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Attachment Based Relationship Tips

Looking to strengthen your relationship? Our blog offers expert relationship tips rooted in attachment theory and Emotionally Focused Therapy. Learn how to identify your attachment style, communicate more effectively, and foster emotional safety with your partner. From overcoming conflict to building deeper trust, our practical advice and tools, created by couples therapist Julie Menanno, are designed to help you move toward a secure and fulfilling connection. Dive in and start transforming your relationships today!

Julie Menanno MA, LMFT, LCPC Julie Menanno MA, LMFT, LCPC

Met Attachment Needs = Secure Attachment

Secure attachment is built on a foundation of consistent emotional attunement and met needs. When both partners feel seen, valued, and safe, the relationship thrives.

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Julie Menanno MA, LMFT, LCPC Julie Menanno MA, LMFT, LCPC

How Disorganized Partners Can Feel Safe in Relationships

Disorganized attachment can create intense emotional highs and lows in relationships. For these partners to feel safe, they need emotional validation, understanding, clear boundaries, and a partner committed to self-care and honest communication.

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Julie Menanno MA, LMFT, LCPC Julie Menanno MA, LMFT, LCPC

Healthy Assertion vs. Reactive Anger

Reactive anger can trigger negative cycles in relationships. Learn how healthy assertion can shift communication, promote emotional safety, and create space for understanding and compromise.

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VIDEOS

VIDEOS

Featured
Episode #71: Are you expecting too much?
Episode #71: Are you expecting too much?

In this session, we explore what it really means to “expect too much” in a relationship. Julie talks about how sometimes, without realizing it, we lean too heavily on our partner to manage emotions we haven’t yet learned to hold ourselves. This can show up as constant venting, needing endless reassurance, or expecting our partner to join us in unhealthy ways of coping.... like over controlling, avoiding, or shutting down.

Episode #70: Are You Doing Too Much of the Emotional Work in Your Relationship? (or not enough?)
Episode #70: Are You Doing Too Much of the Emotional Work in Your Relationship? (or not enough?)

In this session, Julie explores the often unspoken question: Am I carrying too much of the emotional weight in my relationship? She breaks down what emotional work really means—offering support, creating space for connection, showing vulnerability—and helps you identify when it starts to feel one-sided or unsustainable.

Julie guides you through why these patterns develop, what they might be protecting, and how to begin shifting out of them. Whether you tend to over-function or struggle to engage emotionally, this conversation offers a clear, grounded path toward more balance, clarity, and connection.

Episode #69: Managing Disagreements In Your Relationship
Episode #69: Managing Disagreements In Your Relationship

In this meeting, Julie dives into the crucial role of emotional safety and communication during disagreements. She highlights how it's not the disagreement itself, but how couples handle it that truly matters. Learn how being open, curious, and validating each other's emotions can help maintain a safe space for constructive conversations.

Julie also explores how small arguments often mask deeper emotional needs, like wanting to feel heard or valued. She addresses how different attachment styles (anxious versus avoidant) can influence communication and encourages couples to better understand each other’s emotional needs.

Episode #68: What is Relationship Health?
Episode #68: What is Relationship Health?

Julie walks through a framework she uses with couples, illustrating how unresolved emotions, personal wounds, and attachment insecurities impact communication and relationship dynamics. She emphasizes the necessity of emotional awareness, healthy assertion, and processing difficult feelings rather than avoiding or acting out on them.

For those interested in learning how to navigate emotional wounds, assert boundaries, and cultivate healthier relationship dynamics, this session provides valuable insights and practical tools.

Episode #67: Secure Attachment? Co-Dependency?
Episode #67: Secure Attachment? Co-Dependency?