quote:

I'll take a shot at the difference between attachment figure and transference. Its easy to get confused and for a good reason. People who have attachment issues, especially disorganized attachment which is commonly the result of long-term childhood abuse and/or neglect, are often the people who develop intense "transference" relationships with their T. So often the two things, though separate, occur together and are interrelated in some ways.

Transference does not mean you aren't having real feelings in the here and now, you absolutely are and they are real and legitimate (my T tends to avoid the word transference, he doesn't like the connotations). But how you behave in relationship and the feelings that you struggle with in significant relationships can often be indicators of unresolved problems or unmet needs in your past. So the ability to observe your emotions and be able to discuss them with the object of those emotions,your T, who can also do the reality checking of telling you how they actually do feel and think, allows you to see patterns in yourself that you have no other way of observing. We can only know ourself in relationship. So the feelings that occur in the theraputic relationship can often be clues leading us back to things in our past that need to be healed. And when we heal, that allows us to change and having healthier relationships both with our Ts and outside of therapy.

Attachment theory states that our relationship with our attachment figure is a biologically driven behavior designed to help us survive since human infant would die on their own. The interactions with our attachment figure (literally from birth onward) form our "template" for relationships and what we expect from them. It shapes how we see the world and people around them. It literally affects the physical structure of the brain and the neural networks that develop. For people who receive "good enough" care from their attachment figures, their template tells them that when they express a need, it is met. That they matter because someone responds to their outcries and helps them understand themselves. They are taught how to handle adversity and soothe themselves by being soothed by their attachment figure. Recieving this kind of care provides them with a deep sense of their own worth and acceptableness.

But, if you do not receive these things from your attachment figure and in the case of abuse, the very person you need to go towards when distressed is the person causing the distress, all kind of maladaptive behaviors ensue, which provide the important function of surviving your childhood (which is a biggie) but later in life can become the very behaviors that prevent you from having a fulfilling life with close intimate relationships.

Your need to have a sense of your own worth and to learn how to handle your own emotions and move through them go unfulfilled. But these are basic human needs and do NOT go away although they can be driven deep underground.

And this is where the connection between attachment and transference comes in. A person who has never experienced a secure attachment will continue to look for one without even being aware of it. These are strong, primitive needs that can really drive you. So you go to therapy and here is someone who is listening to you, caring about you, treating you like you matter, understanding you and helping you make sense of your emotions. All the things you're attachment figure should have done. And that's when you're long-buried, but intense and primitive needs come roaring back to life because at last you can have them met. That's why the intensity is so high for transference (of any kind, I know I have struggled with both intense paternal and erotic transference depending on which emotions and needs I am dealing with.) because these are primitive needs from a time when you were pre-verbal and pre-cognitive but are experienced as a life and death issue which they were at the time. When we are in fear of our life, our limbic system can really scream at us to do something about it. So our relationship with our therapist takes on a "life and death" aspect. And we feel small and vulnerable and childish because that's exactly the part of ourselves that is so needy in this area.