#152 3 Tips for Anxiously Attached People to Experience Healthier Conflict
In today's episode, I'm sharing three tips for anxiously attached people to improve the way they approach and experience conflict. We cover things like slowing down and saying less, keeping things to one issue, and knowing when to leave the conversation and let things go.
Be sure to tune in next week for Part 2 where we cover tips for avoidantly attached people in conflict!
In today's episode, I'm sharing three tips for anxiously attached people to improve the way they approach and experience conflict. We cover things like slowing down and saying less, keeping things to one issue, and knowing when to leave the conversation and let things go. Be sure to tune in next week for Part 2 where we cover tips for avoidantly attached people in conflict!
3 Tips for Anxiously Attached People to Experience Healthier Conflict
Navigating conflict in relationships can be challenging, especially for those with an anxious attachment style. When emotions run high and misunderstandings abound, it's easy to feel overwhelmed and invalidated. However, with the right strategies, it's entirely possible to foster healthier, more productive conflict. Here are three actionable tips that can help.
Slow Down and Say Less
One of the most critical steps for managing conflict as an anxiously attached person is to slow down. When emotions are heightened, the body's natural stress response can kick in, propelling us into fight-or-flight mode. This physiological state can lead to racing thoughts, elevated heart rates, and a desire to react quickly.
Slowing down means taking a moment to breathe, grounding yourself before responding. It might involve taking a brief walk, practising deep breathing exercises, or stepping away from the conversation momentarily. The idea is to give yourself space to calm the nervous system and approach the conflict from a clearer, more centred place.
Equally important is the tip to say less. When anxious, there’s a tendency to over-explain, justify, or bombard the partner with a torrent of words and emotions. This barrage can overwhelm the other person, especially if they have a different conflict style. A measured, concise approach is often more effective, giving your partner room to process and respond thoughtfully.
Keep It to One Issue
In the heat of the moment, it's tempting to bring up a laundry list of grievances. While it might seem like a good idea to address everything at once, this can be counterproductive. Focus on resolving one issue at a time to avoid overwhelming your partner and muddling the conversation.
Choose the most pressing concern and stick to it. Clearly articulate what the specific issue is, how it makes you feel, and what you'd like to see change. This targeted approach makes it easier for your partner to understand and address your concerns, leading to more effective problem-solving.
Additionally, addressing one issue at a time helps in creating a sense of progress. When a specific concern is resolved, it builds trust and confidence that other issues can be tackled successfully in the future. It sets a positive precedent for future conflicts, showing that issues can be managed constructively and efficiently.
Know When to Let Things Go
Anxiously attached individuals often struggle with letting go of conflicts even after they've been addressed. It's common to revisit the same issue repeatedly, seeking assurance and validation. However, constantly reopening resolved matters can be frustrating for both partners and may hinder the overall relationship dynamic.
Learning to recognise when to let go is crucial. Once an issue has been discussed, and a resolution is in place, practice self-awareness and find ways to comfort yourself. Trust that your partner's efforts to address your concerns are genuine and that continuous nitpicking isn't necessary.
This doesn’t mean burying your feelings or ignoring unresolved problems. Rather, it’s about practising discernment to know when a conversation has reached its natural conclusion and when it’s appropriate to move forward.
Bonus Tip: Show Appreciation
For partners who lean more avoidant, engaging in conflict conversations can be particularly challenging. Acknowledging their effort to stay engaged can go a long way. Expressing gratitude for their willingness to discuss difficult topics not only creates a more positive interaction but also encourages them to remain open in future conflicts.
Simple statements like, "I appreciate you taking the time to talk about this with me," can help foster a sense of mutual respect and understanding. It signals that their efforts are noticed and valued, which is essential in building a cohesive, supportive relationship.
Implementing These Tips
Implementing these strategies doesn’t guarantee a conflict-free relationship, but it does pave the way for healthier and more effective communication. Remember that change takes time and patience, both for you and your partner. Small, consistent efforts in adopting these tips can lead to significant improvements over time.
Slowing down gives room for more thoughtful interactions, while saying less helps prevent overwhelming your partner. Focusing on one issue at a time leads to more targeted problem-solving, and knowing when to let go prevents unnecessary rehashing of conflicts. Showing appreciation helps in recognising each other's efforts and maintaining a positive relational tone.
By practising these tips, anxiously attached individuals can find healthier ways to engage in conflict, ultimately creating a more secure and harmonious relationship dynamic.
Questions for Discussion & Reflection
Do you often find yourself speaking rapidly and intensely during conflicts? How does this influence the way your partner responds to you?
Reflecting on the concept of saying less in conflict, how do you feel you could benefit from expressing yourself more concisely? Are there specific situations in which this might be challenging for you?
When you're experiencing internal pressure in your relationship, do you tend to mentally rehearse what you want to say? How do you think this impacts the actual conversation when it happens?
How do you usually feel after a conflict with your partner? Do you often achieve a sense of resolution, or does the conversation feel unfinished? Why do you think that is?
Do you find it difficult to keep conflicts focused on one issue? How does bringing up multiple grievances at once affect the dynamic between you and your partner?
What are some ways you can practice slowing down your physiological response during a conflict? How might this change the outcome of your interactions?
Consider the idea of letting go. Are there times when you struggle to feel reassured or comforted by your partner's attempts to address an issue? How do you usually respond in those moments?
Reflect on a recent conflict with your partner. How did your attachment style influence your approach and reaction? What might you do differently next time based on Stephanie's tips?
In what ways do you show appreciation for your partner's effort during difficult conversations? How could expressing more gratitude potentially change the conflict resolution process?
How do you perceive your partner's needs and responses during a conflict? Could practicing empathy and patience in these moments improve your relationship dynamic?
FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:29]:
In today's episode, we are talking about how to have better conflict as an anxiously attached person. So I'm gonna be sharing with you 3 tips for changing your conflict patterns in your relationships. And I should say at the outset that this is going to be part 1, and next week's episode is going to be part 2 for avoidant attaches. So fear not. It's not something that you, as an anxiously attached person, need to solely fix in your relationship, the way that you experience conflict, I am going to follow it up with some tips specific to avoiding detachment. Because I think that while there are certainly general principles of better conflicting communication that most everyone can adopt and benefit from, I do think that this specific experience that you're likely to have and the things you're likely to struggle with can very much depend on your attachment style and attachment patterns and the strategies that go along with that.
[00:01:29]:
And so I think it is helpful to delineate between more anxious and more avoidant patterns in giving out advice on conflict. So that's what we're going to be talking about today. As I said, I'm going to be giving you 3 tips if you are someone with anxious attachment who wants to be able to have conflict in a way that doesn't feel so high stakes, so intense, maybe really long and drawn out, but ultimately doesn't really give you the relief that you're seeking. That's certainly a very common experience among folks with anxious attachment, is that there's anxiety and conflict avoidance in the lead up to conflict, but then once you're in it, it kind of goes on forever and ever without really giving you any sort of sense of satisfaction or true resolution. So hoping that I can give you some tips today on just small changes that you can make that will have kind of a knock on effect. And as with all of these things, we can only change our part of the equation, but oftentimes, that's all that's needed to then create a different relational environment, a different kind of vibe in the moment and in a broader sense that allows for a new way of doing things relationally. Before we get into all of that, I wanted to share that healing anxious attachment is coming back in a few weeks' time. For those of you who are new, Healing Anxious Attachment is my signature program, and it is everything that I know and teach about the journey from anxious attachment to a more secure way of being in oneself and in relationships, distilled down into an 8 week program.
[00:03:06]:
If you are interested, this is going to be the 8th round of the program. Over 2,000 people have gone through this course, which is pretty amazing. I have to pinch myself sometimes when I hear that. But if you'd like to be part of this next cohort, I would love to have you in there and I would love for you to join the wait list via the link in the show notes where you can head straight to my website to do that. And that will guarantee you exclusive early bird pricing and, you know, making sure that you are notified as soon as registration opens at the end of the month or or early next month. I haven't finalized dates yet. But I would love to see you there if you're at all interested in not only really deep insights into why you are the way you are and you struggle with the things you struggle with, but also really practical concrete tools for you to learn a new way of being that is likely to get you closer to what you're looking for in secure relating. So all of that is linked in the show notes.
[00:04:01]:
You can also just head straight to stephanierigg.com and, yeah, I hope to see you there. Okay. So without further ado, let's talk about anxious attachment and conflict. So I might just set the scene a little. I do have previous episodes on conflict and anxious attachment, so you can keyword search those if you want to go deeper into that. But let's set the scene. So for most people with anxious attachment, as I said, there is this combination of oftentimes conflict aversion to a degree.
[00:04:32]:
So there might be a tendency to keep the peace, to not want to rock the boat, to kind of walk on eggshells or tip toe around someone from this place of, I just have to be easy, I don't want to be too needy, I don't want to be too sensitive, I have to be low maintenance. But of course, we know that's not honest or true, and so, internally, the pressure is rising and rising. And you've got all of these internal narratives going on about my partner doesn't care about me, and is it always gonna be like this, and what about my needs, and all of that. And then eventually, inevitably, something will happen, and all of this internal pressure will come flying out. Often times in a way that, for your partner who may have no idea of what's going on inside of you, for them it might seem like a total mismatch in terms of what's actually going on in the moment. And of course, as we know so often when we are really activated or triggered by something, we are responding to so much more than just what is happening in that moment. It comes with the weight of not only our history in that relationship, but our history in previous relationships, our family system. Our wounded parts can really come out with a vengeance when we are triggered in our relationship.
[00:05:46]:
So, that often happens for anxiously attached people. They can be this big blow up, and it can come out as quite attacking and accusatory and blaming. This sense that if I can just convey to you how much pain I'm in and how much pain you are causing me to be in, then you'll change. So if you're not immediately validating of me, then I just have to keep going and keep convincing you. Or maybe I escalate so as to convey to you how much pain I'm in, so that then it'll finally click for you, and then I won't have to be in pain anymore. As we know, that usually doesn't work, as much as it can feel like second nature to many of us with that pattern. If you have a more avoidant partner, or even if you have a broadly secure partner, it's not a very productive way of doing conflict. And more often than not, that kind of attacking critical style can very often elicit defensiveness in someone else, which then leaves the anxious person feeling invalidated and emotionally abandoned, which then leads them to kind of up the ante, and so on and so forth.
[00:06:48]:
We know how that goes. So let's go into these three tips that I want to give you. Now these are not going to be a panacea. It's not like you can implement these things and all of a sudden conflict's going to be a cup of tea for you and it's going to be really easy, but I do think that these things can help a lot. So the first one is slow down and say less. Okay? So if you are someone with anxious attachment patterns, you know that you probably go a 1000000 miles an hour, both in terms of the internal experience of your body. So physiologically, you're likely to be very much in your sympathetic nervous system, so that fight or flight zone of heart racing, heat. It feels like your body's kind of on fire.
[00:07:29]:
You might feel really clenched up and pupils dilated, all of those signs of, like, a full blown stress response. And that will be telling you to speed up. Do something, do something, do something. Right? But that's not really helpful in conflict because your partner is going to perceive you in that way. Imagine if you were interacting with another animal, like a dog, that was really worked up, you're immediately going to respond by feeling like, oh, I need to have my wits about me in interacting with this animal because they're really on edge. Same goes for us. Right? We often forget that we too are animals. But that's true, right, that we're very perceptive to each other's nervous system.
[00:08:10]:
So if yours is going, like, full pelt, really hyper activated, very stressed in a fight response, then that's not going to play well. You really need to consciously slow down, consciously fight against that pattern within you. And whether that means taking a break and doing something with that energy that isn't sending it in your partner's direction, like, you know, going for a run or or doing something to discharge the energy. Or if you feel you have capacity to, consciously down regulating if you, you know, have those tools at your disposal. But either way, just slowing down, right, is really important. Being able to have conflict in a more measured, grounded way is going to make a world of difference. And related to that is say less. Okay? So anxiously attached people, typically, and I say this as someone who's so guilty of it, by the time you get into actual conflict with your partner, chances are you have rehearsed what you're gonna say.
[00:09:08]:
You've had the practice conversation a 1000000 times over. Maybe you've been out on a walk, and you're talking to yourself about what you're gonna say and how you're gonna say it, and all of this stuff, you've given a lot of thought to having that conversation. You've been really, like, stewing in how aggrieved you feel for a long time prior to voicing it to your partner, and what that means is, like, when you finally have the stage, when you finally got your opportunity to say this stuff that's been really heavy inside you, usually it all just comes, like, flying out, and you've got a lot of words and you keep talking and you keep trying to say it in the right way so that you can persuade them, so that you can elicit the validation that you're looking for. There might be some protesting in there. All of this stuff, right? But, again, you're going at a 1000000 miles an hour and you just keep talking. And not only is that just kind of a lot to deal with and not particularly helpful, but when we layer over that that your avoidant partner doesn't operate in that way, they haven't been rehearsing the conversation, they don't have their full speech prepared, and they are probably going to be really overwhelmed by being hit with that barrage of information and emotion that is coming from you, because their baseline in conflict and we'll cover this in next week's episode when I talk more about avoidant attachment in conflict but their baseline in conflict is actually to slow way down. And again, that's a function of their nervous system, that's not something they're trying to do, but they tend to, like, space out and go numb and kind of be lost for words. And so when you have person a who is speaking at a 1000000 miles an hour and having a lot of emotion and getting really riled up, and person B who, at the best of of times struggles to find the right thing to say, those tend not to play very well against each other.
[00:10:57]:
So by saying less and slowing down, giving your partner an opportunity to find their words and not feel like they're under attack and under a lot of pressure from someone who's kind of explosive towards them, that's probably gonna lead to a much better way of doing things and much more productive where you're actually likely to be able to hear each other. Then if you're just bombarding them at a 1000000 miles an hour with so much analysis and information and opinion and emotion, that's going to be a lot for them to take in. So slow down. A kind of related point to that, which I'll just add quickly before I move on to the next one, If your avoidant partner is silent, you know, who you've asked them a question and they're sitting there in silence, and it looks like they're kind of thinking about it, try to resist the urge to say, well, aren't you going to say something? Or something like that. Right? Getting really impatient with them and wanting them to have the perfectly formulated response or kind of meet you at your pace. I think that can happen a lot, and again, just adds to that sense of, like, pressure and attack that isn't going to be conducive to a productive conversation. So try to be patient, slow down, say less. Okay.
[00:12:08]:
So the next tip that I want to give you on better conflict is keep it to one issue. So I think the temptation can be there for so many anxiously attached people to kind of come in with their whole shopping list of grievances, right, of all the things they want their partner to change. And I think this stems from that tendency that I spoke about earlier, which is when I have the opportunity, like when we're in conflict, when we're having a serious conversation, that's my window of opportunity to raise all of these things. And because I struggle to raise them in real time, I tend to internalize these little micro ruptures and moments of hurt or disappointment or whatever it might be. Because we file those away and then we stew on them, then when we are in conflict, it's really easy to see that as our moment, to then go, hey, but what about this thing? And last week, you did this, and I don't think I've forgotten about that, or, you know, all of these kind of extraneous things that aren't really directly related to the conversation or the issue at hand. Again, this is generally really counterproductive because your partner is just going to feel like you're not actually trying to solve what we're doing here. You're just trying to attack me. Right? I'm trying to meet you in issue number 1 so we can have a productive conversation about it, but it feels like you just wanna fight.
[00:13:31]:
Right? That's how it's gonna feel to the other person when you just kind of jump from lily pad to lily pad in terms of this issue, that issue, all the things that I am upset with you about that I've been harboring, that's likely gonna feel really overwhelming and demoralizing to your partner, particularly if they lean more avoidant because they're just not gonna know how to respond to that, and they're going to feel like a failure. They're gonna feel like a disappointment to you. They're gonna feel like nothing they do is good enough. There's no point. Why do I bother? Look how up you are with me all the time. Like, nothing I do is enough for you. Right? Those are all the sentiments that tend to come from that kind of pattern. So, as hard as it is, and I know it is hard because I know you don't want to have these conversations all the time, and so when you do get the opportunity, it is really tempting to just sneak in all of those other things that have been bothering you.
[00:14:27]:
Try not to. Try to just let that go and trust that in dealing with the problem at hand, you're much more likely to at least get resolution on one thing. Whereas the more issues you try and incorporate and kind of layer on top of each other, you're probably not gonna get anything resolved, and you're gonna walk away from that feeling less heard, less validated, less understood, which is obviously not what we want. So keep it to one issue if you can. Okay. The third tip that I want to give you is know when to let things go. So again, it's kind of related to the previous point around keep it to one issue. But, for anxiously attached people, the tendency is for these conversations to go on and on.
[00:15:08]:
Again, I get it. I can be guilty of that, of never really feeling like it's enough. If my partner is there and says, like, yes, I understand. I hear you. It's really hard sometimes to believe, like, but do you really understand? Do you really hear me? What are we gonna do about it? Right? There's this difficulty in just accepting the resolution, and, you know, not trusting that the issue is resolved or that your partner does really understand you. And so you kinda keep pushing and keep pushing and wanna relitigate and reopen every single aspect of the conversation, kinda keep testing. Again, in the same way as when we try and raise a 1000000 different issues at once, can leave our partner feeling kind of demoralized. I think when we can't just let it go and let near enough be good enough, You know, we're, like, wait until we have absolute assurance that we have the perfect solution, and we're never gonna have to deal with this again.
[00:16:09]:
I think that approach can be quite demotivating and discouraging for our partner who might be really genuinely trying to meet us in whatever it is that we're upset about. But when we are kind of dismissing or overlooking their genuine attempts, at validating us, at making a commitment to try and do something differently. When we're not really acknowledging them in that, then that can make them feel like, well, I give up. Right? Why bother? So I think there is really something to be said for knowing when to just let it go. It doesn't mean that you have to let the issue go forever, but just knowing when to leave the conversation and, you know, allow yourself to take in whatever your partner has said. Allow yourself to receive that reassurance rather than doubting it and trying to kind of chip away at it or undermine it. Again, I think that struggle with, like, really receiving and really feeling comforted by someone is very real among anxiously attached people. As much as we can ask for reassurance, oftentimes we're not very good at taking it in or believing it.
[00:17:21]:
So try and see the goodness in what your partner is trying to do. Try and see where they are making an effort to propose a solution. Even if you don't think it's the perfect solution, at least honor and acknowledge the effort. That's really much more likely to get you to a more positive overall relational environment. So do try and give your partner the benefit of the doubt. Do try and let things go when you can, and bring things back to a place of connection, acknowledgement, appreciation. And, you know, as a kind of little bonus tip at the end, I think it can be really positive, particularly with an avoidant partner who knows struggles having these conversations at the best of times. Voice your appreciation for them showing up to the conversation.
[00:18:08]:
Say, I know that you don't like having these conversations and I really appreciate you staying in this with me. I really appreciate you taking the time to try and understand or hear me out or whatever. Because that will help them to feel seen and acknowledged as well. Okay. I hope that's been helpful. I hope it's given you some food for thought. If you're someone who struggles with these things, I know it's really tough. I've been there.
[00:18:35]:
Sometimes I still am there. But it's all about just trying something new, taking ownership for the ways in which we contribute to the patterns that we find ourselves in, and even if we change it 1% every time we have one of these conversations, that's progress and worthy of celebration. So as I said, hope it's helpful. Sending you lots of love and make sure to tune in next week for part 2 where I talk about what avoidant attaches can do to improve their conflict experience. Okay. Thanks, guys.
[00:19:08]:
Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you wanna go deeper on all things attachment, love, and relationships, you can find me on Instagram @stephanie__rigg or at stephanierigg.com. And if you enjoyed this episode, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review and a 5 star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here, and I hope to see you again soon.
Keywords from Podcast Episode
anxious attachment, conflict resolution, relationship advice, attachment patterns, avoidant attachment, relationship coach, conflict communication, insecurity in relationships, healthy relationships, thriving relationships, emotional abandonment, conflict aversion, fight or flight response, sympathetic nervous system, stress response, conflict avoidance, micro ruptures, relationship dynamics, partner validation, conflict patterns, relationship tips, emotional regulation, nervous system regulation, conflict intensity, relationship satisfaction, secure attachment, healing anxious attachment, attachment styles, relational environment, relationship struggles.
#145 3 Fights Every Anxious-Avoidant Couple Has Had
In today's episode, I'm unpacking three common pain points that virtually all anxious-avoidant couples will encounter at some point in their relationship. We'll talk about why these particular fights are so common, and what they're really about - so you can approach them next time with more empathy and understanding, and avoid the disconnection and hurt that comes with the typical anxious-avoidant trap.
In today's episode, I'm unpacking three common pain points that virtually all anxious-avoidant couples will encounter at some point in their relationship. We'll talk about why these particular fights are so common, and what they're really about - so you can approach them next time with more empathy and understanding, and avoid the disconnection and hurt that comes with the typical anxious-avoidant trap.
💸 🎉 50% OFF SALE - use code HEYBABY to save 50% off any of the following:
The Dynamics of Anxious-Avoidant Relationships: Common Conflicts and How to Navigate Them
Anxious-avoidant relationships are particularly common and notoriously challenging. The attraction between someone with an anxious attachment style and another with an avoidant attachment style often results in a dynamic where each partner’s needs and fears can exacerbate the other’s insecurities.
The Conflict Over Details
One prevalent source of friction revolves around the need for details. The anxious partner typically craves information and clarity – where their partner is going, who they are spending time with, and what their plans entail. This desire for details stems from a need for assurance and a sense of control, helping mitigate anxiety about the unknown.
In contrast, the avoidant partner may find these questions intrusive and feel their privacy and autonomy are being infringed upon. They often prefer to keep certain parts of their lives separate, which can lead them to be vague or non-communicative. This behaviour is not necessarily about hiding something but rather about maintaining a sense of independence.
Navigating the Conflict: Begin by recognising and empathising with where each person is coming from. For the anxious partner, it's understanding that vagueness isn't inherently suspicious. For the avoidant partner, offering a bit more detail can quell anxiety without impinging on their independence. A balanced approach, where both parties communicate their needs and agree on what level of detail is comfortable to share, can ease this tension.
The Abrupt Exit During Conflict
Another common fight occurs when the avoidant partner exits a serious conversation or conflict. They might abruptly stop the discussion, citing work or another distraction, which leaves the anxious partner feeling dismissed and undervalued. The more the avoidant disengages, the more the anxious partner might react with heightened emotions, perpetuating a cycle of conflict.
For the avoidant partner, leaving the conversation can be a coping mechanism to avoid escalating emotions and preserve tranquility. They might genuinely need to attend to other commitments or simply feel the conversation is going around in circles without resolution.
Navigating the Conflict: The key here is mutual respect for time and space. Agreeing on a suitable time for serious discussions ensures that both partners are fully present and can engage constructively. If a conversation becomes too heated, agreeing to pause and reschedule it for a calmer time can prevent hurt feelings and further escalation. It’s crucial for each partner to express their needs calmly and assure the other that the conversation is important and will be revisited.
The Clash of Love Languages
Love languages – the myriad ways people express and receive love – often become a battleground in anxious-avoidant relationships. Anxious partners might crave words of affirmation and physical affection, feeling loved through constant verbal and tactile reassurance. Avoidant partners, however, might demonstrate love through acts of service, quality time, or even gift-giving, which can seem less direct and tangible to their anxious counterparts.
This divergence can lead to misunderstandings where the anxious partner feels neglected or unloved because the avoidant partner doesn’t frequently express love in the expected ways. The avoidant partner might feel unappreciated, believing their efforts are unnoticed or undervalued.
Navigating the Conflict: Understanding each other’s love languages is a powerful step toward reconciliation. Open conversations about what makes each partner feel loved and appreciated can reveal underlying needs and foster empathy. Encouraging both partners to occasionally step out of their comfort zones to meet each other’s needs can build a more balanced and fulfilling relationship.
Building a Compassionate and Secure Connection
The essence of navigating these conflicts lies in fostering mutual understanding and empathy. Recognising that each partner’s behaviours are rooted in their attachment styles can shift the perspective from blame to understanding. Engaging in dialogues with a compassionate mindset and striving for a balance between personal needs and the relationship’s wellbeing creates a foundation where both partners feel seen, heard, and valued.
Creating a positive relational environment encourages vulnerability and helps each partner feel safer to express themselves. In a space devoid of constant blame and defensiveness, it becomes easier to appreciate each other’s efforts and intentions, paving the way for deeper connection and secure attachment.
By approaching each conflict with empathy and a willingness to understand, anxious-avoidant couples can transform their relationship dynamics, moving toward a healthier and more resilient bond.
Questions for Discussion & Reflection
Do you recognise any patterns in your past or current relationships that reflect the anxious-avoidant dynamic? How have these patterns impacted your relationships?
When you’re feeling anxious in a relationship, do you often seek detailed information and reassurance from your partner? How do you think this affects your partner and your relationship?
If your partner appears avoidant and values their privacy, how do you generally react? Can you identify times when this reaction has led to conflict?
Reflect on a time when you or your partner ended a serious conversation abruptly. How did that make you feel? What steps could both of you take to navigate these situations more peacefully in the future?
How do you and your partner generally deal with arguments about spending quality time together? What love languages do you feel most connected to, and how do you express them?
Think about a recent conflict in your relationship. Was it about an underlying issue rather than the immediate problem? How can you address the root cause rather than the symptom next time?
Consider the concept of "creating a culture of appreciation" in your relationship. How often do you acknowledge your partner’s efforts to show love, even if it’s not in your preferred love language?
Do you find it challenging to understand or appreciate your partner’s need for autonomy and space? How might you work on developing more empathy and flexibility in this area?
Reflect on how you feel when asking your partner for emotional reassurance. Are there ways you can communicate your needs without making your partner feel overwhelmed or interrogated?
How do you typically balance your needs for security and certainty against your partner’s needs for space and independence? Can you identify any strategies to maintain this balance more effectively?
Feel free to reflect on these questions in your journal or discuss them with your partner to gain deeper insights into your relationship dynamics and the ways you can grow together.
FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:
Check out my couples course, Secure Together (& save $200 with the code SECURE)
Save $150 on my Higher Love break-up course with the code PHOENIX
Follow me on Instagram: @stephanie__rigg & @onattachment
You might also like…
Episode Transcript
[00:00:29]:
In today's episode, we're talking about 3 fights that you've probably had if you're in an anxious, avoidant relationship. If you've been in an anxious, avoidant relationship in the past, or indeed if you embark upon a relationship in the future with an anxious, avoidant dynamic, you're likely to have some version of these conflicts. So for anyone who is new here, who's uninitiated in this language, when I say an anxious, avoidant relationship, I'm referring to a relationship between someone who leans more anxious in their attachment style and someone who leans more avoidant in their attachment style. This is a very, very common pairing. It's very common for people with these attachment styles to be drawn to each other. And yet there can be a lot of challenges in that dynamic because, you know, on the surface, at least your attachment needs and wounds tend to sit at opposite ends of the spectrum.
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And it's really easy if you're not conscious and not aware to just trigger the hell out of each other. And, you know, for each of your habitual responses to reinforce the other person's fears and insecurities and thereby really embolden them and their protective mechanisms, their protective you've likely had if you're in your relationship and thinking, why does this feel so you've likely had if you're in your relationship and thinking, why does this feel so hard and why do we keep fighting about these things? I'm hoping that you'll feel very seen by today's episode, particularly by the specificity of some of the examples that I'm going to give. But also, I suppose, to peel back the layers in some of these conflicts, because the fight is never really about the thing that you're fighting about. It's almost always about something deeper, symptomatic of some unmet need or some fear or insecurity that you're being brought into contact with. And our romantic relationships have a real knack for bringing us into contact with those things. And we tend to be most sensitive in that arena to anything that feels threatening to our sense of safety, our sense of self, which we derive from our relationship, at least in part. So that's what I'm gonna be talking about today, giving free examples. It's a little bit lighthearted.
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It's not intended to be a really serious conversation today. So hopefully you'll have a little chuckle and I feel not only validated and seen, but maybe take it in good humor as well. That's my hope anyway. Okay. So before I dive into that, a quick reminder, this is the last week that you can take advantage of the 50% off sale that I've been running since being on maternity leave. I'm gonna wrap that up on the 30th June. So if you are interested in saving 50% on any of my courses or masters, head to my website and you can take advantage of that with the code, hey, baby, all 1 word. And particularly in keeping with today's theme around anxious avoidant dynamics and navigating those and trying to build a more secure foundation within an anxious, avoidant relationship, which I'm a big advocate for my course Secure Together, which I recorded with my partner, Joel.
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It's a really comprehensive course that will help you and your partner if you decide to do it together and to understand each other better and ultimately to love each other better, which is what we're all trying to do here. So, if today's episode resonates with you, definitely check out Secure Together and say 50% with that discount code, hey, baby. Alright. So the first of these common arguments or pain points that you're likely to have encountered if you're in an anxious avoidant dynamic is an argument about details. And in particular, an avoidant partner not giving details about where they're going, what they're doing, being sort of vague or cagey. At least that's how it's likely to appear to the anxious person about it might be where they're going. It might be who they're talking to. It might be who's going to be somewhere.
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So, you know, to paint the picture a little, your partner might be, you know, catching up with friends on the weekend and, you know, you, the anxious partner, might ask them, oh, where are you gonna go? And your avoidant partner might say, oh, I'm not sure yet. Full stop. And you might then say, what do you mean you're not sure yet? Oh, I just don't know. We haven't made a plan. Or I don't know. I'm not the 1 organizing it. And you might then say, as the anxious partner, well, haven't you asked them, how do you know where you're gonna meet them? And you might sense your avoidant partner becoming increasingly agitated with the line of questioning. You might then pivot to, well, who's going to be there? They might say, I don't know.
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And similarly, you might say, well, what do you mean you don't know? That kind of level of back and forth around giving details or not giving details. So why might this be triggering for someone with more anxious attachment patterns certainty and information and details allow you to feel some level of control, right? Vagaries and uncertainty and blank space is a total breeding ground for your anxiety. And particularly in circumstances like the 1 that I've just walked through, you're likely to go to a worst case scenario of they're hiding something from me. They're, you know, cheating on me. There's gonna be someone there that they shouldn't be seeing all of these things. And now I want to be really clear, because I know I'll get people saying, but what if that's true? And what if I've had that experience? And I'm not at all meaning to invalidate those fears to the extent that they are grounded in reality? I'm really talking here just about that dynamic of anxious partner really wanting a lot of information, needing that information to feel safe. And so grilling their partner or kind of interrogating a partner, continuing to like, pick and go back in for more and push and press and then finding resistance in their partner and using the fact of that resistance as evidence that there's something being hidden or concealed. And so escalating that attempt to, you know, draw blood from a stone to pull out information from them.
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And, you know, again, on and on that spirals because you're convinced that they're deliberately concealing or hiding something from you. Now, why would that be an issue for the avoidant partner? Why would they avoid a partner not just give you all of the details that you want? So let's kind of walk around to the other side and look at things from their perspective. We know that avoidant partners really value their privacy, their independence, their sense of autonomy. They will often, particularly earlier in a relationship, be quite protective of different parts of their life and keep them quite siloed. So say they were going to a work function. They might not want to give you all of the details about that. And they might deliberately keep that kind of vague because they don't think that it's relevant for you to know. They don't understand why you would need to know all of that because that's a different part of their life.
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Now I understand that if you're more anxious, that just doesn't make sense to you. It doesn't really make sense to me either as someone who does tend more in that direction and would freely give that information. But I suppose the point is that it's not always sinister, right? It's not always concealing something because there's something to hide that is dishonesty or keeping that kind of buffer can be a way of, keeping that kind of buffer can be a way of protecting their energetic space, and kind of keeping a level of autonomy rather than feeling intruded upon and feeling like you are seeking to insert yourself into every aspect of their life. So there can be this sense of, you know, a safe distance that they maintain by keeping details vague, by not being really over sharing about every little aspect of other parts of their life that they don't necessarily see as being relevant to you. Now that's not to say that you have to be okay with that. So on both sides, anxious partner doesn't have to just be okay with vague detail, with not being included in other aspects of their partner's life or being kept at arm's length. I think particularly as a relationship goes on, it's totally understandable that you would want to be included in different aspects of each other's lives and feel like you have at least some level of insight into that rather than feeling like you're being kept away. But equally, I think that having the understanding around where that might be coming from can allow you to approach the conversation to the extent that you feel you need to have a conversation from a more compassionate place rather than an accusatory 1.
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Because I can assure you that if you go in with an accusation, essentially, you know, what are you hiding from me? Why won't you tell me? Then your partner's only going to retreat further, feel even more intruded upon, and that's gonna exacerbate the dynamic. Now from the avoidant partner's perspective, I think, you know, your work here in this kind of argument is to understand that the more you give, the less your partner's going to go into that mode of intruding upon you or, you know, interrogating you, which is probably how you feel. I use that word kind of loosely or in inverted commas, because I know that that's how you're likely to feel as the more avoidant partner. Like, why are you harassing me? Why do you need to know this doesn't concern you? That protective stance that you're kind of adopting there is actually making it worse. So if you can see things from your partner's perspective and understand that that little bit of extra detail or informational context provides a lot of safety to relax into giving you your space without needing to feel like they have to investigate, you know, pry you open for information. That's, you know, a really nice and I would say relatively easy give, that will actually, you know, your fear story probably tells you that that's gonna be some slippery slope and then you're never gonna have any privacy or time or space yourself again. It's usually the opposite outcome. You'll actually have more freedom, more time and space yourself because your partner is not gonna be so paranoid.
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Okay. The next fight that you've probably had some variation of is if you're already having a fight or a serious conversation about something, and the avoidant partner starting to get restless as will often happen. And then they say something along the lines of it's not a good time or I have to get back to work or I have to go and do something. And so they essentially, like, abruptly leave the serious conversation because they've got some other thing to do. Now if you're the anxious partner and you were already upset or worked up, and then your partner says, I've got to go and do this work thing and it goes and gets their laptop out and starts doing something else. That's gonna feel incredibly rejecting and dismissive. Right? It's gonna feel like, how could you possibly be thinking about something else? How can you just switch gears like that? You must not care about this thing that we're talking about at all. You know, you're just trying to come up with some excuse to get out of this conversation.
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And so for the anxious partner, that's probably gonna fire you up and you're probably gonna follow them or just be really, really upset and hurt and possibly angry at your partner for just disengaging like that. And you're going to feel really deep prioritized. Like, if you cared about me, you wouldn't be going to do that thing, you'd be staying and having this conversation with me, right? For the avoidant partner, there can be this sense of, like, this conversation is gonna go on for 3 hours. I don't have time or capacity for it. It's not productive. We're not getting anywhere. We're just talking around in circles. And so I'm gonna go and do the thing that I was meant to be doing at this point in time.
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And that for them is a perfectly logical, kind of rational response to allocating their time and energy. They're not doing that to deliberately reject or hurt their partner. If anything, they're extracting themselves with a view to keeping the conflict at bay a lot of the time or not letting things escalate to the point of full blown conflict, big emotions, things that they don't really feel comfortable with. And so in nipping something in the bud or kind of shifting gears, extracting themselves, taking themselves out of the insensitive or inopportune moment. Oftentimes it's just their effort at either self regulating, whether they realize it or not, at preserving some semblance of peace and connection or really just doing the things that they were meant to do. You know, if they are genuinely working to a deadline, that might be as important, if not more important to them, than having some big, drawn out relationship conversation. Again, if you're more anxious, that's kind of unfathomable because being drawn out relationship conversations will always come first. Right? You would happily, cancel your plans and push back a deadline or be late for something.
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If something big was happening in your relationship and that needed to be discussed. That's always going to take precedence for you. And, you know, you would happily kinda drop everything else to stay in that until you find the resolution that you're looking for. That's just not true for your avoidant partner. A lot of the time, they don't have that same hierarchy where the relationship just sits like so far above everything else that nothing else matters. And so recognizing that that divergence in approach and how you view a conversation like that and the boundaries and time parameters and kind of staying in it, the presence, again, is not coming from a place of, like, a lack of caring or a deliberate attempt at hurting 1 another. But there are some little tweaks that you can do there to try and prevent that from escalating. Because as I said, there's a good chance if the avoidant partner does extract themselves that the anxious partner is going to fire up and really amplify their attempts at being heard, whether that's by getting nasty or getting really emotional, you know, saying you don't even care about me.
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What's wrong with you? I can't do this anymore. All of those sorts of things, which again tend not to help really. They're, you know, really understandable and oftentimes coming from a place of desperation at being seen and heard. Like, if I can just get you to understand how much I'm hurting, then you'll come to me, then you'll change, then you'll behave differently. And it can be so upsetting when that doesn't work because obviously we then tell ourselves, well, you don't care. So what can we do about this kind of fight? I think a really good starting point is not having those conversations unless you've got the time and space for them. So really getting an opt in from your partner. Do you have time to talk about X thing? So you're not kind of ambushing them when they are in the middle of something or when it's not a good time, when they're then likely to get kind of uncomfortable and restless and impatient with the conversation because they weren't in the headspace to have it in the 1st place.
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And so I think being respectful of their time and energy when you're having these conversations rather than just launching into something when your partner feels kind of backed against a wall, because that's going to naturally lead them to want to find the exit and then that's going to trigger you. So being respectful at the outset and finding a mutually workable time to have conversations, I think is really a good rule of thumb in any relationship. I would also say, hey, you know, if your partner does start to get restless, agitated, start to kind of pull away or withdraw or start to come up with these reasons why they can't continue the conversation rather than jumping to accusation or blame, maybe say, okay, I understand that when would be a good time for us to finish this conversation off? Because it's really important to me. I know that you've got to do x y zed thing. Maybe you just need to cool off and that's actually really valid and sensible. I would say remembering that there is no point in pushing through a conversation when 1 or both of you are really dysregulated. And that's really hard for the anxious partner who just wants to, like, pull those through at all costs until you find your way to that resolution. But when you're both kind of worked up in your own way, you're very rarely going to find yourself to a genuine kind of resolution to that conflict.
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You're not able to hear or see each other. So, respecting that if your partner is needing to pull away from the conversation, that that's actually probably sensible and wise and giving them the space to go and regulate with the caveat of, okay, what do I need out of that? What do I need in order to feel comfortable with you taking that space? Well, I need some assurance that we're gonna revisit this. Tomorrow, whatever. But it's gonna be much easier for you to let them go if you know that they're gonna tomorrow, whatever. But it's gonna be much easier for you to let them go if you know that they're gonna come back at some point and you're going to get what you need. And as a little footnote to that, very sensible for you in that time apart, if you do take that space to go and regulate yourself as well, rather than just, you know, sitting on your bed crying and rehearsing what you're going to say to them, because that's only going to get you more and more worked up. Okay. The 3rd and final fight that you've probably had, I'm sure I could have done an episode without 50 of these, but I'm going to leave it at 3 for today is around love languages.
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So I've done an episode of on the love languages before and I've mentioned it here and there. If you're not familiar with the term, I'm sure most of you are. But basically that we each have our own ways of giving and receiving love that are most natural to us, that we give love, show love in those ways, and that we perceive others actions as loving. We feel really love when people demonstrate their love in particular ways. And so for anxiously attached people, I mean, I always kind of joke that I think like anxious people can identify with all of the love languages almost because they tend to really want to express love and to have love expressed towards them. It's almost like this bottomless pit of expressiveness around love and affection and care and desire in both directions, but particularly words of affirmation being like given a verbal reassurance that you are loved and cared for and, you know, getting compliments, those sorts of things are likely to really feel very nourishing and reassuring to the anxious partner. Physical affection is another big 1. And so what we often see in anxious avoiding couples is once again, we tend to have quite different love languages.
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So for more avoidant folks, you'll tend to see less of those direct shows of affection, like words of affirmation, their physical affection, physical touch and more kind of action based things. More, we might say indirect acts of service, quality time, gift giving as well can be 1 for for avoidant folks. So what you might see and, you know, a common fight that you might have had is around these differences in love languages. So for anxious folks, you probably want your partner to be more expressive to say, I love you more to say, like, you know, you mean so much to me or you look beautiful or, you know, I don't know what I'd do without you or these sorts of things. Right? Just like getting that verbal reassurance. And you probably don't get heaps of that. From most avoidant partners, that's probably not gonna come naturally to them, being so openly expressive about their feelings towards you. And so they might not be very heavy handed on giving out compliments or or, you know, giving out those words of affirmation in terms of endearment, probably not their thing.
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And so you might have had some sort of conflict around that. Likewise, you know, around affection, you might reach out and, like, hold their hand and they might pull their hand back. You might give them a hug, and they might kind of stiffen in your arms. They stand there and then pull away, and that might feel very rejecting for you, understandably. On the flip side of that, you might find that more avoidant partners really wanna spend, like, quality time together. And for them, you know, quality time is likely doing activities together, doing new things together, like being out in the world together. And they might get quite restless, The idea of just hanging out at home together, for example, you know, not doing anything novel or exciting, kind of being in a bubble together is probably not gonna meet that need. And so you've probably had some variation of conflict around these different ways of showing love.
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And oftentimes, it will be the anxious partner. You can see a theme here. Often the anxious partner is the 1 I don't wanna say initiating the conflict, but I suppose expressing the the need or the sense of lack or the sense that there's an issue that needs addressing. And that might be around, like, you never tell me you love me or you don't even find me attractive or those sorts of things. And when an avoided partner hears that, particularly if they've been making an effort to show love in their own way, so via acts of service, via, you know, spending time together, they're likely to hear that as just like, oh, nothing I do is enough. Right? I try and do all of these things, and you're just over here telling me that I haven't done that thing or haven't done enough of it. And you're asking me to do something that doesn't come naturally to me. And for avoidant people, there's this real sensitive point around, I don't wanna have to do something where I feel forced.
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So I don't wanna have to pretend to feel something that I don't feel. I don't wanna say something that doesn't feel sincere or authentic. That feels kind of scripted and awkward to me, they're likely to have a bigger version to things like that. I don't want, you know, engage in physical affection that feels unnatural and and uncomfortable. So, recognizing that there is this aversion to doing that which doesn't come naturally for their point of partner. It's very much out of their comfort zone, and they're likely to be very resistant to it, which is why they're, you know, more inclined to stick to their more comfortable ways of showing love. But you may well have had some conflict around expressions of love and love languages. Now what to do with that, I really recommend if if that is you, then going to listen to the episode around love languages.
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From memory, we also cover love languages specifically in the secure together course that I mentioned earlier. I mean, you know, how to navigate those. But I think once again, we have to give our partner the benefit of the doubt on both sides. Like, what's the most generous interpretation of this? And that's not gonna be, well, my partner just doesn't give a shit about me. They just don't care about me. Can I find my way to a more generous interpretation? Can I try to reorient myself from this really strong negative bias to seeing, you know, how my partner does show up for me and making sure that they know that, making sure that they feel really acknowledged again on both sides? And because the more we shift to that kind of culture of appreciation and acknowledgment, the more safety there's going to be and the more likely we are to be able to then take risks because vulnerability doesn't feel so frightening. If we're in a culture of blame and accusation and attack and defensiveness, vulnerability is a really big ask against that backdrop because we feel like we're in constant self protection. So if you can find a way to shift that culture, shift the relational environment towards something that is more positive, and appreciative, then you may just find that your partner is more willing to meet you in the middle or take those risks, step out of their comfort zone because you've created a really secure foundation for them to do that.
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Okay. So I hope that that's been helpful for you. As I said, I hope that you felt seen validated maybe by aspects of those. And even if it's not a carbon copy of those exact fights that you might you know, see aspects of yourself and your partner or maybe an ex partner in the dynamics that I've spoken to that can sit underneath those surface level fight. So hopefully that's given you a little bit more compassion and empathy for your partner and also some greater conscious awareness about what drives your own triggers and so that you don't just have to do a rinse and repeat of those painful arguments that tend to drive you further and further apart rather than bringing you closer together, which is, of course, what we're trying to do. And as I said, if you want to go deeper on that kind of conversation, Secure Together is a really great course, particularly so because Joel is kind of co teaching it with me. And so he's there in all of the videos giving the avoidant perspective directly. I had so much beautiful feedback from people's avoidant partners, who've really loved that and felt that it's been really balanced and so has felt less intimidating for them.
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It's not just being lectured to by someone who's on team anxious. It's actually really trying to give a voice to both perspectives with a view to helping you understand each other. So, there's a few more days to get 50% off that course if you are interested, and you can do so via the links in the show notes or heading straight to my website. Otherwise, thank you so much for joining me. So appreciative of you all always, and I look forward to seeing you again next time. Thanks guys.
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Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you wanna go deeper on all things attachment, love, and relationships, you can find me on Instagram @stephanie__rigg or at stephanierigg.com. And if you enjoyed this episode, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review and a 5 star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here, and I hope to see you again soon.
Keywords from Podcast Episode
attachment, relationships, relationship coach, Stephanie Rigg, anxious avoidant relationship, attachment styles, conflict, fights, insecurity, building relationships, thriving relationships, conscious awareness, romantic relationships, relationship dynamics, intimacy, fear and insecurity, safety in relationships, attachment needs, protective mechanisms, anxiety, regulation, avoiding conflict, partner dynamics, love languages, words of affirmation, physical affection, quality time, acts of service, gift giving, emotional regulation, relationship communication