Attachment Theory: How Relational Patterns Are Formed
Attachment theory suggests that our earliest interactions with caregivers shape our internal expectations of relationships.
These early relational experiences are not learned through logic or explicit teaching. They are learned through:
Availability (Was comfort present when needed?)
Responsiveness (Were emotions acknowledged or dismissed?)
Attunement (Did caregivers understand the child’s emotional state?)
Consistency (Were responses stable or unpredictable?)
When a caregiver is loving but emotionally limited, absent due to work demands, overwhelmed, or inconsistent, a child can develop a pattern of self-reliance in the face of emotional need.
This does not mean love was absent.
Rather, emotional regulation was frequently internal, rather than shared.
The nervous system learns:
“Connection is important, but I manage my feelings privately.”
Anxious–Preoccupied Attachment Tendencies
The term anxious–preoccupied does not describe a personality trait; it describes a relational pattern the nervous system uses to maintain connection when emotional attunement is uncertain.
This pattern commonly develops when:
The child feels deeply connected and empathetic
But emotional reassurance is inconsistent or unavailable
And the child adapts by monitoring, repairing, or pursuing connection
The internal experience becomes:
High value placed on close relationships
High sensitivity to relational withdrawal or distance
A belief that closeness must be maintained through effort
In adulthood, this may be expressed through:
Strong emotional investment in significant relationships
A drive to repair or “fix” ruptures quickly
Difficulty tolerating uncertainty or ambiguity in attachment
Persistent attempts to understand or rework relational endings
This is not neediness or dependency.
It is a protective strategy learned in conditions where love and availability were meaningful but not consistent.
Relationship Dissolution Without Emotional Closure
When a relationship ends with clarity and mutual understanding, the attachment system can gradually down-regulate.
However, when a relationship ends:
abruptly
without emotional explanation
with betrayal, inconsistency, or confusion
during a period of emotional vulnerability
the attachment system remains activated.
The brain continues to seek:
meaning
coherence
repair
This is not an inability to “move on.”
It is the attachment system attempting to resolve an incomplete emotional sequence.
The mind is not attached to the person, but to the unfinished process.
Limerence: A Cognitive-Emotional Loop Seeking Resolution
Limerence is best understood as:
A state of heightened emotional and cognitive focus on a person, driven by an unmet attachment need for closure, resolution, or reciprocation.
It does not arise from fantasy or weakness.
It arises from:
Unresolved emotional attachment
Ambiguous loss
Meaning-making processes that never completed
Attempts to restore internal coherence
Limerence is not about possession or obsession.
It is essentially the nervous system saying:
“Something important happened, and I have not yet integrated it.”
Once integration occurs — through understanding, emotional processing, relational repair, or grief — the limerent state naturally deactivates.
Why Overwhelm or Shutdown Can Occur in Subsequent Relationships
If a later relationship activates:
safety
care
genuine emotional presence
while earlier relational grief remains unprocessed, the nervous system can experience conflict between longing and self-protection.
This may manifest as:
emotional intensity followed by withdrawal
dissociation, shutdown, or avoidance
difficulty sustaining closeness even when it is wanted
This is the nervous system attempting to prevent re-exposure to unresolved loss.
It is protective, not avoidant.
The Therapeutic Focus Moving Forward
The aim is not to suppress feeling, detach from past bonds, or “get over” anything.
The aim is to:
Re-regulate the attachment system
(create internal safety around connection and loss)Process unresolved emotional sequences
(so the nervous system no longer seeks completion through rumination)Restore the capacity to receive emotional support
(rather than only give or pursue it)Develop a felt sense of relational safety
(that closeness does not require self-abandonment)
When these are in place:
Driving panic decreases
Emotional overwhelm reduces
Relationships become mutual rather than effort-based
Limerence dissolves naturally
Closeness becomes steady and sustainable
No part of this process implies fault, damage, or insufficiency.
It reflects a nervous system that adapted intelligently to its environment and is now simply being invited to update to new conditions.
