If you’re always trying to read people’s emotions or wonder if someone is upset with you, you might have an insecure attachment style.
HERE’S WHAT THAT MEANS 🧵:
If we are born into a born into a home where a parent: is unpredictable, withdrawing (gives silent treatment), has anger explosions, or has us “walking on eggshells,” we learn to constantly perceive that parent’s emotions.
We do this in order to stay safe.
By becoming hyper-fixated on our parents: emotions, tone of voice, body language, etc. our brain is attempting to make sense of the situation.
And our nervous system is on high alert because we didn’t experience secure attachment.
When we’ve had to do this for years as children, this becomes our habit or pattern as an adult.
We might: over analyze conversations, always think someone is mad at us, or fear that we are saying or doing something wrong.
For example: we’re out with friends and we tell a story and one of our friends sighs.
Afterwards, we think about what that sigh meant. Or how we offended them. We search for the meaning in everyone’s actions.
The issue is: our role as adults isn’t to find the meaning behind people’s actions.
This is simply a coping mechanism we’ve developed from a dysfunctional home.
As adults, we are responsive for openly communicating our issues or problems.
And, we are not responsible for the emotions of other adults.
To heal, it’s important to understand healthy emotional responsibility.
This looks like:
- if someone’s upset, they’ll need to directly communicate this to me
- if I’m upset, I need to directly communicate this to other people
- rather than assuming someone’s emotional state (like I did as a child) as an adult, I ask.
- if I ask and someone says nothing is wrong I honor this as truth, not as an invitation to keep guessing or digging.
- if I have upset someone, that’s ok. Adults are capable of being upset. It no longer means I’m unsafe or “bad” like it did as a child.
- if someone’s upset me, it’s ok for me to speak up for myself. This is how I establish boundaries.
When we have insecure attachment patterns our mind may often fixate on people’s emotions to cope.
It’s important to consistently remind ourselves we are safe, and to stop playing our childhood roles.
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1. Some of us always knew something “happened” to our mothers, but didn’t know what…
A tribute to the mothers who carried silent pain:
Growing up, some of us knew our mothers had been through something extremely painful or unthinkable. Maybe it was how overprotective she was. Or her comments for us to cover up. Maybe it was the way we knew she wasn’t at peace.
A part of us felt like she wasn’t fully capable of showing up. That we needed her to reflect love, approval, and reassurance. But she had walls up…
Emotionally immature people (EIP) struggle most with: listening.
They can interrupt, talk over, or completely shut down to conversation.
Here's Why:
Emotionally immature people do not have a fully formed sense of self. Their childhoods had repeated events of complex trauma, leaving them to become quickly dyregulated. They also never learned how to cope with their own emotions.
This creates a situation where they're:
- highly sensitive and perceive most things as criticism
- highly defensive
- deflective ("sorry you feel that way")
- unable to see a perspective outside of their own
- highly avoidant
If you were “mature for their age” you might have been parentified. Parentification is when a child is made to fill an adult role.
This is an “invisible” trauma that has life long impact.
HERE’S WHY: 🧵
Parentification is an extremely common family dynamic where children are expected to: manage their parents emotions or issues (most common is marital problems), take care of the home & siblings on a regular basis, or act as a peer to a parent.
Many parents aren’t aware they’re doing this for several reasons:
1. They were parentified themselves
2. They’re overwhelmed & lack support
3. They don’t know/understand the language & culture so they depend on their children
In relationships that end, one thing is always lacking:
Appreciation.
WHY APPRECIATION MATTERS:
Most people grew up in homes where their talents, traits, and unique quirks went unseen or unnoticed. This leaves people with an even deeper desire to be seen and appreciated by their partner.
In partnership, people have subconscious beliefs around what a partner should do. Ex: "provide."
But what every person is looking for is: someone genuinely who appreciates who they are.
They can: stand up for themselves, express their feelings, and are capable of being misunderstood.
Because their main goal is not to people please, they are skilled communicators who respectfully get to the point. People around them feel safe because they do not give mix messages.