Attachment Disorders

Attachment Disorders

 

Attachment issues arise from disruptions in the early caregiver-child bond. Undoubtedly, these disruptions significantly affect someone’s ability to trust in others or feel safe in relationships. However, when a caregiver consistently doesn’t fulfill their child’s emotional needs or displays abusive or neglectful behavior, the child may develop an attachment disorder.    

Child attachment disorders can significantly impact a child’s social and cognitive development, making it difficult to form healthy relationships later in life. Furthermore, when a child with an attachment disorder doesn’t receive treatment, they may develop an adult attachment disorder. 

Still, it’s reassuring to know that treatment options are out there for attachment disorders; therapy and medication are concurrently effective for treating attachment disorders and the conditions that commonly co-occur.  You may be wondering what attachment issues are. And whether they’re interchangeable with attachment disorders.

Attachment Issues are disruptions in the development of a healthy bond between a child and their primary caregiver(s) and can cause attachment issues, meaning the child may struggle with:

  • Forming meaningful relationships

  • Maintaining a positive sense of self

  • Regulating their emotions

An attachment disorder, on the other hand, is more than just “attachment issues.”

Attachment disorders are a severe form of attachment issue that can significantly impact someone’s ability to function in daily life. Those with an attachment disorder may show socially inappropriate behaviors or retreat from social interactions, as they don’t know what a healthy relationship looks like. To further understand how these disorders develop, we may need to consider the underpinnings of attachment theory.

 

Types of Attachment Disorders

When a caregiver consistently doesn’t meet their child’s basic emotional needs, the child may develop a childhood attachment disorder. If a child with an attachment disorder continues through life without treatment, an adult attachment disorder may develop. The home environment that causes each childhood attachment disorder may outwardly look similar, but the symptoms of each disorder are vastly different, as is apparent from the following descriptions:

Reactive attachment disorder is an attachment disorder in children. Children with RAD typically try to remove themselves from social interaction as they see relationships as unsafe. These children often become withdrawn, unresponsive, and excessively independent. Reactive attachment disorder occurs in children who have experienced severe social neglect or deprivation during their first years of life. It can occur when children lack the basic emotional needs for comfort, stimulation, and affection, or when repeated changes in caregivers (such as frequent foster care changes) prevent them from forming stable attachments. Children with reactive attachment disorder are emotionally withdrawn from their adult caregivers. They rarely turn to caregivers for comfort, support or protection or do not respond to comforting when they are distressed. During routine interactions with caregivers, they show little positive emotion and may show unexplained fear or sadness. The problems appear before age 5. Developmental delays, especially cognitive and language delays, often occur along with the disorder.

 

Disinhibited social engagement disorder is another form of child attachment disorder. Children with DSED may be highly sociable. For example, such children are typically overly friendly, past the boundaries of regular social interaction. They may also be extremely friendly to strangers, potentially putting themselves in dangerous situations.

Adult Attachment Disorder (AAD) develops when a child with a reactive or disinhibited social engagement disorder doesn’t receive treatment. An adult attachment disorder is a continuation of a previous attachment disorder, so the person will show similar symptoms as they did in childhood, but these symptoms will instead affect their adult relationships. When less severe disruptions occur in early relationships, a person may develop an insecure attachment style (rather than an attachment disorder). In adulthood, we split the insecure attachment styles into:

  • Anxious attachment (or anxiety attachment disorder)

  • Avoidant attachment (or avoidant attachment disorder)

  • Disorganized attachment (or disorganized attachment disorder)

 

Signs of avoidant attachment issues may include:

  • Avoidance of physical contact like hugging.

  • Difficulty seeking comfort from others when upset or distressed.

  • Lack of trust in others.

  • Tendency to minimize or suppress emotions.

Signs of anxious attachment issues include:

  • Strong desire for closeness and intimacy in relationships, often leading to a fear of rejection or abandonment.

  • Difficulty trusting others, and often feeling insecure in relationships.

  • Need for frequent reassurance and validation from close others, such as partners.

  • Over-analysis of social interactions.

Signs of disorganized attachment issues typically include:

  • Difficulty regulating emotions, including extreme mood swings, dissociation, and numbness.

  • Feeling overwhelmed and disconnected from one’s own feelings and needs.

  • Problems forming close relationships and trusting others.

  • Use of self-destructive behaviors and unhealthy coping strategies, such as risky sexual behavior.

At MindShift Psychotherapy treatments consist of evidence-based approaches such as Attachment-based therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy for Individuals, Psychodynamic Therapy, Interpersonal Therapy, Family Systems Therapy, and Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy.