ONE YEAR, Y'ALL!!🎉

365 days ago, I sat down in front of a microphone, said "what's up guys" for the very first time, and had absolutely no idea if anyone would ever listen. And here we are — one year, 32 episodes, and 7,000 downloads later — and I am still completely floored that this podcast exists, and that you are here💜

To celebrate, I brought back one of TAC's all-time favorite guests — our very first lived experience guest and my favorite Dismissive Avoidant turned Fearful Avoidant (iykyk), Brent Stokes — to co-host the most fun episode we've ever done!🥂

We're playing "The Attachment Style Most Likely To..." — going through some of the most searched, most debated, and most relatable attachment behaviors, backing each one up with science, and sharing our own lived experiences along the way. Two healing FAs walk into a podcast studio... you're going to want to hear how this one goes😂

• 🚩 Ghost you after a great first date
• 📱 Send the 3am "you up?" text
• 🔍 Stalk their ex's Instagram at midnight
• ❄️ Need 3 days of silence after a conflict
• 🏃 Move on suspiciously fast after a breakup
• 💣 Blow up a perfectly good relationship for no apparent reason
• 😤 Bring up something from 4 years ago during an argument
• 🎭 Become a completely different person for each new partner
• 🔥 Cheat — (this one's a debate, y'all)
• 💔 Stay in a relationship way longer than they should
• 💪 Actually do the healing work
• 🏆 Become Secure AF

Each one is backed by attachment science — and we are not holding back on the personal confessions😅

Thank you from the absolute bottom of my heart for one year of showing up, listening, sharing, reviewing, and DMing me your attachment healing stories. This podcast exists because of you. Here's to year two — let's freaking go, y'all✨

• Inside the Dismissive Avoidant Childhood: Brent's Real DA Lived Experience [Part 1] — Episode 11
• Inside the Dismissive Avoidant Relationship: Brent's Real DA Lived Experience [Part 2] — Episode 12
• Your Attachment Questions Answered: Listener Q&Q — Episode 23

• Attachment Theory Explained: The Beginner's Guide to All 4 Styles — Episode 1
• Anxious Attachment Explained: A Deep Dive into the Anxious Preoccupied — Episode 19
• Avoidant Attachment Explained: A Deep Dive into the Dismissive Avoidant — Episode 20
• Disorganized Attachment Explained: A Deep Dive into the Fearful Avoidant — Episode 21
• Secure Attachment Explained: A Deep Dive into the Born & Raised Secures — Episode 22

See you in season 2, Confessions Fam!!😘

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"I became a prisoner in a golden cage — and I wasn't even aware that I was helping to build it."💔

Those are Mia Hanks' words. And if they just stopped you cold — this episode is for you.

Mia J. Hanks spent nearly 30 years married to a covert narcissist. Not the loud, obvious kind — the kind that operates in the shadows. The kind that makes you question your own reality, your own worth, your own sanity — quietly, methodically, and for decades. And then one day, she got out. And then, she wrote about it.

Her Gold Literary Titan Award-winning memoir Bride-Made is a first-hand account of what day-to-day life with a narcissistic spouse actually looks like — and her follow-up memoir I've Made Plans: A Memoir of Rebuilding picks up exactly where that story ends. This conversation is one of the most powerful we've ever had on The Attachment Confessions💜

• What covert narcissism actually is — and why it's so much harder to identify than the more obvious kind
• What 29 years of narcissistic abuse actually looked like from the inside — day to day, year to year
• How a covert narcissist makes their partner feel like they are the problem — and how long it took Mia to realize the story she'd been made to believe about herself all those years wasn't actually true
• The gaslighting, the manipulation, and the slow erosion of self that happens
• What finally broke through — and what leaving actually looked like
• How Mia rebuilt her identity, her self-trust and her life after 29 years of abuse
• Why she wrote Bride-Made — and who she wrote it for
• The meaning behind the title and what it says about how covert narcissists operate
• Her message to anyone who is in this right now and feels like there's no way out

Mia's story is not just about survival. It's about what's possible on the other side. And her words — raw, honest, and hard-won — are going to reach someone today who desperately needs to hear them💜

"What I had failed to realize during our courtship was that it had all been glamour, smoke and mirrors. I had not been courted. I had been acquired." — Mia J. Hanks

Mia J. Hanks is a survivor of narcissistic abuse and the author of two memoirs — Bride-Made (Gold Literary Titan Award winner) and I've Made Plans: A Memoir of Rebuilding. She is committed to raising awareness about covert narcissism and supporting other survivors, reminding them that they are not alone — and that their story doesn't end with their escape.

• Attachment vs Narcissism: How to Tell the Difference — and Why It Matters for Your Healing
• Narcissist & Codependent Relationships: The Toxic Dynamic Explained Through an Attachment Lens
• Love Bombing 101: How to Spot It, Why We Fall for It, and How to Get Out
• Dating Red Flags & Deception: How to Spot Them Early & Protect Your Heart (Feat. Cray App Founder Justin Smith)
• Boundaries & Anxious Attachment: The True Cost of Having Zero Boundaries — And How to Finally Make Them Stick

What happens when the person who helps everyone else heal finally has to look in the mirror?💜

Caasi O'Day is a licensed clinical social worker and therapist, but not the kind you're probably picturing. She grew up as the "difficult" kid, the lost cause, the one clinicians whispered about in the hallways. At 15, she was shipped across the country to live with her godparents. Somewhere in the middle of all that rage and rebellion, she decided: These therapists have no idea what they're doing. So, I'm going to become one.

Twenty years later, Caasi is the therapist other therapists won't be – working with the clients everyone else has given up on, showing up fully human, and calling out the therapy industrial complex for failing the people who need it most.

And... she's a Fearful Avoidant. Who didn't fully see it until she did.

This conversation is one of the most raw, honest, and genuinely eye-opening episodes we've ever had on The Attachment Confessions. Because here's the thing: knowing all the theory doesn't make you immune to your own blind spots. Not even close👀

• Caasi's origin story – growing up as the "problem kid" and how that shaped who she became as a therapist
• The moment she realized attachment theory wasn't just something she was teaching clients. It was her own story.
• How her Fearful Avoidant attachment formed in childhood and what she found when she finally traced it back
• The blind spots that showed up in her own relationships DESPITE 20 years of clinical knowledge
• Whether understanding attachment intellectually can actually become its own defense mechanism (this one is a conversation stopper, y'all)
• What her own FA healing journey looks like in practice – from someone who knows exactly what it takes
• Her message to anyone who feels like they've tried everything and nothing is working

Caasi tells the truth in a way that makes you feel genuinely seen. This episode is proof that healing isn't about how much you know — it's about being brave enough to apply it to yourself🙌

Caasi specializes in the populations everyone else avoids — active drug users, sex workers, clients with chronic suicidal ideation, and those who've been rejected by provider after provider. She became a therapist because she survived what kills some people. And she helps others survive it too — not by being a distant, detached expert, but by showing up as someone who's been in the fire and knows the way out.

Connect with Caasi:

polarizedparts.com

• My Fearful Avoidant Origin Story: How Tracing Back My Attachment Finally Made Sense of My Relationships
• Disorganized Attachment Explained: A Deep Dive into the Fearful Avoidant
• Insecure Attachment Patterns: How to Stop Repeating Them & Actually Take Accountability (yes, even the hard stuff)