Possessiveness gets a bad name, but Armand DiMele argues the impulse to belong and be claimed is deeply human. With co-hosts Ben Starr and Giullian Gioiello and clinician Lisa Arnone, LCSW, the conversation moves from child development and hoarding to family alienation and the paradox that you must feel owned before you can push free.
Why can’t you get someone out of your head? Armand DiMele traces romantic obsession to the brain’s danger-detection system, arguing that the amygdala treats lost love as a survival threat. Linda Vanella, LCSW-R, joins co-hosts Ben Starr and Giullian Gioiello as callers share raw stories of grief, betrayal, and letting go.
Love is supposed to be the prize, so why is it so painful? Armand DiMele unpacks the psychology of neediness in relationships, arguing that desperation itself can poison a partnership. Drawing on Albert Pesso, Co-founder of Pesso Boyden Therapy, he explores how men and women become needy at different stages, how betrayal trauma differs from fear-based PTSD, and why the drive to make a relationship work can doom it.
Anger hides in workaholism, control, and even the urge to merge completely with a partner. Armand DiMele traces how unmet childhood needs shape adult love, from fusion relationships to the search for safety in families where it was never found. Callers bring raw examples of both.
Falling in love may be less sanity than neurosis. Armand DiMele and co-host Giullian Gioiello, joined by Linda Vanella, LCSW-R, work through why romantic love so often fills a psychological hole, how mirror neurons shape emotional connection, and why couples in trouble can describe what a partner thinks but not what they feel.
Emptiness is not a problem to solve but a journey to undertake. Dr. Robert Gunn, author of “Journeys into Emptiness,” joins Armand DiMele to trace three stages of emptiness, from painful longing through letting go to a Buddhist sense of wholeness, drawing on the lives of Dogen, Thomas Merton, and Carl Jung.
When a divorced woman fell into depression the moment her ex-husband removed his things, Armand DiMele recognized a classic pattern: the husband had been buffering unresolved grief over her father’s death. Armand, joined by Lisa Arnone, LCSW, and co-host Giullian Gioiello, explores how people, music, and objects absorb original pain, and why the loss of a substitute can hit harder than the original wound.
Why do we keep choosing the same partners and recreating the same dynamics? Armand DiMele argues that relationship problems are never really about the other person but about unexamined childhood wounds. With co-therapist Lisa Arnone, LCSW, he traces how early needs for attractiveness, desirability, and parental attention shape adult love patterns.
What if part of you refuses to be loved? Armand DiMele and studio guests Lisa Arnone, LCSW, and Audrey Clark dig into the paradox of lovability: how people unconsciously push away love, choose cruel or unavailable partners, and replay childhood wounds in adult relationships. A listener letter about borderline personality anchors the discussion.
Armand DiMele argues that compulsive sexual behavior in both men and women is really a search for a missing parent: women seeking the nurturing of an absent mother, men seeking the masculine affirmation of an absent father. Callers push back, share personal stories, and probe the theory’s limits.
