It seems like these coping skills may have first started when you were between the ages of 25 and 50
Our level of insight grows as we age. When we are newborns we have no insight. We think we are part of our caretaker. As we grow we gain more insight. Sometimes we get stuck at a certain age level of insight if there was a trauma. Before we get into our teens we have polarized thinking. It’s either black or white, all or nothing and no gray area. So we think to ourselves when a trauma happens, “I will never let that happen again”. In our teens we are very egocentric, we only think of things as they affect us. As we grow, we are faced with more facts and gray area to make wiser decisions, but we tend to keep our polarized or egocentric thinking in emotional matters. Especially with thoughts that are triggered by the initial trauma/s. At this age, according to Erik Erikson, we are moving through "intimacy vs. isolation" and "generativity vs. stagnation". The virtues to learn in these stages are "love" and "care". And if we do not learn these virtues they are expected to reappear as problems in the future.