Dr. Barta: 00:01
Welcome back to Reconnection Moments, a space where we get real about intimacy disorders and healing from sexual compulsivity. Not through willpower or shame, but by gently rewiring the brain and body back into connection. I'm Dr. Michael Barta, creator of The Reconnection Model®. In each episode, I'll be answering questions I hear most from clients and therapists, and I will also be sharing fresh insights from my ongoing work.

Host: 00:34
Welcome back to The Reconnection Podcast. I'm here again with Dr. Michael Barta, creator of The Reconnection Model®. Last two episodes, we talked about how addiction isn't about willpower and how at its core it's about intimacy disorder, something Dr. Barta is an expert in, of course, the inability to feel safe, being seen, and connected. So today, we're going to go deeper into the nervous system itself and addiction actually makes sense in the body. Dr. Barta, thanks for joining us again. Can't wait to dive in this with you.

Dr. Barta: 01:05
Thank you. Appreciate it.

Host: 01:10
So, the body. We really are bringing this home into our body. I know a lot of the work you do is centered around that. But can you just kind of tell us the sense of the body connection with intimacy disorder and this particular addiction?

Dr. Barta: 01:30
Yeah, and specifically, you know, we're talking about the sexual addiction, but this is really paramount for all addictions, okay? Because if we are focusing only on the behaviors themselves and trying to contain those, that's not going to be enough, right? So we have to go in and find out what's causing our behaviors. So we look at the brain and the nervous system. Particularly, we're looking at the autonomic nervous system.

Dr. Barta: 02:02
And our brain and our nervous system, they're not built for happiness. They're built for survival. They're built for connection. And these two components, their job is to protect us from danger. And the problem is when we grew up in a traumatic environment, or didn't have our needs met in that environment. Our system never learned to be safe. It never learned that connection with other people brings us safety. So it keeps reacting that connection is actually a threat. All right? If we didn't have connection, then that connection to the nervous system later in life is going to be seen as a threat. And that's where our intimacy disorder begins.

Host: 02:55
So you talked about the nervous system, a vital part and role in our lives. And so early childhood experiences, it changes that nervous system. And what does that really do in the body?

Dr. Barta: 03:10
Well, if you look at it, the nervous system is the body. Okay? So what is happening in our bodies is we're going to have sensations that come up. The nervous system's telling us, 'hey, connection isn't safe.' And I'm going to feel that in my body. I might feel anxious. I may feel insecure. I may feel, you know, some shame, some guilt. But no matter what it is, it's the autonomic nervous system running it, right? And so their main job is to protect us, right?

Dr. Barta: 03:45
But when we don't feel safe, then that nervous system, our body, goes into one of two gears. And one is we either fight or we try to fix the situation for our safety. That's the anxious, overreactive state where we try to control and manage everything. And the other thing we can do is go into shutdown. So that's when we go numb and disconnect just to get through. In both states, we lose balance. And that's what creates this ache of disconnection. Right? So that's happening entirely in the body. So that's also when the addiction steps in. Porn, sex, fantasy, drugs, alcohol, whatever. What those things are doing is bringing that nervous system, our body, a momentary sense of relief. They soothe the system a bit. It's a body way of saying, I need comfort. And this is all I have right now.

Host: 04:59
So nervous system, the body, senses something's not right. And it echoes, it sounds like, to, from potentially early years, early upbringing things, and goes, 'I need to fix this. I need to get this back.' Is that right?

Dr. Barta: 05:16
100%. Yes, that's correct. And there's three primary states of the nervous system. And first of all, we have the social engagement system. And the social engagement system is a part of our nervous system where we feel safe, calm, and connected. It's where the place where we open to others. And we can give and receive that connection. We can give and receive love.

Dr. Barta: 05:38
But then there's a second part, and that's our sympathetic state. That's the survival mode I talked about a little bit earlier. That's the 'fight it, fix it, or flee it.' Right? And then the body becomes restless, anxious. And there's a sense of urgency in us. And the third part I talked about, it's called the dorsal vagal state, and this is the shutdown, this is the collapse. This is the 'I can't place, I can't do it.'

Dr. Barta: 06:09
And it can cause feelings like numbness, emptiness, or even depression. Now, trauma is what changes how easily we move between these states instead of being able to stay present and calm, and connect with other people. Our system gets stuck in survival. And again, this is when people turn to addictive behaviors because it becomes a survival strategy.

Host: 06:39
We're trying to go back and continually fix something that we're not getting, we don't feel safe. So we're stuck in that sympathetic state. So the body's out there in the world, sensing something, and we get into this sympathetic state, as you mentioned. And we're trying to get back to feeling calm, a part of it.

Dr. Barta: 07:01
Yeah, and the autonomic nervous system, autonomic means automatic, right? And it's going to respond the way every time. So if we didn't experience connection early in life, then when it encounters the chance to have a connection later in life, it's going to see that as a foreign experience. And the nervous system's going to read it as, 'this is dangerous because I'm not used to it,' right? And this is where we're like, you know, people often think that addiction is an irrational and self-destructive behavior.

Dr. Barta: 07:43
But when you look at it neurobiologically, it's deeply rational. The system is saying, 'I can't find safety in people, so I'm going to find it in my behaviors.' It may not be healthy, but it makes perfect sense, given what the nervous system learned about connection.

Host: 08:04
Dr. Barta, when you named the several modes of the nervous system, you started with social, the social engagement system. I'm curious, I mean, that's where the initial early childhood warning comes from, right? But is there a connection there where we get into sympathetic and we stay into sympathetic mode? But can you talk just a minute about that role, that social part connected to…

Dr. Barta: 08:25
Well, that's the whole thing, right? So trauma, if we look at trauma as an experience rather than an event, because everybody gets stuck in looking at trauma as an event. And a lot of people go, 'well, I never had any big events,' all right? And it's not that they're big events. Sometimes it can be, you know, thousands of little experiences that shape the nervous system across time. And we don't see those. We don't remember those. Because when we're little and we're experiencing this stuff, the only thing we know is that's what's normal, right?

Dr. Barta: 09:04
But what trauma does, and when I'm talking about trauma, I'm talking about these experiences that we had, that is a felt sense in the body, right? It's not an event. It's what happens inside of us as a result of what we experience. That's what causes the dysregulation. So when that occurs, what actually happens is the social engagement system becomes disabled. So we don't have a working social engagement system, which means that we're going to be stuck in sympathetic. So if the social engagement system isn't working correctly, then we can't determine safety from danger.

Dr. Barta: 09:45
And because then we're in the next step of the sympathetic system, everything is going to seem like a threat. That might not be an overwhelming threat, but the body is going to continue to be at a heightened state of hyper arousal because it can't determine, 'hey, this is actually safe, but I don't know it's safe,' right? So the body's telling us, 'hey, this isn't safe. This isn't safe. This isn't safe.' And so the whole key is in these intensives, in this model, in all our healing, is to get that social engagement system functioning in again. And how we get that functioning again is practicing the four pillars repeatedly.

Host: 10:31
Practicing what we didn't get perhaps earlier in life.

Dr. Barta: 10:34
A hundred percent, right?

Host: 10:38
And that makes a lot of sense to me that, like you said, it's not an event. It's an experience or experiences. It's a theme of something we needed we didn't get. So then that's not even there. And body's just, like you said, stuck in the emergency mode. Fix it. Fix it. Flight. Flee. Those type of things, which totally makes sense to me, is understanding, like, if that thing we should have got, needed, didn't, then we're going to be stuck in how do we go act out or do or repair to get that back.

Host: 11:11
I'm sure you've shared with your clients over the years, too, what that's kind of like. I mean, to me, it thinks like a car stuck only in a certain gear, that misses the first couple of gears and is just trying to get somewhere, where it doesn't realize, oh, by the way, you should have had this part.

Dr. Barta: 11:28
Exactly. And, you know, so when we're looking at this stuff, right, and we're looking at what the social engagement system provides, when it's working correctly, we can determine if we're safe or not. It also is providing us with that feeling of calm, confidence, regulation, you know, safety. All those things. So just think what happens if that system's not working. We never feel those things. And that's where we turn to behaviors or substances that give us a temporary sense of feeling safe or calm, right? And it makes perfect sense, right?

Dr. Barta: 12:18
So we continue to use those in place of having a functional social engagement system. So it comes down to the biggest thing we need to do is repair that social engagement system. We need to have an experience that allows it to turn back on so that we can start living in that state instead of the fight, fix it, and flee state.

Host: 12:45
This is why all through your work, co-regulation is such a huge concept, I think, and connecting this back where four pillars, all the work we're doing is relearning or learning for the first time, potentially, that social engagement system, co-regulation, is that right?

Dr. Barta: 13:02
100%. Yeah. We have to have that. I mean, that's biologically wired into us, remember? And it doesn't mean that the nervous system is not going to seek it if it's not there, but it seeks it in places that can't really give it to them. It gives it a sense that that's happening, but it's not actual co-regulation. So we're stuck in this never-ending cycle of having to regulate ourselves.

Host: 13:25
Yeah. And those things we're supposed to or need to learn in early life, are those perhaps signals of everything's okay coming from other people, caregivers, things like that?

Dr. Barta: 13:41
Yeah, 100%. So the environment needs to have stability. There needs to be attunement. And there needs to be a place where we can fully express our authentic self without fear of retribution or shame. All right? These are the three most essential things that we needed growing up, right? We needed, and what that gives the nervous system is a sense of safety. And it also gives us, gives the nervous system agency. 'I'm okay as I am,' right? 'I have the ability to navigate life. If I'm upset, I know how to calm myself down in a healthy way,' right? Because life's going to throw stuff at us, right? But with a healthy nervous system and the ability to co-regulate with others, then life is a lot easier, right?

Dr. Barta: 14:39
I don't want to use the word manageable because that goes back to, you know, thinking that we're in control; we're in control, but we can ride the waves when we have a social engagement system and we have support in our life when we can't do things on our own.

Host: 14:57
And I know you've got an assessment on your website and things like that. And you ask clients, but what are some of those, you just named a couple of those ones where you go, okay, was there a sense of safety? What was going on in that early environment? But can you provide some context or things, ways you might help people connect what we're talking about here to some of those experiences in their life?

Dr. Barta: 15:20
Sure. So, what we do is this: I've created a list of things in all three of those areas. And I have people look to see if there was a deficit in these areas because then they start learning, 'Wait a minute, I wasn't born this way.' You know, 'I was on the track to become a fully functioning, healthy human being, and I didn't get these things,' right? So they do this survey of themselves, and then they recall the experiences of those, right? Because then the next step is what we want to learn from that. You know, what are the trapped sensations from that experience? Because that's what triggers us later on. And, just as importantly, what did these sensations, what did these experiences make me believe about myself? Because that forms our core belief system, right?

Dr. Barta: 16:17
And if we didn't get what we need, oftentimes the only thing the kid can do is blame himself. He can't say this is a faulty system. He takes it personally and says, 'This is about me. I'm bad. I'm broken. I'm unworthy, right? I'm shameful.' So in, in essence, we're getting our authenticity rejected by not being allowed to who we are, which makes us ourselves reject our own authenticity, because we believe it's bad. And that's where we come in with, well, then I need to be someone other than who I am to get to be okay. And again, we talk about the pain of dysregulation. We talk about the silent ache inside. That's what we're talking about. The ache is not, not having the capacity or being allowed to be who I really am.

Host: 17:06
So I know in your book, you talk about co-regulation, the social part of being a biological imperative. We've survived as a species because we're tribal. We need each other. So if that's how you get into survival, but I think you've talked about this phrase borrowed regulation. Can you help, like, explain that for a second?

Dr. Barta: 17:27
Yeah, I love it because, so like I said a little bit earlier, when the nervous system didn't get what it needed to form correctly, it is in a sense of dysregulation all the time. Dysregulation is uncomfortable. It's not always conscious. It's just those feelings in my body that something's not right. You know, in 12 steps and other healing communities, we often hear someone saying, 'I don't feel comfortable in my own skin.' That's a great way to explain dysregulation. 'I just don't feel comfortable as I am.'

Dr. Barta: 18:04
And so regulation means calming, settling, coming back to balance in healthy development. We learn regulation through this connection, a caregiver's presence, safe relationships, and have someone who helps us calm down if we're upset, that's called the co-regulation. But if that's not available, the nervous system is going to improvise because it's looking for regulation.

Dr. Barta: 18:32
And so it borrows regulation from whatever it can. And that could be food, sex, substances, work. These become our stand-ins for connection. And they calm the storm for a few moments, but they don't provide the real long-lasting connections. And that's why we find ourselves cycling. We find relief, then ache, then more behavior.

Host: 19:03
So it's really not about weakness?

Dr. Barta: 19:07
Yeah, not at all. It's about survival. And once someone can see this, they stop blaming themselves. They begin to understand, 'I wasn't weak, I was surviving.' And that opens the door to compassion and healing.

Host: 19:23
So, how does understanding addiction this way change that path to healing you just mentioned?

Dr. Barta: 19:31
Well, it changes everything. So instead of asking myself, 'How do I control my behavior?' I ask myself, 'What does my nervous system need in order to feel safe?' That's a very difficult question, a very different question. It shifts us from shame to curiosity, from control to connection. Healing begins when we start giving the nervous system what it truly needed all along. And that's safe, consistent, real connection. And that safe, real connection is with ourselves and with others.

Host: 20:11
That's where your Reconnection Model® comes in, right?

Dr. Barta: 20:15
Yeah, because we don't just talk about the nervous system in the Reconnection intensive. In the Model, we actually work with it. We use those four pillars. The authenticity, vulnerability, transparency, and presence, to give people a felt sense of connection. Because that's what the nervous system needs in order to learn how to be in connection. We give the nervous system that lived experience of safety and connection, and that starts to rewire everything. So people come in and they're actually rewiring their nervous system.

Host: 20:55
And now, group work. You've mentioned it in this episode. It's a huge part of your own healing and the work you do with the Reconnection Model®. But in those groups, it's all about the four pillars, right? Practicing those four pillars.

Dr. Barta: 21:09
It is. And, you know, the intensive itself, this is what we're constantly practicing. Because those four pillars are what's needed for us to be able to connect with people. But if we can't be authentic, if we can't be vulnerable, if we can't be transparent, and we can't be present, because of past wounds that caused us to doubt those traits within ourselves. We need a safe place to experience them so that the nervous system can embody a new experience with these four pillars. And so then we can go out and start practicing them in all of our relationships.

Host: 21:54
And I know that's a part of the Reconnection Model® and the intensives to have group and continue on after the intensive to keep on practicing those.

Dr. Barta: 22:05
100%. I mean, we have aftercare groups. But it's really important that people get involved in communities, right? So the 12 steps, I push those very hard. And the reason I push them so much is because of the communal aspect of the 12 steps. We're going into a group of people. We're allowing our nervous system to co-regulate with other people. And we allow it to regulate with other people in a safe place because I can go into those meetings, and I can practice being myself. I can practice being authentic. I can practice being vulnerable by talking about my current experience, and my pain, and my struggles. I can practice transparency by telling the truth about myself.

Dr. Barta: 22:56
You know, I'm struggling right now, or I'm having a hard time with this. And presence is so important because I'm sitting there and I'm actually listening to other people. I'm not thinking about what to say. I'm not distracted by my phone. I'm there. I'm fully present, and I'm hearing what's being said. And my nervous system is going to receive that.

Host: 23:22
I know you talked about it a lot, but that's what kind of the magic in those intensives is this place where they can be and start to practice those four pillars, where you see a lot of light bulbs and connections being made, where they go, 'I didn't know I could share these things or talk about these things, but there's others in the group in the same in the same situation.'

Dr. Barta: 23:42
Exactly. And, you know, it's not just this group that comes together. I mean, I formulated this model to make that the most important part. Right. It's not just a group experience. It's you're actually embodying and practicing these pillars through the exercises on a daily basis. Right. And so again, they're retraining the nervous system to know what safety feels like, because until they know what safety feels like, they are going to continue to feel unsafe.

Host: 24:24
All right, Dr.Barta, thank you for all that. If listeners just take, you know, one thing away from today, what should it be?

Dr. Barta: 24:32
Well, hopefully what they're hearing is that addiction makes sense, that it's not a flaw. It's our nervous system's attempt at survival. And because of that, healing is incredibly possible, right? When we learn that connection can be safe, our need for substitutes fades away.

Host: 24:54
Beautiful. Thank you, Dr. Barta. In our next episode, we'll talk about when survival strategies start turning into suffering and what the turning point toward that real connection is.

Dr. Barta: 25:09
Thank you.

Dr. Barta: 25:11
Thanks for joining me today. If you want to learn more about how this healing happens, visit drmichaelbarta.com. And if this episode spoke to you, share it with someone who might need to hear it. Until next time. Keep reconnecting. We'll see you next time.