Primal Panic

I can remember one time inviting my partner Tom over for a mid-day date at our house. Drew was away at work and so I didn't give him any kinds of heads up about it because he wasn't going to be there anyway so I didn't think it mattered. Tom and I had dates at our house before, this wasn't like new or outside of our agreements, but when Drew found out about it, he was so upset that Tom had been over without him knowing about it ahead of time and he felt like I had done something wrong. I think the real upset was around the surprise and also the pace the relationship seemed to be progressing and again feeling that out of the loop out-grouped feeling and not feeling thought of. Of course what I did was I explained why I didn't feel like it was necessary so we got in a fight about who was right and what Drew was allowed to feel and be upset about and whether I did anything wrong, instead of slowing down and getting to the real issues. Welcome to Making Polyamory Work. Hi, I'm Libby Sinback and I want to thank you for joining me today. I'm committed to helping people who live and love outside the status quo have extraordinary relationships because relationships are at the core of our well-being as humans. I think love is why we're here and how we heal. Today's episode is about primal panic and I'm not going to say much more about it because I say it all in the episode. If you're listening to this episode on the day it came out though on Tuesday, March 17th, I want to personally invite you to my free open community calls. I host these once a month and I have them at different days and times so that I can accommodate different time zones and schedules. It's an opportunity for us to get grounded together to connect as a community and I do some Q&A with folks who are facing some sticky situations or just have something on their hearts. The next one is tonight, March 17th, at 7pm Eastern Standard Time or I guess it's Eastern Daylight Time. Yeah, it's EDT anyway. I have to say that because in the US we changed daylight savings time but the rest of the world is on a different schedule. Anyway, if you're curious, I'd love to see you there. And now to the episode. Nearly nine years later, this particular night with my husband stands out in my memory. Drew and I were in our house, the kids were already in bed and he was extremely upset. He was convinced that something wasn't okay with how I was being in my other relationship and we were arguing about it. And this part I can't remember. I can't remember the points he was arguing that specific night or what I had been doing that maybe set that off. I can't remember any of that but what it often was about was that I was acting differently in our relationship. I was acting differently in this new relationship and I wasn't acknowledging that to Drew. Which made him feel like I wasn't being fair to him or honest about my feelings. The reason the memory of that evening stands out to me was because Drew got so upset he pounded his fist on the floor and yelled at me. Not in like a threatening way. In a way that just showed he was that overwhelmed. I wasn't scared but I cannot tell you how out of character that was for him. This is one of the most easy-going even-keeled people that I know. When he does display big emotions it's often in the form of irritation but this was panic. And it wasn't just that night either. This went on for a while. There were days when he had panic attacks, nights where he couldn't sleep. He lost weight. It was hard not to think that something was really, really wrong. And we talked more about this in the episode that Drew and I did together which is called Lean In. So I would check that out. But suffice to say this was a rough time. And I was scared because I didn't understand what was happening. And while Drew knew he did not feel good, I don't know that he fully understood either. And of course I felt really guilty because I could see that he was hurting. I could see that he was in deep distress. But I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. The stories that Drew was stuck in weren't things that were true for me. So I couldn't admit and agree on his reality. And therefore I didn't feel like we could solve problems together. And when I tried to tell him this and convince him of my side of things, well, he just got more upset. And sometimes we would get in really bad fights. What Drew knew is that something had to be really wrong for his system to be this activated. And he was sure that it was something I was doing or not doing. So we'd find ourselves locked and conflict regularly, talking past each other, talking all night until we were exhausted, but not getting any resolution. And my work as a coach, I've talked to many clients who are going through the same thing. Jessica Fern, author of Polysecure and Polywise, describes it this way. From the perspective of attachment theory, we need to be connected to people to survive. So our nervous system equates emotional connection with safety and emotional disconnection with danger or threat. She goes on to say these threats don't have to be actual to activate the nervous system. Even theoretical or symbolic threats can initiate attachment distress and what is called primal panic, she says. This can also escalate into panic attacks, meltdowns, or an emotional crisis that can pit partners against each other or become extremely difficult for everyone involved to manage. And she also says that it's an oversimplification to label this kind of thing as jealousy and that it's helpful for folks struggling with this to understand that it's rooted in attachment needs and learn how to both self-soothe and address those attachment needs with their partner. So the way Jessica Fern describes primal panic, that was definitely what was happening in my relationship with Drew. And I like how Jessica Fern describes this as a nervous system activation, which may be rooted in the perception of actual threats, but may also be rooted in theoretical or symbolic threats and that the activation feels the same either way. I also agree that it's an oversimplification to call it jealousy. I think jealousy can kick it off, but the fear and the activation is bigger than jealousy alone. But I have real issues applying attachment theory too much to adult relationships, because I don't think that adults should be looking to other adults as attachment figures the way we look to parents as children. 100% yes, we need other people to survive even as adults. And I also don't believe that we need any one particular person to survive as adults the way we need our parents as children. Parents need to create stability and consistency for their children. They need to regulate their own emotions so that their children who are not actually capable of doing that yet can use their systems to regulate their emotions. They are responsible for all the child's basic needs because children generally speaking can't acquire those needs for themselves. And ideally, they love their child unconditionally. Their child gets to become whoever they choose to become, and they should still have their parents love, though of course parents still get to have boundaries around behavior. The parent child relationship is a decidedly non-mutual relationship. Now, I know there's cultural differences here. I know some cultures hold that a child actually does owe their parents deep respect, and that their life choices should take into account pleasing and honoring their parents. But even if that's how you approach it, you as a parent are still doing a lot more emotionally, mentally, physically, relationally, and financially than your child will do for you. I mean, ideally, I know a lot of us didn't actually have that growing up, but that's how it's supposed to be. That's how children can grow up, securely attached. Adult relationships aren't like that. Adult relationships ideally should be mutual and mutually agreed upon. I don't have to regulate my partner's emotions. That's their responsibility. I get to feel what I'm feeling, and I get to be who I am, and I get to grow and change. Ideally, any adult partner that I have has the capacity to create their own sense of stability and consistency. They do not need to rely solely on me to create it for them. Unless they have a significant disability, they are capable of meeting their own basic needs. Where we participate in resource sharing, which is something that a lot of people do, where we meet each other's needs, that is something mutually agreed upon and can be renegotiated when needed. And love? I don't think love is unconditional here. I mean, maybe love is, but access to a relationship is not. I don't think conditional love is the same thing as transactional love, either. I think I can still see my partner as a whole and complete human, rather than a means to an end. And I still get to have some criteria to access to a relationship with me. Breaking up should always be an option in an adult relationship. That is not abandoning. That is an adult deciding to leave another adult. That doesn't at all mean that I'm saying that adults should never rely on each other, or that you don't need to be trustworthy, reliable, available, attuned, consistent, etc. to be a good partner. It's just that your base sense of okeness shouldn't be based on another adult being that for you. Adult relationships are cooperative and collaborative. Yes, I should regulate my emotions, but I should regulate them. I can regulate my emotions so that I can show up with you when you've regulated yours so that we can co-create together. And relationships changing and ending, that needs to be an okay thing. Otherwise, you are compelling and coercing someone, and I don't think that's okay. And I'm not also invalidating primal panic. It's a real thing. I just want to put it in its proper place. When you're in that state, a very primal, young, basic part of your nervous system is being activated. And then it can start a chain reaction. Your body is in panic, and then your protective systems might come online. You might lash out at your partner or try to control them, aka fight. You might pull away and withdraw and close off. That'd be flight. You might shut down and become paralyzed. That would be freeze. Your mind might go into overdrive trying to figure out what was wrong and try to figure out how to fix it. That would be fix. Or you might go into overdrive trying to make your partner happy to win them back. And that would be fun. Being on the receiving end of those protective systems isn't super fun. And then when it isn't clear what's wrong or what to do about it, you can get caught in this loop of shaming yourself for having such big feelings or having such difficult or even out of character behaviors. You might be afraid of being seen this way. You might be upset that someone's causing this, looking for someone to blame. You are your partner or someone else. And around and around, it can be this little tornado in your relationship. In hindsight, I can see exactly why Drew was experiencing primal panic, which again, we talk about in our episode together, which is number one, the polarity of our relationship shifted noticeably. It used to be that I was always seeking out Drew's attention more than he was seeking mine and that I was always available whenever he wanted me and that changed. To my behavior shifted because of the excitement that I was having with this new partner. I was more into sex. I was texting a lot. When I was with my new partner, I was often very focused on our time, so I wasn't very responsive to text from Drew when that was happening. And Drew felt kind of on the outside of it. These were moving fast and sometimes Drew wasn't caught up on what was going on. It wasn't because I was hiding things or downplaying anything. It was just that with kids in our lives, I wasn't always able to keep Drew in the loop. Add on to that, some of his own wounding from past relationships, some tricky things that were going on just between the two of us, and some stories he was caught up in, and boom, panic. And it put him in a state of hypervigilance, which then put us in a situation where we were getting in really stupid fights. Drew was away at work, and so I didn't give him any kinds of heads up about it because he wasn't going to be there anyway, so I didn't think it mattered. Tom and I had dates at our house before. This wasn't new or outside of our agreements, but when Drew found out about it, he was so upset that Tom had been over without him knowing about it ahead of time. And he felt like I had done something wrong. I think the real upset was around the surprise, and also the pace the relationship seemed to be progressing, and again, feeling that out of the loop out-grouped feeling and not feeling thought of. Of course, what I did was I explained why I didn't feel like it was necessary, so we got in a fight about who was right, and what Drew was allowed to feel, and be upset about, and whether I did anything wrong, instead of slowing down, and getting to the real issues. Hey, real quick before we get back to the episode. If you've been listening to this show for a while, and you've been nodding along, but then feeling stuck in making these ideas part of your reality? Well, I made something for you. It's a workbook based on the most popular episodes of the show, with simple practices and reflection questions so that you can apply this stuff to your life. Just head to LibbySynback.com/workbook and grab your copy. So in my experience with client, primal panic generally gets triggered by surprises, changes in behavior, including things like how available or consistent their partner is to them. Perceived dishonesty or a lack of transparency, feeling excluded, feelings of unfairness, things moving too fast, their partner expressing doubts about their relationship, and just general feelings of uncertainty, especially if those weren't there before. And there are often a lot of underlying fears. Obviously the fear of losing the relationships is a big one, fear of the unknown, fear of feeling replaceable or disposable, fear of being a chump. This is actually a big one, like a fear of being humiliated or taken advantage of, fear of being downgraded, fear of being trapped in a torturous situation, fear of being manipulated or gaslit, and just overwhelmed. And in my experience, people tend to respond to primal panic in one of these ways. One, trying to control things, including your partner, two, trying to fix yourself, three, white knuckling it, and four, avoidance. So trying to control things is one version of fixing, where what you want to fix is what your partner does. Control says, "I need you to behave in a certain way for me to be okay." Control also says to your partner, "I don't trust you or respect your agency." Which obviously does damage to the relationship. Your partner can only respond to control by either accepting the control, which has a high potential to create resentment in your partner or your metamorphors, or they can respond to control by fighting it, and then you're in a power struggle in which nobody wins. Also, your adult self usually doesn't want a partner who's being controlled by you. You want your partner to feel like they're choosing you. They're doing what you want not because you're controlling them or that there's some threat of a consequence, but because they actually want to. While trying to control can bring some sense of relief because at least you're doing something, it actually doesn't help your nervous system because you're remaining in a state of hypervigilance. Anytime your partner slips, it can blow up into World War III, and it's usually exhausting. Trying to fix yourself is when you've decided you're the problem. You say to yourself that I'm not evolved enough, or I'm not healed enough, or maybe I'm trapped in monogamy thinking, and I just need to unlearn it. Maybe you need to read one more book, or go to one more meetup, or take one more class, or find someone to date, or something, and then everything will feel better. But then what if it doesn't? Then you blame yourself, and that can compound. You can feel shame, frustration, overwhelm, and then when you feel like you've tried everything, then you might turn that blame on your partner because someone has to be the problem, right? White knuckleing it is when you decide that there's nothing rationally wrong, or you don't see a different path other than the one you're on, so you just try to hold on and cope, hoping that maybe this will pass and get better over time. Think like you're in the tornado, and you're in the movie Twister, and you're just holding on to this pipe while the Twister pulls you into it, and you just hold on until the Twister goes away. Maybe I'll just let go, and my partner can just do whatever they want, and not talk to me about it, and I'll just grit my teeth and get through it. This can come at a cost. While I do think sometimes just going through a hard thing, and then discovering you didn't die can be a really helpful way to move through it, the flip side is constant nervous system overwhelm can be pretty taxing on the body, and so if you're doing things like losing sleep, losing weight, getting sick, you're going to have less energy and capacity to care for yourself or others, and if your nervous system is in that constant state of activation, you might not even be able to be aware if and when the tornado has passed because you're so sensitized to it. Also, your partner might be really scared for you, seeing that you're hurting so much, and they might be worried that they are hurting you, or they might be confused by what you're telling them to do, which is just to do whatever, and you might also end up feeling like you're telling them to do whatever, but you actually don't want them to do whatever, so when they do whatever you feel abandoned, but this is actually you abandoning yourself. Avoidance is not much better. So this would look like invalidating and compartmentalizing the feelings that you're having or distracting yourself from the feelings with activities or other partners, or numbing them with alcohol or other substances, or just down regulating your feelings so that you don't feel anything. This might make you feel better in the moment, but because you never address the root issue, you will end up overrelying on these tactics in ways that can be harmful. Avoiding or dismissing or compartmentalizing your feelings can cause them to build up and build up until they blow up. Down regulating your feelings not only means you don't feel the primal panic, but you're also not going to feel other stuff like joy and love. And if you're turning to substances, that can lead to its own problems, like when people turn towards alcohol. Alcohol is not only a numbing agent, it is also a disinhibiting agent. So you actually have less capacity to regulate your feelings when you are drinking. Also, alcohol has negative effects on sleep, on your nervous system. So you're actually not doing yourself any favors if that's what you turn to. I want to say we don't generally choose any of these strategies. We just start doing it because it's something that makes us feel better. We're just like reaching around grabbing for something to help us feel better because primal panic feels terrible, but all these things can damage you and do damage to the relationship. They also leave you and your partner without the resources you need to actually address what's actually happening because unexpected change in surprises. That's just a thing that's going to happen when you're doing new things and that doesn't necessarily mean anybody's doing anything wrong. Receive dishonesty or lack of transparency. That could be a partner who is manipulating you, sure. It could also be that they're afraid to tell you the truth or it could be mismatched expectations around communication and how well you know which one it is. Changes in behavior? If you come in already with a story about why that behavior has changed and what it means, then you're going to be fighting about that instead of really getting curious with each other and understanding why the behavior has changed or whether the person perceives it the same way that you do. Maybe you have, again, mismatched expectations of the relationship that you've never communicated about. Feeling excluded or feelings of unfairness? Again, that's something you've got to come to the table together with your expectations and your hopes and negotiate. Sometimes people are perceiving things really differently and you can't understand what's going on unless you are both sharing your realities with each other. Things moving too fast? If you've been listening to me for more than five minutes, you know that I think slowing down is a great idea, but there's more than one way to slow down and demanding that someone slow down so that your nervous system can calm down is going to feel like control. And lastly, partners expressing doubts about their relationship. If that's sending you into a tailspin, then you're probably not going to be able to address your partner's actual concerns and being able to address their actual concerns are probably what's going to keep you in that relationship if that's what you both want or help you lovingly transition it or change it into something else that works for everyone. All of these things require a regulated nervous system, and a big part of regulating your nervous system is listening to it and understanding what's underneath, like what is at the root of your panic. If you're just reacting to your panic and trying to fix your panic or trying to shut out your panic, that is not regulating your panic. That is letting panic drive the bus. And panic only knows that this is an emergency and that things are not okay and they better get better right now. Panic can't hold two things as true at the same time. Panic can't negotiate. Panic can't be creative. Panic can't be accountable. Panic cannot be compassionate. So what do you do instead? The biggest first step is saying yes to the experience, except that this is happening right now without shame or without blame, but instead with compassion because I promise you, whatever is creating panic inside you, it makes sense. Whenever we can meet what's happening inside us with, of course, that alone is regulating. It can take some of the intensity out of the experience. If you can create just a little bit of space between you and the experience of that primal panic so that you can take a position of observer, that can also really help. And that might give you room to observe your thoughts and sensations and get curious about that panicked feeling. I find it really useful to do this with any emotion, be it jealousy, fear, sadness, overwhelm. I turn toward that sensation or that thought or that feeling and say something like, "Hey, I'm not sure why you're here, but I know it makes sense. What do you want me to know right now?" I also like Morgan Birch's scene questions for this. What am I scared might be true? What am I embarrassed about that I want to protect myself from? What am I expecting or what did I think you were expecting and where did that expectation come from and did we agree to it? And what do I need right now? Most of the time what's going on is fear, and often when the fear is this big, it's usually tied not just to something that's happening right now, but also something in your past. It might be something terrible that happened to you that you hoped would never happen again, or something you had a front row seat for as it happened to someone else. Or maybe it's something that you feared would be true about yourself that you really hope isn't true. And remember, this primal fear is coming from a really, really young part of you. Something from a time in your life where you often didn't have safety control or choice. And if you're a fixer, you've likely taken steps to avoid or prevent the thing you don't want to have happen from happening. So if it feels like it's happening now, then it is not acceptable. But that inability to accept it is going to put you in a fight with whatever is happening right now, and if you're able to welcome the fear and accept it and turn toward it with curiosity and non-judgment, this can bring the level of panic to a manageable level. And then you can be in inquiry about what's really going on for you. And then once you've regulated the panic, instead of letting it drive things, then you can go and have a conversation with your partner. Because now you've been in inquiry about what's actually going on with you, and you can talk with them about what's going on with them, and you can listen with curiosity about what's going on with them, and then the two of you can co-create whatever needs to happen next. In the example with Drew, there were a lot of things in his past that were getting kicked up that were helping fuel the panic he was feeling, mostly relating to a previous partner and some truly painful experiences he'd had there. His brain said, "Aha! This is like that other time, and bad things happen then, so bad things are happening now. Alert! Once he was able to slow down and really see that, it didn't take the feelings away. But it really helped him see where they were coming from and have a little bit more space to decide how to handle them. And sometimes the panic is about some truth that we don't want to or aren't ready to face. There were also hard realities in Drew's and my relationship that we both needed to look at together. Both of us slowing down and getting really curious about our feelings made us more able to meet those realities with that curiosity, creativity, and compassion. Now before I close, I just want to say a few things about if you're the partner of someone going through this, you may be listening to this and you may want to help them feel better and you may want to do something like coach them through listening to their feelings and help them regulate. And believe me, I get it, you want it to stop, you want them to feel better. You probably feel really guilty for the pain you're causing or you're even frustrated that they're having such a hard time. However, I would resist the urge to try to help them listen to their feelings, especially in the moment when they're feeling it and you really wanted to stop. If they don't know what they're feeling or what's at the root of it, they will have a potentially even harder time with you wanting to know in a moment when they're activated where you're probably also activated. It can often be more activating too to have a partner step in as a coach or a therapist role. They might shut down because they're ashamed or they might feel talked down to or a whole host of other things and definitely don't argue with their feelings or try to reassure them by telling them their fears are unfounded or the way that they see things isn't true for you or there's here's a bunch of fact to contradict your feelings. It feels like that should help but in that moment of primal panic, their lower brain is running the show and it is not going to be able to take in your reality or logic instead it's just going to fight with you. By the way, if you're wondering how I know these things don't work, it's because I've done them all and I've watched many people do them all and just trust me. What you can do is one of two things. One, you can hold space for what's happening for them with compassion. I want to name that this is a superhero move, it's actually not easy but what you do is you ignore, you just let pass by the things that your partner says that are not true and just hang with and reflect back the feelings with compassion. So what that would look like is, I'm only freaking out right now. I'm overwhelmed with thoughts of you leaving me and I can't get them out of my head. My heart is racing. I'm so scared. I'm so mad at you for lying to me and you'd say, oh, I hear you're freaking out right now and you're overwhelmed with thoughts of me leaving you and they won't stop and your heart is racing and you're scared. That sounds truly awful. I don't totally understand what's happening but I'm here with you. Things I wouldn't recommend saying, I promise I won't leave you. Calm down, things are okay. I didn't lie to you. Oh, hey, I've got a podcast for you to listen to. None of that. If you want to help just being with them while they are spinning without getting caught in the spin yourself is the most helpful thing you can do and it will not be easy because there are times they might say something that is activating for you that you might want to argue with or that might hurt. That's when you can do the second thing, which is to stop. Either by just stopping talking and staying with them while you tend to yourself or by taking a break where you go somewhere else. Taking breaks can be tricky because you can take a break that says, "Your feelings aren't a problem for me. I want to care for you right now and I just need to care for myself first because I'm having feelings too." Or you can take a break that says, "Your feelings are too much for me and I need to get away from them and you until you fix yourself. You can't." Really control how your person takes it, but you can do your best to communicate the first thing. My recommendation is to make a script for yourself that says the first thing in your words, and then practice it. And I would also talk about it together with your partner. If you both agree ahead of time that taking a break rather than escalating the panic is good for both of you, it's less likely to feel abandoning when you need to do it. The most important thing is to be compassionate with your partner, because oftentimes when you're feeling stuff this big, what your biggest fear is is that you're too much, that you're overwhelming, that this is all wrong, and that you're going to push people away by having such intense emotions. You being able to stay out of fix it mode, and you being able to be with their feelings with compassion whenever you can helps reassure them that they're not too much, and that can actually help them say to their own feelings that they're not too much. And again, if it actually is too much for you in that moment, take a break. So to recap, primal panic can be a lot of things, but oftentimes it's an activation of our attachment systems, which can make us feel under intense threat, and that can wreak havoc on our bodies and our capacity to function. It can feel like something is really wrong, either with us or with the situation, and we can spiral. The best way to address it is to greet that experience with acceptance rather than fear, turn toward it with compassion and non-judgment, and get curious about what's happening, rather than going into avoiding, fixing, white-nuckling, or controlling your partner. If your partner is experiencing primal panic, the most helpful moves are to be with them with compassion or taking a break when it's too much. Frustration, fixing, and judgment are only going to make it worse. Primal panic isn't fun, but like any emotional experience, it's an opportunity to understand more about yourself and about what's going on. But in order to do that, it's crucial to learn to regulate it so that it doesn't rule you or your relationships. Thank you so much for joining me today. If you have any thoughts about this episode or a question you'd like me to answer on the show, I would love to hear from you. You could find me on Instagram at that PolyM Mom, or you can find me on my website at libisonback.com. You can also leave a comment on the episode on the Spotify platform, and I read all of those and reply to most of them. If my podcasts are helping you, but you feel like even more support, I do this for a living. I am a coach and I help individuals, couples, and groups have amazing relationships. You can find out more about my offerings on my website. If you love this podcast, please share it with your friends, your networks, your Facebook groups, etc. And make sure you subscribe so you don't miss an episode. Also, if you listen on iTunes or Spotify, it makes a really big difference if you leave a reviewer a comment because that helps more people find the show. And thank you so much to everyone who's already done that. Making PolyMri work is created by me, Libby Sinback. It's edited by the team at Assistify Coaching and hosted on the Spotify podcast platform. You want to Luka manages the website and posts the transcripts.