Attachment Styles 101
Ever get wayyy anxious when someone takes too long to text back? Or shut down the second someone starts expecting too much closeness? Maybe you bounce between craving intimacy and needing space… all in the same day?
Yeah, that’s not just ‘weird vibes’ — that’s your attachment system becoming activated.
If you’ve ever cried over someone not texting back and ghosted someone else for being too available… congratulations, you’ve got a human nervous system! Attachment is the reason why your body screams “ABANDONMENT!!” when your bestie is just busy; or why you feel like running away the second your new boo says they care about you.
As social mammals, we’re wired to rely on close connection for survival. From the time we’re born, our nervous system learns to interpret safety based on how reliably we’re cared for. This system — your attachment system — is designed to keep you close to your people, because closeness literally meant survival.
That’s why it feels like you’re dying when someone pulls away. That’s why your whole body panics at the thought of being left… or overwhelmed… or too much.
Even if the threat isn’t ‘real’, your nervous system doesn’t care. It’s just trying to keep you safe, the only way it knows how.
Attachment styles are nervous system patterns that shape how you show up in relationships — how you love, how you protect yourself, how you react when things feel uncertain.
They’re based on what you learned about love early on; but they still affect how you connect, disconnect, and reconnect right now.
This article isn’t about diagnosing yourself or picking a label to wear forever.
It’s about getting curious:
“What am I protecting?”
“What do I need?”
“How can I feel more secure in the connections I care about?”
What Are Attachment Styles (And Why Do We Have One?)
An attachment style is a nervous system-based pattern that shapes how you relate to others — especially in close relationships. It influences how you give and receive love, how you respond to conflict, how much closeness or space you’re comfortable with, and what you expect from the people you care about.
Your attachment style isn’t about being “needy” or “distant” or “bad at relationships.” It’s about how your nervous system learned to protect you.
As a tiny, helpless baby, your survival depended on your caregivers. So your nervous system developed a kind of relational radar — constantly scanning for cues of safety or danger in your environment.
If your needs were met reliably, your system likely built a blueprint that says, “People are safe. I can relax. I matter.”
If your needs were ignored, unpredictable, or punished, you learned to adapt by clinging, distancing, numbing out, or fawning.
These patterns became your attachment style. They helped you survive. And they still show up now — even when you’re no longer that small or helpless.
But here’s the good news: Attachment styles aren’t fixed. They’re not your identity. They’re learned — which means they can be unlearned, softened, rewired, and reshaped through new experiences of safety and connection.
So instead of asking, “What’s wrong with me?” start asking, “What am I protecting? And what might I need instead?”
Which Attachment Style Am I? (The 4 Main Attachment Styles)
🌱 Secure Attachment
You might relate if:
- You’re generally comfortable with both closeness and independence
- You can communicate your needs without spiraling
- You trust that love doesn’t have to be earned
- Conflict doesn’t feel like abandonment
- You don’t constantly second-guess your worth in relationshipsIf that sounds fake or made up? You’re not alone. Most of us didn’t get this. But this is what it would feel like if your nervous system had consistently experienced care, safety, and emotional presence from your earliest relationships.
This is the baseline your body deserved from the beginning. It’s not about being perfect — it’s about having a deep sense that connection is safe, and that you’re worthy of love, even when things get messy. Think, “I can reach for others, and they’ll be there. I can be myself, and still be loved.”
Even if this doesn’t feel like you right now — it’s where your system is trying to return to. This is what healing moves toward.
🔥 Anxious / Preoccupied Attachment
You might relate if:
- You feel clingy, needy, or “too much” in relationships
- You overthink every text, tone, facial expression, or pause
- You chase reassurance but still don’t fully believe it when you get it
- You attach quickly and fear being abandoned even faster
- You need constant closeness to feel secure, and distance feels like dangerYou’re not needy, babe. You’re just used to love being inconsistent. Your nervous system learned to be hyper-attuned — always scanning for signs of disconnection, rejection, or withdrawal. Because at some point, you had to fight to stay connected.
This style forms when caregivers are inconsistently available — sometimes warm and present, other times distracted, overwhelmed, or emotionally unavailable. So your system went,“If I stay close enough… attentive enough… pleasing enough… maybe I won’t be left behind.”
And now that strategy kicks in even when it’s not needed — because your body still remembers when it was. Like, “If I stop trying, I’ll lose them. If I don’t stay close, I’ll disappear.”
You weren’t too much. You just needed more consistency than you got. And you’re allowed to learn a new way — one that doesn’t require you to beg for connection.
🧊 Avoidant / Dismissive Attachment
You might relate if:
- You feel smothered when people get too close
- You value independence above all else
- You shut down emotionally when things get intense
- You pride yourself on “not needing anyone”
- You crave intimacy… but push people away when they offer itYou’re not heartless, cold, or broken. You’re protected. Your nervous system learned early on that relying on others wasn’t safe — or worse, it just didn’t work. So it adapted by becoming self-contained, emotionally armored, and hyper-independent.
This style forms when caregivers are consistently unavailable, rejecting, or emotionally distant. So instead of reaching out and being disappointed, your system went, “I’ll just stop needing. I’ll stop feeling. I’ll handle it all myself.”
Now, even if someone shows up with love? That old wiring still whispers, “Don’t trust it. Don’t get soft. Stay in control.” The core belief is usually, “If I depend on someone, I’ll get hurt.” or, “If I get too close, I’ll disappear.”
Avoidance isn’t about not wanting connection — it’s about not believing it will be safe. And bb, you deserve the kind of love that doesn’t make you choose between closeness and self-respect.
🌀 Disorganized / Fearful-Avoidant Attachment
You might relate if:
- You crave intimacy and fear it — often at the same time
- You want closeness, but when you get it, you panic or shut down
- You feel like your relationships are a rollercoaster of push-pull
- You don’t fully trust anyone… but you really don’t trust yourself either
You often feel unsafe — even with people you care aboutThis is the style born from conflicted wiring. When the same person who offered love was also a source of fear, confusion, or instability — your nervous system had no clear strategy. So it developed a mix of both: anxious hunger + avoidant self-protection.
This often forms in homes where there was neglect, unpredictability, emotional volatility, or trauma. Your system learned, “I need people to survive… but people hurt me. I want connection… but I can’t relax in it.”
You may feel like you’re “too much” and “not enough.” You may swing between clinging and disappearing. You might sabotage what you want because safety never came without a cost. Think, “Love is danger. But I can’t not want it. So I guess I must want danger?”
Disorganized attachment might seem dysfunctional to those who don’t understand it; but it is how some of us learned to survive under impossible conditions. And healing starts by showing your system connection can be safe.
What to Do With This Info
Finding your attachment style can feel like reading your soul’s secret diary…
or like being publicly roasted by a therapist on TikTok 🫠
Either way: it’s not meant to box you in. It’s meant to help you understand yourself — so you can stop judging your reactions and start responding to your needs with compassion.
Start by:
Getting curious, not clinical. These styles are adaptive strategies, not diagnoses. You're not broken — you're brilliant at surviving.
Learning your triggers. Notice the moments you get activated — distance, silence, emotional intensity — and get curious about what your body’s preparing for.
Naming what’s underneath. What’s the fear beneath the urge? What’s the need beneath the shutdown? (Hint: the Feelings + Needs Wheels can help.)
And remember, healing doesn’t mean becoming “secure” overnight. It means expanding your Window of Tolerance for intimacy, care, and conflict. It means experiencing relationships that feel safer, slower, more mutual — so your nervous system starts rewriting its story about love.
Healing happens through:
Therapy or coaching (especially relational/somatic work)
Self-reparenting and parts work
Gentle, secure connections with friends, lovers, chosen fam
You. Giving yourself the care, attunement, and safety you deserved all along.
Attachment wounds happen in relationship — and so does repair. But you don’t have to wait for the “right” person to show up. You can start by becoming the one who shows up for you.
💡 Pro Tip:
Ready to dive in? Try the Inner Child Healing Meditation in the Resource Library. It’s a sweet, gentle way to connect with the part of you that first learned these attachment strategies — and offer them the safety they didn’t get back then.
Want more ways to understand yourself?
I’ve got a whole library of mind-body magic waiting for you✨