It’s always nice to have friends reassure you when you’re feeling down, but if you constantly need reassurance from your friends, you may think this is a problem. Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for feelings of insecurity to crop up in any type of relationship.
The truth is that many people deal with this regularly.
If you are dealing with this, you may find that it can be quite taxing on relationships. But why do you do it? Most of the time, insecurities that crop up that require reassurance constantly from others all have to do with self-esteem or relationship issues from the past.
As we said, this constant need for reassurance can cause quite a stress in any relationship and impact how you feel about yourself as well as others.
So really understanding it and finding ways to move away from this toxic trait will help you build stronger relationships and help you find confidence in yourself.
Is This Common?
Almost all of us, at some point or the other, need those closest to us to reassure us that we are valued and loved.
No matter if this is because we’ve had an event in our life that has caused us to doubt ourselves or because we’re still dealing with past trauma, it is quite common.
The need for this reassurance is elevated even higher when you’re someone who deals with mental health issues like OCD or severe anxiety.
When that need for reassurance meets these mental health issues, you often find that it becomes a consistent and nagging need. At this point, it is then something that needs to be addressed before it ruins your friendships.
Why Does it Happen?
Funnily enough, though it may be counterintuitive most of us need the most reassurance from those that are closest to us. When we’re looking at this constant need for reassurance, it is most often tied to our attachment styles. There are four different attachment styles:
- Secure
- Avoidant
- Anxious
- Anxious-avoidant
These attachment styles are garnered from the way we are raised. Some things happen in our youth that could potentially cause us to have more anxious attachment styles. Anxious attachment styles are formed when one has an inconsistent and unstable home life.
People with this type of attachment style often get very focused on relationships and are constant overthinkers, leading to self-esteem and self-doubt issues. This causes them to constantly seek reassurance from their loved ones.
But the attachment style isn’t the only issue that could be helping to create these feelings. Traumatic events or relationships from the past may also bring up these feelings.
If you have had bad experiences in the past with friends and lovers, then you may project those feelings onto your current relationships, which ignites that need for reassurance.
How Do You Stop it from Happening?
This could have a huge impact on your relationship if you consistently are begging for reassurance from your friends. It could tax relationships and cause a lot of friction, so you may wonder how to stop doing this.
It is not an easy feat to overcome built-in habits and feelings that have been ingrained in you since you were a child. But if you take the time to really dive into what made you feel this way and the triggers that cause these feelings to crop up, you just might be able to stop.
So here are a few suggestions we have when it comes to the need for constant reassurance from your friends:
- Try stopping and really thinking about how you’re feeling and why you’re feeling that way without giving in to the feeling.
That means taking the time to dissect these feelings and really allowing yourself to acknowledge them. If this is challenging for you, another way to combat this is to seek professional help.
- Breathing is a prime principle of many relaxation techniques. One of the reasons you may find yourself looking for reassurance is because of anxiety.
So taking a few seconds and a couple of deep breaths to help rebalance your parasympathetic nervous system could be just the thing you need to cull this need.
- Reassurance-seeking also comes with very anxious thoughts.
These are formed on negative self-image ideas, so taking the time to stop and challenge them might allow you to work through the problems without needing reassurance from your friends.
- If you still need reassurance, instead of reaching out to your friends all the time (sometimes it is a necessity), try finding ways to reassure yourself. In other words, come up with mantras that give you a sense of comfort.
- Lastly, there is always self-soothing. Self-soothing is something that everyone should know how to do, and it is basically the process of finding ways to calm yourself using the five senses that work for you.
There’s no right answer to this but looking to find the thing that is a good trigger will allow you to need less assurance from other people.
How Long Does it Take to Stop Needing Reassurance?
Just like with everything else having to do with coping with mental health issues or habits that are formed, the length of time it takes is an individual thing, the period for some.
And it may take little to no time to come over needing reassurance because they started with a ton of self-esteem and self-worth.
For those that have and grew up with an unstable home life, it may take a lot longer to get to the point where you don’t need reassurance from anyone else. That being said, needing reassurance from people is a very human need, and it will never completely dissipate.
There will always be times when you need someone to reassure you that you are loved and safe.
But you can. If it’s something that is a consistent worry and is putting stress on your relationships, always work to reduce that need.
Being self-confident, knowing your own worth, and loving yourself could be a long road to removing the need for reassurance from external sources.
Mistakes You Need to Avoid
Even when you constantly need reassurance from your friends, there are some things you can identify that may be the first things to tackle.
In other words, these are mistakes that you make when constantly seeking reassurance from your friends that, one by one, you could work to weed out and therefore is your need for that reassurance.
Here are some things to look for:
- You want to not focus on trying to get compliments from your friends. Always seeking compliments to make yourself really good may put undue stress on your relationship.
- When you do feel good about yourself, the last thing you want to do is keep bragging.
That means if you’re feeling overly confident and have good self-esteem, going to the extreme of needing people to tell you that you are loved and wanted could be frustrating for your friends.
- Whatever happens, do not take to social media to try to get help from your friends. Social media is a tool we use, and there is a lot of focus put on feeling good from these posts.
But when you jump on social media and try to get people to say nice things about you, it often seems very manipulative, and that could really turn people off.
Final Thoughts on Why Do You Need Constant Reassurance From Your Friends
Needing reassurance is a very human feeling. At one point or another, all of us are going to need this from our friends and our loved ones. But when it becomes an incessant need, it is not only bad for our mental health, but it could also be hazardous to our friendships.
We often feel this way because of things that have happened in our past and the way we were raised.
But just because we have these anxious attachments doesn’t mean they are here to stay. So we hope that the information that we’ve given you in this quick article has helped you figure out ways to reassure yourself to feel valued.