GoodTherapy | Attachment Styles and Hope for Your Relationship

By Dr. Jocelyn Markowicz, PhD, Psychologist

Attachment Hope for Couples: How to Improve Your Security Odds

You walk into the room and lock eyes with the most gorgeous human being you have ever seen. This individual locks eyes with you as well. You begin talking and realize that the chemistry between you is intense. You plan a date. You have several great dates. You fall in love and begin to talk about spending the rest of your lives together. You have the wedding. You go on the honeymoon. You begin to live your day-to-day lives together. (Perhaps not quite in that order.) But then, as you settle into shared lives, you notice that something is changing. The arguments are more frequent. The emotions are not all positive. Why does your partner leave when there is conflict? Why does your partner walk away when you need soothing? Why are they sometimes exhaustingly clingy and other times too independent? John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth offered an answer rooted in attachment styles to these questions. Several researchers after them offered solutions. I’d like to share them with you. 

The Evolution of a Relationship

It is important to acknowledge that it takes time for interpersonal patterns to emerge within a romantic relationship. A perception bias occurs when you first fall in love that naturally heightens your connection to your partner’s strengths and limits your awareness of their weaknesses. Thus, it is in day-to-day living that you develop more accurate perceptions of patterns that are problematic. 

Why You Relate the Way You Do

In the 1960s, John Bowlby asserted that we learn positive and negative ways of relating based on our parent-child experiences. Our ways of relating are designed to strengthen our bond with our attachment figures (parents/caregivers) growing up. They help us survive. An attachment behavioral system gradually emerges wherein we attempt to regulate our emotions and behaviors toward an attachment figure. To do this, Bowlby (1980) asserted that the attachment system essentially asks the following fundamental question: Is the attachment figure nearby, accessible, and attentive? According to Bowlby (1980), an individual who has experienced a secure attachment is likely to view attachment figures as available, responsive, and helpful. An insecurely attached individual would view attachment figures as inaccessible, untrustworthy, and unreliable.

Different Attachment Styles

Ainsworth expanded on Bowlby’s attachment behavioral system and introduced specific attachment styles that explain our attachment behaviors. She outlined three specific attachment styles: (1) secure attachment and two insecure attachment styles: (1) anxious-resistant, and (2) avoidant (Ainsworth, 1979). In adult romantic relationships, the insecurely attached adult who is anxious-resistant would be dependent on their partner and yet reject their soothing attempts. The insecurely attached adult who is avoidant would not seek emotional or physical comfort from their partner when experiencing emotional distress. 

Bowlby and Ainsworth helped us to understand that our way of relating to others is guided by our early attachment experiences, but do we indeed exhibit the same attachment behaviors in our adult romantic relationships?

Further Research into Attachment Styles 

Hazen and Shaver (1987) evaluated Bowlby’s theoretical premise that early attachment behaviors extend to adulthood and are relatively stable. They conducted research and found that adults also reported the three attachment categories that Ainsworth determined (secure, anxious-resistant, and avoidant). Their research identified that romantic relationships are attachment bonds and share similar attachment behaviors that characterize parent-child interactions. In essence, Bowlby and Ainsworth were right to suggest that we can look at our adult relationships and evaluate our partner’s attachment behaviors based on their childhood attachment experiences. 

Are People Stuck Forever in Patterns from Childhood? 

What happens if you partner with someone with an insecure attachment style? Can their attachment style become secure? 

Researchers had the same questions about whether or not early attachment behaviors could be changed in adulthood. Findings across several studies did indicate that while early attachment style is relatively stable (Kim, Baek, & Park, 2021), attachment behaviors can change (Tmej, AMA et al., 2020; Sims, 2000; Rimane, Steil, Renneberg, & Rosner’s, 2020; Overall, Simpson, & Struthers, 2013; Gazder & Stranton, 2010; Park, Johnson, MacDonald, & Impett, 2019). Therein lies the hope for the couple. So, back to the question, what happens if you partner with an insecurely attached individual? How can you increase your secure attachment odds in your relationship?

Distress in romantic relationships is the leading cause for adults to seek psychological services (Bradbury, 1998). There are specific interventions that increase attachment security or reduce the negative impact of insecure attachment behaviors in romantic relationships. The following interventions are supported by empirical examination.

Transference-Focused Therapy

Transference-focused therapy (TFT) is a therapeutic intervention that aims to reduce impulsivity, stabilize mood, and improve interpersonal and occupational functioning. The intervention is specifically designed for individuals who struggle with borderline personality disorder. Trauma can impact the internalized representations of personality. It is not uncommon for individuals to develop maladaptive personality traits in response to trauma. Trauma impacts attachment bonds. TFT is a great choice for an individual partner in a couple dyad who may also struggle with borderline personality. A recent study found that individuals who participated in TFT moved towards securely attached with some preoccupied behaviors away from insecurely attached with preoccupied behaviors (Tmej, AMA et al., 2020)

Emotionally Focused Therapy

Emotionally focused therapy (EFT) for couples focuses on reshaping distressed couples’ structured, repetitive interactions and the emotional responses that evoke partners and foster the development of a secure emotional bond (Jonson, 1996; Jonson, 1999). The EFT model assumes that the negative emotions and interactional cycles typical of distressed couples represent a struggle for secure attachment (Bowlby, 1969). Sims (2000) randomized 26 couples in which at least one partner had been rated as insecurely attached to EFT or a waitlist control group. Couples in the EFT treatment condition increased their attachment security (and decreased attachment-related avoidance) more than the control couples. 

Trauma-Focused Cognitive Processing Therapy

Trauma-focused cognitive processing therapy (CPT) focuses on changing the dysfunctional beliefs associated with trauma. Trauma during our early attachment years impacts our attachment functioning, thereby shaping how we related to others in romantic relationships. CPT offers hope for couples in that an insecurely attached partner, who has been the victim of trauma, can participate in this mode of treatment to improve functioning. In Rimane, Steil, Renneberg, and Rosner’s (2020) study, individuals who participated in CPT experienced reduced avoidance attachment (insecure) behaviors when assessed post-treatment.

Dyadic Regulation Processes

Dyadic regulation processing occurs in couples therapy and is designed to improve attachment-relevant dyadic interactions between them. Applying the Dyadic Regulation Processing Model, researchers evaluated how partners can buffer the impact of their partner’s anxious resistant or avoidant behaviors due to their insecure attachments. Overall, Simpson and Struthers (2013) videotaped romantic couples discussing relationship problems identified by one partner who wanted changes in the other partner. Results indicated that insecurely attached partners whose partners displayed more softening exhibited less anger and withdrawal, and their discussions were more successful. These partners buffered their insecurely attached partner’s responses by learning to be sensitive to their autonomy needs, validating their viewpoint, and acknowledging their constructive efforts and good qualities.

Partner Relationship Mindfulness

General mindfulness is defined as the awareness of what is happening in the moment. In their study, Gazder and Stranton (2010) defined relationship mindfulness (RM) as open or receptive attention to and awareness of what is taking place internally and externally in a current relationship. They found that an individual’s own daily relationship mindfulness did not buffer the effects of their own insecure attachment on same-day relationship behaviors, but their partner’s daily relationship mindfulness did. In essence, you can buffer the impact of your partner’s insecure attachment behaviors by increasing your own relationship mindfulness. Therapy is a great place to learn how to practice relationship mindfulness techniques.

Partner with Someone with a Secure Attachment Style

As outlined, various treatment interventions can move an individual and couple towards more secure attachment relating. At this point, you may be thinking that hope is only achieved within a therapeutic setting. I have good news for you. If you are a securely attached individual, you play an important role in your relationship with an insecurely attached partner. Experiencing secure behaviors within romantic relationships can reduce representations of insecure attachment style (Park, Johnson, MacDonald, & Impett, 2019). How romantic! Your secure attachment behaviors can provide a secure base for your insecurely attached partner to grow. In the context of your relationship, you and your partner will experience many life events together. In their most recent study, Fraley, Gillath, and Deboek (2020) found that life events could change attachment style presentations in adulthood, with some changes yielding an enduring pattern.  

What Lies within Our Power?

We cannot go back to our childhood and choose caregivers that would prevent us from developing an insecure attachment style. We, therefore, cannot prevent the impact of any dysfunctional early childhood attachment experiences on who we are, interpersonally, as adults. However, there is hope. We can increase our secure attachment odds by choosing partners who are securely attached. We can participate in couples therapy interventions. We can also offer a secure attachment base for our insecurely attached partner. Attachment styles do not equate to fixed potential in your relationship – there is always room for growth. 

If you’re ready to explore how therapy can help you and your relationship, click through to find a couples therapist near you.

References

Ainsworth, M. D. S. (1979). Attachment as related to mother-infant interaction. In Advances in the study of behavior (Vol. 9, pp. 1-51). Academic Press.

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

Bowlby, J. (1980). Loss: Sadness & depression. Attachment and Loss (vol. 3); (International psycho-analytical library no.109). London: Hogarth Press.

Bradbury, T. N. (1998). The developmental course of marital dysfunction. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Gazder, T. & Stanton, S. C.E (2020). Partners’ Relationship Mindfulness Promotes Better Daily Relationship Behaviors for Insecurely Attached Individuals. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 5;17(19):7267.

Hazen, C., & Shaver, P.R. (1987). Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 511-524.

Johnson, S. (1996). The practice of emotionally focused marital therapy: Creating connection. New York. Brunner/Mazel.

Johnson, S. (1999). Emotionally focused couples therapy: Straight to the heart. 

In J. Donovan (Ed.), Short term couple therapy (pp. 14-42). New York Guilford Press.

Fraley, R.C., Gillath, O. & Deboeck,P.R.(2020, August13).Do Life Events Lead to Changes in Adult Attachment Styles? A Naturalistic Longitudinal Investigation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 

Kim, S.‐H., Baek, M., & Park, S. (2021). Association of parent–child experiences with insecure attachment in adulthood: A systematic review and meta‐analysis. Journal of Family Theory & Review.

Overall, N.C., & Simpson J. A.( 2013) Regulation processes in close relationships. In: Simpson JA, Campbell L, editors. The Oxford handbook of close relationships. New York: Oxford University Press; 2013. pp. 427–451.

Park, Y., Johnson, M. D., MacDonald, G., & Impett, E. A. (2019). Perceiving gratitude from a romantic partner predicts decreases in attachment anxiety. Developmental Psychology, 55(12), 2692–2700.

Rimane, E., Steil, R., Renneberg, B. & Rosner, R. (2020). Get secure soon: attachment in abused adolescents and young adults before and after trauma-focused cognitive processing therapy. European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Sims A. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. University of Ottawa; Canada: 2000. Working models of attachment: The impact of emotionally focused marital therapy.

Tmej, A., Fischer-Kern, M., Doering, S., Hörz-Sagstetter, S., Rentrop, M., & Buchheim, A. (2021). Borderline patients before and after one year of transference-focused psychotherapy (TFP): A detailed analysis of change of attachment representations. Psychoanalytic Psychology, 38(1), 12–21.

A father holding his newborn is distracted by his phoneAttachment may be understood as the relationship between child and caregiver (often a parent). This relationship is the most important in the child’s life, as the caregiver is the provider of all his or her needs. Not only is the child dependent on the caregiver for basic survival, but the child’s social, emotional, and cognitive development also take shape within this relationship.

Attachment and the Disorganized Response

In a secure relationship, the caregiver is able to recognize and respond to the child’s needs in a way that provides support. The caregiver’s behavior is predictable and stable. In a secure relationship, the child is more likely to develop healthy emotion-regulation abilities as well as a healthy view of the self and world. This is because when the child needs comfort and reassurance, they are available. Over time, the child develops a view of the world that when help is needed, it can be counted on. In addition, the child comes to see themselves as worthy of love and support. In a safe and secure environment, the child is better able to take advantage of important opportunities for learning and development.

In contrast, children with unpredictable or abusive caregivers often experience inner conflict and may not form an organized response to fear or distress. When attachment researchers speak about an “organized response”, they are referring to the strategy the child uses when in need of care. For example, if the child’s caretaker is a source of both safety and danger (as in the case of a violent, neglectful, or abusive caregiver), the child may run to the caregiver when upset and then display ambivalence toward the caregiver, such as refusing to be picked up or displaying anger. This demonstrates a fundamentally conflicted situation for the child, as they need the caregiver for safety and at the same time need to protect themselves from the caregiver. In this way, the child can form a disorganized response to distress.

How Dissociative Symptoms Can Develop

Researchers have found that disorganized attachment is associated with dissociative symptoms. Children in a relationship with an unpredictable or sometimes traumatizing parental caregiver have a difficult time establishing a consistent view of the parent and of themselves. The parent is both needed and to be avoided. The child may not understand what makes them a “good” child or a “bad” child, as the caregiver’s behavior is often confusing and unpredictable.

In order to maintain a relationship with the caregiver—and attempt to make sense of themselves—some children simply forget or deny the abuse. Jennifer Freyd refers to this as betrayal blindness. Forgetting or denying trauma is a symptom of dissociation. It is an adaptive and defensive strategy that enables the child to function within the relationship, but it often leads to the development of a fragmented sense of self.

Disorganized Attachment Is Not Always the Result of an Abusive Caregiver

While disorganized attachment is often associated with abuse, sometimes loving caregivers who have experienced trauma themselves can behave in confusing ways toward the child. This happens because of the caregiver’s own inability to control their emotions. Traumatized parents can have a difficult time managing their emotions and providing a sense of security for the child even though they are not abusive or neglectful. Anger or fear can erupt unexpectedly and traumatize the child. A loving caregiver can be experiencing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or dissociative identity disorder and unintentionally behave in frightening or confusing ways to their child.

If a caregiver is dealing with their own trauma, it is recommended they seek therapy. In therapy the caregiver can learn to cope with stress, develop emotion-management skills, and learn more about understanding their child’s needs. Often caregivers who were raised in abusive families are unaware of how to appropriately respond to a child’s emotional needs because they themselves did not have their own needs met when they were children.

There are a range of therapeutic treatments for adults suffering from PTSD that have shown to be helpful. These techniques help reduce symptoms of trauma such as anxiety, depression, and chronic stress. Psychotherapy can provide emotional support to caregivers so they can begin to grow and provide a safe and responsive environment for themselves as well as their children.

References:

  1. Bedard-Gilligan, M., & Zoellner, L. A. (2012). Dissociation and memory fragmentation in post-traumatic stress disorder: An evaluation of the dissociative encoding hypothesis. Memory, 20(3), 277-299. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3310188
  2. Firestone, L. (n.d.). Disorganized attachment: How disorganized attachments form & how they can be healed. Retrieved from https://www.psychalive.org/disorganized-attachment
  3. Freyd, J. J. (n.d.). What is betrayal trauma? What is betrayal trauma theory? Retrieved from: https://dynamic.uoregon.edu/jjf/defineBT.html
  4. Gillath, O., Karantzas, G. C., & Fraley, R. C. (2016). Adult attachment: A concise introduction to theory and research. Academic Press.
  5. Paetzold, R. L., Rholes, W. S., & Andrus, J. L. (2017). A Bayesian analysis of the link between adult disorganized attachment and dissociative symptoms. Personality and Individual Differences, 107, 17-22. Retrieved from http://isiarticles.com/bundles/Article/pre/pdf/155055.pdf
  6. Psychological treatment of PTSD in adults. (2005). Post-traumatic stress disorder: The management of PTSD in adults and children in primary and secondary care. Leicester, UK: Gaskell.
  7. Waters, S. F., Virmani, E. A., Thompson, R. A., Meyer, S., Raikes, H. A., & Jochem, R. (2010). Emotion regulation and attachment: Unpacking two constructs and their association. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 32(1), 37-47. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2821505

Woman motions while talking to therapistSomeone recently asked me why they needed to know about the interpersonal process. There seemed to be a misunderstanding that the interpersonal process is only focused on building rapport, when stronger rapport is, in fact, a byproduct of the interpersonal process. If you have similar questions about how or why this framework could strengthen your practice, read on.

Interpersonal Process as a Framework

It is important to know that the interpersonal process is not a new theory or technique. Instead, it is a framework that can be integrated with any modality you want to use. You lay your favorite theory or technique upon this framework. This makes the interpersonal process not only versatile, but the cornerstone of any practice in which it’s used. Your modality can change based on individual needs, but the framework stays consistent.

Keep in mind that the interpersonal process comprises three core components: process dimension, corrective emotional experience, and client response specificity. Of these three, process dimension is what this article will focus on. [fat_widget_right]

The Cognitive Domain: A Crucial Component of Process Dimension

Tyber and McCluer identify three domains that make up the process dimension: the cognitive domain, interpersonal domain, and familial/contextual domain. While interpersonal domain addresses how a person experiences attachment brokenness, and the familial/contextual domain is where this brokenness is reinforced, the cognitive domain is at the origin of an person’s attachment brokenness.

The cognitive domain addresses the practical application of much of the attachment research that has been done. Under the cognitive domain, we identify the origin of the attachment style a person had or has with their primary caregiver. As therapists, we seek to uncover how a person’s values and identity were established, how they developed coping mechanisms, their covert thought processes, their beliefs about themselves and the world, how their value of self-care was determined, and what they need to restore their identity.

Therapists use these subcategories of the cognitive domain to identify attachment brokenness that occurred in response to real life experiences. To understand the importance of healing attachment brokenness using the interpersonal process framework, let us first look at how we treat attachment brokenness in children.

The Experiential Approach in Action: Play Therapy, Theraplay, and the Neurodeck

Becoming a registered play therapist requires candidates to spend 15 hours in training that specifically address attachment and how to build, repair, and strengthen a child’s ability to attach to a primary caregiver. But what is the common theme between attachment play therapy, theraplay, and the Brain Booster Neurodeck? Simply put, the common thread in these three modalities is an experiential approach. Healthy attachment is developed through experience, not reframing.

As therapists, we seek to uncover how a person’s values and identity were established, how they developed coping mechanisms, their covert thought processes, their beliefs about themselves and the world, how their value of self-care was determined, and what they need to restore their identity.

Play Therapy

In play therapy, clinicians provide experiences that support healthy, safe touch through activities such as foil hand prints, lotion on hands or feet, holding hands during activities, or working together on a task. All these activities encourage safe touch and eye contact. Eye contact in particular is important for our limbic systems to communicate and bond, as we learn from clinicians such as Curt Thompson or Louis Cozolino. Communication between our limbic systems is nonverbal; hence, the importance of eye contact.

Theraplay

Theraplay is also quite experiential; in fact, it may be the most experiential of all the methods listed. Attachment brokenness is healed through re-experiencing the attachment-building interactions that were not provided (or were insufficiently provided) during the first years of life, such as eye contact made when a baby is fed and swaddled. In some cases, the child needs to be cuddled or rocked as they would have been as an infant, a process that is exceptionally experiential. It may also be that a traumatic event broke an initially secure attachment, in which case Theraplay is utilized to re-establish the previously secure attachment style.

The Neurodeck

The Neurodeck comprises activities that build the brain from the bottom up. It begins with activities that assist with sensory integration, utilizing many of the same type of activities used in other attachment play therapy techniques. These experiential approaches harness messy play and movement. For example, they may use the lotion activity mentioned above or swing a child in a blanket to mimic the rocking movements experienced in utero. As a clinician moves through the deck, the activities become increasingly relational. This is the attachment component of the Neurodeck approach.

While it is impractical to swing an adult in a blanket to provide experiential therapy, the interpersonal process provides relational experience to honestly, yet compassionately, bring awareness to a person’s interpersonal characteristics.

The deck specifically states that certain activities should be completed in a one-on-one context before they are used them in a group setting. The one-on-one context is important in establishing safety before engaging in group work. Attachment work is rooted in laying a foundation for understanding safe and unsafe characteristics in relationships through a one-on-one dynamic. This dynamic then informs the safety of other relationships, especially relationships in a group setting. Each phase in the protocol is experiential and progressive.

Addressing Attachment in Adults

It is evident how attachment work in children is achieved through experiential modalities. The same can be said for attachment work with adults. The cognitive domain mentioned above is at the root of an person’s attachment brokenness, while the interpersonal domain is where attachment brokenness is experienced, and the familial/contextual domain is where the brokenness is reinforced. Through our work as therapists, we provide an experiential repair for broken attachment that is evaluated through interpersonal skills. A person’s maladaptive interpersonal skills provide a wealth of information about what happened in the cognitive and familial domains, as well as crucial information for effective treatment planning.

While it is impractical to swing an adult in a blanket to provide experiential therapy, the interpersonal process provides relational experience to honestly, yet compassionately, bring awareness to a person’s interpersonal characteristics. Are they interacting in healthy ways that allow people to draw near to them and create a desire for others to be in a healthy relationship with them, or are they fracturing relationships unknowingly because they lack the awareness or skills to build healthy relationships? Sharing our experience of an person’s behaviors or words can help them develop self-awareness and contemplate whether they are communicating what they intend. This approach can also help with reality testing.

Strengths of Interpersonal Process

One strength of the interpersonal process framework is the way it helps build flexibility and other-focused awareness, which allows for healthy attachments and navigating unhealthy relationships more confidently and constructively. By highlighting awareness of how a person’s communication might be perceived by others, we broaden their understanding of themselves and of others. Maintaining a broader range of interpersonal understanding ideally increases a person’s window of tolerance in their relationships and creates a desire to repair a broken healthy attachment or confidently sever an unhealthy attachment. The individual becomes better equipped to advocate for positive change in their life through a strengthened commitment to repair healthy relationships or by valuing themselves enough to part ways with unhealthy relationships without behaving destructively.

The Effective Interpersonal Process Clinician

A provider who effectively uses interpersonal process reflects truths to people that help them feel heard and known so they may heal. Those on the receiving end of these truths may not always like what they hear. However, when they work with an empathic and skilled therapist, people can hear and understand their therapist’s reflections, even if they do not like what is said.

At the appropriate level of reflection, people learn to trust their therapist. Feeling known and understood improves rapport. In this context, rapport is equivalent to attachment. A grounded relationship with an effective interpersonal process therapist is emotionally supportive so people may engage in difficult, effective therapy that greatly improves treatment outcomes.

Reference:

Teyber, E., & McCluer, F. H. (2010). Interpersonal process in therapy: An integrative model (6th ed). Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.

Close-up photo of loving couple holding hands while walking at sunsetComplex trauma is what happens when someone experiences multiple incidences of cruelty and abuse in the context of an unequal power relationship. This is most commonly found in people who grew up with abusive or neglectful parents, but also happens to kidnapping victims, prisoners of war, and people in abusive sexual or “romantic” relationships. The result of this complex trauma is C-PTSD (complex PTSD), which has similar effects to the posttraumatic stress (PTSD) experienced by people who have been in car accidents or similar traumatic events but involves deeper disturbances of the personality. Many people diagnosed with bipolar and other personality conditions are, in fact, survivors of complex trauma. This requires delving into the individual’s personal history and life story, rather than only analyzing their present symptoms.

Another way of looking at complex trauma and C-PTSD is the concept of attachment trauma. Attachment—the bonds that exist between one human being and another—sounds like a rather vague or abstract concept. Like all emotional states, however, such as happiness, fear, or anger, it is rooted in our biochemistry and is essential for human flourishing.

[fat_widget_right]

While our level of intelligence distinguishes humans from other animals, it is only through working together that we were able to survive and thrive. There is simply no way an individual human could take down a woolly mammoth. Human beings evolved to cooperate and work together in groups. One aspect of this is our unique capacity for language acquisition. For true social cooperation, however, bare communication of information is not enough. In the modern world, one may be able to go about many items of daily business (shopping, for example) without any emotional bond, but the cohesive groups in which humans evolved required a much deeper level of connection.

Even today, we can observe that an office where there is no camaraderie between employees will not function well no matter how highly they are paid. Family life, friendship groups, and romantic relationships are, of course, quite difficult to maintain without attachment. As a result of our evolution, all, or almost all, human beings feel a deep need to be attached to others regardless of whether it is strictly necessary for their survival or material prosperity. People who do not form relationships are often plagued by feelings of depression and sadness, no matter how successful they may be in other areas of life.

Attachment, however, is hard. Forming a relationship with another human being involves both verbal and nonverbal communication, as well as an intricate dance of appropriate behavior. Express too little empathy in a relationship and you may be considered cold or distant. Express too much or too early and you may be considered overbearing. High-functioning people on the autism spectrum (commonly known as Asperger’s, though this has largely fallen out of academic usage) typically lack many of the native instincts for successful relationship formation that other people have, making their lives difficult in ways that those in the general population find hard to appreciate or understand.

However, like all human traits, the ability to form attachment bonds is not purely innate; it is learned behavior. And as with most human learning, attachment is learned by doing. From the moment they exit the womb, babies are learning attachment. This, and not only the need to materially provide for the child, is the basis of the family, a universal component of human society. Even utopian social experiments which aimed to replace the family had to fall back on structures that essentially mirrored mother- and fatherhood, with mixed success.

In treating people with C-PTSD who seek therapy, building up their ability to experience attachment and to feel safe, secure, appreciated, and loved in relationships is a high priority.

It follows, therefore, that when the relationship between parents, or a replacement primary caregiver, and the child is seriously distorted by abuse or neglect, this has far wider implications than the parent-child relationship alone. Survivors of complex trauma typically emerge with gaps in their ability to form attachment bonds with others. This is not to say their desire for attachment is any less—far from it. The unfulfilled desire for connection and pervasive feeling of loneliness in survivors of complex trauma is a major contributing factor to the symptoms they experience, including depression, inability to regulate emotion, and engagement in risky or self-destructive behaviors.

In treating people with C-PTSD who seek therapy, building up their ability to experience attachment and to feel safe, secure, appreciated, and loved in relationships is a high priority. It is also an extremely difficult process. As I have discussed in previous articles, C-PTSD is best conceptualized less as a process of damage than as a learning process in highly unfortunate circumstances. Like all children, people who grow up in an environment of persistent abuse are born with potential, which they develop in their own way under adverse circumstances.

In short, survivors of complex trauma in childhood learn to live in a world turned upside down because that was the only world they ever knew. Therapy for people with C-PTSD is a delicate undertaking, involving revisiting this initial learning process and initiating a new one that allows them to grow and develop in healthier and more fulfilling ways.

References:

  1. Cloitre, M., Garvert, D. W., Weiss, B., Carlson, E. B., & Bryant, R. A. (2014). Distinguishing PTSD, complex PTSD, and borderline personality disorder: A latent class analysis. European Journal of Psychotraumatology, 5, 10.3402/ejpt.v5.25097. Retrieved from http://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v5.25097
  2. Lawson, D.M. Treating adults with complex trauma: An evidence-based case study. (2017) Journal of Counseling and Development, 95(3), 288-298. Retrieved from http://doi.org/10.1002/jcad.12143
  3. Sar, V. (2011). Developmental trauma, complex PTSD, and the current proposal of DSM-5. European Journal of Psychotraumatology, 2, 10.3402/ejpt.v2i0.5622. Retrieved from http://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v2i0.5622
  4. Sullivan, R. M. (2012). The neurobiology of attachment to nurturing and abusive caregivers. The Hastings Law Journal, 63(6), 1553–1570.
  5. Tarocchi, A., Aschieri, F., Fantini, F., & Smith, J. D. (2013). Therapeutic assessment of complex trauma: A single-case time-series study. Clinical Case Studies, 12(3), 228–245. Retrieved from http://doi.org/10.1177/1534650113479442

Couple sits together on window seat, deep in conversation, leaning back and looking relaxedEditor’s note: This article is the second in a two-part series. See Avoidant Attachment, Part 1: The Dependence Dilemma.

When we live in a continual state of freeze, we aren’t only hiding, we are living alone (even when we’re in a relationship). Focused on the preservation of Self and resources, driven by self-sufficiency and independence, we come to believe that outside support is not an option. From the outside, it may seem as if we are hoarding food, money, time, words, emotions, and so on. It can also be framed as a conservation of resources in a closed (isolated) system that does not expect any exchange of resources between systems.

With limited resources, efficiency becomes paramount. Many people on the avoidant end of the attachment spectrum may come to depend on the creation and maintenance of a predictable and efficient routine that does not require energy expenditure on avoidable and unresolvable situations like interpersonal conflict.

The Myth of Functional Dissociation

The freeze state, which prepares us to hold and preserve until safety or support arrives, is a very efficient survival response. As such, it brings with it the valuable tool of self-regulation by dissociation. If something feels uncomfortable, we just turn it off. Compartmentalize. Stuff it away. By breaking life into fragments, we can remain present with the portions that are tolerable.

While in many cases this happens automatically, we may also feel as if we’ve mastered dissociation. Though this can happen at both ends of the attachment spectrum, on the avoidant side it can feel functional and intentional. We then might ask our anxious partners (often with disdain versus curiosity, because resentment does tend to build in avoidant attachment), “Why can’t you just turn off your emotion? Why does it have to get so big?”

Dissociation does bring with it some challenges. Memories, emotions, and bodily sensations may become inaccessible. Sometimes the remaining present feels unbearable, so we disappear. If we feel unsafe and dissociative while in a particular moment of life, sometimes we appreciate that moment (or entire relationship) only in retrospect.

Dissociation can also be activated by conflict. The more the other person amplifies, the smaller and more still we might become. Some even dissociate to a point where they become mute (or even fall asleep) during an argument.

If we feel unsafe and dissociative while in a particular moment of life, sometimes we appreciate that moment (or entire relationship) only in retrospect.

So we continue to live in an isolated bubble, preserved and protected, our resources limited because exchange feels unsafe and we believe “Nobody really loves anybody.”

Communication Resignation

“See me. Don’t see me. Get away from me if you can’t see me.”

The spotlight is our nemesis, and words take effort because they elicit our own physical emotional expression, which those around us may judge and reject. The words we put out into the world can be used as weapons against us: they not only reduce the deniability factor when the spotlight comes back around to us, but when others don’t like our words, we may face conflict.

We often resent those closest to us for their perceived judgment and rejection, for crossing boundaries we never articulated, or for not knowing how to draw us out from our silence (that to us is speaking volumes). From our perspective, we’ve been sending out very clear signals that nobody is picking up.

There is a fatalism inherent in the freeze state.

The Evidence

Showing a person on the avoidant end of the attachment spectrum that it’s okay to need people can be a hard sell. So, let’s take a look at the evidence. The following traits are often indicators of an unacknowledged need for people:

Many of us learn early in life to separate from uncomfortable sensations and emotions by dissociating and compartmentalizing. We may become so good at it that we don’t recognize when it’s happening. This is how we handle things like separation. We don’t realize we miss anyone because we dissociate from loneliness. And when they return from that trip to the store, we can fall right back into our story that says we need nobody, that nobody should need anyone.

Healing

If the dilemma lies in our dissociation from discomfort and our own internal denial of social needs, then healing comes in recognition and gradual exposure to discomfort in feeling and expressing those needs. This healing might include leaning vulnerably on others and feeling met at our own level. A sense of agency in meeting our own social needs can feel liberating, and as our bodies learn to relax, over time we may find it even easier to meet those needs. We experience others as more safe and open as we ourselves open up to their presence and accept ourselves the way we wish to be accepted by others.

These tips can help further healing:

References:

  1. Kinnison, J. (2016, October 18). Type: Dismissive-avoidant attachment style. Retrieved from https://jebkinnison.com/bad-boyfriends-the-book/type-dismissive-avoidant
  2. Sattin, N. (2015, December 29). 19: Recipe for a secure, healthy relationship with Stan Tatkin. (2015, December 29). Retrieved from http://www.neilsattin.com/blog/2015/12/19-recipe-for-a-secure-healthy-relationship-with-stan-tatkin
  3. Tatkin, S. (2012). Wired for love: How understanding your partners brain can help you defuse conflicts and spark intimacy. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger.

Two partners sit on opposite sides of sofa looking away from each otherEditor’s note: This article is the first in a two-part series. See Avoidant Attachment, Part 2: The Downside of Preservation.

We’re in a relationship, and we feel nothing. Or we gather an ever-growing stockpile of resentment, invoking various strategies to escape intimacy without actually rejecting our partner or escalating into conflict. Does this sound familiar?

While romantic relationships may start off with blissful ease, the dependence of connection can eventually feel threatening. We might feel as if their needs are overtaking ours. We may have less time to relax or get things done in the presence of others. We have to hold our guard against judgment or rejection, and we may come to yearn for bodily regulation, free from social threat, in the safety of alone time.

We can’t assert ourselves, because we worry our needs trigger those around us, increasing and amplifying their needs. The most direct path toward self-regulation requires disengagement from others. So as their needs amplify, we withdraw, maybe even shut down, knowing engagement only increases threat of conflict.

Authentic connection may feel unsafe in this conditioned reality of social threat. It isn’t possible for us to lean on an Other, and intimacy is not allowed. Dependence has come to equal imprisonment, and conflict means the demise of self-agency, which to some, may feel like the death of Self. While saying, “Don’t see me,” we resent those who do not see us. [fat_widget_right]

In our more resourced moments—maybe during time alone, when our bodies are calm—we may desire connection, recognize patterns of limited relationships, admit to loneliness, or even regret about the ways we’ve pushed others away. We may be curious how we can become more emotionally available to those we love. It may be the case that we only feel softness and desire for connection in retrospect, when our bodies feel calm and regulated, when resources feel replenished. We feel love only in its absence.

Avoidant Origins

If neglect leads to obliviousness and oppression fosters freeze/dissociation, then we are left with two options. Either we do not know our emotions exist or we actively separate from the discomfort of them, walling them off so they do not exist in our perceived reality.

If reflection teaches us about ourselves, neglect presents a null mirror, leaving us less aware and without language for internal experience. Oppression often removes any permission to speak or assert ourselves. We might feel more comfortable in our minds when we are solving problems and finding value and purpose in that. We may even seek out problems that need solutions, chaos that seeks refinement, or relationships that confirm our belief we cannot depend on anyone because their needs are too great.

When we experience consistent disconnection (oppression or neglect) in childhood, we often feel easily engulfed by the emotional needs of others. We may desire space and freedom to meet our own needs without having to track or navigate theirs. We have learned through childhood experience that our presence—our emotions, our needs, our mere existence—is a burden. So we contain these things. We internalize and enforce counter-dependent rules in ourselves and in others.

We are drawn toward the illusion of connection, often describing our ideal partner as one that “gets” us in such a way that we need not put any effort into explaining, that we need not become vulnerable. This level of attunement is both the missing experience of empathy we lacked in childhood and the mirage of our attachment journey.

When feeling helpless to meet the needs of others, we often use strategies to disengage the attachment systems of those around us, perceiving their escalating emotions as a growing threat (especially when accompanied by facial or other physical expressions of anger that remind us of early life oppression). But this might look like withdrawal and can feel like abandonment to the people we love, who may find themselves walking on eggshells to avoid exposing us to emotions that trigger our feelings of oppression or helplessness (in much the same way that we attempt to avoid triggering their attachment reactions).

Seclusion and Delusion

Stan Tatkin, author of Wired for Love, suggests that we on the avoidant side tend to conceptualize the world in terms of individual systems rather than social/interactive systems. (“I take care of me. You take care of you.”) While we may occasionally function well in pairs or groups, the transition into those settings can feel threatening, and our resistance may present an ongoing challenge in relationship. We live lives more solitary, even in a romantic partnership. [amazon_affiliate]

We are drawn toward the illusion of connection, often describing our ideal partner as one that “gets” us in such a way that we need not put any effort into explaining, that we need not become vulnerable. This level of attunement is both the missing experience of empathy we lacked in childhood and the mirage of our attachment journey.

As a defense, we often remain intent on naming the absence of empathy, even seeking confirmation that our partners are not providing such a basic human need. We might say, “This doesn’t feel like love.” Or, “I want to be loved, not needed.” More likely, we’ll say nothing. We’ll simply resent this relationship in which we feel unseen and unknown, resent partners for not picking up on our signals, for not providing the empathy and acceptance for which we yearn, the positive reflections we never received.

While any extreme attachment posture creates challenges when navigating romantic relationships, those on the avoidant end of the spectrum often feel helplessness in response to external emotion (“You’re supposed to contain your emotion. If you can’t contain your own, I can’t contain it for you.”), reacting instinctively in ways that inhibit intimacy. Eventually patterns of broken relationships and unmet needs may be recognized, and the belief that love is not actually possible may be the result.

The Freeze State: Hiding and Hoarding

When fight and flight are not viable options, we move into freeze. We avoid detection and conserve resources.

That urge to disappear, to become small and quiet—that’s freeze. In decreasing presentation of Self, we decrease risk of being seen. We preserve our chances of survival. For those on the avoidant side, being seen may feel unsafe. But this creates internal conflict.

We may have been born with an innate drive to connect and lean on others, but survival has overridden attachment, though the drive for attachment remains active. The yearning to be seen and loved is countered by the drive to become small and invisible to threats. When safety is the underlying goal, hiding becomes nuanced, entangled in everyday behaviors that others may not even recognize.

Many of us practice any number of these avoidant strategies, but this doesn’t mean we are limited to them. We also carry anxious and secure strategies, right along with the avoidant ones. The challenge lies in recognizing the strategies we default to and working to develop our tool belt of alternatives.

Scarcity is a common perspective between anxious and avoidant attachment styles. The anxious side views interpersonal connection in terms of scarcity. (“I can never get enough. It’s always disappearing.”) The avoidant end tends to view time, space, and other resources in terms of scarcity. And when resources are viewed as individual possessions rather than shared, conservation often dictates competition and resentment. (“My time is not our time. We can’t both get needs met at the same time. When I’m with you, my needs will not be met.”)

A Menu of Strategies: Distract, Deflect, Disengage

While those on the anxious end of attachment often use strategies to amplify and draw attention, we on the avoidant end lean toward the opposite. We actively diminish and contain our reactions in order to avoid detection and negative attention. For those organized around the expectation of continued oppression, negative focus can feel unbearable and unresolvable.

We tend to do whatever is necessary to avoid judgment and rejection, which means a low tolerance for blame or responsibility (and decreased likelihood of apologizing or acknowledging our own faults). While partners may perceive them as premeditated, these survival behaviors are often subconscious and automatic.

Beyond more obvious avoidant strategies like not speaking, physically isolating, chasing alone time and saying “No” by default in order to maintain space and physical regulation, we may utilize a wide range of more subtle strategies to conceal our needs and perceived inadequacies and ensure we avoid attack/judgment/rejection:

Within this process lies invalidation of Self and Other. Over time, the shaming inherent in these strategies can change those around us. As they lose their light, they may initiate less, which may make them feel safer (less confrontational) to us. But what this also means is that they may be growing closer to the point of rejection that we expected all along. In this way, by rejecting their bids for intimacy, we create what we fear and expect: rejection by those closest to us.

Many of us practice any number of these avoidant strategies, but this doesn’t mean we are limited to them. We also carry anxious and secure strategies, right along with the avoidant ones. The challenge lies in recognizing the strategies we default to and working to develop our tool belt of alternatives. If you aren’t sure of how to begin, a qualified and compassionate counselor can help.

References:

  1. Kinnison, J. (2016, October 18). Type: Dismissive-avoidant attachment style. Retrieved from https://jebkinnison.com/bad-boyfriends-the-book/type-dismissive-avoidant
  2. Sattin, N. (2015, December 29). 19: Recipe for a secure, healthy relationship with Stan Tatkin. (2015, December 29). Retrieved from http://www.neilsattin.com/blog/2015/12/19-recipe-for-a-secure-healthy-relationship-with-stan-tatkin
  3. Tatkin, S. (2012). Wired for love: How understanding your partners brain can help you defuse conflicts and spark intimacy. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger.
Important Notice

GoodTherapy is not intended to be a substitute for professional advice, diagnosis, medical treatment, or therapy. Always seek the advice of your physician or qualified mental health provider with any questions you may have regarding any mental health symptom or medical condition. Never disregard professional psychological or medical advice nor delay in seeking professional advice or treatment because of something you have read on GoodTherapy.