What happened to the abandonment trap?

What happened to the abandonment trap?

Fear of abandonment and rejection

Fear of abandonment refers to an intense and persistent worry that someone who is very important to us will leave us or that we will lose them. This fear usually occurs in situations such as romantic relationships, close friendships, or even work environments, and causes the person to feel anxious, insecure, and exhibit extreme behaviors to avoid being abandoned. People who experience this fear are often highly dependent on others and interpret even small signs of lack of attention or emotional distance as a threat of losing the relationship.

The fear of abandonment can have its roots in childhood, especially if the child has experienced experiences such as the loss of a parent, parental divorce, or instability in emotional care. In this case, the child feels that others are not always available to him or her and cannot count on their presence and emotional support.

 Now, if this fear of abandonment is established in childhood and becomes a deep and permanent belief, it manifests itself in the form of an abandonment schema in adulthood. An abandonment schema is a maladaptive thought and emotional pattern that indicates the belief that others will sooner or later abandon the individual. People with an abandonment schema in adulthood are usually very sensitive to separation and rejection, and even in stable relationships, they always fear that their partner or friends will abandon them.

This schema causes the individual to exhibit behaviors in their relationships such as clinginess, control, or excessive effort to protect others, because they unconsciously believe that abandonment is inevitable.

What is an abandonment schema?

The abandonment schema or the rejection and instability schema is seen in people who constantly expect to lose their loved ones. They think that one day that person will either get sick or die or reject them for someone else and they will be left alone. They may think in a relationship that the other person will reject them and leave. Or that I will be lonely because of something that happens between us or to them.

So in general, a fundamental belief that is very strong in these people is that even if they have an intimate relationship with someone, eventually something will happen that will end in them being lonely. The fear of intimacy is very strong in them.  On the other hand, another characteristic behavior in their relationships is that when they feel that the other person wants to leave, in order not to face the fear of loneliness and rejection, they start to blackmail, overdo themselves, and become very persistent. When the other person returns with this behavior, they still feel bad. Now why are they still feeling bad?

Two things that occupy their minds in these situations are:

Why do they need the other person so much and do they feel that they are a miserable person without that person?

Why did that person leave or want to leave and leave me alone?

As a result of these thoughts, they become angry both at themselves and at the other person. In other words, these people try to keep the other person, but at the same time they feel bad about why they are so anxious, involved, and weak.

A person with an abandonment schema feels that people will reject them sooner or later.  Then, based on this assumption, he organizes his behavior in a way that leads to people running away from him. In this situation, because the person is anxious and upset, he gives in and does things that people don't reject him, but ultimately lead to people rejecting him.

Symptoms of the abandonment schema

These symptoms include:

The person is afraid of getting close to others and finds intimacy anxiety-provoking

When they are in a relationship with someone and have someone, they are constantly worried that they will lose them or that they will leave them

They are constantly worried about what the other person is doing right now, that something will happen to them, etc.

They are afraid that the people they love will die and they get anxious (they constantly create scenarios for themselves in their minds. A scenario that involves imagining the death or loss of these people in their minds)

They exaggerate and catastrophize a lot in their minds. 

 When they enter a relationship, they become extremely possessive and jealous, and their own behavior leads to ruining the relationship.

They become dependent on the other person, as a result, separation and cutting may be difficult for them and they feel that they will die if they are separated from that person. They are very exclusive and try to control different people.

Comparisons occur a lot in their minds. (For example, when the person in front of them pays attention to someone or their friend becomes friends with someone else, they constantly compare what they have that I don't have and that they are taking my place)

The abandonment schema causes a person to exhibit behaviors in their relationships such as clinginess, control, or excessive effort to maintain others because they subconsciously believe that abandonment is inevitable.