Separation anxiety
Distress on being separated from someone close — developmentally expected in a child, a sign of insecure attachment in an adult.
How it shows up
In a child it peaks between eight months and three years and is a sign that attachment has developed. In an adult it shows as distress when a partner is away and a need for constant contact.
What we do with it in therapy
With parents we work on predictable goodbyes that don’t drag on. With adults, on what happens inside you when the other person isn’t there — and how to bear it.
See also
Core beliefs
Deep, rarely spoken rules about yourself, others and the world, which colour all experience.
The intrapsychic
A person's inner world: the feelings, images of self and others, internalised relationships and defences through which we experience what happens outside.
Midlife crisis
The period in which you ask whether the life you have built is really yours.
