Abandonment Trauma: Effects on You & Your Health
Abandonment Trauma: Effects on You & Your Health
Abandonment trauma can occur when an individual experiences physical or emotional neglect from someone they trust. Although we often associate this type of trauma with childhood, it can take place at any stage of life. While no two people experience trauma and its effects in the same way, it can be devastating and contribute to an individual’s ongoing fear of being abandoned by those they’re close to.
For many people, childhood abandonment trauma impacts how they connect with and relate to others. They might develop unhealthy attachment styles, which may lead to emotional instability and loneliness. Abandonment trauma and mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety, can also co-occur, impacting their sense of identity and self-worth.
In this article, we explore the impact abandonment trauma has on mental health and the most effective types of therapy for recovery.
What Is Abandonment Trauma?
Childhood abandonment trauma can deeply affect an individual’s emotional well-being. Understanding its roots and how it manifests in everyday life is vital for addressing its impact on relationships.
The Definition and Roots of Abandonment Trauma
Abandonment trauma is the emotional or psychological response a person develops after experiencing severe physical or emotional neglect from a trusted individual, such as a parental figure or spouse. This response may also arise in an individual who experiences perceived or unintentional abandonment.
Abandonment trauma can be rooted in the death, incarceration, or geographical relocation of someone an individual relies on for safety, economic security, and emotional support. Growing up in an environment with emotional abuse or neglect, living with an emotionally unavailable parent, or being left in an unsafe situation by a caretaker can also cause this trauma.
While abandonment trauma can shape how an individual views themselves and the world, professional treatment, such as trauma-focused therapy, can help them break the cycle and build stronger relationships.
The Five Stages of Abandonment
Respected psychotherapist and author Susan Anderson developed a method of identifying the five stages of abandonment using the acronym SWIRL. These stages involve:
- Shattering: In this phase, the relationship ends, and the individual feels overwhelmed and devastated by the loss.
- Withdrawal: The person feels acute pain and withdrawal from the lost relationship.
- Internalizing: The individual internalizes feelings of rejection.
- Rage: The person experiences intense anger and frustration.
- Lifting: The individual comes out of the grief cycle and can move forward.
The Manifestations of Abandonment Trauma
The manifestations of abandonment trauma depend on the individual, their personality and coping skills, and when and how they were traumatized. However, several common symptoms persist. Those that can negatively impact a person’s mental health and well-being include
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- Extreme anxiety or insecurity within a relationship
- Feelings of inadequacy
- Low self-esteem
- Obsessive thoughts and worries about being abandoned
- Distrust of others
- Inability to form healthy, functional relationships
- Feelings of helplessness or worthlessness
- Depression or persistent sadness
- Excessive neediness or clinginess in relationships
- Codependency
- Extreme sensitivity to perceived slights or changes in others' moods or behavior
- Emotional numbness or detachment
- Chronic feelings of loneliness
- Fear of rejection
- Emotional instability
The Signs of Abandonment Trauma in Daily Life and Relationships
Because abandonment trauma creates an unhealthy framework for interactions, it often leads to distorted perceptions of relationships and everyday circumstances. Typical signs of this trauma in daily life include:
- Sensitivity to rejection: An individual with a history of abandonment may be hypersensitive to any genuine or perceived sign of rejection. This may cause them to have difficulty trusting their partner or close friends won’t leave them. In some cases, it leads them to sabotage relationships by pushing people away before they can be rejected themselves.
- Extreme jealousy: Because of the deep-seated fear of their partner leaving them, people with abandonment trauma may exhibit extreme jealousy or controlling behaviors. For example, they may attempt to socially isolate their partners as a result of their insecurity.
- Clingy or codependent behavior: Someone who fears abandonment may need constant proximity and reassurance from their friends or partner. They may lack proper boundaries and rely heavily on others for validation and emotional support.
- Avoidance of emotional intimacy: Those who experience neglect or abandonment may form an insecure attachment style, pushing their partners away to protect themselves.
- Poor communication: Individuals with abandonment issues may lack healthy communication skills. This may manifest as a need for constant reassurance or involve reading too deeply into nonverbal cues. They may also seek to prevent abandonment by avoiding conflict or failing to clearly state their needs.
The Link Between Abandonment Trauma and Mental Health
Trauma from abandonment has a lasting impact on the individual, contributing to their likelihood of developing a mental illness and shaping how they engage with others. By learning healthier coping strategies, a person can develop resilience, establish personal boundaries, and build trust in their relationships.
Abandonment Trauma and Mental Health
Someone who experienced abandonment has a high likelihood of developing mental health conditions, with several studies observing a strong connection between trauma and mental illnesses. For example, a study from the National Library of Medicine found that out of 349 people with chronic depression, about three-quarters reported a history of childhood trauma. Similarly, a 2021 study observed a strong link between childhood abandonment and mental illnesses, such as anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, and suicidal ideation, developing later in life. In a recent study, researchers examined how abandonment affects brain development by rewiring neural pathways that involve problem-solving and emotional regulation.
While abandonment doesn’t automatically lead to mental illness, understanding the connection can empower those with trauma to seek professional help.
The Impact of Abandonment Trauma on Self-Worth and Relationships
People may disconnect from relationships for voluntary reasons, such as seeking independence or feeling unfulfilled, and involuntary reasons, such as dealing with health issues or financial problems.
Regardless of the reason for the abandonment, it can cause trauma to the individual when they internalize feelings of rejection. This may result in them feeling unworthy of love or unlovable. They might develop feelings of self-doubt and low self-esteem and have a constant need for external validation and reassurance. These feelings and beliefs can sabotage the individual’s desire to build meaningful connections and create a fear of intimacy.
Coping Mechanisms as a Result of Abandonment Trauma
To help manage the stress that comes with abandonment, people often develop specific behaviors and strategies. Unfortunately, these coping mechanisms can be unhealthy, preventing the individual from enjoying functional and fulfilling relationships. These may include:
- People-pleasing behaviors: Many individuals use people-pleasing behaviors to cope with abandonment and avoid rejection. For some, this means putting others’ needs before their own, while others actively avoid conflict by not setting boundaries.
- Isolation and avoidance: Some people with a history of abandonment avoid future trauma by isolating themselves and avoiding meaningful relationships with family members, friends, and partners.
- Self-sabotage: To create a sense of control in relationships, an individual may exhibit self-sabotaging behaviors. They may manufacture conflicts and challenges to test someone’s loyalty or trustworthiness or void vulnerability with loved ones.
- Perfectionism: To counteract feelings of unworthiness, they may strive for perfection to feel deserving of love and prevent abandonment by attempting to meet unrealistic or unsustainable standards.
- Aggression or anger: When faced with a perceived threat of abandonment, someone who’s experienced this type of trauma may cope by becoming angry or hostile.
While productive coping mechanisms don’t always come naturally, adopting more effective strategies is crucial for building healthier relationships. Effective strategies include:
- Practicing self-compassion: Individuals can embrace self-compassion by practicing positive self-talk, acknowledging their feelings, and treating themselves with compassion and understanding.
- Setting boundaries: This includes learning to prioritize their needs, saying no without feeling guilt, and communicating their limits to others.
- Participating in trust-building exercises: Fostering trust in a relationship is a healthy way to cope with a fear of abandonment. Individuals can do this by gradually sharing their feelings and experiences, showing consistency in their actions, and practicing active listening.
How Abandonment Trauma Can Lead to Substance Abuse
The Cycle of Abandonment Trauma and Substance Abuse
- Initial trauma: The first experience with abandonment can cause deep emotional pain and feelings of worthlessness.
- Substance use: Individuals often turn to alcohol or drugs to numb their pain.
- Temporary relief: After using a substance, the individual may feel they’ve found a way to escape their pain.
- Reinforcement: The temporary relief an individual feels reinforces the addictive behavior, making them more likely to use the substance again during times of stress.
- New trauma: Substance use creates new problems, including relationship conflicts. It may result in a close friend, family member, or partner ending a relationship with the individual for their safety and mental health, further perpetuating the cycle of abandonment.
A decades-old study from the Centers for Disease Control and Kaiser Permanente found that those who experienced difficult circumstances during their formative years, including abandonment, had a much higher risk for drug abuse. The more traumatic incidents they faced as children, the higher the risk of addiction. For example, the study demonstrated that adults who report four or more adverse experiences during childhood were three times more likely to abuse alcohol as adults.
Understanding the cycle of abandonment and addiction is vital for successful treatment, which typically involves treating the trauma and substance use disorder.
Healing From Abandonment Trauma
Regardless of when an individual experienced trauma, the nature of exposure, and how much time has passed, healing is possible. However, recovering from trauma is a complex process, making it important to seek professional help from a mental health care specialist.
The Therapeutic Approaches for Healing Abandonment Trauma
There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to healing from trauma, so mental health care professionals often incorporate various strategies. These may include:
- Individual therapy: One-on-one sessions with a licensed therapist give the individual opportunities to discuss trauma, reframe it, and learn to process their memories in a healthy, constructive way. During these sessions, the therapist and client identify ways trauma has shaped the individual’s behaviors and beliefs, challenge unhelpful patterns, and develop healthy coping mechanisms.
- Trauma-focused therapy: This type of therapy is specific to trauma and centers on helping the individual process abusive, scary, or dangerous life experiences. It includes modalities such as eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy, which incorporates visualization, breath work, somatic experiences, and cognitive behavioral therapy to change how the brain handles traumatic memories.
- Group therapy: Group therapy offers numerous benefits for recovering from abandonment trauma, including opportunities to connect with others and benefit from their insight and progress. It’s also a cost-effective option for those who may find one-on-one therapy financially prohibitive.
Learning Self-Awareness and Self-Acceptance During Recovery
Self-awareness and self-acceptance are two essential aspects of recovering from trauma. By focusing on these components, an individual can change the narrative from inadequacy and abandonment to empowerment and self-compassion.
Self-awareness involves recognizing and seeking to understand their emotions, behaviors, and thinking patterns and identifying how past experiences influence their present actions, beliefs, and relationships. This lets them recognize sabotaging behaviors, such as people-pleasing and social isolation, and begin to break the cycle of unhealthy coping mechanisms.
Self-acceptance means embracing all aspects of themselves and learning to accept emotions, experiences, perceived flaws, and personal strengths without judgment. For those healing from abandonment trauma, this often requires letting go of guilt and shame.
Building Resilience Through Mindfulness
The American Psychological Association defines mindfulness as an awareness of surroundings, thoughts, and emotions. For someone healing from trauma, focusing on the present can help them avoid seeing current relationships through the lens of past abandonment. It can also help them recognize the source of fear and worry, helping them understand whether their stress stems from present or past circumstances.
Mindfulness and grounding techniques, such as deep breathing or physical movement, can help someone avoid anxiety and panic by turning their focus to the present moment.
How Beachway Can Help
Beachway provides comprehensive treatment for those living with abandonment trauma and co-occurring mental illnesses or substance use disorders. With several specialized programs that treat mental health disorders, addiction, and dual diagnoses, we offer a personalized approach for those overcoming abandonment trauma.
Beachway’s holistic approach involves several types of therapy, depending on the individual’s needs, preferences, and goals. These therapy modalities include:
- Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing: EMDR trains the brain to release painful or traumatic memories, reducing instances of flashbacks by incorporating bilaterally auditory, visual, and tactile stimulation.
- Somatic experiencing: This alternative therapy addresses abandonment trauma by encouraging the individual to be more aware of their bodily sensations and learn to manage physical responses to traumatic memories.
- Cognitive behavioral therapy: As an evidence-based therapy, CBT helps the individual improve their well-being and mental health by identifying and challenging negative thoughts, beliefs, and patterns of behavior.
- Dialectical behavioral therapy: DBT incorporates mindfulness and emotional regulation while helping the individual tolerate uncomfortable memories and emotions without resorting to unhealthy coping mechanisms.
- Family therapy sessions: Trauma impacts the entire family, so Beachway offers family therapy sessions that help family members understand their loved one’s trauma and how to provide support.
- Group therapy: Group therapy sessions reinforce the skills individuals learn in one-on-one therapy and give them opportunities to benefit from others’ insights.
- Holistic therapies: Therapies that focus on the individual’s physical, mental, and spiritual well-being promote healing by treating the whole person. Holistic therapy modalities include meditation, art therapy, somatic breathwork, nutritional counseling, yoga, and psychodrama.
For those healing from trauma, Beachway offers a safe, supportive environment where individuals let go of feelings of guilt and self-judgment and learn to thrive.
Overcoming Abandonment Trauma With Beachway
Abandonment trauma has a profound impact on an individual’s health and well-being, resulting in unhealthy attachment styles, self-sabotaging behaviors, and an increased risk of mental illness and substance use disorder. Fortunately, healing is possible with the support of experienced mental health care professionals.
Beachway offers several programs to support those living with abandonment and other forms of trauma. Our programs offer a variety of strategies and therapy modalities to help individuals build healthy relationships, end harmful cycles of behavior, and learn self-compassion. Contact Beachway today to speak with an experienced counselor about our trauma treatment programs.