Youtube: PsyCurious by Gari

What if the thing you’re calling love is actually your nervous system chasing relief? Not butterflies, not destiny. Relief. You pull away after a fight. You ache. Then they offer a crumb of warmth and the ache quiets. The quiet feels like home, so you run back. The loop tightens. And every time it hurts, you promise this was the last time until the next I miss you hits like a drug. That’s not romance. That’s a trauma bond. A bond built in chaos, sealed with little hits of hope and disguised as love. But that isn’t the whole story. The most dangerous thing about a trauma bond is that it doesn’t feel like danger. It feels like meaning. Today, we’ll reveal why it hooks so deep, why smart people stay, and the exact playbook to step out without losing yourself. One, name the pattern so it stops naming you. Real love has rhythm. A trauma bond has spikes. It usually starts the same way, idealization that feels almost supernatural. You’re told you’re the only one who gets them. The tempo is fast, the stories are intense, and your private details are received like holy secrets. Then suddenly, the temperature drops. Jabs, distance, criticism, not constant intermittent, just enough cold to make you doubt yourself. And right before you give up, here comes the repair phase. Tears, gifts, grand gestures, the speech about childhood pain, the promise that this time will be different. That cycle, idealize, devalue, repair doesn’t always look dramatic from the outside. Sometimes it’s subtle, unreturned texts, jokes that land like knives, a busy week that keeps lasting. You tell yourself, “We’re complicated, not broken.” You call it chemistry. But what keeps you there isn’t chemistry. It’s conditioning. And conditioning is stronger than logic. You can be brilliant and still be trapped. Intelligence doesn’t beat conditioning. Awareness does. But the pattern doesn’t run on words alone. and it runs on rewards. Two, the slot machine of affection. Predictable affection is comforting. Unpredictable affection is addictive. When love is served on a variable schedule, sometimes sweet, sometimes silent, your brain does what it was designed to do. Chase patterns it cannot predict. This is the same loop used by casinos and endless scroll apps. Intermittent reinforcement. You never know when the I’m proud of you is coming, so you keep pulling the lever. You replay every conversation, searching for the trick that earned you last week’s tenderness. You try harder. You walk on eggshells. When a good day finally arrives, the relief hits like a payout. Your brain stamps that relief as proof and the bond tightens. Here’s the part most people miss. Intermittent rewards don’t just keep you engaged, they make the behavior resistant to extinction. In plain English, the less consistent the affection, the longer you’ll keep trying to win it back, even when it’s not coming. That’s why leaving feels impossible. You’re not weak. You’re wired. And your wiring is being used against you. But behavior isn’t the only thing manipulated. Chemicals are too. Three, chemistry under fire. Why? Stress glues you to the hurt. When you feel threatened, abandonment, jealousy, explosive moods, your body floods with cortisol. Your mind narrows, scanning for a way to feel safe. Then your partner offers warmth. A message, a hug, a come over. Cortisol drops. Dopamine spikes. The swing from panic to relief feels huge. And your brain labels the messenger of relief as safe. Over time, the person who triggered the alarm becomes the person who turns it off. That contrast gets welded to your attachment map. There’s more. Oxytocin, the bonding hormone, can rise in moments of reconciliation, intimacy, and even in certain stressful situations where closeness seems to protect you. It doesn’t check who deserves your trust. It just deepens the imprint of the person you’re with. So, you bond harder inside the storm. You feel meant to be precisely because you survive chaos together. The body confuses survival relief with soul connection. And that illusion is powerful. You don’t fight chemistry with shame. You fight it with context. And context means calling out the mental traps you keep stepping into. Four mind games your brain thinks are helping. Your mind wants to protect your identity. So when the relationship hurts, it offers stories that keep your world stable. Cognitive dissonance. I wouldn’t stay in something harmful. Therefore, this isn’t harmful. It’s complicated, passionate, special. The story spares your ego and prolongs your pain. Sunk cost. We already invested years. I can’t quit now. But past time is a receipt, not a reason. Only the future counts. Opportunity costs neglect. You forget there’s a life be, a love be, a self be that can only appear if you make space. Identity fusion. It’s us against the world. The fantasy of being the one who finally heals them ties your worth to their wounds. You become the medic for someone who keeps reopening the cut. The fixer’s high. When you do calm the storm, you get a hero’s glow. The glow becomes the drug. You chase the glow, not the good. These aren’t character flaws. They’re survival strategies that outlive their usefulness. When you see them, you can choose something better. But first, clear the noise around what this is not. Five. Not toxic romance, not destiny, just mislabeling. We love dramatic labels. Stockholm syndrome. Ride or die. They make chaos feel cinematic, but labels can blur more than they reveal. Stockholm isn’t a clinical diagnosis. It became shorthand for bonding with someone who also threatens you. It describes a paradox, not a personality. It shouldn’t be used to shame you. Another confusion is lirance, that consuming infatuation that feeds on uncertainty. It thrives when signals are mixed. You obsess not because you’re shallow, but because the brain craves resolution. Limrance plus intermittent rewards is a recipe for months of rumination. None of this equals love. Love doesn’t need constant cliffhers to feel alive. Love is a steady fire, not a faulty wire. So if it’s not love, why do brilliant, capable people stay? Because the trap isolates you and isolation warps truth. Six, why smart people stay. A trauma bond often comes with micro isolations. You stop telling friends about the fights because you don’t want them to hate your partner. You shrink your world to protect a fantasy you barely believe in. Secrets become loyalty tests. You’re offered conditional closeness. We’re perfect if you stop bringing up problems, so you stop bringing them up. Or you’re guilted for setting boundaries. You’re so cold now. You start parenting their moods. Your calendar becomes their weather. Shame does the rest. You’re embarrassed that this is your life. You’re terrified of being judged for leaving over nothing. You keep hoping for the version you met at the beginning to come back. You keep thinking, “Maybe I’m the dramatic one. Maybe if I heal me, the relationship will calm down. Personal growth is noble. Using it to excuse harm is not. Staying doesn’t mean you’re weak. It means you’re human. Getting out doesn’t mean you’re heartless. It means you picked your future. So, let’s make leaving possible and safe. Seven. Break the loop a sevenstep blueprint. You don’t need a perfect plan. You need enough structure to outpace second thoughts. Think of this as harm reduction for your heart. Step one, pattern journal. evidence, excuses for 14 days. Record dates, triggers, behavior, and aftermath. No poetry, just facts. Patterns are hard to deny when they’re on paper. The journal is for you, not for debate. It breaks gaslighting yours or theirs. Step two, boundary script. Short, clear, repeatable. Write one sentence you can say without shaking. I want a relationship where conflicts are talked through without insults. If that can’t happen, I will step back. Keep it behavioral, not accusatory. You’re naming your standard, not diagnosing their soul. Step three, no low contact plan. Pick a lane. If this is romantic and harmful, no contact is the cleanest break. If you must coordinate, kids, lease, work, design, low contact, written only, necessary topics only, scheduled windows. Predecide how you’ll respond to baiting, default to noted, or I’ll get back to you by Friday. Choose clarity over performance. Step four, withdrawal calendar. Expect the crash. Quitting a trauma bond can feel like quitting a drug. The first 30 days are loud. Intrusive memories, urges to check, dreams that wake you up. Pre-plan the first two weekends and the first birthday anniversary alone. Put something in those slots. Walks, safe friends, classes, a deep clean of your space, anything that moves your body and cools the craving without inbox roulette. Step five, co-regulation team. Borrow a steady nervous system. Shame isolates. Healing connects. Tell two trusted people exactly what support you’ll need. Text me at 900 p.m. Take my phone at midnight if I ask to unblock. If I beg to go back, remind me of pages 3 to 4 in my journal. You’re not weak for needing people. You’re wise for building railings on a steep path. Step six, professional help. Skill, not stigma. If you have access, work with a licensed professional. Modalities differ. CBT, trauma focused approaches, EMDR, parts work, but the core is the same. You’re learning nervous system skills to tolerate discomfort without sprinting back to the familiar. If you’re in immediate danger, prioritize safety and local resources. Your survival comes first, your story second. Step seven, fresh start date. Give your brain a clean page. Pick a landmark first of next month, a season change, your birthday week, and name it. New chapter day. Humans love chapters. Use that psychology. On that day, move furniture, change passwords, start a ritual. Rituals teach your body you’re somewhere new. This isn’t about punishing the other person. It’s about ending your participation in a pattern your future can’t afford. And when your mind says, “But what if this time is different?” Answer gently. If it becomes different consistently, I’ll see it from a safe distance. That’s not cold, that’s grown. If this video hits home and you want words to hold on to when the night gets noisy, consider spending time with Gari Nguyen’s books. Gari Nguyen is a 29-year-old author living in Silicon Valley, and she’s published 13 books in Vietnam since she was 17, including novels, short stories, and personal essays. You can find some of her works on Amazon.com, such as Just Hear Me Out and A Luxury Item Called Me. If you’re rebuilding after leaving a Painful Loop, these pages give you language, perspective, and gentleness without sugar coating. Think of them as long form reflections you can return to while you’re creating your own fresh start. And now back to your blueprint. Eight, relearning love without the adrenaline. When you step out of a trauma bond, the quiet will feel wrong at first. Your body mistakes peace for boredom because it isn’t used to calm. Give it time. Healthy love is not a plot twist every week. It’s predictable presence. It doesn’t punish you for telling the truth. It doesn’t weaponize your soft spots. It doesn’t require you to earn basic respect. Here are a few quick tells to retrain your radar. Consistency. Intensity. Intensity can be chemistry or chaos. Consistency is care you can plan your day around. Repair without repayment. Healthy partners apologize and change without demanding that you forget the impact. Boundaries welcome. If a boundary is treated as betrayal, you’re seeing the ceiling of safety. No secret persona. If you must hide the real story to keep the image of the relationship alive, the image is the relationship. And yes, grief will come. You will miss someone who didn’t exist consistently. Mourn that version. Let the fantasy go with dignity. Grief is not a sign you chose wrong. It’s a sign you’re telling the truth. Before we close, let’s answer the two objections that keep people stuck. Two objections diffused. But they’re not all bad. Of course, they’re not. Almost no one is. That’s how intermittent reinforcement works. Good moments sprinkled into harm keep you hooked. The right question isn’t are there good times. It’s what’s the average emotional climate and what’s the price of the good? If the price is your self-respect, the math doesn’t work. Maybe if I just heal more, this will stop. Heal for you, not as a strategy to become more tolerable to someone who refuses to be safe. Self-work is sacred. It should expand your freedom, not your tolerance for chaos. You can grow and go. Both can be true. Choose the life that can hold you. The most radical thing you can do with your love life is stop calling withdrawal destiny. You are not addicted to a person. You are addicted to a pattern. Crisis, relief, repeat. Once you see the machinery, you get your power back. You stop writing a poem about pain and start writing a plan for peace. If you’re standing on the ledge of a decision, here’s your nudge. Give your next 30 days to the version of you who sleeps through the night. Let the next 90 days belong to the version of you who doesn’t check a phone at 2:00 a.m. for proof you matter. Build a year that proves you never had to beg for the basics. And when your chest tightens and your hand hovers over unblock, whisper this. I don’t have to earn what I deserve. Then put the phone down. Open a book that reminds you who you are and walk into the quiet that used to scare you. That quiet is not emptiness. It’s room. If this helped, send it to the friend who keeps saying, “Maybe one last time.” And if you need steady words in your corner, the books we mentioned are linked below. Here’s to love without cliffhers and to a future that doesn’t ask you to bleed to prove you.