Disorganized attachment

I've been looking more into attachment styles lately. While I do have traits from all of them, and lack some of the more extreme reactive patterns often described, the disorganized attachment is the best fit. Disorganized attachment is also sometimes called fearful-avoidant. The parts that fit me the best are the zig-zag between "I don't have any needs" and "you should just KNOW what needs I have, I shouldn't have to tell you. I'm desperate to get my needs met!". This zig-zag is exhausting for my partner(s), and for me as well. 

This attachment style stems from a profound lack of self worth, and a firm conviction that I will be abandoned again. That I'm not worthy of love, and so every time someone loves me it's a misunderstanding, a sick joke or a very temporary state. That I can't trust anyone, ever, because they'll only hurt me if I do. 

This of course becomes both self-fulfilling and self-sabotaging. I get stressed out of my mind when someone actually seems to continue loving me. I can feel myself start trusting them, and that SCREAMS danger to me. I act more erratically, because I'm so scared, which leads people to leave me. (Or I break off the relationship before ever getting that far.) Thus proving my deepest set fears to be true: I'm fundamentally abandonable. 

Like all the insecure attachment styles, disorganized attachment is fundamentally ego-centric. I'm unable to separate my own self-worth from other people's behavior. The assumption is that when people behave badly towards me, it's my fault. I probably deserve it, caused it somehow. I can't seem to grasp that other people's behavior is a "them-problem". Something separate from my intrinsic value. 

I have this idea that if I focus on the one one I love, read their every signal, remember their quirks and preferences.. Just remain complacent, pleasant, please them, meet all their needs, am understanding and loving... Then I might, MIGHT be good enough. Might receive the same level of hyperfocused commitment back. I don't express my own needs, because that would be admitting I have any. That would mean I would have to make myself vulnerable. Show exactly how undeserving I am.  

So I suppress and ignore my own needs, until the emotional pressure becomes too high. Then I explode in overwhelming emotions, typically a combination of resentment ("why didn't they just UNDERSTAND what I needed without me having to state it?"), sorrow ("I'm not worthy of their attention anyway, I deserve not having any needs met") and fear ("please, please, please see me! love me! help me!"). This explosion probably seems very out of the blue for my partner, who hasn't been reading my mind and thus didn't know that I had any unmet needs to begin with. 

Once the pressure is released, the cycle can begin again. I grow extremely apologetic, because I know my extreme emotions are wrong, I know I shouldn't be feeling them to begin with. I'm fundamentally undeserving, so the audacity of trying to get my needs met is completely inappropriate! I go back to suppressing every need I'm able to suppress, begging my partner to ignore my emotional outburst. Hoping everything will be better if I just gain better control of myself. If I just STOP feeling so strongly. 

There's a cycle of shame here which is REALLY damaging. I clearly see it, now that I'm writing about it. Feelings are fundamentally unsupressable. They WILL eventually leak out, and if you try to suppress them they'll just grow stronger and more damaging in the process. Not allowing oneself to feel, is one of the primary ways to get depression after all. I KNOW this. Logically, I know this.

There is a way out, I think... 

1. I have to express my needs, BEFORE they become a raging bonfire. Meaning I need to FEEL my needs, way, way, way before that point. So I need to get better at introspection. 
2. I also have to separate my own self-worth from other people's behavior. 
3. And thirdly, I need to trust. Knowing I can be betrayed, knowing I can be abandoned. Trust that if Novice says she loves me, that's actually true. That she knows her own mind, she can judge if she wants to give her love to me or not. And she chooses me, actively. It might not last forever, she might eventually abandon me, true. But that doesn't change the NOW. And right now, she loves me.

I have absolutely no idea how to work on the second and third points on that list. I can intellectualize this until the cows come home, that won't change how I fundamentally feel about myself or my own self-worth. So since I have no idea how to work on number 2 or 3, guess I'll have to start on the top of the list; Mindfulness, a compassionate attentiveness to my own bodily reactions and emotional state. That's a place to start. 

I'll probably spend the rest of my life untangling this mess. This isn't a quick process, but it's necessary. 

You will be warm again

The title is a quote from "Rythm of War" by Brandon Sanderson, and it's spoken to a character who struggles with trauma and reoccurring depressive episodes. It speaks of hope. Yes, things might be bleak, but it gets better. 

This winter has been hard for me, on many levels. I've been pretty much exhausted since my top surgery in mid September. December was also really stressful, and since then it feels like I haven't been able to get my head above water. Sickness, mental fatigue, drama online, another hater I had to report to the police (marking the 7th such hater in under a year), sick kids, uncertainty with regards to work and my own future, financial worries etc. 

In addition, Novice gradually withdrew from me more and more, and since New Years' we almost didn't touch each other. She wouldn't let me touch her, not even in completely non-sexual ways. I didn't understand why, I don't think she did completely either. The lack of physical touch became a real problem for me. I just wanted to hold her and be held. I missed it so much. Missed her. We almost weren't talking either, not like we used to. It scared me. 

Now, suddenly, it's better. We're cuddling again, and talking. Having proper, long conversations, without fighting or her completely dissociating. It feels amazing. I feel like I've gotten my girlfriend back. She's been a rolled up armadillo, looking and behaving like a scared rock, for so long... Seeing her unfurl herself, look at me, smile... Hearing her say she wants to be with me, loves me, enjoys our time together, believes in a future together...

It's a balm on my scared, battered and very overwhelmed mind. It made me incredibly happy.

The scary part is that I have no idea what caused that withdrawing in the first place, and I have no idea why she's suddenly coming back more now. So I won't be able to stop it happening again, nor fix it if it does.

It's March now, the first month of spring. Outside, the snow is thawing and the sun is shining. This winter has been long, and hard, and cold. But I have hope. We will figure this out. I will be warm again. We will be warm again.