Integritus Prime

For a while I’ve been noticing the patterns of anxiety in a friend. It all started to come together as I journaled about the tendencies I was witnessing. In this post, I’d like to summarize my experience. But first, let’s look at the basics of anxiety.

Anxiety is a combination of feelings, usually tension, worry, fear – it can be normal unless it’s severe and becomes a disorder. It can cause high blood pressure or sweating, and lead to people saying, doing, or avoiding certain things. Anxiety often includes many rushing thoughts and worries. Anxiety is usually triggered by an event, a conversation, an environmental stressor, or a relationship.

There are 6 types of anxiety or conditions where anxiety is present:

• Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) – worrying thoughts on most days for over six months
• Social anxiety – severe embarrassment and anxiety in social and public situations
• Specific phobias – deep fears e.g. fear of flying or of spiders
• Panic disorder – severe recurring panic attacks
• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) – using certain habits or rituals to address anxiety, like cleaning
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) – stress and anxiety caused by a traumatic event like war or sexual assault

The person I’ve been reflecting on displays anxiety around relationships in particular because they have experienced many betrayals. They display three particular tendencies:

1. Being clingy: they demand lots of time and are afraid to lose their relationship. This actually pushes away the other person because it’s stifling. The anxious person should realize that clinging doesn’t heal their root insecurities and fears.
2. Needing proof: they find more and more ways for you to prove your love for them, and it’s never enough. This can be exhausting for the other person in the relationship. It’s important for the anxious person to consider existing evidence of the affection and support of their loved one.
3. Defaulting to suspicion: they are always asking questions and reading into the responses to look for holes in the story, because they are subconsciously expecting to be betrayed again. Often this can have the effect of pushing away their loved ones and sabotaging the relationship, because their loved ones realize there’s a lack of trust no matter how transparent they are.

The healthiest solution is for the anxious person to recognize these damaging tendencies and seek help through therapy or coaching to heal the inner causes, which usually have to do with extreme low self-worth due to parental or other abuse. Otherwise, they tend to hurt their loved ones. They may even re-enact their past betrayal over and over until the current relationship is destroyed.

Do you display any of these tendencies, or know someone who does? Chances are, they are suffering from unhealed trauma.