Attachment Styles: The Blueprints We’ve Had Since We Were Babies

One of the many reasons I am highly interested in attachment work is the concept that so much happens in our very early years of life. We literally come into this world ready for and dependent on relationships. Take a moment to appreciate the significance of that; during a time of complete vulnerability, our brains are being influenced by our relationships in a way that has lifelong impact for our developmental, physiological, and neurological health. Our society can fall into a terrible coping mechanism making claims that little ones do not remember or understand what is going on around them. That could not be further from the truth. During infancy, we look to our caregivers for signals to make sense of not only ourselves, but the people and the world around us. These signals define what is safe and what is not safe. Interactions with our caregivers build up, one at a time, resulting in a blueprint for our nervous system. Before we are even ready to talk, our brain is collecting data and filing it away.

So, what is this blueprint I’m referring to? Our nervous system collects data procedurally to establish expectations and processes for the world around us. Through the relationships with our caregivers we receive crucial information about the importance of our physical and emotional needs, the availability of the caregiver to get them met, what those needs activate for them, and how well they are able to regulate stress in the process. In turn, this data also informs us on things like our ability to trust others, regulate our own emotions, and even the behaviors we engage in when we are upset. These are all ingredients used in the recipe of our attachment style(s). And although we have the capacity to change our attachment styles, without conscious effort and safe relationships to do that work-we are left navigating the world through the data that we took in from our early years.

Attachment conversations are not easy, and in fact are quite fragile for all parties involved (for this conversation let’s use caregiver vs care-receiver). For the care-receiver it can be quite uncomfortable revisiting moments of unavailability, let down, isolation, fear, shame, anger, or disappointment to name a few. It can be emotionally overwhelming to connect with earlier versions of the self when our needs failed to get met. We can also be bombarded with the desire to protect our caregivers so fiercely that we neglect acknowledging our experiences. For the caregiver, it can be equally (yes equally-not more, not less) emotionally intense to sit with, face, and process the influence one’s own behavior had on another. To revisit those moments in time and what was going on that contributed how the caregiver showed up can include processing trauma and other difficulties with mental health. I cannot stress enough that these conversations are not about blame, they are about learning, understanding, and identifying what ingredients went into each of our individual blueprints. Because remember, that caregiver has a blueprint from their childhood too.

Today is not about how to have those conversations (let’s bookmark it and revisit it in a way that it gets the space it deserves). Today is about understanding the influences to your blueprint. It’s about exploration. I invite you to take sometime getting to know your blueprint. Our attachment styles are processes we’ve had our whole lives, yet we can live life never getting to know them. Despite them being so important for our relationships, mental health, and physical well-being- we can be completely unaware and detached from the data our nervous system continues to use today. So, if it feels safe to do so, I invite you to start exploring.

Who was involved in your caregiving system?

What did your caregiving system relationships teach you about your emotional/physical needs?

What comes to mind when you think about the words you would use to describe how your caregivers responded to your emotions?

Does your blueprint look different with your caregivers vs other relationships in your life? (For example are you more avoidant with your caregiver but more secure with friends or partners?)

Be mindful, lead with love, and don’t forget to listen.

Dr. C

Do You know you?

Biases are important. They absolutely influence perspective. So, let me claim mine here at the start. I am a psychologist that is heavily influenced by attachment theory, research, and clinical practice. That is-I believe relationships are critically important in any conversation about mental health. Now that that is out of the way, let’s proceed. But also- keep this whole biases thing in mind as we continue………

A big component of my approach to therapy is focusing on the relationship with the self. I’ve never quite understood how symptoms of depression, grief, anxiety, or trauma could be assessed and treated without attachment as a core component of that process. A lot of mental health treatments focus on investigating and changing thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. How can we talk about changing thought patterns, challenging beliefs, or building new habits if we don’t know the quality and history of the relationship within? Even more-so if we are totally disconnected with ourselves? Our relationships impact our reactions, perspectives, and how we regulate. How can we work on any of those things if we don’t first learn about the relationship with them?

It is not uncommon for people to struggle with answering questions about their relationship with themselves. We live in a world that offers lots of ways to distract us from spending time with ourselves. Distraction is an effective strategy (watch out-effective does not equal healthy) to avoid all of the thoughts and feelings we’ve accumulated throughout life. Although our brain and body have been present for all of our life experiences, we can live life completely severed from building a relationship with our internal self. What’s even more interesting, is the fact that we can be so unfamiliar with the internal self-while still letting that internal self run havoc on our lives. That internal self can engage in negative self-talk, create self-doubt, hate, and total disdain for ourselves; and is capable of creating entire narratives about our self or the world without a single ounce of objective data. For a part of us that is so influential on our mental health- it seems it would be a good use of time and resources to get to know us a little better, no?

As with any relationship, the relationship with ourselves needs time, prioritization, and investment. Also like any other relationship, work with the internal self requires consistency, vulnerability, and honesty (just to name a few). It can be a daunting and overwhelming task to even think about, let alone to sign up to do it repetitively.

Here is a reminder that often what we need is very different from what we want. If you are feeling overwhelmed at the idea of getting to know yourself, perhaps that is a good place to begin. I highly recommend leading with curiosity and responding to whatever comes up with grace. The cool thing is (insert nerd alert-I understand cool is a very subjective descriptor and you may be reading this thinking “Dr. C, nothing about this sounds cool.”) the more you do this work, the more magic happens. It is truly incredible how improving our relationship with ourselves can and does spill over into our lives (Remember those things above? I’m talking about those-our self-talk, our reactions, our ability to regulate-those things!). Today, I invite you to consider where in your life you can start carving out some time for you to get to know you.

Starter reflective questions:

How did I feel reading about this?

What do I feel inside when I think about my relationship with myself?

How would I describe my relationship with myself?

What comes to mind when I think about what has influenced how I talk to myself?

Be mindful, lead with love, and don’t forget to listen.

Dr. Cunningham