In Love with a Monster? Understanding Attachment Trauma

By Caroline Knight

Understanding Attachment Trauma: Looking Beyond the ‘Narcissist’ Label

It might be time to question whether calling someone a ‘narcissist’ is actually a convenient way to avoid looking at our own subconscious drivers. The trend of labelling those who fail to meet our needs — or hurt us in relationships — as ‘narcissists’ has become increasingly prevalent. Terms like ‘co-dependent’ and ‘empath’ are also frequently used, often without deeper reflection.

As we want to make sense of our relationship issues it is tempting to put our focus on the other person, and when their behaviour doesn’t make sense to us (or hurts us) we consider them to be at fault. That is not to say that another person’s behaviour is actually healthy, and of course it really can be awful. Still, we are unlikely to unearth the complex individual dynamics that led to another person’s behaviour, and it is probably prudent to turn the lens inward to try to understand why we would be attracted to such a person in the first place.

Labelling someone as a narcissist often stems from superficial interpretations of pop psychology, popularised by amateur online therapists. Although their hearts may be in the right place and there is value in trying to understand others’ behaviours, most of this content portrays the other person in your story as ‘the abuser’ and so by default you become ‘the abused’. This is actually quite disempowering because you are not encouraged to look at how your own trauma is affecting your romantic compulsions.

Attachment Trauma: Exploring the Role of Past Wounds

“It’s Not Me, It’s You!”

Trauma is complex, existing on a spectrum that often manifests in subtle and nuanced ways. Experiencing attachment trauma doesn't necessarily mean you had aggressive or neglectful parents or caregivers who mistreated you. Attachment trauma can develop in the central nervous system of a child based on something as simple as inconsistencies in emotional attunement from a parent.

That does not automatically make the parent a bad person; it can mean that sometimes they were not aware of how and why their behaviour led to their child feeling rejected or emotionally ignored. For many people, this alone is enough to cause dysfunction in adult relationships.

The reason that attachment trauma can be difficult to spot is that our coping mechanisms in response to our young experiences were subtle, and then refined over time. These mechanisms become a form of self-conditioning, and being too young to comprehend emotional dynamics, we are unlikely to notice their development. We may not be able to recall any catalyst situations either, since we were too young to process them cognitively.

Then we become adults and we enter into toxic relationships with no real idea why we are choosing a partner, and we find ourselves reenacting our traumas with those people.

We don’t know why this is happening, so it’s easiest to point the finger at the other and label them however we see fit. This way we can see ourselves as the victim in the situation, and we assume that the other needs to change their behaviour. Eventually we will get rid of that partner, only to find ourselves in a similar experience later down the line. This is the manifestation of attachment trauma, and it takes a lot of deep introspection and often challenging practice to overcome.

Protest Behaviour in Relationships: A Common Pattern

Thou doth protest too much

Highly sensitive people - which is most often those with an anxious attachment style - are more likely to realise that something is wrong when their nervous system relives these experiences in relationships. However, they may be less able to put good boundaries in place or effectively and respectfully communicate what they need.

When needs are unmet - or are dismissed outright - individuals may engage in ‘protest behaviour,’ seeking emotional connection or validation through unhelpful means. Protest behaviours often manifest as exaggerated reactions, such as initiating conflicts, employing the silent treatment, issuing blame, threatening to leave, or withdrawing emotional intimacy.

This often fails because it doesn’t make any sense to the partner, or is perceived as unreasonable, challenging and even aggressive. The partner likely has an avoidant attachment style and may be subconsciously afraid of the vulnerability required to connect deeply. Instead of noticing these possibilities in the partner, the anxious person might choose to see themselves as a sensitive ‘empath’ (which is not to say that they aren’t, but the situation is missing context) and their partner an insensitive ‘toxic partner’ or ‘narcissist’ (also likely missing context).

When one person is overtly emotional, and the other has a different method of processing vulnerability - that is, buries and loses touch with it - it is easy to view that person as cold and uncaring, while you are the ‘sensitive and caring one’.

There are not as many narcissists out there as it may seem - not in the pathological sense, at least. There are, however, people with attachment wounds everywhere you look, all acting this out to varying degrees and in various ways in their relationships, and mostly unconsciously. It is no wonder that divorce statistics are so high, and often those that do survive only manage it because the coping mechanisms are so ingrained in both partners. Most of us just don’t have the tools to deal with emotional situations, and so it’s easier to point the finger at the other person and say, “Next please!”.

Healing Relational Trauma: Breaking Cycles

The ‘next please’ approach is ineffective; it’s unrealistic to believe the next partner will be immune to triggering your unresolved issues. They will trigger you - particularly when your feelings deepen - and the less you have worked on your triggers, the harder it is going to be to resolve your issues. I have met many people who have issues in this area; most of those appear to have no clue that they do, and sadly, little desire to consider it. It is hardly any wonder then that relationships get such a bad rap. Yet the truth is that, emotionally at least, we are still children inside. We were not given the tools to communicate effectively, and we didn’t think to look for them.

I feel that turning the focus inward is one of the necessities in this ‘great awakening’ everyone seems to be hankering for. If you just want to be happy, that is another good reason. But if you seek out content that confirms that you are somebody else’s victim, it is never going to happen. Healing relational trauma is challenging. It can be complex, arduous and often uncomfortable, but the clarity and relief it offers are invaluable. If you want to have harmonious, lasting relationships, you have got to get wise to the motivation behind your choices.

In this way you also develop compassion for the other people in your story, for all the things they carry - however unconsciously - and you may be better able to help them, and others, albeit later down the line. Healing from toxic relationships and unconscious patterns is a gradual and non-linear process, but the rewards of breaking these patterns far outweigh the effort. Besides, what is the alternative? Undoubtedly more of the same: repeating cycles and excruciating pain, ad infinitum.

Ending the Narcissist vs Empath Cycle

Generally speaking, we are collectively living with narcissistic wounding to some extent, which is why we are in an immature relating culture, and it shows. It might not even be too much of a stretch to suggest that it could even be what leads to war and genocide.

We are so adept at avoiding our most uncomfortable feelings that our coping mechanisms are all pervading, and we cannot see the woods for the trees. We have to blame others for our experiences with them because if we don’t, we have to admit that we don’t actually know who we really are, thus why we seek what we do. We assume that we do know who we are, but we are operating from artificial personas developed from a very young age because our true selves were stifled, however inadvertently. These personas include only the ‘best’ bits, and the bits that usually led to reward or acceptance for us.

As a result, we do not have the skills to discern that the different coping mechanisms others exhibit (learned in response to their own specific experiences of early dysfunction) are coming from more or less the same place as our own. We have short or distorted memories when it comes to our own childhoods too, especially if we get along with our parents as adults.

Instinctively we may know that our parents loved us and never meant to hurt us, and if we don’t remember much, we just assume it is because of the amnesia that comes with age. However, psychologists know well that it is far more likely that you buried painful emotional experiences as a child because you did not know how to process them. The book, ‘The Drama of Being a Child’ by Alice Miller, exemplifies these issues fantastically. It is a profoundly helpful book for anyone who suspects that they may be stuck in unhealthy relational patterns.

Painful relating is a legacy

We can, in many cases, have compassion for our caregivers, obvious exceptions aside. They were human too, with their own sets of emotional issues, blindspots and even pathologies. Even the most mindful of parents with the best of backgrounds are never 100% consistent, especially in a world that is challenging for many. Just because you were loved and provided for as a child, it does not mean that you were consistently seen, appreciated and understood for who you are. To reiterate, even the most subtle inconsistencies are enough to create an attachment wound.

Perhaps you were not always encouraged to be open and honest, or allowed the full range of expression that would lead to self-knowledge and esteem. Developing a socially acceptable persona can happen for a reason as simple as that. However, operating unconsciously from an acceptable persona leaves you with a void to fill and an uncomfortable sense that you are not being authentic. You will wrestle with the symptoms this brings until you can recognise your unmet needs and their origins.

Until then, most of the time the ingrained persona will feel like the real you, but it is not. It is who you think you need to be in order to receive love, but since you can never be satiated by love that is not given to the true self (warts and all), it gets in the way of authentic relating. It leads to repetitive dynamics in which you have to feel that you are right and the other is wrong, failing you, or purposefully mistreating you.

I know from personal experience that this cycle will repeat indefinitely unless you tap into the early feelings of rejection, abandonment, shame and whatever else arose when you were too young to comprehend the later impact. I also know that healing attachment trauma is worth the effort, and I highly recommend Alice Miller’s book as a great place to start.