WHOOP Podcast - Attachment Theory: Break Down a Healthy Relationship with Couples Therapist Julie Menanno

Episode Date: July 3, 2024

On this week’s episode WHOOP Global Head of Human Performance, Principal Scientist Kristen Holmes is joined by Julie Menanno. The licensed marriage and family therapist specializes in Emotionally Focused Therapy for couples. She’s the author of the book, Secure Love, which helps couples create lasting relationships. Additionally, she founded and runs the Bozeman Therapy & Counseling clinic, and The Secure Relationship Coaching. Kristen and Julie discuss how Julie started working with couples (2:15), couples therapy vs individual therapy (5:45), finding optimism in couples therapy (8:04), characteristics of a healthy relationship (11:11), emotionally focused therapy (14:15), the four attachment styles (18:06), practicing secure love (38:27), red flags in a relationship (43:47), and the organization of Julie’s book (48:42).Resources:Julie Menanno’s WebsiteJulie Menanno’s InstagramThe Secure Love PodcastJulie’s Articles on Disorganized Attachment TheoryFollow WHOOPwww.whoop.comTrial WHOOP for FreeInstagramXFacebookLinkedInFollow Will AhmedInstagramXLinkedInFollow Kristen HolmesInstagramLinkedInSupport the showFollow WHOOP: www.whoop.com Trial WHOOP for Free Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

Hello, folks. Welcome back to the WOOP podcast. I'm your host, Will Ahmed, founder and CEO of WOOP. We're on a mission to unlock human performance. If you're thinking about joining Woop, you can visit Woop.com. Sign up for a free 30-day trial. That's a pretty good deal. On this week's episode, Woop Global Head of Human Performance, the principal scientist, Kristen Holmes, is joined by Julie Manano, the licensed

marriage and family therapist specializes an emotionally focused therapy for couples. She's the author of the book Secure Love, which helps create lasting relationships. She also provides insight and advice for couples at The Secure Relationship on Instagram, which has over a million followers. Additionally, she founded and runs the Bozeman Therapy and Counseling Clinic and the Secure Relationship Coaching. Kristen and Julie discussed, Julie's work as a couple's therapist, the characteristics of a healthy relationship, the framework of emotionally focused therapy,

EFT, attachment theory, and the four attachment styles, what a secure relationship looks like, and takeaways from Julie's book, Secure Love. If you have a question was answered on the podcast, email us, podcast woof.com. Call us 508-443434952. Here are Kristen Holmes and Julie Manana. Julie, welcome to the Whoop podcast. Thank you for having me. I'm super excited.

Yeah, so pumped to have this conversation. You have written a sensational book called Secure Love. I have to admit that I've only kind of read about attachment styles and kind of theory and, you know, I'm very much a novice. So I'm so excited about this conversation to learn more. I think what's so cool, Julie, is that you have, I mean, just thousands of thousands of repetitions with clients, you know, helping them understand how to communicate better, how to use this framework of attachment style to build their language and your skills as couples. Maybe you start. I loved in the introduction of your book where you kind of, you had no desire to work with couples. Yeah. What was that moment

where you were like, I want to work with couples? How did that happen? You know, I'm kind of, well, so the moment was I had to work with some couples to get my licensure because you have to, you know, have experience with different populations to earn your hours after grad school to get the full license. And so I saw the first couple and I thought, well, this is really hard. And which is I love hard. I love challenge. And so I realized there could be some potential here for doing some really cool psychotherapy. But in a way that's also very, it's almost like emotional. Like I don't want to say this as a way to dismiss people's feelings. because I absolutely honor people and their emotional experiences they bring to me.

But it's almost like playing chess because you're having to be so strategic because, you know, one person in a room is very, very manageable to contain. But when you're trying to contain two people plus their relationship, it just felt like, wow, this could be really fun, you know, fun work and very impactful work at the same time. And so I just immediately, you know, if some things, challenge for me that I want to do. I don't waste time. I'll figure out how they go find a way to learn it. I got on the computer, found the first training for emotionally focused therapy for couples that I do. And it happened to be in Montana, the first place in the country that they were

doing it from that point that day, I think it was the following week or something. I could have just stayed in L.A. where I lived at the time and done it like a month later in Pasadena with Sue Johnson, who is the, you know, guru of this work. But I couldn't wait. I had to go do it. So I went and I have, you know, I never took another client on after that as an individual. It was just all couples after that. And, you know, what it really is for me is a couple things. One, it's just, you know, the actual active strategic operating the session, you know, it's just so, so active and fulfilling. And then the emotional part is just so beautiful, just seeing these people go through these bonding experiences and really getting to dive into someone's world that you really get to

see in its rawest form in the context of, you know, their relationship. And then the third and probably biggest piece is I'm leaving my clients with a bond in their real life. That feels very, very important to me that, you know, we're not doing this work. And I am a huge fan of all types of therapy, including individual therapy. But for me, it feels just extra fulfilling to be able to send them out into the real world with the work that we're doing in the room. I love that. One of the things you talk about in the book that I think is really interesting is, you know, sometimes this whole notion of therapy can be, you know, really triggering it in itself. Yeah. How do you think about that, right? As someone who's, you know, kind of just

in the spirit of starting at the beginning, you know, if someone, if a couple or an individual wants to make improvements in the relationship, let's say. And I think oftentimes we think, you know, I'm the problem or I need to fix myself. And there's, to your point, there is a place, of course, for individual therapy. But it seems that coming to a session, you know, with your partner to be able to be in the same room together seems like a more efficient path in some ways. But how do you advise, how do you know when to kind of come at the therapy as a couple versus as an individual.

Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, I would probably, if someone is in a relationship and they have access to really high-quality couples' work, I would recommend that they go that route because high-quality couples' work is every bit as much individual work as it is couples' work. There's some nuance to that. I mean, if someone comes to me and they're really struggling with like a substance abuse issue or serious depression or just a really hard time with self-regulation, like so, so hard that they're actually not able to really participate in the couple's work, which is, it doesn't

happen a lot, but it does happen. Then that person really need, they do need to go get some individual work because they can't fully participate in the couple's work if they're not in, you know, a wise mind, regulated mind window of tolerance for the most part. Nobody's ever completely in their window of tolerance in couples work. that's part of the work, is getting the couples, you know, able to co-regulate each other into that place. But so I think that, you know, for most people, good couples work, given that it is quality and the couples therapist knows what they're doing, it is probably more effective

because your stuff is alive. You know, it's much harder to bring things to life when you're not in the moment of the trigger. So, you know, couples are triggering each other left and right. in the sessions, they start talking about an issue. And so I'm just diving into those triggers and working with them real time. And the most, you know, usually for most people, the most painful stuff that they have to bring to the table is their relationship stuff to begin with. Yeah. Yeah. So let's say, and you mentioned this in the book and, you know, I think oftentimes, you know, you go to couples therapy, then folks get divorced, right? Like, you know, like couples therapy doesn't seem to end very well for couples in that they don't stay together. So, and, you know,

the data around that is kind of interesting. So how do you, how do you answer that? Is the goal to keep folks together? Is the goal to, you know, how do you think about compatibility versus like, you know, just communication issues? You know, it's like, it's obviously there's a lot to unpack there. But yeah, yeah, just curious like at the start, like how do you frame it in a way that's, that's optimistic, you know. Yeah, that's a great question. I mean, I'm really clear. First of all, couples therapy historically does have a very bad track record. You know, I remember in 2000-ish, you know, early 2000s reading an article about how couples therapy statistically leads to more divorce. And I think that there's something to be said for differentiating couples therapy

from really high-quality couples therapy. I mean, couples therapy is, it is a very tricky subject because poor couples therapy is only going to make things worse because the poor couples therapy is only going to be reinforcing the problem in the room, right? And so we do have to be very careful with that. But let's say, you know, in the field gets very, very, you know, we keep growing. We keep learning new things about relationships and neuroscience and attachment and somatic work. And we're really improving the quality of the work, right? So let's say now we get the work to the highest quality possible for any, you know, given all the limitations of, you know, that to begin with. But my job is never to keep a couple together, ever. I mean, I can want that with them, if that's what they're wanting.

But my goal is to create a healthy relationship. And from that place of a healthy relationship, they together, and with me helping them facilitate the conversation would make that choice as to how to go forward. What I have found is that the vast majority of couples, when they do get to a healthy place, they just want to stay together. I mean, we've created the environment that lends itself to, you know, them wanting to keep going forward with each other. They feel close. They feel connected. They're working through their problems better. But it certainly, it can't be the goal. If that's the goal, then that really kind of starts to, you know, cloud the actual work, which is the agenda really has to be to create health and not longevity. Yeah, so I'm really clear

with people about that. And I also am very, very interested in someone's resistance to the work. I mean, that's the work. The resistance to the work is the work. So if someone comes into me and they're like, I don't want to be here, I don't trust couples therapy. I mean, I'm just going to meet them right where they are and dive into that. Help me understand. I'm going to validate that. it makes a lot of sense to me you've had you know you have seen multiple people in your life go through couples therapy and ended up divorcing a year later like of course you don't trust that process right i mean i would like to believe that we can have a different experience in here but you know first of all i just want to honor your resistance and you know wouldn't it be nice

if we could get you guys to a healthier place but if you don't feel like that's happening if i don't feel like that's happening in four or five sessions i'm not you know we're not any changes taking place outside of here, then I don't think it's a good idea to move forward, but why not give it a try? What would be the characteristics of a relationship that would warrant going to couples therapy? You know, what you say this word, you know, a healthy relationship? Yeah. What does it actually look like? It looks like really two things. One is really having a good, solid emotional bond, being able to be open and vulnerable with each other, being able to have positive experiences together, whether that's, you know, physically, sexually, physically affectionate,

verbal, intellectual, you know, people have all different ways that they like to feel connected to other people. And then on the second piece would be being able to navigate a life together. I mean, just all the logistics of running a life together, finances, home, parenting, you know, all of these just decisions that couples have to make, you know, are they able to make decisions in a way that for the most part over the big picture mutually fulfilling for each of them and in a way that doesn't erode their emotional connection. And as we strengthen the emotional connection, it does make it easier for partners to collaborate and communicate with each other. And the smoother their collaborations and communications go, the closer they feel. Now, you asked an important question,

like how do you know when it's an incompatibility issue? And the only way to answer that question is to first clean up the communication. You know, it could be that when we get a couple to a place where they're really communicating in a healthy way, they say, hey, you know, yeah, we're really great at talking about it. But the truth is, is that, you know, I want a family and you don't, or we just really see finances so differently or there's just too many areas where things don't line up. And it is probably better to go forward with other, you know, future relationships where maybe there isn't so much stress on the table because of the differences between the two of us. But again, most of the time, what I find is if people have already come together, they have enough compatibility there,

you know, that if we can clean up the communication, it does tend to work out, but not always. I mean, there are, you know, I want to say probably, I would say 80% of the couples I work with end up staying together, maybe more than that. Wow. That's a good track record, Julie. Well, it is a good track record and I'll tell you what it it you know when I first started this work I mean I was new and I was struggling and it takes a while to learn how to be a good couple therapist and I didn't have that success rate and I do now and you know my couples didn't change I changed I just keep growing and getting better and I think that you know anyone out there who wants to be a couple therapist it is really hard work but it is really possible to just keep growing and getting better at it and

seeing more and more success yeah I mean as a yeah there's lots of different I suppose, psychotherapeutic couples techniques, but you have chosen a specific one. And that has obviously led to, you know, huge amounts of success in terms of your ability to help couples come back together and, and solidify their communication and, you know, get on a path of growth together and, you know, all these beautiful things that you're helping to facilitate across these sessions. Talk a little bit about your framework and why you chose it. Okay. So I chose, I do emotionally focused therapy for. couples and, you know, we work with, basically, we work with attachment theory. We use the

principles of attachment theory to create, you know, an emotional connection is kind of the foundation of the work. We work very emotionally, you know, we're getting people out of talking about situations from a really intellectual place and into processing their feelings and sharing their feelings in the service of creating more understanding, more empathy in the service of basically creating change. You know, we want to create communication change. We want to create behavior change. We just, our way of going about that is to do the emotional work to get there.

You know, it's a very structured type of therapy. The earliest stages are getting, you know, what happens is that when, you know, from an attachment theory perspective, when couples start to talk about a topic, whatever it is, the dishes or, you know, parenting or wedding planning, whatever. The problem's not the problem. The problem's not the problem. What happens is... I've heard you say that in the book a lot.

Yes. They stop. What the problem is, is they're not communicating in a safe way. And so now they're unneeding each other's attachment needs for, you know, to feel valuable, to feel validated, to feel like, my needs matter to you. And that's really the core issue when couples fight. And so I go in and I need to first just stabilize this. Like we got to get you out of these blaming, protesting, you know, stonewalling.

You know, we got to get you out of those behaviors by understanding more about why you're needing to do these behaviors. You know, people really need to understand. You can say to anyone, don't do that anymore, right? And that's going to have limited effectiveness. Most people probably know what they shouldn't, quote unquote, shouldn't be doing. And so I'm really trying to figure out, like, why are you doing this? What's going on here?

You know, why are you needing to protest? Are you not feeling heard, whatever? That starts to stabilize things. And then once they're able to communicate in a safer way, then we go into really a much deeper level of work. We start doing childhood work. We start doing negative self-belief work. We start doing, you know, really intense bonding work. in a way that's facilitating their ability to help each other heal instead of me trying to heal them

instead of them trying to heal on their own, which is all important too, I'm now facilitating healing between the two of them so that in moments when these negative self-beliefs start to contaminate the way they're communicating, they can come in and co-regulate each other around those things. And so kind of, in a way, kind of undoing childhood wounds with each other using the relationship. And then, yeah, so I, you know, in the scaffold of EFT, I can use anything I want. I can use cognitive behavioral work. I can use psychodynamic work. I can use somatic work. I mean, it incorporates anything. So to me, it's not, I don't find EFT at all limiting, but I also find it very containing and that there's a very clear structure to it. So I know what I'm always knowing where I am

in the therapy, where I am in the session, you know, so I just, I mean, I just love EFT. I don't know what my professional or personal life would be like without the EFT concepts that I use. It's cool that you've been able to, in your work just to be able to validate that framework, you know, and, you know, it's amazing. It is. It's a beautiful framework. let's define the different attachment styles sure and i just want to i want to caveat this a little bit or i want to get your thoughts i'm a scientist i communicate science so i certainly don't have a platform that you do but um and folks need to follow uh your work on instagram because it's truly it's unbelievable but i think there can be i worry sometimes uh especially in the area of psychology

sometimes on Instagram, there's obviously a loss in TikTok. It's even kind of potentially more damaging. There's just, there isn't the context, right? So I worry about people diagnosing their partner or diagnosing someone. They haven't even met, you know, that, hey, this is an attachment style. Like, I feel like there are some dangers in creating what I think are some of these, you know, very narrow limiting, essentially boxes that we kind of put people in. Absolutely. And I think that it can color how we see them potentially, right? And it kind of – so I guess before we kind of get into define these attachment styles,

I would love for you to just educate us and, you know, the listeners on how do we think about the stuff that's on Instagram? And, you know, how do we think about attachment styles broadly as a way to understand someone but not necessarily box them in? Yeah, totally. I mean, there's no, I don't think there's a super easy answer to that question. I mean, the way that I approach it is like, look, I really believe that labels can be useful until they're not, right? And I really believe that giving people the ability to see their relationship through the lens of these styles and attachment theory is more beneficial than not, right? but more beneficial than not still leaves a lot of room for people to misuse these labels and you know so I always I try hard to balance it out with like look you know try not to box yourself

in and let's not use this as pathologizing information let's use this information as a tool to have a guide as to what to work on right that's really the usefulness it's helping you understand yourself better so that you are better informed about what you can work on. You know, it's just like if you, you know, go and I don't know, you're studying a new language or something and you get information about where your specific challenges are, then you have a better idea of where to put your energy into working and that's going to help you move faster. So, you know, if you're using these labels to either, you know, pathologize someone else. else or blame someone else or then you're only acting out your own problem, right? And so

anyway, I've just had to sort of reconcile that. Like I'm trying to help people. This lens helps them. I'm going to go ahead and say, look, nobody, we have the categories for a reason. I mean, they do, most people do tend to associate themselves with one. But if you don't, that's okay. I think what's really important is recognizing, hey, I have relationship problems. And that means that I probably have some degree of an insecure attachment. Who cares what the category is? Like, don't worry about the label. Just work on what's showing up. Why am I needing to protest, right? Why am I needing to shut down when I feel triggered? You know, what's going on with that? And we can still look at all of that through the lens of attachment without putting someone in a box. And I mean, one of the

things I've worked incredibly hard on with my account is just really trying to bring a lot of compassionate empathy to these labels and not have people use them as a way to beat themselves up. And, you know, I've had a lot of problems with especially avoidant attachment because, you know, some of the material that I think was being put out initially when attachment theory kind of jumped from the clinical world to the general population is that avoidance are the problem there, you know, and I've really tried to work to undo that because in my work, avoidance, are not the problem. They're 50% of the problem, but it's all, you know, so I hope that answer is your question that, again, I don't think there's a super easy answer to it. Yeah. Okay. So we want to be

secure in our relationships. Why don't you go through just what the four different attachment styles that you use in your practice? Okay. So the basis of attachment theory is that we are wired to have relationship needs for safety and closeness because it's part of our evolutionary, human need to survive as a species as we need each other. So to need each other, we need to feel close and safe with each other. And then the flip side of that coin is that we have relationship fears because the fears kind motivate us to make sure that our relationships are intact and our needs are met. And if you have people who grow up in kind of emotionally dysfunctional environments where

their attachment needs aren't fully being met, you're going to have people who have developed strategies to deal with that. If we don't have healthy outlets for our emotions, then we're going to develop unhealthy ways to manage those emotions. And so when I say emotions, I'm specifically talking about relationship fears when it comes to, you know, romantic relationships. And so so your attachment style for most people is defined by the nature of the fears you experience in relationships and how you manage those fears in relationships. So someone with a more anxious attachment, they're going to be really sensitive to abandonment, which is emotional abandonment or physical abandonment. That's their sensitivity. That's their wound. And so the way that they typically go about managing moments when

that fear gets triggered is close the distance, frantically seek safety, change what's outside of them so that they can feel safe inside of them. All beautiful intentions. We, of course, want people to find a way to regain a sense of safety around their relationships, but it gets a little wonky. A lot of times they're trying to create safety in ways that are, they're putting temporary safety with their partner over their overall well-being, or the way that they're trying to reach for that connection back and reach to motivate change is actually pushing people away

from them. And so that's their work is kind of learning to better communicate their needs and more effectively get their needs met, basically. That's a broad thing to say. But someone with an avoidant attachment, the way they've learned to manage relationship fear is just not have not be consciously aware of the fear at all. Just cut it away, try to distract from it, try to kind of indirectly get your needs met by being an achiever or fixing problems. And so, you know, a lot of times, too, when there's any kind of relationship stress with a partner, they're going to deal with that. Their way of regulating is just get away, get out of it, shut it down, move away from it, distract.

And so their work is to learn to stay emotionally engaged in a safe way. can you give an example of like how that would actually show up like in a practical kind of day-to-day setting yeah the anxious partner feels alone because they you know don't have a strong emotional connection with their avoidant partner and they play a role in that right that they're they're not feeling connected and they don't have real true intimacy because if you have these types of insecure attachment your ability to experience real intimacy is already compromised So the anxious partner is sitting there feeling that loneliness, right? So now they're trying to make sense of it in all these ways.

And let's say they make sense of it as their partner just doesn't want to spend time with them, right? They have all these good reasons to believe that. And so now they go in with heated protest. You never want to spend time with me. And now we have this avoidant partner who is now over here going, well, that doesn't feel fair. I do want to spend time with them. you know, and, you know, so then they now feel triggered like, oh, no, I'm failing them, I'm getting it wrong. And so what do they do? Then they get really rational and they start giving, well,

we took a walk last week together, you know, and they start kind of missing the whole emotional meaning of the message. And then now the anxious partner who was actually trying to communicate emotions, but not in a very effective way, starts to feel invalidated for the emotions they weren't putting words to to begin with. And then they now get heated and they start protesting more. And the more they protest, the more overwhelm the avoidant partner who's used to fixing the problem. They're now not being able to fix the problem. They get overwhelmed. Their strategy is just shut down. So they've had this, you know, fight. It's probably the same fight they've had over and over again. regardless of the topic, and they end up in this kind of tense place.

Then they miss each other. They get to a point where we don't like how we feel when we're not connect, you know, the connection that we do have. And so they make their way back. They don't know how to really fully repair in the process of arguing about this already unmet need for more closeness. They have now left each other feeling attacked, misunderstood, invalidated, unheard. and that just kind of keeps putting dents in the car, you know, and eventually the car, it goes

from, you know, perfectly normal at the beginning of the relationship to all dent it up. And nobody really understands how we got there because, you know, one dent, you know, it's always, it's just like one little, one little thing at a time and it all builds up. So how do you break that pattern? Obviously, it's not in one session clearly, but no, no, no. You kind of have to rewire your thinking, I would imagine, and you have to create new language, new understanding, new awareness. So first I have to just help them be aware of the cycle. Like, this is what's going wrong. Here's your moves. Here's why you're not reaching each other. Here's your part. Here's

your part. And let's now understand better what you're trying to do here. Like you're not trying to leave your partner feeling attacked and like they're failing you. Right. You're trying to reach for connection. Your body is giving you some really important messages here that this doesn't feel right. This isn't working for me. And you're not trying to abandon your partner and leave them feeling alone and not respond to them. What you're trying to do is, you know, stay safe from your feelings of frustration for not being able to calm them down or, you know, your frustrations of not knowing what emotional connection is to begin with. How are you supposed to give something that you don't even have in yourself.

And then, you know, as they start to understand themselves and each other, we start giving them more tools. Let's communicate all this stuff. It's all the same stuff. Let's just communicate it in a way that brings you together instead of tearing you apart. And what are they doing while they're doing this communication? Connecting, right? So now in the session, they're getting the answer to the problem.

They're getting the solution and they're experiencing the solution. So they're getting some skills, plus they're experiencing the solution. So now they start to go outside of the therapy and gradually it just starts to stick where they're able to recreate these experiences. And if they're not able to recreate them in the session, which is a really good thing, because then I get to see what the blocks are. And I get to work through the blocks and get them talking more about the blocks. And then as we go into the second phase, we do what's called a pursuer softening,

which is to get that anxious partner soften. We need you to start delivering your messages in a way that's going to pull your partner in. Create invitations instead of accusations. And we need to get you, you know, yeah, like soften your approach. And then the other piece of it is called a withdrawer reengagement where we're getting the withdrawer more engaged able to be more emotionally engaged with self and with the partner. So do anxious types attract anxious types? Or does it really vary?

Yeah. It's, I would say this is a pretty extreme statistic, but 99% of the couples I treat are in an anxious avoidant dynamic. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. It's a balancing act. I mean, emotional systems are going to find balance.

It's not a healthy balance. Right. It's better than no balance. But you're seeking, you end up being attracted to someone who has what you don't have. basically yeah like people who are who are anxious and they're constantly kind of overwhelmed with their emotions and they're constantly feeling kind of you know some to de varying degrees some people are more distress than others but you know disregulated like yeah they sign me up for the guy who is you know super stable you know is doesn't react and you know that's great until it's not you know

And there's always strengths to that. I mean, you know, I never want to take away from what's working because some things really do work between two people who also have this distress. But then if you have this, you know, person, 75% of those with avoidant attachment are male. And 75% of those with anxious attachment are female. So if you take this person with an avoidant attachment, they don't have connections to their emotions, right? They don't have that rich emotional world. So for them, the, anxious partner who's very emotionally expressive, it can feel good. It can kind of be a vicarious way for them to experience emotions. And then at the beginning of the relationship, they might feel very successful because the anxious partner is really into them or whatever, right, until things start to go south. And so they thrive on feeling successful. So they're getting all these messages, you're successful. And then when they're thriving, they're, you know, trying to be more successful and the anxious partners over here going, wow, I'm getting all this attention. And then as things start to progress and go south, you know, everybody starts

moving into kind of the dark sides of those of those places. Then things, it's not working anymore. And then we have to come in and figure out how to make them both secure. Because what we really want is for both people to be emotionally engaged and regulated at the same time, that window of tolerance. That's where we want the balance to come. come from. Each person is balanced instead of having to balance each other out. And that's a secure attachment. That's secure. Yeah. Great. Okay. And I want to come back to this notion of co-regulation and I want you to unpack that for us. But maybe disorganized. Just talk a little bit about what that style is. Disorganize very difficult to describe. So I kind of like

to paint this picture. Like you take a blender, you pour in some anxious, you pour in some avoidant, you sprinkle on some trauma. You blend it up. You take a glass. And you put it. You pour it all over the counter or maybe in the glass right it's just it's so hard to describe because it's very unpredictable so one person's disorganized attachment can show up very differently from another person's disorganized attachment which can show up very differently from the way their disorganized attachment showed up two days earlier so that's really it disorganized you don't know what you're going to get and people with an anxious attachment a very clear anxious attachment they're going to behave predictably.

When they get triggered, they're going to seek closeness. Their bag of tricks is pretty predictable, right? Someone with an avoidant attachment. When they get triggered, they're pretty predictable. Someone with the disorganized attachment, you just don't know what you're going to get. You know, there's a, there's a, and really at the end of the day, I mean, it's a very painful, a very painful way to live. A lot of emotional dysregulation, a lot of dissociation trauma symptoms and, you know, and yeah. So it's, I have some articles on psychology today that really dive into disorganized

attachment for anyone who's interested in learning about it more. So how does, how does that disorganized attachment show up in a relationship? What would that look like? Or is it just so variable that it really is just all over the place? Well, yeah, the, the predictability is the unpredictability but the core fear of someone with the disorganized attachment isn't just it's not it's more than just abandonment or failing it's it's like fear of people people are really out to get me people really aren't safe right like my what happens is if your caregiver is the source of love and the source of danger i mean that's a really that's going to really disorganize a child's attachment system there it's it's called the um approach

retreat distress. You know, they want to approach, but then they're scared to approach because they don't know what they're going to get. And so there's just constant, like, the fear of threat, the sense of threat is very high a lot of the time. So their partner, you know, can't, kind of has to walk on eggshells. Anything their partner does or says can send them to a really scary place where they get terrified. My partner now is dangerous. And then that leaves them feeling so much emotional chaos and then from there anything might happen you know it might some sometimes someone might just kind of go blank and dissociate and really escape their body you know because it's too much or or some especially if they have trauma and their history that has kind

of lent itself to dissociation as a coping strategy or they might you know freak out and yell and scream and break things or just you know drive away or you know turn to to substances. It's just a lot of like much more intensity in the coping mechanisms, much more intensity in the reactions and the fears. But then sometimes they're in a good mood and they might not react at all, you know. So it's just, it's a mixed bag. What's up folks? If you are enjoying this podcast or if you care about health, performance, fitness, you may really enjoy getting a Whoop. That's right. You can check out Whoop at Whoop.com. It measures everything around sleep, recovery, strain, and you can now sign up for free for 30 days. So you'll literally get the high

performance wearable in the mail for free. You get to try it for 30 days, see whether you want to be a member. And that is just at whoop.com. Back to the guests. What would you say are the, you know, the goal, of course, is to get the couple in a secure place, secure love. I guess I'm wondering, like, what does that language of security look like across a day? Okay. You know, and I think that'd be really interesting. You know, again, I think a lot of this is like, can I identify secure love in my own life, you know, and what does that actually look like?

And I think just having, giving, you know, of course, your book outlines this so beautifully. So I really encourage people to read this because it's just a great way to understand yourself and be able to understand a partner and have and come to your earlier point, come to a relationship with more empathy and compassion. But yeah, just, just wonder, like, what does this like secure love actually look like in practice, you know, and in a home environment? Yeah. I mean, I think it's really the quality of responsiveness, partners, you know, the quality of their, yeah, their responsiveness, especially. to distress. I mean, there's kind of this hovering background of kindness and validation

and, you know, wanting to work together and be flexible and open to each other's perspectives. And that's kind of all, you know, basic, you know, kind of relationship advice that everybody kind of probably intuitively already knows. But then there's this other piece, which is really how we are going to define secure attachment, which is what do you do when you're triggered, right and that might you might be triggered from your partner reaching for connection or you might be you know in a moment that whatever but I'll give kind of an example here like let's say that you know your partner you have children together and your partner snaps at your kid right and says you know kind of reacts to your child's annoying behavior in a way that you you feel is too harsh right

what do you do with that right there you know there's an opportunity to practice secure attachment. So if you want to create an insecure attachment with your partner, then you want to jump in and go, don't talk to her like that. That's not right, you know, or why are you so mean or criticize them? That is going to really leave them alone now with their distress over the issue to begin with. And it's also going to leave them feeling misunderstood and attacked and invalidated. And they could clearly be in the wrong, right? it's not about necessarily right or wrong when we first start dealing with it. A better way to approach that situation, you know, if you're wanting to foster a secure

attachment is, hey, you know, listen, I know that you're really trying to communicate what it doesn't feel right for you to her. I really get that, you know, and I get annoyed to when, you know, she's not cooperating and it's hard. It's, it's, it's really hard, and I understand that. And I know, and I appreciate that you're wanting to motivate her growth and, you know, do all these things that all good parents want to do. But at the same time, you know, we both have had experiences in our past where we haven't been kind of treated in the right way around these kinds of things. And I just want to make sure that we're doing it differently for our kids. And so that, that's the kind of conversation. I mean,

Yeah, so very validating and very, you know, and just not, not defensive. Yeah, not attacking. And now you're also helping, you know, partners need to help each other. Like, I mean, yeah, we're adults and we need to really be on top of how we speak to our kids. But isn't it great? Wouldn't it be great to have a partner who can also be there for you and understand more about what was distressing for you over the incident to begin with? Maybe there was something scary when you see your kids. being rude or disrespectful, your body goes, oh, my God, they're going to have a bad life

because they won't be able to get along with people. Isn't it nice to have someone to talk to about those feelings instead of just being told, you're wrong, you're wrong, you know? So just now take that example and extrapolate it to lots of different little things where areas where things can go wrong. And that's just one little example too. Yeah, that's perfect. So what proportion of the population is secure attachment?

Do you have a sense, just roughly? No, there's a study. I mean, the study is kind of old and it was 50%. I think it's probably lower now. Okay. I think now it's probably, I don't know, it's kind of, we're kind of in a weird phase because it's like, things got really bad. And then all of a sudden social media came along.

And for all it's fault, they're more aware. Exactly. It's giving people better skills. So I would like to think that the self-help availability now is kind of moving things in a better trend. Yeah, I think too, like the. you know, I think there's less stigma around men, you know, seeking help. Oh, so true. Yeah. I mean, I feel like that it's changing everything in a really positive direction.

So I guess my question is, you know, given that half of the population, you know, probably is not, doesn't have the secure attachment kind of foundation. They're entering in relationships with this avoidant, avoidant, insecure anxiety. early in a relationship, everything is awesome, you know, it's going great. You know, what are the flags? And is that even how we should be looking at it, you know, because I guess, you know, part of me is, is like, I feel like every couple should have experience couples therapy, right? To just, again, it's not, things might not be broken, but why aren't we optimizing, right? Like, I don't know. Right? Like, why aren't we just staying ahead of this thing, right? Where we know that we're going to enter into these patterns just that are embedded, you know, from our childhood,

and they're going to rear their head when things get stressed, when money is true. When, you know, whatever the thing is, right, we'd become new parents, right? And we're tired as heck. And so I suppose early in a relationship, to what degree should we be paying attention to these different styles? And what's your feeling on that? Well, first of all, I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think that I have told my kids very clearly, you know,

they're 23 down to 13, like, I don't care what you do, get five sessions of couples therapy when you decide to be in a serious relationship that you want a future with this person. I don't want to go to the extreme of, you know, when you're dating, although I'm a fan of that, why not prevent negative cycles? But, you know, if you're going to be committed five sessions, because that can help you stabilize the way you fight, stabilize the way you deal with conflict and disagreement and help you prevent these negative cycles. Negative cycles take relationships down. And, you know, if you wait for 10 years of negative cycles, you're going to have a lot of therapy to, you're going to need a lot of therapy to stabilize all of that. There's a lot of

mistrust build. There's a lot of unresolved wounds built. You know, there's just more work to do. So, you know, you're talking about the difference between a few months or even in really bad situations, you know, year plus, two years plus compared to five sessions. And so really, if I'm going to kind of say two things to pay attention to at the beginning is one, when you're interacting with that person, what's happening in your body, right? Are you from day one? Are you feeling hurt? Are you feel bad days? Your body kind of tensing up. Are there anxiety feelings creeping in? Are you having an urge to kind of shut down. I don't know what you're what's going on with that, but you need to pay attention to any, any amount of discomfort because that discomfort, there's wisdom in that.

It's saying something. I don't know, again, what it is, but that, people are so used to just, oh, they look good on paper, override their actual experiences, live experiences with the person and moments. You know, relationships are just a series of moments. If those moments aren't high quality at the beginning than something's going on, no matter how great they are on paper, you know. And then the second thing, go ahead. I think just to stay on that first point, though, you know, I think folks like, I think modernity is set up in a way to almost give us license to ignore what's happening internally. You know, like we kind of can ignore signals, right? And just like brush it off. Yeah. But I think to your point, like it's so beautifully said,

like there is so much wisdom, right, and how we're responding and reacting, right? Like, does our heart rate go up? Yes. Yes. Do we, you know, and that's really at the core of safety, right? Like, you know, physiologically, you know, there are very specific things happening physiologically when we feel safe versus when we don't. And, you know, of course, we monitor physiology.

So I see this manifest in the data, you know, in my own data. When I feel safe and loved and, you know, secure, like, I have higher heart variability. I have lower resting heart rate. have more capacity. I sleep better. Like, my life is good, you know. And when it's the opposite, when I'm struggling in a relationship or, you know, I don't feel safe and I don't feel secure. Sure enough, like my heart variability is low. Like I, you know, and I, so I think that there is a lot of wisdom in, in terms of paying attention to those signals. And I just, I wanted to double tap on that. Yeah. I mean, and I, and that's really what I do.

You know, all of the work that I do with couples culminates into the felt sense. And I'm really bringing that to life. At the end of the session, I'm like, we need to really pay attention to the sense of ease in your body right now. And because we need to know what our goal is here. And you guys did it. You did it, the work to get co-regulated with each other. But so I don't lose this point. I'm just going to go back a bit. Really what people need to be paying attention to in addition to that felt sense. is what the first fight, the conflict, nothing is real until the conflict arises, nothing. There's no reason to mistrust. There's no reason to show our worst selves, right, until the conflict arises. That's when you're really going to see the relative health or lack of of a relationship. Oh, so perfect. I, in your book, too, I mean, you talk about felt sense. You say that a lot. And it's like such a powering way of, like, framing it, you know, and kind of. connecting with the body. So it's beautiful. And I just wanted to spend, I know we're coming up on time, but I think just, just real quick, like, how did you decide on the organization of the book?

Because I found that it's really good in terms of just teaching and being very practical. So just maybe real quick, just how did you, what was your vision for how you wanted people to read this and learn from it. I 100% just followed the structure of the work I do in session. Right. That's it. I mean, I need to know the foundational information of attachment theory, what I'm working with here. Then I need to get in there and talk about these negative cycles, stabilize them. Now we need to talk about how to prevent them. We need to talk about how to repair them. You know, if there's old wounds that, you know, a couple is struggling with, I can't really help them fully heal from that until they're not communicating about the wounds

in a negative cycle. We don't have to ignore it, but we don't expect healing to happen until they're being, you know, healthy communication. So just kind of really logically followed the work I do with couples. Yeah. Well, it's beautiful. So thank you to Sue Johnson for creating that structure. Yeah.

Yeah. she's she's the I guess the originator of EFTC right yes and I honestly think that she is the most brilliant well she passed away recently but I know it was really it's so hard when you're like mentor site you know you know I feel so grateful because I got you know just before she passed away I did get her endorsement on my book and that felt really good you know to get that yeah it was like wow you know that's really special But, yeah, I mean, she took attachment theory from a concept to something to do, you know, to a guide, to a map, to a set of instructions. And to me, that's where absolute brilliance lies as being able to turn a concept into, you know, something very tangible and workable.

So I just can't thank her enough for the gifts she gave to the world. I have one final question. I'd love to know your thoughts on vulnerability. And, you know, how important is that in a relationship? And if vulnerability isn't one of the more important kind of or ways to understand, like I think if you can be vulnerable in a relationship, like that means that there's probably like a really high degree of security and health. Like I guess is there a litmus test for, hey, yeah, this is a secure attachments, you know,

on overall, you know, healthy relationship. Like what is that feature, I guess? Yeah. I mean, I think that, you know, people who don't have a secure attachment, I mean, they really like can't be vulnerable. The reason that they have the insecure attachment is, you know, it's a communication is such a big piece of that, how they were communicated to the types of, you know, relationships they find themselves in and the quality of their partners they hook up with their communication

and then their own communication. So, I mean, really, vulnerability is just about really being able to understand and dive in and share your emotional experiences. I don't think that that's really fully possible without having body awareness. You know, if we don't have, without the body awareness, we're just talking about concepts of feelings. We're talking about our feelings from outside of ourselves. and like real engagement is having that feeling be alive and being able to put regulated words

to it. I don't mean robotic words, but, you know, this pressure in my body, I do feel, you know, a lot of fear right now, you know, when you bring up concerns to me, I want to be able to be there for you. And I want to be able to take that in. But this pressure rises up in me that's this fear that if you see me as getting it wrong, you're going to go away. I mean, that is the first step toward being able to stay.

someone's concerns, which is just being able to put words to your emotional block, right? It's easier to work through that and say, you know, have your partner say, okay, I hear what you're saying. You know, let's just kind of hold each other. And, you know, because when I do bring up concerns, that's not what's going to happen. I'm not going to go away. So it's just that, that is a very different type of conversation than your partner bringing up a concern to you, the fear welling up in your body, you overriding it, not having any idea that it's there. and then just kind of shutting down or getting defensive. I mean, game changer.

And one is showing up with vulnerability and one is not. But the emotions are the same. I love that. Well, I could have so many more questions, but I know we're at time. I hope people check out Secure Love. It was such a beautiful book. And I think really empowering information. So where would be the best place for folks to find you?

Like, where do you like folks to go? Well, so I have a website called thesecurelationship.com, but then my Instagram is kind of my hub. That's where I put a ton of information on Instagram, which is at the secure relationship. And then Secure Love is available. You know, the book is available wherever books are sold. I have my podcast starting Monday, which is 20 sessions of EFT therapy with a real couple. Congratulations. That is just going to be so fascinating.

This feels like like everything that I stand for and believe for. and was born for coming to a head is this podcast. So I'm so, so, so excited. I really think it's going to be tremendously helpful for people to see this work come alive. So, well, thank you for all the work that you've done and all the education that you do, you know, online and your book and obviously the work that you're doing with couples, you're making the world a better, safer, more secure place. Well, thank you. I really appreciate that. I mean, likewise. Appreciate your time today. Thank you, Julie. Okay. Thank you. Bye-bye. Thank you to Julie Minato for sharing her insight on relationships and attachment theory.

If you want to learn more, go check out Julie's book, Secure, Love. And if you're in the U.S. celebrating 4th of July this week, be safe and have a great holiday. Happy birthday, America. If you enjoyed this episode of the WOOP podcast, please leave a rating or review. Check us out on social at WOOP, at Will Ahmed, at Kristen underscore Holmes, 2126. Have a question what's the answered on the podcast. email us, podcast at WIP.com. Call us 508-443-4-9-5-2.

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