that it's not actually helping me in , right .
Speaker 1I think the self-esteem thing with anxious attachment is confusing to me a little bit , because I feel like in the anxious at least for me . I mean , maybe a lot of people with anxious attachment style would be like , oh no , like I do have low self-esteem , but I feel like the way that it shows up for me and how I know , and maybe it's not low self-esteem in that I don't feel like I'm a worthy person overtly or I don't see like I think I'm a fucking catch . I really do . I really do in so many ways .
Speaker 1But what I do realize is where it must be is like I feel like people will leave me or won't love me back the way that I wanna be loved , and so I do this over extending , I do this over giving , I do this over over compromising . You know , like a relationship's a contract . When I start a relationship it's a contract . We're like I'm really good about setting up expectations , and what I find in relationships happens is then the contract on my end starts to end up having to shift their direction to make things work . And I will shift , and I will shift until one day I'm like where the fuck am ? I Like I'm standing all the way over on their side of the contract , which is not where I intended to be , and so .
Speaker 1I think that is . That's how that low self-esteem shows up . Because if I had high self-esteem I'd say no , this was a contract , this is what we agreed to , and if you love me like you say you do , then you're gonna honor my needs as well . My needs are going to be as important as your needs . And I don't do that . I mean in relationships . I have so often said . The most common thing I've said in my past relationships has been outwardly you're not meeting my needs . I feel lonely , I feel sad , I'm unhappy , and I've been met with silence . Or in one case the person actually said well , it hurts my feelings that you don't feel fulfilled by our relationship .
Speaker 2That's an avoidant response Because it's all about them as a failure . Right then . They're failing you . It's not about your emotions that you wanted to talk about . It's now about how they are failures . It's a common avoidant thing to say I mean , and they are feeling that pain ? Sure , you know they do feel like failures . Back to what to do .
Speaker 1What to do yourself .
Speaker 2And I hear what you're saying and that it's a lot harder to practice and through experience we learn our limits . And what signs ? When was it that we really should have walked out ? There is something to be said about people being allowed to make mistakes . Miscommunications do happen . None of us are perfect Giving our partners the compassion and understanding that we want to receive , because eventually , eventually , we make mistakes too and we have bad days , absolutely . And when do you know ? When is it too much ? When has it happened too many times ? When was it ? Sometimes people know , oh , it was the first time I should have left . It was that big of a transgression . Other times it was , you know , maybe a year of you know events that happened and it's like , yeah , this is not repairable . You know , I wish I could tell you yeah , just be intolerant , but that's obviously not the best way to be . That can be an avoidant thing to do in itself .
Speaker 1Well , I think the thing that has been helpful for me and that I think is useful probably for all the attachment styles , but definitely anxious attachment style , is self-reflection .
Speaker 2I think that for me , I mean , and for everyone . Then you say you know , what do I want for myself in terms of feeling safe and secure and not criticized , abandoned , rejected , all the things I want to be feeling good and safe and wanted and loved and cared for 95% of the time how fucking young you know I mean .
Speaker 1And really , I'd rather 100 , but I get that .
Speaker 2I'm not perfect . No one's perfect . You're gonna have fights , they're gonna be bad days , you're not always gonna feel great and it may not even always be their fault . So , but we're talking about so , but we're talking way . Most of the time this feels good . That is what you want . So if you are feeling like well , half the time , it's okay . It's not good enough .
Speaker 1No well , I think that has also been something I think that will be helpful for anxious attachment style . First of all , go to therapy . Like I am in like deep , like trauma therapy right now to heal my core wounds . But I also know that until I do that work I will not be able to move forward in a way that I feel 100% confident is healthy . And I will tell you this much the focus therapy that I've been doing for the past I think three , four months now has made a world of difference . I mean a world of difference in my healing process
now .
Speaker 1So first I think you need therapy , learning how to self-soothe and deal with anxiety when it arises , so that the first time you feel it in reaction to your partner , you can take a moment with yourself and soothe yourself . And then it's hard to think critically and logically when you're up an anxiety head right , things seem bigger than they really are . So if you can self-soothe for a moment , then you can look at things clearly and decide Like all right , was that too much for me to keep moving forward with this person ? And like you can trust yourself . Right , if I can soothe myself , I can trust myself . And the more I trust myself , the more I move towards feeling secure .
Speaker 1Ultimately , I'm working on a secure relationship with myself , right ? Because then , regardless of who I'm with , if they leave , it doesn't matter . I'm already in a secure relationship , exactly , you know , and I think that a lot of anxiety comes from feeling like there's no safe space . There's no safe space , there's no safe place to go , there's no safe person to turn to , and the more I feel like , yeah , I can turn to myself , the less anxious I feel , generally speaking , you know . And so I feel like , for anxious people , creating a secure relationship with yourself .
Speaker 1And trusting yourself , because you never . It's hard to really know who you're in a relationship with , and oftentimes we've talked about this . When you're in relationship with someone who's a boy or a woman , or disorganized or a narcissist or whoever , somebody who's toxic or wounded in their own way , one of the first things they do is try and break your trust with yourself , like tell you what you're doing is crazy . I think especially women will relate to this . We get called crazy all the time For what we're thinking , what we're feeling , what our intuition is telling us . And I will tell you something my intuition has actually been correct 95% of the time , which is more than I've felt secure in any of my relationships . So , yeah , I mean you have to be able to trust yourself so that when your partner starts calling you crazy , you can be like well , fuck you , don't fuck with my relationship with myself .
Speaker 1It's telling me you're not doing what you need to do . Yeah , and that's my thought .
Speaker 2Yeah , it sounds like you are already doing the therapy work .
Speaker 1Therapy that's going to help you . Yeah , reflection , self-reflection , reflecting on my relationships , identifying my patterns in relationship , in reaction to other people . And then therapy and using my tools , all of the tools I have , to regulate my own emotions , because isn't that ultimately like becoming a secure attachment person is being able to regulate your own emotions ?
Speaker 2Well , yes , a secure attachment is regulated . There are some avoidance who are very regulated , disorganized , tend to not be regulated at all and , like I said , even I get really anxious , but I'm so well regulated you may not know . So regulation has to kind of do with how do you manage your emotions , how do you deal with them ? Is it in a healthy way ? But , yes , regulation working on your regulation skills , if you see any need to is a definite must if you want to be in relationships of any kind .
Speaker 1Right . Also , another thing that I think is helpful for anxious attachment people is building up a community of people , whether it's two people , one person , your family that you have secure attachments with . I have a small circle of people in my life that I have very secure attachments with and I can turn to them for support for input Create your family , the people you can always turn to , no matter what . Yes , yes , All right avoidant people .
Speaker 2Yes , the therapy for avoiding people is about empathy Learning to empathize , get in touch with your emotions , care about other people's emotions , and I mean that is where to start . That is the cornerstone of , I think , what an avoidant would need to be working on .
Speaker 1Right , so therapy .
Speaker 2Again , therapy with a different focus , like with the anxious attached self-esteem , knowing your value , creating a good support network for yourself . We're all gonna help you . The avoidant is like exercise the empathy muscle , compassion , understanding , learning how to know what you're feeling and not let it direct you , but being able to be like okay , I have my feelings and I can acknowledge them , know what they are and not let them get in the way of exploring what another person is feeling . Not make it all about my feelings , but it's a lot of emotional work Learning how to feel your emotions , manage them and care about other people's experiences without taking it personally .
Speaker 1Right . What about the piece about avoidants ? Like really pushing people away and not being able to attach to people .
Speaker 2Well , I mean , that is how they avoid , they're emotionally disconnected and they struggle to empathize , I think , with what another person is feeling . And so , yeah , you have that conversation of like I'm really feeling stressed right now and they're like , well , I'm really hurt that you are feeling the way you are about me and us , and that's not going deep , that's not really caring about your emotional process and being curious about it and wanting to know if and how I contributed to it .
Speaker 2I mean no one's like . You're not like some evil villain . If maybe you did or said something that hurt another person's feelings , you have the ability to know that and curve that it may not be you , but if we don't explore it then we don't know .
Speaker 1Right , and so something key for y'all to take away is yes , therapy is really important for all of these attachment styles that aren't secure , but it's important to go into therapy with a focus to tell your therapist I have this attachment style , I'm doing this in relationships . It's something I wanna work with and I wanna learn how to attach to people . I wanna learn how to stop avoiding I want or being anxious , and so that you know that your time with your therapist and your work with your therapist is actually directed to an outcome .
Speaker 2Right , and again it keeps coming back to how can I securely attach to myself Again with the avoidant that that's something they would need to do , because a lot of what's going on is they don't even know themselves well enough to know and they're really hard on themselves . I think there is a strong I've noticed a strong sense of failing with them as they move through life and relationships . It's hard for them to look at their own errors and mistakes and not destroy themselves , give themselves that unconditional love and acceptance that they are needing to give to their loved ones . It's kind of like how I see it working with the avoidant , if that makes sense . They're really hard on themselves and they're not very good at giving even themselves an allowance to be human , so it's really hard for them to do that to other people .
Speaker 1Let's talk about this the disorganized attachment style person , because nobody ever really talks about them .
Speaker 2Because you can divide this into working on the avoidant behaviors versus the anxious behaviors . When we look at it , like I said , this looks like PTSD , you know ? So , yeah , therapy where you address your traumas and you work on emotion regulation skills . That would be a really big focus for the disorganized .
Speaker 1There you go . That is your starting point . So for everybody it's time to go to therapy . You know and I am a big , I know you're a therapist I'm a big believer in focused therapy .
Speaker 1My personal belief , like I'm not someone who goes to therapy and I do it like forever and ever , 365 days a year , for multiple years I usually I've gone in spurts , like there's times when I feel like , okay , I've gotten what I desired out of this . I always have a goal oriented therapy and then I kind of go and I work what I've learned and then if something comes up , I go . You know , I find I go back or I find someone who's specialized in what I need and I go into it with like , here's what I wanna work on , here's what I need , where I need to be . And so if you are someone who's not in therapy but you are like struggling with your relationships you're hearing about attachment styles and they are playing into your inability to achieve the kind of connections you want to , you can go to a therapist and say , hey , here's something I've learned about myself . I want to work specifically on this to achieve certain you know , certain outcome and your therapist can work with you that way , correct ?
Speaker 2Yeah , yeah , and there's a lot of ways to do therapy .
I think that self-driven therapy can work . I mean , when I say do the work and do the self-exploration , it isn't necessarily sitting down with one counselor in a room with a couch and all of that . You know there are groups out there that I mean . I participated in a women's group over the summer . That was incredibly helpful . I just went to three women's groups I know it was four women's groups and it was profoundly enlightening for me , really helped me get through this past year .
Speaker 2And there's , you know , doing reading the books and I mean we've even given a guideline in today's you know podcast . It's like go back to your childhood and think about it . What were your parents like ? What did they give you , not give you that you think that you needed ? How did that affect you ? Do you think you had someone that you securely attached to ? And it can be an older sibling or a grandparent or another extended family member and , you know , think about how that affected you . I mean , that is self-driven reflection . That is very therapeutic . And , yeah , talking to a therapist , getting some feedback Someone who's got maybe has spent a lot more time reading information about these things can be very helpful .
Speaker 1All right . So if you wanna find out more about attachment styles your attachment style , there are a lot of books , but you can start with , attached , the new science of adult attachment and how it can help you find and keep love . It is by and I hope I'm not saying this wrong but Amir Levine and Rachel SF Heller . It might be on Audible , I am not sure , but it's a good starting point . There are a lot of resources online as well . Now , how do you find out what your attachment style is ? Andrea and I were just discussing this , and I think it's a little risky to just jump online and , you know , take a quiz and then be like that's what my attachment style is . It maybe is a starting point , but you have some good suggestions .
Speaker 2Yeah , I think it goes back to doing an assessment of your childhood and what it was like and thinking about what kind of caregivers you had .
Speaker 2And I mean you get a book and it's going to list all the different things that indicate someone might be avoidant or anxious , and et cetera , et cetera , and you might say , wow , that really sounds like mom , that really sounds like dad , you know , and that might give you some resources in terms of do I emulate them and how did that maybe affect me ? I also was suggesting , or thinking like I , asking your exes , you know , if they think you know , if they have any kind of working knowledge of this . Obviously , if they don't , then they may not be good resources and even if they're completely wrong , it's still information for you to be like . Well , this person thinks that I'm this way and this person thinks that I'm that way , or all of my exes think that I have anxiety in my attachment style , and so that's something to consider and look at and assess yourself , and that's what matters the most is do I agree ? And don't be afraid to disagree , because no one knows you better than you know yourself .
Speaker 1Right . Is this something that a therapist could help someone discover as well ? Oh , absolutely yes .
Speaker 2Go to therapy . Yeah , talking to your therapist about , say , I want to know what my attachment style is , and they're going to be like , oh fun . So yeah , I mean , yeah , they can absolutely help you with that .
Speaker 1Yeah , so if you really want to take time to dig into this and improve your relationships and how you enter them and how you move through them and understand yourself and your partners and your patterns , go to therapy , I mean . But also really it's helped me . Long before I started therapy I really did . There's a lot of resources out there . There's a lot of reading you can do . There's a lot of self-learning that you can do . That will get you a long way , and so I was able to start kind of working my attachment style a year plus ago and you know it helped a lot . That's why I'm here .
Speaker 1Anyways , I hope that this helped . There's a lot to attachment styles and today was just wanting to use some of the information , get you started on your own journey . Hopefully , what you've learned today has made you feel less alone , helped you understand yourself a little bit better , giving you some peace when wondering what happened in that last relationship or the last five relationships , and giving you some ideas on what to do next as you either work on the current relationship you're in or search for your next big love . Andrea , before we go , do you want to tell people where they can find you ? Anything about you looking you ?
Speaker 2up . Well , I mean , you've got my name and I do have . I am on psychology today . If you looked up my website there , you could find a number in an email to reach me , and yeah , I mean pretty easy to find .
Speaker 1She's easy to find and not only does she work with people in relationships and seeking this kind of guidance , she is also a therapist who works with a lot of people who are in poly and non-monogamous relationships . I actually have an article coming out that I will be sharing on non-monogamous relationships , where I interviewed Andrea , so keep an eye out for that and if you are thinking about or in non-monogamous relationships , check her out . Yeah , all right guys , onward . So until next time , until next time . See you in the locker room . Cheers , cheers .
Speaker 2Wanna join me in my Northwest nightmare ?