Hi,
I'm Dr.
Janice Webb,
Clinical psychologist.
Welcome to my video on emotional neglect.
So in this video,
I'm gonna talk about how emotional neglect impacts your love relationships.
Which is so important and one of the most common and fervent questions that I get asked by my readers.
At my trainings and workshops.
So in just a moment,
I'm going to share with you some very doable tips.
That will help you basically take control.
Of the effects of emotional neglect on your marriage and your love life.
But first,
I want to start by talking about what those effects are.
As I talk about them,
I encourage you to think about yourself and your current or past relationships.
So that you can begin to see if these effects are an issue for you.
So I'm going to begin at the beginning.
With how childhood emotional neglect can make you confused when it comes to choosing a partner in the first place.
So let's start with how you grew up.
In an emotionally neglectful home.
Growing up.
Having emotions in your house,
And people didn't notice that you were having feelings.
Or they didn't respond to your feelings,
Or they treated your feelings as if they were a burden.
Or invisible.
Or unimportant.
Any of these.
Messages in your childhood home,
Even if they were never stated outright.
If you receive them enough,
Then you grew up with childhood emotional neglect.
And you learned that your emotions are a burden.
And a problem.
And that they should be safe.
Taken care of.
And basically,
When children grow up with that message,
Their little developing brain knows just what to do.
Your brain essentially walls off your feelings.
So that they will stay out of the way and not bother your parents or burn them and not bother yourself.
You basically grow into your adult life with your feelings walled off,
Kind of separated,
Not like you never feel anything necessarily.
But.
.
.
You just don't have the connection with your feelings that you're supposed to have as you go through your life.
Your feelings are your best source of information.
For so many things.
But the ones we're gonna talk about now are what you want.
What you need.
What's good for you,
What's bad for you,
And what you should avoid.
And when it comes to choosing a spouse,
This makes it hard for you to know.
Who you want.
Who you don't want,
Who's good for you,
Who's bad for you,
And who you should avoid.
So you are really operating at a disadvantage for being able to choose.
To basically actively choose the best person for yourself.
Because you just don't have access to the information inside of you that you need.
Your feelings.
The next problem that childhood emotional neglect causes in your future relationship has to do with how it can change your experience of romantic love.
So think about it this way.
Love is obviously a feeling.
If your feelings are blocked off.
And you don't have full access to feeling them and being aware of them.
This makes it really hard to fully feel.
Real,
Connected,
Romantic love when it comes your way.
Most emotionally neglected people who grew up with it.
Tend to feel and give.
The same watered down version of love.
And by watered down,
What I mean is the kind of love that comes from someone who doesn't really fully see you.
And get you on an emotional level.
This is what feels like love to you.
Because that's what you got from your parents.
This is just how we're wired.
The kind of love we receive from our parents is what we internalize as the definition of real love.
And it's what we have to give,
And it's a gift.
The best that we can receive.
This is true for.
.
.
The vast majority of human beings.
Who haven't consciously overridden this because it's just our default setting.
It's how we operate as children who grow into adult humans.
Being married to an emotionally neglected person.
Who grew up this way.
Can feel kind of lonely.
You might.
Feel frustrated.
And you might say,
As I've heard many partners of emotionally neglected people say,
I know.
That she loves me.
But I can't feel it.
I just can't quite feel it.
And emotionally neglected people.
Have the same experience.
They will say,
I know my partner loves me,
But I just can't quite feel it.
And this is a very frustrating and painful thing because it leaves both partners in a relationship feeling distant and separated.
And kind of lonely.
It is the opposite of what marriage is meant to do and the opposite of what you want from your marriage.
And the problem,
The root cause of it all,
Is childhood emotional neglect.
The third factor in childhood emotional neglect that affects your marriage is a discomfort with emotions.
And the first way that this affects you is.
.
.
Conflict avoidance.
If you grew up in an emotionally neglectful household,
Chances are conflicts were not taken on head-on and addressed with discussions,
Even whether they're heated or animated.
You have to be comfortable with emotions in order to do productive work.
Working through of conflict.
And if your family doesn't have those emotion skills,
They're probably going to avoid conflict.
And then you grow up not exactly understanding.
What um.
.
.
To do when you come across a conflict.
This can cause quite a few problems.
Because problems are just going to fester under the surface in your marriage.
And how are you gonna resolve them if you're not dealing with them?
Also,
Another thing about being uncomfortable with emotions is that meaningful talk will probably be avoided as well as conflict.
Meaningful talk involves things that carry emotions with them.
Things you feel either really positive feelings about,
Really negative feelings about,
Or everything in between.
Emotion laden things that are meaningful are avoided in a most emotionally neglectful families.
And if you didn't do that in your childhood home,
You're not gonna be comfortable doing it in your relationship as an adult most likely.
Another negative thing that comes from being uncomfortable.
With meaningful talk in your marriage is that you will have problems sharing your inner self with your partner.
Your feelings are the most deeply personal expression of who you are.
They are.
The deepest part of you.
And if you are hiding them from yourself.
Then you're also hiding them from your partner.
And how can your partner.
Feel that they know you in a deep and meaningful emotional way.
If you have this source of connection walled off.
A lot of partners of people who have childhood emotional neglect.
Say that they find their partner distant.
They often feel shut out.
And maybe a little lonely.
Again,
The opposite of what we all want to feel in our marriages.
Please do not despair.
I know I'm talking about all kinds of very negative things right now.
There are answers.
The great thing about childhood emotional neglect,
There is one,
And it is that.
You can absolutely heal it.
It is so possible to heal.
In order to heal childhood emotional neglect,
It's a process of getting back in touch with your feelings,
Which are still there inside of you.
And they're just waiting for you to reach out and pay attention.
So once you start paying attention to your feelings,
Making that decision,
I want to know what I'm feeling and I want to start paying attention to this rich resource inside of me.
Then you can start reclaiming your feelings.
Learning how to label them,
What to do with them,
All of these feeling skills.
Which I'm going to address in my next video,
By the way,
But I'll talk about that in a minute.
Getting back in touch with those feelings.
They are the best source of information.
For you about everything about yourself and the most valuable thing that you can share with your partner.
So.
In order to start taking control of the emotional neglect in your relationship,
Number one,
Make a decision to pay more attention to your feelings.
And start trying to view them.
As something that matters instead of something that doesn't matter.
And the second thing is actually start learning how to express your feelings to your partner.
And start paying attention to your partner's feelings.
Because when your partner feels that you can see and are aware of and care about their feelings,
That is the most bonding thing.
It is the stuff of love.
That is the stuff of love.
Caring about your partner's feelings.
And wanting to make sure that they are safe.
Okay,
Emotionally.
Showing them that you get them and understand them on an emotional level.
Thanks so much for watching and I'll see you in the next video.
Bye.
Bye
