What Does Secure Attachment Look Like in Relationships?

Having a secure attachment style means that you have an ability to form interdependent relationships with others — ones that are built on maintaining a sense of your independent self as well as mutually dependent connection and support. You are comfortable with the steady development of trust, vulnerability, and intimacy in close relationships, and willing to work through relational difficulties as well as able to let relationships go when needed.

What secure attachment in adults looks like in a relationship

In other posts, we have looked at how anxious attachment and avoidant attachment tend to respond to relationship difficulties. The anxiously attached are highly attuned to changes in their partner’s mood or behaviour and frequently seek reassurance. Those with an avoidant attachment style often respond to relationship difficulties as well as increasing intimacy and vulnerability in the same way, by pulling back from closeness.

People with a secure attachment style still experience challenges in relationships — even with another securely attached partner. Being securely attached doesn’t inoculate you from clashes in values and expectations, communication difficulties, and personality differences.

What it does change is how you respond internally in those situations.

In relationship conflict, someone with secure attachment will still certainly have their feelings about it. They might feel angered or upset by a situation with their partner. But where someone with anxious attachment might feel compelled by the fear of loss to seek reassurance, and someone with avoidant attachment might feel overwhelmed by the urge to escape, secure attachment is grounded in the understanding that healthy relationships can withstand turbulence from time to time, that issues can be addressed and worked through when both partners are reflective and willing.

At the foundation of secure attachment is trust — trust in others, and trust in yourself.

Trust in others

Securely attached trust is a thoughtful balance. It requires discernment — it isn’t wise to trust just anyone immediately, or to have such unquestioning trust that you are blinded to indications of unreliable, noncommittal, or otherwise unrelational behaviour.

Trust is formed through consistency of action, though that also doesn’t mean entering a new relationship with the trust-meter at zero until it is duly earned. Someone who is securely attached operates from the belief that most people — people they would choose to engage with, anyway — are generally good and trustworthy.

When you are operating from secure attachment, you begin new relationships with a baseline level of trust, with your eyes open for behaviours that suggest more or less trust is deserved. You have a sense of the type of interaction that is fitting for the current stage and depth of the relationship, not expecting too much or accepting too little.

You are aware of consistency between words and actions, follow-through on commitments, and quality communication. At the same time, you are flexible and can give some grace for human error, paying more attention to the overall pattern rather than single small incidents.

Trust in yourself

Relying solely on the other person to behave in a trustworthy way to feel ok is a recipe for anxiety. For those with anxious attachment, this fuels the classic undercurrent of worry that the other person will leave, the constant background monitoring of changes in the other person’s behaviour or affection, and the resulting desire to frequently seek reassurance. People with anxious attachment often find it difficult to build or maintain a steady sense of their independent selves, and faith in their own capacity to cope without heavy reliance on a partner. Their self-trust is low, which drives their intense focus on the other person and the relationship.

Like the anxiously attached those with an avoidant attachment style also fear abandonment, and also worry about suffocation and loss of independence. Although people with an avoidant attachment style manage their fears the opposite way and are much more likely to leave relationships easily, the concern about feeling trapped can relate to a lack of self-trust in the ability to negotiate space and boundaries, to grow close without losing themselves, and to work through issues without running.

Securely attached self-trust means knowing that you can rely on yourself to recognise and contribute to a healthy partnership. It is rooted in the knowing that you will be able to thoughtfully identify:

• What is a reasonable amount of conflict;

• Whether what happens during conflict crosses over into unacceptable behaviour;

• Whether a relationship is healthy, and the way you and your partner behave is appropriate to the development of the relationship;

• Whether both of you are able to actually work through issues and see a general trajectory of improvement.

That requires from you:

• An acceptance that healthy relationships involve work and can go through tough patches;

• An acceptance that healthy relationships shouldn’t involve constant work and conflict;

• An ability to face and work through relationship issues, as well as the ability to be flexible and let the little things go;

• An willingness to form interdependent relationships;

• A willingness to work on your own side of the relationship.

The self-trust in secure attachment begins with your overall discernment in dating and choosing who to begin forming closer relationships with. Ignoring glaring red flags isn’t wise, nor is seeing everything as a red flag. However, focusing too much on choosing a partner wisely can lead to analysis paralysis.

If you have had difficult past relationships, you might feel unworthy of your own trust in your assessment of potential partners. You might have a story about yourself, that you have terrible taste, or you are always drawn to a particular type of person. And if you have been operating from an anxious, avoidant, or disorganised attachment style, that might have been somewhat true, but you can learn to make better decisions about who and what to pursue. One of the added benefits of developing a more secure attachment style is that people with problematic relationship behaviours become less appealing. You can develop an 'ick' for the unhealthy signals that used to draw you in.

Do securely attached people always have successful relationships?

Secure attachment doesn’t necessarily make someone a perfect partner, or even someone that can always work through relationship difficulties. People can be securely attached and still have their relational weaknesses. Secure attachment is about trust, comfort with closeness and vulnerability, and how a person responds to relationship challenges. That does not necessarily mean a securely attached person will have excellent communication skills, consistent emotional regulation skills, or have strong personal insight. Someone can be securely attached and also not ready and willing to be in a committed relationship. You can have a secure attachment style and struggle with other aspects of your life or own mental health in ways that mean you find maintaining relationships difficult.

Secure attachment is also a spectrum. Many people will be overall securely attached, but exhibit more anxious or avoidant tendencies under high relational stress — these behaviours just tend to be less consistent and short-lived or less intense than someone with a truly anxious or avoidant attachment style.

It is also easier to feel steady with a more securely attached partner — a very anxious or very avoidant partner can sometimes bring out the opposing energy in someone who is otherwise relatively balanced in their approach to relationships. And it’s possible to be securely attached in romantic relationships, while operating from a different attachment style in other relationships like friendships.

Secure attachment isn’t the only thing that makes a relationship work. There are a lot of relational skills involved in being a good partner and maintaining a healthy long-term relationship. Being securely attached tends to make it easier to learn those skills and to use them during challenging times, as the intense emotions that accompany an anxious or avoidant attachment style tend to derail people in their efforts or desire to change how they respond in the moment. Emotional regulation is the foundational skill that underpins changing relationship dynamics.

A more secure approach to relationships can be learned, and it isn’t necessary to entirely ‘heal’ a more anxious, avoidant, or disorganised attachment style in order to successfully date or form a healthy relationship with a partner. What is needed is a growing sense of self-awareness, an ability to self-manage anxious or avoidant urges and use more effective relationship skills, and making progress in addressing the underlying beliefs and trust that underpin attachment.