From fear of vulnerability to an overwhelming need for reassurance, our attachment styles often stem from the ways we were cared for as children. Understanding these patterns, where they come from and how they impact our adult lives is key to healing, growing and forming healthier relationships.
At 24, Sharon Gekonge has begun her journey to understand her attachment style, tracing her roots in childhood and learning how to change it in adulthood.
She identifies her attachment style as avoidant, distancing herself emotionally as a form of protection. Whenever she senses closeness or vulnerability, she sabotages her relationships, finding faults to justify pulling away.
As a child, she experienced her parents differently. Her mother was supportive and present, creating a sense of security in their relationship. With her father, it was the opposite; he was critical and only affectionate when she excelled academically. This, she says, formed the basis of her avoidant attachment.
“With my father, it felt like I had to earn love; it wasn’t given freely,” she discloses.
She remembers showing her report card to her parents and her father calling her mediocre or average, insisting she couldn’t achieve anything meaningful in life.
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“It hurt. I really wanted their approval and to know they were proud of me, but I didn’t get that from my father,” she says.
Conflicts at home were often chaotic, leaving her to associate disagreements with disorder. When she needed comfort, her mother would listen and try to resolve the issue, while her father was dismissive.
Sharon believes the way parents treat their children shapes how they expect the world to treat them. Now, she is taking steps to heal and move toward a secure attachment.
“I didn’t know about attachment styles until recently. Through self-reflection, I’ve seen patterns that repeat in my friendships and relationships. I’m learning that conflict and vulnerability aren’t bad,” she says.
David Omondi, 28, reveals that his attachment style is anxious, where he craves emotional closeness but fears rejection. He pays attention to subtle cues like tone of voice, and any change spirals into overthinking, making him clingy.
“I constantly struggle with worry of abandonment, even when that’s not the reality. I realised that I burden my partner with a need for constant confirmation that she loves me or that I’m good enough for her,” he shares.
In his childhood, David says that his parents would pendulum between emotional attentiveness and absence, creating unpredictability. As an adult, he constantly questions whether he is worthy of love and tends to people-please to keep his relationships and friendships intact.
Avoidant and anxious attachment are two out of the four attachment styles which originated from an attachment theory by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth in the 1950s and 1960s.
John described attachment style as the early emotional bonds between a child and a caregiver. Four attachment styles exist: secure, anxious or preoccupied, avoidant or dismissive, and disorganised or fearful.
Consultant psychiatrist Dr Catherine Syengo Mutisya states how a child is cared for and interacted with by their caregivers in the early days informing their attachment style. She says that attachment begins immediately after birth, with the mother being the first person to lay its foundation.
“It depends on the kind of care the baby receives and how emotionally available the caregiver, especially the mother, is,” she says.
Mothers, she says, play a significant role because they are the first to hold, feed, and comfort the newborn. Attachment, she insists, begins forming from the very first moments after birth. That is why modern hospitals encourage skin-to-skin contact as soon as possible, even when a mother is recovering from delivery. “There was a time babies were kept in nurseries away from mothers. Now we emphasise immediate bonding. If the mother dies, whoever takes care of the baby must be consistently present to help the child form a secure attachment,” she says.
Fathers are also important in establishing emotional security through being present, holding and providing care.
She adds that as much as the mother breastfeeds, the father should also be emotionally available. When both parents are consistent and create a stable environment, the child develops secure attachment. A secure attachment develops when a caregiver is responsive and nurturing, allowing the child to feel loved, worthy, and safe to explore.
“A secure child knows that if they cry, someone will respond. They grow up confident and able to handle stress,” says Dr Mutisya.
Whereas an avoidant attachment forms when the caregiver is unavailable or unresponsive, she says. The child learns not to rely on others for comfort, becoming emotionally distant to protect themselves.
The caregiver also shows inconsistent care; sometimes the parent is attentive, other times detached. This unpredictability makes the child clingy and fearful of abandonment.
The disorganised style, she adds, combines anxiety and avoidance, often resulting from abusive or frightening caregiving.
“Disorganised attachment is a mix of fear and desire for closeness. The caregiver becomes both the source of comfort and the source of fear,” she says.
The attachment styles developed in childhood show up in adult relationships. Dr Mutisya explains that those with avoidant attachment may long for intimacy but sabotage closeness; the anxious may fear rejection and over-pursue partners; the disorganised may oscillate between clinging and withdrawing. Meanwhile, secure individuals usually attract and sustain balanced relationships.
“When you meet conflict or stress, you return to the attachment style you learnt as a child,” she explains.
Insecure attachment can manifest as depression, lack of confidence, substance abuse, underperformance, and difficulty in maintaining relationships in both childhood and adulthood.
Children struggling with attachment may lack confidence, resort to substances, get depressed, or underperform in school. Securely attached children are more resilient and handle stress better and can help others too.
Dr Mutisya also says that parenting style determines a child’s attachment style. Authoritative parenting creates warmth and clear boundaries and therefore produces a balanced child with self-control and self-esteem.
Authoritarian parenting can damage a child’s confidence; permissive parenting, where everything goes, leads to poor self-control, while neglectful parenting produces insecurity or even outbursts.
“A disorganised upbringing, she adds, can leave lasting chaos in a person’s emotional world,” she emphasises.
These days, parents have a lot on their plates, Dr Mutisya notes, adding that increased screen time, demanding work schedules, and distracted parenting have changed how families bond.
“Parents are busier, and when they’re not working, they’re on their phones. Conscious parenting, that is, being physically and emotionally present, has an impact on a child’s attachment,” she says.