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Abandonment
ABANDONMENT/LACK OF SUPPORT: This cluster leaves the sense of important people in our lives will fail to provide emotional support and connection because they are unstable, might pass away, or would leave us. Beliefs are:
*I lack stable emotional support.
*I believe the people I love will soon perish.
*People close to me will abandon me.
*Important relationships never last.
*I expect to be alone.
*People will leave me if I say what's on my mind.
*I worry about losing people close to me.
*People close to me are unpredictible--I never know when they might become angry or self-absorbed.
*It's hard getting close to others--I never know when people might go.
*Nobody can love me long.
*I'm meant to be dropped.
*I fear important people in my life might leave me for someone else.
*My partner is so absorbed in an activity that he/she has no time for me.
*People come and go in my life.
*I can't get close to others because I don't know when they might leave.
*I get desperate when others pull away from me.
*My fearful clinging drives people away.
*I can't trust anyone not to leave me.
*I deserve to be dropped.
*I feel desperate and alone when others let me go.
Here's some more possibilities to consider when you're working with abandonment issues:
*What mostly likely leads to a sense of abandonment:
(1) You lost attention to a new or ill sibling.
(2) A parent left through divorce or death.
(3) A parent was a substance abuser, depressed, mentally ill, or worked long hours or at a distance.
(4) Your family was frequently separated.
(5) Warring parents made the environment seem unstable or like the family would break up.
(6) You were overprotected and greatly feared handling life alone.
(7) Sent to boarding schools, institutions, orphanages, foster homes.
*Abandonment issues can show up in relationships:
(1) You need excessive reassurance that the other person is not leaving.
(2) You greatly fear being set loose or rejected.
(3) You choose folks who are unstable or not there: out of work, substance abusers, commitment phobes, criminals, workaholics, gamblers, people who live in other cities,the highly ambivalent, chronically depressed, mentally ill, and folks wanting to keep all their options open.
(4) You become jealous easily.
(5) You abruptly rage at your partner in an overreaction to a perceived slight.
(6) You feel extremely uneasy getting close with another. When you do, you expect the person to leave you.
(7) You feel tension and a hightened state of alertness when coupled.
(8) You feel tense, lonely, and uneasy when your partner is away even briefly.
(9) You demand to be with your partner as much as possible. You want to know what they're doing at all times.
*Besides processing the Abandonment Personality Cluster, you may want to do the following:
(1) Integrators can be used on your feelings of loneliness and emptiness.
(2) Avoid persons who are uncommitted, unstable, and ambivalent and instead involve yourself with persons showing stability and inviting trust.
(3) Integrate or clear your feelings of jealousy.
(4) Check out patterns in your past relationships. What were your feelings about these patterns? What feelings emerged from these patterns? Any emotions for integration?
(5) Uncover ways you can treat yourself in a loving and caring manner. Gain access to the wholeness and love contained in your essential nature.
(6) The Emo Reviewer or the Emotional Writing Process could be used directly with abandonment memories.
Take care, Steve