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when you feel like you have to provide something to get love in return
I read this tumblr post a while ago and had thoughts about it. The post is all quotes from people who have felt (or still feel) that love is something they have to earn. I kept wanting to reach through the internet and tell them -
When you feel like the value you have as a person is something that can be quantified, and when you feel that it is your job to figure out what people find entertaining/charming/adorable and to be that, and when you feel like people might like you one day because you “got it right,” and they might not like you the next day, whether you changed anything or not, and when you feel like that's just normal, that's just how things are -
Well, ok. I don't know whether this is true for everyone. But for me, what's true is that my feelings, my instinctive emotional responses, were linked to a transaction.
A transaction like [charm/laughter/cuteness] => [care/consideration/support] is maybe appropriate for a professional relationship between an artist and their audience, but when it happens in relationships that are meant to be mutually affectionate (eg family, friend, romantic partner) it twists things into weird shapes.
I still, now, occasionally react to feeling neglected or discarded by a friend by thinking "was I boring/uninteresting/not helpful enough the last time I saw [friend]?" and I think that is because, at some formative point in my life, taught that I was only as good as I made other people feel*.
But what I've found is: it doesn't have to be this way. It just doesn't. Friends, maybe you identify with what I've just described and if that is the case, I'm sorry that happened to you, but also I need to tell you that I've found therapy extremely helpful, and - THIS IS IMPORTANT - all my breakthroughs happened when I specifically requested a therapist experienced in narcissistic abuse.
When you feel like the value you have as a person is something that can be quantified, and when you feel that it is your job to figure out what people find entertaining/charming/adorable and to be that, and when you feel like people might like you one day because you “got it right,” and they might not like you the next day, whether you changed anything or not, and when you feel like that's just normal, that's just how things are -
Well, ok. I don't know whether this is true for everyone. But for me, what's true is that my feelings, my instinctive emotional responses, were linked to a transaction.
A transaction like [charm/laughter/cuteness] => [care/consideration/support] is maybe appropriate for a professional relationship between an artist and their audience, but when it happens in relationships that are meant to be mutually affectionate (eg family, friend, romantic partner) it twists things into weird shapes.
I still, now, occasionally react to feeling neglected or discarded by a friend by thinking "was I boring/uninteresting/not helpful enough the last time I saw [friend]?" and I think that is because, at some formative point in my life, taught that I was only as good as I made other people feel*.
But what I've found is: it doesn't have to be this way. It just doesn't. Friends, maybe you identify with what I've just described and if that is the case, I'm sorry that happened to you, but also I need to tell you that I've found therapy extremely helpful, and - THIS IS IMPORTANT - all my breakthroughs happened when I specifically requested a therapist experienced in narcissistic abuse.