What Are Attachment Styles and How Can Therapy Help You Learn from Them
At one point or another, you’ve said or heard someone say, “I’ve been this way for as long as I can remember.” While that can pertain to many things, one common thing it can be connected to is one’s attachment style.
From the time we are babies, our attachment style is influenced by our surroundings. The emotional attachments formed as infants with primary caregivers such as parents, grandparents, or guardians can influence our relationships, and this has been proved with attachment-based theory.
Before we can dig into attachment-based theory and how the therapy works, it’s important to understand the different attachment styles.
Anxious Attachment Style
Those with anxious attachment styles often fear abandonment and rejection. As a child, you may have felt upset or distraught when separated from your caregiver. Adversely, you might not have been able to find comfort when they returned.
Adults with anxious attachment styles will still fear abandonment and rejection, but they also may worry that those closest to them don’t love them. They also can be more codependent, have low self-esteem, and need approval from others.
Avoidant Attachment Style
This is also a type of insecure attachment where someone may find it difficult to build meaningful relationships due to intimacy fears. This is due to caregivers not being responsive to children’s emotional needs.
As an adult, this can lead to avoiding intimacy and exerting little emotion in relationships. Those with the avoidance attachment style tend to feel very independent but also threatened if someone tries to get close to them on a more personal level.
Disorganized Attachment Style
This style is typically attached to those who have trouble trusting others and can show inconsistent behaviors. Children with a disorganized attachment style often suffer from childhood trauma, abuse, or neglect.
As an adult, those with this attachment style typically exhibit unpredictable behavior. While they may desire a sense of love and belonging, they are generally also fearful of this. An example of this could include pushing their partner away one day and clinging to them the next.
Secure Attachment Style
This is the ability to build long-lasting and healthy relationships with others. Secure children feel safe, understood, comforted, and valued by their primary caregiver.
As an adult, this typically means you feel confident and safe in your relationships, comfortable sharing feelings, have good overall self-esteem, and can seek support when needed.
Once you understand the attachment style that best describes you, learning how to cope and learn from it is important. A popular way to do so is by using attachment-based therapy. This therapy and theory focuses on the role that early interactions between children and caregivers play in the child’s life. Also, it can be used across various age groups for adults, couples, children, or families.
Benefits of Attachment-Based Therapy
One of the main benefits includes feeling more stable and positive. After going through this therapy, you may feel more optimistic and secure in your everyday life and relationships.
It can also lead to those who go through the therapy having better communication skills and healthier relationships with fewer conflicts.
As caregivers, it also improves your bond with your children and overall parenting when you can address your past traumas healthily. If it’s a child suffering from trauma, it helps the parent know how to better help their child cope.
It can be a good fit if you want to understand how your past affects you and how to heal. Also, it can be beneficial if you struggle with low self-esteem, insecurities, and shame.
If attachment-based therapy sounds intriguing, reach out to make your first appointment for attachment based therapy. Just because you have a certain attachment style doesn’t mean you can’t change it.