Relationships

---

You don’t need to be in a couple to work on your relationships.

Sometimes the patterns feel familiar - you over give, overthink, withdraw, cling, shut down, or choose emotionally unavailable partners. You might find yourself asking: Why does this keep happening? Even when you understand it logically, your nervous system seems to repeat the same dynamics.

Individual relationship therapy with Tiffany focuses on your attachment patterns, relational wounds, and emotional responses - so you can build healthier, more secure connections moving forward.

Tiffany's approach integrates Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), Schema Therapy, and Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) to explore both the surface behaviours and the deeper attachment needs driving them.

 Individual relationship therapy may be helpful if you:

• Feel anxious, preoccupied, or fearful in relationships
• Tend to withdraw or shut down when things feel intense
• Struggle with boundaries or people-pleasing
• Fear abandonment or rejection
• Feel uncomfortable with vulnerability
• Notice repeating relationship patterns
• Attract emotionally unavailable or inconsistent partners
• Carry unresolved attachment wounds from childhood
   

You don’t have to be in crisis to do this work. Often, people seek therapy because they want to understand themselves more deeply before entering - or re-entering - a relationship.

Attachment patterns form early in life. If your emotional needs were met consistently, you may have developed secure attachment. If connection felt unpredictable, critical, distant, or overwhelming, your nervous system adapted.

You might have learned:

• To amplify your needs to be heard (anxious attachment)
• To suppress your needs to stay safe (avoidant attachment)
• To feel both pulled toward and afraid of closeness (disorganised attachment)
   

These patterns are not personality flaws. They are protective strategies. But what once helped you survive may now be limiting intimacy and stability.

EFT helps you understand the emotional drivers beneath your reactions. Instead of focusing only on behaviour, we explore the attachment fears underneath - fear of abandonment, fear of inadequacy, fear of being too much or not enough. When you understand the deeper emotional cycle, you can begin responding rather than reacting.

Schema Therapy identifies long-standing relational blueprints formed in childhood — such as abandonment, mistrust, defectiveness, emotional deprivation, or subjugation. These schemas often show up strongly in adult relationships. Through schema work, you begin healing those earlier wounds rather than unconsciously replaying them.

ACT helps you relate differently to painful thoughts and emotional triggers. Instead of being driven by fear-based narratives (“They’re going to leave,” “I’m too much,” “I can’t rely on anyone”), you learn to step back from those thoughts and choose behaviours aligned with your values — like honesty, vulnerability, and boundaries.

DBT equips you with practical tools for emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness. If trauma, attachment wounds, or anxiety have left you reactive, DBT skills give you concrete strategies to manage strong emotions, communicate clearly, and respond intentionally rather than impulsively in your relationships.

Individual relationship therapy helps you:

• Develop secure attachment behaviours
• Regulate emotional triggers
• Strengthen boundaries
• Reduce jealousy, anxiety, or withdrawal
• Build self-worth independent of relationship status
• Choose partners more intentionally
• Communicate needs clearly and confidently
• Break repeating relational cycles
   

Over time, your nervous system begins to experience closeness as safer - not something to brace against.

The goal is not to become perfectly secure or never feel triggered again.

The goal is awareness, flexibility, and choice.

It’s recognising when your attachment system is activated - and responding with curiosity rather than panic.
It’s staying present during vulnerability instead of shutting down.
It’s choosing relationships that feel safe and reciprocal.
It’s knowing your worth regardless of whether someone else validates it.

You are not “bad at relationships.”
You learned ways to protect yourself.

Therapy helps you update those strategies - so connection can feel steady, safe, and sustainable.