Trauma Bonding: Why Is It So Hard to Let Go of Someone Who Keeps Hurting You?
When the same person becomes both the source of your pain and the person you turn to for relief, letting go can feel almost impossible.
By Dr. Bindu Babu
You know the relationship is hurting you.
You remember the arguments. The silence.
The things that were said. The nights you cried. The promises that were made and broken.
Maybe you've told yourself:
I can't keep doing this.
And yet when they pull away, you miss them.
When they don't call, you wait.
And when they finally become loving again, something inside you softens almost immediately.
The anxiety quiets.
Hope returns.
Maybe this time will be different.
And then comes the question that can be so difficult to understand:
If I know this relationship is hurting me, why do I still want them so badly?
The answer may be more complicated than simply saying, Because I love them.
Sometimes, what feels like an impossible love to let go of may also involve a powerful cycle of pain, attachment, anticipation, and relief.
What Is Trauma Bonding?
Trauma bonding can develop when periods of emotional pain, fear, rejection, control, or instability become intertwined with periods of affection, reassurance, closeness, and relief.
The same person who hurts you can also become the person you desperately want comfort from.
There is conflict. Distance. Silence. Rejection.
You become anxious and desperate for things to feel okay again.
Then suddenly, they come back.
They're loving again. They apologize. They hold you. They tell you how much you mean to them.
And for a moment, everything feels right.
The person who created the pain has also become the person who makes the pain stop.
That can create an extraordinarily powerful attachment.
The Trauma Bonding Cycle
Over time, the relationship can begin to feel like a cycle:
Pain → anxiety → longing → reconnection → relief → hope → pain again.
And every time the love returns, so does hope.
You remember the person you met in the beginning. The attention. The affection. The connection. The feeling that maybe you had finally found your soulmate.
So when that person reappears—even briefly—you think:
There you are.
I knew you were still in there.
And leaving becomes harder again.
Because you're not only holding onto the relationship as it is today.
You're holding onto what it was, what it sometimes still becomes, and what you keep hoping it could be.
When Your Brain and Body Become Part of the Bond
There is another reason letting go can feel so difficult.
The attachment isn't only emotional. Your brain and body can become part of the cycle too.
During the beautiful moments—the affection, intimacy, sex, laughter, attention, reassurance, and feeling of being completely connected—your brain's reward and bonding systems are involved. Dopamine plays a role in reward, motivation, and anticipation, while oxytocin helps strengthen feelings of bonding and attachment.
This is part of why the highs can feel so incredibly high—and why losing that connection can feel almost unbearable.
Your brain begins to associate this person with love, pleasure, closeness, and emotional reward. So when the connection suddenly disappears, you don't simply miss them.
You can begin to crave the feeling you had when everything between you felt good.
That craving can become incredibly intense. In some ways, the cycle of anticipation, reward, withdrawal, and craving can resemble some of the same processes involved in addiction.
This doesn't mean a trauma bond is the same as a substance addiction. But some of the brain systems involved in reward, craving, anticipation, and reinforcement can also contribute to powerful human attachments.
So you can know something is hurting you and still feel an overwhelming pull toward it.
Then their name appears on your phone.
They reach for you again.
They become loving again.
And suddenly, the pain quiets.
There you are.
That moment of relief can feel so powerful that you begin craving not only the person—but the emotional high and relief that comes when the connection returns.
When the affection disappears again, your body's stress systems can become activated. You may feel anxious, restless, unable to sleep or concentrate. You replay conversations, check your phone, and wonder what you can do to make things right again.
Then the love returns.
And so does the relief.
There is a psychological principle called intermittent reinforcement. When something we deeply want is given unpredictably—sometimes it's there and sometimes it isn't—we can become especially focused on when we'll receive it again.
You're not simply waiting for another text.
You're waiting for how you're going to feel when the text finally comes.
You're not only chasing the person.
You're chasing the relief.
Why “Just Leave” Can Feel So Impossible
This is why telling someone caught in this cycle to “just leave” can miss what she is actually experiencing.
She may already know the relationship is hurting her.
She may have tried to leave.
She may have promised herself this was the last time.
But knowing something intellectually and breaking an emotional attachment are not always the same thing.
Because she isn't only leaving the person who hurt her.
She's also grieving the person she fell in love with.
The beautiful moments.
The future she imagined.
And the hope that maybe the person from the beginning will finally come back and stay.
Your mind remembers the hurt.
Your heart remembers the beginning.
And your body remembers the relief.
Breaking the Trauma Bond Begins With Understanding It
Maybe the first question isn't:
Why can't I just let go?
Maybe it's:
What am I actually holding onto?
The person they are today?
The person they were in the beginning?
The future you were promised?
Or the relief you feel every time the pain temporarily stops?
Sometimes we assume that because a connection feels incredibly powerful, it must mean the love itself is extraordinary.
But intensity is not always intimacy.
The uncertainty, longing, fear of losing someone, and enormous relief when they return can make a relationship feel even more consuming.
Understanding this doesn't mean you have to make every decision about your relationship today.
It means you can begin separating intensity from intimacy, relief from safety, and longing from love.
Because sometimes what feels impossible to let go of isn't only the person.
It's the cycle of pain, hope, connection, and relief you've become attached to.
Maybe healing begins when you stop mistaking the relief from pain for proof of love—and begin finding your way back to a kind of love that doesn't require the pain in the first place.
Dear Women
If you saw yourself somewhere in these words, Dear Women is my weekly letter about relationships, healing, self-worth, and finding our way back to ourselves.
One letter. Once a week. From me to you.
About Dr. Bindu Babu
Dr. Bindu Babu, MD, PhD is an author, speaker, and advocate for women's healing and empowerment. Her work focuses on helping women understand unhealthy and narcissistic relationship patterns, rebuild self-trust and self-worth, and reconnect with themselves after relationships that have left them questioning who they are.
Through her writing, Dear Women weekly letters, and private work, she explores relationships, emotional healing, self-love, consciousness, and the journey back to yourself.
Her message is simple: healing is not only about what happened to you—it is about who you choose to become next.
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