Why Secure People Stay in Bad Relationships

In my previous article, I showed you what an unhealthy, toxic relationship with someone who is insecurely attached can look like.

There are two (main) insecurely attachment styles:

Anxious: those who cling too much.
Avoidant: those who fear closeness.

Both fear abandonment; they express that fear in different ways.

And, of course, there’s the securely attached person whose relationships aren’t governed by fear of abandonment. They’re just secure and bring a lot of stability and satisfaction to their relationships.

Some people pointed out that secure people would never tolerate or be in a relationship with an avoidant.

This statement implies that secure people only date secure people. And that secure people can never date someone who is not secure.

That’s right and wrong at the same time.

Generally speaking, healthy individuals don’t tolerate toxicity. They pick partners who aren’t batshit crazy to begin with. They remove themselves from dysfunctional situations sooner or later.

But it’s a spectrum. Nobody is %100 secure, anxious, or avoidant. So, even insecure partners have some decent qualities (and vice versa). More importantly, those attachment styles mold and change as we go through new experiences.

Secure people can get into relationships with people from other attachment styles. And sometimes, some of them stay for longer than what’s healthy.

I want to explain how and why that happens. And then, I would like to offer some insights about what to do.

Why?

This will help secure people not lose the precious gift they already have because that can definitely happen. But it will also help people who are not secure understand how they can benefit from a relationship with a securely attached person. It could be their ticket to healthier relationships.

Let’s get into it. We’ll cover 4 points.

#1 Secure people can make insecure people (anxious and avoidants) more secure.

People with insecure attachment styles drive each other mad. They trigger each other. Their wounds and insecurities make intimacy and communication a difficult task.

Through their effective communication style and boldness, secure people teach their partners healthy ways of navigating their relationships.

For one, secure people eliminate game-playing and manipulation in relationships. They see no point in doing so. They communicate directly and honestly to get their needs met.

In other words, they don’t have the wounds and insecurities that make people play games. Why manipulate others if you can ask for what you need directly? Why fear intimacy if you expect your needs to be met?

The phrase, “Speak Truth,” is shown through pieces of dominos that are put together and each domino pieces contains a letter.

As a result, they teach their partner that they can get their needs met without engaging in these toxic behaviors. Again, they show their partner how to do these things; they don’t just lecture them.

More importantly, secure people genuinely care about the well-being of their partner. For them, it’s “us,” not “me vs. you.” I don’t know about you, but nothing can melt my heart more than someone who, during an argument, considers my well-being and genuinely tries to understand my point of view and feelings.

Secure people don’t take things personally, handle conflict well, and aren’t terrified of intimacy/closeness. They also think of themselves as valuable and worthy. So they don’t get triggered easily.

All these things can help their partner become more secure if they’re willing to.

That being said, it doesn’t always work like this. Secure people aren’t perfect. And sometimes, the opposite can happen . . .

#2 Insecure people can make secure people less secure.

Attachment styles are not set in stone. We develop them early in childhood. However, as we grow older, they can change as we go through new experiences.

This is good news for insecurely attached individuals. It means they can become more secure. But it’s scary news for secure people because they can lose their security (even temporarily).

In some relationships, the insecure partner can bring down the secure partner. They either make them more anxious or avoidant.

Nobody is %100 secure or %100 anxious. For instance, someone can be mostly securely attached and tilt towards being anxious.

This person is likely to exhibit some anxious attachment behaviors/traits if they’re with an avoidant partner who isn’t willing to work on themselves.

This person might act in this specific relationship in a dysfunctional way. They won’t be like this in other relationships and with different people.

Their partner is bringing them down, and they’re becoming less secure. The relationship is influenced by the dysfunctional behaviors of the insecure partner.

Of course, this is an oversimplified example, but you get the idea.

Many secure people leave at this point. After all, secure people have healthy boundaries, and they value themselves. However, some stay. Now we’re in a better position to understand why.

First of all, they can handle the relationship. Remember that they don’t take things personally and have excellent conflict-resolution skills? Yup.

But there’s a deeper reason . . .

#3 Secure people stay in toxic relationships for this reason.

Secure people consider themselves responsible for their partner’s well-being. This is a part of their nature and how they view relationships.

In addition to everything we mentioned, secure people have a combination of traits that can make them stay in fucked up situations longer than they should.

Here’s a quick list:

They are confident in their power to improve the relationship.
They are quick to forgive.
They believe they’re responsible for their partner’s well-being (without neglecting their responsibility towards themselves and without doing everything for their partner).
They handle conflict well. This increases intimacy levels, even if the real issues that caused the conflict aren’t solved.
If their partner is suffering in any way, they do not leave.
If they’re agreeable, which is likely the case if they stay too long, this makes everything on this list even more relevant.

In other words, they have great traits. But it backfires when they struggle with boundaries. Without boundaries, those traits can do more harm than good.

Away from attachment styles, secure people are humans. They have wounds and unmet needs, even if they are related to intimacy or abandonment.

So, if their relationship rubs against any of these wounds, they’re likely to stay. We tend to use adult relationships as a second chance to fix what went wrong in our childhood relationships.

Two people sitting on the floor, which is covered with white sheets, and hugging each other. They look like a “yin and yang.”

The good news is that secure people tend to recover relatively quickly. Some secure people can regain their security once they’re in a relationship with someone more stable. They can even move on fast if they genuinely lose hope in the redemption of their relationship.

But that’s not always the case. Sometimes, after painful experiences like these, some secure people make a devastating mistake.

They blame their security for the destruction of the relationship. They believe they should modify their views of relationships and people in general.

So, in their next relationship, they act tougher, listen and empathize less, and care less about their partner. This, sadly, marks the beginning of their transformation from secure to insecure.

It is dangerous, so let’s have a heart-to-heart conversation about it . . .

#4 How to protect your heart: It’s not always your fault.

I heard someone smarter than me say,

“The kind person who was hurt because he was naive has to undo his naivety, not his kindness.”

(I translated his statement into English to the best of my ability.)

Naivety is not a virtue. But neither is cruelty.

Some secure people start changing their beliefs, feelings, and thoughts about relationships after getting hurt. They start playing games, using manipulation, and feeling like their new partner is an enemy they should protect themselves from. They stop being kind and caring, thinking that that got them burnt.

That’s wrong; don’t do it.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t work on yourself after a toxic relationship. Just make sure you work on the right things.

You might need more boundaries. You might need to learn when to let go. You might even need to learn how to spot toxic people and deal with them.

But trust me, you do not need to question your security. You have a valuable gift. Do not lose it because some idiot out there could not appreciate it.

Some people will appreciate it, respect it, and honor it. You only have to find them. And when you do, I hope you still have it because nothing is worse than meeting the right person after losing your ability to relate to them. You will just mistreat them and be another idiot who cannot appreciate someone else’s security.

Don’t be that person.

…

I hope this was helpful

If you enjoyed reading this, Get free 12 practical tips on how to:

Deal with toxic people,
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Also, check my books on Amazon.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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From The Good Men Project on Medium

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