Women with Anxious Attachment Style Get Cheated On More? Men Say Living with You is Exhausting!

The writer Qian Zhongshu once said: those things you spend forever figuring out can get completely overturned by one moment of emotional meltdown.

You can't control your emotions, you can't live a good life — no matter how hard you try.

What is Anxious Attachment Style? Three Signs to Watch For

Anxious attachment is a common personality pattern, usually showing up as these traits:

1. No sense of security in the relationship

In marriage, people with anxious attachment style lack security deeply. On one hand, they don't believe in themselves. On the other, they don't trust their partner.

2. Strong possessiveness

In a marriage, anxious types show pretty intense possessiveness — like always wanting to know what their partner is doing, even what they're thinking.

3. Severe anxiety

In the relationship, lots of things their partner does trigger anxiety. If their partner shows less caring, it causes massive anxiety and discomfort.

Many wives have this attachment style, but it might not show up right away. In the beginning, during the passionate phase of dating, the security is enough. She doesn't show it that much. Even after marriage, when things are good between you, it stays hidden.

But relationships fade over time. That's when these traits start showing up more clearly.

Lots of people don't even realize it themselves. You're torturing yourself while torturing your partner.

Take this woman who reached out for help — her husband cheated on her and wants to end the marriage. She doesn't want to leave him, so she came looking for solutions.

In her own words, she feels her husband still loves her deeply, even after the cheating. She listed lots of things she saw as proof of his love.

Before he cheated, he basically let her check up on him whenever she wanted.

She said she's someone with no security. Maybe her husband wouldn't reply to a message for a long time. She knew he was at work, probably just busy, but she'd keep calling anyway, just to confirm what he was doing.

If he didn't pick up, she might have an emotional meltdown. So when he finally answered, she'd definitely cry and scream.

Her husband would just keep comforting her, even going into the hallway to talk with her for over twenty minutes, just to help her feel at ease.

Actually, you could tell her husband really does love her. But she's also really high-maintenance.

Where It All Started

Why does this woman have anxious attachment? A lot of it comes down to her family background.

Her parents divorced when she was four. She went to live with her dad since he had more money. Back then, her dad treated her well, and she lived with him and her grandparents.

A little over a year later, her dad remarried. Her stepmom didn't treat her badly — she just ignored her, didn't pay much attention to her. At first, the stepmom would pretend to care in front of her dad. But after she had a boy, she stopped pretending. For three years, this woman lived being ignored.

She couldn't take it anymore, so she told her biological mom she wanted to live with her. Her mom hadn't remarried yet and kept working hard, saying she'd come get her.

She did come get her eventually, but it didn't last long. After three or four years, her mom remarried too.

Her stepdad treated her okay, but because of what happened before, she thought if her mom had another kid, she'd definitely get ignored again. So she started making a fuss about them not having kids. But her stepdad didn't have children and really wanted one.

She started rejecting her stepdad. She wouldn't listen to anyone's explanation. She was convinced that if they had a kid, she was finished.

She acted out so badly she even pushed her pregnant mom. So they sent her to live with her grandmother. When the baby was born and her mom wanted her back, she got so worked up that her mom didn't dare bring her home.

She became convinced that other kids being born was why she lost love.

She felt all of this was healed when she met her husband.

Her husband treated her well and knew what she'd been through, so he always made sure to give her security. Dating was fine. Marriage through having a kid was mostly fine too.

But when the kid started kindergarten and she had more free time, problems started showing up.

Before, her energy went into the kid. She didn't seek out her husband that much. When he came home at night and made an effort, they'd be sweet together.

With the kid out of the house, her energy shifted back to her husband. She started demanding security from him constantly.

So she started controlling everything about him — like mentioned before, if he didn't reply to messages during work, she'd blow up his phone.

Or if he went out with friends for a few hours on the weekend, she'd show up and chase him down.

She'd have emotional meltdowns whenever her husband didn't give her what she needed. Fighting, crying, screaming — that's what filled their marriage.

So eventually, her husband chose to cheat. When she found out, he told her: let's divorce.

She said she didn't understand. Her husband loved her so much — how could he cheat? Why did he want to divorce?

The Hard Truth

Don't overestimate love. Sometimes love gets slowly used up until there's nothing left.

If you don't want a divorce and want to keep going with this man, you need to adjust yourself.

The most important thing: find security within yourself. You need to be able to give yourself security.

Build your own sense of safety instead of demanding it from others, then throwing a tantrum when you don't get it.

When you can meet your own needs, others won't feel exhausted living with you. Only then can your marriage continue.

Your marriage has some serious problems. Or you have some painful flaws yourself.

Don't hide from the truth. You need to see the problem and solve it — so you can heal yourself and heal your marriage.