How Early Bonds Shape Your Nervous System

The day I found out I was pregnant, I felt joy and a wave of fear I couldn’t explain. Not fear of becoming a mother, but fear that something essential was missing in me: the ability to bond. That moment sent me straight into trauma therapy with one goal in mind, to understand attachment before my son arrived. What I discovered changed how I see my past, my nervous system, and what healing can actually look like. 

Attachment theory is more than a psychology term. It’s a map of how our earliest relationships teach our bodies whether the world is safe, whether people can be trusted, and whether our needs matter. I walk through what secure attachment does for emotional regulation and self-worth, and what can happen when caregiving is absent, inconsistent, or disrupted. If you struggle with self-trust, second-guess yourself, or feel anxious and confused in relationships, you’ll hear why those patterns may be intelligent adaptations rather than flaws. 

I also share why attachment-focused therapy helped me in ways other approaches couldn’t, and how the brain’s ability to rewire gives real hope for change. Healing doesn’t erase the past, but it can help you create safety in the present, develop a steadier sense of worth, and even form the bonds you once believed were impossible, sometimes starting with yourself. 

If this resonates, listen all the way to the closing question and take a quiet minute to reflect. Subscribe to Held And Becoming Into Your Power, share this with someone who needs it, and leave a review so more people can find the support they’ve been missing.

Transcript

Welcome And The Theme Of Power

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome to Held and Becoming Into Your Power. This is Episode 3, Attachment, and I'm Michelle Gorman. Held and Becoming Into Your Power is a space where you can hold yourself in love, in accountability, in grace and compassion. It's a space of your becoming and a space of you truly fully stepping into your power. The day that I found out that I was pregnant, I was not just excited and so happy, I also was incredibly terrified. Not because I didn't want to be a mother, but because there was something I was so afraid that was missing inside of me. I really didn't know if I had the ability or the capability of being able to bond with my child. And so the very day that I found out I was pregnant, I reached out to a therapist who specialized in childhood trauma. I really wanted to understand something before my son was born attachment. In episodes one and two, we talked about how our nervous system adapts to the environments we're in and the environments we grew up in, and how those adaptations shape the behaviors we carry into adulthood. Today we're going deeper into the root of those adaptations, attachment, and the attachment bond.

Poem And A Pregnancy Fear

SPEAKER_00 2:12

But before we begin, I'd like to start off with a poem. And this poem is from my book Finding My Connection, and it's titled Mom Mom. Connected am I to the one who birthed me. Absent and gone, she robbed me my song. Connected am I to the one who I birthed. Loving and present, he is thriving and strong, singing and singing and singing along. At that time I didn't fully understand why I felt this way, but I knew that it mattered.

What Attachment Theory Really Means

SPEAKER_00 3:09

There is a concept called attachment theory, and it describes something fundamental about how we are wired as human beings. From birth we are designed to seek closeness, closeness to a parent, closeness to a caregiver. That bond, when it is secure, teaches the nervous system something really important that the world is safe, that people can be trusted, and that our needs matter. When a child experiences consistent comfort, responsiveness, and care, the nervous system settles. It doesn't need to stay on alert, it doesn't need to stay on guard. This secure foundation becomes the platform for emotional regulation, self-worth, and healthy relationships throughout life. But when that bond is absent or inconsistent or disrupted in any way, the nervous system adapts in different ways. And those adaptations are not character flaws. Those adaptations are the nervous system's intelligent response to an environment that did not provide it what it needed. Children may grow up feeling unsure of themselves, anxious in relationships, constantly seeking validation or unsure whether they can trust their own decisions. And often they don't even realize where those patterns began. For me,

How Insecure Bonds Echo Into Adulthood

SPEAKER_00 5:32

not having a strong bond with my mother was truly one of the most damaging aspects of neglect that I experienced growing up. It became a part of my foundation. It became a part of all of my emotional regulation. One of the biggest seeds it planted in my life was low self-worth and a lack of trust in my own decisions. For most of my life, I second guessed myself constantly. I looked outside myself for validation, for approval, for reassurance. And it took me a very long time to realize that these patterns were not personality flaws. They were adaptations. They were my nervous system trying to make sense of early experiences. My nervous system was trying to find safety in a world where safety had not been consistently provided.

Why Attachment Focused Therapy Helps

SPEAKER_00 6:58

The therapy that ultimately helped me the most was not cognitive behavioral therapy. While that therapy absolutely had a place in my journey, it wasn't the type of therapy that pulled me over the finish line for me. It was attachment focused therapy. Through that work, I began to understand something incredibly important. While our early attachment experience shapes us, it doesn't have to define our future. And attachment patterns are learned by the nervous system. This also means they can be rewired. Just like we talked about in the last episode, episode two, the brain can change. And attachment patterns are part of that. Healing allowed me to develop something that had been missing in my early life. Safety. Not safety created by someone else, but safety created by myself. I didn't learn safety from my past. I learned how to create it in my present. Through self-awareness, through compassion, through learning to trust my own voice.

Motherhood And Learning Internal Safety

SPEAKER_00 8:41

Being a mother myself really enlightened me to one of the most profound realizations of my life after my son was born. The bond that I was so afraid that I would never experience became one of the most beautiful relationships in my life. Today my son is thriving. Our connection and our bond is something that I so deeply, deeply cherish. That experience taught me that our past may shape us, but it does not limit the love we are capable of giving and the love we are capable of receiving. If you struggle with self trust, if you find yourself seeking validation from others, if relationships sometimes feel confusing or anxiety producing, it may not be because there's something wrong with you, it's a character flaw, but rather an echo of early attachment patterns. And if that is true, then it means that something new is also possible. Patterns your nervous system learned in order to survive. And the beautiful thing about awareness is that it allows us to bring change, to bring something new, to create something new. Our brains are perfectly capable of rewiring past experiences.

A Poem On Low Self-Worth

SPEAKER_00 10:44

I'd like to read another poem, and this poem is titled Low, and it is from my book called Finding My Journey. Low Low Self-Worth, the Kora Me Learned from Poor Parenting Deep Belief held for long still appears when panic screams its song, masked in many different ways, touches my work, touches my play, touches my happiness, but now not every day, not every moment, yay, yay yay. Feeling my worth instilled at birth, now receiving the nurture it needs to provide a life worthy of me. Healing doesn't erase the past, but it allows us to give ourselves the safety we once needed. And sometimes it allows us to create the very bond we were once afraid we would never know. And sometimes that bond begins with ourselves.

One Question To Start Healing

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Before we end today's episode, I want to leave with just one question. How might your early attachment relationships have shaped the way you connect with others, work colleagues, romantic relationships, family members simply begin by noticing as awareness is always the first step towards healing. In the next episode, we'll explore the identities we create in response to these early experiences. The overachiever, the caretaker, the perfectionist, and how those identities may have helped us to survive, but may no longer be serving us today. Thank you for being with me here today. This is how them becoming into your power. Until next time, much love.