Are you struggling to feel secure in your relationships?
Relationships may be the most rewarding, yet challenging, aspect of our day to day lives. With the potential to add so much richness and love to our existence, it's disappointing and painful when we feel unseen by our parents, when we keep cycling through the same arguments with a partner, or when we feel alone with the people we want to feel close to. Together, let's work to understand the relationship dynamics of your past, and how these dynamics are impacting your life today. We can work toward fostering healthy, secure, and fulfilling relationships in your life.
Attachment is everything
We are social bonding mammals
Humans are social beings meant to attach meaningfully to others. We are wired for connection, so much so that our wellbeing is directly related to our sense of connection with other people. Experiencing emotional isolation or lack of predictable connection is detrimental to our mental health.
Attachment changes how we develop
As babies and children, we rely on our adult caregivers to show us what safe, secure attachment is like. When this doesn't happen, nearly all aspects of life are implicated, including emotional regulation, social skills/development, self-esteem, coping mechanisms, and identity formation. Attachment is the basis of how our personality develops.
It impacts relationship patterns as an adult
Attachment patterns established in childhood continue to influence adult relationships. Secure attachment fosters trust, intimacy, and emotional resilience, leading to healthier and more satisfying relationships. Insecure attachment patterns, such as anxious or avoidant attachment, can manifest as difficulties with trust and intimacy, anxiety, preoccupation with relationships, or avoidance of feelings, resulting in relational challenges and conflict.
Let's be honest - Dating is HARD
Most of us desire to love and be loved, but getting to that place is a whirlwind of challenges; from navigating apps to overcoming heartbreak to self doubt and insecurities. Unfortunately, there's no way around how much dating can suck sometimes. The good news is, we often have more control over how things are going than we think.
The people we gravitate towards, the way we handle conflict, the behaviours we tolerate, the cycles we get stuck in: all of this is informed by our earlier attachment. When we date someone, we're not only dating the person in front of us, but also their fears and learned ways of coping (and vice versa).
Your therapist at Everworth will help you to illuminate these patterns, make sense of them in the context of your attachment, and chart a path toward more secure connection, with yourself and others.
Attachment Therapists at Everworth
Megan Gauthier, MSW RSW
Individual therapy for adults
Specialties: Trauma, Childhood Trauma, Relationship and Attachment Issues, Anxiety, Growing Up With Emotionally Immature Parents, Shame, Dissociation, LGBTQ+
Individual session fee: $160*
*Exempt from HST