Attachment Styles

Attachment styles are ways people relate to others, and can be characterized by
how they react to separation and closeness. Below are the core attachment types.

  1. Secure Attachment:
    Individuals with secure attachment generally have a healthy balance between independence and intimacy. They are comfortable relying on others and being relied upon. They tend to have good emotional regulation, can express their feelings, and are capable of managing conflicts constructively.

  2. Avoidant Attachment:
    Often developed in childhood when parents / caregivers were emotionally unavailable or unresponsive, people with this style may feel uncomfortable with emotional closeness. They tend to value independence and may struggle to open up or express vulnerability, often distancing themselves when others get too close.

  3. Anxious Preoccupied Attachment:
    This style often results from inconsistent caregiving in early childhood, where the parent or caregiver may have been sometimes available and nurturing, but other times emotionally or physically distant and unavailable. People with anxious attachment often feel insecure about their relationships and crave constant reassurance and validation, fearing abandonment.

  4. Dismissive Avoidant Attachment:
    People with this attachment style typically develop it when they experience neglect or emotional unavailability from parents or caregivers. They tend to be emotionally self-sufficient and may appear detached in relationships, often downplaying the importance of emotional intimacy. People with dismissive avoidant attachment can be hyper-independent, avoid asking for help and prefer to rely on themselves.

  5. Disorganized Attachment:
    This attachment style can develop when a parent / caregiver is frightening or inconsistent, leading the child to feel both a desire for closeness and fear of it. As a result, their behaviors may appear contradictory or disoriented. This leads to difficulties in forming stable relationships and can result in emotional instability in adulthood.

  6. Fearful Avoidant Attachment:
    People with this attachment style tend to have conflicting desires for intimacy and a fear of being hurt or rejected. They may have experienced trauma or inconsistent caregiving, which leads to confusion about relationships. They often pull away when they feel vulnerable but also deeply long for connection and validation.

Understanding attachment styles can be a powerful tool in improving self-awareness and relationships. They can help people understand the dynamics that shape how they relate to others, whether in friendships, romantic partnerships, or family relationships.

Exploring Attachment

A specific type of trauma, known as an “attachment wound,” can significantly contribute to anxiety, depression, and painful relationship patterns. As a child, it was essential that your attachment needs were met by your parents to help you mature into an emotionally healthy adult. We are wired to need affection, nurturing and loving connection, positive attention, unconditional acceptance and support. When these essential qualities are missing from childhood it creates deficits, or gaps, in your emotional development. Unfortunately, these unmet needs tend to carry over into adulthood, and can result in present day anxiety, depression, and relationship struggles.

Examples of attachment wounds include:

  • Feeling shunned, rejected, abandoned, or neglected by a parent.

  • Being invalidated by a parent, where emotional needs and personal experiences were minimized, overlooked, or belittled.

  • A critical parent or caregiver who was rigid, shaming and punitive, demanding perfection and high expectations, withholding or taking their love back until expectations were met.

  • Having a parent who was unavailable (e.g., distracted, ill, depressed, self absorbed)

  • Having a parent who put their wants ahead of your needs (e.g., drugs / alcohol, other relationships, their own need for perfection, etc.)

  • Having an “enmeshed” family system where parents excessively rely and depend on their children for their own emotional support or perform adult responsibilities such as being responsible for the care of siblings, thereby overlooking and dismissing the child’s needs for emotional support and an appropriate level of independence.

What is enmeshment

Bonds between family members impact a child’s emotional development. In an enmeshed relationship, there is no emotional independence or separation between the parent and child which often leads to a child’s (and therefore adult child) inability to form their own thoughts and perspectives.

A person who may have enmeshed relationships would include someone who:

  • Doesn’t have a strong sense of self, self-worth, autonomy or belonging

  • Depends on others to give them validation in order to maintain their self-esteem

  • Cannot function well alone and avoids being alone

  • Has difficulty acting alone and maintaining a healthy level of independence within relationships

  • Is unable to act and think separately from their family, friends or partners without feeling they were betraying them

  • Doesn’t know or engage in their own interest or activities, rather looks to please others and follow what they want to do.

  • Had a parent who did everything for them, thereby made to rely on a parent(s) rather than be encouraged to learn, do and experience for themselves.

Here are some examples of enmeshment:

  • A mother who calls her son's ex-girlfriend or wife to ask why she broke up with him

  • A person who cannot make simple life decisions without consulting her parent(s) or friends first

  • A family member who takes it personally when someone in the family moves away

  • A parent who relies on her child for emotional support through her divorce

  • A person who has no understanding of activities they enjoy and instead takes on the interests of friends

Children who grow up in an enmeshed family system learn to make others responsible for their happiness and ability to be emotionally stable or secure. Often this person finds relationships and friends who are controlling or emotionally abusive. Because this person has never experienced the right to make their own decisions and make their own mistakes without leaning on others, they can feel paralyzed. Many new parents look to fill the unmet needs from their own childhood through their children. Everyone learns how to parent from their parents or caregivers. The words, vocal and facial tones, actions, responses and reactions… are the model and template from which we draw. Enmeshed relationships and family bonds are without boundaries and rob needed independence among family members.

Recognizing an Enmeshed Relationship

Two key aspects of healthy relationship functioning are cohesion (togetherness) and flexibility (ability to change or compromise). Those in an enmeshed relationship will likely struggle to balance time together and time apart. It may bring stress, anxiety, frustration, fear, or other emotions when there is any form of separation.2

Flexibility refers to a person's or couple's ability to handle challenges and change. In enmeshed relationships, the ability to handle change is often complicated and disruptive. Without the ability to manage one's emotions in tough times, times of challenge usually throw the person or couple off and create significant stress within the relationship.

People in enmeshed relationships may also have difficulty supporting each other and celebrating their differences. They are likely to decide based on what they think the other person wants rather than their needs.

Attachment traumas have two other far-reaching effects:

  • Trauma is often at the root of negative thinking (e.g., pessimism, catastrophizing) and self-defeating beliefs (e.g., I'm not good enough, I'm powerless) - both of which are significant sources of anxiety, depression, and relationship problems.

  • Trauma can interfere with the development of key self-care and relationship skills, which are essential for preventing and counteracting anxiety, depression, and relationship problems.

Overcoming Attachment Trauma

There are multiple methods used to help someone overcome trauma from enmeshment, including learning how to set appropriate boundaries, practicing mindfulness, and attending therapy.

Mindfulness

Coming from an enmeshed family might make it challenging to recognize when you are in an enmeshed relationship as an adult because it's all you've ever known. Mindfulness is paying attention to the present moment and noticing your external environment and internal responses.

Practicing mindfulness can help bring attention to your interactions with others and how you feel about them. Noticing these patterns will allow you to recognize whether you are in an enmeshed relationship or need to set boundaries.

For example, you might realize that every time you are with a particular friend, you give in to what you think they want and cannot express your own needs and interests. This could be a sign of an enmeshed relationship.

Boundary Setting

Enmeshment is a form of emotional control that is achieved through manipulation. This makes it challenging to form boundaries, and boundaries are mostly nonexistent in enmeshed relationships. Since family members are made to feel they must depend on each other for their sense of self, there is no room for functioning independently.1

When learning to set boundaries, it can help to start slowly. It might feel uncomfortable saying no or pursuing something without permission or validation from others, but this is essential to setting healthy boundaries. It can help to take some time to think through the things that make you happy, regardless of how they affect others.

Setting boundaries includes talking about them with those you are closest to. Know your boundaries clearly and stick to them even when you get pushback.

EMDR counseling for attachment disorders, complex childhood trauma (C-PTSD) and other unresolved traumas

Research indicates that counseling is most effective when it incorporates both the left and right sides of the brain. Trauma and attachment wounds are stored in the right side of the brain. Traditional talk therapy typically accesses only the left side of the brain and is not necessarily the most effective for processing trauma. My counseling approach is designed to engage both sides of the brain to help you address trauma and attachment wounds and the painful symptoms that they create.

EMDR is a psychotherapeutic approach that helps to reprocess traumatic memories and move them to long term memory where the amygdala no longer holds these memories hostage. When the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus come back online to regulate emotions, you will be less reactive. Imagine how it would feel to finally get unstuck and move your life forward!


The goal of therapy for unresolved trauma, anxiety, depression, and relationship problems is to help you to:

  • Feel more calm, relaxed, and present-centered

  • Feel happier and have a more positive outlook on life

  • Experience more fulfilling and satisfying relationships

  • Feel empowered to create positive change in your life

  • Experience greater self-esteem and confidence

  • Feel more relaxed and comfortable in social situations


If you’re curious about EMDR or how we can work together to specifically treat your anxiety, depression, or anger... or if you’re interested in learning more about how trauma and/or attachment wounds may be triggering the symptoms that you’re struggling with, feel free to contact me to set up a free 15-minute phone/video consultation so we can discuss your concerns.