Member-only story
Featured
How Trauma Made Me Shut People Out
Emotional neglect from my childhood made me feel invisible and caused me to isolate myself.
“If you start feeling overwhelmed, just call me and we’ll arrange something. You are not alone.” It was my last session with my therapist before I returned home for the holidays. I was excited to be going home, but I was also anxious because I found my parents’ household stressful. Although we had a session scheduled during the last week of my trip home, my therapist insisted that I could call her if I ever reached a point when it was becoming too much for me at home. She assured me she genuinely wanted to make sure I’d be fine during my visit home. I didn’t have to deal with everything on my own. I had support. I had backup. Tears started falling when my therapist told me that. Why was I crying? It took me a second to figure it out. Then it hit me.
As a child, I felt alone quite a lot.
I didn’t realize I felt this way growing up until I heard the phrase being vocalized by someone else. Once the realization struck me though, the floodgates opened and I reconnected with what is an old and buried feeling for me. It made perfect sense. I already acknowledged that I suffered some degree of emotional neglect in my childhood. Feeling alone is a common symptom of emotional neglect…