Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma and Consensual Nonmonogamy

by Jessica Fern

Our attachment styles are a result of our response to how available connection was to us. When connection is unavailable, inconsistent, intrusive, dangerous or out of reach, the attachment system will either start to hyperactivate or deactivate as a survival strategy. Your attachment adaptations are what worked best in the environment that you were embedded in, and it is important to recognize the power and wisdom in the different styles that you constructed. As we give voice to our past, accept and allow our pain and even appreciate the ways we were shaped from this, we are better able to take responsibility for the ways that we still need to grow and show up differently for ourselves and in our relationships. We no longer have to be victims of our past, but can be victorious in the face of it.

Traumas can limit our ability for presence. When we detach from ourselves, whether through pulling too far into ourselves or jumping too far out of ourselves into another, we lose access to our own internal states and therefore our own internal resources. We are not truly here in the moment, whether with ourselves or another.

Life occurs in the present moment and our healing needs the fullness of our attention in the here and now to take place.

Boundaries, boundaries, boundaries! The anxious style tends to have more porous boundaries regarding input where other people are defining you, as well as on the output where you are inserting yourself too far into another person’s emotional, physical or mental space. Creating more distinct, but not rigid, boundaries is important for learning how to stay in your own skin while being connected to others, rather than leaving yourself behind to be with others. Also, be aware of not letting other people occupy more of your internal space than you are.

When co-regulating with partners, make sure that it is reciprocal and that you are not either over-caretaking at the expense of yourself or asking them to take care of you without regard for themselves.

If you are truly unable to access any memories, people or times when you felt protected, explore the mythical, fictional or spiritual realms, where there might be a character that you resonate with or a spiritual and archetypal energy that you can associate protection with.

What is your relationship with your inner nurturer like and how can this part of you become more front and center in your relationship with yourself?

There are natural rhythms to our cycles of sleeping, eating, resting and having sex that suffer when ignored.

Sleeping 8-10 hours a day, little to no scheduling... Basically summer vacation time.

The modern “psychedelic renaissance”—when Westerners travel to South and Central America and partake in ayahuasca rituals for the purposes of healing and self-discovery—also underscores the lack of such important rituals in our own cultural milieu, while simultaneously demonstrating how far people will go to restore the much-needed self-awareness such rituals potentially provide.

So, when we think we’ve made a mistake, when someone challenges our worldview or when we presume that someone is going to judge or reject us, we can get triggered into a fight/flight/freeze/appease response. In today’s world, it’s not a ferocious animal that poses a threat, but your partner on the couch texting with someone else or your date being 20 minutes late. But your body can respond in the same way as if your life were threatened.

Experiment with cognitive reappraisal or cognitive reframing techniques to reinterpret a situation and change your emotional response to it. For example, if you haven’t heard from a partner for an unusual amount of time, instead of thinking that they are uninterested in you or pulling away, you might instead wonder if they are busy doing something important or whether their phone battery died.