Bonding or Attachment in Childhood: Why Is It Important?

Why?

How well you bonded or attached to your parent (or primary caretaker) as a child gets played out daily in your adult life. This impacts how you relate to family, partners, co-workers and neighbors. The way in which you bonded laid the foundation for how you perceive safety and feeling welcomed in the world today. It has the potential to influence your decisions about your choice of mate, kind of work, where you live and how you play. In general, it’s possible that how you and your parent bonded, along with the kind of shock traumas (time-limited overwhelming events, which I addressed in previous blogs) could affect every aspect of your life.

 

When Did Bonding Happen?

The bonding process that was this critical happened in the first couple ofyears of life. Attachment began in utero and continued throughout pre-school years. Specific behaviors you showed as a young child suggests how you bonded with your parent. For example, how you responded when your parent left you, whether you moved away or toward your parent when you were in the same room and how eager you were to explore your environment were all indicators of your attachment process.

 

What Was The Consequence Of Bonding?

How safe and welcomed you felt as a child, as a result of the bonding process, varied depending on how well your parent was in synch with your needs and responded appropriately to them. Because you had yet to develop an analytical mind, this perception of safety was done primarily through noticing such behaviors as your parent’s quality of touch, eye contact, tone of voice and how quickly she responded to your signals of distress. If there were times when your parent acted in ways that compromised your sense of safety and connection, you found ways to stay connected as much as possible to your parent. Without enough connection you could have died.

As a child you probably used one of four attachment strategies in response to how well your parent could be in synch with you. These four adaptive strategies are called secure, avoidant, ambivalent and disorganized. The last three of these, depending on the severity, could have led to developmental trauma.

In the next series of blogs, I will describe these four styles in depth. I will highlight what a parent did or did not do that could lead to each strategy and how these strategies show up in adult behavior. I also will make suggestions as to help yourself or others when it is difficult to relate to or feel safe with others.

 

Next Step?

If you think you experienced developmental trauma and wonder if it is affecting you today, you may benefit from counseling. A skilled body-centered therapist can help you to understand how the parenting you received is causing stress in your personal and professional relationships. She will help you to look at specific behaviors you experienced, how you coped the best way you could as a child and how those coping strategies may or may not be helpful in your adult life. She will help you to make this assessment by inviting you to pay attention to not only your thoughts and feelings but body sensations as well. By engaging these three channels of information, you can gain the most insight into why and what to do next.

If you would like to explore this inquiry with me, I can be reached at 720-635-7943 in the Denver CO area. I offer a complimentary 30-minute consultation in which we can see if we are a good fit for one another.