291 - Attachment Theory and Polyamory
Jessica Fern and attachment theory
This week we’re joined with Jessica Fern, a psychotherapist, public speaker, and trauma and relationship expert with a private practice where she helps individuals, couples, and members of polyamorous relationships who want to move past the limitations from reactive patterns, cultural conditioning, insecure attachment styles, and past trauma in order to help them reach new possibilities in both life and love.
Her upcoming book, due to be published in October 23, 2020, is titled Polysecure: Attachment, Trauma, and Consensual Non-monogamy, and so throughout this episode Jessica discusses the intersection of polyamory and attachment theories and the following topics:
The traditional attachment theory model and what it might leave out regarding polyamory and polyamorous relationships.
Are there pitfalls in the ways that we might use attachment theory to understand our relationships?
How does trauma intersect with this?
How do you find securely attached people?
Recommendations for people growing towards a secure attachment style.
Tips on connecting for more avoidant attached people.
Can you feel secure attachment if there’s only one point of secure attachment?
Visit Jessica’s website at www.jessicafern.com or email her at connect@jessicafern.com to learn more about her and her practice, and don’t forget to check out her book when it comes out on October 23rd!
Transcript
This document may contain small transcription errors. If you find one please let us know at info@multiamory.com and we will fix it ASAP.
Jase: On this episode of the multiamory podcast, we're speaking with Jessica Fern, a psychotherapist, public speaker, and trauma and relationships expert. She's the author of the upcoming book, Polysecure: Attachment Trauma And Consensual Non-monogamy. Today we're going to be talking about attachment theory, one of our favorite things, but we're specifically going to be talking about how our attachment style can intersect with trauma and what this means for non-monogamous relationships and strategies for moving toward more secure attachments. Jessica, thank you so much for joining us today.
Jessica: Yes. Thank you for having me.
Dedeker: Yes. This is super exciting. Your book is going to be coming out in October and I've already told people like in our private patreon group that I'm super excited for this book to be out there. I know on this show we talk quite a bit about attachment theory. I do feel that what I've seen in non-monogamous communities, at least people who are savvy really like thinking about attachment theory. I guess the first thing that I want to pose to you in two minutes, let's say, could you summarize the entirety of attachment theory for our listeners who are not as familiar with the .
Jessica: All in one sentence it's, we need love.
Dedeker: True that.
Jessica: Yes. I think the brief broad stroke of attachment is that as human babies, our first survival strategy is emotionally bonding with the caretaker who will take care of us and be kind and be attuned to us. Depending on how responsive and attuned and available our caretaker is, we either develop a secure attachment to them or we have an insecure attachment.
If our parents are inconsistent or inaccessible or unresponsive or unreliable, a child's going to feel more insecure in their relationships with the parents. Then they're going to go on and feel more insecure within themselves and within the world. Those early attachment experiences are the blueprint that we then go on to replicate in our romantic relationships especially.
Dedeker: This theory has been developed from a lot of research based-- from my understanding, so please feel free to jump in and correct me. Really famous research about the "strange situation" we're a very small child is separated from their caregiver, like left alone in a room for a little while and then researchers are looking at how does the child respond when the caregiver comes back into the room? Is that correct, Jess?
Jessica: That is it. They're looking at both how the child responds when the-- it usually was a mother in this case. This was research starting in the sixties and seventies, but still continues. They've looked at how does the child respond in the room and then how does the child respond when left with a stranger and then what happens on reunion with the mother?
A child that is more securely attached, they're going to feel comfortable around their own parent and they're going to feel free to explore the room of toys. That's a big thing is that exploration comes online when we feel secure. Then when the parent leaves, they're going to actually feel distressed. That's a healthy thing, where is my parent? When they come back, they're going to feel really comforted and soothed by the parent.
That's what we would see in a secure attachment, but in the insecure strategies, a child who's classified or labeled as more avoidant is going to be less engaged with their parent. When their parent leaves, they don't show signs of stress and they don't even explore the room a lot. Then when the parent comes back, it's almost like they don't notice. What's really interesting about those kids though is they look calm and collected on the outside and internally, they're physiologically under stress.
They're actually not okay, but what has happened is they've deactivated their attachment system. Then one of the other classifications is more of a hyper activated attachment system, which is the anxious or preoccupied. The child's going to be more clingy to the parent even when they're in the room. When the parent leaves, they're going to feel a lot of distress and confusion and then when the parent comes back, they're usually then again, really clingy, but they're not soothed right away.
It's interesting. The parent coming back doesn't feel like enough because they're afraid the parent's going to leave. Initially, that was mostly what they saw and then years later, they reinterpreted and found that there was a third category of disorganized.
Emily: Yes, there was new to me, for sure. I don't know about the two of you, but yes.
Jessica: Yes, exactly. This is usually when there's been trauma and we can talk a little bit more about what it looks like in adulthood, but in this strange situation, you'd see where the child would want the parent and then maybe be aggressive towards the parent. Go towards them and then push away from them. Maybe even freeze and be very afraid when the parent was gone or when the parent came back even. You see a lot of signs of more severe physiological stress and also behavioral reactivity.
Dedeker: Something I want to clarify here is that I think that usually these kinds of attachment styles or behaviors that show up in children, at least most resources that I have read chalk it up to yes, there was probably a time where you were trying to get an attachment need met in a particular way and your caregiver responded in a particular way. Maybe in a healthy way, maybe in an unhealthy way or they consistently responded in an unhealthy way and that contributed to having potentially some maladaptive strategies for seeking that attachment. I appreciate that you do clarify in your book though, that this is not all about just laying all the blame on your parents fucking up, right?
Jessica: Exactly. Yes. That's where I came up with that nested theory of attachment and trauma, which in the book I look at, not just the parent child relationship, but how to
things like the home environment, the culture that we're in, the society that we're in, the global level issues that we're facing that can all impact attachment. For example, like one of the main predictors of disorganized attachment is the mother working too many hours outside of the house. That's a societal issue. That's usually an issue of poverty not necessarily her being just a bad mom. It's not about parent blaming.
Dedeker: Then just to connect the dots a little bit for our listeners, these behaviors that we see in children, like you said, then serve as a model for how we end up attaching to people as adults. Could you also go over and rough strokes just like, what this tends to look like?
Jessica: What that looks like? Yes. For the insecure styles, the avoidant is going to be someone who keeps people a bit more at arms length. They're not going to show as much vulnerability, they're going to pull away when they see their partners showing vulnerability, usually they're labeled as more like cerebral or intellectual. They're very confident in those realms too. They usually do really well in the work fields but they're people that are more of a lone wolf or Stan Tatkin uses the nautical metaphors of someone who's more of an Island.
It's not that they don't want relationships. There's a joke in the attachment world that the avoidant style wants to be in relationship and they want you in the house, but just in the other room.
Usually, they're very self-reliant, they really pride themselves on being so confident and not needing. They usually don't like when other people need things or if the word needy gets thrown around. They've deactivated their attachment system. Not because they actually don't have those attachment needs, but because they learned, I can't rely on the people around me so I only have myself to rely on and it might even be unsafe to rely on others. They have a lot of struggle with depending or even interdependence with their partners.
Emily: That was specifically what the disattached from a partner being called that avoidant?
Jessica: Yes, avoidant dismissive.
Emily: I know personally I'm more of what maybe the avoidant would call the clingy side. Can you get into that one? Then finally the secure and disorganized because yes, I read Stan Tatkin book and he never spoke about that. He only spoke of the other three. Yes, I'm interested to get into a little bit more of the disorganized as well.
Jessica: Great. The anxious preoccupied though has more anxiety and they're called the wave from Stan Tatkin's work where, the avoidant is more withdrawing and they are leaning in big time. Their system is hyper activated. They're super hyper-focused on their partner, what their partner is doing, isn't doing, do you love me, but maybe not enough. Oh, did we have-- Oh, we didn't have sex this time, when are we going to have sex next time? There's just a lot of focus outward. Then they tend to lose themselves in that and might not always know what do I feel? What do I need, but they're very sensitive.
This is one of their strengths is they're very sensitive into the subtleties of the relational dynamics and any small shift, but usually, even though they're sensitive to small shifts, they usually think it's personal to them. Oh, are you mad at me? When not necessarily the case. It might just be like, I'm just hungry. Usually, this person in a relationship gets labeled as being needy or what is, what do we call people when they're like, high clingy. Yes, exactly. Then the disorganized, it's called disorganized in childhood and it's called fearful avoidant in adulthood.
Jase: That one I've heard before. I've heard people fearful .
Jessica: Yes, exactly. The disorganized definition comes from there isn't a coherent organized strategy going on here in the same way that the avoidant or the preoccupied has. Most of the time, it vacillates between those two. What happens with this style is their attachment system to move towards people is really high but then so is the defense protective mechanisms. Diane Poole Heller, I love, she says they have this one foot on the gas and one foot on the brake at the same time.
That's exhausting. It can be exhausting to be that person. It can be exhausting to be in relationship too. In a more aggressive version of the fearful avoidant, they might really demand and criticize, this is what I need from you and then they get it and they then criticize that and push it away. In maybe not as much of aggressive, it can be someone who's just stuck in the freeze response a lot and has a lot of perfectionism going and like almost paralysis of just being in a lot of fear.
Jase: Fear of abandonment specifically then or fear of--
Jessica: This is a great question. The avoidant is going to have fear of engulfment. The anxious is going to have fear of abandonment and the fearful avoidant is going to struggle with both.
Jase: I haven't heard specifically that term engulfment used before, what do you mean by that?
Jessica: Oh, you're going to come in and take over me or I'm going to completely lose myself in the relationship if we get too close or too committed.
Dedeker: I like that term better then because I feel like avoidant dismissives are usually described as having a fear of commitment. I like distinguishing engulfment as a step beyond just commitment. It's like the really scary version of commitment so they need to be avoided.
Jessica: Exactly. I don't love the terms avoidant and dismissive. In the book, I make that distinction. In a healthy version it's just someone who's really advocating for their independence. That that's their primary value, whereas the other style, the other end of preoccupied is really looking for connection.
Emily: I appreciate you saying that. Wow. This person's super clingy and this person super avoidant. I do find myself personally to maybe be more clingy in some of those ways, but also I am attuned to people. I appreciated you saying that very much.
Dedeker: If we can talk about them, like the cherry on top of the attachment Sundae, which is the secure attachment, .
Jessica: Secure in its essence it would be like uncomfortable alone and uncomfortable in connection. It doesn't mean they don't have insecurities. I think that's a misconception is that they don't have any insecurities. Of course, they do. Someone who's securely functioning, when they have insecurities, instead of doing this attack or withdraw dance, they can bring them up to their partner and say, Hey, I'm feeling insecure and this is what I need from you. They're able to ask for what they need, they're comfortable with their own needs. They're able to usually communicate well with our partners about boundaries, requests, renegotiating things.
They usually want to meet the needs of their partner. They're not intimidated by their partners having needs and things like that. In non-monogamy what you see is when people are securely functioning, they have an easier time with managing all of the complexities, of all the conversations that need to happen, all the ways we have to become advocates for ourselves, all the ways we can no longer disregard our needs and feelings and be able to have difficult conversations. People who are securely functioning are better usually at compersion and they're usually better with their metamours. They're not taking everything personally or as an offense or as a disrespect.
Jase: When I think about that, so, okay. It's like most of the stuff out there written about attachment theory in relationships is very much focused on how it applies to monogamy, how it applies . This pretty conventional model of it. I think the thing that's interesting about non-monogamy is that if the whole model you've ever been given for what security even means in a romantic relationship, non-monogamy is suddenly pulling that out from under you like intentionally.
I can definitely say like I've seen it in other people and myself that there's suddenly that challenge of all those insecurities coming up and I could definitely see that exacerbating whatever sorts of attachment struggles or challenges you might have.
Jessica: Exactly because non-monogamy is more of an insecure relationship structure. It just doesn't have that secure structure that monogamy does in the same way.
Jase: At least that monogamy claims to have.
Jessica: Exactly, ostensibly.
Jase: What does this look like then in non-monogamy?
Jessica: What part of it?
Jase: I guess, how did those show up? In the research and the writing that you've done, what are some of the key differences that you've noticed between the way that it's written about in monogamous relationships and how it applies to non-monogamous relationships? What's left out? What are they missing?
Jessica: Yes. Great question. What I see that's really spoken about in the monogamous framework is they tell people to rely on the structure itself for their security. Then what I see is that doesn't really work and it doesn't actually really work in monogamy either. One of my emphasis is that don't depend on the structure. You might still have certain structures, but don't depend on that for secure attachment in your relationship, depend on the relational experience that you have. How are you treating each other? How are you showing up with each other? That's what matters.
I think that's what's left out a lot and the one or two things that do talk about non-monogamy and attachment really emphasize a very hierarchical one way to do non-monogamy that's just not going to work for everybody.
Dedeker: Yes. I appreciate in the book you go into this really long and really detailed list of just signs that you may be relying on your relationship structure for security rather than the relationship experience itself. Things like, yes, you live with a partner and share bills, but you don't feel cherished or appreciated, things like that, which I thought was really, really interesting because I know we definitely see, especially a lot of people who are newly opening up their relationship that yes, I think we really are encouraged to lean on that in a very traditional sense and a lot of people are left having to really redefine that.
Jessica: Yes, or they just try to replicate that in non-monogamy and maybe some of that works, but a lot of it then doesn't, so people are really left without a roadmap.
Emily: I'm interested in getting into perhaps some of the pitfalls that can occur when looking at attachment theory because I know a lot of people tend to grab on to like, well, okay, I'm anxious attached, you have to deal with it or something along those lines. We do have listeners that are a bit concerned about over identifying with an attachment style or blaming someone's attachment style for like why they are a certain way or something along those lines.
Can you talk a little bit about maybe some of the pitfalls in attachment theory and I did find it very interesting and I agreed with it hugely that you're not necessarily just one. You can be securely attached while also having a predisposition towards anxious attachment or something else.
Jessica: Yes, exactly. I think with any typology, whether it's your astrological shot sign or your Enneagram type or your Myers Briggs, we can get stuck into like, oh, I'm just a seven or I'm just a tourist and that's how it is. We're much more complex. As attachment, exactly, we're not just solidly one style, we can experience different styles with different, well, children experience it with different parents. They can be differently attached to their different parents.
We have different attachment styles with different partners, so that gets really exposed in non-monogamy in a way that can surprise people because they might have always been more of one style and then they open up and they're seeing themselves expressed differently and they don't know what to do. Even in the same relationship over time our styles can change. I think even though it usually is presented as this typology, most people don't feel that way. They're like, oh yes, sometimes I'm a little anxious and then some more of the times I tend to be withdrawn, but we know there's more nuance.
Dedeker: Yes, we collected some listener questions before this episode and we got, oh my gosh, so much response on this thread. So many people had questions, but I will say a huge bulk of those questions was some variation of I feel different attachment styles with different partners, is that weird? Is that normal? Or some variation of I've found that I go back and forth all the time, is that weird? Is that normal? It was really interesting to see that-- It sounds like, yes, that's very much normal.
Jessica: Yes. It's what I see. So yes. I think it is very common and there's nothing wrong with people for that. You're responding to the attachment style of the person and that's going to vary as well. The different partners are going to bring out different reactive patterns in us. Even not to see this like as a dysfunction or a pathology, these styles came out of a survival necessity. They're actually quite wise, but yet we don't want to stay stuck in them and we do need to grow and evolve beyond the style itself. I wouldn't use our style as an excuse because it can't forever be an excuse.
Jase: Sure. That's actually something else that I was curious about is that, a lot of this is based on research with children and how we develop attachment styles is how changeable is this over our lives? Is it just maybe you happen to be someone who vacillates between a couple of different ones, but you're stuck with it and you just got to learn to deal with it the best or is it changed based on your experiences and your relationships and things like that?
Jessica: Yes. It absolutely can change. That as the good news is that if you have experienced any of the insecure attachment styles, you can jump between them depending on-- I think there was a study that showed in adults that even every four years their attachment style changed. Of course, this was with a monogamous population. I had wondered how much of that is because they changed partners, relationships, maybe for two or three, four years.
Yes, our attachment styles can change, but the good news is that we can go from an insecure style to an earned secure, is what it's called, but it usually doesn't happen on its own. It takes the intentional work of healing our attachment wounds, working through our painful past, and then looking at the behaviors and beliefs that we're continuing to participate in as an adult that we do need to change.
Dedeker: I also wanted to ask, of course, you go into those a little bit more in detail in the book, but how does trauma intersect with attachment theory? We did get a specific listener question, which I thought was interesting. This person asked are attachment styles just dysfunctional trauma responses?
Jessica: It's a great question and I think it's hard to tease them apart honestly, that yes, our attachment styles have come from trauma, whether you call it a capital T trauma or like a lower case trauma. The biological, emotional, psychological needs of that responsiveness, availability and attunement weren't happening. It's not just over neglect, over abuse, but those would be the traumas as well. Yes. These are adaptations from trauma. Absolutely. Oh, go on.
Jase: I was just going to ask what are things that would fall under that category of the lowercase T trauma?
Jessica: I call it the invisible trauma of the middle class where I've seen a lot in some of my clients. You're all like, oh shit. It usually is White folks, but not always, but it's
middle-class White kids who had all of their material needs met for them, but that sense of being seen and that warmth, the emotional connection wasn't there and yet they had everything materially so how could they complain? You're taught, well, people had it worse than you.
That could be one of those. Like it's not even noticed societally as a trauma, but just being in a home where you're over-scheduled all the time and it's always about extracurricular activities or achievement and grades and looks versus like, oh, I love you for who you are. Yes. That could be some of it. It could just be parents even who were loving but didn't have money, so they're working too much and they just weren't around. Again, someone's like, oh, but my parents did love me or my parents are still together. Like there was never something big and obvious.
Emily: Maybe one absent parent versus one that is there. I've heard you say mom a lot. I guess I'm curious, like what if you have one that's there and one that is not can not exist and it makes something happen to a kid, I guess. I'm curious.
Jessica: Yes. I even think of like my own history here. I had a single mom who was married several times and then I had my dad who was a drug addict and an alcoholic. There's my attachment with him that was pretty severely severed. Then he got married so there was an attachment to his wife that was pretty complicated. I had a stepfather who was my secure attachment and it was like, thank goodness for the stepfather who really became what me to be resilient. Yes, we can have this multitude of-- especially now with blended families and the integration of steps families that can either help attachment or it can hinder.
Emily: Because it's different attachments to each of these different people in your life. Like, yes, I grew up with a single mom and my grandmother and my father was never around, so exactly. That kind of thing and I had different attachments with each of those people in my life. Yes. That makes sense.
Dedeker: That is really interesting. In my own personal therapy work as an-- on the receiving end of therapy, that goodness, it's been really interesting to actually really expand my scope of thinking about the places that I did have secure attachment as a child because gain, I do think that so many of the resources really just limit it to this traditional two-parent model, mom and dad, and that's all we can think about.
When I actually thought about it, I was like, oh wait, I actually had this super secure attachment to my grandparents. They were there all the time and they lived next door and they actually created this really wonderful model I think for me that helped me in like my more secure attachments as an adult. I think, yes, there really is something to be said about expanding the way we think about these things.
Jessica: Exactly. Sometimes it's teachers or a coach or someone like that that just showed some interest in us. That can be a way to go, oh yes. That person showed me something different.
Jase: What about things later in life then like a divorce or maybe another lowercase T trauma?
Jessica: Exactly. Well, we don't talk about these things, but they absolutely are attachment ruptures or attachment traumas and it could be a divorce, a breakup, it could be a child leaving for college, it could be the death of your best friend. All of these things definitely can create attachment ruptures. As an adult, I went through, I think it was within a two year period, I had four major losses and then I was disorganized for a year.
Thankfully, I knew like, oh, I know why this is happening, but my nervous system's pretty fried right now from all of these losses and they weren't all deaths. It was almost harder to deal with the like ghosting loss. I've seen a lot of folks in non-monogamy have to deal with that. Yes. We can even feel secure, but then go through traumas, whether it's relational or a hurricane or a pandemic that then create these wobbly attachment experiences after.
Jase: Wow. We want to go on to talk about specifically ways of finding good partners as well as ways that you can work to improve your own, like the amount of security that you feel in your attachments as well as questions that we've gotten from our listeners specifically for you. First, we want to take a quick moment to talk to our listeners about how you can support this show, help keep this content coming, help keep this show growing and making this podcast available to everyone out there for free.
Emily: One attachment book that I've read was Stan Tatkin's book. What was it called? Wired for Love.
Dedeker: That's not the disattached one? Who wrote Detached?
Emily: Two people wrote Detached. Wired for Love was Stan Tatkin. If I am correct on that, I believe I am, but yes, he talks a lot about just like, well find a partner that's secure and then you will become secure. A lot of attachment resources out there do that. One of the many things that I loved about your book was you talk so much about the internal and healing from within rather than just like finding another person to fix you. We do have people out there who asked us, how is it that you do find a securely attached person?
Jessica: Yes. How do you find a securely attached person? This used to be a dropdown menu on dating apps and a filter preference. There is some truths that yes, if you're dealing with an insecure style and trying to work through it, being with a partner who can show up in more secure ways is going to help. Absolutely.
Yet what I've also seen is that when two people or multiple people are intentional about this, like they might say, hey, we're both dealing with an anxious style so how can we start to show up together in more secure ways? And they can work on it together. It's not like you all have to be done and secured and figured out kind of thing. I think there does have to be an awareness of this and an intentional let's do something different and work through this together. Does that get to the question?
Jase: Yes. Could we go into that a little bit more. What recommendations do you have then for that scenario where it's like, we realize that this is going on or maybe even just by yourself, you realize, gosh, I'm having a really hard time dating because I'm so insecure. I just like cling on to them so hard and everyone runs away screaming or I'm so avoidant that it's like, cool, let's go out whatever. I don't care.
Jessica: Not making that emotional connections. Yes, exactly.
Jase: What do we do besides just resign ourselves to a life with our cats.
Jessica: Yes. Well, in the book I come up with the acronym I call hearts, which is here are some of the things to do in relationship and then also solo that people can work on. It would it be helpful to just name what those are?
Dedeker: Yes, definitely.
Jessica: Okay. Well, and even before that, I'll say I don't want to underestimate just the awareness. The awareness isn't sufficient, but it is a big step. Just knowing like, oh, I'm struggling with attachment insecurity, whichever style it is, and the desire to heal through it and wanting to do things differently. Just that alone I think is really important. Awareness and the desire to change.
The things that I came up with are first, it's about being here, being present. Being present with our partners and really defining together what does that look like? What does that mean? What it means to be present with oneself, which is often missed, but we can't be in relationship to ourself or with another, if we're not fully present and not just physically in the room.
Then the next thing is expressed delight. I actually love this because this is not talked about widely in the common attachment literature. Express delight is that just feeling or the oozing that comes from one person to another, that's just like, I'm so happy you exist. I'm so grateful that you're alive and that we get to share time together. It's that real felt sense of just, I delight in your being so to speak, not just what you do for me and how you make my life better, but just in you. That needs to be cultivated in partnership, but then also for ourselves.
The next thing is attunement. This is whether monogamous or non-monogamous, I see most couples need to learn about how do I attune first to myself and know what it means to really be present with my internal landscape? Then how do I tune into my partner and just be curious? How are you? Where are you? What's going on?
Then rituals and routines. That's one of the next things that people can work on. Especially with when healing attachment, I see that it's almost like a cast is needed for awhile. Like when there's been a broken bone, you don't wear a cast forever but you do need it for awhile. That can be what some people really benefit from having, yes, I do need our standing date. I do need to have our little routines and rituals, both profound and mundane to feel the relevance of this bond, so to speak.
Dedeker: Wow. Yes. That broken bone metaphor makes a lot of sense.
Jessica: Yes or scaffolding, that may be another metaphor to use. Like when we're building a new structure together, there is that scaffolding that goes on the outside for awhile but then it doesn't stay. Especially if two or a few people are healing their attachment together.
Then the next is turning towards after conflict. Really about rupture and repair. There's a phrase in the attachment world and even couples therapy that like rupture is inevitable. Some people get really hung up on we should have never even had ruptures or a good relationship is oh, we never fight. It's like, not really, but when there's miscommunications or disagreements, how do you repair with each other? Really knowing what repair work means. I think the biggest thing, this is one of the biggest things I'm seeing with healing individual attachment is how do I repair with myself when I fall short of my standards.
Dedeker: Wow.
Jessica: That inner critic work. I have something I'll be coming out with soon which I'm calling the shame triangle, which is how do I work with the inner critic, the shame and then escape or the part that wants to not have to deal with any of that? When there's been trauma or attachment wounds, I haven't yet seen anyone who doesn't then experience some form of harsh inner critic, a lot of shame and then all the ways we try to escape.
Dedeker: Let me just say, first of all, this heart's acronym when I read it in the book, I messaged Emily and Jase to be like, "Oh, my God. She made an acronym. She really is a multiamoror. It is amazing."
Jase: Multiamoror acronyms, yes.
Dedeker: I will say, I just really appreciate-- we also got a lot of listeners expressing frustration that so many of the attachment resources out there are like, yes, you should aim for secure attachment. Just work on it. You will get there. Just try to grow in that direction, you'll be fine. It feels like very few resources lay it out in this way of like, here's some very clear actionable things that you can do or some questions that you can ask or conversations you can have to help mend this.
Jessica: Yes, that was my frustration too for years of just being like, how do I do this? . And where's the questions or the conversations to have. Of course, hearts may not be perfect, but it's a start. Yes, so far I've said the heart, and then the S. The hearts is secure attachment with self, which is really where you're applying the heart to yourself. This is key I think in general. If you're going to be embarking on non-monogamy, there really needs to be more of a secure attachment with self to be able to navigate that all the complexity and the uncertainty that happens from this more insecure relationship structure.
Dedeker: Yes, definitely. Feels like it's really crucial. Closer to the end here, I want to talk about some listener questions that we've gotten and we sprinkled those in a little bit throughout. I tried to group some recurring themes together and paraphrase a little bit. For those of you listening, I'm not necessary reading anybody's question verbatim, but tried to condense from your many, many, many questions and comments, so that we can ask them in an efficient way.
I wanted to ask about-- We got some questions about helpful tips specifically for avoidant attached people and being in relationship with avoidant attached people because a lot of the resources out there basically say, yes, I don't date those guys.
Jessica: Just don't deal with them.
Dedeker: Just don't even. You see them coming, go the other way and treat them like the bad guys. Of course, being more avoidantly inclined myself, I have some ire about that. I was wondering what your thoughts were on that?
Jessica: There's two question there, tips to how to be in relationship with someone who's more avoidant and then how to date if you're more avoidant?
Dedeker: Yes.
Jessica: I think if you're dating someone who's more avoidant, give them space, but invite them in. It's interesting actually. I think the avoidant has an outer crust and a very soft inner shell .
Dedeker: Delicious.
Jessica: Yes, right. . Usually, actually feels more vulnerable. They really need a certain kind of safety to feel safe coming forward with their vulnerability, and so they often need the prompts like, "Hey, can you open the door to yourself a little bit?" Even having a discussion with them of when are better times? If you ask an avoidant about something more personal when they're on their computer, it's not going to work very well. They need time to transition from one task to the other. Sometimes more of an avoidant partner making time where you're going for a walk or really getting to sit down together or be on a video call together, and inviting them in can be helpful.
Also, being realistic in expectations because what happens with avoidant is that they didn't have the developmental experience of, oh, I can tune into myself and articulate what's going on. They need time and support with that process. It's not just a behavioral change that one day they can do. It's actually something they need to develop. Then if you happen to be more avoidant-- first, as I talk about in the book, there's a lot of things about what avoidants can do to shift. I don't want to just say avoidant. I feel like we've all been throwing that around, like people with that style. . People with that proclivity or who are functioning from the avoidant style.
A lot of it is about entering the body and waking up the body and being embodied sometimes for the first time and starting to tune into themselves more. Actually, intentionally connecting with their attachment needs and drives. You don't actually want to be alone all the time. Allowing those desires to come back alive, which can be a difficult process because then you can feel all the grief too.
Dedeker: I will say that I feel a little bit more comfortable looking at myself as a really delicious loaf of sour dough bread than just this hard hard motherfucker that can't get close to anybody. Our next listener question here, is it possible to feel secure attachment if there's only one point of secure attachment? For example, I feel securely attach with one partner but not another or secure attachment is with people who are not my romantic partners. My friends, my family, my therapist, stuff like that.
Jessica: Absolutely. Yes. Very few of us have secure attachment across the board with everyone in our life. It could be one of several partners that you do feel very secure in and to even go back to that earlier question, use that secure relationship then as a model of like, what's going well here that I can then look for in other relationships or advocate for in my relationships that don't feel as secure.
Jase: How about this. When can you just blame your partner for their attachment problems being all the issues and nothing--
Emily: Obviously, we can't do that.
Jessica: There have been times when I say to one person like, "This really is not you right now." This really is a partner who-- and it's usually someone who's-- It happens in all of them, but I'll just say for a moment someone who's really not able to manage their anxious preoccupied attachment. They're really starting to control their partner or have unrealistic expectations. That it's not the other partner and the other partner might be like, I'm communicating clearly, I'm giving a heads-up, I'm following our agreement.
Partner just keeps losing their shit. There are times where you have to be like, "You need help with this." There's no more that I can do to reassure . There comes a time there's no more reassurance someone can give.
Dedeker: Yes, and that's so hard to make that call sometimes. I think we do see it a lot that there can be times where you do everything right and you follow all the rules and you put in your utmost. Then, that only goes so far sometimes.
Jessica: Yes, exactly. It really was a wake up call for me. I was asking for more reassurance from one of my partners and he said, "I'll give it to you maybe, but you got to take it in." Calls it out, and I was like, "Yes, you're right." I’m great like, "Thank you, you're going to give it, but I haven't been doing my work of really receiving it and believing it."
Emily: I can relate too. This was a really good book for me to read and I want to read it again because there were a lot of juicy nuggets in there. I can't wait for all of you out there dear listeners to read it as well. Besides this book, what is coming up for you next and where can our listeners find out more about you?
Jessica: Yes. They can go to my website, Jessicafern.com, that's the easiest way. In addition to the book, so in the New Year, I am going to be launching a secure attachment with self program. It'll be an online program that will have a combination of videos, guided practices, meditations to do and then live teachings with me and one of my partners. It's going to be probably five or six months long, so it really is a commitment.
I put a lot of thought into this because I was like, six weeks, just whatever, or 90 days. I was like, "No." If we're really going to heal our attachment, it takes six months to three years, honestly. The program is really wanting to support people in diving into healing their attachment and being secure within themselves, which will inevitably then change their relationships.
Emily: That's wonderful.
Jase: That sounds great.
Dedeker: Yes, super exciting.
Jessica: Yes, I'm excited about it.
Jase: Great, so we're at the end of our episode for today but we are going to join Jessica for a bonus episode where we're going to talk some more about examples of how attachment crises actually show up or what they look like in non-monogamous relationships, as well as just what the different styles look like, maybe how you can identify them in yourself or others. For our patreons, if you want to join us in that bonus episode, we will see you after this.