Observing This

My opinion on this is, the connection needs list here isn't just with others. It's also with self. You should try to give all these things to yourself, because they should be part of your connection with and to yourself. I agree with mrob and tnr9 that you should not expect all these things from only one person outside of self or you'll be set up for disappointment. Though I'll add that if you're not getting most or any of these things from someone you're trying to have a friendship or relationship with, then that person is toxic towards you and you should move on to nurture more fulfilling relationships. A relationship with another does need to be mutually respectful.

In regards to how I'm referring to wants versus needs. Here's the thing. As an adult, unlike as a child, you are responsible for and can handle your own survival. Sometimes you need help, from others, like from a doctor. And having human connection is important to well-being, that's been in lots of studies. That's good, that's healthy interdependence. But as an adult, when you're making connection into a need related to survival, and you have an insecure attachment style, then it's about something else (from the past) that isn't really a need even though it feels like it is. It's about that lack of relationship and trust with yourself, which is why you feel like you can't survive, and why relationships then become about NEED. If you want connection but you're okay day to day with whatever you've got, so you're not coming from a place of fear or lack or pessimism or distrust, then it becomes more about want than need.

Distrust of self:

"I would think it's more the "empty" feeling or the separation anxiety or the hunger/longing for connection and to be seen?

But maybe that's a result of distrust of self somehow and that's more the root?"

Yes. Distrust of self is the root. It's part of why it's really tough for FA, and to an extent AP, to have a solid sense of identity. The separation anxiety and hunger for connection is usually tied to you not being properly taught to emotionally self-regulate as a child. People with unaware insecure attachment or personality disorders often can't model or teach this to their kids in a healthy way because they're just not capable of being attuned enough and outside of their own insecurities and fears enough, even though they try their best. So, sometimes they want the kids to regulate the adults. Sometimes they want to neglect the kid because they can't deal or don't know how to deal with the kid's normal human needs. And then the kid grows up unable to land their own nervous system when agitated, feeling deficient and lack and like there's a hole they can't fill, because they don't feel comfortable in themselves. Once you do apply that entire list of needs to your relationship and connection to yourself, self-soothing and emotional regulation and acceptance and identity all becomes a lot easier. Other voices in your head quiet down and you hear yourself. And then connection with others stops being about need and survival, because YOU can survive, and becomes about want instead. You want healthy interdependence with others and a support network, but you're also okay day to day with sitting with yourself for a bit when it's not available.

Trusting yourself means you can be okay, even when things are tough, because you're not abandoning yourself no matter what's going on or how much it stinks. There's resilience in having a perspective like this towards yourself. Optimism instead of pessimism and waiting for the other shoe to drop, looking at things from a place of lack, and hoping someone comes along to make it easier. The punchline is, when you can be at least satisfied instead of longing, then you start attracting solid people who can give you more and more of the connection you seek and want. But when it is a need, and you're an adult, it (subconsciously) scares away other people who have a healthier sense of boundaries. It's a lot to be expected to help someone survive who you barely know.

Yes, but I think this is what we were talking about in recent posts - Introvert also, and me talking about my friend who married and has support now. 

I don't fully agree with this. I think it's a lie to say that a single parent with no support from the other party or anyone is going into a relationship purely for connection. And I'm connected to myself enough to not lie about that. To be honest. This is historically what has ALWAYS been done. Entire cultures have arranged marriages for this reason - not purely for connection but for the practicalities and logistics of every day living as a human and especially with kids. It's why when people want to start a family, they find a partner. They don't say --oh, hey, I am okay to just do this alone. People don't really choose that for a reason. However, my issue is the opposite -- I've isolated myself terribly. And it's not healthy. It's not good for me, it's not good for my daughter-- granted, I kept "sober" because just connecting with anyone isn't the answer and there were lots of options that were really bad ones, IMO.

But, yes, I can see where this is want versus need. I just don't fully agree with being okay with whatever you've got. I'd be weird to be okay with it. It's f*cking beyond hard and beyond human. It's caused me C-PTSD. I'm not okay with it and really never will be. And I'm okay with that fact - I accept that. And I also go on and do this day to day .... I'm just mostly numb, in freeze, and my kid is dysregulated as a result b/c most days she is on her own -- the "lost child" so to speak. Her dad is 98% unavailable. I think our physiological responses to this environment are not something fully in my control.

And *out of health* not insecurity -- I've healed enough to say - hey, I think it would make more sense for there to be another person in this picture and to help with some of the dozens and dozens of things that need to get done here week to week--around hours of cooking, shopping, cleaning, dog care, kid care, homeschooling, emotional connection time, work + me building an online business, car care, yard work, medical stuff, therapies, etc. It's not living life. It's survival mode and the addition of another party - unromantic as that sounds - could potentially make things FAR better, especially if he himself wants to be a father figure, live in a family situation, have regular connection, enjoys being helpful/supportive. I am a good human. I've done my work -- and I talked about this in recent stuff I wrote here. And gave the example of my friend -- and that works. So I think that's where I'm at now -- I have no illusions about this being okay on my own. And yet I'm also not out there at the moment hunting for men. 

Makes sense... but I don't think we get taught this. I think this is something that happens naturally as a result of safe attachment. I think it comes more from having to disconnect to be okay-- a trauma response. And then using "stuff" to regulate. That's adaptive, and makes sense for a system that is under so much stress to shut down as a protection and then the minute it gets a sense of relief or "safety" (it doesn't know safety but what it decides is akin to safety) - like through food, sex, relationship, drugs, alcohol, self-harm, etc. that's regulation for that child. 

I have taught my child endless tools and skills -- boundaries, using her voice, etc -- for self-regulation. But until her system truly senses safety (and it's not something she can will herself to do or think about cognitively), she'll likely stay in freeze. 

It’s interesting. The oppression that is the consequence of one’s own choices, or oppression as a result of an arranged marriage. I actually agree. No choice may have been easier, sometimes. “Love who you’re married to rather than marry who you love”. Thanks Lee Kuan Yew for that snippet tonight.



I’m going to step away from this thread. This one really winds me up. Triggered beyond (my) belief. Definitely something to look at. All the best seeking.

We do get taught this, as babies and little children, in our very first years prior to even speech. Or rather, we're supposed to. That's in part why babies need human touch to survive. A distressed baby cannot regulate itself or land its nervous system or meet any needs, which is why it is supposed to have attuned parents who meet them and calm and comfort them. So yes, it happens as part of safe attachment, but it's being taught at that stage to the baby and young child. When it isn't happening (but there's basic connection and touch instead of none), the child adapts because it needs to, and insecure attachment can already start to naturally develop from there.

We're going to have to agree to disagree about how we see the world and parenting. I was going to try to conceive on my own if I didn't meet a partner, and I know several women who have actually been about 40 without a partner and done the same. I was preparing to return to a family support network to do it, because doing it 100% alone and having to go back to work at the same time was not feasible. But yes, the choice to be a single parent actually is done, by some people, and hopefully they feel they have an alternate support network that isn't just a romantic partner so that the child is still supported and raised with what the child needs. Arranged marriages have been a thing, but so have "villages" to raise kids where the men were barely involved. There are many ways that humanity has supported child rearing in the past, and the current model of 2 party households wasn't even the norm for a long time. Unfortunately, in America, there's barely the support needed anymore and people are expected to go at it with the parents alone, and it's very detrimental and financially difficult on top of that. So, I agree with you that single parents without a support network have a huge struggle and desire help, and you don't have family support at all in addition to not having partner support, so it is a different perspective. Of course you're exhausted. But neither perspective is universal to everyone, so getting defensive and saying approaching the idea of having a child knowing you'll be a single parent isn't done is too black and white.

People can approach it that way. That doesn't mean it has any bearing or comparison on your situation, because I feel like the black and white is back to, you want to defend yourself (when you don't need to, your life and choices are own and okay and comparing yourself to others and who has what will just make you unhappy). Which means thinking about people making other choices and feeling differently about them may be triggering this comparison again, that it's not fair that maybe you're perceiving others can handle the struggle more easily. Or you can disagree with me, which is totally fine.

Ultimately, I'm saying there's no right or wrong answer for how one deals with parenting and the situation they're given. I am saying that resilience and acceptance and seeing situations with some hope and optimism no matter what will keep you from feeling like you're drowning all the time, which is where I'm trying to go. To a place of how you can feel less defensive, less resentful, less distrustful, less like your life should have comparisons. That's the negativity that having an insecure attachment style brings, especially for AP. "The other shoe is about to fall, I'll always be scanning for threats, why does everyone else seem to have it easier than me" -- I used to have all those intrusive thoughts constantly for most of my life, but it's actually not the norm. I've read lists of AP characteristics, and the pessimism-related ones are all on those lists, so it's part of trauma response. Which means it can also be changed.

That doesn't mean you're not struggling and don't have wants and don't wish for more support. Again, there's nothing wrong with that, nothing to be defensive about, no one is attacking you or judging you, the challenging is to encourage you to examine multiple perspectives of thinking. Maybe you'll find other approaches to try, or maybe you'll reject them all as nothing works better for you, that's fine.

The takeaway summary of all this is if it's been too many words: just don't get stuck in doing the same thing over and over again if you're still unhappy and the approach you've always used isn't working for you.

I think coming out of isolation is part of the avoidant healing trajectory, and that's how I interpret things in this thread. If you'll read the list of avoidant trauma responses you will see things from a different perspective. When I read this thread, I empathize a lot with the avoidant parts of this. Insecure is insecure and there are a lot of similarities under the surface. But the avoidant path is different. There are elements of both here and I am weighing in on what is VERY familiar to me having walked the avoidant path. Again, I feel that the AP narrative is being pressed here, and opposing input is being dismissed.

As the resident avoidant, I'm seeing so much that is potentially getting misattributed. In the end, seeking seems to be struggling to be seen here. I think some of what she's expressing is being misunderstood.

The path is winding, with lots of elevation changes. It's not linear, things are not black and white anxious or avoidant, there is a lot of nuance. It will be for OP to discern the reality of her journey. I see a huge development in coming out of isolation (the realization that one has isolated, and growth will involve trusting others). This realization with will lead to further discoveries. There is the distrust of self,but also the distrust of others at play here. I struggled mainly with the latter.

How it happened for me, after gaining some understanding of myself and what I was feeling, I had a growing realization that it wasn't me against the world, that there were intimate alliances that could be had. For me, it was about bringing the circle closer. I had "community support" where everything was "out there". I began to have the urge and the notion to build INTIMATE support, a relationship. It's not just the practical aspects of parenting, parenting is also frought with emotion, soulful battles and celebrations. My partner offers practical as well as emotional support, the likes of which I have never been able to experience until I came out of avoidance and isolation.

Once you discover a want and need to move out of isolation many things begin to fall away. It's just the beginning, and it's a complex process. I see it beginning here and I celebrate it.