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I was adopted by my parents when I was 2 1/2 years old. Six years ago I gave up my son for adoption at birth.
Every relationship I've been in since then (only 3 but 2 makes a pattern...) around the two year point I start pushing my boyfriends away and justifying it by telling myself that it was bound to happen anyway because no will ever want me other than my parents.
I am coming up on the two year point with my boyfriend. Our relationship is not perfect, but I know he loves me and I love him and we talk through our disagreements and seem to come out better. Lately though I've started pushing him away. I think, it might as well happen because he's not going to stay with me forever, so let's get on it with it. But he's never said anything to that effect and as far as I know he does want to stay with me forever.
How do you get over this self-sabotage? Logically I know I'm lovable, but my mind always goes back to "well, they didn't want you, so no one will" But someone did want me! My parents wanted me. And I wanted my son, but I knew giving him up would give him a better life than I could give him. I picked his family personally, with my mom's help.
Does anyone else ever think like this?
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I can somewhat relate to the self-sabotage of it all. My BM gave me up when I was born and my AParents divorced when I was 5. I did not see much of either of them and was raised by the sitter and my Adoptive maternal grandmother until I was 8 and started staying home alone. Every relationship I get into I give up on. It's more like I have an issue attaching to people and not one with leaving. I have no problem leaving relationships. I simply cut that person out of my life almost as if they never existed. I am currently married and this is the first relationship that I have not quit. It's not that my fight-or-flight hasn't kicked in because it does. Frequently. But I somehow force myself to stay because I know that it's not worth leaving my husband of now 4 years over _____ issue. I fear that I will never not experience this. At times, I also fear that he does not want to be in this relationship, but stays because he is expected to and we have a son.
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Anaisnin82
I was adopted by my parents when I was 2 1/2 years old. Six years ago I gave up my son for adoption at birth.
Every relationship I've been in since then (only 3 but 2 makes a pattern...) around the two year point I start pushing my boyfriends away and justifying it by telling myself that it was bound to happen anyway because no will ever want me other than my parents.
I am coming up on the two year point with my boyfriend. Our relationship is not perfect, but I know he loves me and I love him and we talk through our disagreements and seem to come out better. Lately though I've started pushing him away. I think, it might as well happen because he's not going to stay with me forever, so let's get on it with it. But he's never said anything to that effect and as far as I know he does want to stay with me forever.
How do you get over this self-sabotage? Logically I know I'm lovable, but my mind always goes back to "well, they didn't want you, so no one will" But someone did want me! My parents wanted me. And I wanted my son, but I knew giving him up would give him a better life than I could give him. I picked his family personally, with my mom's help.
Does anyone else ever think like this?
Its common for adoptees to have difficulty with intimate relationships. After all the first relationship in your life resulted in being abandoned. This sets the stage for expectations of all future relationships. You might find yourself "manipulating" these relationships but what you are really doing is regulating the attachment so you can feel safe. Love creates fear and the fear makes you sabotoge the relationship. What is needed is for you to understand how being separated from your mother as an infant is driving your life choices today. You have a memory of that loss that has not been mourned. Every time you get in an intimate relationship you are renacting that loss because the memory is triggered and its very painful. That makes you pul away because you need to feel safe.
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Anaisnin82,
I did the same (leave first) many times in my teenage years but it got better but I still have the irrational fear they won't stay...I have had two incredibly long term relationships that the feeling of needing to leave first did not happen.
Time helps. Also understanding what FEAR is.
I think there are a couple of versions of this but here goes.
FEAR spells = False Expectation Appearing Real
When I get scared I think of that and it helps put it in perspective.
Kind regards,
Dickons
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The function of fear is to avoid a situation or person that one feels is threatening. It is very real and it occurs for a purpose. The purpose may be unconcious or distorted. In adoption a fear of an intimate relationship stems from the expectation of abandonment. Adoptees are abandoned by their first relationship so naturally the fear is triggered by current relationships. Infants can make memories and the primal loss of the mother can be recorded as a long term memory. Adoptees can find themselves regulating attachments which confuses friends and lovers as they move closer and farther away for no apparent reason
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