Abandonment issues can be some of the toughest issues you ever deal with. It is the constant fear of being alone, your loved ones leaving you, or of your partner having an affair. Abandonment can come from a parent leaving you as a child, not spending time with you, being addictive, or being emotionally distant. If you get abandoned in some way as a child it will carry with you into your adult years as the fears listed above. Abandonment causes many different issues for individuals, but one of these issues is that you never get to truly be your true self.
Abandonment fear is painful and paralyzing. Your spouse is home late from work and you are sitting by the phone imagining him in bed with another person when in reality he got stuck in traffic and his phone died. It is being scared to bring up how you really feel in a situation because if you make your partner mad he may divorce you. It is being overbearing and attempting to control where your partner goes and who he talks to because that may keep him from having an affair or being influenced by others to leave you. Its being intimate with your partner even if you are not in the mood simply because you believe if you do not have enough sex with your partner he may go and have sex with someone else. These are just a few of the ways abandonment issues can rear their ugly head. Sound irrational? You bet, but this does not change the behavior because the paralyzing fear is still within you.
Can you see the pattern here? In each of the situations mentioned above you are acting in a specific way because you believe that in acting that way you will keep your partner with you. You are not being true to yourself and who you are. You are strategically planning your actions to keep from being abandoned. You have wrapped your world up in your partner. Who are you? I mean really and truly who are you? Who would you be without your spouse? Don’t know? Many individuals with abandonment have no idea. The thought of life without your spouse is too painful. So you just continue to live your life in a way to keep your partner “happy” because if he is happy then he will not abandon you.
The truth is, these behaviors can actually push your partner farther away. He may feel controlled or smothered. He may sense your “faking.” So not only do you lose yourself in your partner’s life, you push him away. You need to gain insight into why you have abandonment issues to begin with. You need to work on these issues and learn that to be enough for you. You need to rediscover who you truly are deep inside. You may not even recognize the person you have been missing!
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