Amelia Lichtenberg 1/14/25 Amelia Lichtenberg 1/14/25

Listening to Inner Wisdom When it Says Something You Don't Like (Radical Transparency II)

I recently had an experience where an inner truth living within my body/mind/soul finally had enough and let itself out into the world. It was a painful, heart-wrenching experience of deep resistance. Even though I knew that the more I resisted, the more intense the feeling would be. Acceptance may have diffused it, but it didn’t make the process less painful. Sometimes it’s the letting go part that hurts more than the thing that initially caused the pain.

The dance of denial

The first part of this process is what I’m referring to as “the dance of denial.” I frame it like this because long before I finally got to the “acceptance & release” phase, I was in a back-and-forth dialogue with myself. Usually activated by something in my relationships or environments, an inner knowing would swell up in response to these events and force me to confront its message. I would move with it, let it move through me (a bit), and allow myself to feel it. Just when this part of me would feel like I was accepting it, I would push it back aside and return to the other parts of myself that I wanted to focus on.

Like a retaliation, this part would march back to my center and force me to engage with it again, and again, and again. I would continue to excuse its recurring presence with stories about my stresses in grad school impacting other areas of my world, like my capacity to tolerate change, my emotional sensitivity to certain trigger points, etc. We danced this dance for months until finally my Ego collapsed from exhaustion.

Remembering radical acceptance

It took me a while to get to the stage where I could remember what radical acceptance actually is about. It’s not about just “going with the flow” and being okay with any & everything. It’s not about masking my feelings to continue fitting into a narrative that doesn’t work for me. In this case, radical acceptance was about accepting a reality that I felt resistant to because of internalized narratives about what and who I thought I “should” be.

Feeding into an attachment of how I thought my ideals would manifest

I wanted to be “poly enough.” More than anything. I wanted to be easygoing and open to new energies, free-flowing and full of so much love and compersion that it stopped being painful. I wanted so much to be enlightened and strong enough to “handle it.” I tried so hard to fit in to a mold that wasn’t working for me. I learned a lot along the way, though.

It’s hard for me to admit all of this, especially in a blog post, but it also feels good to say what’s been stirring inside for so long.

I still believe in the ideals and values of Relationship Anarchy. So much so that I stuck with relational structures that felt harmful for too long as a means of clinging to my attachment of what those values looked like. That was the real trap. At some point along the way, I stopped being in praxis with these values and started trying to embody a narrative that I assigned to them. The whole point of relationship anarchy (as far as I’m concerned) is that it’s a philosophy from which to build any kind of relationship, not a specific structure or practice itself. I stopped listening to my inner guide and tried to play a role, which took me out of my authentic self-expression and harmed both myself and others along the way.

Becoming Radically transparent with myself

There came a point where I stopped fighting with myself about these stories. I started listening to what my emotional body was telling me when I became activated. I communicated with others around my experiences and my needs. Things got better, and there was a quiet period where things were calm, stable, and secure. Life was continuing on, and repair was happening where it needed to.

Then a change came suddenly and I felt the recently closed wounds re-open. I felt flooded with trauma flashbacks and memories of hurtful experiences. My partner approached me with loving and gentle kindness as this happened. We talked about the rupture - where it came from, why it felt so intense. I had to sit with myself and listen to all the parts within me. I had to hear what they wanted and find where they had common ground. After some time, I found my truths.

Changing priorities

One of the truths that came through was about my general life priorities. I realized I was moving into a space where the time spent on relationships and relational processing felt consuming to other areas. As I’m moving toward the end of grad school, moving into a lifelong career, I want to focus my priorities on these areas and on my creative pursuits.

Any healthy relationship takes a lot of time and work. Healthy non-monogamous relationships take even more time and energy. I realized that part of my frustration was from how much time and energy processing these aspects of both myself and my relational sphere took away from other parts of my life. Rather than spend as much time co-processing relational ruptures and changes with my partner, or co-processing our feelings about other relationships, I want to spend that time collaborating on creative projects and supporting each others’ dreams and aspirations.

My relational priority has always been for a partnership that allows for authentic relating and autonomy. For me, that could take any form. In some relationships, I chose to continue in non-monogamous structures at the detriment of the connection because of what I felt I needed in that time. Now I feel that I want to invest in the connection with my partner more than in maintaining a non-monogamous lifestyle. I think we could work through these complications in non-monogamy, but I realized my priority was to heal my relational wounds through other means. Mainly, through building a trusting and committed bond with someone, which felt too difficult with so much possible change and instability in the air.

the direction of my inner growth

While I value the ways that non-monogamy forced me to accept change and relinquish control, I also began to realize that my personal growth trajectory was not working with this structure. As a neurospicy person with a history of environmental instability, I really struggle with change. For the majority of my adult life, I have been striving for stillness.

As someone who grew up with a chaotic divorce custody schedule, part of my healing journey as an adult is about building a stable, grounded life and home. I’ve known this for a while, but it took me time and a stable partnership to realize how non-monogamous relationship structures continued to stunt this part of my growth process. I had to sit with this one a while because I feared that by admitting this, I was engaging in conflict avoidance. I decided that this wasn’t the case because my need is for consistency, and this is just too difficult in polyamory (for me).

I just had to admit that the constant changes that come with a fluid relationship structure were not supporting my need for a slow, still home and life.

my body felt calm when i asked if it wanted this

To me, the biggest indicator that I was making the right choice was that all the alarm bells in my body started to quiet when I asked if it wanted this change. It didn’t mean that there wouldn’t be conflict, or that things wouldn’t be difficult, but that this particular series of activations would not be as much a part of the healing process.

It felt like my body was thanking me for finally choosing to not overstimulate it to a harmful degree. I tell this kind of stuff to my clients all the time, but it has been so hard to take my own advice here. Listening to my emotional body’s wisdom, I finally decided to make life a little easier for myself.

It doesn’t have to be this hard all the time. It’s okay to take a step back.

Finding new balance with my new truth

I don’t regret the years I spent trying to make non-monogamous structures work for me. Through those experiences, I learned a lot about myself, my strengths and weaknesses, my trigger points. I learned how to communicate equitably and accept when things are out of my control. I also learned how to let go of my desire to control, at least to some significant degree. These lessons have served my growth in so many ways, including in my growth toward building a more authentic and equitable relationship with myself.

The point of my journey into relationship anarchy and conscious relating has always been to deconstruct my assumptions about relationships. That includes new assumptions that show up.

In coming into alignment within myself about my need to move towards a less overwhelming relationship structure, I also asked myself (and my partner) how we could find balance between a monogamous relationship and our non-traditional values and ideals. We found that our wants, needs, and priorities were aligned, so developing new agreements that reflected these felt easy. We agreed to allow space for checking in about our relationship structure over time, after certain milestones, etc. We also gave ourselves permission to continue to choose this new relationship structure when we reach those check-in points.

The work is never done. Just because we changed our relationship to a more structured, less complicated form does not mean we have solved all our issues. We still have ruptures and repair work to do. Now it just feels like we have more space to work with. We created a structure that feels supportive to both of our needs, which can help us both feel supported in exploring vulnerability and interpersonal healing in a different way.

I still feel emotionally raw from all the changes. It’s taking a while to settle into my body. Still, I feel that good things are on the horizon, and the next layer of my inner work can begin.

Thank you for reading!

— Emily Lichtenberg

Amelia Lichtenberg 6/15/24 Amelia Lichtenberg 6/15/24

Art is the Process: A Look into the Healing Journey of an Art Therapy Student

For those of you who don’t know, I’m currently embarking on a Master’s degree in art therapy. The school I go to requires a LOT of work, both in regards to my classes, assignments, and clinical work, and with the amount of personal growth and deep reflection we are asked to do throughout our education. Being an art therapy student, that means we are asked to constantly make response art (a practice of using art-making to process a specific experience or concept), and also engage in various art therapy directives that we might ask our future clients to use. The point being that we understand what we are asking of others.

Being a therapist as a lifestyle

They say the best therapists have therapists, and I wholeheartedly believe that. I also think that the best art therapists maintain a personal art practice, which may combine art therapy-type engagement with Self and other forms of artistic expression. While it’s been hard for me to maintain my non-art therapy professional painting practice, I have been dedicating time during grad school to explore new materials and forms of creative expression. Writing is one of those forms of expression for me, so this entry is more to highlight some of the pieces from my process I’ve been cultivating since starting this phase of life.

process-oriented artwork

‘Draw Your Breath’ art therapy group activity (2023)

The major difference between the work in this article and my professional artwork is the process. My professional work is meticulous and carefully planned out and executed. My process work is loose, sometimes based on a pre-meditated idea, but mostly based on the moment, what’s available, and what feels good or ‘right’ to work with.

This ‘Draw Your Breath’ image was the first time I experienced this activity. We were instructed to close our eyes and draw our breath, pass the sheet to the person on our right, and do the same. We did a few rounds of this, and everyone got their original sheets back. We were asked to pull out images/shapes/forms we saw in the scribbles.

I’ve continued doing this activity solo when I need to ground and regulate. On days where I’m feeling distracted at my clinical site, I would take a beat to do a breath drawing.

Another practice I’ve found incredibly useful for processing my own life and experiences is an art journal exercise, where I will write about something and then create art on top of it. Sometimes I get a flash of a visual idea while writing and go with that, other times (like the one shown here) I just go with what ‘feels’ good (physically, emotionally, etc.). As I write this piece I’m being reminded of how much I love this practice and how I need to be engaging in it way more frequently, especially when I’m feeling highly activated.

I’ve also found this particular activity helpful when I’m not sure exactly how to start making a piece of response or process art. Since my artistic background is in commercial fine art, I still often struggle with letting go and making art just for myself. It’s easy for me to get caught up in pressuring myself that every piece needs to be ‘good.’ The process of writing first helps loosen me up from that.

exploring different dialcets of artistic language

Western medical & liberation psychology views of ‘neurodivergence’ - handmade book (2023)

One of my favorite parts of the art therapy grad school experience has been how inspired I am to try different mediums and forms of expression. For my Adult Development class, which really was a class comparing the values of the Western medical model and liberation psychology, we were asked to create a book. Each page was based on the topic of the week, and we were to depict the Western medical view of the topic on the left, the liberation psychology view on the right, and discuss how we would integrate them in our practice in the middle. I chose a different medium for each page of the book, including a page of sewn buttons, glued beads, collage, and more.

‘Acknowledging What’s Here’ - clinical response art (2024)

As art therapists, we also explore the way different mediums elicit different facets of the creative process. Since starting grad school, I’ve grown to love watercolor and inks - the two areas of 2D media I always avoided. The quick and fluid properties of them entice me and have inspired me to learn how to let go.

A theme throughout my personal creative healing journey has been learning how to use artmaking to channel raw emotion. As a person living with PTSD, I struggle with dissociation and over-intellectualizing my emotional experiences. That’s why I write. That’s why my professional artwork has a refined and careful process. I am so used to distilling my creative experience, but I’ve also come to find that while that is somewhat of a strength, it is also one of my bigger shortcomings.

Blindfolded ‘affective’ tempera paint stick drawing (2024)

Vellum layer of blindfolded ‘affective’ image (2024)

As I move toward my final year of school, moving from the classroom to the clinic, I’ve been focusing a lot of my creative processing on this. My supervisor last year taught me an activity where we taped a large piece of paper to the table, I was blindfolded, and she handed me tempera paint sticks and asked me to channel my feelings into marks on the page. Letting go of aesthetics and directing intention, just emoting on the page. This is one of the most valuable tools I have learned, although also one of the hardest activities for me to stay engaged in. I will often set a timer for myself to see how long it takes before I notice myself shutting down from the emotional space. It’s about 5 minutes, maximum.

I’ve added to this practice by taking a piece of translucent vellum (a type of tracing paper) and taping it on top of the tempera piece. I will take a marker and draw/write on top of the page, which has served as a way to ground the experience and provide me context in case I revisit the piece. The two images here show a blindfolded tempera piece and the layered vellum. Sadly, my sharpie was almost dead in this session and it impacted the experience. It was a valuable lesson in making sure that all the materials available are properly working before diving into, or leading someone into, an experience like this.

Eco-art: nature as art material and subject

‘To Be Held’ - response art to wilderness therapy class (2023)

Probably the most significant portion of my creative journey through grad school has been the evolution of my process and identity as an emerging eco-art therapist. Through engaging with the creative process in new ways, through curiosity in exploring new media, I’ve opened myself up to what it means to work with nature in the creative process. This both refers to subject and material. The ‘To Be Held’ piece is still one of my favorites that I’ve created in grad school. During my Wilderness & Adventure Therapy class, I felt held by the trees and moss of the forest where we stayed. I was struggling with heartbreak, and the soil absorbed my tears. I felt loved and at home. I asked the land if I could take some moss and bark to add to my image, to use some berries for the ink, and she enthusiastically consented. To work with the more-than-human world in this way, to create art and meaning from and with nature, has brought a deeper sense of purpose and meaning to my own creative work and the work I want to facilitate for my clients.

This particular creative adventure started with my first Ecotherapy class, where we were asked to practice ‘place bonding’ throughout the semester. We were to visit our chosen place at least 3-4 times per week, at different times of day and during different weather conditions. I chose a spot in a local forest, and each visit I created a watercolor painting of the area from a different angle. At the end of my place bonding experience, I collected fallen branches and other materials to create a final art piece to reflect my experience. Place bonding gave me a practice of tuning in to the beings around me, and offered me a space to prioritize these relationships. I saw myself as part of the ecosystem, rather than a separate visitor. Hence, I created a self portrait out of Douglas Fir needles from the area. It has also been a fun and interesting process to watch the needles dry and change color, changing the way the piece looks over time - a reminder of the impermanence of all things.

This final piece was created during an open studio session facilitated by my cohort peers. We were asked to roam our beautiful campus and forage materials to create a burnout buddy. The process brought about a playful engagement with both the campus ecosystem, while also addressing the experience of burnout that is so pervasive in grad school. Bringing play and childlike joy into the creative process, while also fostering engagement with the more-than-human world has helped me find playful moments in everyday life. Creating burnout buddies out of easily foraged materials like Fir cones and rocks made the activity accessible, able to experience in a wide variety of locations.

In the end, a lot of my art therapy education has been a collection of learning new ways to heal myself through art-making, and thus building a repertoire of directives to use with clients on their healing journey. While it has been, and will continue to be, a tough journey of deep self reflection, I am so grateful for the way we are learning.

— Emily Lichtenberg

Amelia Lichtenberg 5/18/24 Amelia Lichtenberg 5/18/24

Healing Trauma Through Growth-Fostering Relationships

A/N: I found this piece waiting in my drafts from April 2023. I touched it up a bit, but the events which inspired this original piece are now over 1 year old (though I left the recent-past tense in the piece). I may revisit this concept with a reflection piece, as I still see how these general thoughts I had are still so true and relevant to how I experience my current relational landscape, which is much different than the one illustrated below.

Enjoy the read!

Today I realized something important. No matter what partner, my anxieties around deception and abandonment show up at some point. I know these reactions are informed by my trauma history, and while I’ve come a long way in processing these feelings and experiences, there are moments where they still affect me very strongly. I can’t tell if this will ever fully dissipate, but something I noticed is that there are some relationships where this part of myself becomes a source of stress and disconnection, and others where it’s a non-issue and is worked through as quickly as it arises.

I began to wonder, why is this such a big issue with some partners and not with others? I concluded it came down to the dynamic within each individual relationship, and how all parties interact with each other in that space. In writing this article, I came to understand that it is more complicated than simply ‘chemistry.’ Communication compatibility, the structures placed within a relationship, the trauma histories, and how all parties respond to the each other all inform how the trauma-brain parts of myself interface in relationships and what happens when activation occurs.

To understand my experiences better, I decided to examine this recent series of moments from the relational-cultural counseling theory.

Relational-cultural Theory

Relational-cultural theory (RCT) believes that our experiences and identities are shaped by our relationships. Healing occurs when healthy, secure relationships are built, and trauma accumulates when we isolate ourselves from authentic connections. Authenticity is cultivated through affirming experiences in relationships. When we are not accepted in our relationships, we hide our authentic selves.

I recently made the choice to dissolve a cohabiting, core partnership in favor of developing a new structure with this beloved. In rewriting our relationship intentions and readjusting our landscapes to incorporate new partners, I felt my trauma surface in the face of changing dynamics and priorities. When I’ve shared my insecurities in the past, it led to communication breakdown, stress, and distance. Over time, this caused me to feel like there was something wrong with me, and I began to hide parts of my authentic self to maintain peace in our dynamic.

There is a concept in RCT called the central relational paradox which states that chronic disconnection can lead to condemned isolation, or a sense that one isn’t worthy of human connection (Duffey & Somody, 2011). Although people desire authentic connection, trauma causes folks to develop protective habits that further ensure isolation. I did this in my cohabiting relationship by hiding my authentic feelings and withdrawing.

This part of my recent relational history is why I have struggled so much in the last year to write these articles. Finding authentic words felt impossible because I wasn’t embodying them. It is also why I felt a deep sense of dread when my trauma responses began to emerge in a new dynamic.

Response Art: Being Held by My Team (2024)

RCT is a perspective which takes the focus off the individual and puts experiences and behaviors into a broader social context. Reflecting on my recent experiences from this lens, I see why when I shared my feelings with this newer partner, they responded in a way where I felt accepted. I didn’t feel like I was ‘wrong,’ or that my feelings were shameful, and they dissipated as instantly as they arose. Nuances in communication styles and trauma histories made all the difference when engaging in the same conversation with two different partners.

Healing occurs through growth-fostering relationships. Some characteristics of a growth-fostering relationship are:

· Mutuality

· Prioritizing each other’s growth and the relationship

· Authentic communication

· Radical acceptance

· Expansion of thought, feeling, and understanding

Along with complicated trauma histories, there were power differentials in my previous relationship which impeded our ability to achieve mutuality. In my experience, without this sense of mutuality it is impossible to step into a space of expansion, radical acceptance, and authentic communication. This served as a detriment in the vulnerable moments. The effect of these power differentials became apparent after we re-configured our relationship structure and were able to establish mutuality.

Using Relationship Anarchy & ENM to Heal Relational Trauma

We heal through being engaged in authentic relationships. We can build structures to foster these kinds of dynamics by fostering relational resilience, which includes the following shifts:

· Individual ‘control over’ —> supported vulnerability

· One-directional needs for support —> mutual empathetic involvement

· Separate self-esteem —> relational confidence

· ‘Power over’ dynamics —> empowerment through encouragement of mutual growth & constructive conflict

· Finding meaning in self-centered/self-consciousness —> creating meaning in expansive relational awareness (Duffey & Somody, 2011)

I began my journey into ENM and RA with intentions to heal relational trauma from my upbringing and early adult life. By cultivating a lifestyle where my relationship structures are based on intentional, mutual agreements which are subject to change, I have developed a foundation of relational healing to lean on in hard times. The struggles I faced over the last year in my cohabiting relationship stemmed from being unable to fully embody these values in that relationship. When we deconstructed and reconstructed our relationship, we were able to move toward relational resilience practices with each other and maintain a deep closeness in our new relationship.

The relationship with my new beloved has the benefit of the wisdom and experience I gained from my last experience. By weaving in agreements to mitigate the same power differentials that occurred, we are setting a structure that very intentionally fosters mutuality. From this mutuality, we work toward healing each other through compersion and inviting authentic communication. Having similar neurodivergence and communication styles make building and maintaining these structures easier.

I notice this growth-fostering relationship creates a feedback loop in my other relationships. With increased relational confidence built from experiences of security and acceptance, I can interface with other beloveds in a way that embodies radical transparency, radical acceptance, and from a community-based mindset.

My trauma responses still show up in both dynamics from time-to-time, and I imagine they will continue to do so as I heal, but the level to which they are enflamed or diminished, and the impact they have on myself and my connections vary based on the connection and structures in place. There is only so much that ‘compatibility’ can do for a dynamic, and we are all accountable to ourselves to meet others in our lives in a space to co-create growth-fostering relationships.

—Emily Lichtenberg

resources

Duffey, T., & Somody, C. (2011). The role of relational-cultural theory in mental health counseling. Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 33(3), 223-242.

Relational-Cultural Theory: Fostering Healthy Coexistence Through a Relational Lens

APA: Relational Cultural Therapy Sample

A Relational-Cultural Framework: Emphasizing Relational Dynamics and Multicultural Skill Development (NBCC)

Amelia Lichtenberg 7/10/23 Amelia Lichtenberg 7/10/23

Burnouts leading to Breakups: Getting Caught in the Web of Dysregulation

The past few months have been such a struggle for me: moving, full-time grad school, full-time job, complicated relationship dynamics. It’s no wonder I found myself caught in a web of dysregulation. My dysfunction looks like social over-functioning, losing control of my filters, and feeling like it’s impossible to slow down. When I get into this state it can have some harsh impacts on my relationships with others, and recently it has….

I use writing these blog posts as one strategy of processing my experiences. I am someone who thinks and communicates much more clearly through written word than verbal, even with myself. I’ve been struggling to write about my experiences over the last year because I hold expectations around what I ‘should’ be writing about, how my personal commentary about Relationship Anarchy and authentic relating ‘should’ come across, and what sort of vibe I ‘ought’ to portray for those reading. Also, this has been a very confusing time for me with the start of grad school and the way my program asks me to deeply reflect on and question myself all the time.

This piece is a little different. This time, I’m not here to give advice or insight. I’m here to share an experience where my cycle of over-functioning gifted me with hard lessons to sit with. This piece is a reflection of me sitting with these lessons.

I’m exposing myself for the flawed individual that I am. I don’t have it all together, and this process isn’t complete… but then again, is it ever?

What happened?

I lost my sense of intention in important relationships, and I took my beloveds for granted. I leaned on them for more support than I leaned on myself for, and essentially asked them to bear the weight of my stress and anxiety with me. I especially did this to my core partner. I didn’t mean to do this. It happened because I found myself activated from old trauma, struggling with a lot of big adjustments (as a neurodiverse person who struggles with the smallest adjustment), and I forgot to take moments to breathe and check in with myself.

Essentially, I hit severe burnout, and I stayed there for about 2 months.

This looked like me falling into reactive patterns regarding a metamour, expressing self-negativity, bringing my partners into the fold of my mental back-and-forth between my desire to be in ethically non-monogamous, intentional relationships and retreating to monogamy out of fear, insecurity, and activation. It looked like me calling my core partner almost daily to process my stress when they had other things going on. It looked like me using them as a distraction from sitting with my own discomfort and addressing my burnout.

What a mess, right?

I try to hold myself with some compassion around this, though. When school and work lives demand so much intense output, it’s hard to shut one’s brain off in personal time. When there’s no personal time, it’s hard to process and re-regulate before interfacing with others. This cycle put strain on my core partner to the point where a rift formed. They chose to take back space for themself, and I don’t blame them for their choice.

“Don’t Forget Me After the Sun Sets” 2018

I’m grieving so much from this turn of events. Not only the loss of a beautiful relationship that had so much potential, but to see in hindsight all the ways I could’ve made a different choice. Instead of jumping into reactivity, I could’ve taken a moment to slow down and use mindfulness to re-contextualize the situation. I could’ve asked for more time to process something. I could’ve been writing for Love is the Action and reminding myself of all that I believe in relationally through that simple practice.

How to move forward?

The consequences are hard to sit with. The lessons are humbling. What I find the hardest part of this all is to accept myself for all of these choices I made with deep love, compassion, and understanding. Whenever I am in conflict, I try my best to learn from my mistakes and grow. I reframe the situation in a way that allows me to foster acceptance and gratitude. This time it has been really hard.

Instead of saying to myself: “I regret every time I made a sarcastic comment about waiting for them to leave me,” (which, let’s be real, I totally do regret), I’m trying to say “I am grateful for this deep lesson the consequences of my choice is gifting me.” Instead of falling victim to the stress of my life, I’m using this experience as a wake-up call to shift things around and create more space and time for myself and for spontaneity in my life, something which I’ve learned is extremely important for my mental health.

I’m also recognizing that I’m at a place in my life where things are just harder. I’m putting myself through a rigorous grad school program that demands a lot of introspective and creative reflection and output. I am also working to support myself through it. It makes sense why I’d get caught in the web of my dysfunction, and it’s okay that I did.

It doesn’t make the grief and loss easier, but I am so glad for all the lessons that came from this. The ways to gauge myself and my regulatory state, new ways of communicating boundaries with myself and others, learning what’s important to me and what my personal needs are while being a grad student. This experience finally helped me solidify the morning routine I’ve been trying to nail down for years. These lessons will all serve me greatly when I become an eco-art therapist.

“Pervading Loveliness & Exquisite Jubilation” *2020*

The loss of my core partner means I gain opportunities to practice radical self-reliance. As much as I will miss the beauty of our walks and spontaneous trips to go stargazing, and as much as I grieve for all the plans we made that may not ever come to fruition, I also know that these are still things that I enjoy as an individual. I can continue to enjoy walks, stopping to smell the roses, and talking to all the plants in the old growth forest on my own. The sense of freedom and empowerment that comes from this is so deep, and now when I go to do these things, I will think of them and the ways they re-sparked so many things for me in our time together … and who knows? Maybe someday we will be able to do all these things together again, in whatever context makes sense.

I will hold the lessons with deep gratitude and humility, and vow to never forget them so that next time I cross paths with a connection as rare and valuable as the one I just lost, I will not take it for granted regardless of how crazy my life becomes. Thank you so much, beloved, for the beauty you’ve brought to my life in so many ways.

Thank you for reading.

— Emily Lichtenberg

Amelia Lichtenberg 5/18/23 Amelia Lichtenberg 5/18/23

Living Freely (Thoughts on Authentic Relating)

What does it mean to live freely? For me, it means being able to be my authentic self in all moments of my life. This includes when I’m at home, at work, at school, alone, with friends, etc. Through my experiences as a neurodivergent person and a person who walks a non-traditional life path, I find modern US-American society a culture which promotes inauthentic existence through materialism, ‘playing games’ in relationships, and masking.

Note: This post is a reflection of my personal thoughts and perspectives. I do not claim to be an expert on Relationship Anarchy, and I acknowledge that other folks experience RA in different and equally valid ways.

Using relationship anarchy for self-liberation

For me, Relationship Anarchy (RA) has been a tool to learn how to deconstruct these ingrained patterns and behaviors of inauthentic connecting. By learning how to become attuned to myself, my needs & wants, and my state of mind/heart/body/soul at a given moment, I am also learning how to share that outward with those I interact with. The result is my inner self feeling more at peace because I am not masking for the first time.

RA is an ideological framework that prioritizes one’s relationship to themself first. From here, a person expands outward and builds intentional relationships with others.

This takes on a horizontal/landscape view, rather than a hierarchical/vertical one. Relationships with others can be seen as on a landscape or continuum, rather than a ladder. Ranks are replaced with contextual proximity, and static dynamics become fluid and ever-changing (just as life is!).

how it shows up for me

I let my neurodivergence shine through Radical Transparency practices, and my relationships are more aligned with my needs and wants because I integrate agreement-making practices into the structure of my relationships.

The practice of making agreements and building intentional relationships also helps me learn who in my life can fully accept me and how certain people want to show up in my life. As a lifetime recovering people-pleaser, I find this extremely valueable. Establishing these structures of relationship building not only put boundaries for others, they also provide me with self-boundaries to help me say within my authetnicity and not fall into trauma-based patterns of conformity and appeasement for the sake of maintaining connection.

Allowing others to choose how the want to show up in our dynamic, and standing my ground on where I am willing to meet them, gives me a foundation where my energy is reserved for what and who I want.

Taking competition out of the picture gives us room to be our authentic selves. Without the need to fill a societally predetermined role, impress others, or climb a social ladder, we are more able to share ourselves with others without fear of judgment.

This, of course, doesn’t mean judgment won’t enter our lives, whether self- or other-imposed, but we are less likely to base our inner conversations and inward/outward actions on these insecurities. When insecurities arise, which for me is quite often, I do my best to lean into them and and myself why this is coming up. Often times I find that my insecurities (feelings of inadequacy, jealousy, fear of being alone) are trying to tell me something. Sometimes it has to do with my relationships to others, but most of the time I can trace it back to the basics: sustainance, hydration, physical activity, and/or rest.

When our identities are not tied to an external status, we are able to examine our experience with genuine curiosity and find these deeper inner truths.

Learning to live an authentic lifestyle is a lifelong journey. New things come up, old things resurface, I forget the path and then experience something that brings me right back to it. It’s all a cycle, and there is no ‘right’ way.

Thank you for reading!

-Emily Lichtenberg

Amelia Lichtenberg 12/4/22 Amelia Lichtenberg 12/4/22

Existential-Humanism, the RA Counseling Theory

As I’m wrapping up my final few weeks of my first semester of graduate school, I wanted to write a reflection on what I’ve been learning. In my program, our first year is focused on finding our counseling theoretical orientation. Existential-Humanism (EH) is the one that has really lit my fire…

What I love about EH art therapy (EHAT) so much is how well it blends with my pre-existing Relationship Anarchy (RA)- inspired worldview and the Intentional Peer Support (IPS) model I use at work. As part of my final project for my Theories of Counseling course, I decided to write a piece about these intersections.

From Existential Philosophy to Existential Psychotherapy

EH pulls from existential philosophy for its theoretical underpinnings. Specifically, it works with existential phenomenology and considers its historical pioneers to be philosophers such as Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, and Heidegger. From my understanding, EH draws predominantly from the ideas of Kierkegaard and Heidegger as its foundation. Kierkegaard believed that angst, or anxiety and dread, was imperative for becoming fully human, and Heidegger believed that living a meaningful and authentic life was the best way for someone to cope with their angst (Story, 2007).

Existential psychotherapy was born from existential philosophy, largely due to the work of Frankl, May, Bugenthal, and Yalom (Story, 2007). Each of these psychotherapists played a significant role in developing the Existential psychotherapy model.

Both existential psychotherapy and EH share an assumption that there are 4 universal concerns of life:

1. Death – angst is a natural part of being aware of our mortality

2. Meaninglessness – life is without meaning until we give it meaning

3. Isolation – we are, in the existential sense, always alone

4. Freedom – the weight of our freedom can create angst

What sets EH apart from existential philosophy/psychotherapy is the added assumption that people are capable of healing and knowing themselves (Moon, 2009; Story, 2007).

The reason I think EH and RA work so well together is because of the strong emphasis on each person finding the meaning of their own life. Through this process of finding meaning, a person can heal and know themselves. When I think about the self-reflection that goes into an RA lifestyle, it feels like a similar process. Finding meaning for one’s life is like identifying one’s core relationship values.

Finding Meaning Through Adversity

EH is largely influenced by the work of Viktor Frankl, who is someone I greatly admire. A Holocaust survivor, Frankl created a school of therapy based off his experiences in the concentration camps, called logotherapy. ‘Logotherapy’ means ‘therapy through meaning,’ and operates from the assumption that finding meaning in one’s life and through one’s struggles is the path to freedom (Frankl, 1962). From my own experiences of growth-through-adversity, I find this worldview deeply moving.

My values and RA-lifestyle are a result of my own process of finding meaning through adversity. Wanting a life filled with authentic connections and intentional relationships came from painful experiences of trying to fit in the status quo and getting burned. Having experienced what it’s like to be disregarded and unseen is what motivates me to do my best to see and regard others in their authentic truth.

‘Finding meaning’ is like the final task of IPS, ‘moving toward.’ After the other tasks of ‘connection,’ ‘worldview,’ and ‘mutuality’ have been explored, a person is encouraged to find what they’re moving towards. This approach emphasizes the need to look forward at what is next, rather than looking backward or ‘away’ from. An example would be instead of saying ‘I want to stop being lazy,’ saying, ‘I want to be more productive.’

The Therapeutic Alliance – Authentic Connection

Bruce Moon, a prominent existential art therapist, uses logotherapy as the foundation for his work and expands upon it with creative action. Something I admire about his therapeutic style is how seemingly hands-off he is. His sessions are organic and fluid. There is no agenda for his clients, and he is a mutual participant in the exchange. In his book Existential Art Therapy: The Canvas Mirror (3rd ed.), he uses several case studies to describe the chapter concepts. He talks about 3 ways to be genuinely attentive with clients: (1) doing with, (2) being open to, and (3) honoring pain.

Doing With

When Moon (2009) talks about how he participates in his art therapy sessions, it sounds like how I hope to conduct mine. He stresses the importance of the art therapist maintaining their own artistic practice, and modeling therapeutic art-making from the moment the client walks into the studio. He often works on his own projects during sessions and invites conversation about his work.

I believe that it’s unethical to ask someone to do something we aren’t willing to do ourselves. The best leaders and guides are those who have gone through the depths of themselves; they are people who pull from their own experiences to provide insight and wisdom to another.

In ‘Relationships are Like Gardens,” relationships are likened to the process of creating and maintaining a garden. We are responsible for tending our own garden and if working in a community garden bed, we work alongside other gardeners. We ask what they’re planting, how their bed is developing and share our experience. We don’t tell them what to plant or how to plant it, and if someone asks our advice, we pull from our experiences of past seasons. Honoring autonomy like this is how I advocate for folks to engage with their relationships, it is how I approach my consultation and peer-support work, and this is the type of therapeutic alliance I plan to model in my practice.

Within the EH model is the belief that meaning and healing can only be found in relationship with others. This truth constantly reveals itself to me with my own struggles, and when I’m engaged with callers on the peer-support line I work with. I hear so many stories about folks feeling ‘stuck’ until a particular call or interaction with another person. Connection brings growth and can guide change or new perspective.

Being Open

Moon’s openness with his clients about the meaning and experience of his own artwork is the kind of Radical Transparency I discuss when writing about RA. I believe a professionally appropriate amount of self-disclosure is imperative to the therapeutic alliance between client and counselor, and I try to embody this in my relationship consultation and peer-support work.

In these relationship dynamics there is always a power differential. Even in my peer-support work, although the IPS model holds ‘mutuality’ as one of its 4 tasks, I am still in the paid position and am the one with the training. Being radically transparent about these dynamics is the first step toward establishing mutuality. In the art therapy setting, following the ‘seldom initiate, always respond’ model can help find balance between sharing too much and too little and allows the client to lead the discussion.

Moon (2009) says that the success of the client’s journey ultimately depends on their willingness to share their story with the counselor. By being open and responding to, the counselor allows space for the client to grow in trust. By allowing for self-disclosure, the power-differential becomes less-so. This model provides non-judgmental acceptance and honors the client’s autonomous self by avoiding agendas.

Honoring Pain

*“The Patriarchy Has Major Side Effects” (2021)*

I think this may be the most important of the three ways to reach authentic connection in EH. Suffering is a universal experience among humans, although it looks and feels different for each person. Those who’ve experienced significant pain (and healed from it) tend to be the most empathetic toward others’ suffering. In order to truly honor another’s pain, one must honor their own pain first.

IPS talks about ‘sitting with the discomfort’ when providing support. This means that when someone comes to us with their pain, we don’t try to diminish it or fix it. We sit with them in it. Moon (2009) talks about a similar process in EHAT, saying that less pain is a side effect of therapy, not the goal. Instead of trying to make the client feel better, the art therapist’s task is to help them understand their pain and discover the meanings of their suffering.

My ‘Theories of Counseling’ professor is an EH therapist. When discussing this part of the process, he said: “I can’t take your pain away, but I’m here with you every step through it,” (J. Rock, existential-humanism, October 18, 2022). To me, this is compassion in its highest form and is what I strive to embody in every relationship I have.

I think about the sometimes-uncomfortable space when honoring another’s autonomy and honoring my boundaries may cause conflict. In rule-based relationship structures, one might hold another accountable for solving their discomfort by forcing them into action or inaction. In RA, each person is held accountable for their feelings, and action falls on each person to do what they need for their wellness and safety in a way that doesn’t impede another’s autonomy. Sometimes that means changing relationship agreements, sometimes it means changing an internal belief. Similarly, in EHAT, the therapist doesn’t take on the client’s pain, but sits with them while they work through it themselves.

EHAT Across Cultures

One of the most beautiful things about EHAT is how adaptable it is across various cultures. Something I’ve noticed in my studies is how most counseling theories are difficult to adapt outside the Western-European ideology.

Although EHAT originates from the ideas of Western-European, cishet men, the open-ended views of this perspective encourage adaptation from other backgrounds. Across different cultures who use EH/EHAT, the methods look very different, but the core beliefs are still the same. There is not one right way to ‘be with’ a client, just as there’s not one specific definition of what ‘suffering’ is or what the meaning of one’s suffering is meant to look like. Embedded in this theory is the idea that everyone must decide these details for themselves.

This may sound very individualistic, and in some ways because of its Western-European roots I think it does, but the emphasis on growth through relationship with others opens these ideas up to collectivist interpretations. EHAT is about the process rather than the techniques, making it very open for adaptation (Story, 2007).

Translating EHAT into my RA work feels like a seamless process given these intersections between the two worldviews. For me, RA is based in Radical Transparency, Radical Acceptance, honoring autonomy, authentic relating, and personal accountability. EHAT bolsters these beliefs by emphasizing mutuality and authenticity in the therapeutic alliance.

EHAT encourages a client-led practice where the therapist responds more than they initiate; the therapist is there to facilitate a process, not implement a program or series of techniques. The word ‘existential,’ can make this orientation seem unappealing to some, but I find it to be the most natural therapeutic orientation I’ve learned about so far.

Helpful Resources:

Frankl, V. E. (1962). Man’s Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy. Boston: Beacon Press.

Mikayla. (2018, September 11). Relationships are like gardens. Medium. https://medium.com/@mmmikayla/relationships-can-be-like-gardens-98827d8dfdfa

Moon, B. L. (2009). Existential Art Therapy: The Canvas Mirror (3rd. ed.). C. C. Thomas.

Story, M. L. (2007). Existential art therapy. Canadian Art Therapy Association Journal, 20(2), 22-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/08322473.2007.11434771

—

Intentional Peer Support (IPS) official website

The short instructional manifesto for relationship anarchy — Andie Nordgren

— written by Emily Lichtenberg

Amelia Lichtenberg 4/29/22 Amelia Lichtenberg 4/29/22

Re-learning Trust as Someone With C-PTSD

Trigger Warning: Discussing C-PTSD & trauma triggers from a firsthand perspective.

Trust is such an important facet of any healthy relationship – especially in relationships that practice Ethical Non-Monogamy (ENM). As I further my own practice in cultivating long-term partnerships while simultaneously retaining Relationship Anarchy ideals, I regularly come back to the concept of trust and how it fits in to various aspects of authentic relating.

Trigger Warning: Discussing C-PTSD & trauma triggers from a firsthand perspective.

I find one of the hardest parts about building and maintaining healthy, lasting relationships is my hypervigilance around betrayal. Throughout my life I experienced “betrayal trauma,” which is specific trauma that is caused by another person, typically by someone we are close to. For me, it was a combination of growing up learning that trusting others was dangerous, and experiences in adulthood I had with deception and betrayal in close, intimate relationships.

These past traumas find their way into my system at various moments in my core partnership, sometimes triggered by an external circumstance, but often they show up unannounced, unwelcomed, and without context.

For me, this makes it hard to uphold the Relationship Anarchy Manifesto’s principle: “Trust is Better.”

What is Trust?

I decided to research how trauma affects one’s ability to trust, and provide strategies for navigating healing from relational trauma, learning to trust again, and re-building skills to branch trust outward.

I started by examining the definition of “trust,” and looked at some studies that focused on the relationship between one’s level of betrayal trauma and one’s ability to trust.

According to the American Psychological Association (APA), trust can be defined as:

“(n) reliance on or confidence in the dependability of someone or something.”

APA defines trust further in a relational context as:

“…the confidence that a person or group of people has in the reliability of another person or group; specifically, it is the degree to which each party feels they can depend on the other party to do what they say they will do...”

I find it important to acknowledge that by this definition, trust does not refer to a person’s inherent goodness, but refers to the consistency of a person’s behavior patterns. For me, taking ethics out of the equation and focusing on behavior helps me navigate my own patterns and issues with trusting without a lot of self-judgment.

When Trust is Damaged

In a 2013 study at the University of Oregon, Gobin & Freyd examined how betrayal trauma might impact a person’s ability to trust in a “Trust Game” environment. In the Trust Game, participants were asked to transfer money to another person, in exchange for getting the same amount of money back. The recipient was actually a computer system which was programmed to return $1 regardless of the amount received. The study used self-report survey measures to gauge the participants’ general and relational trust, and the Trust Game task measured differences in choices between those with and without betrayal trauma.

The study found that the more severe the betrayal trauma was, the less likely a person was to report high measures of general or relational trust. The researchers were surprised to find that participants with high betrayal trauma were no less likely to participate in the Trust Game than the participants with low betrayal trauma.

Another 2018 study examined the relationship between trust and participants with PTSD, using a similar “Trust Game” set up. In this study, Bell et al. noticed that the participants who suffered from PTSD made lower-risk choices than the control group, but still made effort to participate, nonetheless.

These studies reflect aspects of my own experience as a person living with C-PTSD. I struggle to trust deeply, but my desire to try and build trust is also strong.

PTSD and Interpersonal Trauma

Betrayal Trauma Theory (BTT), first coined by Jennifer Freyd in 1994, states that those who suffer from betrayal trauma are likely to dissociate from the trauma in order to preserve the relationship, usually for survival purposes. When betrayal trauma happens in childhood, usually with a caregiver, this dissociation is likely to affect adulthood relationship choices. Those with more severe childhood betrayal trauma are more likely to struggle with recognizing trustworthiness or -unworthiness in others. This causes the survivor to experience more trauma in adulthood.

As someone who lives with C-PTSD, trust is one of the hardest things for me to navigate. In earlier years, I struggled with trusting the right people. My sense of “safe” and “unsafe” were so skewed by years of adapting to dangerous environments that I continued choosing friends and partners who reflected this instability. This only led to more traumatic experiences.

When I finally decided to take my healing seriously, I allowed myself to recognize that I could not trust myself when it came to knowing who was healthy or not. I dedicated time to reflect on past friendships and relationships to find threads and signals I could have recognized earlier in getting to know them. I started paying attention to how my body reacted around certain cues and situations.

I came to the revelation that more times than not, my body knew the right choice about someone right away. It was my mind that stopped trusting my intuition. When I started intentionally listening to my gut reactions, I noticed that I started making better choices in friends and beloveds. Seeing this change in my community inspired me to feel safe enough to begin exploring deeper levels of trust with others again.

Rebuilding Trust

After “recalibrating my sensors,” I began developing loving, healthy relationships with trustworthy people. During this time, I discovered Relationship Anarchy and began internalizing it as a core part of my relating philosophy.

I started this practice with a Solo-Poly structure because I needed to focus on myself as “primary.” Even though I am now cohabiting with a partner, I still believe that I am my own first priority. Taking on this perspective, and living alone at the time, helped me learn how to trust and confide in myself, first.

This went well for a while, and I felt strong and secure in my ability to trust and love until I began cohabiting with my core partner. For me, cohabitation is a huge source of trauma triggers as my most traumatic events happened with people I lived with.

Although my core partner is an amazing and trustworthy person, my nervous system activated at the slightest things. This is one reason we have taken a “time out” on outer relationships, to stabilize and ground together without extra distraction or activation.

This experience is teaching me that trust has many layers. I can completely trust my partner to be transparent with me, to treat me with respect and love, however, I still struggle to fully trust that my home is stable and safe, now that I’m not in full control of that environment.

So, this is where my next area of trust focus is. Again, I am starting with myself – feeling safe in my space within the home, feeling safe within myself in our shared spaces, and feeling that this is *my* home, too. Only after fortifying myself, do I then lean into trust exercises about my partner.

Helpful Strategies to Re-learn Trust

Something I’m learning as I continue to deepen with my core partner is that rebuilding trust skills takes a lot of time and work. I must teach my nerves that I’m safe in my new home. Safety outside of aloneness is an unfamiliar sensation for me, so it takes constant reminding for myself, a lot of transparency, and co-regulation with my core partner.

Rebuilding trust after betrayal trauma requires community and safe space. Here is a list of things that help me during this process:

Guided Meditation – Tara Brach
Taking time to learn someone’s patterns (instead of decided to fully give or deny trust immediately)
Learning how to recognize and trust my intuition (for me, it’s a body feeling)
Learning how to reflect on where I have been right and wrong in trust-giving in the past WITHOUT JUDGMENT
Healthy co-regulation with my core partner and/or trusted friends/beloveds
Safe space to be transparent about feelings that are coming up for me in a moment
- Ex: my bedroom is a safe space
Seeing a therapist who specializes in PTSD/C-PTSD treatment
- For me, EMDR therapy specifically
“Quieting” the environment by taking away extra factors that cause triggering
- Listening to a 24/7 Meditation Music channel in the background can also help
Developing solo rituals that I enjoy to calm my nerves
- Ex: taking a bath, drinking tea & reading a good book, etc.
Allowing my process to take its time (not rushing things)

Healthy co-regulation with my core partner or trusted friends helps me learn skills to internalize into self-regulation during moments of activation. Sometimes I find it helpful to think of myself as a friend or client that I’m giving advice to.

Hopefully some of these strategies and insights are helpful for you, or someone you love. Sending wishes to you all!

— written by Amelia Lichtenberg

Helpful Resources:

Relationship Anarchy Manifesto - Andie Nordgren

Betrayal Trauma Overview (wikipedia)

When Trust is Lost: The Impact of Interpersonal Trauma on Social Interactions

The Impact of Betrayal Trauma on the Tendency to Trust

Guided Meditations by Tara Brach

What is EMDR?

7 Ways to Help Regulate Your Nervous System When You are Stressed

24/7 Relaxing Music for Sleep, Mediation, etc.

Amelia Lichtenberg 4/8/22 Amelia Lichtenberg 4/8/22

Coming Back to Oneness

CW: C-PTSD mentioned

I had to take time away from non-monogamy in my relationship because my nervous system exploded. It was painful and threw me way off balance, but what was and is even harder for me is the identity crisis that went along with it. I allowed my ego to get attached to the identity of “spokesperson for Ethical Non-Monogamy,” or, as my core partner teasingly calls me, the “Non-Monogamy Expert,” but here I was, triggers flying everywhere, expressing jealousy and insecurity to the point where my core partner asked for us to be monogamous for the time being. It is embarrassing, and it has been hard for me to get back to writing on here because of this cognitive dissonance.

A Reflection on the Importance of the Relationship with Oneself

CW: Mentions of C-PTSD

Related and referenced resources are listed at the bottom of this page!

The last time I wrote an article on here I was just meeting my core partner, and thus I was still operating from a vastly different relational framework than I am today. I thought that I was past a lot of my triggers around possession, codependence and jealousy. Before I began building my partnership this was true, but only as far as I could interface with them in the Solo-Polyamorous (SoPo) framework I was operating from. For me, the vulnerability that comes with cohabitation is a very sensitive area where a lot of my trauma and triggers reside. As I grew into a partnership dynamic with my beloved, and as we grew closer and took steps toward cohabiting I noticed a lot of unresolved trauma and fears began to resurface.

The combination of moving into my partner’s house and him starting to explore a new connection for the first time in our relationship triggered powerful C-PTSD flashbacks and intense trauma responses. Despite obvious signs that my nervous system was on overdrive, I tried to push through and be supportive of his exploration. I wanted to be supportive of his exploration. I also felt that I had to be better than my triggers for anything I say on my platforms to be authentic or meaningful. The self-imposed pressure from this fed into my patterns of shaming and cruel self-speak over whether I was actually “good at non-monogamy,” and I questioned my genuine capacity for compersion. I wondered if the rigid morals of my Catholic upbringing were just too strong to unravel, and if this meant I had to rethink how I presented myself to the world.

Instead of taking time and space to hold myself with compassion during these intense shifts, I ended up hurting myself and the dynamics in my relationships because of my pride. Even when things finally settled down and we mutually decided to take a break from our other connections to focus on settling in together, I disregarded the opportunity to pause and reflect with curiosity and compassion. I began obsessing about making sure I would be ready quickly to go back to our non-monogamous dynamics, so that the next time my partner and his lover were together I could show everyone that I really could be compersionate. I had something to prove, and I had to prove it as soon as possible. This only led to more tension betwith my core partner and less inclination to get back to relating in a non-monogamous framework.

Eventually I hit a breaking point which forced me to finally take a step back from obsessing about how others viewed my relationships and identity. I started to see how I was relating with myself, instead. When I spoke with another beloved about the shifts happening in my core relationship, he calmly told me “nothing would make me happier than to see you take some time for yourself, so that you can reflect on the ways you want to relate with yourself first and foremost.” This struck me.

I began to dive deep into finding ways to rebuild my own sense of a secure self. I recognized that regardless of how many acts and declarations of love, care, and devotion my partner gave me, it is nearly impossible for me to wholeheartedly receive them if I am insecure in my relationship to myself. Amidst the embarrassment and obsessive thoughts, I found it incredibly difficult to remain still and content. I noticed my mind trying to force myself into being ready to try again. Unfortunately, this pushing backfired because my nervous system wasn’t ready yet. I find myself feeling so uncomfortable at the idea of being monogamous after spending so much time discussing RA in a non-monogamous setting, but I ultimately must recognize where my own limitations are now. After all, I’m only human, and that’s okay.

I read on Marie Thouin’s blog that compersion is difficult to cultivate when a person feels deeply insecure in themself or their relationship dynamics, when their mind or body aren’t well taken care of, and during stressful times. Moving in with my partner ignited my C-PTSD triggers around abandonment and home security, and I recognize that I was in full-on flashback mode throughout those initial weeks of the transition. Alongside stress around upcoming my grad school interview, and issues with work, it’s no wonder why I struggled to feel compersion or security in the newly evolving dynamics.

When I began allowing myself to accept where I was at in my process and remind myself that there’s no shame in my trauma history, I noticed that out of everyone involved in the situation I was the only one holding onto it. I was the only one deeming myself incapable of cohabiting and non-monogamy. Changing my focus to how I’m showing up for myself opened me up to see how overstimulated I was. I started to slow down, take time to rest, and lean into the monogamous “settling-in” period my partner requested. I began to uncover roots of where the shame around my identity confusion arose, and I started diving deeper into my EMDR treatment for my C-PTSD, rather than spend my therapy sessions crisis managing each triggering moment in my relationship.

Slowing down helped me realize that unless I can take care of myself and treat myself with kindness and care, it’s impossible for me to show up in any of my relationships (regardless of structure) the way I want to. As I write this reflection, there is still a part of me that is antsy to get back to non-monogamous relating, but slowly it’s becoming about my genuine excitement and passion for connection again, rather than my perfectionist obsessions. There is also a larger part of me that is grateful for this “settling in” time with my core, because my nervous system is still fragile and healing. I am beginning to recognize when I’m more likely to be activated, take appropriate steps to navigate those moments, and I’m learning new strategies to cope with the somatic responses each time.

Right now, the goal for me is to focus on the quality of my relationships regardless of their structure and to let go of positive/negative associates with monogamy and non-monogamy, respectively. I believe that until I truly let go of my attachments to either identity, I will find myself in this same struggle at some point again. The most important thing I’ve come to realize during this time is that regardless of what relationship style I’m actively engaged in I can still share my message about conscious relating and loving openly, the “pillars” of Relationship Anarchy", recognizing that it all starts with our relationship within.

— Written by Amelia Lichtenberg