What is anxious preoccupied attachment?

Anxious preoccupied attachment is an attachment style characterized by a fear of abandonment and a desire for deep connection, often caused by inconsistent emotional reinforcement in childhood.

How does anxious preoccupied attachment develop?

It develops in childhood when a child receives inconsistent emotional reinforcement from caregivers, leading to a fear of abandonment and a need for validation.

What are signs of anxious preoccupied attachment in adults?

Signs include a strong need for reassurance in relationships, difficulty being alone, and feeling either anxious or addicted in relationships.

Why do anxious preoccupied people struggle with boundaries?

They fear abandonment, so they may compromise their own needs to maintain relationships, often backpedaling to avoid conflicts.

What is the anxious-avoidant trap?

It's a relationship dynamic where an anxious preoccupied person is attracted to an avoidant person, resulting in a cycle of intermittent reinforcement of needs.

Everything you need to know about the Anxious Preoccupied

00:06:57

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEOExEQ0n0Q

Summary

TLDRDr. Sarah Hensley, a social psychologist, explores the anxious preoccupied attachment style, one of the insecure attachment types rooted in childhood experiences. People with this attachment style often report a mix of emotional support and neglect in childhood, leading to their adult anxieties about abandonment and need for constant reassurance in relationships. These individuals are often labeled as 'love addicts' due to their dependency on relationships to feel worthy and stable. Dr. Hensley explains that they are drawn to avoidant partners, creating a cycle of intermittent reinforcement, similar to addiction cycles. This attachment style also causes problems with personal boundaries, causing them to feel less valid outside of relationships. Dr. Hensley advises that healing involves learning to self-soothe and embrace solitude. She promises more insights on relationship dynamics and attachment styles in further discussions on her channel.

Takeaways

👶 Anxious preoccupied attachment begins in childhood with inconsistent parental emotional reinforcement.
❤️ These individuals become 'love addicts,' needing relationships for self-worth and stability.
⚠️ They often partner with avoidant individuals, creating an anxious-avoidant dynamic.
🚫 They struggle with boundaries due to fear of abandonment, potentially becoming doormats.
🔄 Their attachment style is similar to addiction, causing cycles of anxiety and dependency.
🧠 Healing involves learning self-soothing techniques and being comfortable alone.
🤝 They are very loving and giving in relationships but often receive less in return.
💬 Conflict in relationships can lead them to backpedal to avoid abandonment.
🔍 Dr. Hensley will explore more on attachment styles and dynamics in future content.

Timeline

00:00:00 - 00:06:57
Dr. Sarah Hensley, a social psychologist, discusses anxious preoccupied attachment in romantic relationships. She notes most people confuse this with fearful avoidant attachment, which she will cover in another video. Anxious preoccupied attachment often stems from childhood experiences where love and emotional support were inconsistently provided by parents, leading to anxiety and addictive behaviors in adulthood. This attachment style involves significant fears of abandonment, leading individuals to become 'love addicts' due to their dependency on relationship validation. They often attract avoidant partners, creating an 'anxious-avoidant trap.' They struggle with boundaries, often self-abandoning during conflicts out of fear of rejection, and typically seek partners who provide inadequate emotional support. These individuals need to work on self-soothing, becoming comfortable alone, and healing attachment wounds.

Mind Map

Video Q&A

What is anxious preoccupied attachment?
Anxious preoccupied attachment is an attachment style characterized by a fear of abandonment and a desire for deep connection, often caused by inconsistent emotional reinforcement in childhood.
How does anxious preoccupied attachment develop?
It develops in childhood when a child receives inconsistent emotional reinforcement from caregivers, leading to a fear of abandonment and a need for validation.
What are signs of anxious preoccupied attachment in adults?
Signs include a strong need for reassurance in relationships, difficulty being alone, and feeling either anxious or addicted in relationships.
Why do anxious preoccupied people struggle with boundaries?
They fear abandonment, so they may compromise their own needs to maintain relationships, often backpedaling to avoid conflicts.
What is the anxious-avoidant trap?
It's a relationship dynamic where an anxious preoccupied person is attracted to an avoidant person, resulting in a cycle of intermittent reinforcement of needs.

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00:00:00
I'm Dr Sarah Hensley I'm a specialized
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social psychologist and I've been
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studying the science of attachment and
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attraction in side romantic
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relationships for over 15 years in this
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video I want to talk about anxious
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preoccupied attachment most people that
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come into my practice think that they
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have anxious preoccupied attachment
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however most of them are fearful
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avoidant stay tuned for another video on
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that attachment however I do come across
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a handful of people who truly do have
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anxious preoccupied attachment so I want
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to tell you about how that attachment
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develops and what are the key signs that
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someone has this type of romantic
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attachment so if you don't know about
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attachment style go back to the
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beginning of my channel and watch my
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recap video anxious preoccupied
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attachment starts in childhood like all
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the other insecure attachments to in
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childhood anxious preoccupied folks
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usually communicate to me in my practice
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that they had a good childhood that they
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felt like their parents really did love
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them and that their parents provided
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some degree of emotional support a tent
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love attention and affection but when I
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really probe into their childhoods one
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thing I find is fairly consistent they
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received intermittent reinforcement of
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that love affection and emotional
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Attunement in childhood what does that
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mean it means that when parents were
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around they did a really good job of
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meeting that child's attachment needs
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for emotional Attunement attention love
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affection support Etc but for whatever
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reason the parents had something going
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on in their lives that pulled them away
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from giving giving this consistently to
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the child so sometimes the child got it
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and they felt great other times the
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parents were too busy or had something
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else going on and they were unable to
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give this to the child leaving the child
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to feel abandoned and always trying to
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seek more connection from their parents
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so whenever we have intermittent
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reinforcement inside of a relationship
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wherever sometimes our needs are met and
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sometimes they're not it creates two
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really really important and problematic
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things one is anxiety the other is
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addiction anything that's addicting
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actually causes anxiety and has the
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principal components of intermittent
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reinforcement involved in it such as
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gambling so when you gamble and you bet
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your money and you win you feel really
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great you get all the good chemicals
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rushing through your brain and body when
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you bet your money and you lose you feel
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really bad you get all the stress
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chemicals running through your body and
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when that pattern happens over and over
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again where sometimes you win and
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sometimes you lose you will get addicted
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to trying to chase the win the same
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thing happens with drugs and people can
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be addicting too so anxious preoccupied
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folks grow up with significant wounds
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around fearing abandonment and not
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feeling good enough trying to figure out
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how they can be better to make people
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like them more AKA give them their needs
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met so we tend to call these folks love
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addicts they really value being inside
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of a relationship being alone to them
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feels really awful for a number of
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reasons one they never really learned
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properly how to self-regulate their
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nervous system in childhood they
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desperately clung to the times where
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they could co-regulate with their
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parents and when their parents weren't
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around they were kind of immersed in
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their feelings and they didn't learn
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techniques or skills to calm their own
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nervous systems so their romantic
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partner provides some degree of
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co-regulation for them helping them feel
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more stable inside of relationships they
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can really be very needy they develop a
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very large bucket of needs and they're
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constantly seeking closer and closer
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connection and needing reassurance of
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the stability of their relationship
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unfortunately anxious preoccupied folks
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are often attracted to avoidant people
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who do provide intermittent
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reinforcement where sometimes they meet
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the needs of the anxious person and
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other times they pull away this causes
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the anxious person to develop
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significant anxiety as well as addiction
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or uh codependency inside of that
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relationship often we call the anxious
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and avoidant together as an anxious
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avoidant trap and that can be the
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anxious preoccupied in the dismissive
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avoidant it could be the anxious
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preoccupied in a fearful avoidant who
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will lean to the dismissive side it
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could be two fearful avoidants one
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leading anxious one leading dismissive
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there's a lot of combinations that can
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cause the anxious avoidant trap the
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anxious preoccupied tends to seek out
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the dismissive avoidant anxious
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preoccupied folks tend to be very loving
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and warm and kind and people are often
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really magnetically attracted to the
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warmth the empathy and the kindness of
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the anxious preoccupied person they are
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the doers in the relationship so they
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are always usually giving more than
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they're receiving sometimes they can
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push people away from being too needy or
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too clingy inside of relationships
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because they constantly need that
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reassurance and that co-regulation of
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their nervous systems they tend to feel
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less valued less valid less important
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and even insignificant when they're not
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inside of a romantic relationship ship
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so they're sort of always chasing after
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a romantic partner they are the people
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that after they get broken up with or
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after they have a breakup they are on
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the dating sites the next day trying to
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seek a new partner because band dating
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the wound of Abandonment becomes very
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important for them the anxious
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preoccupied folks often um really
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struggle with keeping their boundaries
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inside of relationships so they can
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self- abandon and one of the ways in
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which they do that is when they try to
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stand up their needs inside of a
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relationship and a conflict starts they
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get really scared of that potential
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abandonment so they can often do what I
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call back pedling or start to give a
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fawn response where if the conflict
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isn't going well they'll say I'm sorry
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you're right I'm wrong let's just forget
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about it let's just you know move on I'm
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sorry I should never have brought it up
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they really after they see that conflict
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could lead to aband abandonment fall on
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the sword and try to sort of undo the
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conflict and this can really lead them
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to be boundaryless and kind of end up as
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a doormat inside of relationships
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accepting much less than they deserve so
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they kind of have two things going on
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one they tend to want a little bit too
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much and two they tend to seek partners
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that give them a little bit too little
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so you can see the predicament that that
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puts the anxious preoccupied person in
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so the anxious preoccupied person really
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needs to learn a few things they need to
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learn how to self sooth they need to
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learn to be alone and get comfortable in
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the discomfort of being alone yes I know
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that's an oxymoron you need to get
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comfortable with being uncomfortable but
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it's true and they need to do all of the
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attachment healing work such as the
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metacognitive work and the soothing of
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their own nervous systems so please like
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follow And subscribe to my channel if
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you would like to learn more about
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attachment I will be going into detail
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about all of the attachment Styles as
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well as the Dynamics between the
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different attachment pairings as well as
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pretty much everything relationships so
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thank you for being here and