Dr. D explores anxious attachment, asking whether absence of anxiety equals a good relationship, outlines how anxious patterns show up and suggests reflective questions to notice when worry resurfaces.
Dr. D. wants to talk about anxious attachment. Does the absence of anxiety mean that it's a good relationship? All of this information can apply to all different types of relationships.
If you struggle with the anxious attachment style, that anxiety never really goes away. Sometimes we experience relationships that cause us to feel anxious and it feels familiar. The absence of anxiety does not necessarily mean that it's a good relationship.
Ask yourself if you are feeling anxious. Has a person done something that reminds me of a previous experience that left me hurt? Is the anxiety creeping in when you're apart from them, or is it present when we're with them? If you have questions, please put it in the chat.
Next month or next week is a new month, I believe. I'm going to try to pre plan the topics for August. If there's something that you would like me to cover in our coffee chats, please drop that in the chat. I am willing to talk about anything.
Hey, Cadre, what's going on? It's me, Dr. D. Y' all ready for this coffee chat today? So I have. I want to recap a video that I saw. I think it was last night, actually, and it really. It triggered me, I'm not gonna lie. But the video I watched, and it was on Instagram, but it was a few ladies that were discussing this normal behavior. I would say, when you meet someone new or you're in a new relationship and you get texts from the person and you're trying to, I guess, decipher, like, what. What are the texts meaning?
And so you might reach out to your friends and say, what do you think this means? And you know, am I doing something wrong? And you question yourself. You question the person. And so there's a lot of anxiety in the beginning stages of that relationship. Hello there. And so the lady that was speaking in the video was just saying that if you are feeling that way, if you feel the need to have someone check the text for you, that that must not be a healthy relationship, and that must not be the right person for you if you feel like you need to double check on things.
And that triggered me because I think that's lacking some details when it comes to attachment styles. So if you guys know anything about attachment, and I have talked about this in the past, so check out my previous videos. But let's just look at anxious attachment. And so what we're talking about today, if you're just joining, I call it. You know, the question is, does the absence of anxiety mean that it's a good relationship? And all of this information can apply to all different types of relationships.
So my quick answer to that is no and yes, depending on the situation. But it doesn't just mean that there that it's a bad relationship if you have anxiety in the relationship. So getting back to anxious attachment. So with the anxious attachment style, you might feel uneasy and you might be confused in your relationship. You might question yourself, you question your partner, you might search for answers to see, like, did I do something wrong? Are they upset with me? Like, you're always in this mode of, I'm trying to fix the relationship, and that doesn't feel good.
And so you always walk around with this uneasiness in the relationship, trying to figure out if everything's okay. And sometimes that anxiety, if you have an anxious attachment style, that anxiety just. It's like under the surface all the time. It never goes away. It's even if you have a secure partner and someone that really is a Genuine person that genuinely loves you, genuinely cares about you, and is showing up for you. If you struggle with the anxious attachment style, me, that anxiety never really goes away.
It might quiet down a little bit, but there's always moments that will make it resurface and make it really big and bold. And so getting back to the question of does the absence of anxiety mean that it's a good relationship? No, because we can be anxious for no reason. We can have anxiety in a relationship just because we've been hurt in the past and maybe we've experienced, you know, unhealthy partners in the past and this new person comes into your life and we don't necessarily trust it, even if they.
They haven't given us a reason not to trust them. That anxiety just lingers. But I also want you to think about, I wrote something else down that if there's no anxiety, maybe it's because you're really not interested in a person. Maybe it's because that person just doesn't make you feel anything. And that doesn't mean it's a good relationship either. So that's leaning more towards the avoidant attachment style. So if you're typically the person that will retreat or sabotage a relationship because you feel like the person's getting too close, you know, that might be your go to move where you're just disconnected.
Not because you don't necessarily want relationship in general, but you don't want that relationship. Right. And so if you are not feeling any emotion, that doesn't necessarily mean it's a healthy relationship either. But the third reason why I think that this absence of anxiety doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad relationship, is sometimes we experience relationships that cause us to feel anxious and it feels familiar. Or the opposite end, where we feel safe in a relationship, but that doesn't mean that it's a good relationship.
It just feels familiar to us, like we know how to navigate it. So this has come up in my own life where. And then not just in a romantic relationship, but with friendships and with co workers where I thought a person was safe for me. They seemed to be genuine. They seem to be interested in my life, they seem to be interested in who I am as a person. And I felt like there is a mutual understanding with each other. But time passed and eventually the truth comes out where that person really wasn't safe for me.
They felt safe because they seemed to be interested. And so I wasn't anxious communicating with that person. But in the end they were just gathering information about Me. Hi, Speak, Wonder. They're just gathering information about me to use it against me or to talk about me to other people. So this absence of anxiety does not necessarily mean that the relationship is healthy, even with friends. Right. You can feel safe in friendships where you think the person is your friend and you open up to them, you pour your heart out to them, you're sharing just every everyday things with them.
But what they're doing behind the scenes, which we don't always know until it hits us, is that person is maybe jealous of us and we don't sense it. And because it feels safe, it feels familiar. So again, questioning. Do we have to have no anxiety to feel that the relationship is right? No. And I think sometimes, although anxiety doesn't feel good, it's not necessarily a bad thing because what anxiety in relationships can do for us, so we can use it. Anxiety in relationships will help us pay attention.
It will help us pay attention to what we feel, pay attention to our own behavior. It will help us pay attention to the person we're in connection with. Maybe we do need to pay attention to things under the radar that we might have missed in previous relationships. Or it'll help us pay attention to, you know, are things going well in our lives and is this person a part of that? Is this person something that is helping us feel better or are they causing us more anxiety? Right. So pay attention to that anxiety in the absence of anxiety.
Let me rephrase that. The absence of anxiety does not mean it's a good relationship. Y' all feeling this today? I see y' all taking notes. Speak, wonder. Brittany, I see you in there. So here's something else for you to write down. So I have some questions that I want you to ask yourself. One is if you are feeling anxious. And so one question to ask yourself is, has this person done something that reminds me of a previous experience that left me hurt? So I'll say that again. Has a person done something that reminds me of a previous experience that left me hurt?
And sometimes we. We get this sense of anxiety and confusion because it seems like, oh, this, I've been through this before. This feels familiar in a bad way. Right. And it could just be that we're misinterpreting. Speak, Wonder. We're misinterpreting the other person's behavior because we've been hurt. So now we're in this place of expectancy of people hurting us. So although yes, we want connection, we want healthy relationship, but we're waiting for that person to hurt us. Just like the other person did.
Right? So we really have to be still. That's my tattoo. Y' all can't see it, but it's on my arm. We have to be still, and we have to reflect. And that takes time, and that takes us sitting still with our thoughts, with our feelings, and we have to pay attention to are we regulated around this person or not? Is the anxiety creeping in when we're apart from them, or is it present when we're with them? So if you're thinking about text messages that you might receive or emails or whatever this online communication is, is the anxiety creeping in because you're not present with that person when there's communication happening?
Okay, and then the other question to consider is, you know, when there's uneasiness between you two, and who likes to argue? I mean, some people do. Let me take that back. Some people do like to argue. But if you are in conflict with someone now, if you've never experienced healthy conflict, you might get anxious around that person because you feel like they're out to get you, or you don't know how to stand up for yourself, or you're used to silencing yourself and you shut down. Or. Well, consider.
Is this healthy conflict? Is a person trying to. I'll get back to you. Speak wonder. Is a person trying to push your buttons in a way to get you out of character? Is this person just trying to have a better understanding between you two? And it feels like judgment, or it feels like they just don't like me? And we try to find any reason for a person not to like us when we have anxious attachment. Okay? So I hope that helps. I see you love anchors, so. Speak wonder. I'll share this with you. The previous office where I was that I shared a space with Dr.
Ella Duncan. She had anchors throughout the office. And so that. That's a. A really lovely reminder that God is our anchor. So. All right, y', all, if you have questions, please put it in the chat. If this spoke to you, drop your coffee mug in the chat. I do have real coffee today, and I think I had a cup this morning. This morning has been a very interesting morning. A good one. But shout out to my shirt. I know it's backwards to y', all, but it says chat. GPT is not your therapist. Get a real one.
Okay? Share that with your friends. Because there's so much toxicity going out there with AI being used inappropriately and AI. You know, people are saying AI is their best friend. No, no, girl, it's not. It's not your therapist either, so go get a real one. All right. But thank you all for joining me on my coffee chat today. I hope you guys have a wonderful day. And so next month or next week is a new month, I believe. So I will have another lineup. I'm going to try to pre plan the topics for August.
If there's something that you would like me to cover in our coffee chats, please drop that in the chat. Let me know what you're interested. If there's like a hot topic going out there that you want me to hit on, or if there's just something in your life, you're like, hey, Dr. D, I need some help with this. I am willing to talk about anything, so drop that in chat or message me or whatever. But you guys have a wonderful day. All right. Bye.
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