Attachment Related Questions

Attachment Related Questions

Innate within each one of us is the need for close, intimate relationships. We want people in our lives who we can depend on if ever we are hurt or confused. Life is hard enough as it is. The only thing worse that what life may throw at us is feeling alone in it.

We all want to be listened to, heard, accepted. We long to know that no matter what I experience, there is at least one person who will see me and fully embrace me in all my beauty (or lack thereof). Despite how I feel, how I look, what I do, and in all my flaws, because everyone has them, will you still be there? Deep within the corners of who we are, we ask these certain, specific questions. Questions that at times we don’t have language for, and if we did, we are often too scared to say out loud. But they are there. These questions go far deeper than “Why is the sky blue?” These questions are attachment-related questions.

Can I depend on you if I need you?

Will you be available?

Will you be around? Will you be accessible?

Are you someone I can depend on?

Are you someone I can trust?

Are you someone who will provide for me?

Will you take care of my needs?

What if I screw up? Will you still accept me? Is our relationship more important to you than this conflict?

Will you stick around? Will you ever leave me? How will I know? How do I know you won’t ever leave me? What is to say that you won’t leave like all the other people in my life? What makes you different that you won’t do the same and leave?

Are you going to give up on me? Would you give up on me? How do I know you won’t?

Am I important to you?

Am I valued by you?

Am I worth it to you?

I’m not sure if I can trust you…YET! But I want to. Will you be patient as I learn?

Will you reject me?

Will you abandon me?

What if I lose you? What if I get attached and either you leave, or worse…something bad happens to you? How will I handle it? How will I deal with that? How will I be able to move on? Am I a bad person because I’d rather something bad happen to you than for you to leave me, because if you leave me, that says more about me and something being wrong with me or that I am bad than something bad happening? If something bad happens to you, that is out of my control. But if you leave me, how do I know that it wasn’t me that caused it?

As children, if we are born into a home where parents are available and responsive to our physical and emotional needs, we grow up learning that we are somebody worth getting to know, others are trustworthy to provide care and concern, and the world around us is safe enough to explore. And if something happens, we know because we are worthy of care and others will provide care, we can return to those we trust and we can be okay. But what happens if we either are not born into homes where parents are available or responsive, or there is a disruption in our attachments, such as we are taken out of the home and placed into foster care or adoptive care, or our parents go beyond being unavailable and unresponsive and into mistreatment or abuse? At a deep brain level, far underneath logic and rationale and out of reach of language, we begin to ask these questions. Am I worth getting to know? Are you someone who will truly get to know me? And if you do get to know me, how will I know you will still embrace me?