Rebuild your relationship with yourself and foster meaningful connections with others.
Childhood experiences lay the foundation for how we relate to others as adults. Attachment-focused therapy can help you realize the root of your struggles by better understanding your past.
What is Attachment - Focused Therapy?
Attachment-focused therapy (also known as attachment based therapy) is a form of therapeutic intervention that delves into a client’s history to better understand the problems they’re facing today.
It shouldn’t be confused with the similarly named but unrelated form of therapy called “attachment therapy” which has been widely criticized and disregarded as pseudoscience.
Attachment-focused therapy focuses on relationship dynamics in a client’s life, both towards themselves and others. It was originally developed in the 1960s’ by psychologists John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth based on their research on child-parent or child-caregiver relationships.
Their theory was that a child’s first meaningful relationship with an adult lays the blueprint for how they’ll learn to relate to others as they grow older. If a secure bond between parent (or caregiver) and child is established, they hypothesized the child would have a much better chance of success creating meaningful relationships throughout life, and have a generally more stable and secure disposition.
This is known as “secure attachment”. When this relationship isn’t established or is damaged, a child develops what’s known as “insecure attachment” which can manifest in 1 of 3 ways: anxious attachment, avoidant attachment, or disorganized attachment.
How Does Attachment - Focused Therapy Work?
The ultimate goal of attachment-focused therapy is to strengthen a client’s ability to form secure relationships. This is done by examining the experiences they had in childhood, assessing current patterns of behaviour, identifying unmet childhood needs, and finding ways to meet those needs now as an adult.
Attachment issues stemming from childhood can lead to anxiety, depression, substance abuse, dysfunctional relationships, low self-esteem, and other concerning issues. The belief is that by resolving the childhood trauma that created these unhealthy patterns and coping mechanisms, adults can regain control of their lives and write a new story for themselves.
Attachment-focused therapy isn’t just for adults. Children and adolescents can also greatly benefit from this style of therapy, though it’s most effective when their parent or caregiver is on board and willing to actively participate. This could look like efforts towards positive behavioural change at home, or partaking in sessions of attachment based family therapy.
Couples may also benefit from undergoing attachment-focused therapy together to resolve relationship dysfunctions while improving their individual wellbeing.
Is Attachment - Focused Therapy Right For Me?
Attachment-focused therapy can be beneficial for a broad range of circumstances and issues, but there are a few criteria that make it a more suitable fit over other therapy options.
People who tend to benefit from attachment-focused therapy the most are those who’ve experienced adverse childhood events and come from a family with dysfunctional dynamics. It’s likely that these experiences are either the root of their current issues or at least have played a role in their development.
Other signs attachment-focused therapy may be a beneficial approach are indications that you have an insecure attachment style. This could look like difficulty being vulnerable, extreme relationship anxiety, a pattern of codependent relationships, fear of abandonment, fear of intimacy, people pleasing tendencies, hyper independence or low self-esteem.
Attachment-focused therapy is less helpful for people who have struggles unrelated to their relationships or who don’t have significant childhood trauma.
How Can Attachment - Focused Therapy Help?
Anyone undergoing attachment-focused therapy can expect to gain insight into their childhood development and current behaviour. This form of therapy involves uncovering formative childhood experiences which can be an intense and vulnerable experience. Establishing a trusting relationship with a skilled therapist is a requirement for attachment-focused therapy to be effective.
Over time, gentle conversation about the past as well as cooperative analysis of current behaviours will allow the therapist and client to establish new patterns and ways of relating to others. This can be described as “reparenting” oneself under the expert guidance of a therapist. The client will learn how to address the unmet needs that are the driving force of their adverse thoughts and behaviours.
The desired result is increased self-confidence, stable and fulfilling interpersonal relationships, better emotional regulation, as well as healing from past trauma. Overall, attachment-focused therapy is a freeing experience that allows clients to regain control of their story.
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