Independence is viewed as a sign of strength, but when does it become a trauma response? What are hyper-independence signs, and how to avoid its negative outcomes?
Hyper-independence is just another concept of “needing nobody”, where you would feel a massive inability to rely on others. It could originate from traumatic experiences from your home, parents, work, or school. Individuals with hyper-independence believe that this coping mechanism is their best way to protect themselves from the feeling of shame that comes with asking for help. It could interfere with their work-life, family life, or love life and lead to extreme exhaustion from tackling everything themselves.
Read more about hyper-independence, and figure out ways to help yourself.
What is Hyper-independence?
In definition, hyper-independence is your inner urge to do everything on your own, thus avoiding the feeling of depending on other people. It could be caused by old experiences of being in a toxic relationship, an abusive household, or a hurtful specific situation. Acting like everything is under control comes from your fear of being portrayed as “weak”, leading to disturbing your daily life tasks. Usually, individuals with hyper-independence don’t notice how bad their state is until extreme symptoms face them.
These symptoms include:
- Overworking
- Burnouts
- Feeling ashamed of asking for help
- Hard time trusting others
- Impulsiveness
- A constant state of stress
- Refusal to delegate tasks
- Dislike to needy people
Hyper-independence could be noticed when you won’t share your extreme workload with your colleague, when you refuse to ask for emotional support from your friends, and when “I can do it myself” becomes your life motto.
In order to determine how to overcome your super-independence, you should first understand its reasons.
Why don’t you ask for help?
There are several reasons that build up to hyper-independence, and these include:
- Fear of being a burden: Assuming that your helper will view your needs as an unwanted extra load, so you end up thinking, “they have a lot on their plate already.”
- Fear of rejection: You may have had a traumatic experience where your needs were shut down, so you’re afraid of repeating the same experience.
- Fear of needing others: You may be afraid of owing a favor or feeling guilty about needing others. This may be caused by older experiences where you were shamed when being vulnerable.
- Fear of pity: You may associate asking for help with pity, as you don’t want others to take care of you or show you affection and support.
How to ask for help?
In order to be able to overcome hyper-independence, you should practice asking for help.
- Put yourself in others’ shoes.
What would you do if others asked you for help? You would definitely feel flattered and happy to offer your support. Well, others feel the same way about that. People naturally love helping, as it helps strengthen social ties and enhance their communication. Also, rest assured that if someone is bothered by helping you, they will show it.
- Check on your ego
Think of a time when you couldn’t do something all on your own, or you overloaded yourself with useless tasks to avoid asking for help. Replace the thoughts of “It could have been worse if I asked for help” with “Maybe if I asked for help, it would not have been this bad”.
- Acknowledge your toxic autonomy
If you suffer from hyper-independence, you might be so resistant to having others support you. A first healthy step would be to acknowledge that this pattern is not helpful but instead is taking away all your energy. Remind yourself that having someone aside is a sign of connection and opportunity to communicate better and overcome your struggles.
- Shift your thinking pattern
Your hyper-independence is mainly caused by your negative thinking pattern towards accepting help. Think of your problem as an external object that could be better solved if you teamed up with your friend. Then, replace the feeling of indebtedness “I owe them”, with gratitude “What they did was nice, I’m thankful”.
Asking for help is okay. Take your time to practice that, be patient, and go easy on yourself.