Attachment And Touch

[EvenStrongerNow]

@Hope4Now , maybe you are an extreme introvert. Nothing wrong with that. And maybe physical touch is your primary love language. Also nothing wrong with that.

Also though, your experience as a child is pretty profound. Maybe practicing safe touch with someone you trust is a good way to find a balance?

Your compelling need is not weird at all. Now that I've re-read your original post, I can totally relate. We all have a need to be touched safely. It's a basic human need. There are tons of articles on the subject if you google basic needs of a child or basic human needs. Maybe reading them will assist you in your recovery.

[DLMURL]http://www.nspcc.org.uk/Inform/resourcesforprofessionals/neglect/childs-needs_wda91849.html[/DLMURL]

 

[Hope4Now]

@fly away home I agree. Touch from certain people (like my mother...the adoptive one) is not good. But I too crave touch from some emotionally accepting people. It is such an odd thing to feel this because I also have trouble trusting people. And it is so socially unacceptable generally for adults to be in close physical contact unless they're partners of some sort. Very hard.

@EvenStrongerNow I'm not sure what you mean by "primary love language." If you mean that it is how I feel loved and accepted, maybe you're right. And also how I show love. But as @Pencil said earlier in this thread, it is much deeper and more complicated than that. It is like some primal need that goes beyond just hugs or handshakes. It's like the need to be held close for long periods of time so that I can relax and connect with something in myself that isn't usually accessible to me.

I'm starting to accept that perhaps my experiences as a child were pretty traumatic. I have mostly dismissed my experiences until fairly recently. I'll check out the link you posted.

 

[Deleted member 24866]

Look forward to reading the above article. Safe touch.. hmmm. Yes, I recognize my need for it as I have been somewhat reliant on it to maintain sanity. Kinda an adult topic- but have discussed it with my significant other, and in the past felt severely manipulated through its denial. But the past is that and we learn and grow.. I recognize, I am somewhat reliant.. I can not give myself what he gives me. yet.. but darn it I am aiming to try. ;) (yes.. its doubtful it will ever be the same.. but I don't need the external control in my life. ((I know your not talking about sex per se.. but I have a hard time separating it sometimes ..??.. )) I would have a hard time hugging my therapist.. I have a hard time hugging parents/and siblings.. and I am generally not a touchy feely person.

People creep me out.. I had a friend who would hug and thrust his pelvis into you.. yuck.. Being close to people is creepy for me mostly, like a roommate had a party and they were doing ballroom dancing (he was an instructor) So I got a lesson from some dude double my age- he was telling me how to do it, stand up straight, look into my eyes, smile.. then after he started asking if I wanted to cuddle.. YIKES! what the hell is wrong with people. Like I said- a cave sounds nice right now.

I guess sparring (as in mock fighting) does not or does it count as safe touch? (problem there going on 40, and I freaking injured myself doing yoga.. argh. Guess martial arts is out of the question. Back to the drawing board... yeh, and I have already gotten 2 bones broken sparring also..yeh,maybe not safe.. :( Good food for thought.

 

[Hope4Now]

@Solara I looked up attachment disorder criteria. I don't think that's me. I'm just really needy in terms of wanting to be close and connected to people, but then sort of freaking out and not trusting enough to show my real self (whatever that is). I feel very alone in the world although I am surrounded by friends and family.

I WANT attachment. I look for deep connection, but so many people only connect on the superficial level. In fact, I'm already "attached" to some of the folks in this forum! I am a sucker for honest emotional sharing and compassion and connection. It is just so hard to find!

And that doesn't even get to the issue of physical closeness. Something about being in safe physical contact with someone I sense is emotionally accepting of me is incredibly healing, and it seems to open some closed doors in me so that I get out of my cognitive head and into a softer, gentler emotional place. Here's an example that is maybe what @EvenStrongerNow meant by saying touch is my love language. I went to my church by myself around a month ago. I must have been exuding vulnerable energy or something, but one of my friends and his husband invited me to sit with them. It made me feel really good because I generally assume that nobody really cares about me. Tommy then asked how I was doing. I told him not too well. Anyway, he ended up holding my hand for a while. It made me tear up I was so grateful. Then I got nervous that his husband would think it was weird or be jealous so I pulled my hand away and felt very sad. (Yes, I know, LOL...why would a gay man be jealous of his husband holding the hand of a heterosexual married woman...but that's how my mind works...always second guessing!)

But that example is different from the deeper and more compelling desire that led me to start this thread. Or, maybe it is just one end of the continnuum of touch needs.

@soulsearcher I hear you. I want hugs and holding and someone telling me that I am safe and going to be okay.

 

[Hope4Now]

((I know your not talking about sex per se.. but I have a hard time separating it sometimes ..??.. ))

No, I'm not talking about sex, although I get how it gets mixed up. It was really mixed up for me for a long time and I had some difficult relationships because of it with me looking for one thing and him looking for something else. Unsatisfying for both parties.

You might be interested in the article. It is really long, but gets at some interesting stuff. I don't know what your history is, but so many people who have been abused are freaked out by touch. The article talks about healing touch for two types of trauma--trauma by omission (neglect/abandonment) and trauma by commission (physical and/or sexual abuse).

 

[EvenStrongerNow]

@Hope4Now, there is an awesome book by Pete Walker I recommend putting in your library either on your bookshelf at home or on Kindle: Dead Link Removed

It has chapters about attachment, about the inner critic, etc. There is so much amazing stuff in it. I just purchased the Kindle edition and am reading it. I don't have CPTSD that I know of, but because of the neglect and abuse I suffered as a kid, I do relate to it so much.

It's an excellent book!

 

[Hope4Now]

it is much more than that. It is mixed with fear, shame, longing. I can do 'normal' affection. I can't do 'this' type of touch - and I can't describe it. What I can say is - with a specific kind of touch I go very, very deep inside where I am intact. Normal affection could never let me go there - it is almost as if I 'give up' myself, or part of myself.

If I'm posting too much on this, someone please let me know. I'm just trying to understand and perhaps feel less like I am the only one who feels this way. @Pencil, I am the same way--I can do 'normal' affection. It's nice but doesn't help heal me. Then there's the next level like I described when my friend held my hand. Or last weekend when another friend came to my house to find me because I didn't show up at a place where I was expected. He took one look at me and held me in a really long hug that was lovely.
But that still doesn't get to what I need.

The article you posted said: "When a client has regressed to earlier years, very often they are greeted with a ‘psychological wasteland’ – deprived of love, touch and empathy and possibly filled with neglect and damage. Without nurture, the central nervous system is wide open to feel pain. Direct touch can be called for, where the client is ‘held’ in close physical contact for long periods of time – as you would a child in pain." This is, I guess, what I'm wishing for--I guess it comes from a deep need to heal my primal physical abandonment by my birth mother and my emotional abandonment by my narcissistic (both) & alcoholic (one) parents. Talking with people only goes so far. And at the moment, the only way I can get what I need is to imagine it...the same way I have been doing since I was very, very young.

 

[EvenStrongerNow]

Hm, and after reading this, [DLMURL]https://www.myptsd.com/c/articles/complex-posttraumatic-stress-disorder.5/[/DLMURL], it seems complex symptoms have now been included in the PTSD diagnosis in the DSM

Sorry for hijacking. I just wanted to make educated replies and I saw an error in my last.

 

[Pencil]

The desire is overwhelming. These are usually emotionally accepting people. Then others I shudder at the thought.

Same here. As a rule I hate it when people touch me. 'Meaningless' touch bounces around on the surface and can easily make me aggressive. The 'right' touch goes very deep. But the right touch is very hard to obtain.

 

[Pencil]

is different from the deeper and more compelling desire

I get it. And I know from (bitter) experience that it's impossible to explain to people who don't have the same issue.

If I'm posting too much on this, someone please let me know.

Please don't stop! At last I have someone I can talk to about this!

maybe it is just one end of the continnuum of touch needs.

No! I firmly believe it is something different - perhaps due to:

trauma by omission (neglect/abandonment) and trauma by commission (physical and/or sexual abuse).

With trauma of commission, touch - for the person who wants or needs it - can be comforting, safe, reassuring, etc. With trauma of omission it goes WAY beyond that. When I spoke about this to my almost-therapist, who suggested massage (to which I nearly exploded), I compared it to a car: therapy is like mechanical work, massage is like panel beating, while what I'm talking about is like auto-electrical work. Only later did I read that touch (and therefore lack of touch) affects the brain in profound ways. While being held in that specific way specific things actually, actively happen to your brain - things that should have happened but never did . Let me know if you want me to post you a link. I told the therapist that there will, in time, be a term / diagnosis for people like me / us.

This is why I get a little hysterical when people still extol the wonders of talk therapy. Talk therapy can only go so far and it can never reach me where I need to be reached. And this is why I get really hysterical when people tell me to 'self-care' / mother myself. To me that is like a blood transfusion with your own blood, or being your own kidney donor.

And at the moment, the only way I can get what I need is to imagine it...the same way I have been doing since I was very, very young

Pleased to meet you - you are the only person I've ever come across with whom I share this. There might be other people on the forum who relate - this is not something people would readily admit to. I only told the therapist about this very recently - and that was the first time ever I told anyone.

I started a thread on this topic shortly after joining this forum

https://www.myptsd.com/threads/touch-physical-holding.28941/

I really admire your honesty and openness about this issue.

 

[Hashi]

@Pencil, believe it or not this is what I was getting at in your other thread when I talked about transformation in the present rather than working on the issues as they were in the past. It's also why I was reluctant to give examples of what that meant for me, because I think we're very different. I would run a mile from this sort of stuff, for example, but it sounds like something you want to run towards.

Only later did I read that touch (and therefore lack of touch) affects the brain in profound ways. While being held in that specific way specific things actually, actively happen to your brain - things that should have happened but never did

This is what I mean by alchemy. Something that transforms stuck issues instead of endlessly trying to work through them.

For some people, work on reparenting/parenting ourselves might actually be alchemy. It might cut through things and take them directly where they need to be.

For others, like me, work on reparenting/parenting ourselves would be a long and distressing endeavour and might never take them very far. Not to mention the side effects.

I don't mean no-one should ever talk or think through anything. I think that definitely has a place, and it has been very important to me. But that only does so much, and only so quickly.

With many things, I could talk for months in therapy working through my feelings about X and not get very far. Or I could do a collage to express X and doing that can release something and rewire a part of my brain almost overnight. Or I can do several collages over a period of time and each one can release and rewire more. The important thing is that it's effective and continuous.

My question is - what action are you now taking towards this?

 

[Hashi]

Oh gosh, Hope4Now, I've just realised that this is your thread not Pencil's. I've replied as a continuation of a discussion in one of her threads. Sorry, I didn't mean to take it off course. I'm going to copy my post above into Pencil's own thread and ask her to continue that discussion there if she wants to.

So please consider it removed from this particular thread! Sorry.