Attachment Styles and the Psalms for ACODs

British psychologist John Bowlby studied the connection between children’s attachment – or emotional bond – with their mothers and the impact that it had on children’s holistic wellbeing. He found that children are born with an innate need for proximity, responsiveness, and nurturance from a primary caregiver in order to feel secure. Through Bowlby’s findings, attachment theory was born. 

Psychologist Mary Ainsworth expanded upon Bowlby’s research through a study titled “Strange Situation” in which 12 to 18 month olds were observed before, during, and after a brief separation from their mothers. Ainsworth identified three styles of attachment, and other researchers later added a fourth style. The four attachment styles are: secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized. The following is a brief summary of each: 

• Secure: Child is confident that she is worthy of love and that others will give her the love that she needs. (Primary caregiver was dependable.) 

• Anxious: Child is not confident that she is worthy of love but she believes that others are able to give her the love that she needs. (Primary caregiver was inconsistent.) 

• Avoidant: Child is confident that she is worthy of love but she doesn’t believe that others are able to give her the love that she needs. (Primary caregiver was dismissive and/or disengaged.) 

• Disorganized: Child is not confident that she is worthy of love, nor that others will give her the love that she needs. (Primary caregiver was a source of both comfort and fear due to abuse or neglect.) 

Given that divorce brings disorder into the family and is traumatic for children, as the Catechism of the Catholic Church states (no. 2385), for adult children of divorce, it is likely that your attachment was negatively impacted by what occurred before, during, and/or after your parents’ separation. Your attachment style goes with you into adulthood and affects the ways in which you engage with others, particularly those closest to you such as your spouse, children, or best friends. If you find that you do not fit under the category of a secure attachment, know that hope abounds — attachment styles can change! Through engaging in nurturing relationships with close friends or a spouse — and especially our Lord — you can become more secure in your attachments. 

I am an ACOD myself, and when I first learned about attachment styles through my psychology major, I realized that I have an anxious attachment to both of my parents. As I reflected further on my childhood experiences, I saw how I had gotten there. I then began to wonder how my anxious attachment affected my relationship with God. After all, the Catechism explains that, for children, a “wholesome family life can foster interior dispositions… for a living faith and remain a support for it throughout one’s life.” So family systems that are less than wholesome — such as those fractured by divorce and separation — also have the potential to negatively affect how a child learns to relate to God. 

As the only child of my parents’ divorce, I internalized that I was a burden – the cause for expensive attorneys, complicated vacation and holiday logistics, and confusing dynamics for younger half-siblings. I tried really, really hard to keep my parents’ love and I was trying to do the same with God. I knew in my head that God’s love was unconditional, but I had put my earthly experiences of conditional love onto God. Thankfully, we have his beautiful Word to right our wrong thinking about him.

After having become intrigued by attachment theory, I turned to the psalms and paid close attention to verses in which the psalmist expressed security in God, as well as verses in which the psalmist expressed a lack of security; I made this my senior capstone project. I found that I could relate to the psalmists as they asked God why he stood so far away, wondered if he saw them, and wanted affirmation that he listened to them. But the psalmists also wrote reminders of what God is actually like. I gathered together a list of psalms and categorized them under fourteen truths about who I am as a daughter of God, which also speak to how God is different from my earthly parents – and yours. I will list the truths and some of the accompanying Scripture references, which you and I can pray with, especially when we feel anxious, avoidant, or even a mixture of both in our relating to God. May we declare these truths about God and ourselves as his precious sons and daughters, becoming increasingly secure in him. And may the Holy Spirit give us the faith to believe them: 

• I am welcomed 

  • Psalm 84 

• I am completely known 

  • Psalm 22:9-10, 139:1-18 

• I am seen 

  • Psalm 1:6, 11:4, 32:8, 33:18-20 

• I am adopted 

  • Psalm 2:7, 10:14, 68:5, 103:13 

• I am turned toward 

  • Psalm 8:4-5, 28:6-9, 34:4-7, 145:18 

• I am heard 

  • Psalm 3:4, 17:6, 31:22, 66:18-20, 116:2 

• I am delivered 

  • Psalm 18:16-19, 30 

• I am protected 

  • Psalm 4:8, 12:7, 32:7 

• I am comforted 

  • Psalm 16, 23 

• I am defended 

  • Psalm 35:22-24 

• I am sustained 

  • Psalm 3:5 

• I am not abandoned 

  • Psalm 9:10, 16:8, 27:10, 34:18, 37:23-29, 46:1 

• I am loved 

  • Psalm 36:5, 100:5 

• I am kept 

  • Psalm 121:5 
    

About the Author:

The author’s parents divorced when she was four years old. She lives in Arizona and has recently reverted to Catholicism as a young wife and mom, treasuring the riches of the faith anew.

Reflection Questions for Small Groups or Individuals

1. How do you describe your attachment style?

2. How has your attachment style matured over the years?

3. Can you think of other Psalms that fall under the categories in Ava’s list? What about other categories that can be included in her list for ACODs?