What disorganized attachment looks like and how to heal it

Relationships are an important part of every stage in your life. Your ability to create and sustain close relationships impacts your overall well-being and life satisfaction. However, cultivating these bonds depends on your attachment style and may be more difficult for those with disorganized attachments.

Individuals with a secure attachment feel comfortable sharing emotions and trusting others. But if you have an insecure attachment style, experiencing this emotional closeness proves more difficult. Whether you have a fearful avoidant attachment or an anxious attachment, maintaining healthy relationships is more challenging.

It is possible, however, to heal your attachment wounds. With the right practice, support, and self-compassion, you can create a secure attachment style. 

What is disorganized attachment?

A disorganized attachment is defined by a child’s inconsistency in responding to a caregiver in times of stress. The child might show signs of both hesitancy and longing for their caregiver. This insecure attachment often occurs from a lack of reliability in the child’s needs being met and, to a lesser degree, genetic predispositions.

An adult with a disorganized attachment style often has difficulty maintaining relationships due to a fear of emotional closeness and abandonment. Sometimes they pull a partner closer, and other times they push them away.

According to attachment theory, there are four attachment styles. In the 1970s, Mary Ainsworth conducted her famous “Strange Situation” experiment. Based on the results, she could understand the signs and categorize children into the three original attachment types. Ainsworth’s mentee, Mary Main, created the fourth attachment style, disorganized, in 1986. 

Everyone falls into one of the four categories, depending on their childhood and life experiences. A disorganized attachment is one of the three insecure attachment styles. 

Here’s a breakdown of all four attachment types:

• Disorganized or fearful avoidant attachment style: A child often exhibits conflicting behavior between wanting to move toward and away from the caregiver at the same time. As an adult, they may sometimes cling to a partner while, at other times, rejecting them. 
• Anxious attachment style: The individual fears being alone or disappointing others, so they may display jealousy, clinginess, or possessiveness in the relationship.
• Avoidant attachment style: The individual avoids growing emotionally involved with another person. Or, they become emotionally involved and then begin displaying avoidant behavior, such as remaining distant or showing resentment when others display emotion.
• Secure attachment style: The individual is comfortable feeling and expressing their emotions. They can set healthy boundaries in the relationship and maintain emotional permanence and a sense of self-acceptance. 

If you have a disorganized attachment style, you might experience a push and pull in interpersonal relationships. You can fear abandonment and pull a partner closer but also fear emotional intimacy and push a partner away. It can feel confusing, as if your brain is telling you to look left and right at the same time. As a result, you might act or speak in a way that feels hot and cold to your partner. This inconsistency in behavior marks the attachment type. 

Research published by the National Institutes of Health in 2016 provided evidence of two types of disorganized attachment:

• High intensity/high affect (type 1): A display of shifting, mood-dependent states of mind. The individual contains contradictions and shows evidence of oscillating between extremes of attachment styles, such as hostility and helplessness.

• Low intensity/low affect (type 2): A display of diffused, vague, confused, or inadequate states of mind by the individual. They have a tendency to prematurely end relationships, romantic or social, and lack concern for others. 

Someone who displays type 1 disorganized attachment signs tends to switch between being hot and cold in the relationship. Someone showing type 2 disorganized attachment may be more likely to give up on the relationship due to confusion and lack of concern about others.

How does disorganized attachment develop? 

The attachment style you have in adulthood stems from early childhood experiences. As a baby and toddler, you rely on your caregiver to provide for your physical and emotional needs. However, if the caregiver is unable to meet these needs, you’re more likely to develop an insecure attachment type.

Here are the potential reasons for developing a disorganized attachment: 

• The home environment is unpredictable, inconsistent, or unsafe.
• The child experiences abuse or neglect early in life.
• A caregiver fails to respond when the child cries or seeks comfort. 
• The child is often left alone to care for themselves or deal with unpleasant emotions.
• The caregiver discourages showing intense emotion either directly or indirectly.

If the caregiver has a disorganized attachment style, those characteristics are likely to appear in their parenting style. They might inadvertently teach the child that large emotions, like jealousy or anger, are wrong. As a result, the child also avoids these emotions. 

Additionally, if the caregiver is inconsistent in meeting the child’s emotional and physical needs, the child develops conflicting emotions toward the caregiver. This experience can lead to confusion and a disorganized attachment. 

Signs of disorganized attachment

Disorganized attachment displays characteristics of both anxious and avoidant attachment styles. 

Signs of disorganized attachment in children

Children with a disorganized attachment often have mixed emotional responses.

• The child might seek their caregiver for support while sometimes appearing to fear or reject them.
• The child may display difficulty with trusting others, including adults and peers. 
• The child might struggle to cry or display other intense emotions. 
• The child may appear confused when engaging with their caregiver, unsure whether they should embrace or resist.
• The child might appear dazed, showing overt displays of fear of the caregiver. 
• The child may display contradictory behaviors occurring at once or appear to dissociate when upset.  

At the core of these traits is confusion toward the caregiver. The child naturally seeks their caregiver, but with a disorganized attachment, they will seem hesitant or unsure of them.

Signs of disorganized attachment in adults

Adults with a disorganized attachment may experience extreme emotional highs and lows. 

• They may experience low self-esteem or be critical of themselves.
• They might have an inherent distrust of others. 
• They likely experience difficulty with emotional regulation. 
• They may have difficulty maintaining long-term relationships or hesitate to enter into a committed relationship.
• They might show inconsistent behavior regarding affection, communication, and engagement with loved ones. 

An adult with a disorganized attachment style might long for connection but also be terrified or disgusted by it. Their inconsistent behaviors likely appear in all relationships. Physical affection can trigger a fight-or-flight response from someone with a disorganized attachment. 

A 2020 study published by Nature found that people with a history of traumatic parental bonds and a disorganized attachment pattern perceive a “caress-like” stimulus as being unpleasant. Participants with a secure attachment considered the same tactile stimulation to be pleasant. In short, adults with a disorganized attachment were likely to struggle to be comfortable with physical affection.

Additionally, insecure attachment styles lend to increased difficulty with mental health conditions such as depression. While the researchers note that the findings are preliminary, a 2023 article from Sage Journals found that insecure attachments also lend to personality, eating, affective, dissociative, and addictive disorders.  

What does it feel like to date someone with a disorganized attachment?

Due to the unpredictability and inconsistency of a partner with a disorganized attachment, you might feel like you’re tiptoeing around them. You might not know if your partner will be warm and inviting or cold and harsh. It might also take longer for them to be comfortable with physical touch.

Your partner might become emotionally distant during conflict resolution or difficult relationship conversations and share little of their true feelings. Due to their inconsistent behavior, you may feel confused about their real feelings toward you. 

If you have a partner with a disorganized attachment style, cultivating relationship satisfaction takes time and effort. It’s important to respect their boundaries and give them space when needed. However, your partner can heal from an insecure attachment by getting to know their triggers. 

Emotional triggers for disorganized attachment

If you have a disorganized attachment, there are many emotional triggers that involve inconsistent behavior or unknowns in the relationship. When triggered, your amygdala increases in activity, sending a message to the brain and body that ignites the fight-or-flight response. 

Once in this state, you’ll notice physical reactions like a rapid heartbeat, muscle tension, and increased awareness of your surroundings. Biologically, your body primes itself to react quickly to a perceived threat. 

Specific emotional triggers can set off this response in the brain and body. Note the overlap between how a disorganized attachment appears in the relationship and what triggers it. For example, inconsistent communication can be a common trait of your disorganized attachment. However, you could also be triggered if you perceive your partner communicating inconsistently.

These are some of the most common situations that might trigger your disorganized attachment style:

• You perceive signs of abandonment, rejection, or disappointment from your partner. In practice, this trigger can look like your partner not replying to text messages, not coming home, seeming distant, or appearing angry.
• You see inconsistent behavior from your partner. If your partner displays unpredictable behavior, such as inconsistent communication, it can trigger you if you have a disorganized attachment style.
• Your partner seeks commitment or initiates conversations about the future. If a partner tries to prompt discussions about the future or create relationship goals, it can trigger your disorganized attachment, and you may pull away. 
• You feel critiqued or judged. Whether the criticism or judgment is intended or invented, you might distance yourself at the first sign of a partner’s dissatisfaction. 
• You witness your partner shutting down. If you see your partner dissociate and pull away, you might do the same. You fear rejection and abandonment, so instead of opening up to those emotions, you shut down. 
• You experience unexpected physical touch. If someone touches you, it can trigger your disorganized attachment. The contact could be from a friend touching your shoulder or a partner trying to hold your hand. 

To gain a greater insight into your attachment style as well as your partner’s, consider taking an attachment style questionnaire such as this one from Trauma Solutions. You’ll respond to a series of statements like:

• I have a deep longing to be close to others — and then inexplicably, I feel I want to get away from them. 
• Protection often feels out of reach for me. I struggle to feel safe with my partner. 
• I startle or “jump” more easily than most people when approached unexpectedly. 
• When I reach a certain level of intimacy, I sometimes experience unexplained fear. 

Mark each statement with a 0 (disagree), 1 (sometimes agree), 2 (mostly agree), or 3 (strongly agree). The higher your score, the more likely it is that you have an insecure attachment. Such an assessment can be helpful to take with a partner. Together, you can learn about your attachment types as well as how to support each other as you work toward developing secure attachment styles, fixing relationships, and maintaining healthy relationships. 

How to heal disorganized attachment

While you likely didn’t have any control over your environment as a child, you do have power over healing your attachment wounds as an adult and how you might parent a child. 

Reflect on the origin of your disorganized attachment

Because your attachment style is rooted in early childhood experiences, it can be difficult to pinpoint exact memories. However, you have an emotional memory. When you’re triggered, your body has an emotional flashback that signals to your amygdala that you’re unsafe. Old habits you created to protect yourself as a child rise to the surface. 

If you want to examine the beginning of your disorganized attachment more closely, consider exploring the adverse childhood experiences (ACE) assessment. By answering “yes” or “no” to 10 questions, you can better understand how your environment and the meeting of your childhood needs impacted your attachment style. 

There are several other measures professional mental health providers might use to better understand an insecure attachment style.

Pro tip: It’s difficult to dig through childhood trauma, whether concrete or emotional memories. Make sure to go at your own pace. Maintain good self-care practices, and try journaling your responses as they arise. 

Identify your triggers

Start paying attention to your reactions in given situations. Take note of which conversations or experiences cause you to cling to a partner and which cause you to retreat from them. Write them down to reference later. By doing so, you can start to notice behavioral trends and those that are likely your biggest triggers.

It’s also worth paying attention to physical sensations. Sometimes, your body will tell you it’s triggered before your brain fully processes the information. Signs like chest tension, headaches, irritability, or indigestion can all manifest physically.  

If this happens, be gentle with yourself. Create a safe space to experience the emotions and practice self-affirming speech, such as reminding yourself that you’re safe. 

Try different self-regulation strategies

If you’re triggered, the next step is to self-regulate. When your nervous system is unbalanced, you’re on high alert and may have a fight-or-flight response.

The first step is always noticing what is happening. Remember, you won’t always do this successfully. Sometimes, you may notice your response and comfort yourself, while other times you won’t. You’re retraining your nervous system to create healthy coping mechanisms. It takes time. Try these strategies to emotionally self-regulate: 

• Recognize and accept your emotional response.
• Practice breathwork strategies or mindfulness tactics.
• Go for a walk or sit outside.
• Take a warm shower or bath.
• Try somatic or emotional freedom technique (EFT) tapping. 
• Journal the sensations you feel in your body.

With practice, implementing self-regulation techniques will become second nature. 

Pro tip: With an insecure attachment, you’re likely keeping an eye out for threats. Try to reframe your mindset to look for green flags in a relationship. For example, a partner’s ability to respect your boundaries and create a safe space for you is a green flag. 

Practice communication your feelings

When you’re ready, one of the best ways to start healing a disorganized attachment is by expressing your feelings with a trusted loved one. This vulnerability is exceptionally difficult for people with insecure attachments. 

After you’ve practiced identifying and understanding your emotions independently, you may feel more comfortable expressing them with someone else. 

• Start slow, and don’t push yourself further than you’re ready for. 
• If you don’t feel comfortable vocalizing your feelings, write them down and give it to your loved one.
• Use “I” statements to focus on how a situation made you feel.  
• Share your insecurities with someone you trust. 

The more you express your emotions and receive loving responses from those who care about you, the easier it becomes. Slowly, your brain learns that it’s OK to be vulnerable. You can grow your ability to trust others and yourself.

Pro tip: If you feel drained after sharing your feelings, you might be experiencing a vulnerability hangover. Remember that the experience will pass.

Challenge the inner critic

Your inner critic is the small voice in your head that tells you when you’re not enough. When you make a mistake, the inner critic might be quick to condemn you. If you have a disorganized attachment style, the inner critic is likely hard at work, hindering your ability to trust and feel safe with others. 

Here’s how you can challenge the inner critic: 

• Challenge negative self-talk by reframing self-criticism into self-compassion.
• Make practicing words of affirmation a regular part of your day.
• Treat yourself with radical self-compassion, kindness, and acceptance. 
• Write down when your inner critic arises, what it says, and how you counter it.

A harsh inner critic can make it challenging to build strong interpersonal relationships. In building habits around positive self-talk, you can help reframe your mindset. 

Pro tip: The inner critic can appear in sneaky ways. Look for moments when you say, “I should have known that,” or “Why didn’t I think of that?” It’s your inner critic speaking. Rewrite these narratives by saying, “That’s good to know.”

A recent study published in Frontiers in Psychiatry found that depressed individuals who received treatment specific to their inner critic experienced a boost in their self-compassion.

Be compassionate toward yourself

Healing an insecure attachment is difficult for everyone. Not only does it feel unsafe and uncomfortable, but it also brings up many challenging emotions. Here’s how to maintain self-compassion: 

• Treat yourself as you would a friend: You most likely wouldn’t criticize or speak down to a friend. Aim to talk to yourself how you would a loved one.
• Look inward for self-validation: Avoid looking externally to validate your inner world. Refocus that perspective inward, focusing on meeting your desires, needs, and emotions.
• Establish healthy coping mechanisms for difficult emotions: Self-compassion means taking good care of your well-being when challenging emotions arise. 
• Give yourself space to make mistakes: When dealing with mistakes, it’s important to maintain a growth mindset. View them as an opportunity to learn and grow.  
• Consider your personal and relationship values: Knowing what is most important to you can help with reframing how you think about yourself and others. 

Self-compassion helps improve your emotional well-being, enabling you to deepen relationships at work and in your personal life. 

Work with a mental health professional 

Disorganized attachment styles are complex. Working through it alone may be too much, but that’s OK. A sign of emotional maturity is being willing to ask for help when you need it. 

Working with a mental health professional can help create a healthy and constructive environment to address the root causes of disorganized attachment. They can guide you through inner child and shadow work at your own pace. 

If you’re a parent who has noticed signs of disorganized attachment in your child, sometimes Child-Parent Psychotherapy and Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-Up can be effective methods to help the child’s attachment. Ensure you find a practitioner with the proper training. 

A therapist, coach, or another mental health professional will guide you in navigating attachment wounds and triggers. They can provide you with the resources and insights necessary to support the healing journey.

Healing a disorganized attachment though self-compassion

You will wade through many complicated and intense emotions in healing your disorganized attachment. Vulnerability may feel uncomfortable at times. Remember that you don’t have to do everything perfectly. It’s more important that you maintain your patience and self-compassion throughout your journey. 

Sometimes, working with a counselor or coach can help. They can help you sort through complex experiences and emotions, helping you understand them while providing valuable insights. Heal your disorganized attachment with a BetterUp Coach and learn to build healthier relationships.