Podcast 280: Trauma bonding, toxic emotional attachment + how to find healing & freedom

hi I'm Dr Caroline leaf and welcome to my podcast cleaning up your mental mess in today's podcast I continue the series of answering questions from people you've seen some amazing questions and once again what I do is I go through all the questions with my team we group the questions together we find a common theme and then we pick one of the questions that kind of represents the whole concept and then that's what I'm going to use as the basis of answering my question so today specifically we're going to talk about trauma bonds the concept of former bonds and I'm going to explain what they are how they work how they work in the brain and related back to the question but before we begin I just want to remind you that these podcasts are for educational purposes they are not medical advice and if you have any needs for medical psychological therapeutic mental health advice you need to contact your most appropriate professional so this is mental health education thank you so much for joining me and today we are going to be talking as I said about trauma bonds so let's dive straight in and I'm going to start by defining them and the leading expert who actually coined the term trauma bonds is Patrick Dr Patrick cons and he has an incredible book and we will put the link to his book in the show notes as well as in the blog that goes along with us so if you haven't yet subscribed to my email list.addoctorleaf.com I suggest you do I really recommend it because we always do a Blog that's associated with the podcast and then also this is all recorded on YouTube so if you're listening on any of the audio platforms you can can also see me and use using all my props and things to explain this on my YouTube channel so you send can subscribe there for more information okay so let's begin so what Patrick Conn says I'm going to read a couple of his his quotes and statements and he describes trauma Bonds in this way exploits of relationships can create trauma bonds so the first thing I want to point out there is exploitive relationships so those are relationships that are not constantially for the good of both people someone is being exploited in the relationship so exploitative relationships can create trauma bonds and these are like chains that link a victim to someone who is potentially harmful to their mental health or dangerous to them now as we go through this discussion today I'm going to be bringing the brain science and the mind brain integration science behind what this looks like in the brain and the body and the mind in terms of helping to understand why they happen and then give some suggestion suggestions for how to manage the situation okay so continuing with Dr Paul Khan's description divorce employee relations litigation of any type incest and child abuse family and marital systems domestic violence hostage negotiations kidnapping professional exploitation and religious abuse are all areas of trauma bonding so I don't cover every single one of those areas in this podcast and this is why I'm going to refer you to a few different resources where you can go and dive deeper the purpose of this podcast is of an educational nature as I mentioned to help you understand the basic concept from a and more neurological Neuroscience mind brain integration perspective and then also to answer a person's questions so that I can put it into context for you and to to bring that side of the concept to help us understand so Dr bucon goes on to say that all these relationships share one thing and that is they are situations of incredible intensity so there's a lot of high intensity and we'll discuss what that looks like in the brain and the body and why it has such an impact so in the these these situations are are of incredible intensity or importance where there is an exploitation of trust or power so I'm gonna read that again all former bonds all these relationships in these different areas share one thing and that is they are situations of incredible intensity or importance or both where there is an exploitation of trust or power and it may be kind of subtle because of the confusion of the trauma Bond because it's very often if it's in a relationship between two people there's a lot of sort of periods where a person's natural white for love mode comes out and so these periods of of nice times in the relationship which is very confusing but we will discuss that so the letter that I'm going to read is from someone who's Anonymous and who's chosen to stay Anonymous and I want to I'm honor that and I want to thank them for their letter and I know they'll know who they are but I know so many people are going to benefit from this because as I said we've collectively looked at a lot of different questions from from the emails that you guys have sent in find all the ones that related to this kind of former bonding concept and taking one that's sort of a general representation so I'm going to start reading you the letter hi DR leaf first of all I wanted to say that wow I'm so amazed by your work so thank you that's so nice I appreciate that getting that feedback once I was watching your two hour podcast on how to heal yourself with your mind I experienced Goosebumps continuously that's beautiful thank you you just put everything into words what I have experience with my own healing which was always so hard to explain to others well if that's what I can help to do that is fantastic because it's not easy going through mental health challenges it's not easy being a human let's face it there's so much hard stuff to deal with in so many difficult things to deal with okay so now we have a question her questions today she goes on to say my question would be about toxic people and relationships and she goes on to describe and I'm just going to kind of abbreviate it she says I have a boyfriend that was heavily using alcohol prescribed pills and all kinds of drugs for six years four years ago I went away from him because of this reason last year he came back to me promising that he is in a good place stop parting lives a normal life that's what he said but I saw that he was still in a very dark place when we start started almost living together I saw him basically unconsciously killing himself with alcohol smoking amphetamines and so on and it was the scariest experience in my life I was trying I saw how he had disconnected from everybody even from himself little by little I was trying to help him to understand what he was doing to himself but he was rejecting any information that was connected to this topic so basically when she brought it up it was he was rejecting it so she would try and point out to him what he was doing and the impact it was having on himself and others and that he was rejecting her giving that information but after every month he seemed to be getting better and started drinking a bit less but she didn't know what he was hiding from her and he said I knew he was trying to do this for me and there's a key thing over there you can't do something for someone if you're trying to heal yourself you have to do it for yourself first and then for someone okay so it's it's great to have the goal of wanting to you know to to get better for someone that you love and that's a really good goal but you have to want to do it for yourself first and then for others because you have to get yourself right first it's about you in the world so you've got to get be working on you so that you can be in the world and contributing but one day he almost died and got very sick after that I wrote him a letter telling him all the truth about him so she tried to explain all the things that were going on from the way she sought from her perspective to help him to try and get perspective so after that he decided to lead me because he understood that he was hurting me and so he could try and fix it so he left her for a good reason she he read the letter saw what was going on saw the impact on her made the decision to leave independently to go and work on himself and for her to be able to heal and that he could sort of sort himself out then after three months he came back I can see the cloud is gone from his mind he's like a new person so there's been changed there's been healing we are trying to be together again but and here's the big but I can see that all toxic traits are still there emotional manipulation gas lighting emotional instability Etc but now I can see the patterns and understand where everything comes from and I think deal with this in a healthy way for myself and him that he would heal his child's wounds so he's now back and there is two things happening on the one hand she sees this big Improvement that he's a different person but she sees this still certain very very worn a very strong warning signs in the relationship things like emotional manipulation gaslighting emotional instability and that's all going to be mean that that's coming at her so that's toxic to her so his own toxicity which is not being processed is being transmitted through the gaslighting through the emotional instability through the emotional manipulation these are very strong key words that are showing that there is maybe a process of healing taking place because she said she can see a difference and he's come back after the three months so he's gone and done some work but there's still a lot going on and those are warning signals that emotional manipulation that emotional instability that those narcissistic type Tendencies are gaslighting those things are warning signals that there's still quite a lot going on underneath that is still pushed down and not processed but the the his girlfriend the person who wrote the letter is is a safe space for him but it's not really a safe space for her anymore because if you're not dealing with your stuff that goes for All Humans if we don't deal with our stuff whatever we push down you've heard me say this often before is damaging to the brain the body and the mind and whatever is pushed down is going to go into the souls of the body it's also it's already in the brain and it's also in the mind and you're going to transmit as toxic Behavior patterns like emotional manipulation and gaslighting Etc there's so many different things but I'm just going on the specifics of this particular letter so whatever we don't deal with we transmit and if you're transmitting onto others and trying to put the onus on the other person to fix me that's never going to work and the fact that there's still such strong warning signals being transmitted from the boyfriend is a very big red light that something is still not right at all okay so but I believe that the the girlfriend goes on to say but I believe with every day every month every year he'll get better and that's an incredibly important thing that this girlfriend is believing you see deep down inside we are wired for love our neurobiology our brain and our body are wired for love which means that we don't have structures in our brain and our body for all the traumas and things that we experience and very often someone who is showing these addictive type behaviors will not very often the reason people are transmitting these The Addictive behaviors and these all these different warning signals is because they have their own traumas too that they're dealing with and as she already said in the letter I read earlier on he managed to identify that a lot of this is coming from serious childhood trauma so undealt with serious childhood trauma that is suppressed and not managed can translate into these addictive patterns because addiction is not that the substance controls you it's at the trauma controls you and you're using the substance to numb the pain because it's so hard to look at that stop and she in a way the girlfriend in a way has become someone that he obviously does love but someone that is also almost like an addiction because she helps to also numb the pain to a certain extent but then the frustration that he's experiencing with his own former that isn't dealt with is being transmitted onto her so it's a toxic relationship and it's a trauma Bond because there is there is periods of of love and and intense happiness that they have between them and and periods where they really believe this progress and where they talk about the childhood healing and so these periods of progress but in between there's these other periods so while the boyfriend's still trying to sort out this get the toxic Guma of childhood process so that is not transmitting and harming the girlfriend she's in a state where she is actually in a traumatic State herself and she's being traumatized by his way that he is managing his trauma so now there is two traumas and you have to both look after both of them have to look after themselves levels and being together may not be the best solution because the cycle is is continuing it's become a pattern of the problem leave come back the problem continues and so on so she she sees that every day she believes that something will change and that's true you we want people that love us and care for us to Believe in Us and to believe that you can do it and to tell someone hey I believe in you I love you I believe you can do this at the same time putting up the boundary of saying I really believe you can do this but you can do this I can support you I've supported you to this point but from this point on until you can learn how to manage that childhood trauma through going for therapy Etc you are transmitting your pain onto me and it's toxic for our relationship and that's the sort of conversation that may need to be had with that's a boundary I care for you I love you I believe in your healing but I have to put up a boundary because your battle is now becoming is now affecting my ability to function and is affecting creating trauma in me so so that desire to love is good the pouring on of love will increase the person's resilience but staying in that relationship may not actually facilitate because it's like it's it's like you are numbing the pain and then that boyfriend's potentially not I'm not saying this for sure because I don't know them intimately I haven't spoken to them I'm just going on a little bit this brief information in this letter but the situation potentially shows itself as one where the boyfriend is while she is there it's he's that he's transmitting his pain as I've said unto her but she's a form of numbing like the alcohol so until he recognizes that all the substances and alcohol and the way he treats the girlfriend is part of the signals of his trauma unmanaged until he recognizes that it's going to continue so he has to recognize I'm doing that which he's done once which is why he left and sort of doing the work so there needs to be another period where he goes and now works on that stuff so that he doesn't transmit that on to his goal okay he doesn't want to go to therapy so now that's another key thing because if you're going to be healed if you're going to work through healing especially when these major childhood trauma that is resulting in such extreme patterns of behavior which this boyfriend is demonstrating that needs therapeutic intervention and you've heard me talk often about the importance of therapy and going to therapy and dealing with stuff and having a support system counseling coaching therapy whatever it is and then you've also heard me talk about constantly about managing our mental mess through mind management and you've heard me talk about the strategies which I write about in my work my most recent book cleaning up your mental Miss has my most updated version of the system called the neurocycle that you can fit all the other kind of therapeutic techniques like CBT and act and psychodynamic Theory and that kind of thing into the system because the neural cycle is basically a system for how you get your mind under control to manage your mind because you're living with your mind all the time so it doesn't replace therapy but you need a mind management technique to help you process and get through the day and to to help you in your growth process so that it enhances therapy so therapy becomes a place where you can really make sense of what's going on and then you have the Mind management technique in between to help you then grow in those spaces and to be able to live with yourself and to be able to keep on self-regulating mind management is basically getting the messy mind that's battling with the former in this case in the boyfriend's case and manifesting in these behaviors and the messy mind that we all have we all have messy mind this is what we all have it's a great thing it helps us experiment but there may seem it helps us process life but the messy mind needs to connect with the wise mind in order for them I mean the two are working together messy mind and wise mind which is our instinctive wisdom which is I know what I should be doing kind of thing that all needs to be stronger and the relationship between the two they you kind of missing what we don't want is messy mind working alone and only intermittently doing on wise mind and we don't and we not only ever operate in Wise mind because we're alive and and messy mind is experimental part of us so what we wanted to do is to get the relationship between the two balanced where we are listening to the mind to the wise mind like the pilot of a plane and a co-pilots the pilots flying the plane so you need the pilot but you need the co-pilot to give you the direction seeing into the into what's coming up what's behind what we should be doing the big picture perspective the wisdom and that can get very blocked this wisdom the wise might can get very very blocked by high emotional intense situations which is what I read outright in the beginning and I'll quickly just read it to you again what Dr Paul Khan so beautifully explains is that the common underlying situation that is shared amongst all the different ways can occur is incredible intensity in in the situation and and that that intensity of being in love is intense but the intensity of someone having an addiction and seeing them is very intense so this trauma as I said developing the goal and and then the tomb of seeing someone you love going downhill and then seeing them coming back and then they said hi and that low and then trying to talk to them and helping them and not seeing not knowing what to do anymore because they keep saying they're going to try and work on this stuff but then they're rejecting hey go for therapy here's a book read this you know that's that's what we can what we can only do when when you love and support someone I'm here for you I'll listen to you I'll I love you and here's some resources but I can't fix you and that's something that in a trauma bond with a high intense High intense nature of the trauma Bond very often the the other person who is the in this case the girlfriend who is trying to help the boyfriend get through this intense trauma very often that trauma is it's very confusing and very often there's the sense of a failed and shame and guilt I must love him I must support them I must do more so that leads to a lot of guilt and shame internally in the person trying to help that person because there's a thing of I I've got I've done so much uh you know this is like high intensity inside of the person who loves that person who sees that the person you love destroying yourself you want to go in there and fix it and and you say try this try that try that and that can be very frustrating and then you feel guilty because you feel frustrated or you feel irritated or you feel like exhausted or you feel drained and burnt out and you can feel now you're you are becoming traumatized there's a secondary torment you from what is going on in the situation that you're in so it's very very high in tense so this particular letter is talking about former Bonds in a relationship that is going wrong but as I mentioned already from what I read from Dr Paul Connie's book these retoma bonds can form in multiple situations so divorce employee relationship relations litigation of any type incest child abuse family and marital systems domestic violence hostage negotiations kidnapping professional exploitation and religious abuse those are all areas of formal bonding so I'm not discussing all the closed captioning not available okay so he does not want to go to therapy has issues with trusting people which is obviously coming from and very understandably from the trauma in his child that I have no idea what that trauma is but if there's a trust issue these attachment issues there's all kinds of things which is even more reason why you need to maybe try multiple therapists because you may not the first therapist may not be the best one for you so it's now she says but this is getting extremely difficult for me so she's starting to find this extremely difficult for her to be able to watch the situation as I've described and she says sometimes I even think of think of I think myself think to myself what is wrong with me why am I still that I am still doing this so now she's questioning her herself what's wrong with me why can't I fix him meanwhile this is not actually your problem it's your problem it's not your problem you love the person you care for them you want to help them but this is that person's problem that person's trauma and what you can only do is play support draw you can't get in that person's head and make them change they have to get to the point where they want to change and that intense love and and seeing what's going on and trying to help can lead to this tremendous this this reflection back where she thinks I'm failing I'm I've failed I'm wrong I've done something wrong here what's wrong with me and that's where potentially that's not potentially this is so important that the girlfriend now that goes for therapy goes to coach and goes to counseling talks to someone expresses it so well done for sending this letter and I encourage you that there's nothing wrong with you what you are doing is you're trying to understand what's going on and why your boyfriend won't respond and you're trying to help and you can see what's wrong and you know where it's coming from and you know it needs to go for therapy but you can't make anyone do anything so there's nothing wrong with you you've done everything in your wired for love nature you've reached out and done this you've provided the correct support and now you have to look after yourself because you've gone to say he's he's almost like a project for me head find the ways on how to help and heal him now that is very very informative the way when you say find the ways how to help and heal him so you can't heal him you can help him and you've done that you've been there you've supported you've pointed out the situation you've acknowledged the trauma he's probably spoken through with you to a certain extent I don't know those details but you've offered you know you suggest therapy you've suggested maybe resources you've helped to show the link you said all of that in your letter so you've done a lot so there's nothing wrong with you you've done the support that you can do so you but you've got to get to the point where you recognize you can't fix them you know when we love someone and we see them in pain we want to fix them you know I'm a mother of four and within it whenever any of my kids are in pain I want to fix them I want to heal them and same with my husband I want to heal him fix him if something is going wrong but we can't we can only love and support and love and support looks different all the time so your 11 support in this particular case maybe you need to move away from the situation so that he he doesn't use use of crutch and that he actually recognizes that he has to really get to owning this in this this trauma and owning taking responsibility for dealing with the feelings of of lack of empowerment and control and trusted in his life in the meantime you have to look after yourself by hearing your secondary trauma and not and not getting into shame and condemnation because you haven't done anything wrong okay so she finds it very hard to leave him because and the next statement is very informative because she says and I can't leave because of the happy moments and that's a key indication that this is a trauma Bond because the happy moments are keeping you tied in so there's the bed and there's the happy and there's the bad and there's the happy and there's the bad and there's the happy and that happy is even in the happy moment you think I can't you know why why am I doing this and I can tell you I had two instances in my life where I got into a trauma-born type situation when I was just in my fourth year at Universe in my first degree and I met someone who was like really had a lot of issues as well and long story short is that we got internet interrelationship and even to the point where we were speaking marriage and it was very quick and all the emotional instability I was just so thrown by everything it was it was very very toxic I was very young he was much older than me I was very taught it was very toxic in that I was being very emotionally manipulated and I remember the in the happy moments thinking well this is wonderful but deep down inside my when you say that deep down inside I know that's all wise mine my wise mind was sending me signals without feeling on edge and uneasy and I can fix him and you know that's why I recognize a lot of these statements I can fix him I can heal him I can see where this is coming from and I can help him and but I had to realize one day that I can't and it did take my family telling me that listen if you decide to marry him you're not going to support this decision because this man is not good for you and that was really hard to hear I had to kind of Crash to be able to recognize listen there's nothing wrong with me I've got to I mean this if you've all got things wrong with this but there's not something wrong with me inherently I'm not a bad person but this is not a healthy relationship I need to pull away and heal and get myself in the right place and this person needs to heal and we separated our ways I left I ended the relationship and it was very hard and for a while I felt guilt and shame thinking oh I didn't try hard enough and that kind of thing so we need to you know we can be very hard on ourselves and and that you know that I had to work through that and process through that under a lot of neuro cycling wasn't called the neurocycle back then but a lot of it had some had incredible support of family that I could talk to and friends that I could talk to to process and understand what was going on and to get to a place of healing from that relationship okay so now this lady goes on to ask my question she says is it possible to fix toxic relationship patterns when one of the partners are aware of what's Happening trying to find the way out and the other is slowly unconsciously following okay this is a very interesting statement it's always possible to fix anything first part is it possible to fix toxic relationships but both of you have to be involved in the fixing process both of you have to own your own stuff and be working through your own stuff you can't be trying to expect the other person to fix you and you fix the other person so it's always possible to fix but you have to be working on yourself and you have to look at all the circumstances and the circumstance that has been described in your letter is one of a form of one this hind team state that has these highs and lows and has created a situation a pattern that is toxic with you understand what's going on you've got a very clear perspective of what's going on in your boyfriend's life but he doesn't really have it because you say he's unconsciously following along but is he really because yes he's going for periods where he's healing and these periods where you have such happy times but then he falls back into the pattern so it may be that you need to create some distance between the two of you in some way I don't know what that looks like you really do need to get counseling and therapy maybe group couples therapy individual therapy to work out the details of what creating distance between the two of you looks like well you both work on your own issues okay one more thing if one person is wanting to change and the other not it's not going to work then you have the one who's wanting to change or heal has to move out of the situation till the other one realizes they have to do the work you can't get in that boyfriend's head and do the work for him and then she says and does the toxic Behavior change with time treat it with love understanding yes to that over time but you may not be the person who needs to directly impose that so or put that low now you can still love that person but in that space that I'm talking about that needs to be created that's more healthy for you and for him and obviously any therapist who works with him any support systems that he goes into group therapy peer groups family support system obviously the more love when someone's in trauma they need a lot of love but you may you may not be the person because of the trauma bond that has been created to be involved at this at this point but there you need to go specifically you can't take I'm not saying that you must break this off and whatever I am taking giving you the information for you to go and create the space that you need for you to be able to heal and for your boyfriend to be able to heal and you need counseling therapy coaching both of you to be able to work out what this looks like and it may as I said initially be some sort of couples therapy and then individual therapy for each of you but while you work through this process but at the same time stand your ground so you say and does the toxic Behavior really change with treated love I mean with time when treated with love understanding but at the same time standing your ground so that's basically what I'm saying and you're saying it too you've answered your own question standing your ground is looking after you recognizing these toxicity in this relationship you've said all the points you recognize that your wise mind's telling you this is a toxic relationship this is a pattern this is something that's not healthy I'm coming back because of the happy moments I know what's wrong but he doesn't want to face it I'm suggesting therapy he doesn't want to go to therapy you've got all your own answers you need to stand your ground and that's what stand your ground is you've actually described your answer you've actually instinctively your wise mine is working with your with your with the messy mind that we all have every one of us has messy Minds it's not an insult it is a a tremendous gift or messy mind is how we experience life we make mistakes and we repay and we grow when we work with the wise mind messy mind alone is is a problem that's why my book cleaning up the mental mess is teaching the wise mind to work with the messy mind then she says and how toxic are my own thoughts and behavior that I'm doing this and she has an exclamation mark so there is now her value systems are being attacked her identity is being attacked so some emotional manipulation gaslighting is making her feel like she's the problem you're not the problem in the situation you're not his you're not the cause of his problems in the situation you'd be nothing but supportive and the fact that you question yourself is evidence that you've been gaslighted and emotionally manipulated so you need to heal and protect yourself that's why the therapy is so vitally important and then you say should I just leave in order to fix my own issues you've answered your own question your wise mind is listening to your messy mind you are reading those signals the warning signals of the patterns the emotional manipulation the gaslighting etc etc you're starting to recognize and introspect and see that you're questioning yourself all these are warning signals that you need the support you need the safety of the distance and you need to be able to work on yourself first so that is kind of a summary of the letter now what I'm going to do is and and thank you once again to that person who chose to remain anonymous and thank you for sending that letter and thank you for us being able to talk that through okay so now I'm going to talk a little bit more from a scientific side what's happening in the brain body okay so as you've said this kind of emotional attachment that we've been analyzing through this letter is described as a trauma Bond okay a trauma Bond and I'm going to read a definition from Healthline to Great definition a trauma bond is a recurring cycle of emotional abuse that alternates now listen to this from the remember what we've just gone through in the letter it is a recurring cycle of an emotional abuse that alternates with kindness and intimacy which is what makes the situation so confusing okay so summary in the situation just describe she leaves when she sees the damage his behaviors doing to himself and herself four years later she takes him back then there's the repeated cycle of the promise of the boyfriend wanting to change but he doesn't because funds to change but he doesn't and she understands that the now she now has more understanding that the trauma in the repeated cycle is coming from the root cause of trauma and that that which are which is the root cause of his addictive behaviors and she she feels that she can help him with love patience and kindness but she's questioning that this is not healthy because there's warning signals of the emotional abuse gaslighting is coming back changing but not changing he lies to her she's not sure she can trust him all those are signs that she's questioning that her wise mine her non-conscious mind or busy sending to her this is now leading to her oscillating between thinking there's something wrong with her because he doesn't want to get any other help and that will help is in creating a sustainable change so it's definitely time as I said to create the distance so now let's see how this works in the brain so bonding between two people is a psycho I'm gonna give you a long word psycho neurobiological phenomenon so psycho mind neurobrain biological body okay so it's all three that's what I talk about all the time mind brain Body Connection psycho neurobiological okay so when you fall in love and you you start a relationship with someone the experience of falling in love is processed through your mind to the waves of your mind the mind is at 99 part of you it's the whole experience of falling in love needing that person and that Pro that experience is built is the through your mind is pushed into your brain so it's a whole energetic flow of that whole all the elements of meeting someone falling in love the conversations that touch the sense Sensations the communication the meaning all of that you see through your mind pushed into your brain and your brain the the the connection between the mind and the Brain then creates the physical result of that so it's built in this experience is built into the brain as a healthy tree so I'm holding up for the viewers I mean the listeners I'm holding up a little plant in a pot and if you can jump over to YouTube you'll be able to see these And subscribe to Dr Caroline leaf on my YouTube channel and in this little tree there's a bit in a pot and the pot has roots so all the connect the the roots are all the experiences that you are having at each connection point and going more and more little rude memories each time you connect each time you have dinner together tick on the phone send a text have that hug etc etc intimacy Etc each of those is the root experience and as you have each experienced the branches the branch memes or your interpretation of that and so this is building in your head with these proteins and chemicals and also in the the partner's head so both of you are building each other and this connection into your head so each as this or as you're experiencing this so is the partner so you're building each other so you put each other into these protein trees in your head and it's in the waves of your mind and a way to visualize the ways of your mind is if you you know like if you're looking at it if you've any voice tracking you'll see the little lines okay that's kind of a good way to visualize our thoughts in our mind it's like a little pattern that we store okay so it's in our mind which is 99 of us and it's driving the physical it's in our brain as the as these thought trees made of protein and it's in the DNA of every cellical body that's the psychoneurobiological combination okay so now if you have the situation where you meet and it's all nice and everything and it's all happy and then suddenly these some toxic behaviors start happening so now you have some toxic encounters so here's the healthy version of the relationship and here's the toxic version of the relationship but first maybe this is Tiny and there's just a little bit of that addictive behavior and then there's a little bit more and each addictive behavior is intermittently interspersed with the Positive so this pops up and this is maybe small but then over time this is getting bigger each toxic experience is in the roots and your interpretation of is in the branches so when for example she says that I should I what is wrong with me that there's been so many toxic encounters over the four and a half years or whatever it is of their relationship that there's a lot now of what's wrong with me the gaslighting the emotional manipulation which has been there has her interpretation is now her identity and who she is is being attacked and the just the Instinct of knowledge that this is not right that's being attacked but then this happens and then she sticks with him because they have such happy moments we that Partners genuinely obviously genuinely in love but his trauma is being transmitted and that's what's been built into a brain so there's this thing going on and it's the high intensity is because when you your mind is think feel choose okay so everything that you build experience think feel choose these feeling memories in the roots and your interpretations got think feel choose the thoughts feelings and emotions and choices in here so it's there's a lot of emotion and it's in your body and that's why our gut gets sore when we our heart gets physically so when we when the toxic side is activated we feel it in our body it's stored in our body and that's what we have when we do trauma work you also have to work through your body you have to do mind work you have to do brain work and you have to do body work you have to do all of it okay and that's why therapy is so important and the different types of therapy and and that's what I do with the nearest cycle is to try and help you do the mind body and mind brain body work as well in those different aspects okay so now you have this connection between you have these of this relationship and they they it's kind of two competing things so there's this conflict because this is what's right this is what we wired for love for our optimism bias recognizes this so now the toxic and I'm holding up for the viewers and listeners sorry I'm holding up to toxic a toxic version of the green tree so imagine this wiry toxic tree okay so now we have the two trees I'm holding up one in the hand so now we have con because this is dominating and this is dominating in this dominant Dominic Dominic so the toxic one is dominating now the healthy one pops up and the toxic and the healthy and every time because we are wired for love because we believe in love because we have an optimism bias whenever we see this and you love someone You're Gonna Want to this is imbalance the strength and survival you can see she can see that this is threatening who he is and he's almost died already once so so she wants she's drawn to that because she loves him and because she wants to help restore balance so we have this this Paradox and then there's also this but this connection because this is in your head and in the partner's head there version so now and that's connected by this invisible quantum physics connection the electromagnetics between these two so every time you think of that person doesn't matter where they are if they're physically in front of you or they're in another place physically this these are emitting real energy waves you think of them and you activate these you connect it so this is invisible connection through the quantum to quantum physics philosophy the science we use that to explain it so this is invisible string so now he's in your head you in his head and then there's intimacy which increases that the strength of that Bond and then you have this calling to each other when you're apart and because of the intensity and the up and down nature and the confusion and we can get so immersed in this there's a drawing there's a pulling perfect which is very paradoxical so and very confusing and then the confusion adds to this so there's a lot of mix of emotions so it takes a lot of time to discern between all the emotions and that's with the neurocycles so good because the neurocycle very systematically so it teaches you how to very systematically first of all gather awareness let's identify all these emotions let's identify all the behavior signal emotional warning signals let's gather awareness of the emotional warning signals let's gather awareness of the behavioral warning signals let's gather awareness of the physical warning signals the sore heart Etc the behaviors what are you doing keep going back keep saying the same thing what's the patterns in the behaviors in the relationship your behaviors his behaviors gaslighting Etc what are the perspective warning signals okay and as you start this work it's gonna be a lot to unpack so you just do it a little bit at a time so that's why I always recommend the neurocycles done 15 to 45 minutes a day and I have a whole chapter in this book on how to detox traumatic situations using the neurocycle okay whether it's primary secondary traumatic form etcumulative trauma which is in this case what's happening here he's got childhood trauma and cumulative trauma and addictive coping patterns and she's got secondary trauma and so on so there's trauma going on so you work on it for 15 to 45 minutes every day the nearest Cycles the five-step process that you do in that time and in that process you're going to gather awareness of the signals then you systematically go to the next step in a very objective way and you start questioning why and asking answering and discussing and then you write in the two different steps of writing the metacog is the way that you then pour all this information on on paper in this branched way and as you do this Branch you draw Circle right the main topic in the middle of the page so tournament or I'm confused should I stay or whatever it may be related to can toxic relationships heal however you see that at that moment because it will change each day potentially and then you destroy and you write a word and what if Netherland write a word like each branch grows from the other branches when you create a metacog you're growing branches a branch goes out of another Branch it goes out of another branch and you're putting a word on each branch and it doesn't have to make sense and sometimes there'll be a little phrase and sometimes a drawing just pour it out because that's your left and your right side coming together oxygen increasing blood flow increasing all the different waves Alpha dated as the Delta Theta Alpha Beta gamma High beta High Gamma or flowing in the right way bringing balance between coherence between the two sides of the brain to help you to get deep into the wise mind so that the wise mind starts to really talk to the messy mind that you build the relationship so these five steps of doing that pulling the wise mind and the messy mind together and then the fourth step is where you're gonna now stop trying to make sense of that and reconceptualize it and look it in a different way and see it from another angle and look at the patterns and the triggers and the antidotes and the active reaches a little action that you can do in that specific day and the first day you may only identify a few things and each day you're going to progress and then as you go to therapy you can take this work because you write it down in your neurocycle Journal I also now have the neurocycle app so you can get the book get the app and you can actually then like I walk you through the process and then you take that work to your therapy session and then you work through what all of that means you get a deeper level of perspective because maybe you write all this stuff down and you just don't know how to process it so that's where the therapy comes in and so you go on okay and so they're pulling that occurs when you're constantly together so every time you're together this is made stronger and stronger and stronger and stronger so sometimes you get becomes so toxic that you can't see the wood for the trees that you're trying to restore balance but you've got so-called up in the set that is just messy messy messy messy messy so to get messy back working with wise we have to create the distance and in this case with the trauma Bond it's very important that the distance is created so that the healing can happen on both sides are two different types of former that need to be addressed needs to happen on both sides and the less energy when you together these are fed and they grow but when you're part there's still the connection but the energy is now depleting because it's not being fed every day by that direct contact so it's the energy is now getting weaker so this then becomes weaker and this becomes stronger because you're focusing on the healing aspect so therefore this you're being empowered to get more autonomy and to get more Independence to get more agency over facing this toxic situation and the toxic stresses bring it brings but in it it's very hard to do that so you need to get out of it and you get out of the situation to be able to actually do the healing and see the best next steps forward and that's where honestly I can't stress enough neurocycles phenomenal alongside the therapy in these kind of situations okay so and also just another interesting thing is that habits form over 63 days and when a habit forms Behavior changes so that each contact each toxic contact that you have this relationship in the letter that this I read the person's been going through this for four and a half years so in one year okay let's do this it takes 63 days to change to prohibit to form and for Behavior to change that goes for the healthy and the negative so for this person who's the boyfriend who's in the toxic patterns there is it's been going on for a long time for how many years so these patterns that are very very strong and very established and very very dominant so that's going to take a lot of work from you from that from that person not not you from you from the person if it's even speaking to you we have to fix our own toxic stuff we have to it's going to take a lot of time to unwire and rewire and reconceptualize these things so over four years which is the length of this relationship they have been at least 24 63 day cycles so these you know that that's there's this repeated pattern has been a chance to practice these behaviors at least 24 times over that time period so they're very established and there's a lot of them I mean the numbers just to give you an idea the 63 days is important but just how many per year 365 divided by a bias is 63 Times by 4 is where I got to the number more or less 24. so this if that's what you're immersed in this is this has become a habit that's what I'm saying and it's become a very established habit so it's going to be a lot of hard work to disconnect because when you then you separate from that person in a trauma Bond it's confusing that intensity is kind of drawing you back that invisible quantum physics even though it's the wrong pattern is pulling you back and that's why you need a good mind management technique daily and a good therapist and a good support system to give to help you in that space in your healing to create that healing in the space that you are working in okay so just to kind of summarize I want to just read a couple of notes that I've made over here to you see the bonding becomes very distorted when it's toxic with toxic experiences some lovely times mixed in with in in the chaotic manner to create confusion so this some of this some of this some of this some of this and it gets very confusing now this is happening in the brain it's also happening in the brain it's these trees that I keep holding up in the in the in the mind which is 99 of who you are it's happening in these these wave things so that you keep like switching on you know like when you play a podcast and you and these little little lines with the person speaking then imagine that is what that's what the thought looks like in the mind so that keeps replaying it's in your mind that when you talk about online replaying it's literally like when you replay your podcast so what we're doing is like press pause on the podcast press pause on the situation to create the separation so that you can stand back and actually start working through this embracing and processing it and reconceptualizing it seeing it in a different way which is what the neuro cycling and therapy would do okay so the this confusion creates kind of an emotional a kind of emotional blindness to what is really going on but if you to stand back and you really think which is what this this lady has so brilliantly done in her analysis when she said that she recognizes this a problem and should I should I start working on myself should I get out of this should I look after myself that's her why is mind speaking she's seen that she's getting Insight who this coherence happening in her brain which is incredible okay and where we see this where her wise mind is is being listened to Mother by the messy mind we who and and that way she's getting introspective and Diving deep into the non-conscious mind and the non-conscious mind is working with a conscious mind we see that happening in these in these statements that she says sometimes I even think what is wrong with myself why am I still doing this so there's now she's reading the morning signal that I recognize I'm seeing that there's something wrong with myself it's almost like he's a project she's trying to process and understand this it seems like it's this project for me I can't seem to get it right what's wrong with me and she's recognized realizing that that's what she's doing brilliant that's inside that's wise mind talking to messy mind and she's working this out and she says but maybe I should go maybe I should work on myself before I can fix him because I'm recognizing I'm seeing this maybe this is the wrong way to see this so there's tremendous Insight starting to develop there and to continue that development she needs to get into a space where she can start weakening that trauma Bond and do the healing and when the healing happens that trauma Bond changes you disconnect from that person you cut that you Savor that time and you release and you disconnect so that that emotional manipulation is no longer controlling you but you have to get to a place of very strong very strong and when you're that that strong because this this connection is gone the the trauma Bond connection is gone and then you now are in a better space to say okay do I want to go back when when he's done his work am I going to be able to evaluate that am I going to be able all those kinds of questions that are healthy questions to see whether this is going to be good for you going forward it may not be that you go back to them it may be an unhealthy trigger it may be that you both need to get new relationships maybe that once you both work through your stuff that being together may be the best thing no one can say that it's your individual unique narrative that's why you have to do the mind works with the neurocycle you have to get into the therapy okay the same part is why it's harder to leave an abusive relationship the longer it continues and that's because of this these emotional bonds that form bonding makes it hard to enforce boundaries when you're in that space it's very hard to enforce boundaries when you're separated it's much easier to enforce boundaries and it's harder to keep away from people that we bonded to so that's why there's always is coming back so let me explain that quickly in another way that you're separated but because he was there he went she left he came back this is and this is very often this is the pattern of abusive relationships and Trauma bonding is this going bad and it's only when you are are having that that healthy work in that space of Mind work and therapy Etc and mind brain Body Work women it's going to be all three okay you may need to do things like from a yoga and physical stuff there's many different things I give lots of suggestions in my in my app and I'm going to give you some other references of books that are really great for those of you in this situation but basically it's harder to keep boundaries because of this confusion everything is distorted as I said there's almost like this mind blindness that happens when this this occurs here with you and that's the messy mind dominating mind parody comes when messy mind works with wise mind and so that's decisions we have to make that do we have to stand back and observe our own thinking we have to start I mean people say how do I even begin it's to start very objectively standing back and observing your own thinking being a pilot and the co-pilot at the same time and standing and saying okay let me look at my life as though you are looking at someone else although you're giving yourself therapy distancing yourself creating that space and using the note that you've the pronoun you okay Caroline you or ex person you are doing let's look at your warning signals there's no condemnation there's no judgment it's all done in kindness but you are going through a very systematic way of standing back and observing your own thinking feeling and choosing and observing the warning signals that is producing so you're kind of standing back you're not immersed in it you're standing back you can even visualize a building and I talk about that technique in here where you can imagine in a building and sealed up windows in the situations with the person or in the behind sealed windows and you standing on the outside and very objectively Gathering awareness of the signals reflecting doing the right steps and doing the act of reach daily so these those kind of things that you can do techniques a lot of different techniques I talk about in my book and there's a lot of good books on techniques that you can also add in so the resources I give you for beautifully inside the neural cycle and inside a therapy context okay so in leaving a long relationship it's not always useful to judge the correctness of the decision about how hard it is because it'll always be hard and so that's kind of a statement that I want to almost in almost at the end of this podcast but I just want to say that again in leaving a long relationship and four and a half years is a long time even six months can feel like a long time it's not useful to judge the correctness of the decision on how hard it is so don't say oh gosh this is so hard I must be wrong okay it's much because it's always going to be hard it's always going to be hard so don't judge the correctness of the decision based on how hard it feels okay it's not useful to judge the correctness of the decision because it's always going to be hard always for all these physiological reasons the brain Mind Body Connection these invisible connections with quantum physics all the stuff in your dnas change you've got to change all of that you've got to rewire your brain you've got to reset those those little signals in your mind you've got to reset the DNA you've got to change well if that takes a lot of that takes these cycles of 63 days multiple cycles of 63 days okay and then also if you've had any previous traumas that the girlfriend and the boyfriend you already know that these performers but if you've had previous traumas all of those get triggered in another in any apparent traumatic situation all those traumas pop up too that may not even be the same different traumas and they kind of all kind of feed in to this funnel they'll find this seems to find like a magnet seems to find the others it's like a pulling power of this onto other traumas and then that just makes even adds to even more confusion which is so important that we get that mind work that we get that therapy so in conclusion here are some action steps for this particular person or for any of you out there who can relate to what we've discussed in this podcast today first action steps is I would strongly recommend that you get into using the neuro cycle I'm obviously talking about that because I've spent 38 years researching this and I understand that this is the system for a brilliant system for driving the mind and our mind drives everything our mind is always driving everything you wake up with your mind you sleep with your mind you're doing everything with your mind you're in this relationship with your mind you're in life with your mind so you've got to know how to be very objective in managing your mind you need my management so my first recommendation is you need mind management which will help you get the perspective to make the right decisions in whatever situation you're in and what I can offer you from my research is the neural cycle in my latest book cleaning up for me to miss been researching this for 38 years I also have the neurocycle app so there I can offer you those it's not the only mind management but in that is a framework of where you can fit in other beautiful these amazing techniques out there in amazing therapies out there that you can fit in this framework so the neurocycle is how you is a framework for mind management and at the in step five step four and five so you can fit in a lot of the other therapeutic techniques it's just priming your mind to prime your brain to change and to help you get control back to empower you then I recommend therapy strongly recommend therapy counseling support system coaching all of the above in whatever combination you can and then I recommend Dr Patrick Khan's book we'll put the link in the show notes and I also recommend the book the body keeps the school mind brain and body healing of trauma by a basal from the call okay so those are some tips to help you and I thank you for listening to me I hope this has helped you and just remember you can't control the events and circumstances of life but you can control your responses you can learn to control your responses and that's what I hope to help you with thank you for joining me today and I look forward to seeing you next time

Channel: Dr. Caroline Leaf

Views: 63,579

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Id: kiqvZY98dGQ

Length: 56min 50sec (3410 seconds)

Published: Mon May 10 2021