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Resilience and Recovery of Insecure Attachment Styles Within Clinical Practice

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Resilience and Recovery of Insecure Attachment Styles Within Clinical Practice logy ho & P yc s s y c P f h o o t l h a e n r r Journal of Psychology and a u p o y J ISSN: 2161-0487 Psychotherapy Research Article Resilience and Recovery of Insecure Attachment Styles within Clinical Practice Melissa Weise* School of Social Work, Boston College, Boston, MA 02467, USA ABSTRACT Much has been written about attachment styles and mental health. This paper seeks to build a model of the strengths of resilience leading to recovery within the dismissive and preoccupied adult insecure attachment styles. This model will then be discussed utilizing composite case material for the purposes of supporting clinicians treating individuals with insecure attachment styles. Keywords: Resilience; Recovery; Attachment; Attachment styles; Insecure attachment INTRODUCTION disorganized. These styles originated in the work of Bowlby and We learn how to be human from our connection with other Ainsworth and their research on children’s attachment patterns humans. Particularly powerful connections with other human with their parents, including Ainsworth’ s Strange Situation beings become the foundation for our attachments, ways in research [2,11]. From these styles, several measures have been which humans learn to soothe and organize themselves through designed to determine attachment styles in the general the presence of others. Much study has been done on what are population with fairly reliable interrater and reliability results considered the optimal attachment circumstances for a fully [12,13]. Each childhood attachment style has a corresponding integrated and functional person [1-4]. This pattern of adult attachment style. Secure childhood attachment style connection, termed secure attachment, has long been considered becomes autonomous adult attachment style. Avoidant by many to be the pinnacle of healthy human development, with childhood attachment style becomes dismissing adult other patterns of connections being largely relegated to attachment style. Anxious childhood attachment style becomes pathology and “not enoughness” in theory and research [5-7]. preoccupied adult attachment styles and disorganized childhood However, with roughly half the population falling into other attachment style becomes unresolved adult attachment style [14]. types of attachment patterns, termed “ insecure ” , it is not For the purposes of this paper, I will use the adult attachment possible that everyone without secure attachment is style terms and concepts. pathologically predestined. In fact, it is well known in the There is some ongoing discussion about the unresolved insecure clinical world that those who do experience serious mental attachment style. It was originally a research category created by illness also have strengths and capacities that are unique, Ainsworth and her assistants to house data instances that did effective and powerful [8-10]. These individuals are not simply not fit into autonomous, dismissing or preoccupied styles. and wholly pathologized, they are complex and nuanced people. Therefore, the unresolved attachment style is not truly a This paper seeks to explore the ways in which unique strengths “category”, but rather a “catch all” that may be a group of diverse and capacities are manifested in those with insecure attachment ways in which individuals coped with difficult attachment in patterns utilizing composite case material. much less likely ways [4]. Because of the inconsistent nature of the unresolved attachment style, in this paper I will examine ATTACHMENT STYLES only the two stable insecure categories. The two remaining Generally, the literature recognizes four discrete attachment insecure attachment styles, dismissing and preoccupied, have a styles, one secure and three insecure: avoidant, fearful and *Correspondence to: Melissa Weise, Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker, School of Social Work, Boston College, 140 Commonwealth Avenue Chestnut Hill, Boston, MA 02467, USA, Tel: 413-687-9685; E-mail: [email protected] Received: December 21, 2018; Accepted: May 20, 2019; Published: May 27, 2019 Citation: Weise M (2019) Resilience and Recovery of Insecure Attachment Styles within Clinical Practice. J Psychol Psychother 9:359. doi: 10.35248/ 2161-0487.19.9.359 Copyright: © 2019 Weise M. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. J Psychol Psychother, Vol.9 Iss.2 No:359 1 Weise M set of predictable interpersonal and self-organizing patterns in the pattern below (Table 1) [15]. Table 1: Self-organizing patterns of the insecure attachment styles. Attachment Type Patterns Affiliated Questionnaire Statements Dismissing High avoidance It is important for me to feel independent from others Low anxiety I am comfortable without close emotional relationships Values independence It is very important for me to feel self-sufficient Low on trust I prefer not to have others depend on me Values being alone I do not disclose personal information to others that I am not close to Narrow emotional range It is difficult for me to accept advice from others because their views are so different from mine I believe it is a waste of time to argue/disagree with others I do not go to others when I am upset because I like to deal with problems on my own Preoccupied Low on avoidance I want to be completely emotionally intimate with others High on anxiety I worry that others do not value me as much as I value them Craves intimacy I find that others are reluctant to get as close as I would like Ruminates I would like to spend more time with others, but they do not have enough time for me Desire merger It takes a long time for me to become close to someone new Low self esteem I am affectionate in my relationships with others When I disagree with others, I find that they are often defensive I like to deal with conflict immediately, regardless of how long it takes to resolve the conflict I cry easily While attachment styles as categories are the most generally relatively common and which would lead to relatively common understood conceptualization of attachment theory, there is individuals with insecure attachment styles. This begs the some literature from Crittenden, a student of Ainsworth, which question of how those individuals who experience these things indicates that using discrete categories of attachment as a are often able to lead satisfying lives, despite insecure theoretical conceptualization was never the goal of Ainsworth’s attachment. work but instead was a useful research method with the ultimate In her research of severely neglected and abused children who aim being a spectrum rather than categorical conceptualization grew up to be self-reported successful adults in “Strong at the [4]. While this merits further attention, this paper will proceed Broken Places ” , Sanford ’ s investigation of these strengths with attachment styles as categories. suggested themes of doing a lot with very little and utilizing Insecure attachments result from early caregiver misattunement fantasy [22]. Those who have had difficult experiences also seem which leads to insecure attachment patterns and even to find unique ways to adapt and cope with these experiences attachment trauma. This interrupts or arrests a person’s ability which are recognizable to clinicians and others who work in to develop a secure attachment style [16-18]. The Adverse human services fields [23,24]. It would then follow that those Childhood Events (ACES) body of research indicates that who do not have secure attachment due to difficult early difficult things happening during childhood are relatively childhood events may have a particular type of strength that is common in the general population and can lead to many poor worth investigating in order to better conceptualize how to physical and psychological outcomes later in life [19-21]. This support and treat individuals who are struggling. research indicates that adverse childhood events may also be J Psychol Psychother, Vol.9 Iss.2 No:359 2 Weise M RECOVERY Capacity to re-organize the self after threat has resolved Concepts such as “ recovery ” and “ resilience ” attempt to [16,24,29-37]. conceptualize these particular types of strength. They are newer ideas in the mental health lexicon and research than are ideas of Facets of recovery and dimensions of resilience utilized insecure attachment, pathology, and serious mental illness. As within the process capacities such, they also need additional research. The concept of Various parts of resilience and recovery are used in the process recovery is older and more researched and appears to be capacities of resilience which build upon each other in order for organized around stages and facets. The stages of recovery an individual to survive stress and distress (Figure 1). include Moratorium, Awareness, Preparation, Rebuilding and Growth [25] and the facets include Self-esteem, Empowerment, Social support and Quality of life [8,10,26]. A tool called the Recovery Assessment Scale (RAS) to is being utilized in many community mental health programs. It incorporates and measures these ideas [27]. Working definitions Self-esteem: Positive feelings and confidence about one’s self and identity. Empowerment: One’s feeling of having authority to act. Social Support: Care and assistance from other people. Quality of life: a standard of health, comfort and happiness [8,26,27]. RESILIENCE
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