Attachment to Trauma and Toxic Relationships

'Trauma bond' has become a buzz term recently, but rarely does one truly understand what it means. Engaging in toxic relationships—not necessarily only romantic ones—or having issues with maintaining long-term relationships has been one of the prevailing issues that clients bring to psychotherapy.

But why do people engage in toxic relationships? Why are we programmed to live lives of misery and unhappiness? Why can some not find a long-lasting romantic partner? And what does it all have to do with childhood trauma?

Attachment to early life trauma and the re-enactment of such attachment in adult life may shed some light on the issue.

How Trauma Affects the Perception of Self and Others

Firstly, when we talk about trauma, we need to distinguish between childhood trauma (also known as early-life, attachment, or relational trauma) and trauma that may occur later in life, such as the death of a loved one, serious injury, violence, or torture. Childhood trauma, unlike later-life trauma, can affect personality formation, contributing to an individual's presenting issues and interpersonal difficulties. This is especially true for relational or attachment trauma, which occurs as a traumatic experience for the child in their relationship with a parent. Therefore, I will limit myself to discussing childhood trauma because its psychological impact differs from later-life trauma, which can result in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

I wrote more about the internalisation of the child's perception of badness elsewhere. However, for the purpose of this topic, let's go through the process again with a somewhat different lens.

A child who is a victim of an adverse experience with their parent will likely internalise the perception they have of that experience—both their self-perception, which is usually 'bad', and their perception of their parent.

For instance, a person growing up with a dependent parent who smothered them, engulfed them, and expected the child to soothe the parent's distress, may become someone who tends to please people. In the absence of others' needs, they may feel lost, empty, and purposeless. Due to their early life experience with a dependent parent, they often engage in relationships with people who are needy and entitled, expecting others to meet their needs. However, rather than seeing their romantic partners as needy and entitled, they tend to view themselves as selfish if they do not attend to others' needs and feel guilty for it. This causes them to engage in relationships where they are hostages to others, at the detriment of taking care of themselves.

Another example: A person who grew up with a controlling parent may develop a deep-seated perception of themselves as incompetent, inept, and powerless. In adult relationships, they may unconsciously seek out individuals who are controlling. Although they may resent their partner's control, they still see it as a reflection of love or care. In the absence of control from their partner, they may feel unseen and fear abandonment. Thus, the controlling partner is not seen as controlling or insecure but may be perceived as loving.

What we often see as well is that individuals who experienced controlling and punitive parenting as children may, rather than finding a controlling partner, continuously engage in romantic relationships with partners they perceive as dependent, needy, and powerless. These individuals search for an antithesis of their parent in their romantic partner and often end up feeling unfulfilled, unseen, and resentful for having to take care of their partner while they themselves remain in need of fulfilment in life.

Attachment to Trauma

How do early experiences and perceptions of self and others develop into an attachment to trauma?

Initially, attachment to trauma may seem like a narrow and isolated issue. However, in clinical psychotherapy settings, the majority of clients present with issues that, to some extent, relate to attachment to trauma or other subtle early life adverse experiences, often re-enacting these experiences in their present lives.

For instance, a child who grew up soothing conflicts between her parents may remain attached to them as their caretaker and mediator, unable to fully attend to her own partner and children, and instead focused on her family of origin. Similarly, a child who grew up with an alcoholic mother, taking care of her practically and emotionally, may develop a sense of purpose in attending to others' needs, fearing abandonment and loss of identity if they ever stop pleasing others.

Thus, attachment to trauma is an internal, mainly unconscious, emotional attachment to past traumatic experiences that forms a part of a person's identity. This attachment is not only internal but also gets re-enacted and reaffirmed in relationships (or the lack thereof). We have a tendency to engage in relationships where we can play out our past dramas without even knowing it.

Some Variations of Attachment to Trauma

The Hostage of the Past

Consider a successful professional in her thirties who is married and has three young children. She feels consistently discontent and searches for something more to fulfill her. Her husband is emotionally unavailable and disengaged from the relationship, having given up on it a long time ago. Her role as a mother is not enough for her. She needs more. She seeks meaning. When asked what ‘more’ means, she doesn't know; she just knows she is unfulfilled. She needs fulfillment, a spark, a sense of purpose. She turns to her career but also finds some comfort in her codependent mother, soothing her and taking care of her needs. Although she feels exhausted, depleted, and resentful for doing it, she cannot refrain from it—guilt, a perception of being selfish and 'bad,' and a fear of total abandonment if she does not comply keep her hostage to her mother.

What she is completely unaware of is that her life is a re-enactment of her childhood. As a child, she was smothered by her mother's needs, having to give up on herself. Within her family, she was only seen when she performed—solving other people's problems, taking care of others, and keeping her issues to herself. This created a sense of emptiness and tied her worth to pleasing others. The only way she could escape meaninglessness, purposelessness, mediocrity, boredom, and complete directionlessness was by following her fantasy of being a saviour to others and achieving unlimited success for herself. To escape the pull to continuously meet others' needs, she found a romantic partner who seemingly had no needs, was aloof, and disinterested in the relationship. This freed her from the burden of taking care of others but also evoked a sense of emptiness, loneliness, and not being seen, which she escaped by 'performing' in her career.

She remains a hostage of the past, unconsciously engaging in relationships where her needs are unimportant and she is left unseen. She harbors an unconscious fantasy that by meeting the needs of others—predominantly her family of origin—and excelling in her career, she will attain a sense of fulfillment and meaning in her life. She dwells on her childhood, feels like a child, continues to run to her mother, and struggles to engage with her adult life and responsibilities. The realms of her past do not let her go, just as her mother could not bear her growing up and 'abandoning' her.

Attachment to Overt Trauma and Abuse

Some may find it hard to understand a person who continuously re-engages in abusive relationships, one after another. They may find it even harder to understand someone who spends years in a relationship that is continuously abusive, even violent. However, attachment to trauma, along with an attachment to an unconscious fantasy, often keeps one trapped in such relationships.

What those who attempt to act as saviours often do not realise is that for the individual attached to trauma, the abuse is preferred to what they unconsciously perceive as the alternative. And the alternative is not a life of peace and freedom but rather one of abandonment, rejection, fragmentation, emptiness, experiencing oneself as bad, unworthy, lost, confused, and alone. Thus, a person who re-enacts their early life trauma in their romantic relationship attempts to unconsciously escape these negative feelings by enduring abuse.

How does childhood trauma and abuse contribute to the higher probability of engaging in abusive relationships in adulthood?

The abuse causes the child to internalise a perception of themselves as 'bad' in order to perceive their parent as 'good'. The child blames themselves for the abuse and dedicates every effort to appease the parent by changing into 'the good child'. In the process, the child develops an internal experience of emptiness, filled through their attempt to reach their fantasy—the fantasy of pleasing their parent to the extent that the parent will turn into the ideal, all-gratifying, accepting other who will see, recognise, and meet their needs.

And why does the victim not find an accepting partner in the first place? This might seem an intuitive question, but for someone who endured childhood abuse, which normally resulted in a sense of inherent 'badness', finding a partner who cannot be 'controlled' through pleasing—a partner who remains in the relationship because they want to and love the individual—is an ultimate terror. A healthy partner cannot be kept in the relationship by pleasing but is rather in it because they want to be. This results in the person fearing abandonment and experiencing a sense of lacking control of the relationship, which is too anxiety-provoking.

To conclude, continuously engaging in toxic relationships that are unfulfilling or abusive may be an unconscious reenactment of a person's attachment to their own childhood trauma and their attempt to resolve it without realising. In psychotherapy, to achieve a long-lasting resolution, it is important to address the individual's underlying attachment to trauma rather than trying to influence their toxic relationships directly.

Ales Zivkovic, MSc (TA Psych), CTA(P), PTSTA(P), Psychotherapist, Counsellor, Supervisor

Ales Zivkovic is a psychotherapist, counsellor, and clinical supervisor. He holds an MSc in Transactional Analysis Psychotherapy awarded by Middlesex University in London, UK. He is also a Provisional Teaching and Supervising Transactional Analyst (PTSTA-P) and a Certified Transactional Analyst in the field of Psychotherapy (CTA-P). Ales gained extensive experience during his work with individuals and groups in the UK National Health Service (NHS) and his private psychotherapy, counselling, and clinical supervision practice in central London, UK. He was also a member of the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP). Ales works with individuals, couples, and groups. In clinical setting, he especially focuses on the treatment of issues of childhood trauma, personality disorders, and relationship issues. A large proportion of his practice involves online psychotherapy as he works with clients from all over the world. Ales developed a distinct psychotherapeutic approach called interpretive dynamic transactional analysis psychotherapy (IDTAP). More about Ales, as well as how to reach him, can be found here.