Attachment Theory

Dr. Mark Laaser

Codependency, I think in our definition of it, has historically meant that it's anything you try to do to manage another person's reactions and presence in your life. I think it's always been, to me, an anxiety based disorder. I'm afraid that if I don't act right, do the right things. Someone in my life is going to be angry with me and leave me.

Dr. Mark Laaser

So Codependence tend to want to manage other people and they will placate. They will make themselves subservient, they will sacrifice themselves. And as we have often said in a number of books, point this out about codependency. A codependent loses his sense of self. But it's all because we're trying to placate, manage the emotional and physical reactions of other people in our life.

Randy Evert

Welcome to the Peaceful and True podcast. I'm Randy, your co-host. We're happy to be with you again today and featuring a legacy presentation featuring doctor Mark laser. Today's subject on the podcast will be Attachment Theory. Mark will be speaking on this subject and you're sure to enjoy his message. We hope that his message will really help you on your healing journey, and we invite you to visit our website, Faithful and True, where you'll find other resources and information to help you.

Randy Evert

We also hope that you will continue to follow our podcast as we feature the Live the New Live ones, as well as the legacy older ones. So here now is doctor Mark laser and the Faithful and True podcast and Attachment theories.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Today, Randy, we're going to continue what we've been doing a little bit over the last several weeks and kind of addressing some special topics. We talked about the three chairs, the three hoops and circles that we work with on couples. So far today, I thought we'd talk about one of the concepts that is really gaining an ever increasing popularity.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And not only our field, but in the broader field of psychology. And that is attached theory.

Randy Evert

Attachment theory. Okay, that sounds like a subject that our listeners will appreciate learning more about.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, we certainly hope so, because I think attachment theory is somewhat of a corrective to some of the traditional jargon about relationship that's been out there. So here's a test for you, Randy, because you didn't know, given our impeccable levels of preparation for the show, you did not have any anticipation of what we were going to be talking about.

Dr. Mark Laaser

So here's a test. If I was going to ask you, which I am. What is one of the number one relationship terms when we think about the field of addiction? What what term strikes fear in the hearts of everyone?

Randy Evert

Codependency.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Yeah, you're exactly right now, by the way. Audience. We have not rehearsed this. That was a spontaneous test. And Randy, your co-host got it right. So how many of you have heard that term? You know, however long you've been in the field of recovery or heard about, you know, the 12 step groups or whatever it is? Codependency is a is a term that's been around for, I don't know, 30 or 40 years now.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And there's a lot of people who are growing uncomfortable with that term. Well, I think.

Randy Evert

Part of the growing level of uncomfortableness is I think it's a term that is widely misunderstood. I think this is a great time and.

Dr. Mark Laaser

A.

Randy Evert

Great opportunity for you to set the record in describing to us exactly what codependency means.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, codependency, I think, in our definition of it, has historically meant that it's anything you try to do to manage another person's reactions and presence in your life. I think it's always been, to me, an anxiety based disorder. I'm afraid that if I don't act right, do the right things. Someone in my life is going to be angry with me and leave me.

Dr. Mark Laaser

So Codependence tend to want to manage other people and they will placate. They will make themselves subservient, they will sacrifice themselves. And as we have often said in a number of books, point this out about codependency. A codependent loses his sense of self. But it's all because we're trying to placate, manage the emotional and physical reactions of other people in our life.

Dr. Mark Laaser

So you're.

Randy Evert

Not really representing your true self if you're spending all of your efforts trying to please everyone else.

Dr. Mark Laaser

That's right. The term codependency came out of the field of alcoholism, and originally it was used in treatment centers to define anybody who lived in relationship with an addict. And I think a lot of it came from the fact that, you know, people who live with an addict tend to not talk about the elephant in the living room.

Dr. Mark Laaser

They they tend to not face into the truth. They tend not to state healthy boundaries. In many ways, they are trying to placate or pacify the addict and not raise the stink. Keep things calm and under control. Keep the addict present in the system, and as a result, they lose themselves. Living with an addiction, you will oftentimes feel like you you lose yourself.

Dr. Mark Laaser

One of the things we've discovered with our population over the last 20 or 30 years is that virtually every addict is also a codependent. They spend a lot of time trying to manage other people emotionally, physically and so forth. So and I think you're right, the term has been so broadly used now and so often defined by various people.

Dr. Mark Laaser

There's been any number of books written about it that it has become a confusing term for a lot of people. There's a lot of the wives that come here of the men who struggle with addiction. They don't like the term because, you know, they don't like the implication that they're codependent to the addiction or that they're co addicted.

Randy Evert

Well, that's what I'm hearing as you're describing what this really means. It can be confusing in the fact that if you are the spouse or family member of someone who is the addict, and so you find yourself so often walking on eggshells trying to keep, you know, from World War three, breaking out with that individual that you find yourself being codependent.

Randy Evert

And then, on the other hand, as you just told us, the attic themselves can be very codependent in how they behave. That's right. And so it seems to be this struggle of codependent versus codependent.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Yeah. That's right. And it's oftentimes the case that the couples that we work with, they are both codependent. They are both trying to manage the other person. Sometimes that codependency and the reason it's so confusing, it can at times seem like you're self-effacing, just a dish rag and you're just seeking to placate.

Randy Evert

Well, I can see why the spouses come in here with that sensitivity, because the word itself and our vision of it, I think, equates itself to to a, a weakness.

Dr. Mark Laaser

A weakness.

Randy Evert

You.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Know, that is right.

Randy Evert

And I don't think any of us like to think of themselves as a weak person.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Right. Or they they experience it as a judgmental term.

Randy Evert

Right, right.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, that has led a lot of people in the field to be just uncomfortable with the term. But in the meantime, there's been a parallel development in the field of psychology about relationships. And one of the words that's used for a relationship and has been for a long time is the word attachment. So any of the attachments that we're in connotes the relationships that we're in and how we attach emotionally, spiritually to other people.

Dr. Mark Laaser

So what I'd like to do today is briefly describe in a very simplistic way, attachment theory. And then I'd like to invite our audience to evaluate yourself.

Randy Evert

And I think that's a great exercise for our listeners and ourselves to be doing. I think we'll take our break first, because I think once you get on a roll with that subject, I think that there's there's a lot to be said about it and a lot for us to, you know, to digest. That being said, as you just gave that description, I was shaking my head in the fact that I believe my wife thinks I have an attachment, a bonafide relationship with the remote control for the TV and so.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, yeah, but that's an inanimate object which, you know, you can control. We're talking about the variability of trying to control another human being. So you might be attached to it in terms of it doesn't leave your hand from the moment you sit down to watch TV.

Randy Evert

So I'm capable of putting it down. Okay. It's just that I won't let anyone else pick it up. Well.

Dr. Mark Laaser

That is rather possessive.

Randy Evert

It is. Okay.

Dr. Mark Laaser

I think there is an attachment style there. When we get to the attachment styles, maybe you'll see yourself.

Randy Evert

It sounds like I need a great deal of therapy.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, we know we've known that for a long time.

Randy Evert

That's never been in doubt.

Dr. Mark Laaser

That's a given. Yeah. Let me just give a little background for this, because I think it's fascinating. There were a number of psychologists out in California that wanted to study the relationship between mothers and children, and how the attachment is formed early on between a mother and a child. So they divided an experiment in which they had a playroom.

Dr. Mark Laaser

They had a room, an observation room next to it. And they had one of those two way mirrors where the psychologist could observe the interaction in the playroom without being observed themselves. What they did was they they would put a mother in a young child in this room. There were toys there. They would observe the mother playing with the child, and then they would observe the mother leaving.

Dr. Mark Laaser

They would instruct the mother to leave at a certain point, exit the room, and then they observed the child's reaction to that. And then, you know, a few minutes later, they had the mother come back into the room. They observed the reconnection or reattach between the mother and the child. And from all of this they made various observations, and they came up with what is widely regarded as four basic attachment styles that a child establishes with his mother.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Now we can extrapolate from this, I think, and many are doing this, that we can also have attachment styles with our fathers. And these attachment styles, then, are things that we carry with us throughout life and bring into any of our friendships, work relationships, church relationships, and certainly our marriages. So there are four basic styles. Three of them are not so great.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Bad, unhealthy. What is called insecure attachment style? That's three of them. And then there's one of them that's called a secure attachment. And that's something we should all aspire toward.

Randy Evert

Okay. And so describe each one of those four levels of attachment if you would.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well let's start with the basic one, which is the one that we'd all like. And that's secure attachment. And that situation, the, the mother and the child played. And they seem to enjoy each other's company. When the mother left, the child cried for a little bit, but then was able to go back and play and be okay. Then when the mother came back in the room, the child went up to the mother.

Dr. Mark Laaser

They hugged and then they went back to playing. So in other words, it appeared to the researchers and their conclusions that this child enjoyed being with the mother and enjoyed playing with her. When she left. It was sad, but at the same time he was able to take care of himself and play by himself. So from that, the core belief of secure attachment is I can be alone and okay, but at other times in my life I choose to be and enjoy being in relationship with others.

Randy Evert

And does that also illustrate the child's confidence that my mother's coming back?

Dr. Mark Laaser

Yeah, there's obviously.

Randy Evert

A.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Trust factor there. And one of the early developmental stages that Erik Erikson described many years ago is that, you know, that attachment does go a long way in defining whether we're able to trust relationships at all. And if our mother sometimes leaves and we don't know why and we don't know where she is, we're not sure she's coming back.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Or maybe she doesn't come back for a long time. That can create havoc with trust issues.

Randy Evert

Well, I say that because it's been a previous experience not in our household, but in our neighborhood. When you see children going off to school for the first time and you see that insecurity of, you know, mom walking them to the bus stop, and then that separation can sometimes be kind of dramatic.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Kind of very dramatic.

Randy Evert

Yeah.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, that's again, you know, that's an indication that there are kids that will be very sad about that moment. But they do at some deeper level, trust that that mom is consistent. Mom will be there. And obviously in the first days of school, they learn at the end of their school day, you know, mom will be home or mom will be there.

Randy Evert

Well, it illustrates how formative those years are, because when the child starts to experience the security of and when the bus came back, there was mom to meet me. You know, I think that that builds on that security that that follows through for the rest of that individual.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Yeah. That's right. And one of the things we're saying here is that these attachment styles are established very early. In fact, many of the researchers think that your attachment style is really pretty well formed by the age of one year old.

Randy Evert

Wow. That is very early.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Yeah, well, we don't have time today to get into all the reasoning behind that, but let's go on to the three insecure unhealthy attachment styles. And this is again, I want our listeners to be careful. We've given you permission to kind of self evaluate, but I think you might also want to talk to somebody who knows a little bit more about this before you would finally decide, this is an insecurity issue that I need to really work on.

Dr. Mark Laaser

All right. The second style in this situation, when the mother and child were in the room, the child didn't even seem to notice that the mother was there when the mother left, didn't seem to notice that the mother comes back, didn't seem to notice that the child completely the whole time independently by himself, played. And they came to call this attachment situation avoidant.

Dr. Mark Laaser

These people avoid attachments, and the core belief of this style, I think, is that nobody takes care of my needs but me. Now, in researching with the the mothers in these situations, what the researchers discovered was that these were kids that had grown up in homes where they were ignored, sometimes abandoned. Mom wasn't consistently available, so they did learn how to rely on themselves.

Randy Evert

So their survival was dependent on themselves. That's right. And so mom can come and go. I don't really notice because I don't have the bond with.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Her, don't really have a secure attachment with. I don't really have an attachment at all. Now, these people obviously grow up and they get in relationships and their spouses friends are going to complain. You never seem to need me. You never seem to want to be around me. You always seem so independent off doing your own thing.

Randy Evert

And so those individuals, would you say they have built up, you know, a wall around themselves.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And can sometimes seem that way?

Randy Evert

Think they make it nearly impossible for someone to reach them?

Dr. Mark Laaser

That's right. That is right. Okay. So that's that one. We need to go over these kind of fast. Okay. Just in the interest of time. Sure. But the third attachment style, the second unhealthy one in that situation, the mother and the child played together, but at times the mother was doing everything for the child. The mother was building the blocks, coloring the drawing, filling in the answers or whatever she was doing.

Dr. Mark Laaser

She was controlling the entire situation. She was doing everything for the child. When the mother left, the child became hysterical and was crying and and went against the wall and was pounding on the door where the mother had just left. Then finally, when the mother comes back in the. The child grabs on to this mother and clings, clings and won't let go.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And you know that kind of thing. What they discovered in this situation is that these kids have a core belief that I can't be alone in, okay, that I absolutely need my mother. And then later on in life, I absolutely need to be with someone else. This one is called ambiguous attachment. Generally by the field. I call it anxious attachment.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And it's basically the person is so anxious about being alone, they are going to cling to someone and do whatever they can to manage that person's presence in their life. Does this sound familiar? It's fairly similar to our earlier definition of codependence, right?

Randy Evert

Right. Now, does that the child that fits that description? Is that solely based on that earlier experience with the mother, where the mother has has really controlled the control? Yeah.

Dr. Mark Laaser

What I think we find in these situations that that the mothers that produce this kind of attachment, they are themselves very anxious and very obsessive at points and do tend to over control everything.

Randy Evert

The mothers in that scenario. What would be your assessment of her situation? I mean, do you think that she fits into one of those negative categories?

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, she was obviously raised, perhaps in some chaos, some maybe abusive situations even where she learned to over manage over control and deal with her anxiety. By the way, anytime we're talking about this, we're not blaming mothers here. We're just describing the situation. And we're also kind of wanting to point to a challenge, particularly for those people that want to be in healthy attachment.

Randy Evert

Well, I was just wondering, as you're describing this mother controlling building with, you know, playing with the Legos and the moms, the one building, building the structure. And I was just wondering, is that a is that an effect of someone having controlled her and now she's the one in the position of power?

Dr. Mark Laaser

That could be the case. I think the mothers who grow, who grow up and become over controlling, over managing, overly obsessed and so forth. You know, they did grow up in a lot of anxiety and they they have their own management style. They probably themselves, you know, struggle with ambiguous attachment themselves. The avoidant mothers are the ones that are going to produce the avoidant kids and so forth.

Dr. Mark Laaser

One of the it's maybe not a bad point to to introduce the idea that sometimes in our marriage relationships, we will find that we will get with people that will duplicate the attachment style of either our mother or father. So if we grew up with an over controlling mother, chances are out there in the world, just by some stroke of coincidence.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Not really. We'll find somebody who's over controlling.

Randy Evert

Right. And those old habits kick in, don't they?

Dr. Mark Laaser

They do. And we think we absolutely need somebody like that. Because left alone, we're not. Okay. Remember, the core belief is alone. I'm not okay. I absolutely need to be with someone else.

Randy Evert

Well, I think it's interesting because your use of the word anxiety seems to be a perfect fit for the anxiety can be on several different levels. The anxiety in the mother can be. I'm so protective of this child that you know my anxiety over my child being safe. I'm going to take control.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Yeah, yeah. This mother, you know, to be simplistic about it, the child maybe goes out in the backyard to play. The mother is going to always say something like, be careful. Don't do x, y, z because you could possibly get hurt.

Randy Evert

You could put out an eye with that thing. That's right. Put that down.

Dr. Mark Laaser

You know, and I think, by the way, we've gotten. So we manage things for safety these days, sometimes a little bit over the top. But we were talking about this the other day as a family. Our daughter Sarah, who strangely enough has our four grandchildren, was talking about one of their birthday parties and they had sent out the invitation.

Dr. Mark Laaser

You know, they were going to go bowling and ice cream later. And so, you know, all of the mothers dropped their kids off, and Sarah would tell them what time to pick them up. One of the mothers came to the door and Sarah said, hey, you can come back at 8:00. And, and, you know, pick little Johnny up.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And the mother said, no, you don't get it. I'm staying. So this mother went bowling, tied his shoes, made sure he was on the right lane.

Randy Evert

Selected which bowling ball he was going to use.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Exactly. And said the worst part that was that when we were having cake and ice cream for the birthday, this mother actually fork.

Randy Evert

Fed him. Oh, please.

Dr. Mark Laaser

The cake actually cut the cake and put the piece of cake in his mouth. I mean, that's an extreme example, but that's the nature of.

Randy Evert

The I think it's your point. Okay.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, obviously we spent a lot of time on this one because it's a it's a fairly predominant one. Well, the last one actually is the worst. And that's in this situation the mother and child are playing kind of the mother leaves and the kid becomes very, very sad about her leaving. But then when she comes back, the kid starts to rush up, but then stops and freezes and is not able to complete the attachment.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Sometimes the psychologist reported that they they stumbled over things. They ran into walls. They they somehow sabotaged the reconnection. So in a sense, they wanted to reattach but were unable to achieve it. Now, the sad part of this attachment style is that the research shows that these are the kids that grow up in a profoundly abusive situation. So these were kids that were getting hit or sexually molested or whatever they were, and they just don't trust relationship because relationships are not safe.

Dr. Mark Laaser

So they really desperately want an attachment, but at the same time, don't trust it. And there's a lot of work that needs to be done here with this, in terms of some of the fear and chaos in which they grew up. Those are the four attachment styles. All right. And it kind of sped over the last one. It's not one that I generally like talking about a whole lot, but and remember that, you know, things are not always as simple as saying there are these four quadrants.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Sometimes I think there are days in my own life where between those three insecure attachments styles, I play hopscotch. There are times when I'm avoiding, times when I'm overly controlling or anxious, times when out of my own trauma history, I push relationships away. I think it can vary from men to women. So in other words, I think I've had certain attachment styles with men and I've had other attachment styles with women.

Dr. Mark Laaser

I it's all based on my relationship with my parents and so forth.

Randy Evert

That's a pretty complicated subject that we've been talking about today with attachments as we wrap up today's program, as we like to do. How do you want to send the listener away, having heard this description of attachments?

Dr. Mark Laaser

Well, you know us. We always want to leave our listeners with a great degree of degree of hope and maybe some other resources. So let me mention that the research has also shown that if you grew up and had these three insecure attachment styles, you can learn secure attachment. It's contagious and it can be imitated, it can be modeled to you and you can gravitate toward it.

Dr. Mark Laaser

What's the key to this? Randy, one of the themes of our program, you need to hang out with people who have secure attachment because they'll model it to you, mentor you in it, help you to learn how to do some of the acts of trust and surrender that are involved in getting to a more secure attachment style. Remember, secure attachment is I can be alone and okay.

Dr. Mark Laaser

Now, a resource I'd like to point the readers to is one of the more popular books around here. There are a number of books on attachment styles and a number of books in the Christian community about it. One of my coauthors on this new book that we have coming out this fall, Doctor Tim Clinton and another one of my colleagues, doctor Josh Straub, wrote a very profound book called Got Attachments.

Dr. Mark Laaser

And they're basically talking about how our faith will help lead us in the direction of secure attachment. So we have a secure attachment with God that enables us to feel more secure in all of our attachments.

Randy Evert

So what are you telling me is, as we often discover, our relationship with our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ is at the heart of everything that is good. Thank you for joining us today on the Faithful and True podcast. I'm sure that you have enjoyed this message from doctor Mark Lazar, and hope that his words have provided comfort and direction for you as you are on your healing journey.

Randy Evert

We hope that you will visit our website, Faithful and True, where you will find many resources and information that will be helpful to you. And we hope that if you have any questions, you'll feel free to contact us at info at Faithful and True, or give us a call and we'll be sure to try to help you. In the meantime, we hope that this coming week for you will be a week that's filled with many blessings and with great vision.