402. Why trauma bonding feels so much like love ...

We’ve all heard the phrase trauma bonding, often used in jest to talk about two people who became friends after meeting in difficult circumstances. But trauma bonding is actually a psychological phenomenon which defines a relationship characterised by an abuser and their target, and a cycle that can be very hard to break out of. In this episode, we unpack the characteristics of a trauma bond, how you can identify if you might be experiencing one, and steps you can take to break away from one. We explore: What a trauma bond looks like Why trauma bonds can happen What a trauma bond ISN’T Why trauma bonds can play out in a variety of relationships How to identify if you are experiencing a trauma bond Steps you can take to move away from a trauma bond A few resources to help you if you are struggling with a trauma bond: The Attachment Project: HERE https://www.attachmentproject.com/psychology/trauma-bonding/how-to-break/ Choosing Therapy: HERE https://www.choosingtherapy.com/how-to-break-a-trauma-bond/#:~:text=Breaking%20a%20trauma%20bond%2C%20just,develop%20a%20safe%20exit%20plan. Watch on Netflix: HERE https://netflix.com/thepsychologyofyour20s Follow Jemma on Instagram: @jemmasbeg https://www.instagram.com/jemmasbeg/?hl=en# Follow the podcast on Instagram: @thatpsychologypodcast https://www.instagram.com/thatpsychologypodcast/?hl=en# Subscribe on Substack: @thepsychologyofyour20s https://substack.com/@thepsychologyofyour20s For business: [email protected] mailto:[email protected] The Psychology of your 20s is not a substitute for professional mental health help. If you are struggling, distressed or require personalised advice, please reach out to your doctor or a licensed psychologist. See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 3:15Jemma Sbeg?

  Hello, everybody. I'm Jemma Sbeg and welcome back to the Psychology of Your 20s, the podcast where we talk through the biggest changes, moments and transitions of our 20s and what they mean for our psychology.

• 3:37Jemma Sbeg?

  Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to the podcast. It is so great to have you here back for another episode. I just want to let you know before we get into this episode that we are going to be discussing some intense subject matter today to do with. Physical abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse, that sort of thing. So if that is something that you're particularly sensitive to, or you don't really wanna hear somebody talking about today, just giving you a heads up so you can skip this episode, or maybe come back to it at a later time when you are feeling, you know, maybe in a more stable place. There will be some links to some resources and some assistance in the show description as well. Let's get into it.

• 4:23Jemma Sbeg?

  Today, we are talking about trauma bonds. And no, not two people who bond through hardship, because I hate to break it to you. That is actually not a trauma bond. We are talking about a powerful kind of connection that forms between two people when one person manipulates their own trauma or the trauma of the person that they they are with to create a highly dependent, highly painful, highly manipulative relationship that is founded on the highs and lows of emotional gaslighting, maybe even emotional abuse, founded on hot and cold behavior, founded on betrayal and hurt rather than love.

• 5:08Jemma Sbeg?

  What nobody tells you about trauma bonds is how often people who think they would never be susceptible to this kind of thing end up in these relationships all of the time. Because of how powerful inconsistency is at hijacking our brains' reward system. When somebody gives you the most perfect fantasy version of love one day and then switches it into the most terrible kind of love the next, that emotional whiplash does something dangerous to your brain. It teaches you that if you just hold out a little bit longer, the good version is gonna come back around. And so it leaves you holding on to potential and holding on to these terrible relationships

• 5:51Jemma Sbeg?

  and these terrible people because of the potential of reward. In that way, you know, this person, the person that people form a trauma bond with becomes both their biggest source of unhappiness, but also their biggest source of happiness at times. Because this person is the one who can give and take those things, who can give and take safety. People who have never experienced this may look at it from the outside and think. I don't know, why don't you just leave? That person's obviously not good for you. Why? Don't you know you deserve better? Why don't you just walk away? But what they don't understand is the insanely powerful neurobiological, psychological, physical, emotionally addictive patterns that this kind of relationship creates.

• 6:36Jemma Sbeg?

  Which essentially mean that our own self-preservation, our own instincts, our own emotions, our rationality, it all just gets so totally scrambled. I think what they don't realize is how smart abusers and partners can be, how well they understand the mechanisms of insecurity and psychology and how well they can manipulate love. So this is exactly what we're gonna be revealing and talking about today. If you have ever found yourself in this kind of trauma bond, if you are recovering and healing from a relationship that matches this pattern, or if you're just watching like a friend,

• 7:16Jemma Sbeg?

  or or anybody in your life going through this and you're trying to understand like how you can help them. I think and and I hope that this episode will bring you some clarity. So without further ado, let's get into the psychology of trauma bonds.

• 7:36Jemma Sbeg?

  Let's start by really clarifying, because this is totally essential. We really need to clarify what we mean by a trauma bond. Because it has been used very, very casually these days. And that has definitely diluted its meaning considerably. Not because of of anybody's poor intentions, just because of of concept creep. Concept creep is essentially the the casual expansion of serious terms to mean less and less serious things and therefore take away the important meaning of these words. I think we have all heard of people who have become friends at a terrible workplace, you know, joke that they are trauma bonded. Or people who have dealt with like the same tragic awful ex will be like, how'd you guys meet?

• 8:19Jemma Sbeg?

  Oh, we like, we we have like a trauma bond, we're like trauma bonded. That is very different to the original meaning of this term. Trauma bonding was first devised in nineteen ninety seven by this man called Doctor Pratik Khans, who interestingly also is known for his work actually on sex addiction as a sidebar. But he essentially created, discovered, founded this term um to refer to a relationship between an abuser and an abused person or a manipulative person and a target um that is formed in a way that gets somebody to stay against their best interests. Because of trauma, because trauma creates a bond.

• 9:02Jemma Sbeg?

  In contrast to like the normal use of the word bond to describe like a deep, healthy reaction to love and emotional vulnerability and connection. Trauma bonding refers to how we respond to emotional volatility and how we respond to control. Sometimes, you know, actually tunneling further into the relationship that is creating these bad feelings for protection, when it's obviously against our best interests. Because for some reason, our brain isn't able to rationally respond in these situations. It has been scrambled by somebody else's behaviour. A bond is, you know, in simpler terms, really just a connection. A trauma bond is a connection that is forged through something sinister.

• 9:45Jemma Sbeg?

  But it is a connection nonetheless. In short, it is an attachment based on cycles of the threat and relief, which leave the person in this relationship desperate for approval. This can happen, yes, most often with a romantic partner, but it can also hap- happen with a parent. It can happen with a friend, it can happen with an institution, a mentor, anybody who has emotional control.

• 10:15Jemma Sbeg?

  And can take what somebody needs from a, from a relationship and exploit it. These have the capacity to turn into trauma bonds. The way that a trauma bond begins is often through intense affection and praise from the abuser. Love bombing, like major declarations of love, what appears to be fierce devotion. It's like a huge emotional high, it's super intense. It's like, it's a magnetic addictive feeling to be cared for in such a way. They may also, and this is critical, tell the person that they are intending to form a trauma bond with. Stories of their own trauma, particularly from their childhood, particularly from past relationships.

• 10:56Jemma Sbeg?

  To generate like a deep psychological hold over this other person, but also to elicit sympathy. This stage is essential. It basically provides this abuser, this person with an emotional alibi for their future bad behavior.

• 11:15Jemma Sbeg?

  And they need to do this in order to engage the next part of their plan because. Eventually like their behavior is gonna switch, they're gonna become cruel. And having this reason why they do it to fall back on helps them dismiss their behavior to you. Again, like I said, eventually it's gonna escalate. But the thing is, is that this escalation is often also randomly juxtaposed with warmth and affection. It will be like, I love you, you've disappointed me, like nobody ever has. The greatest thing that's ever happened to me, I never wanna see you again. I think you're beautiful, you disgust me. This flip flop, flip flop. In his article, Love and Stockholm Syndrome, The Mystery of Loving an Abuser, this psychologist, Dr. Joseph Carver.

• 11:59Jemma Sbeg?

  He calls this small kindness perception. Perhaps the abuser has been giving somebody the silent treatment. And then they show them this small kindness by breaking the silent treatment with a gift or a hug. Maybe they will exclude you, ignore you, and then suddenly turn around and want you around. This is that cycle of relief, pain and relief, relief, pain, pain and relief, like not knowing which one's gonna come.

• 12:28Jemma Sbeg?

  Again, they become an equal source of fear, but also of safety. Meaning that even if somebody wants to walk away, all of their emotional regulation, good and bad, is tied up to this other person. There are enough good days to entice you and enough bad days to confuse you. And enough excuses that they're giving you to think that they can change. This hot and cold personality has been described essentially like a two-faced soulmate. Which I think is like a brilliant term for describing this. It basically fits this pattern of intermittent reinforcement and reward and punishment.

• 13:11Jemma Sbeg?

  It fits this pattern of like, this person is two different people in one body. And these two different people are so difficult to disentangle because the good is just so good. And the bad is so different to that, that it's literally impossible to know what's real and what's not. From there, the cycle of affection and cruelty continues, often for years. Sometimes even for for a lifetime for some people, which is tragic to say. So why does it happen in the first place? Like, what are the warning signs? Why do these situations occur? And why do so many people often report being like, it just kind of snuck up on me? If you haven't lived it, I feel like it's very hard to understand that.

• 13:56Jemma Sbeg?

  Research into the causes of trauma bonds, this might surprise you, might not surprise some of you actually. It's actually still really in its early days and early stages because psychologists are still getting a grasp on. Just still getting a grasp on like the power dynamics of all of this. But it is thought that one of the core reasons that somebody sets out to create a trauma bond, and whether that's deliberate or like a little bit subconscious, it is because of a deep need for power and adoration. This is highly attributed to narcissistic personality traits or narcissistic personality disorder. A narcissist, as we know from one of our previous episodes on this, needs to be at the centre of everything to feel like they matter.

• 14:41Jemma Sbeg?

  And whether they get that through success, through money, through praise, or through romantic manipulation and playing the victim, like. It's kind of all the same if they get what they want, if they get that spotlight, if they get the attention, if they get adoration. In particular, there's a type of narcissist called a vulnerable narcissist. It's very prevalent to have a trauma bond with this kind of person. This is the type of narcissist who takes up all the emotional oxygen in the room and in a relationship by always making themselves the victim, by making sure that their crisis is always the biggest crisis, by making sure that everybody like orbits them.

• 15:21Jemma Sbeg?

  So, one individual being narcissistic or having high, being high in trait narcissism is a huge risk factor. Another is if the person who is, either person really, has an insecure attachment style. And one that is developed from past bonds or past relationships. Feel like we are all very familiar with how, with what an insecure attachment style is and why, how people develop that style in relationships. But again, if your only blueprint for love is that affection is something to be given and taken away, or that love needs to be earned, it is not freely given. It becomes harder to question a trauma bond and it becomes harder to question when a new romantic partner

• 16:07Jemma Sbeg?

  does things that are a little bit odd or a little bit nefarious. Because you don't know an alternative, that's what love is, that's what you know it as. That's how your parents loved each other, that's how they loved you. So, all these warning signs that to other people would be these bright red flags, like you just miss them. Because you don't have, you haven't learnt what unhealthy love versus healthy love looks like. There's also a biochemical element to this as well, which I don't see talked about very often. But the anthropologist Helen Fisher, she actually showed in her research that this kind of love actually activates some of the same brain regions that are responsible for cocaine addiction, alcohol addiction, gambling addiction, because of that intermittent reinforcement we were speaking about.

• 16:51Jemma Sbeg?

  Basically, sometimes you win, more often you lose, but sometimes you win.

• 16:58Jemma Sbeg?

  And that feels really nice. That keeps you hooked. That's why people keep sitting at slot machines, waiting for their luck to turn. I need people to understand this, like, there are some powerful biological systems working against your favor here. Especially in a turbulent relationship. I think the effects of all these chemicals are gonna be so much more profound. You know, you've got dopamine, yeah, but you've also got oxytocin, vasopressin, serotonin, cortisol, norepinephrine, adrenaline, all mixing together because of how many highs and lows there are. There are just too many signals to intercept and for your rational mind to, I guess, like, sort through. So your ability to walk away and to rationally see what's happening is just scrambled.

• 17:44Jemma Sbeg?

  When somebody is the source of both the best and worst parts in your life, no chemical in your body is a good or bad chemical. It just responds to stress or things in your environment and you're just receiving so much of that. In particular, like dopamine, I feel like it plays a role in so much, but especially for this. Something that you might not know about dopamine is that, yeah, it gives you pleasure, but it also minimizes pain. So when you're going through painful emotional experiences, right? Dopamine is numbing you. It's reducing your pain response, physical and emotional, so that you can endure hard things. But it's also giving you this like strangely positive reinforcement reward here.

• 18:27Jemma Sbeg?

  So it does, it's not working in our favor, right? Dopamine is being released because what you're going through is hard. But then also your brain's like, oh, but tha- but then we feel good. So this is essentially like the perfect chemical assistant to an abuser. Who is playing that hot and cold persona to their advantage emotionally, but also biochemically, and it is, it traps people. Finally, I think another big factor here is just time. The longer the person, the abuser waits before showing the side of them, the more sympathy they are able to gain through those early on vulnerability disclosures, but also the more sunk costs they know they are creating.

• 19:10Jemma Sbeg?

  The harder it is for somebody to walk away because they've already invested so much time into the relationship. You'll also notice that like at first, the switch between kind and awful is is pretty, it's pretty um, it's it's pretty rare like to see this terrible side of them in the first months, years of the relationship. Because they're kind of testing the boundaries. Slowly though, that terrible side becomes more prominent as they kind of adapt somebody and acclimate somebody to their bad behaviour. They know, they know that in the beginning, the longer in between the good and bad behaviour, the harder it is to detect.

• 19:50Jemma Sbeg?

  The longer the relationship continues, the more bio and and emotional rewiring is being done, the more entrenched somebody is. It is just such a powerful reminder that like, people can be in these relationships for years. Everybody from the outside can be like, something is wrong here. And it will not show up on their emotional radar. Because it is essentially, I don't like to use terms like brainwashing or Stockholm syndrome, but it is a form of that. It's like that classic analogy of a frog being put into a pot of boiling water. If the water is already boiling, if somebody dropped you into an abusive relationship, you would jump out immediately. But if the water slowly boils around you, you don't notice it.

• 20:35Jemma Sbeg?

  And in the case with frogs, like they end up dying before they can escape because they just, it just gets hotter and hotter and hotter until they don't even realise. Do not be mistaken here, manipulative people. They know how to target these levers of addiction, of acclimation, of just everything to keep you hooked. Okay, we are going to, we're gonna take a short break here and then I really want to take us through this list of like, is it a trauma bond, is it not? And what are some signs that things are really taking a turn for the worst? Stick around, we'll be right back after this short break.

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• 21:48Jemma Sbeg?

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• 22:33Jemma Sbeg?

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• 25:17Jemma Sbeg?

  We've talked about what a trauma bond is. And I mentioned, you know, there's a lot of concept creep, a lot of people using this for different things. So how can we really know? What what's like the biggest sign that this is going on? I think crucially, like the big thing to remember is that all relationships are gonna have some level of emotional disclosure, like, yeah, duh. People are gonna share their secrets, people are hopefully gonna talk about their childhood trauma. People are hopefully gonna talk about the really hard stuff that is going on in their life. Them sharing that is not a sign that like they're using their vulnerability to manipulate you. Like, it's just genuine vulnerability. So I don't want you to be in maybe the early days of a relationship or sitting here thinking,

• 26:03Jemma Sbeg?

  hey, like, that guy just told me about how his mum was really awful to him. Or like, that guy just told me about his ex and how terrible she was. Is he trying to like get his hooks in me? No. In healthy relationships, there is mutual sharing, there is mutual understanding, there is sympathy for some things, empathy for others, for both people's things. There is never blame, and it will be hard at times, but there is never blame. And you always know you are on the same side, right? You always know, like, this person doesn't think this is my fault, right? In a trauma bond, you are made to feel like the aggressor.

• 26:44Jemma Sbeg?

  You are made to feel like you are responsible for triggering someone else's emotions and their behaviour and their bad habits. You're the reason they cheated, or their trauma is the reason they cheated or did something terrible or were awful to you or switched. So suddenly you're like, I don't know who's the victim and who's the villain. I think I'm, I think I'm the victim, I think I'm having a hard time, but they've made everything so confusing. So these are the five key signs of a trauma bond. Other than that, intermittent reinforcement, highs and lows we spoke about. There is a distinct honeymoon period that you can recollect and you can look back on that is slowly turning into a nightmare period. Number two, the strange desire to initially wanna help this person.

• 27:27Jemma Sbeg?

  There's this sense as well that you should be able to manage their behaviour and that maybe their behaviour is justified. It can be defended, it can be minimised because it's not them, it's their hurt, it's their pain. Like you should be able to work through this with them. You're not a bad person. You're not going to abandon somebody who has trauma. Eventually, it does also seem like their pain seems to hurt you more than them, but you really care and you're just trying to be kind. There's hypervigilance. Eventually, you will get to this stage of being like, I don't know what is the right thing to say. I don't wanna make them angry. I don't wanna make them mad at me. So there is this lingering, ongoing stress response.

• 28:13Jemma Sbeg?

  You reread every message, you reconsider everything you say, even nice things that you wanna do for them. You're like, how can this be interpreted? In the worst possible way, because you know their mind and their behaviour is gonna go to that. There is isolation from support systems and from yourself as well, you as a support system. They will find ways to detach you from people who they know are gonna interrupt what's happening. Perhaps by asking you to move in with them really quickly, demanding all your time really quickly. Asking you to move states really quickly, telling you that like, they don't like your friends, they don't like that guy that you're friends with, they're jealous. They don't think they're good for you. You should spend all your time with them.

• 28:56Jemma Sbeg?

  They also make it hard for you to leave. If you have ever sat in this relationship and thought. I'm actually just deeply unhappy. I don't like who I am in this kind of relationship. This is not the person I wanna be with. But emotionally, you're like, leaving isn't really an option though. Like, I can't leave. Part of me doesn't want to, but I really know I should. That is a big sign of a trauma bond. During my research, I actually came across a test. From this book on narcissistic abuse that I think is really helpful. And the author, her name is Vanessa. She basically devised this test to help people gain that clarity, that situation I was just talking about where it's like. I feel one thing, I think the other.

• 29:42Jemma Sbeg?

  This test like helps cut through that chaos and just be like, no definitively, like this is a bad situation. So you can kind of return to this, but I think this set of questions is really useful. First up, would you want your friends, family, sister, brother to be in this relationship? Would you want them to trade places with you?

• 30:07Jemma Sbeg?

  Yes or no? B, does your situation look toxic when you visualize somebody else in this same particular? Maybe a celebrity, maybe like a sibling or a friend. C, do you frequently find yourself thinking or having to explain to others that like they just simply don't understand your relationship? Do you frequently have to justify the other person's behavior? You kind of have to pitch or like sell parts of this person to others. Do you know it is best to leave again, but you simply cannot? Do you feel like there is an invisible force keeping you to this person?

• 30:47Jemma Sbeg?

  And finally, do you feel confused, afraid, scared when you are apart from them? If your answer to any of these things just gets you thinking, it's not, some of these aren't like yes or no, but if they just get you thinking, I think it might be worth just like sitting with this for a while and being like, huh. How much of their behavior is actually not okay? How much of an emotional haze are they creating around our relationship to keep me hooked? Even though they're treating me really, really badly. Let's talk about why, and this is like the natural next step. Why are these bonds so hard to break though? Like what is the magnetism? I think this question again comes up all the time, like, why don't you just leave?

• 31:32Jemma Sbeg?

  This guy, this girl, this person is awful to you. Think what people don't understand is like what they're really asking. Like how psychologically imprisoning a situation like this is, especially if you are a kind, sensitive, empathetic person. If you are somebody who truly wants to do their best by everybody, you may see this person as genuinely just needing you and fixable, no matter how much holding on to them hurts and burns you. Like, you still feel like it's your job to make them better. There's also the fact that like your entire identity can become this person. Financially, yeah, sure. Physically, yes. Mentally, one hundred percent. They are your weekends, they are your evenings, they are your thoughts,

• 32:16Jemma Sbeg?

  they are what you choose to wear, what you choose to talk about, what you think will impress them, what you say to avoid a fight. Again, just to nail this point home, they are your safety. Like, they control the danger. They are what, they bring danger and sadness and harm and cruelty into your life. They are also the one who can take it away. So this means they control the negative. They also control the positive. They control the highs. And they can position themselves as well as a safe haven from other external disappointing things in life. So you begin to like orbit them because that's the only way that you feel secure is if you're on their good side. Experts have actually pinpointed,

• 33:00Jemma Sbeg?

  like, a seven-stage cycle of trauma bonds to explain like how deeply entrenched you become and what makes them so hard to break and walk away from. We already know like that first stage of like love bombing, indoctrination, vulnerability. The second stage is like, again, when they start to test things out. So they start to just be like, can I get away with this? Can I not get away with this? What is this person gonna do? It's at this point that if somebody kind of detects them or if somebody externally detects them and really like says something, they'll often like abandon the relationship or they'll often be like, they'll switch it up and be like, oh, I just, I don't want commitment. Like, oh, you're, you're this person that like,

• 33:44Jemma Sbeg?

  not ready for this relationship because they kind of can sense like, oh, there's a few maybe other guardrails. But if like, some of them are really sneaky, like if they just happen to get away with it, or if they've waited longer and longer to get away with it.

• 33:58Jemma Sbeg?

  Sometimes it's just like very difficult to recognize. So there is this period after the love bombing of like settling at times and then these like short little sprinkles of like something's kind of happening behind the scenes, like something's not going right. Then comes like the more intense stuff. And it's not gonna start out with like somebody doing something terrible, maybe it does, but it's only, it's mainly gonna be like criticism and devaluation. It's often gonna be like verbal. And it's often gonna be things that like they can blame you for, right?

• 34:38Jemma Sbeg?

  So they're basically, again, it's like this boiling water analogy. They're like slowly bringing you in. Like, how can I make myself the victim here? So that this person, you, feels like the villain and I can get this all twisted. This is also very critical because they start to get you to want to earn their approval or earn their forgiveness for things that you are not at fault for. They're really like, they will work hard at twisting reality to villainize you, to paint you as the problem. So you kind of enter this dance where like you feel blamed, you feel like you have to apologize.

• 35:19Jemma Sbeg?

  You feel like if they were to walk away from the relationship, it would be your fault. All of this is like deeply manipulative. It is part of the trauma bond. Then we get to the stage of like upping the ante. This, this is when we get into like the, there's full on gaslighting going on. You completely doubt yourself. You suddenly uncover maybe lies that are happening in the relationship. This is when you're really like, oh my god, maybe something is wrong. But I'm so in deep now. I'm so bonded to this person. I feel so much like agitation when I'm not around them and I'm so dependent on them for emotional validation that like at this point, I just have to get through this. And there is this continued illusion of another side.

• 36:02Jemma Sbeg?

  That came at the beginning. There's this continued illusion of like, things are going to get better. I think after a while, when you realise this isn't gonna happen and this is what researchers talk about, there is resignation. Essentially, your emotions and your body and your mind is like, if we're gonna stay in this relationship, like, we should just switch off. Like, we wanna be with this person, I care about this person. Maybe there are just parts of this that, like, we just can't engage in. So there is definitely a point that comes about where it's not that you just don't care anymore, but you're kind of just like, okay, this is just how it is. Like, I'm just gonna make myself small. I'm just going to try and be good. And stage six swiftly follows, the loss of self. After so many months of this manipulation,

• 36:47Jemma Sbeg?

  you lose sight of who you are as a person. You are what they want you to be. You are not you. You are what is required to make them stay in your life and to make them happy. All these things, what brings you joy, what makes you excited, your plans for the future, your hobbies, your friends. It would be very hard for you to say, because this is when they get you to the point of like, you are indoctrinated into this relationship. Leaving doesn't just mean giving up the relationship. It means giving up your entire sense of self. It often means giving up money. It means giving up all this time. It means complete emotional withdrawal. At this stage as well, like, there may be options for you, opportunities for somebody to be like, I don't wanna be here anymore, I wanna walk away.

• 37:31Jemma Sbeg?

  Friends may get involved, whatever. But often, that's when the cycle starts again. They will like, turn on the charm. They will give you all this evidence that they are changing, just to recommit you to the relationship. People who are in trauma bonds talk about the fact that it's not just one cycle. It's not just that they've gone through the seven stages once. They've gone through the seven stages like ten, eleven, fifty times, all over again. Like, somebody bringing you back in so that you cannot leave. So if that is what's happening, if this is a slow master plan to make you molded to this person, to make you feel like they're everything and you cannot walk away, how do you walk away?

• 38:16Jemma Sbeg?

  This happens in in many, many ways, like obviously, like some people, like their abuser just never lets them and they just are never able to. But I do think that there does come a point for the people who do walk away and the people who have the help to walk away where they're like, oh, my god, this is not love. And some people describe it as an epiphany moment. Some people describe it as a rock bottom. Other people describe it as like this gradual realization of like, this is not what people fantasize about. Like, when I was a child thinking about love, when I watched those beautiful romance movies when I was a kid, like this was not it. Who would wanna be in this situation? I don't see anybody else in this situation, or maybe you do, but like,

• 38:58Jemma Sbeg?

  I don't want this for my kids. I don't want this for my friends. Like, I don't want this for myself. This is not how I wanna be loved for the rest of my life. And I think choosing to leave requires acknowledging firstly, like, that this is gonna be hard and mentally preparing for that first. It will be at times emotionally difficult always, but also physically taxing. This is something I rarely see people talk about. People who leave relationships like this, like, I honestly believe they should be entitled to sick leave, like, their entire immune system has often become compromised from chronic stress. So there have been all these like doctor reports or studies talking about how when people finally walk away from these relationships,

• 39:41Jemma Sbeg?

  they actually develop like month-long sicknesses. They feel physically stricken down. They get aches, fatigue, just colds, pneumonia, things they've never gotten before because their body like stops running on cortisol and stress. And suddenly, like, the body has no more reserves to fight off things that it's been holding back. I wish people talked about this more, like your body sometimes does like feel physically burdened by leaving this relationship. So there needs to be an acknowledgement of that, but also some grace around that, that. Yes, you're gonna feel mentally shit, you're gonna feel physically probably not great as well. That is all part of your body, I think, like cleansing itself of this relationship. This is still grief, right? This, there is still a loss here.

• 40:25Jemma Sbeg?

  Our body grieves anything that we were familiar with. Anything that felt normal and comfortable. Our loss of that, our lack of that, like our removal from that does feel like pain. Because it was still something that you relied upon, even if it was unreliable. This is not, this is again, not a sign that you should go back to this person. It is simply your body emotionally detoxing from a bond that had you addicted. We also have to appreciate the huge emotional and psychological draw of trauma bonds is how good they made you feel.

• 41:05Jemma Sbeg?

  And those times are not discounted by the bad times. You still lived both times equally. Both states of being in that relationship were ones that you experienced. But because the good times were contrasted with such powerful bad times, they do kind of feel more emotionally profound. That's why the first week, the first month after being like, I'm done with this, we're done. Can actually be really confusing and I feel like people need to prepare for that. Expect to not know how to feel, expect to not necessarily feel the elation you anticipated. Expect to question whether this version of reality um is one that you actually want. It is, trust me, you do want this version of reality. You've just got to get through this tiny period first.

• 41:50Jemma Sbeg?

  There's also this cognitive dissonance, like, why do I feel so devastated yet so loyal? How could I hate them so much and still care about them? Why do I feel like I'm to blame and yet I didn't do anything wrong? This is just your brain trying to regain its perspective. And trying to retell the story in a way that makes sense to you. After it's been dictated by somebody else for so, so very long. Whatever comes up for you, whatever like emerges.

• 42:26Jemma Sbeg?

  Guilt, shame, fear, anger, sadness. It is all just your mind suddenly coming up for air from this terrible situation. And suddenly encountering all these emotions that have been suppressed. And trying to make sense of them so that it can pursue closure, so that it can pursue emotional clarity. So that it can give this story some kind of ending. That shame, that guilt, that is not for you to bear, that is not your burden. It is purely your mind trying to find the appropriate emotional reaction and just drawing on anything it it can from the past that maybe slightly felt similar.

• 43:09Jemma Sbeg?

  That is not the correct emotion. Guilt and shame, they will come up. You did nothing wrong. You are not to blame for their behaviour. This is just physical and emotional withdrawal. This is again, you're just trying to make sense of it. They are probably not have going through the same things that you're going through because they do not have a conscience. They are probably not struggling in the same way that you are. They are not sitting here contemplating, did I do anything bad? Did I do what was right? Did I hurt this person? And that in itself is the sign that they were the one to blame in this relationship. Because the very fact that you are considering even that you have a role to play in this. Or considering that you, you know, should feel some guilt, should feel sorry for them, should feel some some shame.

• 43:53Jemma Sbeg?

  Shows that you are a much better person than this individual and shows that, again, you have a conscience, you have care. They do not have care. That is why they are not considering it in this perspective. That is why, and that is the clearest evidence that like they were the manipulator. They were the cruel person in this situation. I wanna take another short break here, um, so we can just really focus again on how to trust. How to feel, how to love, how to heal after these relationships, especially if you are encountering it or enduring it in your twenties. So stay with us, go get a cup of tea, we'll be right back after this short break.

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• 45:06Jemma Sbeg?

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• 45:51Jemma Sbeg?

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• 46:36Jemma Sbeg?

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• 46:48Jemma Sbeg?

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• 47:32Jemma Sbeg?

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• 48:16Jemma Sbeg?

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• 48:55Jemma Sbeg?

  So we did an episode a couple of weeks ago around how to experience healthy love after toxic love that I would highly recommend if you resonate with any of the things that we're talking about today. But I thought, you know, as we wrap up this episode, I would just give you guys like a little bit of a bite sized summary right here so that you just get like the key high line points for this journey and this like recovery that you're in. Recovering from a trauma bond is is never not complex, but one of the best things that you can do that I've heard from so many people is to find as many objective witnesses as possible. And not witnesses in like a legal sense, sometimes that is equally

• 49:35Jemma Sbeg?

  necessary, but I mean witnesses in the emotional sense. People who you can be truly open about your relationship with now that it's done, people who can and people who will confirm for you again and again, like, that's not love. That's not right. That person was bad. That was bad behavior. People do not do that. You need those kinds of emotional witnesses. I just finished reading Strangers by Belle Burden, which I think is an amazing memoir if you are going through this right now. And in her memoir, she basically details how her husband of 20 years, out of the blue, commits this terrible betrayal against her

• 50:18Jemma Sbeg?

  and takes no accountability, but also then like abandons her and like overnight, abandons their family and their children as like, I don't want, I don't want anything to do with this. And one of the most powerful things she talks about in this book is this moment when someone completely out of the situation, like outside of the situation, who really doesn't know them very well, kind of tangentially is like, that is bad. Like, no, whatever you are thinking, he shouldn't have done that. All your emotions about this are completely correct. And she just talks about it as this relief, this catharsis of like, finally, somebody outside of me and outside of us can tell me. This is what our pain often needs. It needs a witness.

• 51:00Jemma Sbeg?

  It needs somebody who will interrupt that self enforced gaslighting that sometimes lingers when somebody else has externally gaslit you for a while. We need somebody who's gonna be like, that was wrong. I can objectively, I don't have any skin in the game here. That person was bad. A therapist is obviously the best case scenario here. If you have access to that, or a counselor, or a psychiatrist, anybody who is trauma informed is incredible. But again, sometimes that's not accessible. Even just having friends, new systems of support, family members that you trust, who will recenter you with their honesty and with their honesty about like,

• 51:38Jemma Sbeg?

  about what they saw and what they know about love and why that situation wasn't love is extremely powerful. Especially because so much of your social life and emotional life has been wound up in this other person. It's gonna be so easy to feel like you should just retreat into your shell. Nobody wants to see your emotional wounds. I promise they do. I promise like people around you, especially after what you've been through, they want the opportunity to love you, to heal you, to be there for you. That is a language of love that many people speak. They will provide that for you. They wanna help you. Next, you need to restructure your beliefs. You might have deep rooted fears now that people will abandon you.

• 52:22Jemma Sbeg?

  You are unworthy of love, that you did something wrong. Again, not true. So it is so important to take a step back and challenge that negative self talk. That is not your voice. That is their voice. That is the voice they implanted in your mind. I need you to ask yourself, like, is that really true? Is that really true? Your brain will always focus on the most negative thought you have about yourself or about the situation or about the future of love in your life. Because, you know, it is the one that scares you the most. And therefore, it feels like the most important thought to interrogate and to ruminate on and to question and to solve. Or just to think about because it's so scary. You think if that one is true, we gotta really sort that out.

• 53:06Jemma Sbeg?

  It's that age old threat detection system we talk about on the podcast all the time. Our brain is constantly scanning, like, what is gonna take us down? Let's deal with that first. Thing is, that threat detection system has probably, again, become hijacked by this other person. Meaning your ability to dismiss your fears is harder because in the past, they made them come true for you. They knew what your fears were because they got you vulnerable and close. They made them come true. So anything that gives you cognitive distance, anything that lets you be the judge and jury of your thoughts, not just the person who feels persecuted by them, or who feels like these thoughts are dropped into your mind and you have to believe them, that is essential.

• 53:50Jemma Sbeg?

  This involves, or might involve for you, locking your thoughts, taking the false belief about whatever you're thinking, and providing all the evidence that it's not true. Providing or generating five alternatives, making art from your thoughts, expressing them like in a creative way. Maybe it involves reprogramming through gratitude, through therapy, whatever works for you. Know those thoughts are not your own. Find a way, find a practice that lets you look at that thought and kind of just examine it and not commit to it. And know that like your mind, as powerful as this other person probably was and definitely was in your life,

• 54:36Jemma Sbeg?

  you are equally as powerful in changing those false beliefs and changing those narratives that they have implanted in you. Cause now you get access to your brain all the time. You are in charge. Think of it like weeding your internal garden of like the invasive weeds and vines that they have planted. Think about like, visualize every time you take a negative thought, you identify it as a thought they have planted. You like, pull it out from its roots and you throw it away. You are cleaning up the garden, your garden. Finally, and obviously there's a lot more to talk about, but for this episode, finally, the most important thing you can do after a relationship ends, other than therapy, other than getting as much physical distance from that person as possible,

• 55:21Jemma Sbeg?

  is to work on creating a whole new universe of interests, people, weekend plans, evening rituals, creative rituals, practices, books, podcasts, favorite TV shows, that they have no connection to. They will never get to touch it. They have never heard about those parts of yourself. Because they're things that you only started doing after them. If this person was your whole world, it is time to create another planet of your personality that is just for yourself. They know nothing about this. This is all you. They will never, I just cannot express, anything that like you always wanted to do when you were with them and you never told them about, and you never tried, now is your time to do this.

• 56:06Jemma Sbeg?

  Now is your time to put yourself at the centre and to just completely replow and replant the garden. You have to forcefully dislodge them from your mind by pouring as much novelty, joy, newness as you can back into your life. I had a friend who left a relationship a couple of years back now, who, it was definitely a trauma bond. I think we always recognise that. She definitely does now. And she went and lived on a ranch for three months. Thankfully, she had the flexibility to do that. And when she ran into him, I can't remember when it was, like, a year later, he was like asking her about all these things that like she was doing.

• 56:52Jemma Sbeg?

  And she just like had this realisation of like, oh, you don't know anything about me anymore. Because I am not that person. I've completely recreated myself in my image, in the image of like, what is gonna make me happy? And I think after these kinds of bonds, whether they lasted for two months, two years, twenty years, like that is the most powerful thing you can do. Anything to separate your stories and to start essentially just like, yeah, re rewriting, rewriting, I should say, your own. So I think that is all we have time for. I could talk about this for so long. So if you have made it to the end of this episode, thank you and I hope you're doing okay.

• 57:33Jemma Sbeg?

  And I hope that this has been helpful for whatever situation you are in. I just, it's so difficult, whether you're trying to support a friend, whether you're trying to avoid this in your own life, whether you have been through this, like, this is one of the most awful, insidious kinds of relationships or bonds that somebody can form with another human. So you're incredibly brave. Hopefully now you are much more informed about what has gone on and what will, you know, what has gone on in your mind and in your body to make this kind of relationship so difficult to leave. And I'm just wishing you the best of luck and I'm wishing you so much healing and self-love and just like confidence going forward. And I just know that you are going to,

• 58:18Jemma Sbeg?

  yeah, replant your garden with the most beautiful flowers and in the most beautiful way. And you're going to create an incredible life for yourself that this terrible, tiny, toxic person can never touch. So thank you so much for listening. Thank you as always to our researcher Lucy Davidson. If you have made it this far and you are listening on Spotify, leave a little black heart in the comments below, just so I know that you are still listening. You can also follow us on Instagram at that psychology podcast. You can leave a five star review if you feel called to do so. You can follow us on Substack. There's so many things. Honestly, just check out the description of the episode and you can find all of our links to Netflix, to all that stuff, as well as, as I said, some further reading.

• 59:01Jemma Sbeg?

  If this episode really resonated with you, but as always, as we wrap up, and especially with this episode, be safe, be kind, be gentle to yourself. We will talk very, very soon.

• 59:20Jemma Sbeg?

  I've been approaching my health really differently this year. I used to be really focused on maximizing and doing more. And now I'm just realizing that if I listen to what my body needs, I perform way better. And that's why I am obsessed with my Whoop. Truly, you guys, you know, I'm such a data and information driven person. And I love opening my Whoop app and seeing how my sleep, my stress, my strain is correlating with my mood, with my running performance, with how I'm just feeling day to day. I'm not an elite athlete by any means, but I do really benefit. And I also just really enjoy knowing more about my body. And Whoop also gives me these actionable personalized insights that have made me more

• 1:00:04Jemma Sbeg?

  intentional and meant that I make smarter decisions day to day about what I need, rather than just putting my foot on the gas and just going, going, going, going. New members can try Whoop with a 30 day free trial before committing to a membership. That's join.whoop.com/psychology for your free month of Whoop. This episode is sponsored by Gymshark. Gymshark has spent over 14 years obsessing over gym clothing and the people who wear it. And let me just say, I think we all know, they are very, very good at what they do. No, seriously, their stuff is so good. Their everyday seamless collection is light, it's soft, it's stretchy. All of their stuff just looks

• 1:00:44Jemma Sbeg?

  good on. And it's made for people who love to exercise, whatever exercise that is, lifting, cardio, Pilates, running around campus, maybe just doing errands. Discover Gymshark and find your new favorite gym clothing at gymshark.com.

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