The Nourishment Barrier: Shock Response to Toxic Intimacy

Course overview

Many individuals have learned to defend against taking in nourishment that is available, whether it be emotional or physical, because their early life experience indicated that accepting nourishment carried a heavy price. Perhaps the debt incurred in return for accepting the nourishment was exorbitant, e.g., becoming responsible for meeting all of a parent's needs. Perhaps the price was being forced to tolerate toxins that inevitably accompanied any nourishment. We call the defense constructed by such an individual a nourishment barrier. In this course, we will explore toxic intimacy, defense mechanisms, the connection between the nourishment barrier and the vagal parasympathetic response, the basis for anorexia, and the connection between need shock and the nourishment barrier. We will utilize case studies to illustrate the dilemma and discuss how to treat it.