Understanding Attachment

Understanding Attachment: What It Is & How Therapy Helps Us Heal

Attachment has recently become a buzzword floating around social media. You may have heard people refer to themselves as having an “anxious” or “avoidant” attachment style or even try to tell you your type. Whether it’s used casually or clinically, the jargon can be confusing. Let’s bring some clarity to the concept of attachment and how attachment-informed therapy can help you (or your child) build healthier relationships across the lifespan.

So, What Does Attachment Really Mean?

At its core, attachment is simply how we bond with other people (John Bowlby, 1969). Because humans are social creatures wired for connection, our experiences with caregivers in early-life relationships shape our sense of safety, trust, and comfort in future relationships. We have a biological need to feel safe with others. To be soothed, supported, and understood.

Most attachment patterns begin forming between six months and three years old during a time when children are learning:

·      Are people/my caregivers safe?

·      Can I trust others to meet my needs?

·      Is closeness comforting, or chaotic?

·      Am I loved? (Mary Ainsworth et al., 1978; Mary Main & Solomon, 1990)

Unlike the social myth that children won’t remember it anyway, our early experiences do not disappear – even after childhood amnesia (the normal inability of adults to recall episodic memories from the first 3/4 years of life).  Our bodies retain early childhood memories through pre-verbal felt sense, even when the conscious mind cannot recall childhood events. Connection with others in the first few years of life is physically imprinted in our nervous system, automatic stress responses, and tissues. The body can really keep score.

Essentially, the connection we form with caregivers early in life becomes the blueprint for how we relate to others in friendships, romantic relationships, parenting, and even ourselves.

The Four Main Attachment Styles & How They Show Up

Attachment style can be shaped by many experiences, including trauma, neglect, abrupt life changes, loss, inconsistent caregiving, and stressful environments. It affects how we connect, cope, and relate to others.

There is no “right” or “wrong” attachment style; it is simply a relational style influenced by how we learned to feel safe in relationships. Unlike what an unlicensed TikTok mental health coach may insinuate about attachment, these intersocial patterns are understandable responses to early experiences, not flaws.

There are four commonly recognized attachment styles:

• Secure

• Anxious / Preoccupied

• Avoidant / Dismissive

• Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant

A person with a secure attachment style may navigate life's challenges with resilience, emotional balance, and confidence. Insecure attachment patterns (anxious, avoidant, and disorganized) can make it harder to regulate emotions. This increases vulnerability to anxiety, depression, and difficulties managing daily life stressors (Mary Main & Solomon, 1990).

A secure person may generally feel safe with others, trust easily, and be comfortable with both intimacy and independence. Caregivers were not “perfect parents” – they were likely consistently warm, responsive, and emotionally attuned.

How it may show up in children: A securely attached child may explore freely, cry when left, and get quickly soothed upon parental reunion.

An anxious/preoccupied person may fear abandonment/disconnection or seek frequent reassurance. Caregivers were likely inconsistent (sometimes warm, sometimes emotionally unavailable). An anxious person may act codependently and feel highly anxious when physically or emotionally separated from a partner.

How it may show up in children: An anxiously attached child may cling tightly, panic when left, and act angry or resistant during reunions.

An avoidant/dismissive person may feel safest relying on themselves. They value independence and sometimes pull away from emotional closeness. Caregivers were often emotionally cold, rejecting, or overly demanding of early independence. Some suppress emotions or may pull away when a relationship starts getting “too deep” to protect themselves from rejection.

How it may show up in children: An avoidant/dismissive child may ignore their parent, hide their distress when parents leave, and turn away during reunions.

A disorganized/ fearful-avoidant person may be a mix of seeking closeness and pulling away, often rooted in early experiences of fear or unpredictability. Caregivers were often emotionally cold, rejecting, or overly demanding of early independence. They may yearn for love and connection but become terrified and panic once they get it. This can oftentimes look like sabotaging good relationships, experiencing chaotic emotional highs and lows, and struggling heavily with trust.

How it shows up in children: A disorganized-attached child may freeze/shut down, appear confused, or exhibit unpredictable behavior around a caregiver. This often happens in relationships where the caregiver is scary, unsafe, very inconsistent, or unable to respond to the child’s needs because of their own trauma or stress.

How Attachment-Informed Therapy at Birch Therapy Helps

Across the lifespan, I help individuals and families identify their attachment patterns and begin building relationships that feel safe and resilient. That work always begins with the relationship you have with yourself. Changing your attachment style is a journey of rewiring your brain by learning to feel safe in your nervous system when dealing with intimacy. You learn to recognize your emotional triggers and implement grounding/calming techniques. This helps you, or your child, build safe, supportive relationships through communicating your needs honestly and setting boundaries.

For children ages 0-5, I implement Child Parent Psychotherapy (CPP). In CPP, both the child and caregiver are the client. The goal is to repair and strengthen the attachment bond and support the child’s healthy socio-emotional development. This therapy approach is helpful for children who have experienced early childhood trauma (Alicia F. Lieberman et al., 2015).

For children 3-10, play therapy is utilized to help children express emotions, build safety, and strengthen attachment with caregivers. Play is the language of children. Through play, children act out thoughts and process difficult emotions. Because the therapeutic environment is safe and predictable, the therapist acts as a secure base, helping children rewrite unhealthy attachment narratives and build secure relational bonds (Garry Landreth, 2012). 

For teens and adults, we explore attachment patterns, your history, and how trauma or early experiences may be impacting your relationships today. This approach helps heal past emotional wounds that may be affecting present-day relationships and challenges (Daniel J. Siegel, 2020).

How to Get Started

Ready to break you or your child’s old patterns and build secure, lasting connections? Book a consultation today with Akejah.

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Sources

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. Basic Books.

Landreth, G. L. (2012). Play therapy: The art of the relationship (3rd ed.). Routledge.

Lieberman, A. F., Van Horn, P., & Ghosh Ippen, C. (2015). Don't hit my mommy!: A manual for Child-Parent Psychotherapy with young witnesses of family violence (2nd ed.). Zero to Three.

Main, M., & Solomon, J. (1990). Procedures for identifying infants as disorganized/disoriented during the Ainsworth Strange Situation. In M. T. Greenberg, D. Cicchetti, & E. M. Cummings (Eds.), Attachment in the preschool years (pp. 121–160). University of Chicago Press.

Siegel, D. J. (2020). The developing mind: How relationships and the brain interact to shape who we are (3rd ed.). Guilford Press.

by Akejah McLaughlin, LCMHC