Question:

Dear Lo,

During childhood, my mom would purposely stonewall me whenever she was upset with me. If I failed to abide by her standards, expectations or rules, it usually resulted in stonewalling. She emotionally abandoned me as her way of basically saying "I don't want to talk to you or acknowledge you because you've upset me." She would purposely ignore my needs and emotions because I upset her. I would feel scared to tell her anything with the fear that she would either continue to ignore me or unintentionally anger her some more. "Ugh... WHAT!!" or ".......WHAT DO YOU WANT?!" would be her responses if I was lucky enough to her to say anything. I was scared to talk to her. There was really nothing I could to revert her back to normal other than just ride the tide and hope she'd revert back to normal, even if I was there crying my eyes out because I upset her or just wanted her attention again. She just didn't care because I upset her. She emotionally abandoned me because I depended on her for basic needs, hence, the likelihood of my survival was greatly at stake. Her love had to be earned back. How? By over-loving her. Sometimes it worked. Other times, it didn't. And if it didn't, it usually intensified the negative emotions. Her "love" was conditional. However, there were also times where I felt her love was unconditional. It was freely given to me and I didn't have to do anything to feel her love. I felt safe, loved and acknowledged. Cool! This inconsistency childhood love by my mom, however, has set me up for what I am experiencing today.

Whenever I develop an emotional connection with a romantic person, I tend to feel intense abandonment anxiety and irrationally fear that she could abandon me at any given moment for any given reason. I have also felt very much so anxiously attached to romantic partners in the past, both physically and emotionally, because over-love will keep me safe from a romantic person’s abandonment. I need constant reassurance that she still desires me, people-please romantic individuals to ensure I’m desired upon and for the lesser likelihood of an abandonment, cling to her physically and emotionally, and have even subconsciously turned her into my new “mom" by irrationally and subconsciously believing she'll love me like a mom. A romantic connection is emotionally turbulent with negative/irrational thoughts and anxiety. And so if a romantic person does unexplainably abandon/reject me and walks out of my life as it’s happened before, it’s going to trigger an extremely profound sadness where I could be on the floor crying uncontrollably hard with extreme emotional pain that deeply overwhelms me. This last happened to May of 2023 after Angelica walked out of my life without much of any explanation and basically abandoned me. I never heard from her ever again. My therapist believes it could be Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria. I will feel this post-abandonment extreme depression because my “mom” abandoned me. How will I survive now???

It's also important to note that I only feel these negative emotions/thoughts with romantic individuals. It's never felt with any other social group.

Bottom line is this: I cannot form an emotional connection with a romantic person without feeling abandonment anxiety, anxious attachment issues, or codependency issues. Abandonment by a romantic person = extreme sadness. I want to heal. I want to develop an emotional connection with a romantic person without the negative emotions and thoughts from interrupting the romantic connection. I want to separate my mom’s pot of love and establish a new pot of love for romantic partners.

~Gabriel

Answer:

Dear Gabriel,

First I want to share how impressed I am with your level of self-awareness and insight into how your childhood continues to affect your current romantic partnerships. I can tell that you have done a lot of exploration, reflection, and healing work already. Bravo!

I am very sorry to hear about how your mom’s stonewalling behavior impacted you as a child. It breaks my heart to imagine how confusing, scary, and painful that must have felt. Stonewalling is one of the most toxic responses to give another person, especially a young child who is looking for love, acceptance, and security from their parent. As you described, it sends the message that a person’s worth is connected to their behavior, that love needs to be earned and is conditional, and that their existence is meaningless if they are not “perfect” in the parent’s eyes. It makes total sense that in response, you chose to give an abundance of love to your mom and never upset her in any way in order to keep the peace, feel safe and stable, and try to prevent rejection and abandonment. You were doing the best you could as a child to get your emotional needs met in an environment with little resources or support. In that way, you were smart, creative, and a problem solver because you survived immense challenges that you shouldn’t have had to face.

In terms of how to prevent these patterns in romantic relationships, I love that you are aware of how and when they show up for you and where they stem from in your past. Awareness is always the first step! I encourage you to consider inner child healing/reparenting in order to move from anxious to secure attachment. Some steps can include looking at a picture of yourself as a little child on a daily basis to form a connection to younger you. The goal here is to be your own most loving parent, checking in on Little Gabriel with consistency to build trust with him. By providing him with the love, support, and encouragement that you needed as a kid, it will help to heal those childhood wounds. You can also write a letter to your younger self, letting him know that mom’s behavior was not his fault and had nothing to do with him. As your wise adult self, you can let Little Gabriel know that he is wonderful, smart, fun, and that you love him unconditionally no matter what. I also think it may be beneficial to read a book called “Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents” by Lindsay Gibson because it can provide comfort, understanding, and validation to your childhood experience. Finally, consider writing a letter to your mom (which you do not send) to express all of your feelings about the impact of her behavior on you both as a child and now. Write freely without censoring yourself or judging anything that comes up. Share in detail how you felt, what you needed, and any questions that you had for her. After you’ve gotten everything out, you can safely burn or rip up the letter to release the energy and symbolize the cleansing that comes from allowing yourself to feel these intense emotions. Allowing yourself to grieve the relationship with your mom that you wanted, needed, and deserved is an important step of the process. Feel the anger, sadness, confusion, disappointment, etc. and release it in healthy ways (crying, punching a pillow, screaming into a pillow, hugging yourself and rocking back and forth, etc.).

I would encourage you to spend some time to cultivate a beautiful relationship with yourself before re-entering the dating world. Befriend yourself, learn more about yourself, and find small consistent ways to treat yourself with love and compassion. Do things that make you feel good, speak kindly to yourself, and reconnect with the inner child within you. Do activities just for fun, treat yourself, and focus on how to meet your own emotional needs. Consider how you can allow and guide yourself to feel safe, seen, soothed, and secure - the four universal human needs. Spend the time you would normally use to over-give love to others finding ways to give yourself that love, compassion, and understanding. Be kind and gentle to you, and remember that healing takes time. You can do it, and you are worth it. I am rooting for you and sending you lots of love!