Is Insecurity Ruining Your Relationship?

Is Insecurity Ruining Your Relationship?
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Feeling insecure in your relationship can lead to needy behavior and unhappiness for both partners.

Feeling insecure in your relationship can lead to needy behavior and unhappiness for both partners.

Do you worry constantly about whether your partner really loves you? Whether they are cheating or betraying in you in some other way? Insecurities in a relationship can be destructive and a quick way to sabotage potential happiness. They can cause both men and women to make some of the biggest relationship mistakes out there.

When one partner feels constantly insecure in the solidity of the relationship both partners suffer. And unfortunately it can lead to vicious cycle of suspicions, complaints and reassurance that will sap the energy of both and lead to an unhealthy and unbalanced relationship.

For the person feeling insecure the worry that something somewhere is undermining your relationship can be debilitating. You may be fully aware that your worries are unfounded, but the inability to “shake” the feeling can cause the need to seek constant reassurance and initiate some very destructive behaviors. For instance, do any of these apply to you?

  • You need to constantly know exactly where your partner is.
  • You check up on them – looking through their phone, email or calling their work repeatedly.
  • You accuse your partner of things like not really loving you, cheating on you, or finding others more interesting than you.
  • You often feel desperate to talk to them, see them or “hold onto” them.

Any of these behaviors can be a sign of destructive insecurity.

These feelings can lead to an unhealthy situation within the relationship. Not only is the person who is feeling insecure not experiencing happiness, but the partner to that person is likely to be suffering as well.

Having to routinely reassure someone of your love and commitment can be exhausting. And it sets up a one-sided situation where one’s persons needs completely overshadow the others. That imbalance will eventually cause what could have otherwise been a happy relationship to fall apart.

What can you do?

Insecurity in a relationship is often not a function of the relationship itself. Many times the source of these feelings comes from something experienced in the past. These past experiences create a mental framework for how we view all current and future experiences.

Relying upon your partner to continually soothe you and make things okay will not fix things. And eventually your partner may run out of patience for doing so. Getting to the root of the actual problem is the only real way to resolve these feelings. Once you can distinguish between past experiences and their affect on you, and what you experience in current and future relationships, you can begin to restore your belief system and make important distinctions between the then and now.

Recognizing your own worth and building trust in yourself and others is an important step as well. There is a lot of truth to the idea that you cannot be happy with someone until you are happy with yourself. You may need to spend time addressing the issues you have with your self-identity. When you are feeling more secure with your own attributes you will be better able to control the tendency toward being needy and suspicious.

Remember that you and you partner may be good together, but you are separate and independent people. Exercising your independence and respecting theirs will make you stronger and fuel your own self-confidence.

If you find that you need additional support overcoming the insecurities you face, or the circumstances that created them, you may want to seek the help of a professional counselor. Problems that have a deep root in the past can be tough to work through on your own. Whatever the case, recognizing when your personal insecurities are causing problems in your relationship is important. Talking to your partner about them can help as well. You may be surprised at how supportive they are in helping you get past the things blocking your happiness.

You can read more advice from Dr. Kurt at Guy Stuff Counseling, Facebook, Google+, or Twitter.

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