Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
How do I stop feeling needy?
Twoapenny:
Hi all,
Thank you so much for your responses. I haven't replied for ages because this has set of such an avalanche in me I've had to really think about things and I've been watching my own behaviour.
I've no idea of what a 'normal' relationship is supposed to feel like. Phoenix, you are right, I have always felt that any 'demand' on my part was selfish and unnatural, another flaw in my character. I have no point in my life that I can look to and say "that's how I want to feel again". There's no point where I can say I felt consistently safe, wanted, loved or listened to. I must know on some level that's what I want, otherwise I wouldn't notice the lack, I think?
I feel that talking about my needs - my thoughts, my feelings, my hopes and desires for the future - is wrong. I get resentful listening to other people talk about themselves. I feel cross if they don't ask me the questions that give me the opportunity to talk about what I want to - I need their permission to talk about myself perhaps? I don't feel able to just speak about myself without prompting or reassurance from them that it's okay?
I find it hard to believe that anyone would want to spend time with me just because they like my company. I think of myself as dull, boring, fake, tainted in some way. Lollie, you said the same thing about people realising how crazy you are - I feel like that very much, that if people have any idea what goes on inside my mind they'll run for the hills and I'll be even more alone.
Hopsie, I realised the thing that stops me telling people I'm lonely is that I don't want them to feel guilty for not making any effort to make me feel less alone. I can't quite get my head around that. I do feel that I've been thoroughly abandoned by most of my friends. I am really struggling with being direct about this. I know that the right thing to do is to express this. I recently got a call from a friend who'd taken four months to return my call. That's not okay. I felt that she didn't value our friendship, that I didn't matter to her, that she didn't particularly want to see me or spend time with me and that it's just plain bad manners. I said it was fine when she apologised and that it didn't matter. I do this a lot. I think that either (a) she doesn't see it as a friendship - to me she's a friend, to her I'm someone she has coffee with when she's nothing better to do. That seems to happen a lot to me as well. She may see me as a friend but not see the need to treat me well - I think that less likely as she isn't like that with other people she knows.
Perhaps I am drawn to superficial friendships, where there isn't a point that we get close and share nitty gritty. I think perhaps I attract fellow co-dependants. I've a couple of friends who will run to my aid when things are really bad but don't really want much to do with me just to socialise, chat, have fund etc. I've friends who I tend to hear from when they have problems (my own codependency coming through). I don't know what it feels like to base a friendship on fun, mutual respect, shared interests and so on, instead of some messed up crap where I have to need them or they have to need me or some trigger from years ago goes off and has me running for people who don't really care about me and couldn't give a shit whether I'm there or not. The thought of voicing my needs terrifies me - actually telling someone the truth about how I feel, how lonely I am, how hard I find my life. And then dealing with their response to that - the rejection of them not caring that I feel like that or, even worse, them trying to do something about it and me feeling pathetically grateful that someone's noticed and is trying to make me feel better. That makes me feel dirty, somehow.
Bleurgh. I need to stop writing now, it's making me feel bad. Sorry. Thank you for all your thoughts and insights. Tup xxx
Hopalong:
I hear this frustration...
--- Quote ---I recently got a call from a friend who'd taken four months to return my call. That's not okay. I felt that she didn't value our friendship, that I didn't matter to her, that she didn't particularly want to see me or spend time with me and that it's just plain bad manners.
--- End quote ---
Boy, do I get that. For me, after all these years working on my reactivity...there's still one friend whose neglect pushes SUCH primal buttons. I've figured out that with her, I'm re-enacting FOO hurt. Not being seen or valued by my mother. So...when this particular friend (with whom I get along great when we do see each other, and with whom I sometimes have moments of great closeness) does her absence thing, which I interpret internally as a very primal abandonment...those triggers fly.
The other thing I can relate to, and I mean this non-judgementally, is the reflex to JUDGE the person who's neglecting, not needing us the way we need them, etc. As you pointed out her being "not okay" and "not valuing your friendship" etc.
The thing I continue to get into my skull is that my needing to judge her, as "not okay" or "not caring" is ... well, not relevant. I get such slim comfort from being "right." So...I've gotten into the old Victor Frankl thing of asking myself, what if it's actually true? What if she's careless about my feelings? What if she just doesn't WANT to respond to my need for reciprocity? What if it's true that she really DOESN'T value our friendship in the way that I would like it to be valued?
Very uncomfortable questions. But I find that if I keep asking them of myself in a new tone...drained of anger, but instead CURIOUS, I get some new answers. Like, "Oh."
I had a shrink once who made amazing use of that word. I would have such an emotional charge about something, or judgement of someone, and passionately explain it. And she would say, "Oh." Not in a cold way. Just not in a...I'm going to validate your hurt, kind of way. She didn't INvalidate that I was feeling pain. She just said, "Oh."
So I began to try to say that to myself. Ask those questions about what appears to be true, drain the "Okay vs. Not-Okay" judgment off (after venting it to myself)...and then I was left with the NEXT brilliant question that shrink would ask me. And that was, "Then what?"
How would that kind of thinking process go for you?
I'm sorry this is upsetting Tupp...but I think it's the Chinese kind...chaos preceeding growth or something like that.
love
Hops
Twoapenny:
--- Quote from: Hopalong on April 02, 2013, 04:28:58 PM ---I hear this frustration...
--- Quote ---I recently got a call from a friend who'd taken four months to return my call. That's not okay. I felt that she didn't value our friendship, that I didn't matter to her, that she didn't particularly want to see me or spend time with me and that it's just plain bad manners.
--- End quote ---
Boy, do I get that. For me, after all these years working on my reactivity...there's still one friend whose neglect pushes SUCH primal buttons. I've figured out that with her, I'm re-enacting FOO hurt. Not being seen or valued by my mother. So...when this particular friend (with whom I get along great when we do see each other, and with whom I sometimes have moments of great closeness) does her absence thing, which I interpret internally as a very primal abandonment...those triggers fly.
The other thing I can relate to, and I mean this non-judgementally, is the reflex to JUDGE the person who's neglecting, not needing us the way we need them, etc. As you pointed out her being "not okay" and "not valuing your friendship" etc.
The thing I continue to get into my skull is that my needing to judge her, as "not okay" or "not caring" is ... well, not relevant. I get such slim comfort from being "right." So...I've gotten into the old Victor Frankl thing of asking myself, what if it's actually true? What if she's careless about my feelings? What if she just doesn't WANT to respond to my need for reciprocity? What if it's true that she really DOESN'T value our friendship in the way that I would like it to be valued?
Very uncomfortable questions. But I find that if I keep asking them of myself in a new tone...drained of anger, but instead CURIOUS, I get some new answers. Like, "Oh."
I had a shrink once who made amazing use of that word. I would have such an emotional charge about something, or judgement of someone, and passionately explain it. And she would say, "Oh." Not in a cold way. Just not in a...I'm going to validate your hurt, kind of way. She didn't INvalidate that I was feeling pain. She just said, "Oh."
So I began to try to say that to myself. Ask those questions about what appears to be true, drain the "Okay vs. Not-Okay" judgment off (after venting it to myself)...and then I was left with the NEXT brilliant question that shrink would ask me. And that was, "Then what?"
How would that kind of thinking process go for you?
I'm sorry this is upsetting Tupp...but I think it's the Chinese kind...chaos preceeding growth or something like that.
love
Hops
--- End quote ---
Oh ;) This is interesting and very different to how I normally think about stuff. I'm going to give this some thought and apply it day to day. Will report back. Thank you! xx
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