Relationship anxiety – how to find emotional safety

Relationship anxiety is a source of great angst in many relationships and can be triggered by a number of factors. Understanding what those factors are and how our relationship history – from birth to the present day – can feed into those anxieties and conflicts is a crucial part of finding security and peace once again.

What does relationship anxiety look like?

It can be anything from a recurring sense of unease to the stomach-churning fear of losing everything. The biggest worry many anxious partners have is how to trust their feelings, how to communicate their fears and how to not drive their partner away.

I really want to emphasise here that there is hope. If your relationship patterns frequently fall into feelings of distrust and fear, there is a path out of that all-consuming stress. We all deserve to find a partner we can count on, one who helps us to feel secure, respected and someone to anchor us during the more trying times of our lives. When it is our intimate relationships that are causing us to feel adrift and alone, it can be a very scary time but with the right outlook and support, relationships can get back on track and be the fulfilling union we need.

A crucial step here is to examine your (and your partner’s) attachment styles. How we connect and attach begins very early in our young lives with our parents and caregivers. Physically or emotionally unavailable caregivers can leave us with a sense of not being enough, of feeling overlooked, disposable, needy or a nuisance. We can easily carry these messages with us through life and this can present in a number of ways.

For some people, the feelings of insecurity in a relationship cause them to withdraw, to not fully give of themselves in a partnership. They may be emotionally shut down, having learned to turn off their feelings and needs. For others, questioning, doubting and reassurance-seeking are constant companions. That sense of waiting for things to fall apart, to be left, abandoned.

Bring these dynamics into a relationship and there is potential for fear and conflict. One partner, who has an anxious attachment style, may lean in looking for reassurance only to be met with frustration, anger or a cold avoidance that only serves to ramp up the feelings of insecurity. Equally, both partners may be avoidant and withdrawn, getting in the way of closeness and intimacy or else two anxious partners may find themselves in a spiral of fear and conflict.

Simply knowing, understanding and sharing what you understand about yourself and your needs in the relationship is a huge first step. Learning how to communicate and express our needs, and crucially, making space for your partner to express theirs, are significant first steps.

In therapy, a model known as the ‘Four Horseman’ is used to describe how conflict and communication can become unproductive, reactive and even toxic. Dr John Gottman (Gottman Institute) identified the four as:

• ‘Criticism’ – this type of communication is usually accusatory and blaming, often starting with ‘You’ and using language such as ‘Always’ ‘Never’ etc. This is likely to lead to a defensive response from the partner on the receiving end.
• ‘Defensiveness’, as above is often a reaction to criticism and blame. This cycle of attack/defence can become incredibly stuck, unproductive and damaging. Eventually, the relationship is worn down, and the urge to defend becomes pointless and leads to contempt.
• ‘Contempt’ is a painful experience for all involved. This might show up as mocking, eye-rolling, disparaging comments and sarcasm. The partner hurt by these words and gestures can start to shut down in pain and despair.
• ‘Stonewalling’ is when the person tries to tune the other out by ignoring, changing the subject, leaving the room, pretending to be busy or avoiding their partner altogether.

So you can see that what begins as fear and insecurity can quickly snowball into patterns of conflict that only increase anxiety and push the couple further and further apart.

So what to do? The first crucial steps:

Examine your past relationships - with caregivers, friends and romantic partners. Get in touch with the feelings each of these relationships have left you with. What messages have you received about you and your worth?

How does your anxiety show up in the relationship? How do you communicate that? What kind of response do you get and is that way of communicating helping or hindering the situation?

Make time for a proper conversation, plan it, make space for it and go into it with a commitment to one another that you will ‘listen’ and ‘hear’ what each has to say. Write down the Four Horsemen as shown above and catch yourselves when you find the communication falling into those patterns.

Express your needs and ask your partner what they really need. Invite them to share their personal history of relationships and identify their attachment style.

Seek couples therapy. An experienced couples therapist is trained to notice the tension between you, the way you communicate with one another and any patterns that could potentially be getting in the way of working out your problems.

What you should discover is the emotional layers that are causing anxiety and what it is your need to grow in confidence, closeness and intimacy with your partner. Your partner can, perhaps for the first time, grow to understand where your anxiety comes from, what it is like for you to live with that, and develop an empathy that enables you both to share your deeper experiences.  

It is a space like no other where the therapist can witness in real-time the interplay between you both and bring that into the room to enable you to explore new ways of communicating, connecting and enjoying each other.