What happens when the very people who were supposed to provide safety and protection were gone, unreliable, or actively harmful? This creates an attachment-based trauma. You felt abandoned and alone, and needed to freeze-out the enormity of the loss, terror, anger and other emotions. The feelings were too big for your young self to process, and perhaps expressing them would have gotten you into more trouble.

Being fully seen, ‘gotten’ and accepted without judgment allows you to feel less alone. And feeling less alone makes bearable what now at times feels unbearable.