Living With an Anxious Attachment Style

Living with an Anxious Attachment Style for me, is one of the worst feelings. I’ve always experienced the emotions associated with it, for as long as I can remember, never really knowing why.

Towards the end of 2025, I became more self-aware in regard to my behaviour associated with this type of anxiety, and made a vow to myself that I would attempt to fix it.

With the help of some mindfulness activities such as the 54321 exercise, journaling, and the use of heat therapy, I’ve been able to calm my Central Nervous System in times of panic, and bring myself to a more grounded state.

This however, hasn’t been without its own f*ck-ups along the way. Spiralling out of control in front of my partner, and then feeling psychotic for my uncontrolled actions in that specific scenario.

My Mental Shift

Aside from learning from my past mistakes, I’ve also had a mental shift in how I view different situations.

I discovered that my perceived reality isn’t necessarily the same as the objective reality, and that I have to view life from a neutral perspective. Not the one where my mind comes up with the worst possible outcome out of fear.

I’ve also learned that spending time apart from my partner is healthy. That we should both be able to live our independent lives, and be better together but able to function apart.

In the past, I may have viewed this as a form of personal rejection. That he didn’t want to spend time with me. But the truth is, we were spending almost every day together, constantly, and I was pushing him further away by not giving him the space he needed to do his own things.

Building My Own Life Outside the Relationship

In hindsight, knowing what I know now, I think that part of the problem was that I didn’t have much of my own life outside of the relationship. Though, I never really had much of one before we dated either.

Upon reflecting on my past, I realized that due to the toll my mental health had on me since 2018, most of my hobbies had been impacted with the diagnosis of Bipolar Disorder Type II, and the deep depression that came along with it.

Over the years, I found it difficult to maintain my interest in activities I used to enjoy, such as singing, photography, video games, reading, and more.

The only “fun” I really seemed to have, was when spending time with other people and receiving external stimuli from them.

It’s sad to say that it has taken me almost a decade to recognize this issue, and to try to come up with a plan to fix it.

I started with trying to build a daily routine, of getting some gentle movement in during the mornings, to clear my mind and get some steps in before the start of the day.

While trying to maintain this over the long-term, I also, however, learned to value consistency over perfection. To not mentally penalize myself for missing a day or two if for whatever reason I wasn’t able to commit to it at the time.

Around the same period that I was building this habit, I also joined a writer’s group in my city, using the Meetup application. Allowing me to get out of the house over the weekend, and sit with other writers of different types - authors, lyricists, poets, and more.

I always found that making new friends as an adult was one of the hardest things to do. Thus, I am glad that I discovered this option as a way to talk with others and build new connections.

Concluding Remarks

Lastly, I want to mention a quote that I recently read on Pinterest. It goes, “If you can overthink the worst, why can’t you overthink the best?”

It truly stuck with me - as 2026 is the year that I want to dedicate to building the life I want. Meaning, I want to manifest positive outcomes and situations, through embracing the feeling of Light & Love, as opposed to letting fear and anxiety control my life.

With that being said, I hope that this article brings you some inspiration, if you yourself are someone who struggles with having an Anxious Attachment Style. Perhaps it will reshape your thoughts, the way it did with mine.

Please consider liking this article, supporting me on ko-fi, and/or sharing it with a friend who may find it beneficial.

Sincerely,

KlaraK.