Attachment Styles – Benjamin Fry

When Love Isn’t Enough: How Attachment Patterns Shape Our Relationships

Benjamin Fry — Tue, 12 May 2026 14:40:00 +0000

We tend to begin with a simple idea, if two people love each other, things should work. That love should create safety, ease, and a sense of being understood. But relationships often challenge this assumption. Care can be present, commitment can be genuine, and yet something still feels unsettled. Patterns repeat, conflict returns, and moments of closeness can quickly give way to distance.

This can feel confusing. It can even lead to the belief that something is wrong, with ourselves, with the other person, or with the relationship itself. But often, what is playing out is not a failure of love. It is the influence of something much older and more deeply embedded.

The Invisible Blueprint of Attachment

John Bowlby introduced the idea that our early relationships shape how we experience connection throughout life. These early interactions form what we might think of as an internal blueprint, an implicit understanding of what relationships feel like, what we can expect from others, and how safe it is to depend on someone.

This blueprint is not something we consciously choose. It develops through repeated experiences in early life, particularly in moments of distress. When a caregiver responds with consistency and attunement, the nervous system begins to associate connection with safety. When those responses are inconsistent, absent, or overwhelming, the system adapts in order to cope.

Over time, these adaptations become patterns. They influence how we respond to closeness, how we handle conflict, and how we interpret the behaviour of others. They are not simply thoughts we can change at will. They are lived, embodied expectations that shape our experience from the inside out.

Adaptation, Not Dysfunction

It can be tempting to view these patterns as problems to fix. But a more useful perspective is to see them as intelligent adaptations. Gabor Maté has written extensively about how what we call dysfunction is often the result of the body trying to maintain connection while also protecting itself.

For example, moving toward others in moments of distress can be understood as an attempt to restore safety through closeness. Moving away can be understood as an attempt to reduce overwhelm and regain a sense of control. Both are strategies that make sense in the context in which they were formed.

Difficulties arise when these strategies, which were once necessary, continue to operate in situations where they are no longer needed in the same way. In adult relationships, they can create cycles that feel confusing or even contradictory. One person reaches out, the other pulls back. One seeks reassurance, the other seeks space. Without awareness, these patterns can reinforce each other.

The Nervous System Beneath the Surface

To understand why these patterns feel so powerful, it helps to look at the role of the nervous system. Bessel van der Kolk has highlighted how early experiences, particularly those involving stress or trauma, are held in the body. They shape how the nervous system responds to the present moment, often outside of conscious awareness.

In relationships, this means that our reactions are not always deliberate. A shift in tone, a moment of distance, or a perceived change in attention can trigger a response that feels immediate and intense. The body reacts as though something important is at stake, even if the current situation does not fully warrant that level of activation.

This is not a failure of reasoning. It is the nervous system doing what it has learned to do, scanning for safety and responding to potential threat. These responses can take the form of heightened emotion, urgency, withdrawal, or shutdown. From the outside, they may appear disproportionate. From the inside, they often feel necessary.

Why Insight Alone Doesn’t Shift the Pattern

Understanding these dynamics can bring a sense of relief. It can help us make sense of why we feel the way we do, and why certain patterns keep repeating. But insight, on its own, is rarely enough to create lasting change.

This is because these patterns are not just cognitive. They are physiological. They live in the nervous system, not just in thought. We can know that we are safe, and still feel anxious. We can understand that someone cares, and still feel the urge to withdraw.

This gap between knowing and feeling is a common part of the process. It reflects the difference between intellectual understanding and embodied experience. Change requires more than new ideas. It requires new experiences that the nervous system can register as safe.

Regulation and Co-Regulation

Deb Dana has helped make the concept of nervous system regulation more accessible, particularly through the lens of polyvagal theory. Her work highlights how our ability to connect depends on our capacity to feel safe in our bodies.

When the nervous system is regulated, we are more able to stay present, listen, and respond with flexibility. When it is dysregulated, we are more likely to react automatically, either by moving toward or away from connection in ways that can feel difficult to control.

Regulation is not something we do entirely on our own. It is also shaped through co-regulation, the process by which one person’s steady presence helps another find their way back to balance. This is something we experience early in life, but it continues to play an important role in adult relationships.

Moments of co-regulation can be subtle. They might involve staying present during a difficult conversation, offering reassurance without urgency, or simply being alongside someone without trying to change what they are feeling. These moments create a different kind of experience, one where connection and safety begin to coexist.

Love, With Understanding

Love becomes more effective and nourishing when it is supported by an understanding of these deeper processes. Without that understanding, love can become entangled in patterns that feel frustrating or immovable. With it, there is often more space for curiosity, compassion and genuine connection.

Instead of asking what is wrong, we begin to ask what is happening. Instead of trying to fix the other person, we become more interested in the patterns unfolding between us. This shift does not remove difficulty, but it changes how we relate to it.

Over time, as new experiences of safety and connection accumulate, the nervous system can begin to update. Patterns soften. Reactions become less intense. There is more room to pause, to notice, and to choose.

Love, in this context, is no longer asked to do everything on its own. It is supported by awareness, by regulation, and by a growing capacity to stay present with what is.

References

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and Loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. Basic Books. https://ia800205.us.archive.org/5/items/attachmentlossvo00john/attachmentlossvo00john.pdf

Maté, G. (2022). The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture. Vermilion. https://ia601504.us.archive.org/23/items/the-myth-of-normal-by-gabor-mate/The%20Myth%20of%20Normal%20by%20Gabor%20Mate.pdf

van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking. https://ia601604.us.archive.org/35/items/the-body-keeps-the-score-pdf/The-Body-Keeps-the-Score-PDF.pdf

Dana, D. (2018). The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation. Norton. https://virtualmmx.ddns.net/gbooks/ThePolyvagalTheoryinTherapyEngagingtheRhythmofRegulationNortonSeriesonInterpersonalNeurobiology.pdf

Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation. Norton. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3490536/

Secure Is Learned – How Attachment Can Be Rewired in the Right Relationship

Benjamin Fry — Mon, 20 Apr 2026 05:50:00 +0000

We Learn Safety Through Relationship

Many people carry a quiet belief about themselves when it comes to relationships, that something inside them is fundamentally flawed. Perhaps closeness feels overwhelming, or emotional intimacy triggers anxiety rather than comfort. Others may find themselves pulling away from connection even when they deeply want it. These patterns can lead people to conclude that they are simply “bad at relationships,” or that their attachment style is permanently fixed.

However, contemporary research into trauma and attachment offers a far more hopeful perspective. Attachment patterns are not personality defects, but adaptive strategies that the nervous system develops in response to early relational environments. When caregivers are consistently responsive and emotionally attuned, the nervous system learns that connection is safe and regulating. When caregiving is inconsistent, neglectful, or frightening, the body learns different strategies for survival.

Importantly, these strategies are learned responses rather than permanent traits. If attachment patterns develop through relational experiences, then they can also be reshaped through new relational experiences. In this sense, emotional security is not solely something we either receive in childhood or never experience. It is something that the nervous system can gradually learn when the conditions are supportive and stable enough.

Attachment Is Rooted in the Nervous System

Attachment is often discussed in psychological or relational terms, but its foundations are deeply biological. From infancy, our nervous systems are shaped through repeated interactions with caregivers. Babies are not born with the ability to regulate their own emotional states, but instead, they rely on caregivers to soothe distress, respond to signals, and help restore equilibrium.

Over time, these repeated moments of soothing and attunement become internalised as expectations within the nervous system. They form the template through which the body anticipates how relationships will feel.

Stephen Porges’ work on Polyvagal Theory has helped illuminate this process. Porges proposes that the autonomic nervous system continuously scans the environment for cues of safety or danger through a process known as neuroception. When the nervous system detects safety, it shifts into a state that supports social engagement. In this state, people are more able to maintain eye contact, communicate openly, and feel emotionally connected. When the nervous system detects threat, defensive states such as fight, flight, freeze, or shutdown become activated.

For individuals who experienced relational instability early in life, the nervous system may become highly sensitive to perceived threat in relationships. Situations that appear safe on the surface can still trigger defensive responses because the body has learned to associate closeness with unpredictability or danger. As a result, relationship difficulties often reflect the nervous system’s attempts to protect rather than a conscious decision to push others away.

Trauma Shapes How the Body Responds to Connection

Trauma research has further expanded our understanding of how early experiences influence adult relational patterns. Psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk’s work has been particularly influential in demonstrating that traumatic experiences are not stored solely as memories but also as physiological responses within the body.

In The Body Keeps the Score, van der Kolk explains that trauma changes the functioning of brain regions involved in threat detection, emotional regulation, and bodily awareness. When early environments are unpredictable or unsafe, the nervous system may become organised around vigilance. The body remains prepared for danger even in situations that are objectively safe.

Similarly, physician and trauma researcher Gabor Maté emphasises that trauma is not only defined by what happens externally but by the adaptations that occur internally as a result. In his work, Maté describes trauma as the disconnection from the self that occurs when individuals must suppress emotions, needs, or authenticity in order to maintain attachment relationships. These adaptations often continue into adulthood, shaping how people experience closeness, vulnerability, and trust.

From this perspective, insecure attachment patterns can be understood as intelligent survival strategies. They developed in response to environments where the nervous system needed to remain alert or protective. The challenge is that these protective responses can remain long after the original circumstances have passed.

The Nervous System Can Change

Although early relational experiences exert a powerful influence on development, they do not determine our future permanently. One of the most encouraging findings in neuroscience is that the brain and nervous system remain capable of change throughout life. This capacity for ongoing adaptation, known as neuroplasticity, allows new experiences to gradually reshape neural pathways.

Peter Levine’s work in Somatic Experiencing highlights the central role of the nervous system in trauma healing. Levine suggests that trauma arises when the body becomes stuck in defensive states that were originally mobilised to respond to threat but never fully resolved. Healing occurs when the nervous system is able to complete these responses and return to its natural rhythm of activation and settling.

This process is rarely achieved through intellectual insight alone. While understanding one’s past can be valuable, the nervous system primarily learns through lived experience rather than analysis. What ultimately shifts attachment patterns is not simply knowing that relationships can be safe, but experiencing safety repeatedly within real relationships.

The Importance of Co-Regulation

A key mechanism through which attachment healing occurs is co-regulation. Humans are biologically wired to regulate one another’s nervous systems through social interaction. Tone of voice, facial expressions, eye contact, and physical presence all convey signals that influence whether the nervous system moves toward safety or defense.

Deb Dana, a clinician who has extensively applied Polyvagal Theory in therapeutic contexts, describes co-regulation as the process through which one regulated nervous system helps another find stability. When someone remains calm, present, and emotionally attuned during moments of distress, they provide powerful cues of safety.

Over time, these cues begin to reshape the nervous system’s expectations. The body gradually learns that connection does not necessarily lead to overwhelm or rejection. Instead, it can become a source of stability and support.

In this way, healing often occurs not through dramatic breakthroughs but through repeated, ordinary experiences of relational safety.

The Role of the Right Relationship

Not every relationship provides the conditions necessary for this kind of healing. Relationships that mirror earlier dynamics of unpredictability or emotional withdrawal can reinforce existing attachment patterns rather than shift them.

The relationships that support healing tend to share certain qualities. They are emotionally consistent rather than volatile. They allow for disagreement without threatening abandonment. Most importantly, they provide a stable environment in which vulnerability can gradually emerge without fear of ridicule or rejection.

Within these conditions, the nervous system begins to experience something it may not have encountered before: safety within connection. At first this may feel unfamiliar or even uncomfortable, particularly for individuals whose early experiences associated closeness with danger. Trust develops slowly, often through small moments of repair after misunderstanding or conflict.

Over time, these moments accumulate. The nervous system begins to update its predictions about what relationships can be.

Earned Secure Attachment

Researchers sometimes describe this process as the development of earned secure attachment. This term refers to individuals who may not have experienced consistent safety in childhood but later develop a secure relational style through corrective experiences in adulthood.

These experiences often occur in supportive romantic partnerships, close friendships, or therapeutic relationships. What matters most is the presence of reliable attunement and emotional responsiveness over time. Through these repeated experiences, the nervous system gradually learns new patterns of regulation and connection.

As these patterns become internalised, the individual begins to develop greater emotional stability and flexibility within relationships. Situations that once triggered strong defensive responses may become more manageable. The body learns that closeness does not inevitably lead to harm.

From Survival to Security

The deeper transformation in attachment healing involves a shift in the nervous system’s fundamental orientation toward relationships. When early environments required constant vigilance, survival strategies dominated relational experiences. The body remained focused on detecting threat and maintaining protection.

Through consistent experiences of relational safety, the nervous system can begin to relax these protective strategies. This does not mean that defensive responses disappear entirely. They remain part of the body’s survival system and may still appear during times of stress.

However, they no longer define the entirety of relational experience. Instead, connection becomes something the nervous system can tolerate and even seek out.

Security, in this sense, is not the absence of fear or vulnerability. Rather, it reflects the growing capacity of the nervous system to remain regulated and present in the context of relationship. When this capacity develops, the patterns that once seemed permanent begin to soften.

In this way, attachment security is not simply inherited from early childhood. Under the right relational conditions, it can be learned, strengthened, and embodied throughout the course of life.

References

Dana, D. (2018). The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation. W. W. Norton & Company. https://virtualmmx.ddns.net/gbooks/ThePolyvagalTheoryinTherapyEngagingtheRhythmofRegulationNortonSeriesonInterpersonalNeurobiology.pdf

Levine, P. A. (2010). In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness. North Atlantic Books. https://archive.org/details/inunspokenvoiceh0000levi

Maté, G. (2022). The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture. Penguin Random House. https://ia601504.us.archive.org/23/items/the-myth-of-normal-by-gabor-mate/The%20Myth%20of%20Normal%20by%20Gabor%20Mate.pdf

Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation. W. W. Norton & Company. https://archive.org/details/polyvagaltheoryn0000porg

Van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking. https://ia601604.us.archive.org/35/items/the-body-keeps-the-score-pdf/The-Body-Keeps-the-Score-PDF.pdf

Wired for Survival, Longing for Connection: How Attachment Styles Play Out in Adult Love

Benjamin Fry — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 05:00:00 +0000

As soon as we are born, we inherently learn to relate to others in order to survive. Before we start to use language, before we can think our way through experiences, we feel our way through it. The nervous system, exquisitely sensitive, reads the world not in words but in safety and danger, closeness and distance, attunement and rupture. What we come to call love in adulthood is, in many ways, the continuation of these early bodily negotiations. It is less a conscious choice than a deeply patterned response, shaped by our earliest bonds.

Attachment is not simply about how we relate to others, but about how our nervous system has learned to survive.

The Nervous System – Love as a State, Not a Concept

Much of what unfolds in adult relationships is not driven by conscious intention but by the autonomic nervous system. Stephen Porges’ Polyvagal Theory offers a lens through which we can understand this more deeply. Our nervous system continuously scans for cues of safety or threat, shaping whether we move towards connection, into fight or flight, or into collapse.

When we feel safe, we enter what Deb Dana calls the “ventral vagal state,” where connection feels safe and therefore possible. We can make eye contact, listen, and feel the warmth of another person’s presence. But when the nervous system detects danger, often based on past experiences rather than present reality, it shifts. We may become anxious, hypervigilant, or withdrawn. These responses are not choices but adaptive strategies.

In intimate relationships, this means that moments of closeness can paradoxically activate fear. A partner’s silence might be interpreted as abandonment. A request for space might feel like rejection. The body reacts before the mind can intervene. We are not simply responding to the person in front of us, but are constantly responding to an entire history encoded in our physiology.

Attachment Patterns – The Echo of Early Bonds

John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth described attachment styles as patterns formed in early relationships with caregivers. These patterns, secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganised, become templates for how we expect love to feel.

Anxious attachment often carries a deep longing for closeness, accompanied by a fear of loss. The nervous system is primed for inconsistency, scanning for signs of withdrawal. Avoidant attachment, by contrast, tends to associate closeness with overwhelm. Distance becomes a way of maintaining regulation, even if it comes at the cost of connection.

Disorganised attachment reflects a more complex experience, where the source of safety is also the source of fear. This creates a push-pull dynamic, a simultaneous longing for and fear of intimacy.

Gabor Maté reminds us that these adaptations are not pathologies, but are intelligent responses to the environments in which they developed. As children, we are faced with an impossible dilemma between authenticity and attachment. When those two needs come into conflict, attachment almost always wins. We learn to shape ourselves in ways that preserve connection, even if it means disconnecting from our own needs.

In adulthood, these adaptations can become rigid. What once protected us now constrains us. The strategies that ensure survival can undermine intimacy.

Trauma – When the Past Lives in the Present

Trauma is not only what happened, but it is also what remains unresolved in the body. Bessel van der Kolk speaks of trauma as something that is “remembered” not just cognitively, but somatically. The body keeps the score.

In relationships, this means that seemingly small interactions can activate disproportionate responses. Reactions such as a raised voice, a delayed message or a change in tone can trigger states of alarm or shutdown. The nervous system does not distinguish between past and present, but responds to perceived threat.

This is why many couples find themselves caught in repetitive cycles. One partner pursues, the other withdraws. One escalates, the other shuts down. Each is responding not only to the other but to the echoes of earlier experiences.

Understanding this shifts the narrative from blame to compassion. Rather than asking, “What is wrong with you?” we begin to ask, “What happened to you?” and, more importantly, “What is happening in your nervous system right now?”

Boundaries – The Bridge Between Self and Other

Healthy relationships require boundaries, yet for many, boundaries are fraught with difficulty. If early experiences taught us that our needs were unwelcome or unsafe, we may struggle to assert them. We may overextend, seeking approval, or withdraw entirely to avoid vulnerability.

Boundaries are not walls, but necessary points of contact. They define where one person ends, and another begins, allowing for genuine connection rather than enmeshment or isolation.

From a nervous system perspective, boundaries help create safety. When we can say no, when we can express our needs without fear of rejection, the body relaxes. We are no longer in survival mode, and we can engage from a place of choice. Boundaries are both cognitive decisions and embodied experiences. When we learn to listen to the subtle signals of discomfort or ease, we begin to act in ways that support our regulation.

This is not about rigid rules but about attunement, to ourselves and to others.

Co-Regulation – Healing in Relationship

While much of our conditioning occurs in relationship to others, so too does our healing. Humans are not designed to regulate in isolation. We are social beings, wired for co-regulation.

Co-regulation refers to the way our nervous systems influence each other. A calm, grounded presence can help soothe an activated system. Eye contact, tone of voice, and physical proximity all contribute to a sense of safety.

Deb Dana describes this as “borrowing” another’s nervous system. When we cannot access regulation on our own, we can find it through connection. This is particularly important in intimate relationships, where the stakes feel high, and the triggers are often close to the surface.

However, co-regulation requires awareness. If both partners are dysregulated, they may amplify each other’s distress. Learning to recognise one’s own state and to communicate it becomes essential and very powerful.

This is where compassion becomes transformative. When we can see our partner’s reactions not as attacks but as expressions of nervous system activation, we create space for something different. We move from reactivity to responsiveness and acceptance.

Healing – From Survival to Connection

Healing is not about eliminating our attachment patterns but about bringing awareness to them. It is about expanding our capacity to stay present, even when the nervous system is activated.

This involves developing what Porges calls “neuroception of safety”, which is the ability to recognise when we are safe, even if our body initially says otherwise. It means learning to track our internal states, to notice when we are moving into fight, flight, or freeze, and to gently guide ourselves back to connection.

Practices that support regulation, such as breathwork, movement, and mindfulness, can be helpful. But equally important is the relational context. Safe, attuned relationships provide the conditions for new experiences. They allow the nervous system to learn that closeness does not have to mean danger.

Gabor Maté speaks of the possibility of “compassionate inquiry,” a way of exploring our patterns with curiosity rather than judgment. This shift is crucial. Shame keeps us stuck, whereas compassion opens the door to change.

Over time, as we experience safety in new ways, our patterns begin to soften. We become less reactive and more flexible. We can tolerate the discomfort of vulnerability without collapsing or defending against it.

We begin to experience love not as a threat to survival but as a source of nourishment.

The Paradox of Intimacy

At its core, the challenge of adult love is a paradox. We are wired for survival, yet we long for connection. The very strategies that keep us safe can also keep us alone.

Moving towards intimacy requires courage. It asks us to stay present with sensations that once signalled danger. It asks us to risk being seen, to set boundaries, to remain open in the face of uncertainty.

But it also offers the possibility of something profoundly healing. When we can bring awareness to our nervous system, when we can meet ourselves and our partners with compassion, we create the conditions for a different kind of relationship, one that is not driven solely by the past, but shaped by the present.

In this space, love becomes less about managing fear and more about experiencing connection. Not perfectly, not without rupture, but with a growing capacity to return to one another.

And perhaps this is the essence of healing, not the absence of activation, but the ability to find our way back to safety, again and again, in the presence of another.

References

Ainsworth, M. D. S. (1978). Patterns of Attachment: A Psychological Study of the Strange Situation. Erlbaum. https://archive.org/details/patternsofattach0000unse_g0x9/page/n3/mode/2up

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and Loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. Basic Books.https://ia800205.us.archive.org/5/items/attachmentlossvo00john/attachmentlossvo00john.pdf

Dana, D. (2018). The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation. W. W. Norton. https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2018-26630-000

Maté, G. (2019). When the Body Says No: The Cost of Hidden Stress. Vintage. https://archive.org/details/whenbodysaysnoco0000mate

Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation. W. W. Norton. https://archive.org/details/polyvagaltheoryn0000porg

van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking. https://ia601604.us.archive.org/35/items/the-body-keeps-the-score-pdf/The-Body-Keeps-the-Score-PDF.pdf

Anxious Attachment and the Fear of Abandonment

Benjamin Fry — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 10:00:00 +0000

Anxious attachment is often misunderstood as insecurity, emotional dependency, or a need for constant reassurance. In reality, it is a highly organised survival strategy shaped by our earliest and most important relationships. This attachment style is not a weakness of character, but is informed by a nervous system that has learned, under real conditions of uncertainty, that connection is fragile and must be actively maintained to prevent loss. The fear of abandonment is therefore physiological in nature.

Attachment theory, first articulated by John Bowlby, reframed human bonding as a biological system designed to preserve proximity to caregivers under threat. In this model, attachment is not primarily about affection, but is about safety. When caregivers are consistently available, predictable, and emotionally regulated, the child’s nervous system learns that connection is reliable. When caregivers are inconsistent, emotionally overwhelmed, intrusive, withdrawn, or frightening, the child’s nervous system does not learn safety. It learns vigilance.

How Hyperactivation Becomes a Life Pattern

Mary Ainsworth’s research demonstrated that anxiously attached children show heightened distress during separation and difficulty settling even after reunion. This pattern reflects a deeper problem in that the attachment system activates, but it does not successfully deactivate. This means that although the threat may be gone, the nervous system is unable to calm down. Over time, this becomes a pattern of hyperactivation in the context of intimacy.

In adulthood, this unhelpful pattern repeats itself in romantic relationships. Those of us who are anxiously attached do not simply want closeness, we need it to regulate ourselves. When proximity feels uncertain, our bodies react as if our survival itself is at risk. This is why anxious attachment often presents with rumination, urgency, emotional flooding, and a persistent preoccupation with the availability of attachment figures. It can make sustaining true connection really difficult.

The Nervous System and the Fear of Relational Threat

From a nervous system perspective, this is best understood as chronic sympathetic activation in relational contexts. Subtle shifts in tone of voice, delayed responses, or perceived withdrawal from our partners and loved ones are interpreted not as neutral fluctuations in relationship dynamics, but as signals of imminent abandonment. Our nervous systems are unable to assess these situations through narrative reasoning and rely instead on pattern recognition built from our early experiences.

This is why reassurance from others rarely resolves the anxiety for long. Reassurance is processed cognitively, but the fear originates from nervous system dysregulation. The body learned that safety is temporary. It therefore remains prepared for loss even in the presence of comfort.

Developmental Trauma and the Roots of Emotional Vigilance

Many individuals with anxious attachment grow up in environments where emotional attunement was inconsistent. The caregiver may have been loving but overwhelmed, affectionate but unpredictable, emotionally available at times and withdrawn at others. In these conditions, the child learns that maintaining connection requires vigilance, performance, and emotional monitoring. The attachment system becomes task-oriented rather than trust-oriented.

From a developmental trauma perspective, this is not always the result of overt abuse. Emotional inconsistency, unresolved caregiver trauma, role reversal, and chronic misattunement are sufficient to shape an anxiously organised nervous system. As van der Kolk has emphasised, trauma is defined not only by what happened, but by what the person could not safely process and regulate.

When Attachment Becomes Identity

Over time, anxious attachment often becomes intertwined with our identity. We learn to track others more than ourselves. We can become skilled at anticipating emotional shifts, adjusting behaviour to maintain closeness, and scanning for rejection. Gabor Maté’s observation that children will sacrifice authenticity to preserve attachment is particularly relevant here. When emotional needs are inconsistently met, the child learns that self-expression may threaten connection. The result is a pattern in which love becomes conditional on performance, emotional availability, or an erasure of self.

Protest Behaviour and the Intolerance of Ambiguity

Anxious attachment also carries a profound intolerance for relational ambiguity. Space, silence, and emotional neutrality are not experienced as neutral states. They are experienced as warnings. This leads to patterns of protest behaviour in adult relationships, such as attempts to restore closeness through pursuit, reassurance-seeking, emotional escalation, or over-functioning. These behaviours are not manipulative. They are subconscious attempts to regulate what feels like a threat.

However, these same strategies often intensify relational instability, particularly when paired with avoidant partners. The anxious partner moves toward threat by increasing proximity, whilst the avoidant partner naturally moves away by increasing distance. Each person’s nervous system confirms the other’s deepest expectations. The anxious system experiences rejection. The avoidant system experiences engulfment. What emerges is not incompatibility of personality, but a clash of attachment styles.

The Cost of Chronic Relational Hyperarousal

The chronic state of relational hyperarousal common in anxious attachment takes a significant psychological toll. Many individuals develop persistent anxiety symptoms, difficulty tolerating aloneness, compulsive reassurance seeking, and a collapse of self in intimate relationships. Their sense of stability can only be found outside of themselves. When the connection is steady, they feel grounded. When it is disrupted, their internal coherence deteriorates.

Why Insight Alone Is Not Enough

For this reason, healing anxious attachment cannot be achieved through insight alone. Understanding one’s pattern does not resolve the physiological threat response that drives it. Regulation must occur at the level at which dysregulation is generated, in the nervous system.

From a somatic and trauma-informed perspective, healing involves increasing the capacity to remain present in the body without the pursuit of external regulation. Peter Levine’s work emphasises that trauma symptoms resolve when the nervous system completes defensive responses that were once overwhelming. In anxious attachment, the incomplete response is not flight or freeze, but constant mobilisation without successful deactivation. The system learned how to activate, but not how to settle.

From External Regulation to Internal Stability

As regulation capacity increases, individuals gradually learn that emotional discomfort does not require immediate relational action. They learn to experience fear without changing their entire behaviour to escape that feeling. This creates an important internal shift, and safety becomes something that can be generated within rather than exclusively through proximity to another person.

This does not stop a desire for connection. It changes its function. Instead of connection serving as the primary regulator of the nervous system, it becomes a relational choice rather than a biological emergency. Dependence gives way to interdependence.

Secure Attachment as Nervous System Trust

The deeper transformation in healing anxious attachment is not the absence of fear, but the creation of internal self-trust. Rather than the belief that others will never leave, we learn to believe that we can survive uncertainty without falling apart. With this, intimacy begins to feel less like a survival task and more like a relational experience. Boundaries become possible without panic. Space apart becomes tolerable without catastrophe. Desire no longer requires urgency in order to feel real.

Adaptation, Not Pathology

Anxious attachment is not a pathology. It is an adaptation that was supposed to support us. It reflects a nervous system that learned to maintain connection under conditions of emotional unpredictability. That adaptation once served a vital protective function. In adulthood, however, what once preserved attachment may now destabilise it.

The work of healing is not to eliminate this adaptation, but to update it, and to teach the nervous system that connection no longer requires consistent fear. When we learn to regulate ourselves, we can be open to lasting connections.

Reference List

Ainsworth, M. D. S., Blehar, M. C., Waters, E., & Wall, S. (1978). Patterns of attachment: A psychological study of the strange situation. Lawrence Erlbaum. https://mindsplain.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Ainsworth-Patterns-of-Attachment.pdf

Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent-child attachment and healthy human development. Basic Books. https://www.increaseproject.eu/images/DOWNLOADS/IO2/HU/CURR_M4-A13_Bowlby_(EN-only)_20170920_HU_final.pdf

Levine, P. A. (2010). In an unspoken voice: How the body releases trauma and restores goodness. North Atlantic Books. https://www.scirp.org/reference/referencespapers?referenceid=2656772

Maté, G. (2018). In the realm of hungry ghosts: Close encounters with addiction. North Atlantic Books. https://www.academia.edu/89900118/Gabor_Mat%C3%A9_In_the_Realm_of_Hungry_Ghosts_Close_Encounters_with_Addiction

van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. Viking. https://ia601604.us.archive.org/35/items/the-body-keeps-the-score-pdf/The-Body-Keeps-the-Score-PDF.pdf

When Independence Is a Trauma Response: Avoidant Attachment in Relationships

Benjamin Fry — Thu, 30 Oct 2025 12:50:13 +0000

We often admire independence. The ability to stand on our own, to support ourselves, to need little from others and to be self-sufficient. These qualities are seen as signs of maturity and strength. But sometimes what looks like independence is actually armour. For many people, especially those shaped by early experiences of neglect and trauma, independence is less of a choice and more of a survival strategy. This is what we see in avoidant attachment: the appearance of self-reliance that hides a nervous system braced against the vulnerability of connection.

The Roots of Avoidance

Attachment theory, developed by John Bowlby (1969), shows us how children adapt to the caregiving environment they find themselves in. When a caregiver is consistently responsive, children learn that their needs can be met in relationships with others. But when caregivers are dismissive, emotionally unavailable, or uncomfortable with intimacy, the child faces a dilemma. The longing for closeness does not disappear, but expressing it often leads to rejection or shame. To manage this pain, the child learns to minimise attachment needs. They turn away rather than reach out.

Mary Ainsworth’s (1979) “Strange Situation” experiments demonstrated this vividly. Infants with avoidant attachment styles did not cry when their mothers left the room, nor did they seek comfort when she returned. On the surface, they appeared independent. But physiological measures told a different story, as their stress responses were highly activated. The lion was there, but it was hidden behind a mask of self-sufficiency.

Trauma and the Nervous System

From a trauma perspective, avoidance is not a personality flaw but a nervous system strategy. As Stephen Porges (2011) explains in polyvagal theory, our bodies constantly scan for cues of safety or danger. When closeness feels threatening because in the past it led to pain or abandonment, the nervous system adapts by withdrawing. This withdrawal is not a conscious decision, but it is biology doing its best to protect us.

Bessel van der Kolk (2014) reminds us that trauma lives in the body. For the avoidantly attached person, intimacy may trigger survival responses even in the absence of actual danger, as their system remembers that closeness once meant risk.

The result is a life lived at arm’s length, where self-reliance is celebrated outwardly but isolation gnaws inwardly.

Independence or Isolation?

Here lies the paradox, as what looks like strength is often a wound. The avoidantly attached adult may be successful, competent, and admired for their independence, but beneath this surface, there is often a deep loneliness. The nervous system is caught in a loop that involves longing for connection but fearing the vulnerability it requires. The lion of the past is projected into the present, and the body reacts accordingly.

This is why avoidant attachment is not simply a style or preference. It is a trauma response. It is the body remembering that to need is to be hurt, and so it teaches the mind to dismiss needs altogether.

Independence becomes a fortress, and within its walls, the nervous system never truly rests.

The Cost in Relationships

In adult relationships, avoidant attachment often shows up as difficulty with intimacy, difficulty trusting, or a tendency to withdraw when emotions run high. Partners of avoidantly attached individuals may feel shut out or unloved, even when affection is present. The avoidant partner is not cold by nature, but their nervous system has been shaped to associate closeness with danger. When conflict or vulnerability arises, their body moves into survival mode. They shut down, distance themselves, or intellectualise feelings to keep the lion at bay.

Donald Winnicott’s (1960) concept of the “false self” is useful here. The avoidant individual presents a competent, composed exterior, while the true self, the part that longs for connection, remains hidden for fear of rejection. This false self may function well in the world, but in relationships, it creates a painful gap. Intimacy requires the presence of the true self, and healing requires that this hidden part feels safe enough to emerge.

Repair and Regulation

The good news is that avoidant attachment is not fixed. Healing lies not in forcing intimacy, but in gently retraining the nervous system to tolerate and trust closeness. Deb Dana (2018) describes how regulation and co-regulation are central to this process. For the avoidantly attached person, small, safe experiences of connection help to heal the nervous system. Over time, the body can learn that closeness is not always dangerous, that the lion is not really in the room.

Repair in relationships becomes the fertile ground for this healing. Each time a rupture is acknowledged and repaired, the nervous system receives new evidence that connection does not always end in abandonment, and vulnerability does not always invite shame. Slowly, the body learns to relax its guard. Healing happens not through perfection but through repeated experiences of rupture and repair, where safety is rediscovered.

Letting Go of the Armour

Letting go of the armour of independence is not easy. For many, it has been a lifelong strategy for survival. The idea of relying on others may feel unbearable, even dangerous. But true independence is not the absence of need, but the freedom to need without fear. As we grow in regulation and as we experience safe connection, the protective walls can soften around us. The self no longer has to hide. We can stand strong, not because we are alone, but because we are connected.

Conclusion

Avoidant attachment teaches us how deeply trauma shapes the nervous system and our capacity for intimacy. What looks like independence may, in fact, be the scar of unmet needs. Healing begins when we recognise this independence for what it is, a trauma response. Through nervous system regulation, safe relationships, and the courage to repair, we can move beyond the armour of avoidance. In doing so, we discover that true strength lies not in standing alone, but in allowing ourselves to be seen, held, and connected.

References

Ainsworth, M.D.S. (1979). Infant–mother attachment. American Psychologist, 34(10), 932–937. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.34.10.932 https://local.psy.miami.edu/faculty/dmessinger/c_c/rsrcs/rdgs/attach/ainsworth.1979.amer_psych.pdf

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and Loss: Vol. 1. Attachment. New York: Basic Books. https://mindsplain.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/ATTACHMENT_AND_LOSS_VOLUME_I_ATTACHMENT.pdf

Dana, D. (2018). The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. https://www.scirp.org/reference/referencespapers?referenceid=2897973

Porges, S.W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. https://archive.org/details/polyvagaltheoryn0000porg/page/352/mode/2up

Van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. New York: Viking. https://archive.org/details/polyvagaltheoryn0000porg/page/352/mode/2up

Winnicott, D.W. (1960). The theory of the parent–infant relationship. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 41, 585–595. https://tcf-website-media-library.s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/21095241/Winnicott-D.-1960.-The-Theory-of-the-Parent-Infant-Relationship.-International-Journal-of-Psycho-Analysis.-411.-pp.585-595-1.pdf

How Attachment Styles Influence Relationships: Disorganised

Benjamin Fry — Sun, 11 May 2025 08:00:00 +0000

When it comes to human connection, attachment styles shape how we love and relate. Among the four main attachment styles—secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganised—the disorganised attachment style is perhaps the most complex and misunderstood. This style, often rooted in early trauma, creates unique relational challenges that can affect intimacy, self-worth, and emotional regulation. Understanding disorganised attachment and how to heal from it requires an integrated approach that addresses the mind and the body—particularly the nervous system. Boundaries and containment also play a crucial role in recovery and creating healthier relationships.

What Is Disorganised Attachment?

Disorganised attachment, sometimes called “fearful-avoidant,” is characterised by a profound inner conflict: the need for connection is deeply felt, but so is a fear of intimacy. This attachment style often stems from childhood environments that were both a source of comfort and fear—such as those involving abuse, neglect, or inconsistent caregiving (Main & Solomon, 1986). Children in such environments may not develop a coherent strategy for seeking safety and closeness, leading to chaotic or contradictory behaviours in adult relationships.

In adulthood, individuals with disorganised attachment might alternate between clinging and distancing, struggle with trust, and have difficulty regulating emotions. These behaviours are not conscious choices but survival adaptations formed early in life. To understand and heal disorganised attachment, it is helpful to look at the role of the nervous system.

The Role of the Nervous System

Trauma, especially relational trauma, imprints itself not only in our memories but also in our biology. According to The Polyvagal Theory (Porges, 2011), the autonomic nervous system governs our responses to safety and threat. For people with disorganised attachment, the nervous system is often dysregulated—frequently shifting between sympathetic arousal (fight or flight) and dorsal vagal shutdown (freeze).

This dysregulation means that even minor relational triggers can provoke seemingly overblown reactions: panic, dissociation, rage, or numbness. Nervous system regulation becomes crucial for healing because it helps individuals develop the capacity to stay present, tolerate emotional discomfort, and build secure connections over time.

Trauma-informed practices and techniques such as breathwork, somatic experiencing (Levine, 2010), learning about triggers and vagus trauma-informed practices can support regulation. Importantly, working with a trauma-informed therapist can create a “co-regulating” relationship, helping the individual learn to calm their system in the presence of another—an essential skill for healthy attachment.

Boundaries: A Path to Safety and Autonomy

People with disorganised attachment often struggle with boundaries, and often flit between being extremely close and firmly distant, either enmeshing with others or erecting rigid walls between them and their partner. This is a learned response: when safety in relationships has historically been unpredictable or dangerous, boundaries become blurred or defensive. However, healing requires relearning what it means to have—and respect—clear, consistent boundaries.

Boundaries are not just about saying “no” but also about knowing what we are responsible for and what we are not. This creates a sense of agency and autonomy, both essential for developing a secure self. Learning to set boundaries can feel threatening at first, especially if we fear abandonment or rejection, but with time, boundaries become a source of empowerment rather than disconnection.

Boundaries also create emotional safety, which is essential for nervous system regulation. When we know our limits and that they will be honoured, we can relax more fully into connection, reducing the fear and hypervigilance that so often accompany disorganised attachment.

Containment: Holding Emotional Experience

Containment, in the context of psychological healing, refers to the ability to “hold” emotional experience without becoming overwhelmed by it. For individuals with disorganised attachment, emotional intensity often feels like a flood—unmanageable and frightening. Without containment, emotions spill out in destructive ways or get buried deep, only to resurface later.

In therapy, containment is partly provided by the therapist, who models emotional regulation and offers a safe space to explore difficult feelings. Over time, the individual internalises this sense of safety, learning to “contain” themselves. This involves developing tools for self-soothing, reflection, and emotional expression that do not rely solely on others for stability.

Containment also intersects with nervous system work: when the body is regulated, the mind is better able to hold complexity without tipping into chaos. This capacity allows for deeper intimacy in relationships, as we are no longer driven by unconscious patterns of reactivity or avoidance.

Healing Is Possible

Healing from disorganised attachment is not linear, nor is it quick. It requires a multidimensional approach that includes relational, psychological, and somatic work. Central to this process is developing secure attachment—a state in which an individual, through therapy and self-awareness, develops the capacity for secure connection despite an insecure early environment (Siegel, 2010).

Key elements of healing include:

Therapeutic Relationships: A trauma-informed therapist provides a reparative experience, offering safety, consistency, and empathy.
Nervous System Regulation: Techniques such as grounding, breathwork, and somatic therapy help build physiological resilience.
Clear Boundaries: Learning to identify and honor personal limits fosters autonomy and reduces relational chaos.
Emotional Containment: Developing the ability to process emotions without overwhelm increases self-trust and stability.

Each of these elements supports the others. For example, better regulation allows for clearer boundaries; clearer boundaries create space for containment; containment reduces reactivity in relationships. Over time, these practices lead to a greater sense of safety in the world and within oneself.

In Relationship: From Chaos to Coherence

Disorganised attachment plays out most vividly in close relationships, where unresolved trauma meets the vulnerability of intimacy. But relationships can also be the safest and most important place to heal. With self-awareness and support, individuals can begin to choose differently—to pause before reacting, to speak their truth with kindness, and to offer themselves the compassion they may never have received.

This is not about becoming perfect. Rather, it’s about becoming present. Healing disorganised attachment means becoming someone who can stay with their experience, who can regulate through difficulty, and who can relate to others from a place of authenticity and care.

Embracing Transformation

Disorganised attachment may be rooted in chaos, but it does not have to define our lives. Through nervous system regulation, the cultivation of healthy boundaries, and the development of emotional containment, healing becomes not just possible but transformative. The path from disorganisation to integration is one of courage—but it leads to a life of deeper connection, greater resilience, and true intimacy.

References:

Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent child attachment and healthy human development. New York: Basic Books.https://www.scirp.org/reference/referencespapers?referenceid=556378

Main, M., & Solomon, J. (1986). Discovery of an insecure-disorganized/disoriented attachment pattern: Procedures, findings and implications for the classification of behavior. In T. B. Brazelton, & M. Yogman (Eds.), Affective development in infancy (pp. 95-124). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
https://www.scirp.org/reference/referencespapers?referenceid=1076926

Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W W Norton & Co.
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2011-04659-000

Levine, P. (2010) In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma. North Atlantic Books, Berkeley.
https://www.scirp.org/reference/referencespapers?referenceid=2656772

Siegel, D. J. (2010). The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are. Guilford Press.
https://colegiopspchubut.com.ar/storage/2024/09/Daniel-J.-Siegel-M.D.-The-Developing-Mind-Third-Edition_-How-Relationships-and-the-Brain-Interact-to-Shape-Who-We-Are.-Bonus-Brilliance-Audio-2020.pdf

How Attachment Styles Influence Relationships: Avoidant

Benjamin Fry — Thu, 24 Apr 2025 14:11:52 +0000

Attachment theory, developed by John Bowlby in the 1950s, gave us a map of how our early relationships shape the way we connect with others later in life. For people with avoidant attachment, early experiences of emotional unavailability can create a defence mechanism that lasts into adulthood (Bowlby, 1988). Avoidant individuals often distance themselves emotionally, preferring to rely on themselves rather than risk being vulnerable. This behavioural pattern is not just an emotional response—it’s deeply connected to the regulation of their nervous system. And while healing from avoidant attachment might seem daunting, it’s absolutely possible through boundary-setting, nervous system regulation, and emotional containment.

What is Avoidant Attachment?

The avoidant attachment style is a response to early caregivers who were emotionally unavailable or unresponsive. As babies, these children learned that their attempts for comfort were often ignored or met with indifference. In response, they adapted by suppressing their emotional needs and developing an internal belief that they could only rely on themselves.

As adults, the effects of this early experience show up as emotional distance in relationships. Avoidant individuals have a nervous system that’s conditioned to shut down during times of emotional distress. They may keep others at arm’s length, fearing that intimacy and emotional closeness will lead to hurt or disappointment (Wardecker et al., 2016). This is a classic case of how a dysregulated nervous system, shaped by early attachment experiences, influences adult relationships (Porges, 2003).

Avoidant Attachment in Adult Relationships

In relationships, people with avoidant attachment often seem cool, calm, and collected, but beneath that exterior, they are typically emotionally disconnected. They don’t lean on their partners for comfort and struggle to open up about their feelings. This emotional distance is a way of self-protecting, a shield formed to avoid the vulnerability that intimacy requires (Sagone, 2023).

Here are some ways avoidant attachment manifests in relationships:

Emotional Distance: Avoidant individuals often struggle to share their feelings. Their discomfort with vulnerability keeps them from expressing emotional needs or seeking support, even from a partner they love. Their nervous system, trained to stay closed off from emotional connection, might make it feel physically uncomfortable to engage deeply.

Prioritising Independence: Because their caregivers were unavailable or unresponsive, avoidant individuals often value their independence above all else. They have a deep-seated fear of losing their autonomy, and this fear triggers a flight response when emotional closeness arises. The need to preserve their independence often translates into pushing partners away when the relationship becomes too emotionally intense.

Difficulty with Vulnerability: For someone with an avoidant attachment style, vulnerability can feel like stepping into a minefield. Their nervous system has learned that emotional closeness equals emotional pain. Therefore, they suppress their feelings, convinced that being open will lead to rejection or disappointment.

Conflict Avoidance: When issues arise in the relationship, avoidant individuals may choose to shut down rather than engage. The very thought of emotional confrontation can trigger a fight-or-flight response in their nervous system. They may avoid difficult conversations, leaving problems unresolved and causing emotional distance to deepen.

The Cycle of Emotional Withdrawal

The cycle of emotional disconnection in relationships with an avoidant partner is often self-perpetuating. When an avoidant person withdraws, their partner typically tries to close the emotional gap, seeking more connection. But this only amplifies the avoidant person’s sense of overwhelm, leading them to retreat further. This back-and-forth can create significant tension and frustration on both sides, as the avoidant individual becomes more distant, and the partner feels rejected and unimportant.

This dynamic is a direct result of the nervous system’s response to emotional intimacy. For the avoidant person, their body and mind have been conditioned to see emotional closeness as a threat—something to be avoided at all costs. This is where the concept of containment comes in. In healthy relationships, both partners can provide each other with emotional containment, creating a safe space where vulnerability can be slowly explored and emotional needs can be met. Without this containment, avoidant individuals are more likely to withdraw, reinforcing the cycle of emotional disconnection.

The Role of Nervous System Regulation

One of the key pieces of healing avoidant attachment lies in nervous system regulation. The nervous system of someone with avoidant attachment has been shaped by early experiences of emotional neglect, leaving them with a “hyper-aroused” or “shut down” nervous system when it comes to emotional intimacy. Learning to regulate the nervous system through practices like mindfulness, deep breathing, and somatic experiencing can help individuals with avoidant attachment break free from this response.

Nervous system regulation is about learning to manage overwhelming emotions rather than suppressing them. By intentionally calming the nervous system, avoidant individuals can slowly shift their response to intimacy from withdrawal to connection. Practices like grounding, deep breathing, and other self-soothing techniques help to create a calm and contained emotional space, making it easier to stay present during vulnerable moments with a partner.

Boundaries and Containment: The Key to Healing

An important part of emotional healing for avoidant individuals is learning how to set and respect boundaries—both for themselves and in relationships. This is a critical aspect of containment. Setting boundaries allows individuals to feel safe enough to engage in emotional intimacy at their own pace, without feeling overwhelmed.

In relationships, it’s vital to have a partner who understands the importance of boundaries and who can offer containment without becoming overwhelmed themselves. A partner who respects emotional space while also being present can help the avoidant individual feel safe enough to explore vulnerability and intimacy.

For someone with avoidant attachment, this might look like communicating openly about what feels comfortable and what feels like too much. For example, an avoidant partner might need space after an emotional conversation or might need time to process feelings before sharing them. By honouring these boundaries and allowing emotional regulation to take place, both partners can create a healthier dynamic of trust and emotional closeness.

Healing the Avoidant Attachment Style

While avoidant attachment presents unique challenges, healing is absolutely possible. The key is to gradually build emotional awareness, practice vulnerability, and incorporate emotional regulation techniques into daily life. Here are a few steps that can aid in the healing process:

Develop Emotional Awareness: The first step is becoming aware of one’s emotions. Practising mindfulness, journaling, or talking with a therapist can help avoidant individuals become more in tune with their feelings and better able to communicate them to others.

Start Small with Vulnerability: Opening up emotionally may feel like a threat, but vulnerability is essential for intimacy. Begin with small steps—sharing a feeling, expressing a thought—and gradually increase emotional openness. Over time, these small actions will help desensitise the nervous system to emotional closeness.

Therapy and Somatic Practices: Therapy, especially attachment-based or trauma-informed therapy, can be an essential part of healing avoidant attachment. Therapy can help explore the root causes of emotional withdrawal and introduce techniques for nervous system regulation, like breathing exercises or body-based practices (such as yoga or somatic experiencing), that help the individual reconnect to their emotions safely.

Create Safe Relationships: Building healthy relationships based on respect, boundaries, and containment is essential for healing. A partner who understands the avoidant style and can provide emotional space will help foster a sense of safety and security, making emotional intimacy possible.

It’s Never Too Late to Heal

Avoidant attachment is often the result of early emotional neglect, and it can create significant challenges in adult relationships. However, with a focus on nervous system regulation, emotional containment, and healthy boundaries, individuals with avoidant attachment can learn to build secure and emotionally fulfilling relationships. It’s never too late to begin healing—by creating safe spaces, practising vulnerability, and managing emotions, individuals can break the cycle of emotional withdrawal and build stronger, more connected relationships.

References

Porges, S.W. (1995) ‘Orienting in a defensive world: Mammalian modifications of our evolutionary heritage. A Polyvagal Theory’, Psychophysiology. Received March 6, 1995; Accepted March 23, 1995, 32(4), pp. 301–318. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8986.1995.tb01213.x

Porges, S.W. (2003) ‘Social engagement and attachment: a phylogenetic perspective’, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1008(1), pp. 31–47
https://nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1196/annals.1301.004

Sagone E, Commodari E, Indiana ML, La Rosa VL. (2003) Exploring the Association between Attachment Style, Psychological Well-Being, and Relationship Status in Young Adults and Adults-A Cross-Sectional Study.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10047625/

Sheinbaum T, Kwapil TR, Ballespí S, Mitjavila M, Chun CA, Silvia PJ, Barrantes-Vidal N. Attachment style predicts affect, cognitive appraisals, and social functioning in daily life. Front Psychology. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4364085/#:~:text=In%20contrast%2C%20compared%20to%20secure,differentiate%20less%20between%20close%20and

Wardecker, B.M., Chopik, W.J., Moors, A.C., Edelstein, R.S. (2016). Avoidant Attachment Style. In: Zeigler-Hill, V., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_2015-1

How Attachment Styles Influence Relationships: Anxious Attachment

Benjamin Fry — Wed, 02 Apr 2025 11:49:36 +0000

Attachment theory, introduced by John Bowlby, sheds light on the profound impact that early childhood relationships have on our emotional and psychological development (Bowlby, 1988). Central to this theory is the idea that our earliest connections with our caregivers – usually our mothers – lay the groundwork for how we will relate to others throughout our lives. In particular, the anxious attachment style – which often stems from inconsistent caregiving – can have a lasting influence on relationships, especially when it comes to emotional regulation and healing after trauma.

The Roots of Anxious Attachment: Trauma and Emotional Regulation

Anxious attachment often emerges from attachment trauma—when a caregiver’s emotional availability is unpredictable. For a child, this inconsistency in caregiving creates confusion, anxiety, and a fear of abandonment. At the core of anxious attachment is the child’s difficulty regulating their own emotional responses because they were not consistently soothed in their early years. Over time, the child learns that in order to feel safe, they must alter their behaviour to make sure they receive love.

This causes nervous system dysregulation, which affects the child’s ability to self-soothe and manage emotions in future relationships. Emotional resilience after trauma can be a challenging skill to develop, but it is essential for healing anxious attachment and improving relationship dynamics.

As adults, those of us with an anxious attachment style may find it difficult to regulate our emotions in relationships, especially when we fear rejection or abandonment (Lahousen et al., 2018). This can manifest as a seemingly irrational need for closeness or validation, both of which are rooted in the need to feel emotionally secure. However, this behavior often causes tension in relationships, as the intense demand for reassurance can overwhelm our partners, creating a cycle of anxiety and emotional distress.

Why Anxiously Attached Individuals Repeat Unhealthy Cycles

One of the most challenging aspects of anxious attachment is the tendency to repeat harmful relationship patterns (Speranza et al., 2022). Those of us with anxious attachments often find ourselves in relationships that reinforce our fears of abandonment, creating a cycle that feels impossible to break. The reason we attract the same relationships, whether with emotionally unavailable partners or people who are inconsistent in their love and care, can be traced back to unresolved attachment trauma.

The inner child often remains unconsciously drawn to relationships that mirror early trauma, as this is familiar, even if it’s painful. This can lead to the repeating of toxic relationship patterns—whether through choosing emotionally distant partners, remaining in unhealthy relationships, or trying to fix someone else’s emotional wounds as a way to avoid facing our own.

Breaking these cycles is a critical part of healing anxious attachment. It requires not only emotional regulation but also a shift in the way we perceive our own self-worth in relationships. Healing emotional abandonment wounds and rebuilding trust after childhood trauma are essential parts of this process. As we heal our attachment wounds, we begin to form healthier, more secure relationships which are based on mutual trust and emotional availability rather than fear and insecurity.

Healing Attachment Trauma: Overcoming Anxious Attachment in Relationships

Healing attachment trauma is a difficult but achievable process that involves understanding the roots of our anxious attachment and learning how to create more secure emotional bonds. The foundation of this healing often begins with therapy, particularly trauma-informed therapy, which helps us understand how early attachment wounds shape our present-day behaviors. For those of us with anxious attachment, this means learning how to regulate our emotions and break free from toxic relationship patterns.

Understanding the Polyvagal Theory can also help healing. According to the Polyvagal Theory, the nervous system plays a critical role in our ability to feel safe and connected (Porges, 1995). Learning to regulate the nervous system through tools like breathwork, mindfulness, and grounding techniques can significantly impact how we relate to others. This type of work helps regulate the nervous system by allowing those of us with trauma to shift out of a survival state and create more secure, grounded connections (Porges, 2003).

Personal Healing and Growth: Rebuilding Trust and Self-Worth

For adults with anxious attachment, understanding how trauma affects self-worth in relationships is an essential step in the healing journey. Those with anxious attachment often struggle with feelings of inadequacy and a fear that they are unworthy of love or attention. These negative beliefs about ourselves are rooted in early attachment experiences where our emotional needs were either inconsistently met or ignored. This, in turn, can lead to a lack of self-worth and difficulty trusting others.

Therapy plays a pivotal role in helping people process past trauma, develop emotional resilience, challenge these negative beliefs, and build healthy relationships. Healing attachment trauma is not just about learning to regulate emotions; it’s about learning to trust our own inner worth and ability to create lasting, secure connections.

The Path Toward Secure Attachment: Trauma-Informed Therapy and Healing

Healing from anxious attachment requires patience, commitment, and a willingness to understand abandonment fears. By learning strategies in nervous system regulation and focusing on healthy boundaries and containment, daily life can become more manageable and gradually, attachment wounds will begin to heal. By recognising how early attachment experiences influence our emotional responses, we can teach ourselves strategies for regulating emotions in relationships.

Practices like mindfulness, meditation, and breathwork can help those of us with anxious attachment learn to regulate our nervous systems, reducing anxiety and creating space for healthier relationship dynamics. These practices, or tools, can help us become more attuned to our bodily sensations and emotions, grounding us and allowing us to create a stronger sense of safety within ourselves and our relationships.

By committing to self-healing, breaking unhealthy patterns, and learning to regulate emotions, those with anxious attachment can begin to build the emotional resilience needed for healthy, loving relationships. Overcoming anxious attachment is not only about healing past wounds but also about creating a future where one can feel secure, loved, and truly connected to others.

Transforming Attachment, Transforming Relationships

With boundaries, containment, and strategies for nervous system regulation, we can prevent past trauma from overwhelming the present. Those with anxious attachment can break free from patterns of emotional instability and create deeper, more meaningful connections with others. The key lies in creating trust – in both oneself and others – and in learning how to self-soothe in ways that are healthy, grounded, and sustainable. It’s through this process that individuals with anxious attachment can move toward secure, loving relationships and emotional healing after trauma.

References

Bowlby, J. (1969) Attachment and Loss: Volume 1. Attachment, New York, Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1973) Attachment and Loss: Volume 2. Separation: Anxiety and Anger, New York, Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1988) A Secure Base: Parent-Child Attachment and Healthy Human Development, New York, Basic Books.

Lahousen T, Unterrainer HF, Kapfhammer HP. Psychobiology of Attachment and Trauma-Some General Remarks From a Clinical Perspective. Front Psychiatry. 2019 Dec 12;10:914. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00914. PMID: 31920761; PMCID: PMC6920243.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6920243/

PORGES, S.W. (1995) ‘Orienting in a defensive world: Mammalian modifications of our evolutionary heritage. A Polyvagal Theory’, Psychophysiology. Received March 6, 1995; Accepted March 23, 1995, 32(4), pp. 301–318.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8986.1995.tb01213.x

Porges, S.W. (2003) ‘Social engagement and attachment: a phylogenetic perspective’, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1008(1), pp. 31–47.
https://nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1196/annals.1301.004

Speranza, A.M. et al. (2022) ‘The role of complex trauma and attachment patterns in intimate partner violence’, Frontiers in Psychology, 12. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.769584.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.769584/full

Adult Attachment: Love Avoidance

Benjamin Fry — Fri, 13 Mar 2020 13:00:00 +0000

Even when a child’s early relationships weren’t straightforward or particularly healthy, they still grow up to have another go at forming intimate relationships. However, we tend to end up being the person we learned to be when we were young.

The attachment styles that we learn in our early childhood greatly influence the relationships we have in adulthood. When the mother, or caregiver, demonstrates a well-regulated nervous system, the baby will follow and exhibit the same behaviour in their adult relationships.

A mother that overreacts to triggers, where the reaction is greater than than the intensity of the stimulus, teaches the baby to do the same, which carries on into their adult relationships.

A mother that under-reacts to triggers, where the reaction is much weaker or even non-existent in relation to the stimulus, will teach this pattern of behaviour to the baby, who will carry that into their later relationships.

A compelling framework for understanding dysfunctional romantic relationships was popularised by Pia Mellody, describing the cycles of love addiction and love avoidance.

Love Avoidance

A love avoidant tends to enter relationships out of a sense of overwhelm from their childhood. The nervous system of the love avoidant has been influenced by over reactions from the primary caregiver. This type of attachment is characterised by an apparent confidence and even charm in relationships, but the truth is that the love avoidant is acting out of a dysregulated nervous system.

The over reactions that the avoidant exhibits could have come in the form anger or violence, or even smothering and neediness. The caregivers over reactions flood the baby’s nervous system, and sets their default to over reaction. The adult that this child becomes tends to be rebellious and argumentative, and seemingly out of control.

The love avoidant often plays the role of the hero or saviour in the love addict’s fantasy, fulfilling their own fantasy at the same time.

Over Reactions in Love

The original dynamic, the one that characterises the first relationship, looks like this when the caregiver is an over reactor:

Without any frame of reference on how to regulate its nervous system, a baby will learn from the behaviour of the caregiver. In the above diagram you can see that the caregiver (on the right) is triggered, but reacts in a much stronger way than that which would be appropriate for the intensity of the stimulus (the green arrow). The baby’s nervous system (on the left) learns from the caregiver, and will later bring this type of reaction into their adult relationships.

The love avoidant generally seeks out the love addict so that they can play the role of the hero, the charming prince who will save the day. However, part of the love avoidant’s pattern of behaviour is that they inevitably become exhausted by all of the care-taking and become overwhelmed again. The dynamic they were exposed to with the overreacting caregiver means that they were set up to be out of control, and that is certainly an exhausting way to be.

The love avoidant leaves relationships without any obvious pain. The distance is often a relief. But they tend to eventually go back to being out of control and engaging in risky behaviours. The love avoidant may soon be ready to start all over again, with the same person or with someone new, so the cycle continues.

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Adult Attachment: Love Addiction

Benjamin Fry — Fri, 13 Mar 2020 12:00:00 +0000

Blog #27

The attachment styles that we learn in our early childhood greatly influence the relationships we have in adulthood. When the mother, or caregiver, demonstrates a well-regulated nervous system, the baby will follow and exhibit the same behaviour in their adult relationships.

A mother that overreacts to triggers, where the reaction is greater than than the intensity of the stimulus, teaches the baby to do the same, which carries on into their adult relationships.

A compelling framework for understanding dysfunctional romantic relationships was popularised by Pia Mellody, describing the cycles of love addiction and love avoidance.

Love Addiction

Most of us, at some point, have had a fantasy about saving someone, or being saved, or both. This fantasy leaves us believing that happiness can be found in a perfect, fairy-tale-like relationship. People enter these relationships with fantastic notions about the other person; that they, and only they, can save them and make everything OK. It’s the belief that if we can get the right relationship, then all of our pain will go away.

If this sounds familiar, then you’ll know that in the end, something will happen to shatter the fantasy. Having ignored warning signs and told little lies to ourselves to maintain the fantasy, eventually we will be confronted with a truth we can no longer deny, we won’t be able to maintain the fantasy, or the other person will leave. Whatever the reason, it hurts a lot.

Breaking up from these relationships can leave the love addict devastated. It is completely shattering, because our sense of self has been so closely tied to the fantasy about the other person. In the end, the fantasy is gone, along with ourselves. After eventually recovering, the love addict finds the space and energy to start again, usually to begin the same cycle over again, either with the same person, or with someone new.

So why do people entertain these illusions, the fantasy relationships? The answer lies in the story of the nervous system.

Under Reactions in Love

For the love addict, relationships usually start out as a way to fill a void. This void is usually created from the first relationship, that with the caregiver, when the caregiver is an under reactor. Under-reactive caregiver-baby relationships look like this:

Within this dynamic, there is no emotional feedback, and the baby will struggle to maintain a nourishing, satisfying relationship and connection with the caregiver.

Nothing creates a void like having a caregiver who is an under-reactor. The child is likely to behave in a similar way, with under-reactions as their default in later life.

A nervous system like this hasn’t received enough connection in childhood, and as a result, yearns for it. For this reason, this nervous system believes that it needs everything from the outside. A fantasy is created about the perfect person or relationship that will come along and make everything OK.

You can download this post in a handy 2-page PDF to print and share with friends, family, clients or colleagues. Follow this link to download now.

You can buy a copy of The Invisible Lion now on kindle or paperback from your local Amazon store. Just click here to buy now.