Emotional attachment is a normal part of development. You are driven to connect to those that provide a sense of protection, comfort, and validation. Attachment can become toxic if you rely too much on others to satisfy emotional needs. The goal of healthy emotional attachment is finding a balance between getting your emotional needs met by yourself and by others.
What Is Emotional Attachment?
Emotional Attachment is the emotional connection you receive from being attached. We are attached to people, pets, relationships, places, objects, and even dates because of the bond it provides. This bond can be with another person such as a relationship, a particular place such as a childhood home, a date such as an anniversary, or an object such as a blanket.
The emotions you receive from emotional attachment are a sense of safety, protection, sense of belonging, comfort, reliability, and positivity. Emotional attachment is a healthy part of development. However, it can become unhealthy.
If you are not able to emotionally attach you can become anxious, distant, rigid, and worried about your ability to be loved or connected.
Studies show that poor attachment can lead to vulnerability to develop disorders such as:
Like with anything in life there is a need for a balance. Being overly emotionally attached and having no emotional attachment are both detrimental to your mental wellness. The key is to find stability in learning your emotional needs and finding healthy ways to have these needs met.
What Are the Signs of Healthy Emotional Attachment?
If you are experiencing healthy emotional attachment within your relationship, you should feel:
- Close and connected to that person
- Comfortable with being vulnerable, open, and trusting towards that person
- That you can rely on that person to be responsive and available to your needs
- Confident in your ability of self-expression within the relationship
- Secure in the relationship
Emotional Attachment vs. Love: Are They the Same?
Emotional Attachment may seem like love, but there is a difference. The biggest difference that many experts have identified is that love is selfless and emotional attachment is selfish. Selfish is not necessarily bad, but it is stating that you are in the relationship to get your innate needs met. Love is not derived from a needs base agenda but from the desire to prioritize another person’s wellbeing.
A good example that can help you understand the difference is the relationship between a parent and a child. Assuming that the parent comes from a foundation of healthy attachment themselves. A parent does not expect their attachment to their child to provide any needs such as protection, security, or safety. However, their love for the child purely comes from a place of wanting the best for that child’s well-being.
Yes, you need a healthy emotional attachment to have love, but emotional attachment does not mean you are in love. Again, emotional attachment is needs-based, and we seek to be with others to get our specific needs met. When you can understand emotional attachment based on this definition you can determine if the relationships you are in are based on love, emotional attachment, or both.
If you are purely in a relationship for emotional attachment the relationship may feel stagnant, fearful, or fragile, which can easily make the relationship toxic or destructive. This happens because you become dependent on that person. This creates room for you to subject yourself to treatment or behavior that can be counterproductive to your personal growth.
When Does Emotional Attachment Become Unhealthy?
There is a thin line between healthy emotional attachment and unhealthy emotional attachment. We all have needs to emotionally connect and bond with others. However, it is when these needs direct us to abandon our self-worth, peace, and freedom of choice that this connection can become unhealthy.
Some signs of unhealthy emotional attachment might include:
Measuring Self-Esteem Based on Relationships
Unhealthy emotional attachment occurs when you solely rely on a relationship to define your worth, value, and lovability. If you find yourself more depressed and self-critical after ending a relationship, then you may have attributed your self-esteem to being connected with that person. This of course is detrimental because you are giving your personal power away.
Levine and Heller emphasized that “Our partnerships help us thrive in the world. They influence how we feel about ourselves, how we believe in ourselves, and what we can achieve.”2 However, if you experience an unhealthy emotional attachment, this connection can lead to self-critical talk, depression, or anxiety about your ability to love yourself.
You Seek Out Relationships to Avoid Being Alone
Never being alone and continuing to jump into new relationships is a sign of unhealthy emotional attachment. When you don’t allow the space to build a relationship with yourself then you become co-dependent on others to get needs met. In turn, you emotionally tether yourself to someone that can potentially be a barrier to your overall growth. Also, you are more likely to settle for situations that can be emotionally harmful, counterproductive, and stagnant.
You Stay in Harmful Relationships
If you stay in a relationship that severely triggers depression, anxiety, past trauma, and overall stress then this is a sign of unhealthy emotional attachment. It is important to recognize if you are sacrificing your mental health to stay connected to a person. Even though it may seem like staying in the relationship will be beneficial in the end it is detrimental to your health.
Jurist and Meehan highlight that only healthy emotional attachment will lead to “resilience in the face of stress, optimism, high self-esteem, confidence, the ability to self-disclose and be assertive, and ability to regulate difficult emotions.”3
What Makes It So Difficult to Let Go?
There are three major reasons why it is difficult to “let go” of unhealthy attachment. One, you are programmed with a basic need for attachment and connection. All of your attachment needs come from the relationships you had with your parents or caregivers. If you experienced unreliable, inconsistent, and non-responsive attachment during childhood then you will continue to attempt to fill these voids in adulthood.
However, without a healthy blueprint on knowing how to do this. You are more likely to involve yourself in relationships that cannot truly satisfy what you are seeking. Your desire to be emotionally attached is not wrong. It just needs to be re-calibrated on how to do this in a healthy manner
The second reason is due to the emotional bonds that are formed. When you emotionally attach to someone, it has significance based on time (we have been together x amount of years), comparison (they were this way in the past), sympathy (they will be hurt without me), responsibility (I owe it to them), or hope (they will change in the future). When you have these bonds, it is difficult to let go of relationships or situations that are no longer healthy.
The last reason is due to fear of abandonment. Even if you find a relationship to be toxic or dissatisfactory you tend to remain in the relationship because of one primary emotion: fear. Fear keeps us stuck in unhealthy attachments. Studies point out that fear’s primary job is to prevent isolation, loneliness, and loss.1 Think about the times you wanted to end a relationship, but you retreated because of fear.
This happens because of the distress that arises when separation threatens an attachment bond. Your brain processes this as potential for vulnerability, danger, and helplessness.4 It is imperative to understand your personal reasons for why it is difficult to “let go.” This awareness will help you make the transition to leave from an unhealthy attachment.
How to Break Off an Unhealthy Emotional Attachment
It is always difficult to make that first step in breaking off unhealthy emotional attachment. Not only is it scary, but the threat of being alone is intimidating to your sense of well-being. Breaking off an unhealthy emotional attachment starts with you recognizing that you truly want to be happy. Once you can be honest and vulnerable with yourself you can take the necessary action to leave toxic relationships or situations. Journaling is a great way to work through these thoughts and provide yourself space to write down what you need in order to feel emotionally healthy.
Find an area in which you can be by yourself so you can reflect on your current relationship. Identify if it is based on healthy emotional attachment or unhealthy emotional attachment. Ask yourself if you feel capable to satisfy your emotional needs or do you primarily rely on your partner? Lastly, ask yourself what emotional bonds keep you locked into the relationship. Don’t be afraid to be truthful with yourself. Your answers may not conclude that the relationship will end. However, it can provide an opportunity for more balance and healing in your life.
Another way to break off an emotional attachment is to get support from friends. This does not mean to transfer the emotional attachment to them. Instead, allow this support system to help you make brave decisions that allow you to focus on yourself. The fear of being alone can make you cling to toxic situations. Having the support of friends and family can help alleviate this fear of loneliness. If you don’t feel comfortable with this support system another alternative would be to find a support group that you can lean on.
Lastly, remember that it is okay to prioritize the relationship with yourself. This means that taking responsibility and ownership of emotional needs is healthy. This does not mean you have to do everything alone. However, it is important to explore how you can build love, commitment, trust, reliability, comfort, and security within yourself. Sometimes we give other people the responsibility to take care of our emotional needs. Again, this can lead to unhealthy situations. To help you break away from unhealthy emotional attachment you must be willing to identify what you need to be happy.
How Therapy Can Help You Move On
A great support for working through emotional attachment disorders is finding a therapist. In therapy, you can work through the origin of your attachment issues and have a better understanding of why they impact your current relationships. Also, you will be able to explore how emotional attachment affects existing disorders such as depression, anxiety, borderline personality disorder, or post-traumatic stress disorder. Another benefit of going to therapy is that it provides a safe space to process emotions and feelings.
Final Thoughts on Emotional Attachment
Building emotional regulation can help you obtain healthy emotional attachments within relationships. The therapeutic relationship is a good example of what healthy emotional attachment looks like in a relationship. Remember, if you’re dealing with an unhealthy attachment, you’re not alone. Talking to a therapist or reaching out to a trusted friend or family member can make a big difference in how you feel.
Additional Resources
- Mental Health America
- National Alliance on Mental Health
- MentalHealth.gov
- Online Therapist Directory: Sort therapists by specialty, cost, availability and more. Watch intro videos and see articles written by the therapists you’re considering working with. When you’ve found a good match, book an online therapy appointment with them directly.
Are you ready to connect with a therapist but feel a little overwhelmed by all your options? Speak with one of Choosing Therapy’s Client Navigators. Client Navigators are mental health professionals who will listen to what you’re looking for in a therapist and help pair you with the best possible fit. Getting started is free, easy, and confidential.
