- Danielle Roxborough
- Jun 9
- 5 min read
Severance and IFS: A Powerful Metaphor for Trauma, Parts work, and Healing
“You couldn’t be here if you were out there.”
Apple TV’s Severance isn’t just dystopian sci-fi — it’s a parable about trauma, attachment wounds, and the survival strategies we carry inside.
The show’s premise is clinical and surreal: a controversial procedure splits a person’s consciousness into two distinct selves:
• the “innie” — who works, with no memory of life outside
• and the “outie” — who lives, with no memory of what happens at work
But through the lens of Internal Family Systems (IFS) and attachment theory, Severance becomes something more profound:
A mirror of what happens when our most vulnerable parts are exiled — and how interpersonal connection becomes the medicine for reintegration.
🧠 IFS 101: A System of Inner Survivors
IFS therapy, developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz, teaches that we are made up of parts — internal subpersonalities that hold roles, stories, and protective instincts.
• Exiles carry pain, shame, grief, and unmet needs.
• Managers maintain control through perfectionism, people-pleasing, or emotional detachment.
• Firefighters burst in with reactivity, addiction, dissociation, or impulsivity to shut down emotional overwhelm.
At the center is the Self — our calm, clear, compassionate core — capable of healing the system through connection and leadership.
But in trauma, the Self gets buried. The parts take over. The system fractures.
Sound familiar?
💔 Attachment Wounds: The Original Severance
Long before we’re in corporate roles or adult relationships, we form attachment templates based on early caregiving:
• If love was inconsistent → we learn to overfunction or chase
• If connection was dangerous → we detach, avoid, or numb
• If we were shamed for needs → we silence parts of ourselves to survive
These early wounds create internal splits — versions of ourselves we hide to stay loved or safe.
The “severance” in Severance is literal. But for many of us, it’s emotional — a quiet internal war between who we are and what we believe we’re allowed to be.
🧍♂️ The Cast as Inner Parts: Trauma Told Through Character
Each Severance character reflects a fragmented, adaptive system:
• Mark: Emotionally avoidant, grief-exiled, dissociated. His innie is numb; his outie is haunted.
• Helly: A rebellious Firefighter part — fighting back after years of being silenced and objectified.
• Irving: A Manager driven by rules, rituals, and loyalty — terrified of chaos but aching for connection.
• Dylan: Activated protector — reactive and impulsive, but beginning to remember what matters.
Each part is doing its job — protecting the system.
But healing doesn’t begin until something radical happens:
They connect.
🤝 Healing Through Relationship: Painful, Powerful Integration
The character arcs in Severance are more than narrative — they’re a metaphor for trauma integration through relational repair.
As each character begins to form bonds — hesitant, fragile, and sometimes explosive — something changes in the system:
• They witness one another’s pain.
• They begin to question the stories that kept them loyal to oppression.
• They discover that togetherness is the thing that makes remembering bearable.
Their healing journey is messy. It nearly destroys them.
And yet — it’s the connection between parts, not the severing, that leads to freedom.
Just like in IFS therapy, healing begins when internal exiles are seen, heard, and invited back into the circle — not alone, but in the presence of Self and others.
🕵🏽♂️ Mr. Milchick: The Inner Enforcer
Milchick is more than an office manager. He’s the internalized enforcer — the Manager part inside us that:
• Rewards performance
• Punishes deviation
• Shames emotional truth
He represents every survival adaptation that says:
“Don’t cry at work.”
“Be good and they’ll love you.”
“Feelings get you in trouble.”
From an attachment lens, Milchick mirrors the internalized parent or societal pressure that conditions us to earn safety through compliance.
But even Milchick starts to crack. His smile slips. His control frays.
Even our harshest inner managers grow tired. And beneath them? There’s usually an exile longing to be free.
🧠 The Kier Doctrine: Internalized Oppression as Identity
The cult of Kier isn’t just creepy — it reflects the internalized ideologies that hold us hostage:
• “If I work hard enough, I’ll be enough.”
• “If I follow the rules, I’ll be safe.”
• “If I’m useful, I’ll be loved.”
IFS helps us locate the parts that uphold those beliefs — and understand who they’re protecting underneath.
Healing means questioning the system inside — not just outside.
💡 Modern Work Culture: We’re All Severed Somewhere
The glowing screens. The fake smiles. The pressure to perform.
We don’t need a brain chip — many of us already live in a state of low-grade disconnection.
• We smile through Zoom calls while grieving alone.
• We micromanage others while ignoring our own emotional pain.
• We reward productivity and repress presence.
Severance puts a face to this disembodiment — but it also shows us the way back.
🛠️ Integration Is the Revolution — And It Hurts
When the characters start to remember, it’s not beautiful — it’s destabilizing.
They weep. They scream. They betray and doubt and freeze.
This is trauma work.
This is what it looks like when exiles return.
But through relationship — through secure attachment, shared vulnerability, and chosen connection — they begin to build an internal system that can hold truth.
The path to healing is terrifying — but it’s also sacred.
And it doesn’t happen alone.
💬 You Don’t Have to Sever to Survive
If you:
• Have ever shut down a part of yourself to keep the peace
• Felt unsafe expressing emotion, especially in front of authority
• Lived two lives — the polished version, and the hidden, aching one…
Then you already know what severance feels like.
But you don’t have to stay fragmented.
IFS shows us how to turn toward our parts with compassion.
Attachment theory shows us why connection heals what isolation never could.
And Severance reminds us that even in the coldest systems, the Self is still there — waiting for an opening.
🧠 Try This: Healing Prompts
• What part of me is carrying pain I’ve avoided feeling?
• What survival belief am I still loyal to — and who taught it to me?
• Can I let someone else see that part, even for a moment?
Connection isn’t just healing.
It’s liberation.
#SeveranceShow #IFS #InternalFamilySystems #AttachmentHealing #PartsWork #TraumaInformed #ModernTherapy #EmotionalRepression #SelfLeadership #KierCult #WorkLifeBalance #DissociationRecovery #PartsNotPathology #MilchickMetaphor #HealingIsMessy #InterpersonalHealing
