Emotional Unavailability (part 1), the Origins…
Every human is born with the ability to give and receive love. Then we test it on the 2 people who should love us: Our parents… And if we don’t perceive their love, we believe we don’t deserve to be loved. Our ability to give and receive love gets broken.
This is, at its most basic, ‘Attachment.’
The psychology behind our adult relationship choices is often rooted in our childhood experience of attachment.
Emotional unavailability/distance in adult relationships can often be traced back to a persons attachment dynamics learnt through experiences during their younger years. Attachment Theory provides a framework for understanding how our early relationships with parents/caregivers then shape our approach to relationships in adulthood. Some of the ways these attachment dynamics can contribute to emotional unavailability are:
Attachment Dynamics in Younger Years:
Insecure Attachment Styles: Early interactions with parents/caregivers can lead to the development of insecure attachment styles, such as anxious, avoidant, or disorganised attachment. For example, if parents are inconsistently available or emotionally distant, a child may develop an avoidant attachment style, learning to suppress their needs and emotions as a way to cope with the lack of reliable care and affection… A protection mechanism!
Emotional Neglect or Dismissal: Children who experience emotional neglect or whose emotional expressions are consistently dismissed, or even punished, may learn to hide their feelings and needs. This can lead to a belief that expressing vulnerability is unsafe or unwelcome, which then fosters a tendency towards emotional unavailability in adult relationships… A protection mechanism!
Trauma and Loss: Early experiences of trauma, such as the loss of a parent, divorce, abuse, or severe neglect, can lead to difficulties in forming secure emotional connections. The fear of experiencing pain, loss or abandonment again can make a child hesitant to open up emotionally and get close to others… A protection mechanism!
Modelling and Mirroring: Children often learn how to relate to others based on the behaviour modelled by their parents. If parents are emotionally unavailable or handle emotions in unhealthy ways, children may adopt similar patterns in their own relationships.
How This Leads to Emotional Unavailability in Adult Relationships:
Fear of Vulnerability: Individuals with insecure attachment styles may associate emotional expression with vulnerability and potential rejection. To protect themselves from perceived threats of abandonment or hurt, they keep emotional distance from their partners.
Difficulty Trusting Others: Early experiences of betrayal, inconsistency, or emotional neglect can lead to a deep-seated difficulty in trusting others. This lack of trust makes it challenging to form deep, emotionally available relationships.
Lack of Emotional Regulation Skills: Without adequate modeling of healthy emotional expression and coping mechanisms, individuals may struggle with regulating their own emotions. This can lead to avoidance of emotional situations altogether and/or being quick to anger as a defence mechanism from feeling disabled.
Self-Protection Mechanisms: Emotional unavailability can be a self-protection mechanism against getting hurt. By not investing emotionally in relationships, they minimise the risk of experiencing pain similar to what they might have endured in their younger years.
Repetition of Familiar Patterns: People tend to gravitate towards what feels familiar. If emotional unavailability was a norm in early life, they then might unconsciously seek out similar dynamics in adult relationships, perpetuating the cycle of emotional distance.
Addressing emotional unavailability often involves exploring these early attachment issues and working through the underlying beliefs, fears and behaviours that contribute to maintaining emotional distance.
A.L.Smith said: “So many people are living with the decision they made when they were 1 year old: that unconsciously said ‘I am hurt, I am scared, I am sad, I feel vulnerable, people will abandon me or people will betray me, there is something wrong with me and I can’t ever open again because I’m never going to be this scared, hurt, vulnerable for the rest of my life’. They don’t even remember this decision, but that foundational belief has been set in their brain as an absolute fact of the universe. ‘Gravity pulls things down, water is wet, love is impossible and I must live in fear for the rest of my life to stay safe.’”
This foundational belief is not true and there is an alternative model for living that results in close, trusting and mutually nurturing relationships. Therapy, particularly approaches focusing on attachment and emotional regulation, is beneficial in helping individuals understand their patterns and in learning healthier ways of connecting both with ourselves and with others.
As always, please remember that these are just a few words about a subject that could easily be a book. Would you like some help in understanding your relationship patterns and to put in place strategies and tools to help cultivate fulfilling relationships, to find and feel ease together?
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