Speaker 1: Welcome to the Laverne Cox Show, a production of shondaland
Speaker 1: Audio in partnership with My Heart Radio. A good secure
Speaker 1: attachment lowers our blood pressure, It lowers our heart rate,
Speaker 1: It lowers our stress hormone cortisol level, It rises levels
Speaker 1: of dopamine, oxytocin, neurope Eneugh Fron, all those feel good
Speaker 1: neuro hormones. Love is the best medicine we have. Hi there,
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Laverne Cox Show. I'm Laverne Cox. So
Speaker 1: a few years ago, in therapy with Jennifer Burton, who
Speaker 1: some of you have met through this podcast, she said
Speaker 1: this thing about attachment style to me, and I was like,
Speaker 1: what are you talking about? And she was like, there
Speaker 1: is this theory about attachment and I think it could
Speaker 1: be really useful in your work. And she suggested this
Speaker 1: book and I downloaded the book and I started it
Speaker 1: reading it and never finished reading it because, like life,
Speaker 1: happens and it keeps coming up in therapy. So then
Speaker 1: I discovered Dr Wendy Walsh and that she specializes in
Speaker 1: attachment theory. Thought since I never finished reading the book this,
Speaker 1: this would be a really great opportunity for me to
Speaker 1: learn more about attachment theory to help my life and
Speaker 1: my own therapeutic process and maybe help you as well.
Speaker 1: So for anyone else out there who has not finished
Speaker 1: the book, just listen to this podcast. Dr Wendy will
Speaker 1: break it all down for you in a brilliant and
Speaker 1: very clear way. Dr Wendy Walsh is a psychologist specializing
Speaker 1: in human development and attachment theory. She's an author of
Speaker 1: three books about the science of love, a professor of
Speaker 1: psychology at California State University, Channel Islands, and an award
Speaker 1: winning television journalist and radio host kf I AM six
Speaker 1: forty in Los Angeles. She also has her own podcast,
Speaker 1: Mating Matters, which uses evolutionary psychology to explain human mating strategy.
Speaker 1: Please enjoy my conversation with Dr Wendy Walsh. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be made. Hello, Dr Wendy Walsh, Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: How are you doing today? Like so many, I'm just
Speaker 1: at home trying to find privacy during COVID with kids
Speaker 1: doing stuff. You have two children, I do, they're almost
Speaker 1: grown young woman women. I have a twenty two year
Speaker 1: old daughter who just graduated college, and I have a
Speaker 1: seventeen year old daughter. Wow, good for you. That's incredible.
Speaker 1: So a couple of years ago, I was in therapy
Speaker 1: I'm often in therapy, thank God, and my therapist said
Speaker 1: this thing to me about attachment theory, and I was like,
Speaker 1: what are you talking about? And I learned that I
Speaker 1: had an anxious attachment style, and I was like, if
Speaker 1: I had known this twenty years ago, I could have
Speaker 1: saved so much time. So can you please talk to
Speaker 1: the people and held them what attachment theory is? Sure?
Speaker 1: So it's an area of psychology that's been very well
Speaker 1: researched for many, many decades, and it is the one
Speaker 1: that spoke to me most in graduate school. I just
Speaker 1: it just made so much sense. And basically, we all
Speaker 1: come into the world with a genetic predisposition for closeness
Speaker 1: or feeling easily smothered, or predisposition towards anxiety or depression.
Speaker 1: And then what happens with our beautiful little genes is
Speaker 1: they meet the environment, and our primary environment when we're
Speaker 1: young are our parents, and so they behave in a
Speaker 1: way that either activates some of our genes or suppresses them.
Speaker 1: And so what ends up happening is, in simple terms,
Speaker 1: during the first three years of life. We form a
Speaker 1: kind of model for love in our heads, and then
Speaker 1: in our adult romantic lives, we go out and we
Speaker 1: go right back to the scene of the crime. We
Speaker 1: try to find somebody who will play along and what
Speaker 1: we believe love is. So even if love was filled
Speaker 1: with criticism, abandonment, God forbid abuse, we will find somebody
Speaker 1: who will give us all that and more, because that's
Speaker 1: what's familiar to us. So attachment theorists put people into
Speaker 1: sort of categories, loose categories, secure, anxious, avoidant, disorganized, and
Speaker 1: and then you know it's incumbent on us to understand
Speaker 1: our model for love and to try to heal attachment injuries.
Speaker 1: I love that so much and something and all the
Speaker 1: research preparing for this, and then when I've learned from
Speaker 1: my therapist, I didn't realize that there was a genetic
Speaker 1: component to this. You just said that the way our
Speaker 1: parents treat us in those first three years activate something genetic,
Speaker 1: And as can you tell us a little bit more
Speaker 1: about that research around the genetic piece of attachment theory, Well,
Speaker 1: I would say that in fact, about every single human behavior,
Speaker 1: there's a biological, there's a psychological, there's a social component.
Speaker 1: We aren't born in a vacuum. We're actually a many
Speaker 1: one brained species, and we interact with each other. And
Speaker 1: while we're interacting with each other, we're enlivening or suppressing genes.
Speaker 1: So here's an example. Let's say a baby comes into
Speaker 1: the world with a very big gene for anxiety. Maybe
Speaker 1: their parents or their grandparents suffer huge trauma that actually
Speaker 1: changed their DNA. And in fact, we're learning, for instance,
Speaker 1: that even grandkids of Holocaust survivors have huge genes for
Speaker 1: anxiety and depression and they live in wealthy neighborhoods in
Speaker 1: Connecticut and never saw any trauma. Right, But it's you know,
Speaker 1: passed down from generations. Can I just can we just
Speaker 1: pause there? I just think it's so important because that
Speaker 1: that that's something that I've been looking into and reading about.
Speaker 1: The first time I heard that trauma can be passed
Speaker 1: down from generation and generation, it just like I felt
Speaker 1: there were some things when I heard about my grandfather,
Speaker 1: you know, living on plantation for example, it was just
Speaker 1: like I was like, oh my god, It's just like
Speaker 1: I knew it was the truth immediately, just in myself.
Speaker 1: But but go on, So here's our anxious baby comes
Speaker 1: into the world, happens to come into the world into
Speaker 1: a set of parents who read all the parenting books
Speaker 1: they can, and they really believe in what we call
Speaker 1: attachment parenting, wearing their baby, consoling their baby, not leaving
Speaker 1: them alone to cry it out because it's good for
Speaker 1: their lungs. But when that baby feels anxiety, they say, sure,
Speaker 1: come in my bed, baby, it's fine, and they soothe
Speaker 1: that baby. Well, that gene for anxiety doesn't get enlivened.
Speaker 1: Then you might have a same baby with a different
Speaker 1: set of parents who read a parenting book that said, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, they just need to cry it out, just
Speaker 1: leave them alone in a room. They'll fall asleep eventually,
Speaker 1: and that baby lies there in the dark, maybe hungry,
Speaker 1: maybe with a wet diaper, and that anxiety gene flourishes
Speaker 1: because of it. And I want to talk about more
Speaker 1: examples book I want to share as yours online. Personal
Speaker 1: so from chief as in one into two thousand and five,
Speaker 1: I was in a relationship with a man who was
Speaker 1: a really an insane alcoholic and he was really emotionally abusive,
Speaker 1: and it became a codependent relationship where it was it
Speaker 1: was it was gruesome and it was awful. It really
Speaker 1: really was awful. And what I as I was in
Speaker 1: therapy at the time and working a lot on codependency issues,
Speaker 1: I realized that he with my mother. I realized that
Speaker 1: he was my mother, that he was my emotionally abusive mother,
Speaker 1: and he spoke to me, and very soon I thought
Speaker 1: I was in love. He spoke to me in very
Speaker 1: similar ways that my mother did, and that felt like
Speaker 1: loved me. And it's so deep to me now and
Speaker 1: so like my goal in the relationship. If I can
Speaker 1: make him love me, then I can then my Mom's
Speaker 1: gonna love me, and then and then I'm enough, and
Speaker 1: then I'm worthy. I'm worthy. It really was about that
Speaker 1: working out this whole thing with my mom through him,
Speaker 1: which is a strange thing. I was. It was twenty
Speaker 1: years ago, so you know, so no, even in our
Speaker 1: later adult lives were constantly talking about our partners as
Speaker 1: representations of pieces of our parents, because they always are.
Speaker 1: We go back to try to resolve conflict. Yeah. What
Speaker 1: I what's been lovely though, is I've actually gone to
Speaker 1: my mom. We kind of done work together. My mom
Speaker 1: and I are in a great place now. I feel
Speaker 1: so weird. It's like talking about like her being emotionally
Speaker 1: abusive publicly because I'm like, we're in such an awesome
Speaker 1: place now, But it wasn't easy getting to where we
Speaker 1: are now. It was a lot of years of painful
Speaker 1: conversations and saying this is how you made me feel,
Speaker 1: and it was really awful, and now it's it's wonderful
Speaker 1: and now and and now I'm in a place to
Speaker 1: where I'm like, she did the best she could. And
Speaker 1: then that piece of inter generational trauma to so informed
Speaker 1: how she treated me and my grandfather was really abusive anywhere.
Speaker 1: We're not going to go there, but like that, all
Speaker 1: of that is actually connected to attachment style if we're
Speaker 1: talking if it's genetic, and so what is so beautiful
Speaker 1: is that I've you know, healed a lot of that
Speaker 1: with my mom. She's still with us and she's healthy,
Speaker 1: and that's awesome. And now I have not repeated that
Speaker 1: relationship either. I have not dated an alcoholic since you know,
Speaker 1: since I broke it off with him, and I have
Speaker 1: not repeated that pattern of dating someone emotionally abusive. I've
Speaker 1: done other things, We're always growing, but I haven't done
Speaker 1: that one again. I do want to say, though, that
Speaker 1: that is such a beautiful story, hardly because you were
Speaker 1: given the gift of an open minded mother who was
Speaker 1: willing to grow with you. But for other people listening
Speaker 1: who may have an abusive parent where they're only ability
Speaker 1: to heal is to completely cut off all communication with
Speaker 1: that parent. You don't have to go back and fix
Speaker 1: things with them to change inside yourself, and you can
Speaker 1: use what I call the romantic objects that you pick,
Speaker 1: because as you pick better and better ones, as I say,
Speaker 1: you start to heal yourself. You know, I don't know
Speaker 1: if you've ever heard this metaphor for the four stages
Speaker 1: of personal growth. The first stages, you're walking down the street.
Speaker 1: You don't see a hole, and you fall in it.
Speaker 1: There's your alcoholic, abusive boyfriend. Right stage two, someone tells you, oh,
Speaker 1: this is about your relationship with your mother, and you're
Speaker 1: now aware of it. So stage two, as you're walking
Speaker 1: down that street, you see the whole this time and
Speaker 1: you still fall in it. The third stage, that's the
Speaker 1: second alcoholic boyfriend you get next. The third stage is
Speaker 1: you're walking down the street, you see that whole, and
Speaker 1: this time you very carefully walk around it thinking about
Speaker 1: every step you take. But the fourth stage is you
Speaker 1: take a different street. Oh yes, that is if I
Speaker 1: get to bed fourth stage. But it's a process. It's
Speaker 1: a process, and learning doesn't always happen in the moment.
Speaker 1: And sometimes I have what I've learned to about relationship
Speaker 1: that I was if igiated this guy briefly next like
Speaker 1: two or three years ago, met this guy. I knew
Speaker 1: immediately that he had issues. He was he was in recovery,
Speaker 1: but he it was a mess. He was a mess.
Speaker 1: I knew that there were issues there, but I also
Speaker 1: knew that I needed to work something out. So I
Speaker 1: didn't just like unmatched, blocked delete immediately. I was like,
Speaker 1: let's just see this out, you know. And so it
Speaker 1: was about three months of you know, with some boundaries,
Speaker 1: and like then I had to cut it off. But
Speaker 1: sometimes we have to like see something through and work
Speaker 1: it out. And I say this to friends of mine,
Speaker 1: what do you think about that that sometimes we have
Speaker 1: to you know, go back the hole in the street,
Speaker 1: you know, and maybe like risk falling in. Well that's
Speaker 1: the walking around stage, right, So watching it and walking
Speaker 1: around stage, and I think that's a lovely concept. Now,
Speaker 1: not for everybody, because there are some people that just
Speaker 1: continue to re injure themselves, and there are other people
Speaker 1: who cut off something at the first hint that it
Speaker 1: could be pain and their manufacturing it in their head.
Speaker 1: So they definitely need to stay in it and walk
Speaker 1: through a little bit. But you know, I always say
Speaker 1: relationships are a gymnasium for the mind. Relationships are a
Speaker 1: gymnasium for the mind. Explain. In other words, you don't
Speaker 1: get stronger by sitting on a mountain and meditating alone.
Speaker 1: We need to actually be entangled with somebody and pushing
Speaker 1: back against them to grow bigger muscles, and the same
Speaker 1: with your psychological muscles. So you've touched on this a
Speaker 1: little bit. But can we change our attachment style? Are
Speaker 1: we're always going to be anxious, once anxious, always anxious?
Speaker 1: Or can that change? And then does knowing that can
Speaker 1: it help us in navigate relationships better. Well, now I'm
Speaker 1: going to get really complicated on you, because our attachment
Speaker 1: style is actually a number of things. It's based on
Speaker 1: the relationship we had with our mother, the relationship we
Speaker 1: had with our father, and the relationship we witnessed between
Speaker 1: the two of them, and that our own genes. What
Speaker 1: if what if you had a single mom and never
Speaker 1: knew your father like me, like I met my dad
Speaker 1: one exactly. So there's a big empty space and a
Speaker 1: hole in one piece of your love map, right, And
Speaker 1: so the short answer is, even in present day, you
Speaker 1: can have different kinds of attachments with different people. It's
Speaker 1: not like you are doomed to have an anxious attachment
Speaker 1: with all your friends, your work curse, and your lovers.
Speaker 1: The dysfunction tends to show up the most in our
Speaker 1: most intimate relationships. And yes, there are three kinds of relationships,
Speaker 1: according to research, that can actually heal attachment injuries. The
Speaker 1: first one is the therapist patient alliance. No matter what
Speaker 1: degree your therapist has, no matter what brilliant intervention they
Speaker 1: make during a session, that's less important to your brain
Speaker 1: than the consistency, the fact that you know, every Friday
Speaker 1: at ten am, good mommy's there, who's going to reflect
Speaker 1: back to you good parent, and that shifts your attachment style.
Speaker 1: The second one is if you're lucky enough to get
Speaker 1: hot for somebody who happens to have a secure attachment
Speaker 1: style and they accept our craziness, then after a while
Speaker 1: you calm down right, So you get like the really
Speaker 1: secure attachment guy who's like really straight and okay, and
Speaker 1: the spinning out the drama queen who you know, come forward,
Speaker 1: go away kind of person, or the drama queen and
Speaker 1: he's like, you are so cute when you're doing that.
Speaker 1: Don't worry, baby, I'm here when you want to come back.
Speaker 1: That was my That was my last two relationships because
Speaker 1: I very much have an anxious attachment style. And two boyfriends.
Speaker 1: He was just so consistent and he was there and
Speaker 1: it's soothed and then and then we had to break
Speaker 1: up and the next one sued that even more, and
Speaker 1: so and literally my therapist like, you're learning secure attachment.
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, cool. And then the third relationship is
Speaker 1: parent child relationship because plenty of people like I myself
Speaker 1: had an anxious attachment. So I can definitely tell you
Speaker 1: that I had all the symptoms of it, and I
Speaker 1: practiced attachment parenting with my girls because I used my
Speaker 1: anxiety to be attached to them. Oh, through you being
Speaker 1: a parent, not with your parents, but with you being
Speaker 1: a parent, you can explain because what ends up happening is,
Speaker 1: let's say a mom with anxious attachment style is consoling
Speaker 1: a baby, and she's saying, you know there, to a toddler,
Speaker 1: It's okay, baby, Mommy will always come home. Don't worry.
Speaker 1: Mommy's gonna let's look at the clock. When the big
Speaker 1: hand gets on the floor, Mommy's going to come back.
Speaker 1: And here you can hold my nightgown that smells like me.
Speaker 1: And here's your teddy bear, your transitional attachment object. And
Speaker 1: the more she does all these things for her child
Speaker 1: with their anxiety, consoling them, there's another brain in the
Speaker 1: room who's also getting consoled, and that's the mom's brain.
Speaker 1: We are self consoling at the same time as we
Speaker 1: become good parents, we are reparenting ourselves. That cool, It's
Speaker 1: really cool. I'm just like processing that in the moment.
Speaker 1: It actually kind of got emotional, so I'm like just
Speaker 1: kicking him in it. That was like, I mean, just
Speaker 1: the idea of I'm just breathing the energy, the idea
Speaker 1: like when you know, tin to the coccus, tin to whatever,
Speaker 1: like my parents going to be there. It's like it's
Speaker 1: I don't know why. That just makes me very emotional.
Speaker 1: It is these are the most tender feelings in the
Speaker 1: human mind. These are really tender stuff. It is the
Speaker 1: most important motivator of human behavior that exists, and it
Speaker 1: is the backbone of who we are because we're programmed
Speaker 1: for connection, like we are social beings, connection and belonging
Speaker 1: our immutable needs of human beings. Wow, that's just blowing
Speaker 1: my mind. And attachment impacts our careers, our relationships with
Speaker 1: co workers, our ability to manage people. It impacts our
Speaker 1: need for power or not attachment every relationship. How what
Speaker 1: is an attachment theory in the need for power? What's
Speaker 1: that control? So here's the baby, right who's out of
Speaker 1: control and doesn't have reliable parents, and so as a result,
Speaker 1: they need to be the CEO and dominate, right, because
Speaker 1: their parents may be narcissists or had substance abuse issues
Speaker 1: and there was no consistency for them, so they have
Speaker 1: this desire for control. Then you could have the other
Speaker 1: baby who was waiting and longing all the time for
Speaker 1: mom to come back to the crib. And there's that
Speaker 1: employee who's always taken advantage of at work, who's just
Speaker 1: waiting for somebody to notice them and give them a promotion.
Speaker 1: But they're not going to actually go out and get
Speaker 1: it because that's their normal place to be, that's their
Speaker 1: familiar place to be longing. Wow, this is a good
Speaker 1: time to take a little break. We'll be right back though. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's taken care of. Let's get back to our chat.
Speaker 1: What's kind of interesting to me as you talk about
Speaker 1: attachment theory, there's a lens that we can sort of
Speaker 1: filter almost everything through attachment theory in the same way
Speaker 1: that we can through a shame lens or trauma lens. Look,
Speaker 1: I will say this about of Americans have a secure
Speaker 1: attachment style. There's been so much research done. People with
Speaker 1: a secure attachment style get better grades in school, they
Speaker 1: tend to make more money, they tend to have fewer divorces,
Speaker 1: they tend to have fewer mental health problems physical health
Speaker 1: as well. Know, attachment theory has been studied in relationship
Speaker 1: to just about everything, including religiosity. God as an attachment figure.
Speaker 1: Some people have an anxious attachment to God. I that
Speaker 1: feels like a full episode, but I think physical piece
Speaker 1: because you because I wanted to ask you about this,
Speaker 1: how does attachment style affect our physical health? So here's
Speaker 1: the sad part. When babies either fear their primary attachment figure,
Speaker 1: or are left in states of longing for them to
Speaker 1: come back. Their cortisol levels rise, and so lots and
Speaker 1: lots of research has been done, long term, longitudinal research
Speaker 1: on babies who have an insecure attachment style early in
Speaker 1: life and later diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, because
Speaker 1: these it's like they're in their life long in a
Speaker 1: constant state of alert, either alert that an angry parent
Speaker 1: will hurt them, which in adult life is the world
Speaker 1: is against me, or that they're just in a state
Speaker 1: of pression and anxiety and longing for a lover to
Speaker 1: call them back, and that impacts our health. You see,
Speaker 1: love is so good for our health. A good secure
Speaker 1: attachment lowers our blood pressure, it lowers our heart rate,
Speaker 1: it lowers our stress hormone cortisol level, It rises levels
Speaker 1: of don't bemane oxytocin Europe and there from all those
Speaker 1: feel good neuro hormones. Love is the best medicine we have.
Speaker 1: I've always felt that, but I love hearing the research
Speaker 1: on it. And what I'm aware of listening to that
Speaker 1: is that that very much intersects with a lot of
Speaker 1: the work I've been doing in my therapists over the years.
Speaker 1: The community resiliency model and regulating my nervous system and
Speaker 1: dealing with trauma and cortisol levels, right, and so just
Speaker 1: be I've just been kind of aware over the past
Speaker 1: few years that I've been in a constant sative bipe
Speaker 1: lighter freeze that at my court is all that I
Speaker 1: and I'm thinking that it's started with attachment, and my
Speaker 1: therapist is that this. But now it's like I'm still
Speaker 1: of having an AHA in a different way where it's like, oh, okay, So,
Speaker 1: like I I had a moment happened in in Griffith Park,
Speaker 1: like you know, a couple of months ago, and I
Speaker 1: was so triggered by it. And I've learned that when
Speaker 1: it's hysterical, it's historical. So it's not about that moment,
Speaker 1: but I'm just thinking about, Oh, it's because I've been
Speaker 1: bullied so much in my life, and I've experienced violence
Speaker 1: and and like I've had so many traumatizing experiences. But
Speaker 1: even before that, it started with the attachment, even before
Speaker 1: all the bullying, Right, So the bullying that I experienced
Speaker 1: in school activated this sort of insecure, anxious attachment that
Speaker 1: started when I was a baby. That's that's exactly girl.
Speaker 1: It was the next version of it. And you know
Speaker 1: your inability to at the time as a child, to
Speaker 1: maybe stand up for yourself or find other connections with
Speaker 1: people who would help make you feel secure, was that
Speaker 1: you were just sort of reenacting what was familiar to you.
Speaker 1: We know we have voices inside our head, right and
Speaker 1: we're not even aware. But sometimes that voice is saying,
Speaker 1: you know, you're bad, you're wrong, you don't fit in
Speaker 1: or whatever. We don't know. They're so subtle. I know
Speaker 1: the voice very well. Yes, I did a lot of
Speaker 1: work around the voices in my head, especially during quarantine
Speaker 1: and I live alone. But go on, But did you
Speaker 1: know we can actually change those voices ourselves. We can
Speaker 1: reparent ourselves. So here's my little trick for you. Because
Speaker 1: of and I'm going to tell you this is an
Speaker 1: outsider first. You may not know that this is how
Speaker 1: most people look at you. Beautiful, glamorous, brilliant, well spoken,
Speaker 1: and an absolute survivor and crusader. You don't know that,
Speaker 1: but that's what we see. I'm assuming you don't know
Speaker 1: that because I'm talked to the child in you. So
Speaker 1: every time you go in the mirror and begin your makeup.
Speaker 1: I want you to literally say out loud into the mirror,
Speaker 1: I am so proud of you. I'm so proud of you, Laverne,
Speaker 1: and I want you to implant that a voice, and
Speaker 1: if you do it every single day for months, you
Speaker 1: will be amazed and how your brain will literally change that.
Speaker 1: That feels like that drew to me that I'm going
Speaker 1: to add that one. I become very aware of just
Speaker 1: the thoughts because I'm alone with my thoughts a lot,
Speaker 1: because I you know, I'm single, now, kids, now pets.
Speaker 1: And I became aware early on in quarantine, like March
Speaker 1: or April of the quarantine, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: the negative thoughts and negative self talk is strong with
Speaker 1: this cognitive behavioral therapists call it thoughts stopping and thought replacement.
Speaker 1: Thought stopping and thought replacing replacement. So as soon as
Speaker 1: you sense that thought coming in you, I'm not allowed
Speaker 1: and then replace it with I'm so proud of you.
Speaker 1: I love it. What my what Jennifer, my therapist says,
Speaker 1: is if I slew myself down and enough to um
Speaker 1: look at the thought, is the thought useful? Is this
Speaker 1: thought useful? And I love that too? Stopping the thought
Speaker 1: is great, and then if we can't stop, is this useful?
Speaker 1: And oftentimes it's not. It's just it just re traumatizes me.
Speaker 1: It just re and it reprograms the same neuropathways instead
Speaker 1: of creating new neuropathways. And and I'm so proud of
Speaker 1: you that replacing the thought, replacing the talk creates new neuropathways.
Speaker 1: Does it literally reprograms? You know? There's a guy I
Speaker 1: think he's at the University of Kansas. I interview him
Speaker 1: a lot. He's a neuroscientist who actually puts people live,
Speaker 1: people who brains and m r I machines and he
Speaker 1: hasn't even just think about their loved one. And he
Speaker 1: can tell by what parts of the brain light up
Speaker 1: if they have a secure attachment style or not, whether
Speaker 1: it's associated with stress centers, fear centers, and love centers.
Speaker 1: It's real. I kind of want to do that. Where
Speaker 1: does he do this? Now? I'm serious. It's been so
Speaker 1: interesting for me lately thinking about the brain and then
Speaker 1: the chemistry of all of it. It's so interesting. I mean,
Speaker 1: you said, there three elements is biological, sociological, and psychological.
Speaker 1: Every human behavior has all three. So one has to
Speaker 1: do with our mind's manifestation of what happened. That's our psychology.
Speaker 1: Then there's a biological ramification of what happened. But also
Speaker 1: nothing happens without being in a social world, so you know.
Speaker 1: And and so for people who don't fit into their
Speaker 1: current social culture, they have such high rates of mental
Speaker 1: health issues. And it's not there's nothing wrong with them,
Speaker 1: it's just that there's this big social factor because somebody decided,
Speaker 1: you know, you don't fit in on this year, you're
Speaker 1: not in fashion. And I think, you know, I feel
Speaker 1: like you're kind of almost reading my mind a little bit,
Speaker 1: because I I know from my own experiences that I've
Speaker 1: made different choices, I've changed energetically, and I've attracted different
Speaker 1: kinds of people. I've really they have, so that is
Speaker 1: the truth. But I also but I also am considered
Speaker 1: attractive by certain cultural sort of standards. I you know,
Speaker 1: I'm not. There's a lot of other factors that are
Speaker 1: aesthetic that are systemic around race, colorism, size, age, that
Speaker 1: are also factors. So in terms of the attachment lens
Speaker 1: or in relationships, what would you say about all of
Speaker 1: the sort of discriminatory things that happen around like women
Speaker 1: of a certain age, or women of a certain size
Speaker 1: or color. I'm always talking about women, but it's not
Speaker 1: just women, it's LGBTQ people in the gay community. What
Speaker 1: would you and through an attachment lens or whatever lens
Speaker 1: you have, what what what are your thoughts on those
Speaker 1: sorts of things that are not really about us? Right? Um,
Speaker 1: it's I'm not responsible for somebody else's racism. But you
Speaker 1: have to understand that human survival since the history of
Speaker 1: our species has been paramount on us being accepted by
Speaker 1: the village. Right, so our d this fear is being
Speaker 1: shunned by the village, literally left in the wilderness to die,
Speaker 1: being eaten by a lion, or not having enough food.
Speaker 1: We survived because we we are a cooperative species who
Speaker 1: have cooperative breeding, and we share food and we share childcare.
Speaker 1: You know, every other primate of try to take a
Speaker 1: newborn baby from a chimman zie, you will be murdered
Speaker 1: in a second. But yet a human will hand their
Speaker 1: newborn to a total stranger in a hospital room. So
Speaker 1: so what happens is if somebody comes into the world
Speaker 1: with a genetic predisposition to be different than whatever that
Speaker 1: cultural norm is for a very long time, their only
Speaker 1: choice was to suffer in silence because their survival was
Speaker 1: paramount on being accepted. But now we've reached a place
Speaker 1: of such I mean, I know people don't believe it,
Speaker 1: but such enormous wealth. If you think about it, even
Speaker 1: a hundred years, their entire life and your day was
Speaker 1: spent procuring enough food or enough money for food, right,
Speaker 1: and that's all we thought about. Now it's about which
Speaker 1: kind of designer shoes. And we don't even need food.
Speaker 1: We're trying to not a feat too much food. In general.
Speaker 1: If as the species globally we're actually doing better survival wise,
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that there aren't disparities and there aren't
Speaker 1: starving children in America today. So as a result, those
Speaker 1: people don't need the tribe. In addition, the tribe has
Speaker 1: gotten so darn big that there are million subsections of
Speaker 1: the tribe and so people who come into the world
Speaker 1: genetically not matching the particular tribe can find their own people,
Speaker 1: or they can fight to dribe and try to change
Speaker 1: the rules. And we are seeing all of the above
Speaker 1: happen in our culture right now. It is actually a
Speaker 1: time of really great freedom. It is a time where
Speaker 1: more people have a voice. You know, if I can
Speaker 1: say only one thing about the commonality that we all
Speaker 1: have as human beings is the social revolutions that have
Speaker 1: happened and l g P t Q, trans life, Black
Speaker 1: lives Matter, etcetera. And there are a group of Americans
Speaker 1: that are playing catch up, and progress happened really really
Speaker 1: fast for them, and many of them survived by having
Speaker 1: very strict rules in their life, rules about religion, rules
Speaker 1: about gender, rules about jobs, who gender roles, men do this,
Speaker 1: women do this, whatever. And so this progress has come
Speaker 1: on fast and furious. And there are groups of Americans
Speaker 1: who are not bad people who misspeak and get canceled
Speaker 1: as they're trying to play catchup, and they are angry.
Speaker 1: They use words like, oh, you know, we don't have
Speaker 1: to be political correct. And so the leader that they
Speaker 1: chose was the most politically incorrect leader because he spoke
Speaker 1: to that piece of them that was unacceptable to the culture,
Speaker 1: and so they had an attachment to him. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: I talked with Bernie Brown about this. We've sorted ourselves
Speaker 1: to such an extent that we don't usually get to
Speaker 1: interact with people who might have different backgrounds and different beliefs.
Speaker 1: You know, Bernie Brown says its heart to hate, close up,
Speaker 1: lean in, you know. And I'm hanging out with someone
Speaker 1: now who has different political beliefs, and it has been
Speaker 1: very challenging and in a really good way, in a
Speaker 1: really loving way, because it's challenging me to be more
Speaker 1: empathetic and to practice what I've been preaching for years
Speaker 1: around having difficult conversations around different Okay, it's that time again.
Speaker 1: A lot more is coming though. Alrighty, we're back. There's
Speaker 1: something I wanted to ask you, because lot of research
Speaker 1: out there talks about relationships and dating that tense to
Speaker 1: be like, Okay, men do this because they're looking for
Speaker 1: a woman who's going to be able to have children,
Speaker 1: and women do this because they're looking for someone who's
Speaker 1: going to be a provider or be smart enough, you know,
Speaker 1: um to provide. And all that feels so hetero sexist
Speaker 1: to me. I always think, like, what about the gay
Speaker 1: and lesbian people, and what about a trans people? And
Speaker 1: where do LGBTQ people fit into there? Okay, So I
Speaker 1: want to remind everybody that you know, I'm an evolutionary
Speaker 1: psychologist and the history of our species. They're always were
Speaker 1: gay by and trans people in some cultures around the
Speaker 1: world in some ways speak absolutely okay. So this is
Speaker 1: not like a new invention of humanity. It's just a
Speaker 1: more vocal invention so that we're aware of. So when
Speaker 1: I talk in terms that sound heteronormal, I want to
Speaker 1: remind people who are in between the wonderful scale, whether
Speaker 1: it's the Kinsey scale, when have you, that you know,
Speaker 1: in some ways you have the freedom because you don't
Speaker 1: have culture saying these are your gender roles, you must
Speaker 1: do it. You have the freedom to construct your relationships
Speaker 1: the way you want to. Also, we're evolving. I mean,
Speaker 1: there was a great article I think it was in
Speaker 1: the New York Times, and I did a segment on
Speaker 1: my show that it was like, how to make your
Speaker 1: marriage happier, make it more gay, and it was about
Speaker 1: getting rid of some of the strict gender ideas in
Speaker 1: a relationship. But even if somebody is on the Kinsey
Speaker 1: scale more gay than not, say I think we're all
Speaker 1: programmed to be by by the way, depending on the situation,
Speaker 1: then that person still has stopped up a few messages
Speaker 1: from their family of origin of a gender role, and
Speaker 1: indeed because of either their hormonal expression, they may have
Speaker 1: more feminine or masculine qualities that come along genetically. Right,
Speaker 1: So we know that gender is a little bit biological
Speaker 1: and a lot cultural, and biological sex as a huge
Speaker 1: range of variations based on the sex chromosomes that you know,
Speaker 1: we know at least seventy different variations of the sex
Speaker 1: chromosomes alone, and so there is this human variation biologically
Speaker 1: and that expresses itself in sometimes more feminine or masculina
Speaker 1: to use those tired terms of wants, needs, desires, or characteristics. So,
Speaker 1: having said that, where does l g pt Q fit in,
Speaker 1: they are They fit in everywhere across the span. You
Speaker 1: know you're gonna see gay couples who have the most
Speaker 1: traditional gender roles that you've ever seen in your life,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna have others that have more equitable peer
Speaker 1: relationships when it comes to their gender roles, and the
Speaker 1: same with sexuality. However, having said that, evolution has evolved
Speaker 1: in us all the tools needed to keep the species
Speaker 1: alive by procreating. So back in the day, when I
Speaker 1: tell you that there were always l g pt que people,
Speaker 1: it doesn't mean the gay people didn't have babies. They
Speaker 1: still did and we also know that the evolution of
Speaker 1: homosexuality in our species partly is because we are cooperative breeders.
Speaker 1: In other words, if you had a gay brother or sister,
Speaker 1: you got to have more babies yourself because he was
Speaker 1: there protecting and feeding it as well. And guess what,
Speaker 1: he or she was also nurturing their own genes in
Speaker 1: their nieces and nephews, so the genes stay alive. Fascinating.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for that. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: A lot of the conversation gets very heteronormative and and
Speaker 1: it's it's something I noticed, but that's awesome. Pheromones. What's
Speaker 1: deep from me is like if a guy does not
Speaker 1: smell right, it's over for me, Like it's over. And
Speaker 1: I think you said for women, I think is that
Speaker 1: smell is like and I'm not I'm a trans woman,
Speaker 1: but smell is so huge for me, for both particularly women,
Speaker 1: but for all genders. So what pheromones do is they
Speaker 1: indicate immune system genes. So back in our hunter gather pass,
Speaker 1: when we weren't taking showers every single day, we were
Speaker 1: pretty fragrant, and we learned that our brothers and sisters
Speaker 1: did not smell so good to us, and we did
Speaker 1: not want to mate with them, partly because they shared
Speaker 1: the same immune genes. In other words, they had immunities
Speaker 1: for the same group of diseases that we did, because
Speaker 1: we're genetically close. Right. So here's the interesting thing. When
Speaker 1: two humans get together and procreate, they may take blue
Speaker 1: eyes from one, long legs from another, brown hair from another,
Speaker 1: except immune system genes. Immune system genes combine to make
Speaker 1: a stronger superhuman. So when this hunter wandered into our
Speaker 1: village from another tribe as he was off hunting, I'm
Speaker 1: telling you, he smelled delicious. If we'd only been spelling
Speaker 1: our brothers and cousins at that point. This guy came
Speaker 1: in and we were, oh, my good news. Who was
Speaker 1: that man? And so we can determine reproductive fitness through smell.
Speaker 1: Wow wow. And I don't have children, but the smell
Speaker 1: is very important. That is so interesting and so fascinating.
Speaker 1: There's research to show that if couples have a desperate
Speaker 1: a different immune system, they actually have longer term relationships.
Speaker 1: They have better sex that lasts for longer. Um. I
Speaker 1: love that, So so I should really like lean into
Speaker 1: like the smell even more that I love that that's amazing.
Speaker 1: It's your body telling you what's good for you. Yes,
Speaker 1: And I think that the big thing is like how
Speaker 1: do we listen? So much of my work right now
Speaker 1: is like, really, how do I listen to my body more?
Speaker 1: How do I because my body is talking to me,
Speaker 1: how do I listen to it more and honor and
Speaker 1: instance of being an opposition with it? And I think
Speaker 1: that goes for just you know, being by myself, and
Speaker 1: then also for relationships we should be wrapping up. Is
Speaker 1: there anything else you want to say to the people
Speaker 1: out there about all pheromones, attachment style, all the things
Speaker 1: we've been talking about today. I just want to say this.
Speaker 1: First of all, thank you so much for having me on.
Speaker 1: I've always been a huge fan of yours, So I'm
Speaker 1: gonna fan girl for a moment and say that I'm
Speaker 1: just so grateful you're on the planet. I just want
Speaker 1: you to know that I appreciate that. But secondly, I
Speaker 1: want everyone else to know that to not give up
Speaker 1: hope that love is here. There are different kinds of love.
Speaker 1: Don't let your culture tell you that it has to
Speaker 1: be you know, swinging from the chandelier sex. There are
Speaker 1: plenty of people who have mature companion at love who
Speaker 1: for physiological reasons or whatever, may not be having sex,
Speaker 1: but they're having lots of closeness and cuddling and getting
Speaker 1: dopamine from their hugs and kisses. Um. There's so many
Speaker 1: different ways that human beings can connect with each other.
Speaker 1: There is somebody there who will love you and respect
Speaker 1: you the way you deserve, but not until you do
Speaker 1: it first, you cannot. We can only love others as
Speaker 1: much as we love ourselves. Or how you going to
Speaker 1: love somebody else if you don't love yourself? Can I
Speaker 1: get amen in here? Exactly? Amen in Thank you so much,
Speaker 1: Dr Wendy. Will we like to end this podcast with
Speaker 1: a question what else is true? And this actually comes
Speaker 1: from my therapeutic work in the community resiliency model, from
Speaker 1: the idea of both and and Basically, it's it's like,
Speaker 1: when things are really, really, really difficult in our lives,
Speaker 1: that is one thing, but then there's something else that
Speaker 1: is true. We can be in the space of both
Speaker 1: and and what else is true is what is a
Speaker 1: thing that helps you get through? What else is true?
Speaker 1: For you? Dr Wendy to die, I think the thing
Speaker 1: that helps me get through is the question why. Every
Speaker 1: single day, at every single moment, I'm saying, why, why
Speaker 1: do they do that? Why is that? Like that? Who
Speaker 1: created that? Why? And keeping my brain and my nickname
Speaker 1: is Nerd Barbie in a Nerd Barbie case where I'm
Speaker 1: constantly investigating human behavior just keeps me going. It's so
Speaker 1: fascinating to me. I love that. And I love that
Speaker 1: because of another therapist of mine who said, we're not
Speaker 1: living in reality when we make positive or negative predictions
Speaker 1: of the future, when we're ruminating on the past, when
Speaker 1: we're reading minds, and she says, our work is to
Speaker 1: stay present, curious, and non judgmental. So the why is
Speaker 1: the curiosity. And I think the why and the curiosity
Speaker 1: keeps this in the present moment too. Yeah. Yes, And
Speaker 1: it also makes me very forgiving of everybody and their behavior.
Speaker 1: I don't get Piste off because and I was like, ha,
Speaker 1: why were shot a bit? What happened there in her life?
Speaker 1: Like I never I don't get mad at people. I'm
Speaker 1: more trying to understand people who think differently than me
Speaker 1: or act differently. I love it. I love it. This
Speaker 1: was so amazing. I'm gonna need to listen to this
Speaker 1: because you said so much that I need to like
Speaker 1: take notes so I can practice all this. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, Dr Wendy Walsh. M TILM till is your podcast.
Speaker 1: The podcast is Mating Matters and you can follow me
Speaker 1: anywhere on my social media at Dr Wendy Walsh Perfect.
Speaker 1: How could you not want to go listen to Mating
Speaker 1: mad after this incredible conversation. Thank you so much, Thank you.
Speaker 1: By Wow. There are a few moments when I felt
Speaker 1: like I was in a therapy session which felt very vulnerable.
Speaker 1: Um at that moment when she talked about letting her
Speaker 1: baby know that, like it tend to be our mommy
Speaker 1: is going to be there. I don't know why that
Speaker 1: like just hit me in my gut. Um. What I
Speaker 1: know for sure is there's a little kid in me
Speaker 1: that still needs my mommy. And that spoke deeply to
Speaker 1: the little kid in me. And there's a little kid
Speaker 1: in all of us that needs nurturing. And I love
Speaker 1: having it reaffirmed by Dr Walsh that we can reparent ourselves,
Speaker 1: that we can be reparented through friendships and romantic relationships,
Speaker 1: and we can reparent ourselves as we parent our own children.
Speaker 1: That's amazing and it just reminds me of something a
Speaker 1: dear friend of mine said to me many years ago
Speaker 1: when I a struggling, and he said, it's never too
Speaker 1: late to have a happy childhood. Isn't amazing. It's never
Speaker 1: too late to have a happy childhood. And the way
Speaker 1: I interpret that is that it is never too late
Speaker 1: to give the child within us the love and nurturing
Speaker 1: that she needs. So yeah, I'll leave you with that,
Speaker 1: It's never too late. I love you. Thank you for
Speaker 1: listening to The Laverne Cox Show. Join me next week
Speaker 1: for my epic conversation with the original trans supermodel, Tracy
Speaker 1: Africa Norman. I walk in the footsteps of many women,
Speaker 1: but Tracy's courageous modeling career in the nineteen seventies has
Speaker 1: provided a blueprint for breaking barriers. You don't want to
Speaker 1: miss it. Please rate reviews, subscribe and share with everyone
Speaker 1: you know. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter
Speaker 1: at Laverne Cox and on Facebook at Laverne Cox for Real.
Speaker 1: Until next time, stay in the love. The Laverne Cox
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