Healing Attachment Wounds: Internal Family Systems

I have always had attachment issues, from a very very young age. My mother says that I absolutely could not be alone as a child and I constantly needed to have someone with me, playing with me. I was extremely jealous when my sister was born because my parents no longer had as much time to spend with me. As I got older, I would repeatedly cling to one single friend and depend on that person for a sense of security. We would become attached at the hip and I would feel abandoned if that person became closer with someone else. As I got even older, this turned into needing a relationship all the time in order to feel whole. It’s been a lifelong journey of needing others, attaching to others….even if those people were terrible for me and caused me mental anguish. Apparently the mental anguish was better than being alone. 

After my divorce 4 years ago, my attachment issues got exponentially worse. I felt so devastated and alone that I grasped onto anything I could get when it came to human connection. I was addicted to finding someone that would fix my broken heart, but no one was able to do that. No one could do that but ME.

After a series of toxic relationships and mental health breakdowns, I finally took charge and decided I just couldnt live that way any longer. I began seeing a psychiatrist who diagnosed me with a variety of things and got me on appropriate medication. This began to help, but I still felt a strong need for others and depended on them for my sense of well being. 

My mother has been in therapy for many many years and recommended that I try something called IFS (Internal Family Systems). At this point I was willing to try anything and by a twist of fate, an incredible woman in Moab provided that method of therapy and she also took my insurance, which was one of the biggest hurdles for me in getting the help that I needed. I’ve been going for about 6 months now and I am absolutely astounded at the change within me. 

IFS addresses issues from your childhood, specific events that shape and form who you are. You go back in time, in a bit of a meditative state, and you talk to your former self. You learn more about that person and why they felt the way they felt. You learn about why you may have developed specific patterns, and how to nurture all of the different parts of yourself. It’s self love, acceptance and understanding of why you have become who you are today. 

After addressing the events that shaped me, I can't explain how different I feel. For the first time in my life, I feel like I truly do not need a relationship. I don't want or need someone else in my space all the time. I like me. I am looking out for me. I look in the mirror and I love me. I've been going on dates but I leave feeling overwhelmed and just want to be alone. Alone! It’s actually one of the wildest experiences, to change so drastically that I’m not quite sure how to process it yet. It’s both confusion and pure joy at the same time. 

This post is not only for me to express what I’ve been through, but hopefully to let others know that it is possible to heal. It takes work, the desire to change and the hope that it’ll happen. I am beside myself with gratitude for how far I have come, for the practitioners who have helped me and for my own willingness and strength to get through it all. Mental health is something that we all struggle with in some way or another and is part of the human condition. I’ve decided to let go of any shame associated with that, and you should too. We’re all in this together and I’m rooting for anyone who is on this journey. You can do this. So much love!! 💜

Things won't change until you learn the lesson

When it's time for you to learn a specific lesson, the universe will provide you with every opportunity to master it. I never really understood this concept. When the same circumstances would happen over and over again in my life, I would get angry, complain, and act like a victim. I would feel like nothing was going right for me and that I had no control over this. Somehow, over the past year, I've realized that until we master a specific lesson, the circumstances will not stop. It is our changed behavior that matters.

My most recent lesson has been standing up for myself and not allowing others to treat me poorly. So, the universe has provided me with countless people and situations where I can practice my responses. I will not name names because that is absolutely not the point here at all; the point is how I have evolved and how freaking proud I am of myself.

In the past, I would have let the following things slide. I would have accepted the treatment and continued to allow these people to exist within my life for fear of upsetting them. With practice, I am now able to release people while standing up for how I deserve to be treated. All of these things have happened within the past year and here is how I responded:

1) Someone close to me judged me, talked behind my back and was not there for me when I was in the deepest, darkest depression of my life; someone that I have always been there for during their darkest times. They compared my difficult circumstances to their own, claiming theirs had been worse and that I was overreacting to my situation. I had been accepting this kind of treatment from them for a very long time. Instead of continuing to accept it, I released them from my life.

2) Someone I was dating and living with last year was verbally and emotionally abusing me. In the past, I would have continued to suffer because I didn't believe I deserved better. I would have also stayed, believing that I could fix the person and help them to understand their behavior and grow. This time, I packed my things, left, and saved myself from any more pain.

3) The most long term partner in my life told someone that was interested in dating me that I am "just your typical Moab girl with nothing going on". When I heard about this comment, it was like a stab to the heart. So, I confronted them about it and released them from my life.

4) I have been cat sitting for someone for the past few months. One of the cats that this person had rescued had a 3rd degree burn on its neck. The owner was cutting socks to cover the burn but the socks did not actually cover it, so the cat was scratching the wound down to the muscle. I told the owner I would be happy to bandage the cat in a different way so that it could heal and he said that was fine. Somehow, he began to get upset with me (I think it was his ego stepping in) and started to treat me poorly because I wasn't using the socks that he had cut. He told me that I would have to purchase supplies myself to take care of the burn. He began sending passive aggressive messages and treating me like I was doing something wrong by helping the cat. I told him that I genuinely cared for the cat, but that didn't want to be talked to that way and that he could find a new cat sitter.

4) Someone that I have known for a long time was interested in dating me and pursued me for a month and a half, from a distance, while he was traveling. He texted me morning and night, bought me presents, talked about future plans, started to call me his girlfriend and even sent me money to get my passport so that I could travel with him. When he got back from his travels and things were going well, 5 days in he told me he wasn't sure if he wanted a relationship due to his travels, that he needed time to think and that he was having a mid-life crisis. In the past I would have fought for the relationship and tried to prove my worth. Instead, I released him from my life and wished him well.

6) Someone that I know recently decided to tell me that I am fatter than I used to be. In the past, I would have been heartbroken and felt like crap about myself. Now, I ignored it and next time I see this person I am going to tell them how inappropriate it is to talk about other people's bodies. Also, it didn't emotionally affect me. I love my body.

7) A customer who had come into the restaurant drunk decided to tip me zero dollars the other day (after I heard him tell his wife that he had tipped me $12). I walked up to the table and asked if he had meant to leave me nothing and if there was something I could have done better. He said "well yeah, we never saw you" in slurred speech. The wife was stunned and later came up to me with money, apologizing. In the past, I would have ignored this and sulked about it. Instead, I said something.

These were ALL tests.....were the people involved happy with me? Absolutely not. But, I think I passed with flying colors.