To say I have abandonment issues is putting it mildly. Since the beginning of my relationship with my husband I clung like a vine and felt incredible despair when I perceived he was leaving. Even though I’m an adult, I still have intense feelings of longing for my parents, of needing to belong to them and be close to them. I’m afraid of the need I have for my parents and will often shove it down and white knuckle through it. There are times though, especially in the middle of the night, that I will wake up in my home and have such a strong urge to drive to my childhood home and be with my parents that I have the keys in my hand before I change my mind. Normally after a bad flashback, I want them very badly. I feel uncertain about this need and longing for them. I’m not sure I feel safe enough to be that vulnerable with them and always keep a careful facade when I’m around them. It’s a pleasant enough relationship but I don’t think I could ever share what’s really going on with me. It makes me sad. I think back to when I was a child and my abuser made himself a very strong paternal figure. As a child I wanted to please him and turned more to him for reassurance. He would sometimes give it and sometimes push me away, refusing me. I felt abandoned and confused. I didn’t understand why he was doing that. What had I done wrong? I tried harder but it never worked. As an adult, I see how he isolated me emotionally from my family and made me feel disconnected from them. They seemed very far away from me then. I had this huge secret that I couldn’t tell and then a secret within a secret that I had to keep. He also set me up for a lifetime of abandonment issues. My relationship with my family has never recovered. My therapist tells me this is the worst form of psychological abuse: where the abuser is nice then not then nice again. It confuses the brain and entrenches the shame-blame cycle more firmly.
My husband is a wonderful man. He stays around me and takes care of me. He is my safety person. He comforts me in the middle of the night and keeps me safe during my flashbacks. He points out when I’m being paranoid and irrational. On the days (and there are many) that I can’t get out of bed, he takes care of the kids and the house and me. When I get stuck at work and literally can’t leave my office because I’m panicking, he comes and gets me. He is patient and never demands anything physical from me. He has to go to a conference in May and I am already freaking out. I know that I’ll be fine. My rational brain tells me that. But the emotional part, the part that quite frankly has been running the show for the past few years is screaming that we’re about to be left behind. I am proud of him. He’s going on this trip because he does such a good job at his job but that doesn’t soothe me. I’ll be without my comfort person, my safety person, for 7 days and will be alone with my symptoms and thoughts. When I try to tip toe towards thinking about it, I feel the panic and anxiety bubble up from my gut. I cry and cry because it feels like I’m powerless and alone and that’s how it felt when I was little. So yes, to say I have abandonment issues is an understatement. It’s something I don’t know how to fix and don’t see a solution to. Complex PTSD sucks.
Surviving Complex PTSD/PTSD 