DenverBachelor Posted January 5, 2010 Posted January 5, 2010 Amazingly, I had an epiphany tonight and I can't really describe how or why, but I'll explain it. I'm sure there will be many who disagree ... I realized that we all get older, but that two year old inside us lives on and is the root of so many of our actions. There are two things that drive the greatest accomplishments and worst actions of mankind -- fear and love. We're all deadly afraid of being abandoned and alone. We fear that constantly throughout our lives. We leave so many people behind -- friends, family, mentors, etc. It isn't always our choosing, but the nature of life constantly separates us from the comfortable and thrusts us into so many unknowns. I was online tonight and decided to Google my first true relationship and love and found a photo album that was put online by her mother. It basically chronicled not only my first love's childhood, but the childhood of her mother and even her grandmother. I saw pictures of their house in Oyster Bay, New York when it was first being built. I suddenly realized that even while dating her, I only had a fraction of the knowledge and history of her family. I paralleled her life for approximately 9 years -- as friends, lovers and then distant friends again. I'm not sure why the pictures were so emotional to me, but her family became my family and it was really like stepping outside of space and time and examining something larger than yourself. I realized that I've adopted a lot of families through relationships and then lost them. The family went on -- I did not with them. And so, I realized that abandonment is the worst fear that we all face. It is the quintessential human element in which we all reside. We all fear it and we all experience it over and over. I remember when I was around 4 years old, my mother took me to Nursery School for the first time. I remember her standing there at the door and telling me goodbye and as she started to walk away, I freaked out and ran towards her and started screaming. It was the first time in my life that I can remember when I felt I was being abandoned. I didn't have any conception that she would come back for me -- I was too young to understand. All I knew at the time was that she was dropping me off at a strange place, with a strange man who was promising her that he would take care of me -- while she was walking away and saying goodbye and crying. I was absolutely hysterical and distraught. That is probably one of the most powerful memories I have from my childhood. I remember the strange man coming up to me, grabbing my hand and showing me fish in a fish tank. He was trying to gain my trust and I absolutely hated him. I hated him, because I blamed him from ripping me from my mother. I felt so afraid and scared of what could happen. I felt absolutely isolated and alone, since I knew no one there, and my mother had left. I was too young to run away or find shelter. I was stuck holding this strange man's hand as I was being shown stupid fish in a fish tank while my mother was gone and my heart was pounding. I eventually grew to trust this man and accept him as a father. He would read bible verses to me in the morning because he was religious. It made me grow close to him and trust him because, as a kid, I knew instinctively he was a good man. And what of instincts -- we use them in every relationship. We go from one screaming on the inside fearful of abandonment and into the next. We start out distrusting with our guard up -- but we learn to lower that guard as the trust builds. We place our full heart and emotions in the relationship after time because that's what we do as humans -- that's what we all had to learn as kids. The greatest buildings and structures exist because someone was fearful or in love. Fear and love are the two largest driving forces throughout our lives -- and they will constantly alternate, one after the other, and serve to push us forward from anxiety and passion. We'll always be little kids deep down inside -- fearful of being abandoned and anxious of the unknowns. Sorry I am babbling.
Ms. Joolie Posted January 5, 2010 Posted January 5, 2010 Thank you for sharing this here. I do think there are two forces that drive us. It is a common belief throughout the board of belief systems. You can fill in the blank between what those two forces are, but generally I believe one force drives you to do positive things and the other one drives you to do negative things. Your epiphany about a fear of abandonment is more personal though. I think you got a powerful insight about yourself, which is always a great thing.
sean1970 Posted January 5, 2010 Posted January 5, 2010 Abandonment... My alcoholic mother was married 5 times, my father was her second husband. They divorced when I was three; my sister just a newborn. Her third husband's son and I grew up as brothers (birthdays are 3 days apart). They left when I was twelve. The lasting relationships I have had with women were almost always followed by an unceremonious adoption by her family. Severing ties with them was always multiplied by the loss of a family as well. I feel it is so late in my life to have learned this but I want... I need... to be self sustaining on all fronts. Not that a loss of any number of people would not hurt; just that it would not hobble me so.
GrayClouds Posted January 5, 2010 Posted January 5, 2010 I suggest a very good read: The Journey from Abandonment to Healing: Turn the End of a Relationship into the Beginning of a New Life by Susan Anderson
LovelyDaze Posted January 6, 2010 Posted January 6, 2010 *tears* I come on here everyday becoming increasingly and delightfully enlightened. Fear and love is the main courses of our breakup. We fear we will never love (particularly our ex) again and we still love them for quite awhile afterward. I do have a fear of abandonment myself to where I am learning that I haven't abandoned "me" and I need to continue to love and cherish my heart enough to know that I am lucky that I didn't spend another moment in the wasteful arms and empty heart of my ex. What we all should fear is letting that painful intruder back into our hearts. Recognize the gift that we DO know what love is and let that drive us to let the right ones in next time.
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