Disorganized Attachment

Elisa A. Escalante/ LCSW/ 10-04-2025

It’s human nature to seek love, because it is a developmental, physiological, mental, and emotional need. But what happens when this need is met with both love and chaos? Love with abuse? Love with betrayal? Love with confusion? People might develop the pattern of seeking love while fearing it. They develop trust issues with others as well as their own brain wiring. Relationships, over time, feel like a tug of war. Push and pull. “I love you, I hate you. Come here, now get away from me. I miss you. No, leave me alone! I want love, I don’t want love. I’m lonely… NO! I don’t need anyone!” They’re confused because love was confusing for them. It was given in a painful manner, with toxic conditions attached. And perhaps they were guilt tripped and treated as a burden just for seeking it out. No consistency, no stability, nothing that made sense. This is called a disorganized attachment style, and it happens when young children suffer from complex childhood traumas during stages of rapid brain development. (Suffering from childhood traumas from ages 0-7 put kid’s at a much higher risk of developing unhealthy attachment styles)

Triggers and emotional dysregulation

Many people with CPTSD and disorganized attachment styles are accused of being over reactive, having unpredictable mood swings, and are even mislabeled as bipolar. But, the mood swings are not strictly due to a chemical imbalance, they are quite often due to unknown or mismanaged triggers. For example, their partner could unintentionally speak in a way that mirrors their childhood abusers, and then their body will go into the state of ‘fight, fly, freeze, fawn or dissociate’. Their primal body/ mind is actively protecting them from a familiar danger, and they will then lose access to their prefrontal cortex which helps with logical thinking. Their partner may not have had ill intent, but they need to protect themselves from more danger regardless. They can protect themselves by arguing back, getting away from their partner, shutting down, or faking nice. If this is a large unknown, or poorly communicated in a relationship, it will cause perpetual resentment on both sides.

Fears of commitment

Though people with disorganized attachment styles may chase after love, unlike an avoidant, they will fear every step of the love story. They might commit in fear. They might settle while refusing to ‘commit’ fully; avoiding marriage for example. Having one foot in the door while having a ‘Plan Z’ in case things go south. Because from their experience, it always does go south, eventually. They may see love/ relationships as things that feel very good, but can’t truly be reliable in the long run. They’re more likely to have ‘off and on’ relationships with the same people throughout the course of their lives. Their brain cannot fully trust anyone, all day, always and forever. But, they still crave the familiarity of the love from the people they grew close to… when it was good, healthy love at least.

Love bombs and dissociative cycles

This is especially true for kid’s that grew up with various abandonment and emotional neglect cycles, the love bomb feels so good it can become addicting. The neglect turns into a black hole so to speak. A deep empty void due to unmet childhood needs. In adulthood this could look like someone becoming quickly attached the moment they receive welcomed attention. They may attach and feed off of the love bomb for much needed brain chemicals. But, when the relationship starts to get overwhelming, the disorganized brain may resort to dissociation or numbing. Maybe the anxious feature of the disorganized brain causes the person to stay in the relationship. However, the avoidant feature of the mind must remove itself from the stressful environment. If you cannot fight the threat, and you cannot leave it, and you are frozen, then the last method is for the brain to float away from reality. This often causes their partners to feel neglected or shut out.

Distrust and jumping to conclusions

Because love was so abusive and chaotic, the disorganized brain goes into relationships with deeper levels of distrust. They know they are taking a risk, but they need to feel love so badly. And, if they are dealing with a partner that does not offer them reassurance, their brain will search for answers. An anxious to disorganized brain jumps to conclusions when it DOES NOT get the answers. If things feel confusing, if things feel familiar in a negative way, they will assume the worst. Examples include that their partner must be cheating, or must be lying, or must be manipulating them. They may either interrogate them for answers or falsely accuse them of things because in their mind, it feels like reality. Unfortunately, if a person with disorganized attachment encounters a narcissist, this will only prove to them what they already know; people can’t be trusted, so they might as well sabotage the relationship early. This is the self fulfilling prophecy.

Lonely but still isolating

Unlike avoidants, disorganized people feel quite lonely. And, unlike the anxious types, the disorganized person does not cling to people for dear life just to ease the loneliness. There is still the fear of what will go wrong, eventually. So despite feeling lonely, a disorganized person will still isolate to protect themselves from getting hurt again. They may come out in spurts to get that magical feeling of love, but run away and retreat to their solitude the second they feel overwhelmed by the threat of love. They will likely be described as people that give ‘mixed signals’ while simultaneously believing that everyone else is giving them mixed signals. They may try to connect with someone, then the moment that person displays behaviors that indicate potential neglect, abandonment or abuse, the disorganized person may retreat without appropriate communication.

Healing is HARD

Childhood trauma and unhealthy attachment styles are extremely difficult to heal. These are deeply rooted defense mechanisms that were needed for survival in rapidly developing brains. People get wired to operate, think and behave in their attachment styles. The riskiest thing of all, is that a healthy relationship is what can help a traumatized brain heal. But, it’s so risky. There are no guarantees any given person will find a healthy relationship with healthy comforting love. But if we can find healthy connections, we can prove to ourselves overtime that they do actually exist. Healthy love and/ or relationships can help people learn that they can let their guards down. They can delegate some of their care to others. Approaching potential love matches with your values, boundaries and reciprocity in mind could help. It would then be a relationship based off of honesty and clarity, versus fear and chaos. And if it does not work out, it is okay to step away from that early on, without a volcanic eruption of an ending. Moving with the ebb and flow of love with grace versus racing or running from connection.