Thais Gibson

And then after you date them for four or five, six months, when things get a little more real and serious, they jet or they pull away or they retreat.

And then they end up in situations where, you know, even if they make it through that period of time and keep dating somebody and keep investing, they really retreat emotionally and they shut down.

And so then you have these individuals as adults who are like, OK, you know, I feel like I'm trying to connect with you and my partner's not really available or present.

And they really cope by trying to always minimize their attachment needs and create space.

And so they become quite distant in relationships.

And then the very last one is the fearful avoidant attachment style.

Fearful avoidance are basically characterized by more big T trauma growing up, some more emotional chaos.

You know, it can be anything from like having a parent with narcissistic personality disorder to having a parent who was an alcoholic or parents in active addiction, a really intense divorce growing up.

You have more extreme kind of scenarios that children are exposed to.

But their wiring is such that while an anxious attachment style is like they always want more closeness and to win people over and dismissive avoidance always want more space and to keep distance, fearful avoidance learn that love is both a really good thing and a really hard thing.

So they grow up essentially going, well, love is a good thing because let's say, for example, that mom is an alcoholic.

Well, maybe one day mom comes home and she's had a few drinks, but she's in a good mood and she's loving and she embraces you.

And you're like, oh, love is safe.

Love is good.

I want more of this.

And then other days, maybe mom's an alcoholic.

And she's drinking more heavily and now she's angry, drunk and she's cruel and she's mean and she's unpredictable.

And a child is like, well, love is a really good thing, but it can also really hurt me.

It will be really harsh and critical and cruel sometimes to me.

And so they end up having very competing associations about the same thing.