This article was originally published on Counseling Healing Moments.
Emotional security is at the heart of any thriving relationship. However, it is not something that comes naturally or effortlessly. Building emotional security requires conscious effort and intention from both partners.
When someone turns to their significant other for comfort and support but finds them unresponsive, feelings of loneliness, fear, hurt, or anger may arise. Doubts that are ignored or dismissed can escalate into deeper fears and insecurities, affecting the overall well-being of the relationship.
Insecure attachment in relationships can trigger deep fears, such as fear of rejection, abandonment, failure, not being accepted or appreciated, and fear of control. These fears are reasonable and often stem from past experiences in current or past close relationships.
The impact of these insecurities becomes apparent in statements such as
- “They just don’t care about me.”
- “I feel invisible in this relationship”
- “My opinions don’t carry much weight”
- “I can never please them” or “I’m not good enough.”
- “I don’t want to rock the boat, it’s just going to make things worse.”
- “It doesn’t matter what I do. I can yell and scream, I can’t have a relationship [partner].”
- “I do it myself and take care of things myself.”
The anxiety that results from such insecurities becomes a pressure cooker when individuals feel unable to openly acknowledge their fears and receive comforting responses from their partners.
When partners are not there for each other at critical times, such as dealing with a serious illness, the birth of a child, or the death of a loved one, the feeling of insecurity in the relationship intensifies. This perception leads to the belief that the relationship cannot provide the necessary support, leaving partners feeling emotionally disconnected and distressed.
It is necessary to recognize and deal with these feelings of distress in a relationship. This is why repair is so important in close relationships.
Attachment Disorder: The clues are in the reaction
Difficult emotions such as hurt, anger, fear, sadness or shame may arise as a reaction to the feeling of insecurity. This is the way with attachment systems that make us try to change this feeling of insecurity.
These feelings often manifest as a protest against a threat to one’s basic need for security in the attachment bond. The intensity of these protests reflects the importance of the relationship with the people involved.
A common problem is that partners often express their distress or insecurities in ways that prevent us from gaining the reassurance and security we desire.
Professor John Gottman, a renowned researcher of couple relationships, points out that troubled couples are overwhelmed by negative emotions and trapped in repetitive cycles of interaction.
“Most couples during conflict repeatedly try to repair a conversation that has started to turn negative. In the NEGATIVE MARKOV ABSORPTING STATE, these repair attempts tend to fail… what John discovered [in his observational research] was that most conflicts are the result of a failure to connect emotionally” – Dr. John and Julie Gottman
The Science of Couples and Family Therapy: Behind the Scenes at “Love Lab”
This trapped state can lead to a sense of discouragement and frustration for partners experiencing attachment distress. We become desperate and suffocated in the stuckness.
Negative cycles are patterns of interaction that often repeat themselves during conflicts or difficult conversations between partners. These cycles tend to follow a familiar, repetitive pattern, regardless of the topic being discussed, such as household chores, finances, or decision-making. Although the trigger for these cycles may not be immediately apparent, it is clear from how the conversations spiral into negativity that they are emotionally charged.
The focus in couples therapy is not on the specific topic of conversation but on how the interaction unfolds and the emotional chain reactions that occur between the partners. These emotional dynamics are most critical to understanding and resolving conflict.
How partners react to each other in these moments may be their best attempt at handling the situation, but it can also inadvertently push them further apart.
“Negative cycles feed on themselves: How I deal with my difficult emotions is also a REACTION to a threat [to our bond] and I become a fresh BEGINNING for my partner.” – Veronica Kallos-Lilly & Jennifer Fitzgerald
An Emotionally Focused Workbook for Couples: The Two of Us (2nd Edition)
The negative cycle often leads to unsatisfying interactions, where conversations take a negative turn, fall flat, and leave partners feeling unresolved and distant. The key to addressing and changing this negative cycle lies in identifying the repetitive moves each partner makes in the pattern. By recognizing and becoming familiar with the pattern that is driving their relationship down, partners can take the first step toward changing the pattern and soothing attachment anxiety.
Relationship experts in Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy have described three common patterns or emotional “dances” that reflect distressed relationships. These patterns probably occur in various combinations and intensities:
- Pursuit-Withdrawal Cycle: In this pattern, one partner becomes anxious or distressed and tends to look to the other for closeness, validation, or resolution using demanding, judgmental, or controlling strategies. The other partner, feeling overwhelmed by the strategies, withdraws and shuts down emotionally as a coping strategy. This further fuels the protective behaviors of pursuit and withdrawal, creating a cycle of increasing emotional distance.
- Criticism-defense cycle: In this pattern, one partner expresses criticisms rather than desires, to which the other partner reacts defensively because they feel attacked or blamed. The defensive response escalates the criticism, leading to a back-and-forth of negative exchanges that perpetuates disconnection and loneliness for both partners.
- Withdrawal cycle: This pattern occurs when both partners respond to tension and disconnection in the relationship by withdrawing and emotionally detaching from each other. This can lead to emotional disconnection and a lack of meaningful communication, exacerbating the disconnection in the relationship
Acknowledging and acknowledging attachment distress within these patterns is the first step toward healing and creating emotional safety within the relationship. Partners must be willing to understand each other’s fears and insecurities and work together to create a safe and supportive bond. Seeing fears as a longing for connection and closeness, not as guilt or personal failure, creates a space for new ways to connect and stop repeating the negative pattern. Accessing this place of safety may involve seeking professional help, such as couples therapy, to explore and deal with deep emotional issues.
Emotional security is not a guarantee in any relationship. It requires active effort, compassion and understanding from both partners. When dealing with attachment anxiety, vulnerable communication plays a vital role. Couples need to listen to each other’s hearts with an open mind, validate and express themselves gently and honestly.
Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy aims to help partners recognize and understand their negative cycles, enabling them to develop healthier patterns of communication and emotional responses. By recognizing these patterns and learning how to express feelings and needs more effectively, couples can rebuild trust, connection, and intimacy in their relationship.
By recognizing and addressing attachment anxiety and the pattern it creates, couples can cultivate a healthier and more secure emotional connection, cultivating a foundation of love and support that can stand the test of time. Relationships flourish when partners are willing to feed each other’s emotional needs and create a space where partners feel seen, heard, and loved.
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