You take an attachment style quiz. You read through the descriptions. And then you get stuck, because anxious sounds like you in certain relationships, but avoidant sounds like you in others. Or you recognize yourself in the secure description in some areas of your life while feeling distinctly insecure in others. You wonder if the quiz is broken, or if you are somehow an exception to how this all works.
You are not an exception. The reality of attachment is considerably more nuanced than the four-category model most people encounter first. Yes, you can have more than one attachment style. Yes, your attachment patterns can shift depending on who you are with, what you have been through, and where you are in your own growth. Understanding how this actually works is far more useful than landing on a single label and stopping there.
Attachment-Informed Therapy
Understand Your Patterns and Begin to Change Them
Sagebrush Counseling offers attachment-informed online therapy to clients across Maine, Texas, and Montana. Start with a free 15-minute consultation.
Licensed in Maine · Texas · Montana · Join from anywhere in your state
A Quick Grounding in What Attachment Styles Actually Are
Attachment theory, developed by John Bowlby and expanded significantly by researchers Mary Ainsworth and Mary Main, describes the patterns of relating we develop in response to our earliest caregiving experiences. These patterns become internal working models, largely unconscious blueprints about whether the world is safe, whether other people can be trusted, and whether we are worthy of care and connection.
The four most commonly referenced attachment patterns are secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized. Secure attachment develops when caregiving is consistently responsive. Anxious attachment tends to form when care is inconsistent or unpredictable. Avoidant attachment often develops in response to caregiving that was emotionally distant or dismissive. Disorganized attachment is most commonly associated with caregiving that was frightening or traumatic.
These are descriptions of tendencies, not fixed identity categories. And this distinction matters enormously for understanding why so many people recognize themselves in more than one.
So Can You Actually Have More Than One Attachment Style?
Yes. In several different ways, actually. Research on adult attachment consistently shows that attachment patterns are more fluid and context-dependent than the early four-category model suggested. Here are the three most important reasons why someone might experience more than one attachment pattern.
Why Your Attachment Style Can Look Different in Different Relationships
One of the most important findings in adult attachment research is that attachment patterns are not purely global, meaning they do not operate identically across every relationship. While most people have a general attachment orientation that shows up across contexts, specific relationships can activate different aspects of the attachment system depending on what that particular person represents or triggers.
Someone who is generally secure may become anxious in a relationship with a partner who is emotionally unpredictable. Someone who generally trends avoidant may find a particular relationship pulling more anxious responses because of how intensely they care. A person whose primary pattern is anxious in romantic relationships may be quite secure in close friendships where the stakes feel different.
What does it mean if I feel anxious with some people and avoidant with others?
This pattern, sometimes called the anxious-avoidant flip, is more common than most people realize. It often reflects a disorganized or fearful-avoidant attachment organization rather than two separate styles operating in isolation. People with this pattern tend to become anxious when they sense potential abandonment and avoidant when they sense potential engulfment or vulnerability. The underlying driver is the same in both directions: relationships feel both necessary and threatening.
This pattern can be particularly exhausting to live inside of. It can also be one of the most rewarding to work with in therapy, because understanding it clearly tends to produce significant relief.
What Is Disorganized Attachment and Why Does It Feel Like Having Multiple Styles?
Disorganized attachment, sometimes called fearful-avoidant in adult attachment models, is the pattern most commonly associated with the experience of having what feels like contradictory styles. It was identified by researcher Mary Main and is characterized by a lack of a consistent strategy for managing attachment needs, often because the person who was supposed to provide safety was also a source of fear.
People with disorganized attachment often describe wanting closeness desperately and fearing it equally. They may feel at home in the early stages of a relationship and then become destabilized as real intimacy develops. They may alternate between intensity and withdrawal in ways that confuse both themselves and their partners. Reading about multiple attachment styles and recognizing something of themselves in all of them is extremely common for people whose underlying pattern is disorganized.
How is disorganized attachment different from just being confused about your style?
Confusion about your attachment style is often simply a sign that you are a complex person who has had varied relational experiences. Disorganized attachment is a more specific clinical pattern with identifiable roots and a recognizable shape. It is not something that requires a formal diagnosis to be real or useful to understand, but it does benefit significantly from working with a therapist who has experience with trauma-informed attachment work. If the pattern of simultaneously wanting and fearing intimacy feels deeply familiar, exploring this with a therapist is worthwhile.
Can Your Attachment Style Change Over Time?
Yes. This is one of the most important and hope-giving findings in attachment research. Attachment patterns are not fixed traits. They are adaptive strategies that formed in response to early experience, and they can shift in response to new experience. Researchers use the term earned security to describe adults who did not have secure early attachment but who have developed secure patterns through meaningful relationships and often through therapy.
Change is not linear and it is not fast. Old patterns tend to re-emerge under stress, particularly in intimate relationships where the attachment system is most activated. But the trajectory toward more secure relating is genuinely available to most people, and recognizing the pattern you carry is the necessary first step.
What helps people develop more secure attachment as adults?
Several things support the development of earned security. A consistently safe and attuned therapeutic relationship is one of the most reliably effective. Relationships with partners, friends, or family members who are themselves securely attached can also shift internal working models over time. Developing a coherent personal narrative about your attachment history, understanding where your patterns came from and why they made sense at the time, is particularly associated with earned security in research by Mary Main.
What shifts attachment patterns over time
What This Means if You Are in a Polyamorous or Open Relationship
If you are navigating ethical non-monogamy, understanding that you may carry more than one attachment pattern, or that your pattern shifts across your different relationships, adds an important layer of self-knowledge. The presence of multiple attachment relationships can amplify these dynamics significantly. A pattern that was manageable with one partner may feel overwhelming when it is activated simultaneously across several.
Our post on attachment styles in polyamorous and open relationships goes deeper on how each specific pattern shows up in ENM relationship structures and what to do about it. If you recognize yourself in multiple attachment descriptions, that post also applies directly to you.
Ready to Understand Your Patterns?
Start with a Complimentary 15-Minute Consultation
Our therapists are trained in attachment-informed approaches and serve clients online across Maine, Texas, and Montana. You do not need to have it all figured out before you reach out.
Currently accepting new clients in Maine · Texas · Montana
Can You Have Multiple Attachment Styles: Frequently Asked Questions
Can you really have more than one attachment style?
Yes. Research consistently shows that attachment patterns are context-dependent and relational rather than fixed global traits. Most people have a general orientation that shows up across relationships, but specific relationships, life experiences, and personal growth can all shift how that pattern expresses itself. Many people carry elements of more than one pattern simultaneously.
Why do I feel anxious in some relationships and avoidant in others?
This often reflects a fearful-avoidant or disorganized attachment organization, where both abandonment and intimacy feel threatening. The specific pattern that activates tends to depend on which threat feels most present in a given relationship. With a partner who seems likely to leave, the anxious response comes forward. With a partner who is very available, the avoidant response may activate as closeness becomes threatening.
What is fearful-avoidant attachment and how is it different from disorganized?
Fearful-avoidant is the adult attachment term that most closely maps onto what researchers studying childhood attachment call disorganized. Both describe a pattern where the person simultaneously wants and fears close relationships. The fearful-avoidant label is used more often in adult attachment research and therapeutic contexts, while disorganized is more common in developmental research. They refer to the same essential pattern.
I was secure in my last relationship but anxious in this one. What happened?
Different partners activate different aspects of the attachment system. A partner whose behavior is consistent and responsive supports your secure functioning. A partner who is unpredictable, emotionally unavailable, or whose availability shifts without clear reason will tend to activate attachment anxiety regardless of your general orientation. This does not mean you have regressed. It means your attachment system is responding to real relational cues.
Is it possible to be both anxious and avoidant at the same time?
Yes. This is the core of the fearful-avoidant or disorganized pattern. Rather than having two separate styles operating in parallel, it is more accurate to say that the attachment system is oriented around a fundamental conflict: closeness is both desperately wanted and deeply threatening. Which response shows up in any given moment tends to depend on which fear feels most active.
Can attachment styles change with therapy?
Yes, meaningfully and reliably. Research on earned security shows that adults who did not have secure early attachment can develop more secure patterns through new relational experiences, and a therapeutic relationship is one of the most consistent pathways. The change tends to be gradual and non-linear, with old patterns re-emerging under stress, but the overall trajectory toward security is genuine and achievable for most people.
How do I figure out which attachment style or combination is actually mine?
Self-assessment tools like the Experiences in Close Relationships scale can give you a useful starting point. But the most accurate and useful understanding of your attachment patterns tends to emerge through therapeutic exploration, where a skilled therapist can help you see how the patterns operate in real time rather than through how you answer questions about them in the abstract.
Do attachment styles affect friendships as well as romantic relationships?
Yes, though the attachment system tends to be activated most intensely in romantic and sexual relationships. Many people find that their patterns in friendships are noticeably different from their patterns in romantic relationships, which itself is informative. Understanding where and with whom your attachment system activates, and where it does not, is part of building a complete picture of how you relate.
My partner and I seem to have opposite attachment styles and it is creating a lot of conflict. What can we do?
The anxious-avoidant pairing is one of the most common and most challenging relationship dynamics. The anxious partner's need for closeness tends to trigger the avoidant partner's withdrawal, which then intensifies the anxious partner's pursuit, creating a cycle that can escalate quickly. Individual therapy for each partner to understand and work with their own patterns, alongside or before couples work, is often the most effective approach.
Is there a therapist in Maine, Texas, or Montana who specializes in attachment?
Yes. Sagebrush Counseling therapists are trained in attachment-informed approaches and are licensed to see clients anywhere in Maine, Texas, and Montana through online therapy. All sessions are held online, so your location within any of these states is not a barrier to accessing this kind of care.
How does having multiple attachment patterns affect parenting?
Attachment research by Mary Main found that a parent's own attachment organization is one of the strongest predictors of their child's attachment style. Parents who have achieved a coherent, reflective understanding of their own attachment history, regardless of whether that history was secure or not, tend to raise securely attached children. This is another reason why doing your own attachment work matters beyond your romantic relationships.
Working with Attachment at Sagebrush Counseling
At Sagebrush Counseling, we work with attachment in all of its complexity. Whether you are trying to understand a pattern that does not fit neatly into one category, navigating the way your style shifts across different relationships, or working toward more security in the ways you connect, our therapists bring both clinical training and genuine attunement to this work.
All sessions are held online. You can join from anywhere in Maine, Texas, or Montana, and you do not need to come in with a clear understanding of your pattern before reaching out. Figuring that out together is often where the most useful work begins.
Online Therapy · Available Statewide in Maine, Texas, and Montana
Your Next Step
Book a Free Consultation with an Attachment-Informed Therapist
All sessions are online. Join from anywhere in Maine, Texas, or Montana.
Licensed in Maine · Texas · Montana
References
- National Institute of Mental Health. (2024). Psychotherapies. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. nimh.nih.gov
- American Psychological Association. (2023). Attachment theory. APA Dictionary of Psychology. dictionary.apa.org
- Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2023). Trauma-informed care in behavioral health services. samhsa.gov
- MedlinePlus. (2023). Mental health counseling. U.S. National Library of Medicine. medlineplus.gov
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2023). About mental health. cdc.gov
