Emotional Neglect: An Empty, Absent Feeling When Your Inner World Is Ignored / Attachment Trauma
Вставка
- Опубліковано 18 січ 2024
- Emotional Neglect: An Empty, Absent Feeling When Your Inner World Is Ignored / Attachment Trauma
Alan Robarge, Attachment-Focused Psychotherapist
Join us in the Improve Your Relationships Community
Click Link to Learn More
bit.ly/462sWNM
The Four Attachment Distress Responses Course
Click Link to Learn More
bit.ly/3Nnp8iK
Want a Session? Want to Work Together?
www.healingattachmenttrauma.c...
This is for all of us who were raised in a “children are seen and not heard” culture.
Also for us who were not seen nor heard.
My mother's favorite saying.
Yes, it’s true.
Emotional neglect is next to impossible to describe or explain. Watching you attempt to do so reveals how difficult it is to explain especially as it can destroy a person. Yes, it plays out in a craving for connection that never happens. " Parents who are there but not there." That says a lot and why we spend so much time trying to find the person who is not there. I question whether or not someone who is raised like this will even recognize connection when it happens.
How can you find a house you've never seen or been in. And every time you ask people what it looks like, they describe different houses?
My experience of emotional neglect has been so traumatic and painful. My wishes for us all to find healing through relationship where we repair our ruptures and be able to hold each other in our vunerable places
So true. A most difficult situation. I wish it had been better understood when I was younger. I chose to not have babies because I feared passing on the disruption and pain I experienced. It seems we do that as humans, when we can't heal our own wounds. Very hard decision, as now in my late 60's, I can feel the lack of family, kids and be rather lonely . But I would have probably been even sadder if I was looking at my children in confusion and pain and knew it was because of me.
@@beckythornton6470wow the same - it took me until my 50's to understand why I went lone wolf --- never wanted kids -husband - in - laws even pets 🤷🏼♀️
@@beckythornton6470 I never had maternal instincts, meaning the need so many women and men have for a child. I like kids and would have loved my child(ren) desperately, but there just was not that "need" to give birth. I have no idea if I would have parented in the best way for a child, meaning I might have not known at an early age what children need. So I am glad I did not bring someone into a world that even with great parents is a hard place. Thank you for sharing. I hope you have found peace.
I’ve never felt seen, heard, or even known. If I were to pass away tomorrow, there would be NOONE who could stand beside my body and give an authentic eulogy. I’m 47 and I’m just awakening to this absence. It’s led to my new found strength, love, and drive to fall in love with myself and ridding my mind of the ‘ick’ I’ve held on for far too long. Your content IS so informative and eye opening! A few years ago when I started watching them, I wasn’t ready to comprehend your message. Thank you for continuing to share your wealth of knowledge with us💯
I hear you and you’d probably be surprised at how many of us feel exactly like that about the profound absence. It’s so affirming when others relate with our experience. I’m wondering if you heard about the Community Program, Improve Your Relationships. I remember when we talked about this and we learn so much from each other. Thank you for commenting and for sharing your experience. www.healingattachmenttrauma.com/iyr_quiz_2
Or a misplaced resilience for being able to endure substandard relationships or situations.
Yes. This exactly.
A misplaced resilience for what I should not be tolerating. This has been on my mind today.
I grew up very the “black sheep”as the youngest of 8 children (came along 8 years after the next youngest) in a family of loggers. Some of my siblings didn’t want me to be born, and probably thought it was “disgusting” mom was having another baby. This is a word that my mind has used to describe myself at times. I bet that’s where it comes from. The older siblings went off to get married and have their own kids, kind of ignoring me all together. Then I see my nieces and nephews who aren’t much older than me; get all the attention I wanted. It’s all been so confusing until recently…why I have felt so bad my whole life. Now I’m just trying to heal from it all at age 50. Thank you for affirming the unseen Alan.
“We get very confused with this chronic longing for more.”
That hurt 😞
The analogy that keeps coming to mind is the dog that did not bark. It was from a Sherlock Holmes story, somebody killed a racehorse, and nobody could figure out who did it. At the stable was a dog who barked at everyone but the stable owner. Sherlock Holmes noticed that the night of the murder, nobody heard a dog bark, so he figured out it was the owner. The evidence was the absence of the barking.
Here, the evidence of the neglect is the lack of connection and vulnerability. You don’t notice it, unless you have help from Sherlock Holmes. In this case Sherlock Holmes is the therapist.
After being emotionally neglected I now feel so bad because although I loved my children like a friend I inherited the same pattern and never really asked them about their inner worlds. They did OK and are much better parents than I was but I wish I had these insights from you decades ago - please send us more
There is the concept of the ‘good enough’ parent, I think I fit in to that category. I know your kids know they were loved. Maybe talk to them about this. ❤❤
Its never too late! I am going to do better with my son going forward too 🙏🏻
It is such a painful experience to crave that level of emotional connection and it’s just not there with many people. As you said some people won’t, don’t, or can’t. What’s more, some people get triggered by the emotional closeness and can even push you away or display bewildering behaviors like anger. I feel so blessed to have a couple of very close friends that I have that level of connection with. Growing up I yearn for my mother‘s attunement and it just wasn’t there. What’s really sad is even as a young childI knew it. I knew she wasn’t really there even though she was right there in front of me she wasn’t available. She’s come along way and so have I but it has been a very bumpy road. I’m grateful for you and all that I have learned from you. Wishing you many blessings in 2024.
This has been the most painful thing to overcome. Finally moving past Limerence…blessings to everyone reading the comments and listening
👏💪
Emotional neglect is worse than being beaten. For me it shows up as productive isolation. I lock myself in the house and work all day until my human needs resurface and I push them down, cauze I would rather drink pain than get attached to another human being. I'm even scared to get a pet Sire.
Animals are amazing companions and can help to keep our hearts alive. Best wishes 🙏🏻🌺
Thank you for sharing this. 🙏
This longing, this aching. Yes. I have compassion for him, an avoidant. I know he feels smothered perhaps. He would be content for this to last, apparently. That’s the part I don’t get. No, they weren’t very loving , just dutiful and supportive. Somehow there is a difference. It has to go deeper.
If only you knew how many of us can relate. It’s true, emotional neglect is the worst and it’s so important to talk about it. Good for you for being aware of how it shows up for you currently. It’s comforting to know we’re not alone in this experience because of how many people shared about going through it as well. I’m wondering if you heard about the Community Program, Improve Your Relationships. I remember when we talked about pushing our needs down. It’s incredibly validating when others can understand us. We learn so much from each other. Thanks again for sharing your experience. www.healingattachmenttrauma.com/iyr_quiz_2
I would say in a nutshell emotional neglect is emotional trauma and developmental trauma
Yep, an invisible concussion being experienced on a daily & the only evidence is in the lack of true bond relationships
O!M!G! OM effing G! I have never heard this described such succinctly and in my case - correctly than this!!! Yes to the inner escape mechanism. Inner life is richer and more rewarding than the outer interactions. Yes to deep, meaningful and explorative conversations and exploration of partners. I was fortunate that I found this in my very first boyfriend and got spoiled. We both have since been looking for this in other partners and not found it. We are still [40+ years later] the best of friends, and by default - since neither of us has a partner to have these type of discussions with - share these type of conversations.
My heart's deepest wish??? To find a new, mature partner that can do this and is not afraid to open up and be vulnerable in the process, because it is indeed - a baring of the heart and soul.
33:29 I feel this occasionally. It’s the shame of putting yourself out there only to feel invisible in front of another human - not seen, not heard, and most definitely not understood
I've never encountered anyone who can give shape to these 'feelings' and phenomenons. Thank you.
You were gone for a time so I missed that you are back. I couldn’t be happier! I can’t wait to have the weekend to catch up.
Me too!!😊
Thanks for presenting this info, it can be so difficult to understand what would be helpful to look for in healthy relating. My tolerance for not getting needs met has basically turned into a trained expectation at this point, despite all the work I put in to seek out healthy connections.
Reminds me of the difference between physical deformities cause by malnutrition, when compared to blunt trauma. Both affect the way the body forms during growth, but malnutrition is the lack of something causing an illness ( for example, certain type osteoporosis) and blunt force trauma is too much of something ( for example breaking a bone). it sounds to me this is analogous to what you describe when talking about emotional abandonment. Can be caused by action or lack of action. Another analogy could be lying. We can give false information (lie) or not inform someone of pertinent information (lie of omission).
No one ever in my life has ever asked me those questions.
❤ this explains my life
38:08 I absolutely hear you, your insights are profound and you’re describing something I’ve been living out my whole adult life. My partner of 14 years just lashed out at me on that anniversary and broke up with me and this has happened as I’m just about to start treatment for cancer. I’m absolutely shattered and I’m more alone than I ever have been and I cannot comprehend what is happening to me. Thank you for the great work you are doing and I wish you all the best.
This sounds painful and I can understand how overwhelming it can be. It may be helpful to know that many have shared going through similar challenges and that we aren't as alone as we may initially think. I'm wondering if you heard about the Community Program, Improve Your Relationships. It can be affirming and comforting to know others can relate.
www.healingattachmenttrauma.com/iyr_quiz_2
I have never heard to described so clearly. I now know why I am the way I am .. thank you infinitely for this video!
It’s not what happened , it is what did not happen. So it’s hard to identify ‘it’.
Thank you for your videos Alan. I find great comfort in them. As a child and adult I always had this feeling that something was missing. I have though come to think are we expecting too much of others? Not everyone is seeking deeper emotional connection. Its tough when they are people you would like to get closer to, like your parents, but I now just enjoy them as they are, rather than how I would like them to be. I am at an age where I can find ever deeper emotional connection with myself without others validating my feelings or me trying to share my inner world with them.
Thank you for sharing your incredible insight and amazing way of explaining what feels too complex to easily relate to others. You've helped me understand myself and others better 🙏❤️
You very well describing my life experience, and im all about awarness and learning, but i feel like it puts me down at the same time.
If i had the delusional thought that all i feel is ok because its common feeling of the human shared emotional experience.
Now i feel like im officially broken, emotionally handicapped, and beyond repair.
Like if there is a logical explanation to why i feel empty and cant get my personal relation right, it means thats what im programmed to, and thats my destiny, to always feel empty and alone.
And if there was comfort before that everyone somehow broken in this way, no i feel like im surrounded with well functioning people who live a full lifes
Spot on for explaining my inner situation. Thank you!
My mother lost her mind from BPD, shock therapy and medication when I was 10 years old. She was present, but not there for my emotional and basic needs. Since then, I’ve had an anxious attachment resulting in a recent failed marriage with an avoidant and bedridden depression.
Oh God. I can just say that unfortunately but simultaneously luckily it's incredible what a human being is able to endure.
I wish you luck and strenght..🙏
Thank you you gave me my inner voice and clarity. It’s my denial that tolerance that keeps me in the shadows of my reality 🎉
That's great to hear this video was helpful and brought you clarity. And great insight about the tolerance. I want to share you may also be interested in taking the relationship quiz. www.healingattachmenttrauma.com/iyr_quiz_2
Darn Algorithm! I haven't seen ur videos popup for the Longest 😔 Glad ur Back
So well articulated.
Some people are so adaptable, they accept the “ when in Rome ” or when in home - philosophy. And maybe that’s the root of addiction.
Thank you thank you thank you so much for this. It’s amazing to find a resource which articulates and validates emotional neglect in such a wholesome way.
Thank you for this ❤
Thank you for this video ❤
Whoaaaa never heard this explained so clearly. It’s something I’ve suffered since as long as I can remember. Thank you for making this video!
Amazing!! We miss you ❤
Thank you! I live this. 🙁
Very helpful. I really resonated with the restaurant analogy
Thank you for this video.
Thanks Alan
Thanks Alan - that was super helpful. I have shared it with a few friends. 🙏🏼
I love you Alan
Thank you for your new videos and explaining what neglection does to us deeply. It means a lot to us to see what happened to us.
Thanks for this very good video, sir. I relate to what you are speaking of very much. This helped define things for me.
Thanks!
Thank you for the kind donation. Glad the videos are helpful. I appreciate your support.
Thank you so much for being a mirror for me (and I think others too) Because your deep-feeling-art I can research my deep feelings, my patterns connected to my feelings etc. It's worth so much more than I can express in words! Again: thank you from the bottom of my heart!!
I found this excellent. Thankyou for grappling with finding the words for such an important matter, one that is so fiendishly difficult to describe.
thank you for this depth Alan. I feel all you ve described but have no language to articulate it to really digest that what i am feeling. I was emotionally neglected and now as a student therapist struggle to deepen my clients internal explorations, but i am learning. You questions really helped me with how to connect with my 10 year old daughter. Coz as i said i want this depth, but sometimes have no idea how to go about it as i never learnt the alphabet of this language.
I really want to break the cycle and the patterns I have with my romantic relationships. Right now I am with someone who can't tap into his inner world and isn't able to be emotionally vulnerable. I have been working with a therapist. I am learning how to communicate my needs but it still seems that he is opposite of me (can't share, focused too much on me, solution focused) and I am feeling very dissatisfied, like logically he isn't the best partner for me but the moment I try to leave I have a lot of fears plus grief coming up. So now I am working on my own emotional availability and how to connect deeper to myself, my needs, my boundaries, values, changing core wounds, etc. Any my family- never were interested in each other worlds and so mine developed quite well- like the fantasy, richness and I remember feeling loneliness and wanted to know more about other's worlds. It is just now that I am learning how to ask about other's experiences, etc. and see this with my friends/job, but still not my romantic partner. Anyway, I might join the community because I love how in-depth the content gets! Thank you!
He'll continue to let you wollow and not engage with you so long as you give him sex and food and if he's staying with you a place to do so. You're probably trauma bonding with him if you can't leave him and feel a pull back to him it's not love you can't love someone who is so unengaged as to not care that you're hurting or want emotional closeness and he's not interested (takes a real red flag no go of a person to be like this) so it's either trauma bond or not wanting to grieve and let go of limerance with him cuz you'd have to be alone then which being alone doesn't have to = bad and miserable like society wants you to believe many people are alone happy and do not feel lonely.
Can this cause major depression?
Not a professional here, but I would say absolutely causes depression.
For sure! Depending on the personality and the level of loneliness and disconnection. Some of us have learned to be happy and content being by ourselves, without feeling lonely. Others need all kinds of distractions, and possibly addictions to get by. You do you - just do the best you can, until you can do better.
I have major depression and I relate to this 100%. I think the depression is a symptom of the attachment trauma. I'm not a professional though.
How do you learn to be content with this trauma? I have tried so many things but the same issue resurfaces over and over. I wish I could be at peace not needing others.@@ssiegreen5292
Oh gosh I’m in this situation. Married 17 years emotional neglect on every level to the point I break myself trying to restore even breadcrumbs. Haven’t seen him in 7 weeks, gaslighting on steroids from him and I feel numb, I feel beyond crushed but reflecting on the reality externally made me look inside. I’m 60 this isn’t going to be easy as we have no house just rented and during my 24 operations (breast cancer) he wasn’t there or even at home for me. Small steps daily to healing but this is so hard and I know the acceptance comes from my dads neglect of us, he was dying and we were not allowed to see him or go to his funeral (only 18 months ago) how crushed my soul is 😥
Thank you for sharing your story. Empathy to you.
@@AlanRobargeHealingTrauma Thankyou Alan. I feel numb inside but for once my head is clear on what is happening. Where I move forward on this I have no idea atm. Your videos I’ve shared with so many they are the best I’ve come across, Thankyou 😉
Ur thumbnail should be a clip from ur video it’s so pretty and colorful and clean
Exactly
You are a beautiful human Alan and so gifted in expressing the subtle nuances of relating to ourselves and others. I have sent on to family members and am considering how I might be more emotionally curious and engaged with my son whom I adore and with my husband who is on a healing journey from a traumatic childhood also.
We will heal try to heal the world one relationship at a time and I pray that the 100th monkey phenomena/ morphogenic field (?!) will do the rest ✨
Best wishes from Western Australia ☀🌺
I'm so glad to hear this video was inspiring for you and I appreciate the kind words. Yes, we can heal the world on relationship at a time starting with ourselves and the people who are important to us. It helps to know that other people are striving to do the same. It is encouraging and affirming. I wonder if you heard about the Community Program, Improve Your Relationships. We learn so much from each other. Thank you again for the kind comment. www.healingattachmenttrauma.com/iyr_quiz_2
I remember that question just once in a lifetime.. it was as if someone finally pressed "play", the ice cap started melting and spring finally arrived -- all at once, in one go.
Edit: i usually phrase it, "what's going on in your universe?"
It really is like that, like the ice cap melting and spring finally arriving... when someone asks that question with actual interest. You wouldn't believe how many of us can relate with wanting to be asked that question. It's interesting what happens when we are together. Since we can understand each other, together we learn how to seek others and open up. I know when we had this conversation in the Community Program, Improve Your Relationships. We learn a lot from each other. Thank you for commenting. www.healingattachmenttrauma.com/iyr_quiz_2
I knew you were talking about "navel gazing" the minute you said you don't really like the phrase. Here's my view on the phrase:
I have always felt I could understand where people are coming from when they use this phrase. It's clearly derogatory...and I can even imagine certain scenarios in which "even I" might feel the phrase is appropriate. Basically when one is simply spending waaaaaay to much time and putting waaaaaaay too much energy...into what it is that makes them tick, compared with all of the other things in life that are also important....and that keep a person "balanced".
At the same time, I do think there are certain personality types that will call any minute level of self reflection "navel gazing" and shame those who are actually engaging in self reflection in a healthy way.
I believe both of these are unhealthy extremes.
The whole time I've been watching this video I've been thinking about personality types...specifically the MBTI, because that's the one I'm most familiar with....and I'm actually beginning to wonder if self reflection and even the whole "inner world" thing resonates far more with "some" types than others. For example, INFJs (of which I am one) are very introspective and are known to have a rich inner world and focus as much if not more on that "inner world" than we do on the outer world ....whereas an ESTP, for example, is ALL ABOUT what's happening "right here"..."right now"..."right in front of my face" (not behind it!)..."im here to manipulate my environment" and "how the *%$#@ is self reflection not be the biggest waste of time there is?"
When I think about this, I know it would be IMPOSSIBLE for me to operate the way an ESTP does.....and I seriously think it may also be IMPOSSIBLE for an ESTP to do as you describe here. I think it might drive them truly nuts. It's just not the way they're wired...and it may have little to do with the way they were raised. My experience with one particular ESTP is just like your analogy of the restaurant that's "closed"....and I've come to almost "assume" that this particular ESTP has an analogy of their own in which some other business seems "closed" in my company (The daredevil fun-factory, maybe?...I'll have to work on that one)
Thank you for sharing this. I experienced that exact thing you said at the end about someone being interested and how we are then self absorbed and lack the skill to ask them about their inner world. But I am curious if we do ask them about their inner world and instead they think we are interrogating them but we are just asking them the same questions they are asking us and because it makes me curious about myself I think they would like to share their experiences too but they don't.
@DreaMoreno86 If I understand your words, I am in the same confused state as you. I want to ask people about themselves, to really get to know them and to be known by them. BUT, I fear they will be annoyed, angry, that they don't want this intimacy. I respect their boundaries but want how do you connect without crossing boundaries? Are we humans just lousy at getting what we need most from each other: real acceptance, real knowing? Do we want something we do not understand how to get?
@@nancybartley4610 Nancy - you ask these questions slowly, and with consideration, when the right opportunity opens itself up. With tact, kindness and calm or enthusiastic - as the situation allows for - acceptance. I don't have many friends - never had the capacity of handling close + deep interactions with more than 2-3 core people at any given time. After listening to this - I now realize why. BUT - that said - all of these friends - are still friends today - 20, 30, 40, 50 years later! Maybe they are also soul family - I don't know. But I think learning more about yourself and how you tick, will help you to discern who is receptive to your questions, and the answers or how they respond - will tell you whether to proceed or disengage... Sharing too much of your inner world and personality with the wrong person, will come back to bite you in the tushi! Sharing it with the right person, will net you a new bestie!
I understand that as well. For me, I'm practicing asking open-ended questions. Not too personal. Always remember that the other person is welcome to express a boundary, and they are personal to each individual. I'm also beginning to notice how many people I thought I was close to simply from the longevity of them being in my life as opposed to actually knowing them and them knowing me. This includes my family. I took a card 'game ' to the Christmas gathering called mind to mind, which is conversation starters and offered anyone who would like to try it to grab one anytime during the gathering. They all looked at me like I was strange. Lol. The cards never left the box. I did sit down with my nephew and had an in-depth conversation with him about his future goals, and he actually seemed excited that anyone was interested in him and his dreams. It made me a little sad as I know what it's been like growing up in my family dynamic. I see the generational trauma and its effects playing out in such situations.
Yep. Spot on, haha…
🎉
🙌
The restaurant analogy
You should probably leave and go find an open restaurant. Easy
What if I don’t know that this isn’t the way restaurants function? Maybe we should take into account that when you are a child and that’s all you are exposed to you start to think thats the way things are supposed to be… 🤷🏻♀️ I think that a more appropriate analogy would be that the restaurant appears to be open, the waiters are running around but they never stop to ask you what you would like to order, but you try to signal them you are there and hope that at some point they’ll realise you are there, but it never happens and you are left with the sensation that there’s something majorly wrong with you. Please know that your comment can be very triggering for someone who spent their whole life thinking they were unworthy of attention, and it seems to imply that the person was too stupid to realise they should go to a different restaurant 😔
PS I have a very quick question for you. Have you ever taken the Myers-Briggs personality type indicator test? If you have I’m guessing you are highly likely an INFJ. Just curious.
I wish emotional neglect was a real like diagnosis ..cuz to all who hear you suffer from this .....or attachment trauma...or are a survivor or narcissist abuse ...they kinda look at you like ..ohh so your one of those reallt sensitive types ......
The DSM doesn't want to recognize it cuz nearly everyone has it! They have several conditions like this that are super common so they choose not to put them in.
@@destroyraiden I see ......man well I sure am greatful for UA-cam at least I get validation through it ...if I didn't have it I swear I feel like I would have lost my mindlol
Wow! Seriously. Nobody - even in my “ good” relationships, never asked. Not really. I thought it was normal. I mean you can squeeze blood from a stone. I think, I chose people different from my FOO ( family of origin), but they also had no one super interested in their personal feeling life either- at least it seemed in hindsight. So hence, this is normal.
💔❤️🩹💗💞