In the ongoing debate of nature versus nurture, both elements significantly influence who we are. While our genetic makeup dictates certain traits, our early experiences and environment play crucial roles in our emotional and social development. As part of the ‘nurture’ aspect, we all need a safe and loving environment to thrive. From birth, we seek closeness with our caregivers, forming attachment relationships. These relationships profoundly shape our worldview, influencing our perceptions of relationships, others, and ourselves.
We develop certain ways of coping while our attachment with our primary caregiver is being compromised or threatened. While these coping strategies may have served us well in childhood, they might not be conducive to forming deep, intimate relationships as adults. These characteristic ways of coping and perceptions of relationships and people form our attachment style.
The Four Attachment Styles
Secure Attachment Style
If our caregivers were consistently responsive and attuned to our needs, making us feel seen, understood, safe, and secure, we are likely to develop a secure attachment style. We tend to see our caregiver as a reliable, understanding, and loving figure who provides a safe, supportive, and nurturing environment for us.This leads to confidence that our needs will be met in relationships. We feel good about ourself and connecting with others, believing that “I deserve support, my needs are important, and people will meet my needs.” This foundation allows for healthy, balanced relationships where emotional needs are reciprocally met.
Avoidant Attachment Style
If our caregivers were not responsive; our needs were consistently unmet, we might develop an avoidant attachment style. Feeling unseen and misunderstood, we internalised that our needs are unimportant or that others cannot be depended on for support. In response, we may tend to minimise or disconnect from our own needs and emotions, reducing our dependence on others, because we think that, “People won’t help me when I need it, but I don’t need them anyway. I’ll manage on my own.” This can lead to hyper-independence, finding it hard for us to trust others, keeping emotional distance, and fear of vulnerability, making deep connection with a partner challenging.
Ambivalent Attachment Style
Caregivers who are inconsistently responsive and often intrusive, flooding the child with their own emotions, the child may develop an ambivalent attachment style. As a result, the child becomes anxious about whether their needs will be met, often feeling confused about their emotions. This leads to an expectation of inconsistent support, adapting by clinging to the caregiver when present but remaining difficult to soothe due to fear of abandonment. Individuals with an ambivalent attachment style frequently seek validation and approval, appearing needy and placating others to feel good about themselves. They might think, “I need to make others happy to feel good about myself,” or “I’m not good enough if my partner is not happy.”
The client with ambivalent attachment styles often struggle with anxiety about their needs being met and confusion around their emotions due to inconsistent caregiver responses. Therefore, it is important to cultivate self-love and self-compassion. This involves exploring the origins of their need for validation and approval, helping them recognize their inherent worthiness beyond external validation. Through therapeutic techniques such as mindfulness, cognitive restructuring, and emotional regulation strategies. We help our clients to develop a deeper understanding and acceptance of their emotions. By fostering a compassionate self-dialogue and practising self-care, clients can gradually build a more stable sense of self-esteem and healthier relationships based on mutual self-respect and self-understanding.
Disorganized Attachment Style
When caregivers are a source of fear or terror like abuse and neglect, the child faces two conflicting impulses: the survival system wants the child to escape, but the attachment system urges them to seek comfort from the same caregiver. This internal conflict results in a disorganized attachment style, where the child becomes fragmented, both yearning for and fearing connection with others. Such individuals may develop dissociative tendencies, such as disconnection from reality, memory gaps, emotional numbing, and identity confusion. Relationships tend to be turbulent and chaotic, marked by a push-and-pull dynamic, making stable intimate relationships difficult to form.
As therapists, we approach clients with disorganized attachment styles with deep empathy and understanding. We recognize that their internal conflict, stemming from traumatic experiences with caregivers, has profoundly shaped their relational dynamics and sense of self. Our therapeutic journey focuses on creating a safe space where clients can explore and make sense of their past experiences with safety and support, without judgement.
Through trauma-informed therapy such as EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), Emotional-Focused Therapy for complex trauma, Somatic Experiencing, and Narrative Therapy, we help clients gradually integrate fragmented parts of themselves. By fostering a compassionate and non-judgmental therapeutic relationship, we support them in developing a coherent narrative of their experiences, promoting healing and resilience.
Our goal is to assist clients in building self-trust and self-compassion, cultivating a more stable and secure sense of identity. We work collaboratively to explore healthier ways of relating to others, addressing dissociative tendencies, emotional numbing, and memory gaps. With time and support, clients can navigate towards more stable and fulfilling relationships, finding strength in their journey towards healing and personal growth.
Conclusion
Our early childhood experiences with caregivers profoundly shape our attachment styles, impacting our capacity for deep, intimate relationships. If you identify with an insecure attachment style and find yourself facing relationship challenges or self-sabotaging behaviours, it’s essential to understand that healing is possible through therapy. By exploring your attachment style and learning healthier coping strategies, you can greatly improve your relationship dynamics.
One powerful concept in therapy is “reparenting”, where we learn to cultivate our own nurturing inner parent to fulfil the emotional needs we may have missed growing up. This process involves developing self-compassion, setting boundaries, and learning to nurture ourselves in ways that promote healing and growth.
If you’re seeking support on this journey, our therapists in Awaken Counselling Centre are here to help you navigate and transform these patterns, empowering you to lead a healthier, more fulfilling life.
Written by Michael Chin.
