Shutting Down & The Avoidant Attachment Style

If you're avoidantly attached, you learned that having a need or a feeling isn't safe. Your parents likely weren't attuned to you in a healthy way. In order to get acceptance, safety, and validation, you learned to be invisible, suppress feelings, and be independent. This was an adaptive survival response that makes sense. However, now as an adult, it may be doing you more harm than good.

Transcript

Hi,

This is Robert and thanks for listening.

Let's talk about shutting down and the avoidant attachment style.

Understanding your shutdown and distancing patterns.

A brief explainer.

It's known that the avoidant attachment style begins in early childhood at a time when the brain is literally being wired for relationships.

The avoidant style stems from a disruption in the attunement or lack of attunement from the parent.

Healthy attunement basically means the parent's demeanor toward the child is curious about who the child is,

Mirrors back to the child what the child is feeling,

And does their best to understand the kid and make sure he or she consistently feels accepted.

In the strange situation,

A study done to assess attachment styles,

When mom left the avoidant child with a stranger,

A safe therapist,

The child showed no signs of distress when mom was leaving,

Played normally with the safe stranger during mom's absence,

And when mom returned,

The child showed very little interest in her return.

Basically,

The child related to the mother and the stranger equally.

This is fascinating stuff and the avoidantly attached child's reactions differ greatly from securely attached and anxiously attached children.

A securely attached child would show a bit of distress when mom leaves,

Be a bit apprehensive to engage with the stranger,

And welcome the mom upon her return with happiness.

Again,

The avoidant child was aloof and disengaged,

Both when mom left and when she returned.

This lack of attunement in childhood may have looked like parents who were dismissive or emotionally abusive or neglectful.

The caregiver may be emotionally unavailable and even unresponsive.

The parent is much more concerned about their own needs.

In fact,

When the child expresses a need,

The parent might shame or even punish them.

So this indeed can look like a child getting punished for doing what a child naturally does when their needs aren't being met,

Which is crying or showing emotion.

This is obviously quite sad because the child is being ignored and their needs are being determined as unimportant.

How can this not have lasting consequences later on down the line?

So growing up,

The child or teenager will have learned to avoid the primary caregiver,

Mom or dad.

When the child does feel that impulse to seek connection or comfort,

Even when hurt or sick,

That urge,

That impulse will get suppressed.

The child has learned to disconnect from that impulse to reach out and ask for help or seek comfort because they've learned that mom or dad are not able to fulfill that need.

It's no wonder then that the child feels equally as comfortable with a stranger as they would with their parent.

In fact,

If the parent was abusive or neglectful,

The child has adapted to actively avoid them and began learning how to cope without seeking comfort.

If this resonates with you,

Perhaps you were told that you are an old soul or so mature for your age because you were hardened by having to take care of yourself and grow up too quickly.

Anyway,

All of this is how the avoidant attachment style begins.

A reminder,

As adults and especially as children,

We have core needs.

These needs are basically the need to feel emotionally safe.

This is reliable and consistent attunement from the parent.

The need to feel seen.

The felt experience of being understood by parents,

Including the child's full range of authenticity and feelings being tolerated and accepted.

Three,

The need to be soothed.

The need to feel soothed.

This can be a gentle touch by the parent when the child is upset,

Settling the kid's nervous system.

And four,

The need to feel appreciated.

The parents celebrate in the child's small wins and are there in an understanding way when it wasn't a win.

As a little boy or girl,

If you're avoidantly attached,

You learn to ignore your own needs and feelings.

Of course you did,

Since you were all too often sent the message that your needs and feelings aren't important.

You began to believe that.

That message became a core belief.

My needs and feelings aren't important.

And in fact,

It's not even safe to have them,

Much less express them.

Therefore,

I must suppress these feelings and needs.

Of course,

We don't think with this verbiage at that age,

But it's a felt experience that gets wired in.

That poor little you just became avoidantly attached,

And intimacy and connection just became something to be feared.

This is why now,

As an adult,

In moments of intimacy or conflict,

Your primary survival response is to shut down.

Emotions are to be avoided.

Those feelings in the body that signal to us how we feel?

Forget about it.

The avoidant has successfully disconnected from the body and from feelings as a coping skill and a way to survive.

Because of your parents' own trauma or stress,

They often dismissed or invalidated your feelings or needs.

If this happened consistently enough,

The message you internalized is that having needs and feelings is certainly not safe.

Pilling away the onion layer even further,

You may have an overdeveloped sense of independence,

Autonomy,

And even confidence.

After all,

You've made it this far surviving on your own,

And look at what you've accomplished and achieved.

You may feel the urge to pull away during conflict and feel suffocated with intimacy and closeness.

You might think emotions are unhelpful and judge people for having needs.

You may mistake self-reliance and independence as superior to connection,

And you might experience space and distance as more comfortable.

You prefer,

Quote-unquote,

Logic over emotions.

There may be nothing wrong with you as you see it,

Except for your sitting here on the couples therapy sofa with your partner.

Because your parents were emotionally unavailable,

And because a child longs for connection,

The absence of that connection can be traumatic.

The child learns to dismiss their own feelings and needs and disconnect from them in order to accommodate the parent and whatever the parent is needing.

Of course,

This adaption is a survival response.

It makes complete sense.

The child only has one set of parents,

So it's basically interpreted as a life-or-death situation.

The child must learn to do whatever it takes to earn the parent's love,

Approval,

And attention.

This means the avoidant may have been parentified.

What is that?

It's when,

As a young person,

They became the caretaker for their parents' needs and learned to set their own needs aside,

Because this resulted in a safer,

More calm household.

If you're avoidantly attached,

You learn that the way to survive is to be invisible.

Don't have feelings,

Don't have needs,

Take care of yourself.

This is what felt safe in childhood,

And this belief has now carried over into adulthood and into your adult relationships.

The problem is humans do have feelings and we do have needs,

However disconnected from them you may be.

And it is in our most intimate relationships that the consequences of disconnection and avoidance arise.

An important reminder here,

It makes sense.

And this is a big first step toward healing,

Is validating that inner child,

That part of you now,

Who has learned to survive in this way.

So shutting down can look like,

1.

Avoiding emotions,

2.

Disconnecting from the body,

3.

Immersing yourself into a hobby,

Career,

Or sport to avoid intimacy,

4.

A strong ego or defense to protect your identity and cover up any vulnerability,

5.

Interpret your partner's attempts to connect or understand you as needy or clingy,

6.

Tell your partner to grow up and handle this on your own,

7.

Stonewalling during conflict.

This could be freezing up,

Gazing off into the distance,

Feeling numb.

8.

Validation comes from independence,

External achievements.

Some more reminders.

Avoiding intimacy or emotions is a subconscious attempt to protect yourself.

Vulnerability,

Intimacy,

And felt experiences in the body don't feel safe.

Growing up,

You learned nobody cares about you and your needs aren't important.

Growing up,

You learned it's not okay to ask for help and you are alone in this world.

You may have learned that closeness with another equals abandonment of yourself.

Growing up,

You learned that trusting another is difficult.

You may feel closer to someone when you're apart,

And you may have difficulty in asking for help coupled with a drive toward independence.

Some steps on how to heal.

1.

Reconnect with your body with mindfulness,

Meditation,

And being curious about your felt experience in the body in any given moment.

2.

Understand why you withdraw,

Freeze,

Or shut down.

What triggers it?

Validate it.

It makes sense.

Be aware of shaming your partner for having too many feelings.

3.

Practice connecting to a feeling.

Give it a name.

Give it space to be here.

Even scarier,

Express it.

4.

Give yourself permission to have needs and feelings.

Set the daily intention to connect with a need or a feeling.

5.

Practice telling your inner child that your needs are valid,

And you are safe in moments of intimacy and activation.

Growing up,

You learned to shut down during these moments.

6.

Be compassionate with yourself as you acknowledge your painful childhood.

7.

Grieve.

That means willingly feel the pain of what happened or what didn't happen.

Voluntarily turn toward those feelings of pain.

Give them space,

And let them do what they need to do.

And in closing,

Here are some things you can say to your partner.

What you say is important to me,

But I can't hear you when I feel criticized or judged.

Your feelings matter to me.

I can see I've been trying to comfort you the same way I comfort myself,

By trying to make the painful feelings go away.

Let's make space for it all.

Can I have some space to process this?

I'll get back to you soon.

Let's slow down and breathe together and try to come back into regulation.

You show your emotions in a big way.

I hold mine in.

Let's move toward each other.

I hope this was helpful.

You can help me by leaving a review and a comment below.

Thank you.

Reviews

Attachment theory is such an awakening to me, having been married to a guy from a very dysfunctional family. I needed this awareness and these tools 30 years ago!! Alas, they are available to me now! Thanks for this lesson!

Incredibly insightful commentary and tips for the avoidant attachment folks out here! Thanks a mil, Rob!

Really helpful- a hard message no doubt to hear given in a way that makes it possible to hear and see a path towards healing.

This was in short completly hitting the nail on its head. I was the nail. I am in a fitty with a friend and noe I understand why. I do not understand her emotional reaction to so many things. I strp away, become practical. Am very independent, even named my dog that name, became indy in short, but wow. Thank you’n it really well explains what I finally started to see, why I cant have/keep a relation and what feels so lonely now. I am so scared to let some one in. I dont trust it. I cant deal with it. It overwhelms me.
And … it sucks
But well… work in progress I guess.
Thank you! 🙏🏼

Nice, but what if the avoidant is not able to open up to this insight… Pain is driving them away from safety. It is really sad, but it is their path to walk by themselves.. Love is all around. ♥️

This was really insightful & gave me some clarity into my struggles with closeness. Thank you. 💜💫🦋

Wow, that is really helpful to understand the avoidant attachment parts of myself and avoidant attachment partners.

Rob explains the bonding process clearly and succinctly. It's relevance to adult behavior is outlined using practical examples. I will revisit this talk and this topic in an attempt to deepen my understanding. Thank you, Rob!

This was one of the best explanations of avoidant attachment I’ve experienced. I realized that both my partner and I have this style but it manifests in different ways. I have a lot more compassion for his experience and behaviors as well as my own.

Very pleased to have recently discovered your excellent talks. Many thanks 🙂

This was a turning point in releasing the pain of not understanding certain actions. I finally feel some peace as I wish them healing instead of blaming my self. Thanks.

Bery helpful. Sounds like my husband except he doesn’t shame me.

Very helpful. My childhood had no guidance and I was the caregiver for my parents

Great approach and actionable insights. Thank you!

Very helpful,thank you

🙏🏻

I discovered recently that I may have some avoidant traits. Your calm explanation helps me believe that I can heal one step at a time.

I lost someone I love deeply because I wasn't far enuf along in my awareness of myself. She still stayed for 4 years. What you say here is spot on for me, and helpful in my healing journey- alone unfortunately.

Very comprehensive and informative summary. It is helpful to realize where these feelings come from. Thank you.

This was exactly what I needed to hear today. Things make so much sense now. Thank you so much, Rob. 🙏🏻💚