Emotions
How I Released My Fear of Rejection and Abandonment
One of the consequences of being a sensitive child growing up with emotionally unavailable parents was that I didn’t feel loved and accepted for who I was. I developed a strong fear of rejection and abandonment which lasted long into adulthood. It would most often come up in conversations with women, especially if I got the sense that they didn’t like me or didn’t seem to want to talk to me.
For example, I was at a birthday dinner for a female friend a few years ago and was sitting next to an attractive young woman who my friend worked with. We struck up a conversation which went quite well and lasted for several minutes. After a while when there was a lull in our conversation, she turned to the woman sitting on her other side and started talking with her instead of me. I broke out in a sweat. (more…)