[HalfSwede]

I was talking with my T yesterday about my fears of abandonment, and he pointed out that others can fear I'll abandon them as well, when I get upset with them. That might then cause the relationship to disintegrate anyway, as others are afraid of making me upset. Pretty obvious, but it had never occurred to me before.

I would add that the same thing can happen when I start to believe, probably mistakenly, that my friends or colleagues don't want to be my friends or colleagues anymore, and I don't share my concerns with them.

[lastyearisblank]

It sure does! I had a friend that this happened with. She didn't call me for a while and then I didn't call her back because I was DETERMINED not to get hurt. Then we finally met up and had this really intense conversation where she was like, "you stopped being my friend why? I feel like you just stopped being interested?" and I was like "what????" and she was like "what?????". Really eye opening sometimes. It's fantastic to be able to talk about this stuff in therapy, good job!

[SpiritRunner]

yup, abandonment is a two-way street......we can be abandoned, but fear of abandonment or trying not to seem like we are fearing it sometimes leads us into acts of abandonment ourselves......
I definitely know how that goes.....I sort of feel like abandoning everyone in my support system because I feel like sooner or later they will become so disappointed in my continued failings that they give up on me. Seems less painful to do the cutting away myself.....except the fallacy of that logic is that I could make stronger efforts to NOT be a disappointment and to change so that I don't face/feel abandonment.....

[WePow]

Very insightful. Yes, what we fear can be what others fear as well.

[HalfSwede]

Thanks, everybody. I really appreciate all the replies.

I'm still wrapping my head around this concept of me doing the abandoning (I honestly don't mean to sound flip). I have always had a big blind spot when it comes to my own behaviors. I'm quite good at pointing out other peoples' shortcomings, of course!

I took one of the personality quizzes yesterday. It said I was emotionally volatile, which makes total sense. Others have said they don't know what's going to set me off, so rather than risk doing so, they just keep their distance. I've also often wished I knew how I was going to feel from one moment to the next.

I'm trying to just be more aware of my rapid shifts, which is a bit of a double-edged sword. I can ride the shifts out and just sort of step back and watch them happening, but now I also worry about whether my anger or sadness is showing and, consequently, if it's pushing people away. What I'm telling myself is that I'm probably the only one who can see it. That's my goal anyway.

[HalfSwede]

Originally Posted by poetgirl76

.....I sort of feel like abandoning everyone in my support system because I feel like sooner or later they will become so disappointed in my continued failings that they give up on me. Seems less painful to do the cutting away myself.....except the fallacy of that logic is that I could make stronger efforts to NOT be a disappointment and to change so that I don't face/feel abandonment.....

exactly poetgirl. I either avoid starting friendships in the first place, or I keep starting new ones and then I just let them whither away from neglect. And yes, the sensible thing to do would be to put the effort into maintaining the relationship. Now that I write these words, keeping a friendship going really doesn't seem like such an impossible task. That begs the question of why I haven't been making the effort all along, but I've always believed that everything would just sort of fall into place, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.