7 Ways Your Attachment Style May Be Sabotaging Your Relationships

Odds are you’ve probably heard something about attachment style, or at least recognize that your childhood and past experiences impact who you are in some way. These experiences impact what we do, how we act, and how we feel. They lay the foundation for our relationships and how we show up in them. From an attachment lens, some of the most important experiences happen before we can even form memories. Therefore, how we form relationships with our caregivers can have a profound impact on how we work, date, be a friend, and be parents ourselves. 

What is attachment style?

Attachment styles were first recognized by British psychiatrist John Bowlby and American psychologist Mary Ainsworth. In their framework, we attach to our caregivers in one of four ways:

1. Secure attachment

2. Anxious (Preoccupied)

3. Avoidant (Dismissive)

4. Disorganized

As infants, we simply cannot meet our own needs. We must rely on our caregivers to provide us with the physical and emotional support we need to learn and grow. Someone with secure attachment sees their caregiver as a secure base from which they can explore the world, but knows that they have someone safe to return to who makes them feel loved and valued. We establish secure attachment when we know our caregivers will respond to our needs and emotions in a way that makes us feel safe and loved. However, when caregivers don’t or can’t provide consistent emotional support, we adopt behaviors to accommodate for this inconsistency. In an attempt to soothe our discomfort from this unreliability, we might try to continually re-establish connection by crying or clinging to our caregivers; alternatively, we may distance ourselves from our caregivers by becoming hyper-independent. 

We all struggle in our relationships from time to time, and it’s normal to experience some separation anxiety from our loved ones or need some space for ourselves. However, when anxiety overwhelms our ability to think clearly, or we notice a desire to pull back when relationships become more intimate, this may be a sign that our attachment pattern is coming into play. 

So, how do you know if your attachment

style is sabotaging your relationship?

Anxious Attachment:

1. You fall fast and hard. You might not feel it at first, but once you recognize your feelings, your partner quickly becomes the most important person in your life. This often comes before you fully know them. 

2.  You’re hyper-fixated on your partner’s mood or behavior. You’re analyzing their texts, tone, and how long it takes them to respond. Maybe you’ve been called “clingy” or feel that your attempts to build closeness with your partner are “too much.”

3.  You are often seeking reassurance. You ask questions like “Do you love me?” or find roundabout ways of seeking approval from your partner. The reassurance you get is often short-lived before needing another confirmation. 

4.  You find it difficult to be alone. Being away from your partner causes intense anxiety and a drive for closeness. Despite needing time to yourself, you might have difficulty taking that time or setting boundaries for fear of abandonment or rejection. 

5.  You feel oversensitive to perceived slights. You are constantly scanning your partner’s moods and reading into their behaviors for evidence that they no longer care for you. This may even become a self-fulfilling prophecy where your partner starts to distance themselves because they feel inadequate, over-criticized, or don’t feel they can fill the need.

6.  You’re prone to strong bouts of jealousy. Seeing others with your partner, or watching your partner share their time with friends, family, or others, causes discomfort. This might stir up thoughts or feelings that they are distancing themselves or are gearing up to leave the relationship. 

7.  You’re afraid your partner will leave or lose interest despite a lack of evidence. Everything is as-normal, but intrusive fears that your partner will leave keep resurfacing. You find yourself consistently questioning their commitment in the relationship. 

Avoidant Attachment:

1. You feel uncomfortable when relationships become more intimate. While closeness might bring short-term comfort, you quickly find yourself wanting to pull away or disengage. 

2. You delay or avoid commitment. Whether it’s a few weeks, months, or years away, you find yourself putting off taking next steps or making future plans with your partner, despite it being a strong, supportive partnership. 

3. You keep interactions surface-level and shy away from deeper conversations. Interactions feel good when they are light-hearted, but deeper topics are of little interest and prevent you from making closer bonds. 

4. You get annoyed or shut down when emotional needs come up. When a partner voices emotional needs or issues, you find yourself getting quickly frustrated, wishing your partner would deal with it on their own or feeling overwhelmed, like you don’t know what to say. 

5. You overrely on logic to avoid emotions. You might be quick to devalue the emotional aspects of your own or someone else’s experiences, dismissing them as illogical. You downplay your own or others’ emotions for the sake of logic. 

6.  You idealize “freedom” and “space.” Independence is an important part of any relationship, but so is interdependence. If you find yourself craving more and more space and freedom, especially as relationships get closer, this can quickly drive a wedge between you and your partner.

7.  You criticize or devalue your partner to create distance. You might find yourself getting more irritated than normal, nitpicking, or criticizing your partner as a tool to keep them at arm’s length. 

Disorganized Attachment

Disorganized attachment is often the hardest to pinpoint since it is a mix of avoidant and anxious attachment (it’s often referred to as fearful-avoidant). Some signs of disorganized attachment include:

1. You want close relationships but they feel unsafe. Unlike avoidantly attached adults, you want close relationships, but have deep fear around them.

2. You have dramatic mood swings, lashing out at people without knowing why. For women, these large emotions are not tied to hormonal factors or monthly cycles.

3. You are highly sensitive to perceived rejection. You often anticipate rejection by holding negative beliefs about others, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy that pushes others away. 

4. Your relationships often feel scattered and intense. One moment, you feel very close to your partner, and the next your feel distant or defensive

5. You have periods of dissociation or emotional shutdown. When things get scary you retreat and lose access to your own emotional self. 

6. You have a hard time identifying your emotions, or only identify them once there’s an outburst or dissociation. 

Healing Attachment Wounds

If you’ve noticed some of these behaviors in your own relationships, it is likely you have some attachment wounds. While this may sound scary, research has found that attachment patterns can be reworked and 'earned secure' attachment can be achieved. By working to confront fears, anxieties, and build stable, healthy relationships in adulthood, you can work towards a version of you that feels more self-assured, content, warm, and connected to those around you. 

For a deeper look into your attachment style, you can take the attachment style quiz here. 

*Note: Insecure attachment is not a diagnosis, and it is best to explore attachment with a qualified professional in a therapeutic setting. If you or someone you know is struggling and would like someone to talk to, Cypress Counseling Group, based in Brentwood Tennessee has clinicians who can help.