AVOIDANT ATTACHMENT

People with an avoidant attachment style have two basic relationship rules.  The Other-Person Dimension Relationship Rule First, regarding their other dimension, those with the avoidant attachment style assume, Other people are not reliable, dependable, or trustworthy when it comes to my needs.  I You may be asking; how did this happen?  Why did this person come to believe this way?  The answer:  In close relationships, this individual was often turned away, rebuffed whenever he made bids for comfort and safety.  He was given the message that to be needy was to be weak.  As a result, he came to learn that reaching out would often be met with hurt, shame, and rejection.  Imagine living in a home with a depressed mom or dad. These parents just don’t have any emotional energy to give.

They can be irritable, dismissing, and rejecting because they are so absorbed with life’s troubles. So the child, like a turtle, slowly envelops his heart with a hard, impenetrable shell to protect himself from the feelings of abandonment and rejection.
The Self-Dimension Relationship Rule Second, regarding their self-dimension, those with Second, regarding their self-dimension, those with avoidant attachment styles also assume, I must rely on myself alone in order to meet my needs. Again, why? This assumption flows naturally from the belief that I can’t rely on others, so I must turn to myself. The child learns to bury his or her feelings of weakness and vulnerability and replaces them with an inflated sense of self-confidence, an “I-don’t-need-you, I’ll-do-it-myself” mentality. As one avoidant mother said, “I learned to suck it up, to just get over it and go on with my life. Just stop whining and move on.” She had long ago given up on others to be there for her and had become a female version of John Wayne. She had a good heart and a well-meaning soul, but she had hidden her sense of vulnerability and was impatient with the neediness of others, including her children.

With these relationship rules, it only makes sense that the person with the avoidant attachment style becomes hardened. If those near her can’t be trusted, why let anyone in? However, avoidant persons are typically not paranoid. After all, Arnold knows his wife, Sheila, isn’t out to hurt him. He knows Sheila doesn’t sit around all day looking for ways to make his life miserable. The opposite is true. She works tirelessly to make his life a lot better, and he knows this. She does all the cooking, cleaning, and washing; she takes care of the kids, does his errands, and when he needs someone to complain to, she’s there. No, she wouldn’t deliberately hurt him, but still, he can’t bring himself to trust her not to hurt him inadvertently. In his mind he can’t count on her to be there every time he needs her. She’s not perfect. She might make the wrong decision or say the wrong thing at the wrong time. In fact, she has. And Arnold took this “failure” as just another confirmation of his relationship rule: Others always let you down, just when you need them the most. Because avoidant persons don’t have anyone
who’s qualified to be let in, especially when they are emotionally bruised, they have no one to confide in. There’s no one to share the hurt with, no one who’ll understand why they’re hurt, and no one who knows them well enough to help them deal with it. So they’re forced to rely on themselves to provide comfort. What’s amazing to us is how much inner strength some of these armored adults and children have. We have worked with avoidant people who are very reliable, capable, and competent. They can make good leaders because of their avid self-reliance and their ability not to be weighed down with emotion. Below the tough veneer, however, they are also empty, especially when they get hurt or disappointed. They are particularly vulnerable to fragmentation when faced with a professional or public failure. Because they give so much emphasis to success, their world can quickly come crashing in when they stumble. And though they often deny painful emotions, they are prone to depression and even anxiety.

More frequently, they turn to an alternate substance—anything to replace the other person, (books, magazines, or the Internet) creates a false intimacy. Even positive addictions and rituals—like studies, sports, and religious activities—can create a false sense of closeness in which habits and things replace our need for relationship. Think about your relationship with God. First John 5:21 (NKJV) says, “Little children, keep yourselves from idols.” When we turn from God to something else for comfort, safety, or security, we have, in essence, turned to an idol for the fulfillment of our deepest needs. If we don’t believe God is faithful, it is no wonder that these substitutes have so much meaning and power in our lives. That’s why they are so hard to give up. These addictions medicate and temporarily numb the emptiness that only God can work to fill.
Clinton, Tim. Attachments: Why You Love, Feel, and Act the Way You Do (p. 58).