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Lost Connection: Self-Soothing for Anxious Attachment · Trauma Free Relationship

• 0:04
  If you fall into the more anxious style of attachment, one
• 0:08
  of the things you do really well is you love hard.
• 0:12
  When you decide to let somebody into your life, you give your
• 0:16
  whole heart to that person. That's one of the things I love
• 0:21
  about the more anxious style of attachment.
• 0:23
  They're always fighting for the relationship, but one of the
• 0:27
  things you really struggle with if self soothing and not being
• 0:32
  overwhelmed when your partner feels or you feel disconnected
• 0:37
  from your partner, which is what we're going to talk about today.
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  Now this is a mirror episode of the one I did previously.
• 0:45
  So if you're more avoidance style in your attachment, then
• 0:49
  listen to that one or if you have a more avoidance style
• 0:52
  partner because you can pick up things and that one that would
• 0:55
  be helpful as well. But this one we're going to
• 0:58
  focus on when it feels like connections being lost.
• 1:02
  How do we increase self soothing for the anxious style of
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  attachment? So by the end of this episode,
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  you're going to understand what anxious attachment is.
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  You're going to understand where it comes from, its strengths and
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  limitations, as well as some effective ways to begin
• 1:20
  soothing. Don't forget now to download the
• 1:23
  free ebook that's attached to the liner notes in this episode.
• 1:27
  It's called Get to the Root of the Problem.
• 1:29
  And this is a book that I created for couples to help them
• 1:33
  drill down below the surface of their conversations so that they
• 1:37
  can understand the deeper meanings and learn how to repair
• 1:41
  in a safe, guided conversation. So if you also need any help
• 1:46
  implementing of those ideas, feel free to sign up for a
• 1:49
  clarity call or we can help you sort of create a plan, create
• 1:53
  some next steps and get you moving in the right direction.
• 1:56
  Welcome to trauma free relationship.
• 1:59
  I'm your host, Tom Philp, and I've been working for years with
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  adults who struggle with relational trauma to regain
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  trust in themselves and others so that they can experience a
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  safe and secure relationship. Let's get started,
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  OK? As I mentioned at the opening,
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  what we're going to talk about today is the anxious attachment
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  style. Now, first of all, let's sort of
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  define what that means. The anxious attachment style is
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  the way your body has adjusted to inconsistent connection.
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  This might have happened growing up with your parents.
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  It might have happened in adolescence, somewhere along the
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  way, where you had a an event or series of events that felt like
• 3:00
  you were betrayed by some friends, maybe a first
• 3:02
  boyfriend. Whatever it might be, This might
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  have happened to a first marriage you had when you were
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  young. And regardless of where it was
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  in your stage of life, what your nervous system learned is that I
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  can't seem to get this person to focus on me when I need them to.
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  And so I have to, I hyperactivate my attachment
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  style. And that's essentially what
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  anxious attachment is. Your nervous system says, OK,
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  we're going to kick this up a notch.
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  We're going to go from 1:00 to 2:00.
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  We're going to go to 10, right? And we are going to now do
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  whatever we need to do to get our partners attention.
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  We're going to do whatever we need to do now in order to be
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  able to get that person to focus on us in a way that feels
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  comforting, soothing, and restores connection.
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  So when we fear abandonment, we might have a hyper focus on
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  other people's reactions, and we have difficulty calming
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  ourselves when connection feels uncertain.
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  Those are some of the three hallmarks of anxious attachment.
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  You tend to be very good at being cued in to the feelings
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  and and facial expressions, tone of voice, you know all of the
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  non verbal types of behavior of your partner because you're
• 4:25
  always looking for that potential lost connection.
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  And so again, one of the things you really do well is you love
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  hard. You give your whole heart, you
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  throw yourself into a relationship, you're all about
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  the relationship. There's nothing you won't do for
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  your partner. There's nothing you won't do for
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  yourself to be able to help your partner.
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  You are all in 110%. And I love that.
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  I love it, love it, love it about the anxious attachment
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  style. They they play hard and they
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  love hard, but one of the things that's really difficult, right?
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  And the focus of this podcast today is when you feel that lost
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  connection and you want to hyperactivate your attachment
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  style. At this point, you want to
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  hyperactivate that need for connection and and to repair.
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  How do you self soothe yourself enough that you allow your
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  partner space to be able to draw their own conclusions, to be
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  able to show up in a way that feels right for them, to not
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  push them away so that they feel overwhelmed by your emotion and
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  so that you guys can sit down and you actually allow enough
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  space for them to be able to be emotionally engaged and
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  receptive to you in those conversations?
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  So again, this style of attachment is because it was
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  learned simply because the nervous system had to adjust to
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  inconsistent attention, inconsistent connection in the
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  relationship. And so now what it does is it
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  learns to hyperactivate and it learns to sort of go into
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  OverDrive. I think about that, that movie
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  Spinal Tap, if you've ever seen that movie, it's kind of a
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  mockumentary on a, on a British band, I think back in the 1970s,
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  maybe early 80s. And at one point the director,
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  Rob Reiners in a scene with one of the band members and he's
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  talking about the amp and he's showing the different knobs on
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  the amp. And one of the knobs on the amp
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  goes up to 11, not ten. Normally knobs all go up to 10.
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  This one goes up to 11. And it's a really funny scene,
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  but it, it, it always cracks me up.
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  And it, so it makes me think about this like, you know, the
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  nervous system of the more attachment style, it doesn't
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  just go up to 10, it goes all the way to 11 and it's that much
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  louder. It's just one, one turn of the
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  knob louder. And so it kind of reminds me a
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  little bit about what the nervous system does to those who
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  fall into the more anxious style of attachment.
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  It sort of goes all the way up past 9, past 10, all the way to
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  11. And boy, it really needs
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  connection at that point in order to be able to calm down.
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  And it struggles to be able to turn itself down to maybe a 5 or
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  a six so that it can it. It has the ability to self
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  soothe. It has the ability to connect
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  with itself. Anxious attachment styles often
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  times look in a relationship like they're needy and often
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  times they end up abandoning themselves in order to try to
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  get connection from others. So turning down that volume,
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  turning down that anxiety is about trying to connect with
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  oneself in many different ways. And so you know that the, the
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  emotional center of the brain perceives the threat and it
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  says, I know what to do. I know how to turn this up to
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  11. And when I do that, I'm going
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  to, I'm going to employ all my focus and all my energy on my
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  partner in order to try to re establish that connection.
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  And it's coming from a good place.
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  You know, I've often said this before, but it bears repeating
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  both styles of attachment. Well, actually, all three
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  insecure styles of attachment, anxious, avoided and
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  disorganized to some degree, are trying to preserve the
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  relationship. The difference with the
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  disorganized is they're actually trying to preserve their own
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  sense of coherence, their own sense of themselves, because
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  they kind of become fragmented in those moments when they feel
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  lost, but they also feel fragmented in moments where they
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  feel overwhelmed with connections.
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  So in some ways their goal is to try to maintain a coherent sense
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  of self. But certainly for the more
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  anxious and avoidance style, what they're trying to do is
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  preserve the relationship. They're trying to preserve that
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  sense of connection. And so everything in the
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  amygdala says, OK, we've got to respond in a way that tries to
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  neutralize this threat. And how the more anxious style
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  responds is by going after coming in sort of hard and
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  aggressive at times, turning the the volume up to 11 inside their
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  body and and then sort of directing all that energy at
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  their partner. Where's the more avoidance
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  style? What it does is it turns down
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  the volume almost to 0. It it wants to just block out
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  all the noise that the amygdala inside is firing.
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  It's saying this is dangerous. This could lead to something
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  horrible in the relationship. And it's just that person more
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  avoidance style just turns their volume down to almost 0.
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  And so they lose any ability to be able to glean the information
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  from what their amygdala, their their threat center and
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  emotional center is trying to tell them.
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  So, you know, there's only so many options that we have in our
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  nervous system that that allows us to try to re establish
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  connection. And those four options are
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  fight, flight, freeze and fun. And so two of them tend to be
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  hyper activated, fight and flight, and two of them tend to
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  be almost under activated, if you will.
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  And that is freeze and fought. We sort of freeze up, go numb,
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  or we just abandoned our sense of self, who we are.
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  And, and we become sort of, we lose ourselves in, in the, the
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  relationship and, and just simply become people pleasers.
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  And so there's I say that to say there's only so many exceptions
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  that the nervous system has available and they tend to map
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  into these nice kind of discreet sometimes categories that we
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  call anxious or avoidant or disorganized style of
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  attachment. OK, so you know, when self
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  soothing feels hard, what that what's happening is the volumes
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  turned up to 11. And so learning how to turn that
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  volume down is one of the greatest opportunities for the
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  more anxious style. In the previous episode, the one
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  I said that mirrored this, one of the greatest opportunities
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  for the more avoidance style is how to reach out for connection.
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  When they've been hurt or upset or they feel like they're not
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  good enough, when they're kind of swimming in shame at times,
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  how do they learn to reach out for other soothing?
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  They're great at soothing themselves, but they've got to
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  learn to reach out. It's the opposite for the more
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  anxious style. They have to learn to how to
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  self soothe. And so being able to do that,
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  being able to turn down that volume inside themselves is, is
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  the great struggle for the more anxious style of attachment.
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  So there's a couple, I think of of misnomers, if you will.
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  There's a couple of false beliefs about this.
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  One is that if you're anxiously attached and you turn down the
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  volume, what you're doing is shutting down your needs.
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  And that's not really what's happening.
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  You're not shutting down your needs.
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  You're just turning down the noise that surrounds those
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  needs. Part of that anxiety is you are
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  being flooded with it, so much so that you can't really drill
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  down and understand what feelings lie beneath the anxiety
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  there. There's all of this emotion.
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  Some authors call it emotionality, meaning just a mix
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  of a lot of emotions. There's fear, there might be
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  guilt, there might be sadness, but it's just all so jumbled.
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  It just feels like anxiety. And if the more anxious person
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  is able to sort of sort through all of that and drill down, what
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  they end up finding is there's a more core vulnerable emotion
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  beneath that. But unless they can turn down
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  the volume, they don't really get to that more core emotion.
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  And that more core emotion might be a deep sense of abandonment
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  and loneliness. Those are some of the two
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  primary ones that the more anxious attachment person finds.
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  So beneath all this emotionality, all this anxiety
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  and sadness and fear and shame or whatever it is that might be
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  whirling up on the surface, being able to turn down that
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  volume and being able to drill down like what am I feeling
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  below this? What they often find is there's
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  a deeper, more vulnerable emotion that's actually driving
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  all of it. And that is where the the the
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  wound is held. That is the sense that if I
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  don't re establish connection now, I will be abandoned, I will
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  be forgotten and I will be alone.
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  And so being able to turn down the volume allows the more
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  anxious style to be able to drill down to the core of what's
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  happening. Think about this.
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  Think about what would happen if you were able to take time to
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  soothe yourself in order to get to a place where you could
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  actually be able to communicate from that emotional place, that
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  vulnerable place of abandonment or fear of loneliness to your
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  partner, your partner. And I've seen this thousands of
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  times. So I feel really confident your
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  partner's going to hear that different and they're going to
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  be able to respond differently to you because what they're not
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  feeling is a sense that they're not good enough.
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  They're not swimming in their own shame because they're
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  feeling attacked or blamed. They're not feeling like the
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  sole focus is on them and what they did or didn't do in the
• 15:47
  moment. All of a sudden, they can hear
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  you coming from a place where they want to show up for you.
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  They want to be there for you. They want to get it right.
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  They want to hit a bullseye in those moments and make you feel
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  better. But their nervous system is
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  primed to shut down if you come on with all of that
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  emotionality, so to speak, all that anxiety that tends to be
• 16:15
  targeted at them. So being able to drill down and,
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  and soothe yourself in those moments is really part of the
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  primary task. So let's talk about that.
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  How do we drill down? How do we begin to sort of get
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  at what the, the core vulnerable emotion that's really driving
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  all of it and has been triggered that wound, if you will, the
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  trauma, What is, what's it holding?
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  How can we drill down to that? So one of the things we have to
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  do is we've got to be able to take a deep breath and name what
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  we're feeling. So step one might involve, OK,
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  right now I'm feeling really afraid.
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  I'm feeling really afraid because I'm my partner might
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  disconnect from me further or they might begin to shut down
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  again or they might feel like, you know, they're done with me.
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  This may be too much for them. Whatever it is, there's a lot of
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  fear right now. And I can sense that fear.
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  I can feel it all over my body, but I certainly feel that
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  anxiety in my stomach, this sense of dread.
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  Oh my gosh, here we go again. And so being able to one name,
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  the feeling name where it is in your body is really important to
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  be able to do that. Why?
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  Because what you're doing is you're focusing inward.
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  You're not focusing on your partner, you're focusing inward.
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  And that's a brilliant first step to being able to shift
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  through all this emotionality, all this different kind of
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  emotion and more get at the core of what's happening.
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  So that's step one, Orient and name.
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  Look inside. I'm really anxious.
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  I'm really scared right now and I know where I feel that.
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  Then the second step is to learn how to regulate your body.
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  So you might start with putting your hand on your chest.
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  You take in a deep, deep breath and you exhale, and then you
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  might be able to recall a time where you and your partner felt
• 18:27
  really connected. Recall a grandmother that you
• 18:31
  feel connected to, that you know loves you more than anything in
• 18:34
  the world. Recall a past love or a parent
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  or whomever it is in your life that you know just delights in
• 18:44
  you that thinks that you hung the moon.
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  And recall some of those episodes where you felt loved
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  and cared for and allow your body to be able to calm down.
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  If you have trouble evoking a memory of somebody, then
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  practice a breathing technique of what I call the the the 644.
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  So inhale for six seconds. Hold it for four seconds and
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  then exhale for four seconds and do that over and over until you
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  feel your body begin to calm down and you're focusing on your
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  body now. You're not focusing on the
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  partner, right? We've turned our thoughts
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  inward. We've named that.
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  We're scared. We know where it is in our body
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  now. We're starting to try to
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  regulate ourselves and so we can evoke a memory or we can
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  practice some breath, breath work like I just talked about
• 19:49
  the 644. Or you might even in these
• 19:52
  moments show up for yourselves, yourself.
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  And so in doing that, that's this is step three.
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  You can say something about you, you mattering.
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  I matter. My feelings in this moment
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  moment matter. My needs are important and it's
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  OK that I have these needs. As you're breathing, you can say
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  to yourself my feelings are important.
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  It's OK. I know where this comes from and
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  I know this is a wound I hold and it's OK that I have this
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  wound. I'm not going to judge it.
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  I'm not going to criticize it. The inner critic is not going to
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  come out. All you're going to do is in
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  this moment, you're going to figure out how do I soothe
• 20:39
  myself? And so repeating to yourself
• 20:43
  these sort of internal phrases that get right at the wound.
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  I'm not going to be alone. My partner cares about me.
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  He or she is not going to abandon me.
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  They're just scared right now to.
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  It's OK for you to feel this way.
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  I know you're scared. I know where this comes from.
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  You will get through this. This will pass.
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  You will get back to a place where the two of you can
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  reconnect. Any kind of statements that you
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  can come up with at all that will be helpful in these
• 21:22
  moments. It can can be really
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  transformational, really transformational.
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  And so the more you practice this and this is something
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  you're going to have to do that is not just in the moment when
• 21:37
  you sense disconnection. This is going to be something
• 21:40
  you have to do daily. Because remember, a secure
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  connection or in secure attachment, it is not an
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  endpoint, is not a destination, it is a practice.
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  Even people who are secure in their style of attachment
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  practice it to stay secure. They have things that they do
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  now it comes a little bit easier to them because they're not
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  having to earn that secure sense of attachment from an insecure
• 22:07
  style. But once they they have it, it's
• 22:10
  it's still a practice for them. Otherwise, if they didn't
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  practice those things, they probably would slip back into an
• 22:16
  an insecure style or they would move into an insecure style
• 22:20
  maybe for the first time in their life.
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  So this is not unique to you. It is something that everybody
• 22:26
  has to do. I want you to think about it
• 22:28
  being a practice and not an endpoint.
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  So those are the three steps. Being able to Orient and name
• 22:36
  what's happening, what you're feeling, where it is in your
• 22:40
  body. Being able to begin to regulate
• 22:43
  it by evoking images of loved ones that care for you.
• 22:48
  Being able to regulate yourself. Get back in that window of
• 22:52
  tolerance, grounded, clear, and connected.
• 22:55
  You'll know when you are. You'll you'll know it.
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  Your body will tell you. You'll feel that anxiety start
• 23:00
  to subside a little bit. Maybe you'll start to feel a
• 23:04
  little bit fragile because you're getting at the core
• 23:08
  vulnerability there in that moment.
• 23:10
  So you'll know when that begins to shift because you'll feel it
• 23:14
  in your body. And then finally, you'll also
• 23:16
  have phrases that you say to yourself that will help soothe
• 23:20
  you in those moments. So being able to recall these
• 23:25
  things and soothe yourself is very important.
• 23:29
  And you might want to do these before you even go talk to your
• 23:33
  partner. That would be that would be
• 23:36
  really crucial because that way you're not coming in really hot
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  and and already worked up. Gottman talks about a slow start
• 23:46
  up. Those who don't self soothe
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  before they talk to their partner usually come in with a
• 23:52
  fast start start up, which means it comes out with more of a
• 23:56
  tone, more defensiveness, more criticism and blame, more
• 24:01
  protection, all of those things that we don't want to happen in
• 24:05
  these kinds of conversations. So being able to soothe yourself
• 24:10
  through those three steps is a great, great aspect or, or great
• 24:15
  process, you know, beginning process to do something else.
• 24:20
  I think you can do here that that I, I teach as well.
• 24:24
  And that is the pause, soothe and choose technique.
• 24:29
  So pause before acting, soothe your nervous system and choose
• 24:34
  connection intentionally. How are you choosing connection?
• 24:39
  Is it when you're in fight or flight?
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  Because that's not the best way to choose connection.
• 24:45
  But if you pause before acting, soothe your nervous system, get
• 24:49
  yourself back into a window of tolerance.
• 24:52
  And, and let me just say this because I I just thought about
• 24:55
  this. Being in the window and being
• 24:58
  soothed and being calm does not mean you cannot come to your
• 25:01
  partner and say something hurt your feelings.
• 25:04
  It's not about talking, not talking about your feelings, but
• 25:08
  it's, it's talking about things in a way that you're sharing
• 25:11
  your internal experience, not being focused on what your
• 25:16
  partner did or didn't do. And that's crucial because when
• 25:19
  you talk about, hey, can we talk about something that hurt my
• 25:22
  feelings the other day? I've been thinking about this
• 25:25
  for a while and I was trying to self soothe through it, but it
• 25:29
  just kind of keeps coming up. So I'd like to share it with you
• 25:31
  if that's OK. And this might come out a little
• 25:35
  bit messy, but I really think it's important to talk about.
• 25:38
  And so something happened the other day just kind of hurt my
• 25:41
  feelings and it's been hanging around long enough that I feel
• 25:44
  like I need to talk about it. That's very different than
• 25:47
  coming in hot, than coming in fast and focusing on what your
• 25:51
  partner did or didn't do. So being able to soothe, pause,
• 25:55
  soothe and choose is really important as well.
• 26:00
  And so maybe that's a little bit of a mnemonic device that that
• 26:05
  will kind of stick with you. And that if that's better than
• 26:07
  the 644 breathing technique, or if that's easier than putting
• 26:11
  your hand over your heart and, and evoking an image of a loved
• 26:15
  one or being able to say soothing aspects to yourself,
• 26:21
  then that's OK to do that as well.
• 26:24
  And so, you know, building a secure attachment from the
• 26:28
  inside out is really what we're talking about here.
• 26:32
  And it's not about never needing others, but it's about trusting
• 26:37
  yourself to survive those these emotional waves, not abandoning
• 26:43
  yourself for the sake of connection, Being able to stay
• 26:47
  connected to yourself while also seeking safe connection.
• 26:52
  Because believe me, if your partner starts to shut down, I
• 26:56
  know that provokes your anxiety even more.
• 26:59
  But at that point, it's not safe connection for you.
• 27:02
  It's really not. Your partner's not emotionally
• 27:04
  available and responsive. And so you're probably going to
• 27:08
  end up more frustrated and more hurt because your partner's
• 27:12
  beginning to shut down. And I fully recognize that
• 27:15
  sometimes your partner shuts down even if you're doing some
• 27:18
  of these things, right. I acknowledge that.
• 27:21
  But that's because it's about them.
• 27:23
  It's not about you at that point.
• 27:26
  You're doing the things that you need to do to be able to try to
• 27:30
  choose safe connection. And so they're allowed to have
• 27:33
  moments where they just can't be there for you.
• 27:36
  They're allowed to have moments that are difficult.
• 27:39
  And immediately they just drop the volume on their knob to 0
• 27:43
  because they said something's happening or because the cycle
• 27:46
  has taught them that this is going to go really bad.
• 27:50
  But if you have a couple of times where you're able to come
• 27:53
  in and you have soothed yourself and your volumes down to about
• 27:57
  A5 and your, your partner's going to learn.
• 28:01
  Oh, this can go differently. This, this, this, this is not
• 28:05
  the same as what we used to do. Now our cycles looking
• 28:08
  differently. And when that happens, you begin
• 28:11
  to win. When that happens, you begin to
• 28:14
  choose safe connection. Your partner begins to show up
• 28:17
  for you. You guys begin to break the
• 28:20
  negative cycles that you get locked in and your anxiety
• 28:24
  begins to learn. Oh, in this relationship, at
• 28:28
  least some of the times my partner can be there for me and
• 28:33
  I can re establish connection and soothe myself in a way
• 28:38
  that's effective. Thank you so much for listening.
• 28:42
  I'm Tom Phillip here to remind you to stay grounded, clear and
• 28:46
  connected.