9 signs YOU experienced childhood emotional neglect

sign number one and this one is going to hurt when children are emotionally neglected they most likely struggle to process feelings as they grow into adults these unresolved issues hold them back in many shocking ways today I want to address nine signs in adulthood that we were emotionally neglected as a child when I was in graduate school we were taught that emotional neglect is a form of child abuse that occurs when a parent deprives their child of basic emotional needs things like comforting your child when they cry asking them how they're doing and supporting their emotional expression and while that's still true after spending thousands of hours with patients reading all of the latest studies and speaking with colleagues I believe that focusing on the cause isn't enough because most of us who were emotionally neglected didn't know it was happening at the time we need to talk about how it can show up in our lives as adults which leads me to sign number nine being being out of touch with our emotions this means that if I were to ask you to identify what you're feeling today you might not be able to give me an answer you won't know how to explain what agitation or even excitement feels like to you and if you do feel something you have no idea how to experience it and regulate it emotions because they are so foreign to us can feel out of control we never got the chance to get to know our emotions or learn how they can be used so we slowly lost touch with them the reason this is the first sign I want to talk about is because it's at the Crux of emotional neglect when our parents don't support our emotional expression it's often done because they themselves can't handle emotions they are stunted and therefore they can't support our natural reaction to the world they have to suppress it or ignore it all together and I'm not saying this to condone their behavior at all rather to help us understand why this could have happened sign number eight being extremely defensive M of our community shared their experience with this they said I hate the question what are you doing because it makes me feel like I'm doing something wrong and I'm being told to justify my stupid Behavior right now it triggers the worst fight ORF flight reaction in me and I can't stand that I get so pissy about it because it's like never coming from a bad place it's always genuine curiosity yet I can't hear it without feeling like I'm being shouted at when our emotional expression is constantly being suppressed maybe we were told to stop crying or to just get over it or we were ignored until we quote unquote calmed down when someone asks us how we're doing or what we're doing it can feel like an attack like they're going to treat us just like our parents did and we're going to get in trouble it's almost like us just being there and having feelings is too much that's another key issue with emotional neglect when we don't get support for how we feel any amount of feeling can feel like too much I used to hear this a lot in my practice patients would tell me that they were scared to open up or talk about what was going on because they thought they would drown in it like all of the emotions they've stuffed down would somehow sweep out and like swallow them whole and of course it would feel like that if we were never allowed to have feelings at all right the idea of expressing anything is too much in fact we could have been told that we were always too much so we associate emotions with being too much therefore when someone comes along and wants to check in with us we don't think it's safe we get defensive and we shut down number seven people pleasing now I'm not talking about someone who wants to just keep the peace sometimes or goes along with things I'm talking about doing whatever we can to ensure that other people are okay first because it's only when everyone else is okay that we know how to relax that's why people pleasing is really just a form of manipulation and yes I was just as offended by that when my own therapist said it to me but it's true because we're trying to ensure others are happy so that we can be okay which makes sense if we were emotionally neglected we didn't know how to check in with ourselves we only knew how to read other people and check in with them meaning that if our parents were upset that could mean that they were even more distant or cold towards us and so it was in our best interest to keep them happy without realizing it we may have been trying to keep them happy so that they would offer us the emotional support we truly needed but that's just a thought number six we are often unable to ask for help there was this meme going around where a guy was moving a couch and the other side of the couch was being held up and wheeled by an office chair have you seen it anyway the caption reads them how good are you at asking for help when you need it me insert this guy and it's funny because it's true when we grow up thinking that we're too much and every feeling we have shouldn't be had at all we can think that our needs aren't okay therefore we don't feel comfortable or even warranted in asking someone else for assistance and if you consider back to sign number eight that we're extremely defensive we can worry that if we do ask for help it will be met with upset or frustration and we don't want anyone to think that we are too much or we can't handle it so we just don't even ask for help even when we need it number five shame after even the smallest mistake our concerns upsets and painful feelings weren't accepted or maybe even acknowledged so we grew up thinking we had to deal with everything ourselves we could have even developed what I like to call toxic Independence where we take pride in doing everything ourselves in fact we don't need anyone else ever but this is really a reaction to our parents inability to support us and if we believe that we are supposed to do everything ourselves then when we mess up we can feel intense Shame about it or like a member of our community shared I go to Great Lengths to cover up even the smallest errors because when people are mad at you that means that they don't love you so they cannot ever find out this lack of outside support can put unnecessary pressure on us to be perfect when we all make mistakes and that's really how we learn and grow sign number four is that we want to isolate all the time being around other people means that we are reminded that we're too much and it can make us want to people please and we can worry that they're going to ask us how we're doing and honestly it can all just feel too overwhelming therefore it's easier to be by ourselves right it's less stressful to be alone or as one member of our community States I'm 35 years old and reading this under the comforter in my bed because that's my safe hidey-hole and no one can be mad at me if they can't interact with me in many ways not interacting with others feel safer we can't let anyone down or be too much if we aren't around anyone else right obviously the tough side of this is that we actually do need others around it's how our nervous system is wired and even if we try to tell ourselves that it's better to be alone that loneliness feeling will creep in it's like we're trying to remove one stressor that we think is upsetting us and we end up creating an entirely different issue number three we compulsively lie compulsive lying is when we tell falsehoods out of habit because it feels safe and sometimes for no reason at all when this happens as a result of childhood emotional neglect it's done because telling the truth may not have been accepted or safe if we spoke up and said how we really felt it could have been shut down or dismissed if we actually asked for what we needed it could have been ignored or laughed at so we learned to lie to survive as one person shared it wasn't safe to trust the adults in my life with my feelings so I developed a sense of safety in line it helps me feel like my personal inner truth is protected because nobody can invalidate it if they don't even know about it the problem with this is while it may have helped us when we were growing up as we get older it can lead to other problems like issues at work or in relationships when they find out that we lied about something important it can be stressful hurtful and just like the isolation we talked about it can cause other issues for us sign number two difficulty making decisions if we aren't in touch with our emotions we often feel like we don't know who we are or what we want and this can make it hard for us to decide between one thing and another also if we're more of an anxious people pleaser type we can worry that we're going to make the wrong decision and upset somebody else so we can feel Frozen when we're asked to decide speaking of Frozen this particular sign could also be a result of going into freeze you know our stress response fight flight freeze if having an opinion or a strong response to something was never okay it can be triggering to be asked what we want and push us into our stress response and finally sign number one and this one is going to hurt we seek out unavailable Partners I know that's a hard truth but when our parents weren't emotionally attuned with us we can think that that's what relationships look like and go out into the world seeking it out when we find someone who isn't emotionally available we can feel comfortable and want to attach to them because it's what we know as normal and even if someone who is healthy and emotionally available seeks us out we can feel like they're clingy or they just give us the I but don't worry this is something we can overcome through therapy and by being curious not judgmental about who we are attracted to it does take time and you may be uncomfortable with it at first but trust me when I tell you that it does get better know that even though our childhood may not have been the best in fact it could have been the worst that doesn't mean that we can't heal and work towards a healthy and happy future our past does not have to dictate our present or future you got this I know you do