Anxiety is relational

“The greatest conflicts in life are threats to, or disruptions of, basic attachment ties (separation anxieties or abandonment fears). In this regard, anxiety is a signal that emotional ties to caregivers are being threatened." -Edward Teyber & Faith Holmes Teyber

Deep breathing, exercise, meditation, mindfulness practices. We’ve all heard these prescriptions for reducing anxiety, and likely felt the guilt around not doing them “enough”. While these techniques can all be helpful for managing symptoms of anxiety in the short term, they miss a deeper truth about anxiety that is often the key to resolving it in the long term. 

Anxiety is relational. What does this mean? We feel anxiety when we fear that our connections to caregivers could be threatened. Growing up, we learn which emotions are “acceptable” in our family and which we have to bury to avoid disrupting our attachments. For many people, tears were seen as weakness, and anger was punished. Consequently, these emotions were repressed to avoid negative reactions from caregivers. Or maybe you sensed that your emotions would “burden” your caregivers, that they were “too much” for them to handle. So you learned to deal with emotions on your own, and maybe even hide them from yourself.

But emotions don’t just go away. If we don’t acknowledge and feel them, they get stuck. Oftentimes, this takes the form of anxiety or depression symptoms, and sometimes physical health concerns. 

Fast forward to today. Let’s say a loved one passes away, and you notice those familiar sensations of anxiety surfacing: racing thoughts, irritability, restlessness, difficulty sleeping, maybe even a panic attack. Underneath those symptoms, you might actually feel sad or angry. But you find yourself unconsciously responding to those core feelings in a similar way to how your caregivers responded to them. You shame yourself for having them, push them down, and deal with them alone. Even though the people surrounding you today may be able to hold your feelings in a way your caregivers could not, you revert to processing emotions in the way you learned to do so as a child. And in this way, your anxiety persists because the emotions it is guarding are not being released.

The implications of anxiety being relational are far-reaching. It means that anxiety is not random. We feel it for a reason, and it’s trying to tell us something important. When we try to “deep-breathe” the anxiety away, it may calm us for the moment, but the buried core feelings are still there, building up and waiting to be felt.

This is where therapy can be invaluable. Together, we can slow down and notice patterns in how you respond to your emotions, and then practice truly acknowledging and feeling them. Over time, this will help you feel more at peace and connected to yourself.