Feeling Needy in Your Relationship

Feeling needy and insecure in a relationship is completely normal -- especially if you'd been through a painful breakup in the past. Don't fault yourself for being needy and don't allow your partner to criticize you for it.

On the other hand, don't aim your emotional suction cups at him or her. Instead, take complete responsibility for your emotional well-being. It is not your partner's responsibility to make you secure. It is your responsibility.

You must become self-reliant, which means to recognize that it is not anyone else's job but your own to reassure yourself.

When your partner sees you taking care of yourself emotionally -- and not making your struggles about him or her -- he or she will respond to you differently. It will change the dynamic of the relationship.

Get out of the push-pull dynamics by not pulling anymore. Admit your insecurity and neediness, feel proud of yourself for having vulnerable emotions, and take responsibility for reassuring yourself and making your own self secure.

Susan Anderson is a psychotherapist and the author of Journey From Heartbreak to Connection, Journey From Abandonment to Healing and Black Swan: Twelve Lessons of Abandonment Recovery. Through her books and www.abandonment.net, she reaches out to abandonment survivors and clients from all over the world.

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Describe your own situation and let Susan Anderson help you move forward from insecurity and heartbreak.