Are You Mistaking Intensity for Intimacy?
- mapcouplesprogram
- Sep 1
- 3 min read
Have you ever felt swept away by a relationship full of passion, longing, and emotional highs and lows—only to realize later that it left you drained or unsafe?
For many survivors of childhood trauma, this is a familiar story.
What feels like intimacy may actually be intensity—a reenactment of old survival patterns that confuse chaos with closeness.
Why Trauma Survivors Confuse Intensity with Intimacy
When children grow up in unsafe or unpredictable environments, their earliest lessons about love and attachment are shaped by survival, not security.
This wiring often carries forward into adulthood, where the nervous system mistakes emotional charge for connection.
1. Attachment Wounds and Inconsistent Care
If care was inconsistent—sometimes warm, sometimes rejecting—a child learns to associate love with instability. Emotional highs and lows become the “language of love”.
2. The Chemistry of Chaos
Adrenaline and cortisol, the body’s stress hormones, surge when a relationship feels uncertain.
This rush can mimic attraction.
Over time, dysregulation becomes mistaken for passion ( As Stephen Porges explains in
Polyvagal Theory).
3. Repetition Compulsion
Bessel van der Kolk (1989), explains that trauma survivors often reenact early dynamics in hopes of rewriting them.
Relationships that mirror childhood wounds feel magnetic, not because they’re good, but because they’re familiar.
4. Fear of Stillness
In many traumatic homes, calm was not safe—it was the silence before the next outburst.
As adults, survivors may mistrust stability, finding intensity more comfortable than peace (Schore, 1994).
5. Inner Child Longing
Volatile relationships activate the younger self still longing for the caregiver who never consistently came through.
That longing can be confused with intimacy.
In short, trauma survivors confuse intensity with intimacy because their bodies learned that love is conditional, unpredictable, and often painful.
The Adult Impact
This confusion doesn’t stay in childhood—it shows up in adult relationships in powerful ways:
Attraction to unsafe familiarity: Feeling drawn to partners who are emotionally unavailable, hot-and-cold, or unreliable, because the nervous system recognizes the pattern.
Rollercoaster relationships: Experiencing passion in volatility and discomfort in calm. Stability may feel “boring” or “off.”
Fear of abandonment: Testing, clinging, or pushing away partners to replay old dynamics of insecurity.
Distrust of vulnerability: Either oversharing too quickly (to force closeness) or never letting anyone all the way in.
Sabotaging healthy love: Struggling to stay with steady, kind, reliable partners because the nervous system doesn’t yet recognize their love as “real.”
These patterns don’t mean we are broken. They’re signs that our body learned survival strategies early on—strategies that now interfere with the kind of intimacy we truly want.
Relearning What Intimacy Really Is
The hopeful truth: intimacy can be relearned.
Just as the nervous system once adapted to survive chaos, it can adapt to feel safe in steadiness.
This shift takes practice, compassion, and often therapeutic support.
Here’s how intimacy differs from trauma-driven intensity:
Intensity vs. Intimacy
How to Learn Authentic Intimacy
Intimacy is not about rejecting passion or desire—it’s about unlearning the belief that chaos equals closeness.
Real intimacy isn’t about intensity.
It’s about trust, care, and a deep sense of being seen, known, and loved as you are.
Here are some ways to start learning about intimacy:
Notice body cues: Learn the difference between anxiety’s “rush” and safety’s calm.
Practice slowness: Let relationships build gradually without confusing instant sparks for deep bonds.
Inner child work: RRP (Relationship Recovery Process) groups and individual therapy are
designed (by Amanda Curtin) to help participants reclaim intimacy.
True intimacy is not about intensity.
It is about trust, care, and being fully seen—without fear that love will be withdrawn.
Journal Prompts
Reflect on these questions to explore your own patterns:
When have I mistaken intensity for love? What did it feel like in my body?
What qualities feel “boring” in relationships—and could those actually be signs of safety?
How do I react when someone shows me consistent care and availability?
What would intimacy look like if it were grounded in safety rather than survival?
Closing Reflection
If you’ve mistaken intensity for intimacy, you are not alone—it is one of the most common ways trauma echoes into adulthood.
Remember: your nervous system learned that chaos was love because that’s what it knew. But just as it adapted once, it can adapt again.
With compassion, awareness, and support, you can begin to trust that love can be calm,
steady, and safe.
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