The Five A’s of Intimacy: A Conversation on Trauma, Touch, and Self-Discovery

In a recent episode of The Intimacy Lab, host Michelle Renee sat down with Nathan Young for a deeply vulnerable conversation about relationships, trauma, and the journey toward authentic connection. What emerged was a masterclass in somatic healing, nervous system regulation, and the often-overlooked role of touch in trauma recovery.

Understanding Trauma-Informed Intimacy Work

The conversation opened with Nathan’s personal story—a journey that many trauma survivors will recognize. The discussion explored how early experiences shape our capacity for intimacy and connection, particularly when those experiences involve fear, hypervigilance, and the need to constantly anticipate others’ needs.

Michelle shared her own recognition of these patterns, describing how she learned to read rooms and anticipate what others needed—a survival skill that became both a professional asset and a personal challenge. This pattern of self-abandonment is common among those with childhood trauma, particularly survivors of emotional neglect or religious trauma. The nervous system learns to prioritize others’ comfort over personal safety—a survival strategy that becomes deeply problematic in adult relationships.

The Five A’s Framework: A Roadmap for Healing

Michelle introduced a powerful framework from the book How to Be an Adult in Relationships by David Richo: the Five A’s—Attention, Acceptance, Appreciation, Affection, and Allowing. As she explained, “We’re always looking for [these] in the areas that were not met by our parents.”

The framework offers a practical lens for understanding what we seek in relationships. Michelle noted that “if those needs were met when we were young, we are not searching for them so frantically. And what happens in the beginning of a relationship, all those A’s are being met because of all the excitement and energy.”

Attention: Being Truly Seen

Attention means being fully present with another person—not just physically, but emotionally and energetically. For trauma survivors, receiving undivided attention can feel both deeply healing and profoundly uncomfortable.

Acceptance: Embracing All Parts

Acceptance involves welcoming someone exactly as they are, without trying to fix or change them. This is particularly powerful for those who grew up feeling conditionally loved or chronically misunderstood.

Appreciation: Recognizing Value

Appreciation goes beyond acceptance to actively valuing someone’s unique qualities. Many people with trauma histories struggle to internalize appreciation, having learned early that their worth was conditional.

Affection: The Power of Touch

Affection encompasses both physical and emotional warmth. For many trauma survivors, particularly those with touch trauma or sexual abuse histories, learning to receive affection safely is a crucial part of healing.

Allowing: Permission to Be

Allowing means giving someone space to have their own experience without interference. This A is often the most challenging for people-pleasers and those with anxious attachment patterns.

Somatic Healing and Nervous System Reprogramming

One of the most powerful themes in the conversation was the role of the body in trauma recovery. The discussion explored how nervous systems become programmed to associate closeness with danger, and how therapeutic touch work can help reprogram these deep patterns.

This is where somatic approaches to trauma healing become essential. Talk therapy alone often can’t reach the pre-verbal, body-based patterns that trauma creates. Therapeutic touch modalities—including cuddle therapy, somatic experiencing, and EMDR-compatible touch work—offer a way to address these deep nervous system responses.

The Role of Therapeutic Intimacy in Trauma Recovery

The conversation explored the often-misunderstood world of surrogate partner therapy and therapeutic intimacy work. These modalities provide a structured, boundaried space for clients to practice intimacy skills with professional support.

Michelle explained the triadic model—a collaborative approach where the client, their therapist, and the intimacy practitioner work together. This framework ensures that somatic work is integrated with psychological processing, creating a comprehensive healing experience.

For many trauma survivors, particularly those with sexual trauma or attachment injuries, this kind of supported practice is transformative. It offers what Michelle calls “corrective emotional experiences”—opportunities to rewrite old patterns in real time, with professional guidance and safety.

People-Pleasing and the Fawn Response

A significant portion of the conversation focused on patterns of people-pleasing and self-abandonment—what trauma experts call the fawn response. This trauma response is characterized by chronic accommodation of others’ needs at the expense of one’s own.

Michelle shared her own journey with this pattern, describing how in her twenties, “I thought I was right. I was sure that I knew what everyone was thinking, what they need.” She explained how she had to learn to walk the line between anticipating needs and over-functioning: “I think I know what you may need, but I might not be right.”

Breaking free from people-pleasing requires both cognitive work (understanding the pattern) and somatic work (learning to tolerate the discomfort that arises when we stop accommodating). The body often experiences setting boundaries as dangerous, triggering stress responses even when we’re intellectually committed to change.

EMDR and Touch: Integrating Somatic and Cognitive Approaches

Michelle discussed how therapeutic touch work can complement EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) therapy. While EMDR processes traumatic memories through bilateral stimulation, somatic touch work addresses the body-based patterns that trauma creates.

Some therapists are now seeking practitioners who can provide EMDR-compatible touch therapy—work that integrates with their clients’ existing treatment plans. This collaborative approach recognizes that trauma healing requires both top-down (cognitive) and bottom-up (somatic) interventions.

Attachment Styles and Intimacy Patterns

The conversation touched on attachment theory, exploring how early relational experiences shape adult intimacy patterns. When asked to describe being in love in one word, Nathan offered two perspectives: “elated” for the positive experience of feeling “wanted and needed and connected to someone,” and “chaos” for the other side of that experience.

He described how “life can feel kinda empty but then you do like life just feels very full and wonderful” when in love—capturing both the beauty and the complexity of intimate connection.

Understanding attachment patterns is crucial for trauma-informed intimacy work. Attachment styles develop based on early caregiving experiences, teaching us whether love is safe, predictable, and unconditional—or dangerous, inconsistent, and conditional.

Healing attachment wounds requires both relational experiences that provide consistent safety and somatic work that helps the nervous system learn to tolerate vulnerability without panic.

The Journey Toward Authentic Connection

Throughout the conversation, both Michelle and Nathan shared vulnerable moments from their healing journeys—the slow, sometimes painful process of learning to prioritize one’s own needs, set boundaries, and tolerate the discomfort of being truly seen.

Michelle reflected on her own transformation, noting how disconnected she once was “from my body and my wants and my needs.” She described the journey of learning to be less passive in her communication and more present in her own experience.

This insight captures the essence of trauma-informed intimacy work: it’s not about achieving some idealized version of connection, but about developing the capacity to show up authentically, with all our imperfections and vulnerabilities.

Finding Support for Your Healing Journey

If the themes in this conversation resonate with you, know that you’re not alone. Millions of people struggle with the aftereffects of trauma, particularly in the realm of intimacy and connection.

Therapeutic approaches that can support this healing include:

• Trauma-focused therapy (EMDR, Somatic Experiencing, Internal Family Systems)

• Therapeutic touch modalities (cuddle therapy, surrogate partner therapy)

• Attachment-based therapy for relational healing

• Nervous system regulation practices (breathwork, mindfulness, body-based practices)

Whether you’re in San Diego, Los Angeles, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, or elsewhere, trauma-informed practitioners are increasingly available to support this deeply personal work.

Conclusion: The Courage to Heal

Healing from trauma, particularly relational and touch trauma, requires immense courage. It means facing the parts of ourselves we’ve learned to hide, tolerating discomfort as we build new patterns, and trusting that authentic connection is possible.

Nathan’s willingness to share his story—and Michelle’s expertise in holding space for that vulnerability—offers a powerful reminder: healing is possible, and we don’t have to do it alone.

Listen to the full conversation on The Intimacy Lab podcast for more insights on trauma, touch, and the journey toward authentic intimacy.