When a relative was seriously ill and in intensive care for more than a month, Cianne Jones stepped in. \u201cI took it upon myself to be that person in the hospital every single day \u2013 chasing doctors, taking notes, making sure I understood why they were doing things.\u201d It was so stressful, she says, that at one point her hair started falling out, but she ploughed on.<\/p>\n
It was Jones\u2019s therapist who gently questioned whether she was going to ask for help. Jones laughs. \u201cThe hair falling out didn\u2019t suggest to me that I needed help, it was somebody else looking in and saying that.\u201d She has a large, close family who would have helped immediately \u2013 and did, once Jones asked \u2013 it\u2019s just that it didn\u2019t occur to her to ask. \u201cI had taken that role on: \u2018I\u2019m just going to get everything done.\u2019 I just took off, and that was it.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s an experience many of us with so-called hyper-independence will recognise. I\u2019ve behaved in similar ways, from more serious situations (I too have shouldered care responsibilities) to ridiculous ones, such as moving house alone, and the time I bought some weightlifting equipment then realised I wasn\u2019t strong enough to carry it home. For most of my life, I\u2019ve prided myself on my hyper-independent lone-wolf status \u2013 not relying on anyone but myself. But in recent years, I\u2019ve come to see it not as a sign of my superior capabilities, but fuelled by fear of burdening others with my requests \u2013 or worse, being rejected \u2013 or of losing control.<\/p>\n
Anything that shows that I\u2019m not capable, I don\u2019t think I\u2019d askCianne Jones<\/p>\n
It is well established that the quality of your relationships<\/a> is key to happiness, and also has a big impact on health. \u201cWe are wired for connection,\u201d says clinical psychologist Dr Stephen Blumenthal. \u201cIt\u2019s bad for you to exist alone.\u201d There may be those whose hyper-independence is more innate, and less of an issue, but for many people it can lead to isolation and loneliness. Blumenthal sees it in his clinic every day. Often, hyper-independent people are successful at work, \u201cbut then it\u2019s a disaster when it comes to interpersonal relationships\u201d.<\/p>\n For Jones, it has been more of a learned behaviour. She saw her single mother raise four high-achieving children while leading a charity. \u201cShe did everything herself, and it was very much me watching that that suggested this is what you do, you just get on with it. I was always inspired by my mum.\u201d It spurred Jones on to qualify as a solicitor, run a company, found a charity \u2013 Women in Leadership<\/a>, based in Uganda \u2013 and start a PhD. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given all that, as well as her propensity to shoulder everything herself, Jones has experienced burnout. \u201cI didn\u2019t realise how much I was taking on until I had a panic attack one morning and had to go to hospital.\u201d She smiles at herself. \u201cEven then, I thought I would take my laptop with me.\u201d<\/p>\n She resists asking for help in general. \u201cAnything that shows that I\u2019m not capable, I don\u2019t think I\u2019d ask.\u201d She is close to her family and has strong friendships, some going back decades, but she thinks her hyper-independence has affected romantic relationships. \u201cThere\u2019s this narrative with quite a few women in my age group, our 30s: we\u2019ve got everything, jobs, our own homes. Then, considering romantic relationships, you feel a little bit lonely, but do I really need anyone?\u201d<\/p>\n This was the same for Urvashi Lad, who had run businesses and was, she says, \u201csingle pretty much until I was 43\u201d \u2013 much of which she puts down to her hyper-independence. \u201cIt gives you a feeling of control.\u201d But, she says, it \u201ccan keep you alone because you don\u2019t feel safe to find that love\u201d.<\/p>\n It took more than a year doing journalling and other therapies, she says, \u201cto feel safe, to let that guard down and let somebody in\u201d. Then she met someone (they\u2019re getting married this year). She still catches herself trying to reject her fiance\u2019s help, even with small things such as checking the screenwash in her car. \u201cIt got my back up initially, until I went: \u2018No, it\u2019s OK, he wants to do something nice for me, and it\u2019s really nice that he wants to do this.\u2019\u201d She has tried to curb her hyper-independence in other areas of life. \u201cIt can really lead to burnout, brain fog and overload. We can\u2019t do everything ourselves, no matter what we tell ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n In western society, independence and individualism is encouraged over community and relying on one other. For men, especially, says Blumenthal, our culture celebrates the hero forging his own path, from the characters of 19th-century novels to the cowboy archetype to the \u201csigma male<\/a>\u201d internet trend of the past decade. Hustle culture and \u201cgirl boss\u201d goals similarly prize individualism in women.<\/p>\n There are other cultural forces at play. Jones, who is Black, sees a lot of hyper-independence among other Black women. It comes from the stereotype of being \u201cstrong\u201d, she thinks, and is \u201cvery much a narrative that\u2019s placed on us\u201d. Her PhD is on domestic abuse in the Black community in London, and the response by the Metropolitan police, and this stereotype feeds into it. \u201cSo will women actually go out and ask for help in the first place? And do police officers think that you need help?\u201d<\/p>\n She sees how successful Black women in the workplace are often placed in \u201csaviour\u201d roles \u2013 for instance, as an incoming CEO of a struggling company \u2013 which creates added pressure. \u201cOn top of that is care responsibilities,\u201d says Jones of her Caribbean cultural heritage. \u201cI know others in the Black community understand that. So you\u2019re \u2018strong\u2019, you\u2019re a carer, you\u2019re a saviour, you\u2019re a survivor. And you\u2019re working.\u201d It is, she says, \u201chaving a detrimental impact on many Black women\u2019s lives\u201d.<\/p>\n Lad thinks hyper-independence is about \u201cprotection \u2013 from being disappointed, being hurt by someone \u2013 or having had an experience that\u2019s led someone to believe that it\u2019s actually easier to do it all themselves. It\u2019s not that a hyper-independent person doesn\u2019t want help. In fact, they crave that help, but they want to feel safe enough to receive it.\u201d In the past, she says, whenever she has let her guard down, \u201csomeone would take advantage, or expect [something in return], and so I put my guard back up, and I put myself in a fortress and it can be a lonely place\u201d. If someone did her a favour, Lad would feel indebted \u2013 even letting someone buy her a coffee would feel uncomfortable. She thinks her hyper-independence partly has roots in her Indian heritage. \u201c[Women] have been conditioned to do it all ourselves \u2013 to cook, to clean, to get a good job, to have our own money, all of that kind of stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n Hyper-independence tends to start in childhood, says Kathleen Saxton, psychotherapist and author of My Parent the Peacock<\/a>. Perhaps parents or caregivers were inconsistent, unreliable or emotionally unavailable. \u201cMaybe they were working very hard and couldn\u2019t give you the attention, so you learned to cope well on your own. It could have been that you had somebody who might have had an addiction, or maybe just a very dismissive parent for various reasons. Maybe they were brought up in quite an unemotional environment themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n Or perhaps you are the eldest child and took on care for a parent or siblings early on. As an adult, it could develop from an experience of betrayal. Hyper-independence, she says, is \u201ca coping mechanism. It\u2019s a sense that: I can\u2019t rely on anybody, so I will rely on myself. We sometimes wonder if there is suppressed grief and anger in there.\u201d<\/p>\n Her hyper-independent clients are often proud of it, she says. \u201cThe positives are you\u2019ll be seen as the fixer or the organiser or the rescuer, and that also allows you to be in control quite a bit, but underneath that you may feel exhaustion. You may offer to do it all, but in the end, you may feel resentful.\u201d<\/p>\n The fact that her clients have recognised it, and are seeking Saxton\u2019s help, shows hyper-independence has its downsides. \u201cThe negatives I see are emotional isolation, so you don\u2019t share your vulnerability with other people. You share very selectively \u2013 you worry about burdening others. But it means that nobody ever really gets to know you, and people aren\u2019t ever able to help you, and you start to have a belief that your needs can\u2019t or won\u2019t be met by other people.\u201d This can also lead to cynicism and emotional numbness.<\/p>\n Hyper-independence has typified Phil Rowe\u2019s life, he says. \u201cCertainly, when I was younger, it was feeling not important enough to warrant anyone\u2019s effort. I think I just had zero confidence for that kind of thing. It was a case of, \u2018Who am I to ask?\u2019\u201d In his late teens, he was hospitalised with depression. \u201cA part of that was probably my inability to discuss what was going on. I think it was very much that I didn\u2019t want to burden people.\u201d<\/p>\n Though he was an academic child, Rowe left school at 14 to work in a factory, because he was keen to start earning his own money. Now in his mid-50s, he has been married for 35 years, so it didn\u2019t affect his chance of creating a strong partnership, but it has only been in the past 10 years or so that Rowe has become more comfortable asking for help from others.<\/p>\n I think, generally, people are a lot nicer and forthcoming than they are in my head at timesPhil Rowe<\/p>\n Five years ago, inspired by his love of drama at school, Rowe started a new career as a voiceover artist, which required him not only to ask people for help and advice but to work in a collaborative, creative way. Sometimes he still feels uneasy, he says, but \u201cnot only does the world not fall apart, it gets infinitely better. Looking inward is kind of negative, compared with reaching out into the world. Usually, people are quite happy to help. I think, generally, people are a lot nicer and forthcoming than they are in my head at times.\u201d<\/p>\n Independence verging on the extreme is, says Saxton, \u201ca great thing to have in the locker, but I would challenge someone: what would it be like to begin to state what your needs are and seeing whether or not they could be met?\u201d If your hyper-independence is something you\u2019d like to change, try to understand where it might have come from. A therapist could be helpful, but Saxton says you can do a lot of this yourself. A person may have \u201clots of reasons and excuses as to why and how they like being independent, but if they\u2019re able to drop down into whether or not there might be an inner wounded part that was let down, then you can work on being able to be with that part that felt nobody was there for them. Where did I learn I was better off to be on my own? Who might have failed me? Who didn\u2019t give me maybe some of the support that I needed? And then we can begin to move towards tolerating some level of vulnerability.\u201d<\/p>\n One way would be to start practising bits of \u201cmicro-dependence \u2013 asking for help with a small task that maybe isn\u2019t so important, sharing a worry with somebody, letting somebody in a little bit. Micro-dependency or micro-vulnerability is stepping out and seeing what it feels like, just to show a little bit of your underbelly.\u201d Healthy intimate relationships, points out Saxton, require reciprocity.<\/p>\n It was challenging herself to let someone buy her a coffee, remembers Lad, that allowed her to start to shift some of her hyper-independence three years ago. As well as leading to her relationship \u2013 which she thinks wouldn\u2019t have worked before \u2013 the change has also improved her friendships. She now works as a coach<\/a>, helping \u201chyper-independent women heal so they can feel safe, open up and receive that love and support that they crave\u201d.<\/p>\n Jones has experimented with reaching out more, for instance by trying a local running club. \u201cThis sort of accountability and having other people around to support you with your goals I know is important.\u201d Although she does lean on close friends, this is about being more vulnerable with people she doesn\u2019t know well, and accepting that \u201cthose people could be supportive\u201d. She is a little sceptical about how much of her hyper-independence she really wants to give up, but she is considering it. \u201cYou take on this role where you just do everything and get on with it.\u201d As she gets older, she says, \u201cthe more I start to realise that I\u2019m not sure I particularly like that role all the time\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When a relative was seriously ill and in intensive care for more than a month, Cianne Jones stepped…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":481115,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-481114","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=481114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/481115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=481114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=481114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=481114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}