Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma and Consensual Nonmonogamy

by Jessica Fern

When our attachment needs are being met, this system enables us to feel comfortable and free to explore ourselves, others and the world around us.

If our attachment figures were absent or scary to us as children, we didn’t develop our ability to freely explore and to learn about the world and about our own abilities. When this happens, we develop insecure strategies for engaging with others—we may become more vigilant and anxious or more avoidant and dismissive.

As children, when we feel afraid, threatened or in need, and seeking closeness with our parents is not a viable option because they’re not available or because turning towards them doesn’t make things better, we learn to rely more on ourselves. We become more self-reliant and we minimize our attachment needs. When we deactivate our attachment system, we suppress our attachment-based longings—not because we don’t still want closeness and connection, but in order to adapt and survive. If we experience discomfort or danger and closeness to a parent is still somewhat of a viable option, we might learn that we can get their attention by intensifying our attachment cries. If our caretakers did not respond to our initial bids, but ramping up our demands and hyperactivating our attachment system did get their attention in some form, we then learn that this is an effective strategy.

Caregiver behaviors that could lead a child to take on a deactivating attachment strategy include: Neglecting or abusing the child. Being emotionally cold or rejecting the child. Giving the child hostile, angry or threatening responses. Discouraging a child’s expression of vulnerability. Encouraging (whether explicitly or implicitly) the child to be more self-reliant and independent.

when the child has an attachment need, they reach out to their attachment figure and that attachment figure moves towards them in an emotionally attuned way that calms the child’s nervous system.6 This in turn teaches the child

that allowing themselves to feel their needs and communicating those needs to others is an effective strategy. A caretaker being present, safe, protective, playful, emotionally attuned and responsive is of paramount importance to a child developing a secure attachment style.

Early positive attachment experiences have a huge impact on healthy brain development and emotional regulation.7 When the attachment figure is able to emotionally resonate with the child, the child feels supported and learns to regulate their own positive and negative emotional arousal. This helps to lower stress hormones and increase oxytocin (the bonding hormone). By co-regulating with a caretaker, the child learns to understand and process facial and social cues, they learn empathy and they develop an increased ability to cope with stress. When children experience secure interactions with the adults in their lives and function from a secure attachment style, they also tend to have better self-esteem, be more resilient to trauma, have strong social skills, concentrate better, enjoy play and have solid overall emotional health. Through these nourishing experiences, a child develops a sense of safety and trust. They take in the messages that the world is a friendly place and that they can ask for what they want because the people in their lives care and are willing to help.

This is so foreign to my experience. My mother was not even aware of my grandmother's behavior toward me. Somehow, I felt that the authority figure, in most cases grandmother, knew better than me, and so I thought she was right and I was wrong, so I said nothing to mom...

Secure Attachment as an Adult

Early childhood attachment experiences become the blueprint for the kinds of connections we go on to expect...

relationships. The interactions we experienced with our caretakers create internal working models of how we see ourselves—both positively and negatively—and set our positive or negative expectations about how attuned and available our partners will be to us in times of need.8 People with a secure attachment style experience a healthy sense of self and see themselves and their partners in a positive light. Their interpersonal experiences are deeply informed by their knowledge that they can ask for what they need and people will typically listen and willingly respond. It’s empowering to know that our actions are effective. As children, if we reach out with our body and use our voice to get the help or connection we need to mitigate our distress, and if our parents usually meet these attachment bids, we learn that we matter and are worthy of love. This builds the foundation for healthy self-esteem and a sense of competence in the world. As adults, this helps us be more flexi...

I have been so far afield of this. I have never been able to ask for what I want. If ever I did, it was meant with reluctance or refusal, so I stopped asking.

We can see many parallels between the parent-child attachment relationship and the adult-adult attachment relationship. For instance, adults seek physical contact with each other, engage in dreamy eye-gazing, and even use baby talk or cooing sounds to nurture and encourage bonding. We feel separation distress when apart, and we turn towards our romantic partners as a safe haven in times of need. We also see them as a secure base from which to explore the world and our sexuality, and we feel able to share important discoveries with them.10

I have never experienced such security.No wonder I have had so few relationships, most short lived, and in looking back, unsatisfactory.

Sexuality also becomes an integrated part of the attachment and caregiving behavioral systems.

I have been miserable with this. Selfish and at the same time, not asking for what I want. How confused I have been.

A child with a secure attachment style will likely grow up into an adult who feels worthy of love and seeks to create meaningful, healthy relationships with people who are physically and emotionally available. Securely functioning adults are comfortable with intimacy, closeness, and their need or desire for others. They don’t fear losing their sense of self or being engulfed by the relationship. For securely attached people, “dependency” is not a dirty word, but a fact of life that can be experienced without losing or compromising the self.

Clearly, I do not have a secure attachment style. Been more than 10 years since marriage, and...nothing since.

People with secure attachment are able to internalize their partners’ love, carrying it with them even when they’re physically separate, emotionally disconnected or in conflict.

I have never been in love, or felt love or recognized loving behaviors from the other. Sad. Very sad.

receive support from their partners.

Never reached out and asked for help.

more securely attached partners are often better able to set healthy boundaries.

They truly say no when they mean no and yes when they mean yes. To me, this is the foundation of true consent.

I have never gotten to this point in any relationship.

Research has also shown that having a secure attachment style as an adult is correlated with higher levels of relationship satisfaction and balance,12 higher levels of empathy, respect and forgiveness for partners,13 and higher levels of sexual satisfaction when compared to people who are insecurely attached in their relationships.14 Additionally, having a secure base with a partner can increase sexploration, a term coined to describe “the degree to which a person co-constructs a sex-positive, supportive, and safe environment with their partner(s).”15

This is all very enlightening. I am seeing why I have been this way, and would really like to be open to the newness of my deires here. I want a partner, or to be in a community of partners who are all searching and yearning for a better way, a loving, self-positive way of living.

I find it easy to make emotional connections with others. I enjoy being close with others.

I don’t often worry about being abandoned or about someone getting too close to me.

I want to reveal myself. It is the only way to be a parner in love.Total honesty, Take the gloves and all the masks off!!!

The Avoidant/Dismissive Attachment Style

Avoidant Attachment in Childhood

Parenting that is cold, distant, critical or highly focused on achievement or appearance can create an environment where the child learns that they are better off relying on themselves. When a child does not get enough of the positive attachment responses that they need or they are outright rejected or criticized for having needs, they will adapt by shutting down and deactivating their attachment longings.

This is me, so me. I spent a lot of time alone as a child. Mom was at work, dad lived elsewhere, and gram didn't interact with me, as far as I can remember. I drew,read, watched television, alone.

Dismissive Attachment as an Adult

A person who is functioning from a dismissive style will tend to keep people at arm’s length.

A person with a dismissive attachment style likely didn’t get what they needed early in life from their primary caregivers, so they learned to get by and survive by needing little to nothing from others.

Me

they find it extremely difficult to be vulnerable and open with others.

Oftentimes, their own painful emotions or experiences are placed below the radar of their emotional awareness in order to avoid the discomfort of feeling pain. This in turn creates a disconnection from their own feelings and needs. Living with a sense of chronic disconnection from themselves, others and the world, they might at times experience the longing to be close, but then feel at a total loss as to how to bridge the gap between their isolation and others, missing opportunities to receive support from their partners or to provide care to their loved ones.

So me...

People in this attachment style do want relationships. They will enter into relationships, even long-term relationships, but may struggle with their ability to reflect on their own internal experience as well as sensitively respond to the signals of their partners. They usually find it difficult to tolerate emotions related to intimacy, conflict and different forms of emotional intensity. When someone who is functioning in this style either feels vulnerable or perceives vulnerability in their partner, they will distance themselves to avoid discomfort. Signs of potential rejection or criticism from others will also create a quick withdrawal.

Me

For many, contacting and admitting one’s actual feelings might be perceived as a threat to their current relationship

When someone with a dismissive style starts to work on healing their insecure attachment, they must begin by no longer dismissing and distancing from themselves. This requires that they no longer deny their desires and needs, allowing the longings and wants for connection that have for so long been forbidden.

The process of allowing feelings as they arise, learning how to self-soothe and establishing an inner trust that experiencing feelings is safe, cannot be rushed.

Oct 12, 2024. I have just recently begun doing this.

My autonomy, independence and self-sufficiency are very important to me. I am generally comfortable without close relationships and do well on my own. I want to be in relationships and have some closeness with people, but I can only tolerate closeness to a limit and then I need space.

I prefer not to share my feelings or show a partner how I feel deep down. I frequently don’t know what I’m feeling or needing and/or I can miss cues from others about what they are feeling or needing. I feel uncomfortable relying on partners and having partners depend or rely on me. I either struggle with making relationship commitments or if I do commit, I may secretly have one foot out the door (or at least have the back door unlocked).

I am very sensitive to any signs that my partner is trying to control me or interfere with my freedom in any way (and I...

During disagreements or in conflict I tend to withdraw, shut down, shut out or stonewall. I do well with the transition from being together with people to then being alone again, but once I’ve been alone for a while I can be slow to warm up to others or struggle with the transition from being alone to entering back into connection with someone.

Even in elementary school, when I was out sick for a day or a few days, it felt weird being amidst all the others, like I was in a foreign land or another planet.

their emotions, again and again turning outward to make sense of their inner feelings and unable to emotionally regulate on their own.

Over-involving the child in the parent’s state of mind, where the parent’s emotions or state of mind is more central to the parent-child interaction than the child’s. In this case, the child might be asked (whether explicitly or implicitly) to be responsible for meeting the parent’s needs, making the parent feel better or supplying the parent with meaning and purpose. This is often due to a parent’s own level of anxiety, stress or unresolved trauma, or their own anxious attachment history. When the state of mind of the parent is the centerpiece of

I did this with Olivia. She was just a baby, and I was talking out my anxiety to her!!!

A person with a preoccupied style can be uncomfortable, even terrified, of being alone.

Engaging in compulsive caretaking can also become a way to prevent the discomfort of feeling lonely and enhance the perceived security of not being abandoned.

I will often guide clients to tune into where their sense of self is. Is it within their own body or out there in someone else’s body? If it is with someone else, we can then

focus on calling themselves back to establish a sense of inner authority and self-trust.

I tend to overfocus on my partners and underfocus on myself.

guilty!!!

being punished or shamed for not doing something that they were never shown how to do,

The pharmacist I had to take orders from, making my job there the worst job I have ever had!!!

being asked to solve problems that are unsolvable, or being expected to do tasks beyond their developmental capability can all lead to a level of disorientation where the child is left frozen and unclear whether to move up or down, right or left. They are damned if they do, damned if they don’t.

This is similar to being in an argument with a girlfriend, may even be Kim/wife, when I am asked to respond to her words and have no idea what to say. I am so afraid in this moment, yet I am frozen.

a culture of overachieving in which every minute of a child’s life is scheduled with extracurricular activities can all create a home of chaos.

Not my personal experience, but I see so many mothers frantically shuttling their daughters around from one activity to another.

Well-intentioned parents who push their child into more and more enriching activities can cause children to feel destabilized from the lack of rest, downtime and free play time that is needed to feel settled and soothed in the nervous system.

Approximately 15 to 20 percent of the population has a nervous system wired to be more sensitive. These people are more attuned to the subtleties of their environment and process that information much more deeply compared to others without this trait.

This American culture has little regard for sensitivity.