Thank you everyone for your replies. It’s one of those issues that seems so amorphous and insubstantial it’s even really hard to write about it - like trying to pin down smoke and fog.

It’s also something that seems to affect, well me at any rate, in a negative kind of way, I mean that when I think about the negation and invalidation (neglect I suppose, but it’s really hard to apply that word because it’s so easy to see that people didn’t mean it, and there’s no kind of objective standard by which to say ‘aha see you didn’t tell me I was lovable you didn’t make me feel ok about myself that’s something you did wrong’.)

Anyway when I think about it the feelings are more like withdrawing, impossible to get a handle on exactly WHAT was wrong about it all and so it’s impossible to get angry or even feel hurt and the end result is more like having this incredibly vulnerable and needy and defenceless core that you need to hide away all the time, not something you can openly talk about as something seen by the world as unacceptable. Imagine trying to explain to someone that you’ve got major problems because of something in the past and when asked you say oh my parents didn’t praise me or see me as wonderful or tell me what a fantastic person I was all kind of a bit impossible really. Because basically the end result of negation and invalidation is that you walk around experiencing yourself as worthless and unlovable (at the least) so it’s impossible to take a stand and judge anyone for NOT having seen you as wonderful and precious and wanted etc. Hm that’s total waffle anyone know what I’m getting at there?

I’m trying to say that because it’s all an absence, and at the time you don’t really have any idea that it could (and should) be different, you just accept it all as the status quo, as normal, and sponge up the messages as being a reflection of who you are (unimportant, worthless, not mattering, not able to be loved and liked and wanted and seen as good etc etc). So when it comes to trying to undo those messages there’s nothing concrete to fix on - no specific incident that is serious enough by itself to warrant getting emotional about it (as some of you have said, what’s the big deal in that? It just doesn’t seem enough to explain the way I am now.)

The catch-22 in all of this is that being stuck now in experiencing self as worthless and undeserving - it’s really hard to go back and feel that I deserved or should have had all these goodies, goodies that I only know about from listening to and talking with and reading about and watching how other people relate to each other. And all the time the biggest message of all - that it’s all my fault for needing/wanting/demanding too much - that such things CAN’T be given that I’m making it all up because of something wrong in me. Sigh.

Exactly Peaches! It’s like so many ‘small’ things that most people would just accept as normal human failings or imperfection or whatever and that to be upset about it is like being a pathetic bratty give me give me give me I demand child. Though in your case I have to say that the things you’ve described are pretty concrete and open signs of neglect! And I so get what you mean when you wish someone would tell you whether you’re making a big deal out of nothing (or not lol - that’s what I really want, someone to say, YES it’s serious, it IS a bad situation). A big part of that kind of emotional absence is that you end up with a not good enough sense of objective reality because your own feelings and needs and perceptions have been so invalidated that you can’t rely on yourself to tell you the objective truth about things.

I guess the other catch-22 is that even if you can find something ‘real’ - that’s not the point of it is it, to blame or get righteously angry about it, the real issue is why wasn’t I good enough for them to be nice and kind and caring and loving towards me?

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These things you guys have posted means there is hope!

For years I’ve been running around in little circles trying to GET all the things that were denied when I was a kid and I’ve experienced that as something MAJOR wrong with me and it’s only now that it’s started dawning on me that it just might be possible to actually get some of those needs met, or at least be able to accept that they were legitimate and valid needs and not my fault (well ok not entirely lol).

Ugh just reread what I’ve written and it sounds so pathetic when I think about its being posted in a proper abuse forum.

Hmm and for that reason I’m going to go ahead and post it, because I reckon I’m just buying into the message that says it’s not serious enough, not bad enough, just me being pathetic and attention seeking and sod that it’s time to stand up against those messages. Ok sorry I’ve written a really long post I can’t seem to help myself, and it would have been a lot longer because I wanted to say something in reply to all the posts on here. So thanks again everyone for your comments.

Torn Mind