5 Signs ‘Fawning' Is Short-Circuiting Your Career And Relationships

Forbes

09-07-2025

You probably know about fight-or-flight and freeze as the three class trauma responses, but there's ... More a fourth, lesser-known response known as "fawning" which harms relationships.
Most people know the classic trauma responses: fight, flight and freeze. But psychologists now recognize a fourth F— known as 'fawning'—and it may be the most common, socially rewarded and misunderstood of all four responses to stress. The majority of workers are unaware they are fawning or that it leads to self-erasure, short-changing them in careers, friendships and intimate relationships.
How 'Fawning' Short-Changes You In Relationships
Fawning explains why we stay in bad jobs, fall into unhealthy partnerships and tolerate dysfunctional environments--even when it seems obvious to others we should bail, according to clinical psychologist Dr. Ingrid Clayton. She describes the term, coined by psychotherapist Pete Walker, as the tendency to respond to a threat by 'becoming more appealing to the threat.'
Clayton, author of the forthcoming book, FAWNING: Why the Need to Please Makes Us Lose Ourselves—And How to Find Our Way Back, points out that many high-functioning, capable people can't seem to break the pattern of fawning. Fawners mirror or merge with a coworker, friend or intimate partner's desires and expectations.
Just as we're wired to fight, flee or freeze when threatened, fawning is the instinct to appease, please and self-abandon at any cost in order to stay safe—a survival response often mistaken for being agreeable, easygoing or helpful, Clayton notes. She adds that research shows chronic fawning is a trauma response from the past--a form of self-erasure, linked to anxiety, burnout, poor boundaries, toxic relationships and even physical health issues.
I spoke with Charlotte, NC psychotherapist, Karen DuBose, psychiatric nurse clinical specialist. She told me that fawning is a form of self-abandonment in which someone depends on the approval of others for psychological safety instead of finding safety within themselves. She states that fight, flee and freeze are observable behaviors, whereas fawning--which is also fear-based--is more subtle to the eye.
DuBose quotes Sir Winston Churchill, who said, "An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last. She explains that, in an attempt to appease a threat--such as fear of disapproval, rejection or abandonment--fawning can manifest through 'love bombing,' people pleasing, over-giving, codependency, over-working and even careaholism.
She also mentions that fawning can lead to what scientists call 'flocking'--the tendency to align your actions or decisions with a group in the face of adversity for safety and avoidance of ridicule if you disagree or speak your mind. Break-room chatter at work is an example when disgruntled coworkers collectively complain about management, but they might not feel safe to complain individually for fear of sticking out.
Clayton points out that fawning depends on connection as a means of protection, asking us to abandon ourselves and our needs, values and opinions, which strengthens vulnerability in the long-term. She explains that fawning is a relational trauma response when fighting, fleeing or freezing are not options for safety or might make things worse.
Often the result of long-term exposure to pervasive traumatic events, fawning can develop into a pervasive safe-guard against further harm, according to Clayton. She describes fawning as a useful survival tool for navigating life under distress, adding that it can leave us trapped in unhealthy relationships and situations.
5 Signs You Could Be 'Fawning' In Relationships
Dubose suggests that the helping, medical and mental health professions are bulging at the seams with fawners. Some clinicians over give, over care and overwork to the point they develop 'careaholism' and suffer compassion burnout. But you don't have to be a medical or mental health practitioner to show the symptoms. Clayton gives five signs that could indicate you're a fawner. If you . . .
1. Apologize to people who have hurt you
2. Befriend your bullies
3. Ignore others' bad behavior
4. Obsess about saying the right thing, even when there's no 'right' thing to say
5. Make yourself into someone you're not while seeking approval that may never come
The Rx For 'Fawning': 6 Tips For Radical Self-Care
The remedy for fawning is self-care, and it's more than a bubble bath. Sometimes fawners must practice radical self-care. The goal is to take the necessary steps to go to unpopular extremes if necessary—to take care of yourself and protect your mental and physical well-being at all costs.
1. Ditch concerns of disappointing or appeasing others and care as much about how you treat yourself or allow yourself to be treated.
2. Be realistic about what's humanly possible for you. Every time you say "yes" when you want to say "no," you do yourself an injustice.
3. Examine your motivation for helping. Do you believe sacrificing yourself for others will fulfill a greater need in you than in them? If the answer is yes, you could be taking more than you're giving.
4. Show the people you help how to fish instead of feeding them fish. If the help you give makes a colleague or friend dependent on you or you dependent on them, you could be holding them and you back.
5. Set emotional boundaries. Gauge your actions by your own standards, not by the approval of others. Work on becoming emotionally independent. Avoid over-identifying with the feelings of others. Chameleons lose touch with who they are.
6. Help yourself first. Get comfortable with disapproval and disagreements and learn to face instead of avoid conflict. Start to see your individualism and independent decision-making as healthy attributes.
7. Refrain from being 'overly nice.' If you get labeled as a 'yes employee,' it works against you, and you lose collegial respect.
8. Don't shrink around bullies or aggressive people. Stand up to anyone who bullies you, and call people out who are rude or behaving badly.
At the end of the day, after all is said and done, no matter how much you fawn, DuBose points out that fawning is unsustainable. Someone will disapprove or disagree, and its only a matter of time before the crocodile feasts upon you. But when you send fawning packing and reclaim your self-respect and stand firm in your values and opinions, you won't have to fear the crocodile anymore.