#99 Attachment Styles & Break-Ups

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In today’s episode, we’re talking all about attachment styles and break-ups.

Break-ups are difficult no matter who you are, but understanding how different attachment styles affect one's experience can offer valuable insights into the emotional landscape post-separation. Attachment styles, an aspect of psychological theory, play a critical role in how individuals process relationships and, subsequently, the end of those relationships. Here, we delve into the contrasting experiences of anxious and avoidant attachment styles during break-ups.

Anxious Attachment: The Struggle with Loss

For those with an anxious attachment style, break-ups can feel extraordinarily challenging. Individuals with this attachment style often place a high value on connection and see their relationship as an anchor, contributing to their sense of safety and identity. This dependence on the relationship can lead to a tendency to prioritise it over other aspects of life, such as friendships, hobbies, and even career goals.

When the relationship ends, the anxious person might feel an overwhelming sense of failure and loss. This isn't just the loss of a relationship, but also the loss of their perceived source of stability and purpose. The immediate reaction can involve a frantic need to reconnect, as the void left by the relationship feels too daunting to face alone.

It's common for those with an anxious attachment style to become preoccupied with their ex-partner post-break-up. Actions like checking social media for updates or looking for signs of their ex's current emotional state can become all-consuming. This obsessive behaviour is a way to manage the overwhelming emotions of rejection and uncertainty. However, this only serves to delay the necessary process of healing and personal growth.

Avoidant Attachment: Seeking Relief in Solitude

Contrastingly, individuals with an avoidant attachment style have a different experience. For avoidant individuals, relationships can already feel like a substantial emotional labour, detracting from their preferred state of independence and aloneness. As a relationship becomes strained, the avoidant person's instinct is to withdraw, feeling drained and overwhelmed by the emotional demands placed upon them.

When a break-up occurs, the primary response for an avoidant individual is often one of relief. The end of the relationship signifies the end of the stress and the return to a more comfortable state of solitude. This sense of relief does not necessarily mean they didn't value their partner or the relationship; rather, it indicates their low tolerance for prolonged conflict and heightened emotional states.

In the immediate aftermath of a break-up, avoidant individuals might engage in activities that distract them, such as socialising more, immersing themselves in work, or picking up new hobbies. These activities serve the purpose of avoiding the emotional reckoning that follows a break-up, providing a temporary shield against the feelings of loss and sadness. However, it is common for the emotional impact to surface later, potentially weeks after the separation.

Misunderstandings and Projections

The diverging reactions of anxious and avoidant individuals can lead to significant misunderstandings. Anxious individuals may look at their avoidant ex-partner's apparent ease post-break-up and assume they never cared about the relationship. On the other hand, avoidant individuals may interpret the anxious person's heightened emotional state as excessive or irrational.

These projections are based on each attachment style's approach to emotional processing and coping. Anxious individuals assume that if their ex-partner truly cared, they would also be in a state of visible distress. Meanwhile, avoidant individuals may fail to understand the depth of the anxious partner's emotional investment, leading to further miscommunication and misinterpretation.

Focusing on Self-Healing

For both attachment styles, the key to healing post-break-up lies in redirecting focus from the former partner to oneself. For anxious individuals, this involves shifting their energy from the relationship to building a stronger sense of self. Developing self-worth, self-respect, and self-trust can create a more secure emotional foundation, reducing the need to cling to a partner for stability.

Avoidant individuals, meanwhile, could benefit from fostering a deeper emotional awareness. Instead of strictly avoiding the discomfort that follows a break-up, facing those feelings and understanding their roots can lead to more meaningful personal growth. This involves recognising their tendencies to withdraw and working towards more balanced ways of managing emotions and relationships.

Conclusion

Understanding the nuances of how different attachment styles experience break-ups can foster empathy and self-awareness. While an anxious attachment might lead to feelings of intense loss and fixation, an avoidant attachment may initially result in relief and later sadness. Both experiences are valid and form part of the complex tapestry of human relationships. Ultimately, the journey through a break-up can be an opportunity for profound personal development, teaching us to build healthier and more secure connections in future relationships.

Use the code PHOENIX to save $150 off Higher Love - stephanierigg.com/higher-love

FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Sign up for my upcoming masterclass on Building Trust

• Download the free guide: Attachment 101

• Follow me on Instagram: @stephanie__rigg & @onattachment

• Visit my website

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Episode Transcript

Stephanie Rigg [00:00:04]:

Welcome back to another episode of On Attachment. In today's episode we are talking all about breakups and specifically how different attachment styles, people with different attachment patterns are likely to experience and respond to breakups. So I know I say this at the start of every episode, but this is something that I get asked about a lot, particularly from my anxious attachers. No surprises there. And people wondering a why breakups feel so intensely hard for people with anxious attachment patterns, but also desperately trying to decipher what their often avoidant leaning ex partner is thinking, feeling why would they do this? Why aren't they doing that? And while you would know, if you're familiar with my work, my approach that I usually will politely decline to join you in analysing and hypothesising about someone's behaviour, why would they do this? What does it mean when they do that? I think that playing that game actually just keeps us more stuck and so I usually opt out of that and gently discourage you from spending too much time and energy in that, spinning around in the hypothesising.

Stephanie Rigg [00:01:44]:

At the same time, there are some clearly observed differences in the way that folks with anxious attachment patterns tend to process and experience a breakup compared with those who have more avoided patterns. And I think that in having a conversation around this we can cultivate greater understanding and be less inclined to project our own way onto the other person's behaviour and interpret accordingly. So I think again, and we do this all throughout relationships, right? All throughout the life cycle of a relationship. I think without conscious awareness, we do tend to project and receive someone's behaviour as what it would mean if we did that, notwithstanding that we're coming from completely different places, we have completely different sensitivities and values and all of those things. We put ourselves in their shoes and then construct meaning and it tends to give a very inaccurate and distorted and one sided view of things, which, spoiler alert, usually makes things worse because we then craft these painful stories out of it. So

I'm hoping that in today's episode I can give you a bit more context for that and probably more of an insight into that avoidant experience post breakup, so that you can understand that, depersonalise it a little and hopefully keep your eyes on your own paper, stay in your own lane a little, and support yourself as best you can. If you are going through a breakup, or maybe you've been through a breakup and you've had a lot of unanswered questions and wondered these same things, so hopefully I can give you some insights there. Before we dive into that, a couple of quick announcements.

Stephanie Rigg [00:03:31]:

The first being you might have heard me announce that I'm holding a Live Master class in a couple of weeks time on Building Trust. So this will be a 90 minutes. Although in the past I've tended to go a little overtime, so probably 90 minutes to 2 hours. Live Masterclass where we'll be talking all about trust, both self trust and relational trust, how to build trust, looking at trust wounds, rebuilding after infidelity, whether you've got kind of legacy trust issues from a previous relationship, how to learn to trust yourself more, intuition, all of those topics will be woven in. Even as I'm saying this, I'm wondering how I'm going to fit it all into 2 hours. But anyway, that's what we're going to do. If you'd like to come along to that. I would love to see as many of you there as possible.

Stephanie Rigg [00:04:17]:

There will be a recording that you'll have access to afterwards as well. If you're unable to join Live or you just want to revisit the material and you can find the link to that in the show notes or directly on my website. Second quick announcements just to share the featured review, which is I've listened to a few episodes and already learnt so much.

Stephanie's calm, kind, compassionate approach is helping me understand relationships and myself at a deeper level. Thank you Stephanie. Keep on making a difference. Thank you for that beautiful review. I really appreciate it and I'm so glad that you are new to the show and already seeing an impact in your life and the way you're relating to yourself and others.

Stephanie Rigg [00:04:55]:

If that was your review, please send an email to podcast@stephanierigg.com and my team will set you up with free access to one of my Masterclasses, which includes, if you would like, a free ticket to the Rebuilding Trust Live Masterclass so you can choose that one rather than one of my preexisting Masterclasses if you so desire.

Okay, so let's dive into this conversation around attachment and breakups. So I've spoken at length on the show and elsewhere around anxious attachment and breakups and I'll give a bit of a recap on that for anyone who needs a refresher. Or perhaps if you haven't listened to me speak about this before. For anxiously attached people, breakups tend to be very, very challenging. We know that for anxious folks, connection is a very, very high ranking need and the relationship tends to be our anchor and our source of safety. We really lean on the relationship as giving us identity, as giving us purpose. We tend to orbit around that and really prioritise the relationship above the other pillars of our life.

Stephanie Rigg [00:06:03]:

And while that's not, oh, you're so anxious and clingy and needy because of those traits or preferences, it's normal. I would say that folks with secure attachment patterns also find their relationship to be a source of security and comfort and stability and they prioritise it. And that's not an anxious trope. Anxious folks tend to over index on their relationship to the exclusion of other areas of their life or to the detriment of other areas of their life which can be neglected in favour of putting the relationship first. Above. All else, and particularly if a relationship is under stress or strain, the anxious person will up the ante on how much time and energy they are devoting to being around their partner, trying to fix the relationship, thinking about the relationship. All of your internal resources are going to be funnelled into like Operation Save This Sinking Ship, right? And so the irony there being that as you keep ramping up your efforts, as the relationship becomes more and more strained, if you do then find yourself in this situation of a breakup, the relationship has ended, you've expended all this energy trying to save it and you're left really empty handed. And it can be a double edged sword because you feel this sense of failure that you weren't able to salvage the relationship and at the same time you then turn around and look at the rest of your life and there's not much happening because you became so laser focused on the relationship.

Stephanie Rigg [00:07:47]:

And you might have neglected friendships. You might have isolated yourself. You might have stopped doing whatever else you usually do. You might have abandoned your regular routines or become disengaged from work or any number of other things because you were so focused on the relationship and trying to stop it from ending when it was feeling really dire. And so for the anxious person, there are so many different layers of struggle here. Not only have they lost this anchor and this safety blanket, but there's a sense of failure, there's the sense of the unknown, of uncertainty. All of these things are big triggers for people who struggle with anxiety and usually try and manage that anxiety through control and creating predictability, through focusing on another person and their needs. All of these patterns that are pretty common among most anxiously attached people.

Stephanie Rigg [00:08:47]:

You've got all of this kind of energy that you are used to heaping onto someone else and a relationship and all of a sudden you don't know what to do with yourself. And that can feel just incredibly uncomfortable and you can feel almost frantic and panicked and very, very overwhelmed by that experience. Being in the void of all of that is just deeply uncomfortable. And so many anxiously attached folks will just spin out after a breakup and feel this overwhelming urge to reconnect with their partner. Not knowing how your partner is thinking or feeling, if you're not in contact with them, that is also likely to be incredibly difficult. So all of a sudden, this person who you're used to having access to and you're accustomed to feeling entitled to speak to them and to know how they're feeling and to know what they're doing and who they're spending. Time with and all of those things, all of a sudden you kind of overnight you lose jurisdiction over that and that can feel again for someone whose tendencies to create safety via a level of control and oversight feeling. Like you've just lost power there and that you no longer have any right or entitlement to know what they're thinking, to know what they're feeling, to know what they're doing with their time, who they're seeing, all of those things that is likely to send you into spirals of stress and panic and anxiety and jealousy and all of those other things.

Stephanie Rigg [00:10:19]:

And I think that behaviours like stalking their social media and when have they been online and who have they been talking to? Oh, did they just start following this person? Is that some all of that stuff, which I'm sure you're listening and some of you will be sheepishly raising your hand and going, yep, that's me done that. I get it, you are not alone. A lot of people do. I've done that before. It's a really easy trap to fall into just feeling like we need to gather information to somehow arm ourselves because that's just what we know to do. But of course, none of that is really helping us. And as always, the healing and the growth and the thing we really need, the medicine that we need, even though it's not what we want, is to turn from our obsessive focus on the other back to ourselves. Go, okay, I am feeling all of these big feelings.

Stephanie Rigg [00:11:15]:

I'm feeling scared, I'm feeling lonely, I'm feeling rejected, I'm feeling a sense of failure and humiliation and shame and loss and grief. And instead of being with those feelings, I am trying to fix or distract or avoid or get away from the immense overwhelm that comes with all of that big emotion because we don't trust ourselves to be able to handle it right, because we are so accustomed to the other person providing the safety. So I think that the very best thing we can do, as much as it's the last thing that we would do by instinct or impulse is actually to just focus on ourselves and try and release the grip, to surrender to the fact that we are no longer in control of this person. Not that we ever were, but we really now, as I said, we don't have jurisdiction over that anymore and obsessing over them and what they're doing and what they're thinking and what they're feeling is very much our way of trying to create a sense of control when we're feeling out of control. And so I think the best thing we can do is offer ourselves a more adaptive strategy which is going to be focusing on us. That is really the task of people with anxious attachment patterns, whether you're in a relationship or not, if you want to really work on healing and growing and cultivating a greater sense of security. You need to rebuild the foundations within yourself because that's where you are perhaps underdeveloped because you've been so accustomed to focusing on the other person. You need to start laying those bricks of self worth and self respect and self trust and self compassion, self esteem.

Stephanie Rigg [00:12:58]:

Those are the things that allow you to stand on your own. 2ft. To go to relationship with a strong sense of self and really love with an open heart rather than love someone with a lot of fear behind it and a need to control and grip and cling and all of those things. So that is your work and I really think that a breakup is a beautiful opportunity to take stock and to really look at that and go, okay, what are the lessons learned and what is next? That turned into a little bit of a soapbox pep talk for my anxious attaches. That was meant to be a quick setting of the scene. But anyway, we're now going to talk about the avoidant experience, which spoiler alert, is not what I just described in 99% of cases. And of course I will give the caveat that I should have done this at the start that of course everyone's different, right? To say like anxious people do this and avoidant people do that, universally categorically, the end overly simplistic. So this is not gospel, this is not universal, but it is often true in a general sense.

Stephanie Rigg [00:14:05]:

And that is to say that for avoidant leaning folk you'll recall I was saying, as a relationship becomes more strained towards the end, anxious folks dial up the intensity and they ramp up their attempts at fixing, saving, controlling, getting closer, problem solving. One more chance they might engage in more conflict and more demands in this desperate effort to get engagement and to turn the ship around. Avoidant folks, as things get more strained, become more and more overwhelmed and it just SAPS them of energy. It's like it drains the battery so fast because avoidant folks really value relational harmony and for them to feel like a relationship is just constant work, that is a very exhausting experience. I think it's exhausting for anxious folks as well, but it's not exhausting in the sense of like I can't do this, I'm out. Anxious leaning people tend to roll up their sleeves and want to do that work kind of relentlessly rather than walking away and deciding it's too much. For avoidant folks, I think that that just becomes more trouble than it's worth. And reminding ourselves that there is a really different baseline in terms of need to be in a relationship and if aloneness is comfortable, that is the comfort zone.

Stephanie Rigg [00:15:37]:

For a lot of people with avoidant patterns, the being in a relationship is the thing that is challenging them. And so as soon as the relationship becomes consistently tense and strained and conflict ridden, and they're feeling like they're under attack the whole time or like they're constantly being dragged into a three hour long conversation every other day where someone is highly emotional and you're going around in circles. That is not what an avoidant person, they don't get a lot out of that and that can just very quickly tip the scales in favour of this isn't working, this is costing me more than it's giving to me, it's too much, it's too exhausting, it's not working. And so when the relationship has been like that in the lead up to a breakup, the first thing that most avoidant people are going to feel is a sense of relief. There will be this sense of like, okay, I was feeling all of that stress and now that stress is alleviated and I feel free again and I feel relief and it's not like free, woohoo, I'm going to go out and sleep with a bunch of people. I mean, some people might do that and whatever, but I think that to suggest that it's freedom in the sense of, oh, now I'm single, like it's party time. I don't think that that's true. I think it is just a lifting of a huge emotional burden that comes with relational tension over time.

Stephanie Rigg [00:17:06]:

And so for avoidant folks, there is this sense of probably peace and relief retreating to an environment of aloneness where they feel like they're back in control and they don't feel like a failure and a disappointment. Someone's always upset with them and wanting things from them that they can't give. And so you might see that an avoidant person after a breakup is likely to seem pretty fine, particularly at the start. So they might seem to be pretty okay. And you might see them socialising a lot, they might distract themselves because like you, they don't know how to be with those big emotions that might be underneath that relief, but their way of coping with that. Whereas the anxious person tries to get away from those emotions by obsessing over the intellectualization of them and trying to find information and focusing on the other person and trying to solve the problem. Avoidant person tends to avoid and distract and numb. So they might go out and socialise a lot, they might throw themselves into work, they might take up a new hobby or something.

Stephanie Rigg [00:18:17]:

They might just go all in on other areas of life in a way that from the outside, if you're looking at them and you're following them on social media or whatever, you might look and just see them seemingly being fine and looking even like they're thriving. And that's probably pretty excruciating for you if you are more anxious. Because again, as I said at the start, you are interpreting what you are seeing through the lens of what it would mean if you were doing that. So for you, if you a week after a breakup were out socialising heaps and maybe going on a trip or all of those things are unfathomable because you're in this really dark place, you're going, wow, for me to be in that place, I must not care at all. I would have to not care at all. I would have to not miss them at all. I would have to have not even really loved them. I didn't value the relationship.

Stephanie Rigg [00:19:09]:

That's the only way that I could be ready for all of that. But that is just such a projection coming from a very different starting point and a very different experience and emotional landscape and way of coping with things. So while that's likely to be the avoidant person's initial experience, what will often happen is that a few weeks might go by, a month might go by, and then they might start to kind of really come to terms with what's happened. And that initial experience of relief might become something a little bit more sad, or having that grief come up, probably not in the same intense, overwhelming or consuming way as anxious person would, but still like having the, oh, that's sad, I miss them. And this is where you'll see people reaching out or they might like your Instagram story or send a casual message saying, hey, how are you? And I always get anxious attaches going, why would they send me a message? Why would they do that? I haven't heard from them for three weeks and all of a sudden they get this random message. Often that is what's happening, that they've kind of come through the fog of that initial period and realised what's happened. And again, people go, oh, if they missed me, does that mean we should get back together? You know, a lot of you would know that my take on that is not that getting back together is a bad thing or that you should never do that. But I think it's got to be based on a whole lot more than missing each other.

Stephanie Rigg [00:20:44]:

Because that's just going to lead you right back to where you started and you'll be in the same patterns and the same dynamics. As soon as you have that temporary relief of getting back together, you haven't actually resolved anything substantively. There's a really good chance that you'll be right back where you started. But that is kind of the arc or the trajectory that you could expect from a lot of folks with avoidant patterns is that they will seem to be fine and then they might have a bit of a hangover. But it's kind of a delay because of that initial experience of relief and feeling like, oh, thank God I'm not in the midst of that really high conflict, intense, overwhelming dynamic, which is what the tone of a lot of these relationships are right before a breakup. So I hope that that's been helpful in giving you a bit of a sense of those contrasting experiences. Again, I offer that with a view to helping you depersonalise and maybe cheque yourself on those projections and those stories you're telling yourself about like, oh, that's what their behaviour means, they're fine. That means that I'm pathetic and I loved them more and they never cared about me again.

Stephanie Rigg [00:21:58]:

That just really adds to our suffering and is not helpful at all. If this episode is something that you are really needing right now and you're in the midst of a breakup, definitely cheque out my Higher Love course. It's a breakup course. It's very comprehensive and it also has a bonus masterclass called Attachment Styles and Breakups, which is about 45 minutes and is more of a deep dive on the conversation we've had here today. And you can use the code Phoenix to save $150 on Higher Love, so you can enter that code at the checkout and you will save $150. So sending so much love to anyone who is going through a breakup. I know that it's tough. In a couple of weeks time, maybe next week, I'm going to do a Q and A episode all on breakup.

Stephanie Rigg [00:22:44]:

So covering a few different topics because it is one of the areas that I get a lot of requests for support from, from people who listen to the show and who follow me on Instagram and all of those things. So keep an ear out for that if that is something you're going through at the moment. Otherwise, so grateful for you all being here and I look forward to seeing you again next time. Thanks, guys. Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you want to 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 five star rating. It really does help so much.

Stephanie Rigg [00:23:26]:

Thanks again for being here and I hope to see you again soon.

How Do I Get My Avoidant Partner To Open Up?

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This week, I’m answering the community question, “How do I get my avoidant partner to open up?”. I’ll dive into how to pave the way for more genuine, authentic connection and what that looks like for people with avoidant attachment styles and anxious attachment styles within relationships.

WHAT WE’LL COVER:

• Preferences of wanting to receive information

• Trust wounds in avoidant partners

• Self-serving behaviour that could be impacting this issue

• Insight into their experience

FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:

• Use the code JUNE50 for 50% off 3 masterclasses or the Higher Love Course - www.stephanierigg.com

• Apply for my 6-month Homecoming Mastermind

• Download the free guide: Attachment 101

• Follow me on Instagram: @stephanie__rigg & @onattachment

• Visit my website

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Episode Transcript

0:00:00.09 → 0:00:30.08

You're listening to On Attachment, a place to learn about how attachment shapes the way we experience relationships and where you'll gain the guidance, knowledge and practical tools to overcome insecurity and build healthy, thriving relationships. I'm your host, relationship coach Stephanie Rigg, and I'm really glad you're here. You. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of On Attachment.

0:00:30.22 → 0:01:02.23

In today's episode, I'm going to be answering the community question of how do I get my avoidant partner to open up more? So this is a very frequently asked question, as you can imagine. I know that it's something a lot of more anxious partners struggle with and really desire is to have more depth and connection with their partner, particularly a partner who leans more avoidant. So I'm going to be unpacking that a little today. And importantly, and I would say more importantly than the actual, how do I get my partner to open up more?

0:01:02.32 → 0:01:59.10

As you can imagine, if you are familiar with my work and my philosophy, I think the more revealing inquiry here is what is it within me that needs to control or influence that? What part of me feels unsafe with them not telling me everything right away or feeling like I can't reach parts of them, how much of my desire to get them to open up is about them versus me? And I think that when we can get a little curious about that and take responsibility and really own the parts of us that maybe want to control someone or want to change them, want them to be more like us or as we would like them to be, then we're more able to approach those situations with a level of conscious awareness. And hopefully that will pave the way for more genuine, authentic connection, rather than connection that is, with a motive of control attached to it. So that's what we're going to be talking about today.

0:01:59.20 → 0:02:40.00

Before I dive into that, a couple of quick announcements you might have heard me share in the last episode that for the month of June I am offering a 50% off sale on my online courses and master classes. So included in that is my Higher Love course, which is my breakup course, and my three master classes how to navigate anxious, avoidant relationships, better boundaries and sex and attachment. So for the month of June, you can use the code June 50 on my website, the checkout area, to save 50% on all of those products. So if you've been interested in going a little deeper with my work, now is a great time to do that. We'll link all of that in the show notes for you.

0:02:40.77 → 0:03:05.15

Second announcement is just to share the featured review, which is Stephanie's an incredible teacher on attachment. Not only theories covered, but so many good examples of practical implementation. I've had experiences learning about attachment theory that made me feel like I'm a bad person because of how I tend to behave in relationships with Stephanie. I never feel that I've learned so much from listening to her, and I've only just scratched the surface on the many episodes available. Also, her voice is very pleasant and soothing.

0:03:05.20 → 0:03:24.76

She has a wonderful accent, and her way of facing her words makes it very easy to understand. Thank you so much, Stephanie. You're making a huge contribution by creating this valuable content. Thank you so much for that beautiful review. It's kind of you to say that my voice is very pleasant and soothing because I got a message from someone on Instagram yesterday telling me to please make my voice more professional because it sounded unnatural.

0:03:24.82 → 0:03:52.47

So apparently you can't please everybody, but it's nice to have the alternative perspective. So thank you so much for your review and your kind words. If that was your review, please send an email to podcast@stephanierigg.com, and my team will set you up with free access to one of those master classes that I mentioned a little while ago. Okay, so let's dive into this conversation around how do I get my avoidant partner to open up? So let's acknowledge the starting point for anxious people.

0:03:52.62 → 0:04:34.60

Disclosure. And arguably, over disclosure is a way to fast track connection a lot of the time. So even if it's very early in the dating process, something that a lot of anxious people will relate to is, I want to tell you everything about me, and I want you to tell me everything about you as a way to fast track us to depth. Right. I don't want to hang out in this in between uncertain thing where our relationship isn't really intense yet, and I lean on disclosure as a way to bypass that in between stage that uncertainty and fast track us straight to really intense connection.

0:04:34.79 → 0:05:28.13

So as is the case a lot of the time, noticing that as an anxious person, you probably sit at one extreme or one end of the spectrum when it comes to disclosure or opening up. And sometimes that can be maybe over disclosure, so it can be a lack of boundaries. I think that if we look at some of those descriptors of the various attachment styles, you'll see anxious people over disclose, avoidant people are very protective of disclosure and might under disclose or not share much of themselves with someone. And secure attachment is somewhere in the middle, right? I share an appropriate amount with people, but I don't blurt out everything and all of my deepest, darkest secrets and my history and my family struggles and my trauma and everything, because that might be too much too soon.

0:05:28.25 → 0:06:23.76

So I suppose I say that just to invite you to reflect on am I sitting at one extreme and judging someone or expecting them to meet me in my version of doing things my way, which maybe isn't healthy either. And I think that we can see that kind of dynamic play out a lot in anxious avoidant relationships is that we tussle over which extreme should win out, when really the goal is to meet in the middle. So I think when it comes to getting someone to open up, we first have to acknowledge that that is driven by our preference from the other extreme. Now, that is not to say that desiring connection with someone via feeling like you know them on a deep level is problematic. I don't think that it is problematic.

0:06:23.82 → 0:06:59.53

I think that's really understandable and natural and can be healthy at the same time. We do need to acknowledge that there can be a level of protectiveness from the avoidant person around sharing parts of themselves with other people. There can be trust wounds. Certainly for more fearful avoidant people, there can be a real betrayal, fear and not trusting in people's good intentions and feeling like the more I share of myself with you, the more potential you have to use that against me or hurt me. So I want to keep you at arm's length.

0:06:59.58 → 0:07:37.50

Or maybe if I do share something with you, then I retreat because I feel like I really regret sharing things with you. But I think that we do have to get really curious around how much of me wanting you to open up is because I genuinely want to know you better from an open hearted, agenda free kind of way. And how much of it is because I can't tolerate the distance that I perceive from not being able to reach you, from there being things about you that I don't know. Because as we know for anxious people, information feels safe. The more information we have, the more in control we feel.

0:07:37.55 → 0:08:01.08

The less information we have, the more out of control we feel. That uncertainty tends to feel really destabilising and can feel like you can't mobilise to keep yourself safe because you don't know what you're dealing with. And those blanks we tend to fill in with worst case scenarios, right? We catastrophize, why would they hide something from me? Why wouldn't they share it with me?

0:08:01.53 → 0:08:33.15

It must be something really bad or they don't like me, or there's something awry here. We become very, very suspicious of someone not sharing everything with us. Again, because our preference and our baseline is to share everything with everyone in a way that again, we use that to fast track connection. So we are suspicious and judgmental of the ways in which someone might be different to us and we think that it necessarily spells trouble. So I do think that we have to get honest and own.

0:08:33.30 → 0:09:11.50

How much of this is me wanting you to open up? Because I want to feel more connected to you and how much of it is I would feel more in control of you and our relationship and I would feel safer if I had more information. Because the more information I have, the more options I have, the more strategies I feel like I have at my disposal. To troubleshoot, to problem solve, to preempt something bad happening. But without that information, I feel like I'm going in blind to this situation where I feel like I'm going to have to protect myself and not going to be able to do that because I'm not armed with that information.

0:09:11.87 → 0:09:50.61

I think the other piece of this is that the other kind of self serving piece and as always, I say self serving not in a judgmental way because I am guilty of all of these things. But the other self serving thing can be if you loved me, you would tell me, right? That's the logic from the anxious side. It's if you really cared about this relationship, you would share everything with me. And so the fact that you don't want to share certain things with me or you're not opening up to me makes me feel rejected or unloved or suspicious or any other thing.

0:09:50.65 → 0:10:43.75

But I'm making it mean something about how much you care about me or how much you love me. And again, that is a very good example of projecting what something would mean if it were us onto someone else who's very different to us. So just recognising all of those different limbs that might be playing out here that might be influencing your need for someone else to be a certain way and how much of that is genuinely about them and how much of it is about you and arguably about control. So putting that to one side and that's kind of a whole inquiry in and of itself is all of the pieces within us that want to get someone to open up and actually looking at, okay, what would be the conditions which would support someone to feel like they could open up? And for an avoidant person, we have to look at the core wounds and the fears there.

0:10:43.79 → 0:11:21.45

And a lot of the time that is around, I don't want to be controlled. I don't want to feel like someone is trying to take away my privacy, my independence, my selfhood. And so feeling like someone is literally or figuratively looming over them and demanding that they open up or making them wrong for not opening up on someone else's timeline, that's usually going to exacerbate it rather than alleviate it. Right. That's going to really lead them to dig their heels in and reinforce the need for self protection rather than to support them to feel safe.

0:11:21.55 → 0:11:48.29

You can't just demand that someone feel safe enough to open up to you. You have to kind of earn that. And earning that might mean building trust incrementally over time and releasing the grip on trying to control someone or trying to make demands of them that are more than they are able to give at a certain point in a relationship or a certain point in their own journey. Right? This stuff can feel intensely vulnerable and unsafe.

0:11:48.39 → 0:12:47.18

And I think we have to really remind ourselves of that rather than just asking these questions of how can I get them to do this thing that I want them to do. There's a lot more in it than that. I think the important thing to add to all of this is it's really reasonable and understandable to want to know that someone is connected to their own emotional landscape. And I think to the extent that your desire to get your partner to open up is because it feels unsafe or otherwise destabilising to you to feel like there's something going on that not only you don't understand, but your partner doesn't understand. If you listen to a recent episode I did with Connor Beaton, a guest that I had on, he works a lot with men, and we spoke in that episode in the context of men that what we really desire from someone in partnership is, can I trust that you know what's going on with you?

0:12:47.36 → 0:13:19.91

And you have self awareness around that, and you have the tools and the resources to do whatever you need to do to take care of it. And I think that that is really the crux of it. And when we feel like someone is not only cloistered but also in denial about there being something wrong or something that needs their attention, that's when it starts to feel really unsafe. And that's where on the anxious side, you probably start escalating and going into this panicky frenzy of, you have to tell me there's something wrong. I know there's something wrong.

0:13:19.95 → 0:13:46.44

Why aren't you telling me? Just open up to me. Because we feel like if they don't understand what's going on with them or they don't know, then how are they going to take care of it? And that can feel really unsafe and really stressful. So I think that that aspect of it, to the extent that that's your experience, feeling like you don't have trust in the fact that they're self aware enough to know what's going on for them and to manage that for themselves, I think that's really understandable.

0:13:46.47 → 0:14:28.17

And maybe the middle ground then is to say I don't need you to tell me everything that's going on. But it would be helpful for me if you could just reassure me that whatever it is that you've got it under control, or that you're taking care of it, or some other reassurance that isn't. I need you to bear your soul to me so that I can launch in and fix it and go into that Caretaker mode, but at least give me some sort of insight into what you're experiencing and what you're going to do about it. Right? And I think when we can ask for that from a more restrained place rather than a demanding place and a place that's tell me what's going on for you, and then I'm going to mobilise straight away into trying.

0:14:28.18 → 0:15:02.66

To fix it, which might feel like a boundary violation for the other person. Or we can do it in a more restrained way, in a more trusting way, a way that says I trust you and I respect you. And I know that you'll take care of it, but it would really help if I could get a little insight into what you're going through that feels more balanced and that feels like more of a healthy middle ground, rather than poking and prodding and demanding that someone open up so that you feel better about it. So I suppose it's a long winded way of saying how do I get someone to open up? I don't know that you do get someone to open up.

0:15:02.68 → 0:15:54.75

I think people open when they're ready and if they're opening before they're ready because you've made them, that's probably not a great outcome, is it? We really want people to open from a place of a natural unfolding and unfurling of their authentic self in a way that feels really true and honest rather than getting someone to share parts of themselves that they're not ready to share or that they feel really reluctant to share. And then that being cloaked in fear or self protection and probably not feeling that great on either side. I think when we can trust that in time, if we are loving and respectful and trusting of one another, that that revealing just happens. It takes place naturally because the safety is established between you in a really genuine way.

0:15:54.90 → 0:16:21.73

And so I think that if you can cultivate that patience and trust rather than needing someone to operate on your timeline of opening up or revealing themselves or disclosing certain things, then I think that that's maybe the better path. Now, of course, all of the caveats, all of the what about this? What about this? What about someone lying to me? Or I'm not talking about any of that.

0:16:21.77 → 0:17:01.23

Right? Really talking about sharing emotionally disclosing things about fears and insecurities recognising that that's much harder for some people than others. And that doesn't mean that they're bad or wrong or broken, but just trying to accept our partner's process and trust their ability to make those decisions for themselves rather than feeling like we need to step in and steward their personal development process for them. Which, as I've said, I think is a really easy place for more anxious people to go. But it costs us a lot because once we step into that role of coach or therapist or caretaker, that can become the balance point in the relationship.

0:17:01.35 → 0:18:03.28

And that can be the role that we cement ourselves into, which for a time might feel good because we might feel needed or we might feel in control, but ultimately it costs us a lot because then who's there to support us when we've anointed ourselves, the support person in the relationship? It can skew things in a direction that ultimately doesn't serve us. So I realised that was a lot of different limbs and thoughts and reflections and probably wasn't the answer you were looking for if you were hoping for a nice, neat three step process on how to get an avoidant person to open up. But I hope that it's given you something a little more nuanced and layered to reflect upon, and ultimately an invitation into greater self awareness, greater self responsibility, and maybe more acceptance of your partner and more trust and respect for them in a way that will naturally give rise to opening and safety in your relationship. If you've enjoyed this episode, as always, I'm super grateful.

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For those of you who can leave a quick review or a rating or a feedback little comment thing on Spotify, share it with the people in your life. It all really helps and adds up and is a huge support for me in continuing to get the word out about the podcast. Otherwise, I look forward to joining you again next time. Thanks, guys. Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment.

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If you want to 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 five star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here and I hope to you again soon.