(Why Your Reactions Matter More Than You Think)
There are moments in therapy we rarely speak about openly.
Moments when you feel oddly flat.
Restless.
Anxious.
Pulled to reassure or fix.
Quietly ineffective.
These reactions can feel uncomfortable – even unprofessional.
We’re trained to focus on the client’s internal world, not our own. And yet, attachment-informed practice asks us to reconsider this divide.
Because your reactions in the room are not distractions from the work.
They are the work.
Countertransference without the drama
Countertransference often gets a bad reputation.
It’s sometimes spoken about as something to manage, control, or keep out of the room – as though therapists’ feelings are inherently risky.
But from an attachment perspective, countertransference is simply relational information.
Your body, emotions, and impulses are responding to something happening between you and the client – often before words can name it.
Feeling useless may reflect a client’s own sense of helplessness.
Boredom may signal emotional disconnection or dissociation.
Anxiety may mirror a client’s internal chaos.
The urge to rescue may echo a client’s unspoken longing to be taken care of.
None of this means you’ve failed.
It means you’re attuned.
Why some clients evoke strong reactions
Certain attachment patterns reliably evoke particular responses in therapists.
Clients who present as helpless may pull therapists into over-functioning.
Clients who are emotionally distant may evoke boredom or doubt.
Clients who oscillate between closeness and withdrawal may stir anxiety or confusion.
These reactions aren’t random.
They are part of the relational dance – shaped by the client’s early experiences and now playing out in the therapeutic relationship.
If we ignore these responses, we lose valuable information.
If we shame ourselves for them, we lose clarity.
The danger of acting without reflecting
The risk isn’t having reactions.
The risk is acting on them unconsciously.
Rescuing instead of containing.
Withdrawing instead of staying present.
Over-explaining instead of listening.
Becoming overly neutral instead of relational.
When this happens, therapy can subtly re-enact old patterns – even with the best intentions.
Attachment-informed work doesn’t ask therapists to suppress their responses.
It asks us to understand them.
Making room for your internal world
Developing comfort with your own reactions takes time and support.
It requires:
- Slowing down enough to notice what’s happening inside you
- Curiosity rather than judgement
- A framework that helps you distinguish what belongs to you and what belongs to the client
- Space – often in supervision – to think relationally rather than defensively
When therapists feel permitted to reflect rather than react, something shifts.
They feel less pressure to perform.
More grounded in uncertainty.
Better able to stay present when things feel difficult.
When boredom is information
Boredom is one of the most taboo therapist experiences – and one of the most useful.
It can signal:
- Dissociation in the client
- Emotional avoidance
- A relationship organised around keeping things “safe”
- A lack of affective contact
Rather than trying to banish boredom, attachment-informed therapists get curious about it.
What might be absent here?
What isn’t being felt?
What is being avoided?
Boredom isn’t failure.
It’s a clue.
When the urge to rescue appears
The urge to rescue often emerges when a client’s distress feels unbearable – either to them, or to us.
This urge can feel compassionate.
But rescuing too quickly can rob clients of:
- Agency
- Emotional processing
- The experience of being with difficult feelings safely
Attachment-focused work invites us to stay present without taking over.
To support without replacing.
To offer containment rather than solutions.
A kinder view of the therapist
Perhaps the most important shift attachment work offers therapists is this:
You are not meant to be neutral observers.
You are participants in a relational process.
Your feelings, reactions, and impulses are part of the data – not signs of incompetence.
When held thoughtfully, they deepen the work.
A reflection to carry into practice
You might gently reflect on this:
- Which clients evoke the strongest reactions in you?
- What feelings do you find hardest to tolerate in the room?
- How do you usually respond to the urge to fix, rescue, or withdraw?
In attachment-informed therapy, the therapist’s internal world is not something to overcome.
It’s something to listen to.
In the next blog, we’ll explore what happens when clients make therapists doubt themselves – and how shame dynamics quietly shape the therapeutic relationship.
For now, you might sit with this:
What changes when you trust your reactions not as problems to solve – but as information to understand?
Often, that’s where the work deepens.
