When we experience emotional abandonment in childhood, it can cause us to feel anxious, distrustful, ashamed, or inadequate. These feelings can follow us into adulthood and make it difficult for us to feel we are enough just as we are.
Emotional abandonment might be so subtle that we don’t realise it’s even happening in childhood, but it can have long lasting effects into adulthood. We can experience anxiety and depression and never really know what has caused these episodes to occur. The pervasiveness of childhood emotional abandonment can affect how we see ourselves, how we act in our relationships, and how we view our future.
What is emotional abandonment?
Emotional abandonment is when your parents or caregivers as a child, were emotionally unavailable. This can occur in a variety of ways. The more overt forms are when you had parents or caregivers that were violent, abusive, had drug and alcohol issues or suffered from severe mental health issues and did not have the capacity to be there for you. In these environments parents are emotionally unavailable and not able to provide the nurturing and care to support healthy emotional development.
Emotional abandonment can also stem from having to walk on eggshells to avoid a parent’s emotional reaction. Essentially any circumstance where your emotions as a child were neglected by the adults around you can be considered emotional abandonment. Emotional abandonment in childhood can also be subtle and sometimes not easily recognised or easy to describe. Other forms of emotional abandonment can look like:
- Growing up in a family that didn’t talk about or express emotions
- Having your emotions ignored or being left alone when you were upset or angry
- Having your emotions minimised
- Being told you were too sensitive
- Being punished or scolded for expressing emotions
- Being made to feel responsible for a parent’s emotions
- Having a parent take on your emotions in a way that left you without someone stronger
When we are emotionally abandoned in childhood, we are left to figure things out for ourselves without the proper tools, skills or know-how. This leaves us to make sense of our experiences by ourselves which as a kid, can be very confusing at the best of times.
When we’re emotionally abandoned, and our emotions are neglected, it’s very hard to pinpoint what’s going on because it’s more of what didn’t happen than what did. Due to these experiences, we can develop unhelpful beliefs about ourselves and the world as a result of our childhood emotional abandonment.
We can feel and believe things like…
- ‘No one will ever understand me’
- ‘I am not worthy of love’
- ‘People don’t understand how I feel’
- ‘My feelings aren’t important to anyone’
- ‘I have to hide my problems from others’
- ‘Everything is my fault’
- ‘Others will always assume the worst of me’
- ‘I am ashamed of who I am’
- ‘I have to numb my emotions’
- ‘I am powerless to change my life’
To escape further emotional abandonment in our adult lives we can develop maladaptive coping strategies and behaviours that maintain our ‘perceived safety’. They might be so embedded within our psyche that they operate on a subconscious level. Here are some examples of how childhood emotional abandonment can show up in adulthood.
Relationship perfectionism
Believing that you have to be ‘perfect’ in your relationships. When you are not allowed to share negative emotions in childhood you can be given the message that you need to be perfect all the time. This can be further reinforced by having to take care of the emotional needs of the adults in your life. Perfectionism in your adult relationships takes the form of fawning and codependency behaviours. Self-sacrificing to please your partner becomes an avenue to avoid the risk of emotional abandonment again. To receive love and safety in relationships you have learnt to forfeit your own needs.
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Staying put in toxic relationships
Feeling neglected in your relationships, taken for granted, or experiencing partner abuse on a regular basis but staying in the relationship can be a sign of childhood emotional abandonment. You feel you want to do anything to make the relationship work because it is better than being alone. Finding your own self-worth and value in fulfilling other people’s needs can keep you stuck in toxic relationships.
Seeking external validation
Never feeling secure in your relationships despite all the good signs that you are in a secure and loving relationship. Feeling like you can never really be convinced of security compels you to seek external validation and constant reassurance. The fear that your partner will leave you and the belief that you are ‘not enough’ keeps you highly anxious.
Being ultra-independent
Because you had to figure out everything on your own, you have learnt that you must be ultra-independent – that you can’t rely on anyone for help and support. The thought of reaching out for help might make you feel extremely vulnerable, so you go it on your own, even if you do need help. In being ultra-independent you protect yourself from being emotionally abandoned again.
Have difficulty sharing emotions with others
Talking and sharing your emotions with others might feel so awkward and uncomfortable that you don’t even consider it. It might come from a deep-seated fear that if you shared your emotions with others, it could potentially drive them away. Or you may have learnt to bury your emotions deep down, so that you have even hidden them from yourself and ignore or block emotions when they arise.
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Although emotional abandonment can leave long lasting scars it can also be healed in time. It is important to understand that emotions are not bad, they give you information. What you feel in adulthood can be the key to unlocking old wounds and being able to move forward feeling healthier, more vibrant and fulfilled in life.
When you notice signs of emotional abandonment playing out in present time, look after yourself and take the time to meet your own needs. Figure out what gives you comfort and fulfills you the most and do more of that.