Looking back now, I can see that for many years, I wasn’t really living as an emotionally grounded adult.

I looked like an adult. I worked, parented, functioned, and carried responsibilities. But emotionally? A large part of me was still stuck in child mode — reactive, approval-seeking, emotionally dependent, and desperate to feel safe, loved, included, and chosen.

And because of that, I unknowingly attracted people operating from the same emotional level.

Not just romantically, but in friendships too.

For a long time, I thought emotional immaturity only showed up in romantic relationships. I could recognise unhealthy attachment, drama, insecurity, or emotional chaos in dating dynamics. But healing forced me to look at my friendships honestly as well.

And that was uncomfortable.

Because when I look back now, I can see that many of us were emotionally immature in different ways. We were adults externally, but emotionally still operating from unresolved teenage wounds.

A lot of our friendships revolved around drinking, drama, validation, emotional dependency, gossip, games, and social politics. At the time, it felt normal. It felt fun. It even felt like connection.

But underneath much of it was insecurity, fear of rejection, jealousy, control, abandonment wounds, and emotional immaturity.

We were grown adults with families, responsibilities, and children of our own, but many of us were still relating to each other like wounded teenagers.

I can see that clearly now.

One friend became controlling about who I spent time with and would sulk if she didn’t get her own way.

Another seemed jealous whenever I saw other friends, as though friendship was something possessive rather than supportive.

Another kept all her friendship groups separate from one another. People weren’t mixed together or included. At the time, I didn’t fully understand it, but now I can see how much fear, insecurity, and control sat underneath that behaviour.

Back then, I personalised a lot of it. I thought their reactions meant I had done something wrong. I spent years overthinking, people-pleasing, trying to keep everyone happy, trying to avoid upsetting people.

But healing taught me something important.

Those behaviours came from THEIR wounds.

And equally importantly — I was emotionally immature too.

Because emotionally healthy people usually don’t stay comfortable for long in dynamics built around jealousy, control, dependency, emotional games, exclusion, or constant drama.

That was one of the hardest truths for me to face.

It would have been easier to say, “I just attracted toxic people.”

But the deeper truth is that emotional immaturity often recognises itself.

We unconsciously gravitate towards people operating at a similar emotional level because it feels familiar.

If we are still seeking validation externally, uncomfortable with boundaries, emotionally reactive, fearful of abandonment, or dependent on intensity for connection, we often feel drawn toward people carrying similar wounds.

Not because we are bad people.

But because emotionally, it feels like home.

The psychology behind this makes a lot of sense when you begin to understand trauma, attachment, and emotional development.

When emotional needs are not safely met in childhood, parts of us can become emotionally frozen at the age those wounds occurred. We grow physically, but emotionally we may still carry the fears, coping mechanisms, and unmet needs of a younger version of ourselves.

That can show up in adult friendships as:

• fear of exclusion
• needing constant reassurance
• jealousy
• emotional dependency
• controlling behaviour
• people-pleasing
• conflict avoidance
• emotional reactivity
• testing loyalty
• difficulty with boundaries
• needing to feel “chosen”

Underneath all of those behaviours is usually fear.

Fear of rejection.
Fear of abandonment.
Fear of not being enough.

And when a whole friendship group is operating from those wounds unconsciously, drama becomes normalised.

The emotional highs and lows can even start to feel exciting. Chaos can feel like closeness. Intensity can feel like connection.

But it isn’t true intimacy.

It’s often just wounded people trying to feel safe with each other in unhealthy ways.

One of the strangest parts of healing was realising that I no longer enjoyed the same kinds of friendships.

The chaos stopped feeling exciting.
The drama stopped feeling connecting.
The emotional games started to feel exhausting instead of meaningful.

And gradually, I began attracting — and being attracted to — emotionally grounded people.

Friendships where conversations could be honest, calm, emotionally mature, and safe.

Friendships where people could communicate directly instead of sulking, controlling, competing, excluding, or testing one another.

Friendships where somebody else having other connections didn’t feel threatening.

Friendships where people could celebrate each other instead of quietly competing.

The fun didn’t disappear.

It just became deeper.

More peaceful.
More authentic.
More emotionally safe.

Less performing.
Less surviving.
More simply being.

And I think that’s one of the biggest signs of healing.

Not just that you stop attracting emotionally immature dynamics — but that you stop being attracted to them.

You stop confusing chaos with connection.

You stop mistaking intensity for intimacy.

You stop feeling at home in emotional instability.

Healing changes your nervous system. It changes what feels familiar. It changes what feels safe. And eventually, it changes the kinds of people you naturally connect with too.

I don’t write any of this from a place of shame.

The unhealed version of me was doing the best she could with the emotional tools she had at the time.

But healing required honesty.

I had to stop seeing myself only as someone who attracted unhealthy dynamics and begin recognising that I was emotionally wounded too — through fear, people-pleasing, dependency, reactivity, and unhealed attachment wounds.

And honestly? That realisation was freeing.

Because once we become aware of our patterns, we no longer have to keep repeating them.

The beautiful thing about emotional healing is that eventually you grow out of what once felt normal.

And that changes everything.

Andrea, x