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Relationships | Attachment Style
Relationship Struggles When Your Parents Were Emotionally Absent
Insecurity and fears of abandonment impact my relationships because my parents weren’t emotionally available
I have struggled in romantic relationships to feel secure and be emotionally available to my partners. I believe this is because I didn’t have emotionally available parents growing up, and I realized after several unsuccessful relationships that I was missing a lot of the vital ingredients required to build a happy and fulfilling relationship. I also operate with a critical inner voice constantly putting me down and extinguishing affection. It sometimes made me take clingy, jealous, and controlling actions towards my past partners. My off-putting actions only served to push the other person away.
My first heartbreak in life was not from one of my romantic relationships. It was unintentionally inflicted by my parents when they weren’t able to consistently meet my emotional needs as a kid. Their inconsistency meant that I was not soothed when I was distressed and I didn’t receive enough words of warmth and affection. As an adult, it formed me into an individual who felt insecure in relationships. I constantly demanded reassurance from my partner and had…