Early Deprivation: Can Someone Unconsciously Reject Human Warmth If They Experienced Early Deprivation?

If someone were to step back and reflect on their life, they may find that they rarely, if ever, experience human warmth. So, they can see that they don’t have many conversations where they feel seen and heard and seldom receive affection.

Due to this, it can be normal for them to feel invisible and as though they don’t exist, and to feel a deep sense of emptiness. As a result of this, it won’t matter what their diet is like or how much they exercise, as they will be missing out on something that is essential.

Nothing New

If they were to look back on their life, they may see that it has been this way for as long as they can remember. What might enter their mind, at this point, is that there must be something wrong with them.

They can believe that, if this weren’t the case, their life wouldn’t be this way. However, although this is what their mind can conclude, what if there is far more to it?

A Closer Look

What if they are unknowingly doing what they can to ensure that they don’t experience human warmth? After hearing this, they can say that this is not true, as this is what they desperately want to experience.

Now, this will be true at a conscious level, but it might not be true at a deeper, unconscious level. If they are open-minded and feel the need to know more, even if part of them may reject this view, they can wonder why this would be.

A Deeper Look

What can allow them to gain a deeper understanding is if there has been at least one moment in their adult life when they did experience human contact, and instead of this having a positive effect on them, it ended up being a time when they felt bad. This is not to say that they felt bad straight away, but as time passed, this might have been how they felt.

After having a conversation where they felt understood and valued, or where they were touched and then hugged, they might have soon felt low, helpless and hopeless. Before this had taken place, they might not have felt a great deal.

A Strange Scenario

If so, they might have thought that they would have been better off not having had this experience. Assuming that this is what they have experienced on at least one occasion, it will show that experiencing human warmth is not something that only has a positive effect on them.

It is then not a surprise that they have, without consciously choosing to do so, done their best to avoid having experiences where they receive the presence, attunement, care and affection that they need. As confusing as this will be, if they were able to go back in time and observe their early years, it might gradually make sense.

Back in time

From a very young age, they might have missed out on the attunement, care, affection and support that they needed to grow and develop in the right way. Being ignored, rejected, starved of affection and abandoned would then have been the norm.

As they were egocentric, their undeveloped brain and nervous system would have come to associate their needs and feelings as bad, and concluded that they were worthless and unlovable. To allow them to handle what happened, and to keep it together and function, their brain would have repressed how they felt and a number of their needs.

Another Element

This would have involved them losing touch with their embodied, connected and fully feeling true self, and forming a disembodied, disconnected, and not fully feeling false self. But as emotionally unavailable and out of reach as one or both of their parents were, they would have lived in the hope that, if they became who they wanted and behaved how they wanted, they would be loved.

As futile as this was, as one or both of them had probably also been greatly deprived and deeply wounded early on and were unable to provide them with what they needed, this hope would have served as a secondary defence. This is because it would have made it easier for them to repress their needs and feelings and release tension.

The Past is present

This stage of their life will now be over, of course, but thanks to how they adapted and what part of them will still be looking for, they will create a reality that is very similar. First, they won’t have a strong connection to their body, plus they will feel ashamed of their needs, which will naturally cause them to ignore their need for human warmth.

Second, the part of them that is looking for the love that they missed out on will cause them to unconsciously create a depriving life, in the hope that this time it will be different. This part won’t have a sense of time and will be blind, which is why it won’t see that, as this stage of their life is over, and another person is not their parent, it is too late.  

A Painful Reminder

Furthermore, experiencing human warmth will be painful, as it will unlock some of the pain that they experienced when they were deprived as a child. When they are not experiencing human warmth, they typically won’t be in touch with how they feel; instead, they will be in a disconnected state.

This will be painful, but it will be even harder for them to tolerate this empty state of being after they have experienced human warmth. Keeping human warmth at bay will then be a way for their system to protect them.

Moving Forward

Taking all this into account, for them to gradually change their life, 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