3 Ways Your Attachment Style is Affecting Your Relationships

Your attachment style can have a profound effect on your relationship with your significant other, your friends, and your relatives. It’s particularly important within the context of romantic relationships.

So, how does your attachment style change your relationship dynamic?

Someone with an anxious attachment style often feels intense anxiety over the thought of being separated from their partner. On the other hand, someone with an avoidant style may resist dependence and stay distant from their partner. A person with a disorganized attachment style may struggle to regulate their emotions and develop a deep connection with their partner at all. And finally, someone who is securely attached feels like they can maintain a balance between closeness with their partner and maintaining their own independence.

Are you curious about how your attachment style might be affecting your relationship? Here are a few areas of your love life that will inevitably be influenced by your attachment style.

1. Your Trust in Each Other

If you have a secure attachment style, you will likely have no trouble trusting your partner. You know that they love and care about you. Even when you can’t spend much time together because your schedules are busier than usual, you know that their love for you hasn’t waned.

But if you have an anxious or avoidant attachment style, trusting your partner fully can be challenging. Depending on your attachment style, this fear of trust will manifest differently, but the impact is similar—you may push your partner away. Someone with a disorganized attachment style, who often develops this style as a result of trauma or abuse, may desperately want to trust their partner but holds themselves back as a protective mechanism.

2. Your Communication Style

For someone with a secure attachment style, communicating with their partner is simple and straightforward. When they’re upset, they speak up. If they need something, they let their partner know. And when they’re feeling joyful, they express it.

However, someone with an anxious attachment style may feel hesitant about being honest with their partner out of fear of pushing them away. Alternatively, a person with an avoidant attachment style might shut down when they have something important to communicate. They often perceive themselves as “lone wolves” who can handle things on their own. Therefore, they often try to push their feelings aside rather than opening up to their partners.

And finally, someone with a disorganized attachment style may not know how to communicate with their partner in a healthy way. They may be prone to starting arguments when they are upset or feeling like they have to suffer in silence when something goes wrong.

3. What You Want From Your Partner

Overall, your attachment style can define what you want from your partner. These “wants” can determine whether or not the relationship has a future.

If you have an avoidant attachment style, you may want your partner to keep their distance, allowing you to keep your guard up. Yet this may result in your partner feeling unloved. Someone with an anxious attachment style may cling to their partner, hoping to draw them closer with a guarantee that they will never leave. But this can also drive a partner away. And a person with a disorganized attachment style might want an emotionally intimate relationship with their partner, even if they need to heal before they can achieve this.

Someone with a secure attachment style wants to enjoy their independence while building a happy life with their partner. Ultimately, as we grow, we can all work to build this kind of connection in our lives with those we love.

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Are you worried that your attachment style is negatively affecting your relationship? Do you want to develop a secure attachment style? Talk therapy can help. Please feel free to reach out to us to find out how we can help.

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