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Fear Of Abandonment/rejection

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I have noticed that fear of abandonment is a big fear of many people on here. My question pertains more to dating than anything else. Do most people with PTSD have this fear? Is it dependent on a certain kind of trauma? Or can it come with PTSD related to any trauma? Do certain things raise or trigger this fear when dating? What have all of you experienced?
 
I have no idea if most people with PTSD have this fear but I'd wager that many with childhood trauma do. (I am a CSA survivor.)

I'm fine with dating until i start to feel vulnerable and at that point the abandonment issues kick in. Any other time the paranoia keeps me isolated from most everyone and the abandonment stuff doesn't bother me.
 
I will always fear being abandoned, but as EveHarrington mentioned, I had bad childhood experiences, so I fit into that category as well as PTSD. In fact, my PTSD came from being abandoned. However, I didn't notice it early on in relationships, but as it got more serious because my abandonment issues come to light with certain looks or tone of voice from a significant person; which doesn't occur in that first exciting stage of dating.
 
I'm not sure most do have fear of abandonment, and if they do it might not be linked to what caused their PTSD. Although when I think that a feature of all trauma is loss: safety, trust etc. and this often results in the feeling of being foresaken (how biblical!) or abandoned, then maybe.

I fear being abandoned and abandoning (although I will choose the latter with no problem in order to protect myself). I'm certain this has its roots in CSA/developmental trauma history and the attendent abandonment, which in the end has been the most painful part of the abuse. CSA/developmental trauma has left me terrified of intimacy and with zero ability to trust.

In relationships getting in the zone where I'm required to trust others with me and my feelings, in order for things to move forward into deeper relating ultimately brings on an unbearable fear/panic that my sympathetic nervous system takes care of; ah ah ah arghhhhhhhha....RUN! I lost the only person I ever managed to open up to, I even say love (however unskillful) like this. :(
 
This may or may not be of any help, but I do not believe I have any big fear of abandonment. I think this varies from individual to individual, regardless of PTSD diagnosis, and trauma type(s) may have something to do with the intensity of this fear. I would imagine a lack of trust and/or a poor sense of safety would raise this concern when dating (for instance, if the sufferer found out about their date lying, their fear of abandonment might spike more so than that of someone without PTSD)... but I don't know, I'm still trying to figure it all out!
 
I don't think I have a fear of abandonment particularly. An expectation of it maybe, and that does affect how I relate to people and how much I feel able to give to relationships, but I wouldn't describe it as a fear.
 
I've just finished reading The Primal Wound by Nancy Verrier. It's about her belief that separation of the child from the birth mother causes a deep psychological wound, even in cases of adoption, where the adoptee was a baby and has no conscious memory of the events.

She believes adoptees (and any child separated from their birth mother) will experience the event as abandonment. She goes on to explain that this sense and experience of abandonment can affect the development and maintenance of future close relationships (e.g. between the child and adoptive parents, future adult partners, parent and child etc.) and the development of a 'sense of self'. She suggests that having experienced abandonment once, suffers may resist close relationships as a way of protecting themselves against future potential abandonment. That's the theory at least.

I was given up by my birth mother soon after I was born, and finally adopted when I was five. In the intervening period I was in care, and spent a lot of time in hospital. Even after adoption I experienced being repeatedly taken and left at hospitals (for treatment) by my adoptive parents as further abandonment.

I do recognise certain behaviours that can be linked to the experience of abandonment and fear of this happening again, for instance.

I have never been or felt emotionally close to my adoptive parents. Some of this is also about my need to have control of me, because of other aspects of my childhood where I didn't have any control, but I believe it's also because I feared of further abandonment by them, and I have integrated this fear. I deliberately live hundreds of miles away from my parents, so as to keep them at 'arms length'.

I push my own family away emotionally, and sometimes struggle to feel strong emotions towards them. I also do this when I feel they are threatening my autonomy. I also push friends away and am very poor at keeping in touch. Friends have to work hard to maintain a friendship and contact. And yet when I lose friends I am devastated and can't recover from it (as happened a few years ago).

These are some things I recognise about myself that I believe have some roots in abandonment. The book I mentioned has been very helpful in highlighting some of my responses to feelings that are somewhat dysfunctional. Recognising them is at least a starting point in trying to change my dysfunctional behaviours.
 
I have a fear of abandoning others... But no fear of bing abandoned, myself.

I detached myself for 8 years until i met my best friend a year ago. He is getting married and the fear of loosing him as a friend and being all alone again caused me to spiral down completely. He doesnt understand my negativity (i wanted to die, never told him that, but just the behaviour that goes with that). He hasnt talked to me for three days now and i feel i lost him forever. Im afraid i will regress big time and detach just to get over the pain of a situation i created over the overwhelming feeling of POSSIBLE abandonment. I know i have a self destructive side but i cant control it. I cant control the PTSD at times.
 
I have noticed that fear of abandonment is a big fear of many people on here. My question pert...

Oh dear, going through dating crap right now. I hate dating. I really hate it. And the thing is that this time, like many others, it was a casual relationship, which I keep thinking will decrease the pain of rejection but it seems to somehow always turn out badly. Sometimes I wish I could cut out the part of me that needs human connection.
 
I have a fear of abandoning others... But no fear of bing abandoned, myself.

This rings very true to me... I don't think I have a problem with being "abandoned" either. Indeed, being alone is not a problem for me. Does any of the following characteristics by any chance sound familiar to you: Sleep disorders for as long as you can remember (difficulties falling and staying asleep and anxiety, not of sleep itself, but of spending yet another night tossing and turning); recurrent eating disorders (anorexia); self-imposed programs and monitoring (food, exercise, alcohol, etc.); high academic achievements; perfectionist; workaholic; absolute horror of not finishing something off properly; willing to take on tasks (and risks, even potentially life-threatening) to save others from having to do so; bad at recognizing your own limits and limitations (need for someone else to stop you e.g. a hierarchical superior, a physician, etc.); suspicion of anybody's true intentions including your own (compliments make you feel uncomfortable); excessive self-criticism (including beating yourself up for not respecting your own stupid programs...); strong wish to be 100% honnest and sincere; systematically turning blame towards others into guilt and shame about yourself ("How could I be so stupid...?"); pretty crap at relationships but really, really good at ending them; staying in touch with people you don't really like (including ex-partners who've not been so nice to you); alway, always giving people the benefit of the doubt; frequent fear of not detecting depression in others and not being there for them (family, friends, colleagues); occasionally even fearing that people will commit suicide and that you didn't do everything you could to prevent it...
 
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