Trauma & Disorganized Attachment in Relationships
Top Three Remarkable Ways to Heal from Disorganized Attachment
What does disorganized attachment look like?
Disorganized attachment may look like a combination of anxious attachment and avoidant attachment behaviors. Someone with an anxious attachment exhibits behavior that can be seen as clingy and demanding. These behaviors are rooted in a deep fear that we are not loved and will be abandoned.
On the other hand, an avoidant attachment is characterized by an avoidance of connection. The fear of getting close to someone and being hurt is so strong that barriers are built.
If you struggle with a disorganized attachment style you will show a mix of the behaviors from both attachments. This behavior concoction may look like desperately wanting connection but pushing it away once you have it. Contradictory behaviors and feelings will surface such as a need for closeness while pushing away in fear.
What causes disorganized attachment?
Ideally, parents are a loving, safe, and secure base for their children. This forms a strong connection and feeling of safety that provides the child with tools to create healthy relationships. A secure relationship to a parent supports the nervous system and leads to social engagement.
However, not all parents have the tools to offer a warm and nurturing base for their children. Parents that have unresolved trauma and disorganized attachment themselves may perpetuate abuse. Often, childhood maltreatment and an abusive guardian is the root of a disorganized attachment in adults.
Unpredictable, abusive behavior throws the nervous system into overdrive to protect the child. This abuse and modelling of contradictory behaviors trigger behaviors that are meant to keep the child safe.
A guardian that is supposed to protect but is instead hostile and/or neglectful confuses the child. This confusion forms contradictory behaviors in relationships and a deep seated fear of connection.
Adults with disorganized attachment often carry those behaviors and fear of connection into adulthood. These behaviors that kept you safe as a child may not be useful in adult relationships.
What does disorganized attachment have to do with the polyvagal theory?
According to the polyvagal theory, we can live our lives in social engagement, sympathetic activation, and or dorsal vagal shutdown. Social engagement allows for connection and is dominant when we are calm.
Sympathetic activation is the fight and flight response that is activated for protection. When we perceive a threat our nervous system and fight or flight behavior is activated. This aids in our survival.
When a threat is perceived as life threatening our nervous system believes that fight or flight will not save us. So, dorsal vagal shutdown is triggered. Dorsal vagal shutdown is when our nervous system hits the breaks. This often looks like a freeze response and avoidance of conflict.
People with disorganized attachment live in sympathetic activation and dorsal vagal shut down. This is because you have learned from experiences that you must live in both to survive.
Signs of disorganized attachment in adults
Emotional and nervous system dysregulation. Our nervous system primes us for danger by sending us into sympathetic activation. Sympathetic activation throws our organs, body, and mind into overdrive for survival. This activation throughout our body results in nervous system dysregulation.
Then, all of a sudden the parasympathetic nervous system, the brake that calms our body, is triggered. Usually, this is a positive thing if we perceive safety because we are able to be calm in a safe environment.
However, a disorganized attachment is often paired with the perception of danger. When we perceive a deadly amount of danger our nervous system dips us into a freeze response. This response elicits dorsal vagal shutdown.
We were not meant to go between sympathetic activation and dorsal vagal shutdown regularly. These reactions are there to save us, but chronic activation causes wear and tear. Identifying ways to regulate your nervous system is a huge leap towards healing disorganized attachment.
2. Struggle with connecting with and trusting others. Social engagement, a state we enter when we perceive safety, allows us to connect and engage with others. However, people with disorganized attachment and unprocessed trauma tend to not live in this space. So, this results in difficulty in connecting with others.
Also, past betrayals and abuse can plant a wariness and inability to trust others. Calming our nervous system and reaching social engagement will empower us to trust others. Obtaining tools that allow us to reach social engagement is the key to connecting with others and ourselves.
3. Excessive fear of rejection.
Often, people with this attachment have been hurt and rejected by others. Also, challenges in connecting with others may make it difficult to find people that don’t reject you. So, you have learned that rejection is common and that you deserve it because you are bad in some way. You are worthy of love! Calming your nervous system and leading you to social engagement will empower you to form healthy relationships. Healthy relationships that don’t include rejection can teach you to expect and embrace love.
4. Tendency to view others and the world as unsafe.
People with this attachment style have been taught that the world and people are not safe. Your parents, past partners, and experiences suggest that you need to be ready for chaos and pain. However, reaching social engagement and connection will allow you to rewire your thought process. The more safety and love we feel the easier it is to live in those states and embrace it.
How can I learn to connect with others despite disorganized attachment?
Adults with disorganized attachment are wired for chaos. So, the key is to create an environment that is the opposite of chaos and calm our inner system.
Co-regulation. Co-regulation is when people regulate their nervous systems when they are together. We tend to match each other's nervous systems and identify safety cues that calm us. Once we reach social engagement we can co-regulate and maintain our feeling of safety together.
Mindfulness and breathing exercises. Diaphragmatic breathing is a belly breathing technique that calms our nervous system. Practicing mindfulness allows us to be present and accept the present moment as it is. Both of these techniques calm us and empower us to reach social engagement.
Identify your triggers. Identifying your triggers allows you to use your tools when you need them the most. For example, if your trigger is the fear of abandonment you can use self-soothing tools when this fear is likely to show up.
growgood psychology has a team of therapists that strive to give you the tools to heal disorganized attachment and form stronger relationships.
We are dedicated to helping adults with disorganized attachment calm their nervous system. We want to help you live your life the way you want to despite anxiety and trauma. Our therapists strive to support you on your path to healing.
The high stress from this past year has potentially aggravated your anxiety and disorganized attachment. We are here to help you collect the tools to heal relationships and attachment problems in the midst of high stress. You deserve healing, happiness, and connection! Now it is time for you to embrace your path of healing and live life to the fullest.