What Drives High Conflict Isn’t the Fight Itself.
It’s the Unconscious Dance of Insecure Attachment Between Two Dysregulated Nervous Systems
High-conflict dynamics aren’t fueled by logistics or legalities—they’re driven by two nervous systems locked in survival mode, each reacting to perceived threat through old attachment wounds. But the cycle can shift.
It only takes one parent to step out of the reenactment and begin healing their own nervous system by orienting toward internal regulation and external support—not the source of the chaos.
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Coaching with Aaron can help you make the shift out of chaos and into self-regulated inner peace.
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THIS is what your children need—a regulated parent who has disengaged from the survival dance.
What Is High Conflict?
High conflict isn’t just a communication problem or a lack of ability to reach an agreement. Those are symptoms. It’s an attachment rupture—a collision of two nervous systems shaped by early childhood experiences of safety, trust, and emotional attunement (or the lack of it). In this lens, high conflict is what happens when unmet childhood attachment needs show up in adult relationships—cloaked as control, blame, avoidance, or chaos.
When one or both people carry unresolved attachment injuries, even small disagreements can feel like threats to survival. When I say "unresolved attachment injuries", I want you to think "unconscious, unresolved fight or flight responses that are suspended in time". The conflict becomes less about the surface issue—schedules, money, custody—and more about fear of abandonment, rejection, betrayal, or powerlessness. One person may protest the disconnection by attacking, blaming, or demanding. Another may shut down, avoid, or collapse into appeasement. Both are trying to protect themselves from pain. But without awareness and regulation, these strategies only deepen the divide.
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In high-conflict co-parenting, this dynamic can become relentless and exhausting—especially for the parent who is trying to create stability for their child while being pulled into the emotional gravity of the other parent’s unresolved attachment wounds. The court system often overlooks this invisible layer, focusing only on external behavior rather than what drives it.
That’s where my coaching approach comes in. I help parents understand the attachment-driven patterns that fuel high-conflict interactions, so they can step out of reactive cycles and into grounded leadership. You can’t change the other parent’s attachment history, but you can stop participating in the reenactment. And when you do, you not only protect your child—you begin to heal yourself.
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As you begin to disengage from the survival dance that the other parent is unconsciously trying to keep you locked into, expect resistance. High-conflict dynamics thrive on reactivity, and when you step off the dance floor, the other parent will likely escalate in an attempt to pull you back in. This isn’t a sign of failure—it’s a predictable response.
Family systems theory teaches us that when one member of a system changes, the rest of the system will instinctively work to restore the previous balance—even if that balance was dysfunctional. The key is to recognize this for what it is: not a personal attack, but the system’s attempt to regain homeostasis. If you stay regulated, grounded, and aligned with your new way of relating, the system will eventually reorganize around your new center of regulation.
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I will coach you on how to ground and resource yourself so that you can maintain your own rhythm and get back to giving your energy and attention to what you love—your kids and your life you're building with them.