Before You Get Married, at Least Know Your Attachment Style

This time I want to talk about another reason "we just can't communicate": attachment styles.

I assume everyone has heard the term "attachment style" at least once or twice. If you dream of a happy relationship and marriage but have never even heard the phrase, I'd encourage you to take more of an interest in dating and pick up at least the basics.

There are already plenty of videos and books on attachment styles, and the concept even shows up in the relationship personality quizzes people take for fun. Yet very few people actually understand attachment styles properly and apply them to their own love lives. I'm convinced that simply understanding each other's attachment style would make relationships far less painful.

Let's just do a quick comparison of the two most representative styles: anxious and avoidant. It's not as simple as "anxious types feel anxious when dating and avoidant types keep avoiding things." These two differ in their very way of living and in their values.

Anxious types are people whose lives center on love and marriage, and because they're like that, they end up expecting everyone else to be the same. Avoidant types, on the other hand, keep life and love separate, and living their own life well is what matters most to them, so there is no way they can date and marry the way an anxious type does.

Anxious types sometimes even give up their careers for marriage and believe that if you love someone, that's something you'd do. Do you see now why that's close to impossible for an avoidant type?

In most cases things start to grind before marriage is even on the table, back in the dating stage. An anxious type wants to text and meet up whenever there's free time, while an avoidant type needs that free time to themselves.

So one of the things an anxious type most often says when dating an avoidant type is

"Do you even love me?"

Once again, this is a state of not being able to communicate. The avoidant type was probably already putting in a lot of effort for their partner. Why? Because they love them, of course.

How do you think the avoidant type feels when that line gets thrown at them? "I've been trying this hard because I love you..." and all they hear is that their feelings and their efforts go unrecognized, and that they're being spoken to harshly.

Dating is one thing, but if you're going to get married, in other words share your life with someone, you can't be in a state where you misunderstand and blame your partner for not loving you the exact same way you love them. That's just a road to misery for both of you.

As I said in the last column, having love for each other is never enough on its own to live happily ever after. Conflict is inevitable in any relationship, and when the two of you can't communicate, conflict usually ends in a blowup rather than a reconciliation.

Attachment style is ultimately one way of understanding how you and your partner live and how you love. Understanding this is what lets you avoid misreading each other's affection and work through conflict with conversation when it arises. Without trust in each other's affection, even small conflicts are hard to resolve.

To have a good marriage, you need to be able to at least resolve conflict with your partner, and for that, you need to trust each other and feel that you can communicate before any real conversation is possible. If you don't know each other's attachment style, this process is bound to be harder. Do you see now why you should look into your own attachment style, starting today, and pay attention to the other person's attachment style whenever you consider dating or marrying someone?

If you're curious about your own and your partner's attachment style, or if you know your attachment styles but still don't know how to carry the relationship forward in a mature way, I recommend submitting a diagnosis questionnaire.