Dr. Ed Tronick, an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard University, has found in his research that even the best parents, the ones who form secure relationships with their kids, only get it right about 30 percent of the time.
The way we experienced relationships in our very early lives creates an “internal working model” for how we view relationships throughout our lives. In other words, our past relationships affect everything from who we choose as a partner to how we are likely to interact with them and what behavior we will illicit from them. Our early relationships provide a template for how relationships go; can I depend on others? Will they sooth me when I need it? Will they see me for who I really am?
Their parent may have been available and attuned some of the time, and then all of a sudden they’d be neglectful or rejecting. The parents may even become emotionally hungry at times, attempting to get their own needs met by their child. As a result, these people may grow up feeling desperate, insecure and clingy toward a romantic partner.
Allowing our past to consume us emotionally doesn’t work but neither does burying the past and pretending like it doesn’t affect us.
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