During the pandemic, I was living and working by myself. It was hard, even for a then-introvert who liked to be alone. But it was also quiet, too quiet. And like so many others during this strange moment in history, I decided I wanted a pet. Or two.
Enter my cats. These puffballs of black fur and slightly conditional love. They looked to me for reassurance, food, and safety. I gave them what I could. And I screwed up. And I repaired. And I tried my best.
See, I knew about attachment theory at this point and I wanted to ‘win’ at being the best parent. But I was also grieving the seemingly sudden loss of a long-term relationship. I spent some nights crying on a yoga mat. I spent other nights dissociating, barely able to stay awake past 6:00 p.m. I did not have myself together, and I wanted to hide that from the kittens.
I felt AWFUL about it as I healed and saw what was happening. I gave my kittens the bare minimum to live and be healthy. This is great, for sure, but it’s also how I grew up. I felt safe enough. I felt loved…enough, but it was not the enough my nervous system really needed.
I needed to be held, to be comforted, and to be cherished. Yes, there were moments of this, but I needed more. I deserved more.
Repair & the Deity Relationship
You can repair attachment wounds, over time. You don’t need to be 100% perfect for someone else to create a secure attachment. Some sources say you only need to attend to another’s needs 30% of the time to create a secure bond.
When I realized this, I was able to step up my bonding with my cats. We healed some wounds of the past, I’m sure. And I have to keep it up.
I tend to identify as having an anxious attachment style most of the time. Since I had inconsistent emotional support as a child, I can get clingy with people and need constant reassurance that things are okay. I do this because I didn’t get the consistency I needed when I was growing up, and now I have to work really hard to overcome my anxiety about this happening in the present, even when it’s not.
I have repaired my attachment style through lots of therapy, reading, and securely attached friends. But it’s also the work that I’ve done with godds that has helped me.
Unlike friends and partners, I don’t think of the godds as being mad at me. I don’t think periods of disconnect are my failure. I can think of my relationships with deities as being something that I need to work on, but not worry about. I do my part to the best of my ability, and then I see what happens.
I don’t stay up at night thinking back through my past trance or invocation with my deity to see how I sounded or if I could have said it better. I don’t change my entire personality to be liked by a deity so they don’t leave me.
I am securely attached when it comes to divinity. I trust their actions and hope they trust mine. I can come to them with problems and feel them hold me, but I don’t assume they will solve my problems.
I don’t pester them or blame them for feelings I have. Instead, I turn inward to see what my role might be and I work on that. If I need advice, I might ask them. If I don’t know what to do, I might ask another friend for help. I don’t make my well-being or comfort their responsibility.
This pattern of relationship has helped me see that things are safe, more often than not. The way I come back to godds and things are okay has bolstered how I deal with humans now.
Are Deity Relationships the Cure for Attachment Issues?
Have I healed my attachment wounds? I don’t think this sort of healing has a final destination. When I am stressed or haven’t slept, I can veer right back into my anxious ways. If I am not speaking up for my needs, my attachment stuff jumps right up to ‘help’ me become hypervigilant and blame-y.
When I am not taking care of myself, I will believe the worst of everything. I will get so dysregulated that I get quiet and distant, or passive-aggressive.
I need to take care of myself to see things clearly. Things are wrong or ‘off’ sometimes, but without the work I have done to create my own security, it would be hard to differentiate between a reaction and a right-sized response.
I trust the godds. And from that place, I have been able to extend that trust to humans. If how you do one thing is how you do everything, may this trust-building continue to stretch from the wounds of trauma to the arms of welcoming myself home again.
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My cats are creatures of the pandemic, so they have their own anxious attachment styles too. They worry when I’m out of sight or the routine is off. I reassure them as best I can. I try to stick to what they know and what makes them feel secure.
I don’t always succeed. But I keep trying. I keep trying for all of our sakes.
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Feel free to contact me with comments or questions. There’s a contact form on my website, where you can also see more things I do and offer. www.irisanyamoon.com
This is so resonant, thank you. So much becomes possible when you can feel more secure. I've been learning a lot about that this year.
I, too, lean on my deities for emotional security. They have helped me find stability that I never knew as a child and that's hard to find in our current, rapidly-shifting world. Like you, I've done plenty of healing work, but I can't imagine the mess I would be without Them. They're my stable center, always have been.