Early Deprivation: Can Early Deprivation Cause Someone To Unconsciously Look For A Mother And Father?

If someone is an adult, it could be said that they will no longer need a mother or father. Now, this is not to say that their mother and father, that’s if they are still around, no longer have a purpose in their life.

Of course, they will still be their parents, and they might enjoy being around them, so there will be no reason for them to cut their ties with them. However, the key point here is that they won’t need a mother and father in the same way that a child would.

The Difference

A child is powerless and dependent, so they need a mother and father; unlike an adult, they can’t handle life by themselves. But, as time passes and they receive the right things, they are likely to grow out of this state.

Thanks to this, by the time they are an adult, they will no longer need a mother and father. The trouble is that even though this is what should happen, it is not always what happens.

Another outcome

Due to this, someone can be an adult, and yet, at an emotional level, they can feel like a child. Not a child that feels wanted, accepted, seen, heard and loved, though; no, a child that feels unwanted, rejected, unseen, unheard and unloved.

Nonetheless, due to repression and how they behave, they might rarely, if ever, come into contact with these feelings. What they might often experience is anxiety, with there being moments when they feel depressed.

Another Part

But even if they are typically out of touch with how they feel deep down, it doesn’t mean that what is going on for them at a deeper level won’t impact their life. This is partly because, along with the feelings from their childhood that out outside of their conscious awareness, there arealso likely to be the developmental needs that were not met.

These unmet developmental needs will play a part in who they are drawn to and who they are repelled by. What these parts of them will want is to receive the love and support that they missed out on.

The past is Present

These parts will have no sense of time and will be blind, which will stop them from being able to realise that, as this stage of their life is over, and another person is not their mother or father, it is too late for them to receive what their mother and father didn’t give them. They can then be drawn to people who act more like parental figures than friends and lovers.

These people can then tell them what to do and how they should live their life. As opposed to being treated like an adult, it will be as if they are a weak and incapable child.

Two Stages

When they first meet someone who takes charge of their life, they can feel wanted and supported. But as time passes, they can end up feeling ignored, controlled and trapped.

Or they can become very close to another person very quickly and feel as though they have merged with them, and then, for no apparent reason, the other person can pull away. They are then likely to have felt connected and whole at first, only to feel disconnected and empty after.

A Replay

In both of these situations, how they felt at the beginning is likely to have been how they would have felt as a child if their needs were consistently met. This would have allowed them to grow and develop in the right way.

They would have gone from an emotionally dependent child to an emotionally interdependent adult. How they felt as time passed, though, is likely to have been how they often felt as a child.

The Same Old Story

When something like this happens, their adult self is going to be confused, and it can conclude that they are powerless. Nonetheless, not only will other, hidden parts of them be looking for the love and support that they missed out on as a child, but these parts will unconsciously cause them to be drawn to people who are very similar to their parents.

This is because these parts of them will have the need to re-experience how depriving it was for them as child, and then to change the experience into one where their needs are met. What this shows is that as much as these underdeveloped parts of them want to receive what was not received, this is secondary to their need to re-experience their early struggle.

At The Root

These parts will live in the hope that, if they struggle for this love by being a certain way and behaving in a certain way, their needs will be met. Back then, this false hope would have played a key part in allowing them to block out what was going on for them internally and what was going on externally.

It was then something that enabled them to handle a stage of their life when they were greatly deprived and deeply wounded. Without this false hope, and their system repressing how they felt and a number of their needs, they probably wouldn’t have survived.

Moving Forward

Taking all this into account, for them to no longer look for the love and support they missed out on and that is no longer available, and embrace the love and support that is available and emotionally develop, there will be a number of steps for them to take. They will have beliefs to question, pain to face and process, and unmet developmental needs to experience.

This will take courage, support, patience and persistence.  

Awareness

If someone can relate to this and they are ready to change their life, they may need to reach out for external support. This is something that can be provided with the assistance of a therapist or healer.                                        

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Oliver JR Cooper
http://www.oliverjrcooper.co.uk