Q & A

What is Abandonment?

Many people ask me, “What is abandonment? Is it people in search of their mothers? People left on the doorstep as children?”

I answer, Everyday there are people who feel as if life itself has left them on a doorstep or thrown them away. Abandonment is about loss of love itself, that crucial loss of connectedness. It often involves breakup, betrayal, aloneness. People struggling with abandonment issues include those going through the ending of a relationship as well as searching adoptees, recently widowed, and those suffering the woundedness of earlier disconnections.

Abandonment casts a wide net, encompassing anyone who’s ever felt a loss of love or connection. Abandonment fear is primal and universal, the crux of the human condition.

Abandonment represents core human fear. We have all experienced primal abandonment fear. When a relationship ends, the feelings harken all the way back to our lost childhoods when we were helpless, and dependent. Our adult functioning temporarily collapses. We feel shattered, bewildered, condemned to loneliness. As we apply the tools of The Program, at the bottom of abandonment’s pain, we discover a wellspring of positive change.

Abandonment is a cumulative wound containing all of the losses and disconnections stemming all the way back to childhood. Abandonment is:

A feeling
A feeling of isolation within a relationship
An intense feeling of devastation when a relationship ends
An aloneness-not-by-choice
An experience from childhood
A baby left on the doorstep
A woman left by her husband of twenty years for another woman
A man being left by his finance for someone ‘more successful’
A child left by his mother
A friend feeling deserted by a friend
A father leaving his marriage, moving out of the house, away from his children
A child whose pet dies
A little girl grieving over the death of her mother
A little boy wanting his mommy to come pick him up from nursery school
A child about to be ‘replaced’ by the birth of another sibling
A child needing his parents but they are emotionally unavailable
A boy realizing he is gay and anticipating the reaction of his parents and friends
A teenage boy with his heart twanging, but afraid to approach his love
A teenage girl feeling her heart is actually broken
A woman who has raised a family now grown, feeling empty, as if she has been deserted, as if the purpose of her life has abandoned her
A child stricken with a serious illness or injury watching his friends play while he must remain confined to braces, wheel chair, or bed
A woman who has lost her job and with it her professional identity, financial security, and status. Now she is left feeling worthless, not knowing how to occupy her time – – feeling abandoned by her life’s mission
A man who has been ‘put out to pasture’ by his company, as if obsolete
People grieving the death of a loved one report feelings of abandonment
The dying fear being abandoned by their loved ones as much or more as they fear pain and death
Suicide is an excruciating form of abandonment
Abandonment is all of this and more. Its wound is at the heart of the variety of human experiences, and is found in the uniqueness of each person’s life.

The Abandonment Recovery Program offers recovery to all abandonment survivors. The books, workshops and videos guide you thgough step-by-step. See "The Program" on the Menu

What is Unresolved Abandonment?

Unresolved abandonment – the source of our insecurities, addictions, compulsions, distress, and self-sabotage. Unresolved abandonment is expressed through Outer Child patterns of self-sabotage.

Unresolved abandonment – the insidious virus invading body mind and soul – the culprit for the anxiety we are forever trying to self-medicate with food, alcohol, shopping, people and a host of other self-defeating behaviors.

Unresolved abandonment – the roadblock to reaching our potential – the invisible wound that drains self-esteem from within – the hidden trap that keeps us stuck in Outer Child patterns.

Unresolved abandonment – the chronic insecurity that sabotages our love-life relationship.

Unresolved abandonment – the internal barrier to fully connecting to others. Fear short-circuits our attempts to find and hold onto relationships. We become abandoholic.

Unresolved abandonment – the elusive grief so many seek therapy for and can’t seem to overcome – an undifferentiated emptiness often misdiagnosed as depression and inappropriately medicated. Sometimes its stress and agitation are persistent enough to create chemical imbalances that do, in fact, respond to drug therapy.

Unresolved abandonment – a source of self-abandonment. We’re not leading the life we really want to live.

Unresolved abandonment – in seeking remedies, self-help books have had a placebo effect. They offer reasonable enough sounding advice, like “Find happiness from within.” But these truisms are easier said than done. Many abandonees feel inadequate when they try to perform them and are not able to “Just let go” and “Move forward.” So they abandonment themselves once again.

Unresolved abandonment – simplistic programs of ‘positive thinking’ or just going to therapy do not deter it. For all of their positive ‘affirmations’ and enhanced insight, they have not been able to address the system of drainage that lies buried within the primal abandonment wound.

Programs like Co-dependency, Alanon, and Adult Child have helped to assuage the erosion of energy and self-worth that are symptomatic of unresolved abandonment. Likewise, Alcoholics Anonymous, Alanon, and Over Eaters Anonymous, etc. have been extremely effective in dealing with the addictive and co-addictive patterns secondary to abandonment. But without extra focus, these programs by themselves are unable to get beyond the symptoms and treat the underlying abandonment wound itself.

Unresolved abandonment – people continue searching for one more tape, one more lecture, one more book that will finally free them. But all of the self-medicating and soothing words in the world will not eradicate the distress, disturbance and dysfunction caused by unresolved abandonment. For that you must go beyond insight. You must take action.

Abandonment survivors need more than symptom management and feel-good relief. They need an approach that facilitates not the illusion of change, but real change. This can only happen when you realize that the magic bullet is not in any book or program. It is within you. It is your ability to integrate awareness with action. You don’t think your way out of abandonment, you DO your way out.

The Akeru exercise program and Black Swan’s 12 Lessons of Recovery are action-oriented tools that complement each other. Each is designed to help you get to the taproot of abandonment, access the S.W.I.R.L. energy, and heal from the inside out.

The Abandonment Recovery Program offers recovery to all abandonment survivors. The books, workshops and videos guide you through step-by-step. See "The Program" on the Menu

What is S.W.I.R.L.?

S.W.I.R.L. is an acronym for the five stages of the grief specific to abandonment:

1. SHATTERING – Your sense of security has been threatened, the rug pulled out from underneath. Your sense of future has been Shattered. You are devastated, bewildered. You Succumb to despair and panic. You feel hopeless and have Suicidal feelings. You feel Symbiotically attached to your lost object (be it a lover, a job, a friend, a sense of purpose). You feel mortally wounded, bereft, as if if you’ll die without this object. You are in Severe pain, Shock, Sorrow. You’ve been Severed from your primary attachment. You’re cut off from your emotional life-line.

2. WITHDRAWAL – Painful Withdrawal from your lost love object. The more time goes on, the more all of the needs your object was meeting begin to impinge into your every Waking moment. You are in Writhing pain from being torn apart. You yearn, ache, and Wait for them to return. Love-withdrawal is just like Heroin withdrawal – – each involves the body’s opiate system and the same physical symptoms of intense craving. During Withdrawal, you are feeling the Wrenching pain of love-loss and separation – – the Wasting, Weight loss, Wakefulness, Wishful thinking, and Waiting for them to return. You crave a love-fix to put you out of the WITHDRAWAL symptoms.

3. Internalizing – You Internalize the rejection and cause Injury to your self esteem. This is the most critical stage of the cycle when your wound becomes susceptible to Infection and can create permanent scarring. You are Isolated, riddled with Insecurity, self- Indictment and self-doubt. You are preoccupied with ‘If only regrets’ – – If only you had been more attentive, more sensitive, less demanding, etc. You beat yourself up with regrets over the relationship and Idealize your abandoner at the expense of your own self Image.

4. RAGE – the turning point in the grief process when you begin to fight back. You attempt to Reverse the Rejection by Refusing to accept all of the blame for the failed relationship, and feel surges of Rage against your abandoner. You Rail against the pain and isolation you’ve been in. Agitated depression and spurts of anger displaced on your friends and family are common during this turbulent time, as are Revenge and Retaliation fantasies toward your abandoner. Your Outer Child is spurred by abandonment rage and becomes very active and potentially desctuctive. New Outer Child patterns may set in.

5. Lifting – your anger helped to externalize your pain. Gradually, as your energy spurts outward, it Lifts you back into Life. You begin to Let go. Life distracts you and gradually Lifts you out the grief cycle. You feel the emergence of strength, wiser for the painful Lessons you’ve Learned. And if you’re engaged in the process of recovery, you get ready to Love again. A word of caution: When you Lift, it is important not to “over lift”. Unless you know how to work with the feelings, you can lose connection with yourself once again, creating an internal barrier to others, i.e. you can develop the posttraumatic pattern of being attracted only to the unavailable.

You SWIRL. through the stages over and over within an hour, a day, a month, sometimes a period of years – cycles within cycles – until you emerge out the end of the funnel-shaped cloud, a changed person, better able to find love than before.

There is an Akeru exercise for each of the phases of the SWIRL process. See "The Program" on the Menu

What is an Abandonment Survivor?

Abandonment survivors are those who have experienced the trauma of love-loss and have the courage to go on believing in life and in their own capacity for love.

This is a select group of survivors, but membership is not restricted to those who have achieved success in their relationships. On the contrary, it’s members are those who continue to struggle to remove obstacles in the way of finding love. There are many crushing feelings that are posttraumatic to abandonment. These feelings can be intrusive and make it difficult for survivors of abandonment trauma to get to a place of trust and security within a relationship.

The membership also includes those who become securely and happily coupled. But for all abandonmates, the impact of past or present abandonment is evidenced by the fragments of unlived life, unreached potential, and unfulfilled dreams still waiting to be redeemed through the Abandonment Recovery Program.

See "The Program" on the Menu

What is The Abandonment Recovery Program?

Abandonment Recovery is a program of life-changing tools and insights including 5 Akeru exercises that take you step-by-step through a comprehensive process of healing the primal wounds of abandonment and shame. You can access the five phases of the Program through Susan's workshops, books, and a series of vodeos.

Abandonment Recovery is a treatment protocol for healing abandonment trauma.

Abandonment Recovery is an innovation in mental health and has been helping thousands of people for over 20 years. The Program makes healing possible, not just from a recent heartbreak, but from your old abandonment wounds as well – the ones that have been festering just beneath the surface post traumatically, eroding your self-esteem and interfering in your relationships all along. Unresolved abandonment is the cause of self-sabotage – your Outer Child thrives on it.

Abandonment Recovery is a powerful treatment technology. Its awareness tools and hands-on exercises help to reverse the injury to your sense of self – the shame, insecurity, self-doubt, and anxiety caused by earlier separation traumas large and small. The program helps you reverse self-abandonment which is the source of self-sabotage, overcome your Outer Child, increase your self-esteem, and find greater life and love than before.

To benefit from the Abandonment Recovery Program, you must be ready to take responsibility for your own recovery. Susan’s workshops, books, recordings, and workbook guide you through step-by-step. The program provides you with self-assessment tools, personal growth exercises to practice on a daily basis, and workbook exercises.

Become involved in a dynamic process that operates over time. You gain a new way of seeing and feeling, new sense of yourself, and new life-direction. The goal of abandonment recovery is to benefit from your abandonment experience rather than be diminished by it.

SWIRL – a self-assessment tool to help identify where you are in the five stages of abandonment – Shattering, Withdrawal, Internalizing, Rage, or Lifting.

Akeru – a program of five mental exercises that maximize the growth potential at each stage of the cycle and promote healing.

Black Swan – 12 Lessons of Abandonment Recovery, an inspirational story of emotional and spiritual healing — a form of book therapy, ideal for someone with abandonment issues from childhood or going through the loss of a love as an adult.

Outer Child – a program of exercises that work like physical therapy for the brain to help you change your most deeply entrenched patterns of self-sabotage by reversing self-abandonment, step by step.

Journey from Abandonment to Healing – a comprehensive self-help and professional resource. A therapist’s voice guides you through each stage of the abandonment cycle, S.W.I.R.L. Susan provides case examples and intensive support along the way, and includes step by step instructions for Akeru, as well as questionnaires and inventories to help you identify where you are ‘stuck’ in the five stages of abandonment (SWIRL) – where your hot spots are – where you have work to do.

The Abandonment Recovery Workbook – Offers step-by-step healing exercises and questionnaires to fill in, and directions for setting up peer-led abandonment support groups.

Abandonment Workshops – You practice the Akeru Exercise Program of Abandonment Recovery within a caring, sharing group, receiving support and inspiration for healing the primal wounds of abandonment and shame, and overcoming the self-defeating Outer Child patterns that have beel holding you back – a life-changing experience. Offer training for professionals and CE’s.

Susan’s Seminars and Lectures – Case studies and discussion of theoretical and clinical issues regarding the abandonment grief cycle, shame, PTSD of Abandonment, the psycho-biology of abandonment, and techniques for treating unresolved abandonment (CE’s).

Susan’s recordings and books – Step by step guidance through the 5 Akeru exercises and other program tools.

See "The Program" on the Menu

What is Outer Child?

Outer is the part of the personality that breaks your diet and gets attracted to all the wrong people. Outer is the impulsive, obstinate, self-centered ten-year-old within all of us. Outer wants what Outer wants NOW, and will overrule you, the adult, to get its way. Outer prefers to binge on candy when you are trying to stick to a diet. Outer says yes to a third glass of wine when you, the Adult, had decided on a two drink limit. Outer lounges around watching TV when you’ve decided to go to the gym.

Outer Child patterns developed as defense mechanisms against your past abandonment traumas. Unresolved abandonment fuels Outer with uncomfortable emotions. Outer Child acts out your Inner Child's insecurity – it’s primal fear of abandonment – in ways that sabotage your relationships. When your Inner Child craves love, Outer foils this need by chasing the unavailable, or by aiming its emotional suction cups (its neediness and desperation) at your partners and scaring them away, or by shutting down or starting an argument.

Outer Child is a revolutionary self-awareness tool featured in my books, workshops, and recordings. In discovering your Outer Child, you get a leg up on overcoming your self-defeating patterns, improving your relationships, and becoming the self-possessed adult you always wanted to be.

You can benefit by taking the 200 item Outer Child Inventory. It helps you undertake the first in-depth self-reckoning of your lifetime. As you gain Outer Child awareness, you own up to character defects most people prefer to deny. You learn how to deal with traits that until now formed an invisible infrastructure of self-sabotage deep within your personality.

Go to our bookstore to get Taming Your Outer Child

Outer Child and Anger:

Outer is fueled by emotion. Take anger. Outer either overreacts or under-reacts to anger. For example, abandonment survivors tend to be too insecure to risk expressing anger or assertiveness directly to someone because they fear it might break the connection. Outer takes advantage of this fear and gets you to take your anger out on yourself, damaging your self-esteem. Conversely, Outer displaces your anger on innocent bystanders and makes you look like a monster.

Outer is the “yes but” of the personality. If you let it, Outer ties your life up in knots.

Outer Child likes to play games, especially in relationships. It wears many disguises including "hard to get" and "Florence Nightingale" (where Outer panders for ‘love-insurance’ by over-caretaking). It poses as your ally, but is really your gatekeeper. Its covert agenda is to maintain your patterns – albeit your most self-defeating ones. By deconstructing your Outer Child defenses, your Adult Self has the opportunity to guide your behavior, rather than remain driven by your hidden nemesis.

Susan continues to collect data on Outer Child, so please contact me to send me your own unique Outer Child characteristics as well as your comments. Thank you for your help.

Go to our bookstore to get Taming Your Outer Child

Why do we carry a torch for so long when someone we love has left us?

Scientific research explains why heartbreak hurts so much. Someone who leaves you becomes very powerful to your primitive mammalian brain. They become powerful simply by being able to inflict so much pain just by leaving.

Being left as an infant or an adult is perceived by your developing brain as a threat to existence, an attack upon your personal being. It triggers fight or flight responses, etching an indelible impression on emotional brain, conditioning it to react automatically to protect you. You react with aversive fear each time you encounter the person whom it perceives as a threat to your wellbeing.

Acting beneath awareness, it maintains a constant vigil on your abandoner. You experience this as being temporarily obsessed with the person. Your nerves are set to ‘go off’ if you should unexpectedly bump into them later on or see them with a new lover.

This enduring emotional reactivity is known as ‘carrying a torch.’ It confuses you into concluding that if the pain can last that long and feel so strong, the person must have been very special. But this is not so. You can feel this way toward anyone, even someone who had nothing special to offer. It is just your well-conditioned mammalian brain efficiently trying to warn you of this person’s ability to cause pain by leaving.

What is the Profile of an Abandoner?

Abandoners come in every possible size, shape, shade, age, social form, and disposition. It is often difficult to tell who is safe to attach to and who is not capable of being emotionally responsible – who is worthy of trust, and who is an abandoner.

What complicates the picture even more is that one person’s abandoner might be another’s permanent partner. Also, many abandonment victims, depending upon certain conditions, go on to become abandoners themselves. The circumstances surrounding relationships are so complex and variable, that it is neither wise nor fair to make moral judgements, point fingers, nor draw generalizations.

But there are serial abandoners – abandoners who get secondary gain from inflicting emotional pain on someone who loves them. For them, creating devastation is their way of demonstrating power. But even abandoners who are not motivated by this need, might experience a heightened sense of self-importance as an unintentional by-product. As regretful as they may feel about having to pull away, they can’t help but go on an ego trip as they witness the protests and agony of the person who still wants to be with them.

In the light of the other person’s pain, abandoners will not usually admit to feelings of triumph. Instead they tend to speak about their more humble feelings, like their regret over having caused another person to be disappointed. They are usually easily distracted from regret however, as they get caught up in their new lives with greater sense of freedom, newness, and a larger ego than before.

Many abandoners, however, are able to by-pass regret by remaining oblivious to what is going on for the other person. They blame the other person for the break-up – attempting to justify their actions and avoid guilt. Their agenda is to sustain their image of themselves as a decent, caring person. This denial and blame often come across as callousness and cruelty to the one they left behind. The abandonee must grapple alone with the pieces of a broken relationship, further wounded by unjustified blame.

Let it be said that many abandoners do not set out to abandon, to hurt-by-intention. Many are just human beings struggling to find the answers to life’s difficult challenges along with everyone else. None-the-less, to the extent that abandoners are able to blame, remain oblivious, or stay in denial of the other person’s pain, abandonment recovery reaches out to them to increase their awareness as well. The program is devoted to the growth and development of all of those who struggle to sustain relationships – abandoners and abandonees alike. Journey and Black Swan are designed to enhance this awareness.

What is Black Swan? What are the Swan Lessons?

The Swan lessons are from BLACK SWAN: 12 Lessons of Abandonment Recovery. I wrote this book while discovering lessons for how to recover, heal old wounds, and grow, step by step, from my own painful abandonment experience.

BLACK SWAN is a form of book therapy — you gain emotional benefit by reading and enjoying a brief story, and along the way you encounter the 12 Steps of Emotional and Spiritual Healing — the actual steps involved in overcoming the loss of a love. You learn to discover your center, cleanse your abandonment wound, build your sense of self, and make a connection to love.

Preview: A little girl and her daddy go into the woods to pick a bouquet of wild flowers. They follow a path all the way to the brook where they are immersed in the richness of the forest. Daddy walks the little girl across a log and onto an island in the water. He lifts her up and sets her atop a giant rock. “You stay here,” he says, “and I’ll go back to pick us some huckleberries for lunch.”

The little girl clasps her hands. “Don’t go far, Daddy,” she pleads. “I won’t,” promises the daddy. He makes his way back across the log and into the forest as the little girl studies the back of his red shirt to keep track of him. He is momentarily hidden, first behind this tree and then behind that. Suddenly there is no sign of red at all.

Perched atop the giant rock on the island, the little girl begins calling to her daddy, hoping he is right nearby only teasing her. “Daddy, I’m here,” she calls. “Daddy, where are you?” But after a while she can’t hold back her terror. She screams into the forest with all her might. But the forest is silent.

As night falls the little girl is frozen with fright on the cold hard rock. She is aware of the slithering sounds of snakes and other woodland animals creeping about. She tries not to move. She doesn’t want to alert the creatures to her position high atop the rock. But soon she succumbs to terror once again. “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy,” she cries into the now pitch black darkness. “Mommy! Daddy!” But the forest remains distinctly silent except for the menacing sounds of the animals lurking about.

What is Akeru?

Akeru is a Japanese word that means “to pierce, to end, to begin.” Akeru is the name I’ve given to the five hands-on exercises of the Abandonment Recovery Program.

The exercises act like physical therapy of the brain, working incrementally to turn the pain of an ending into the beginning of positive change.

Akeru works with the natural flow of life process, enabling the individual to restore a sense of self, increase life, and find new love. You recognize abandonment as rebirth.

Akeru promotes growth through powerful new self-awareness tools such as Outer Child, SWIRL, Abandoholism, Abandoner Profile and more, that empower you to create a healthy new relationship with yourself and move your life forward.

There is an Akeru exercise for each stage of the abandonment process called S.W.I.R.L. Susan’s books, workshops, recordings, and workbook take you step by step through the 5 Akeru exercises of The Program. (See Akeru on Menu)*

What does it mean to be an Abandoholic?

You’ve heard of foodoholism, shopoholism and, of course, alcoholism. Now here comes abandoholism. Being an Abandoholic means being attracted to the unavailable – being addicted to the biochemistry of the emotional drama of abandonment.

Abandoholism is similar to the other ‘oholisms, but instead of being addicted to a substance, you’re addicted to the emotional drama of heartbreak. You pursue hard-to-get partners to keep the romantic intensity going, and to keep your body’s love-chemicals and stress hormones flowing.

What makes someone an abandoholic?

Abandoholism sets in when you’ve been hurt so many times that you’ve come to equate insecurity with love. Unless you’re pursuing someone you’re insecure about, you don’t feel in love.

Conversely, when someone comes along who wants to be with you, that person’s availability fails to arouse the required level of insecurity. If you can’t feel those yearning, lovesick feelings, then you don’t feel attracted, so you keep pursuing unavailable partners.

You become psychobiologically addicted to the high stakes drama of an emotional challenge and the love-chemicals that go with it.

Abandoholism is driven by both fear of abandonment and fear of engulfment.

When you’re attracted to someone, it arouses a fear of losing that person. This fear causes you to become clingy and needy. You try to hide your insecurity, but your desperation shows through, causing your partners to lose romantic interest in you. They sense your emotional suction cups aiming straight toward them and it scares them away.

Fear of engulfment is at the opposite end of the spectrum. It occurs when someone is pursuing you and now you’re the one pulling back. You feel engulfed by that person’s desire to be with you. When fear of engulfment kicks in, you panic. Your feelings shut down. You no longer feel the connection. The panic is about your fear of being engulfed by the other person’s emotional expectations of you. You fear that the other person’s feelings will pressure you to abandon your own romantic needs.

Fear of engulfment is one of the most common causes for the demise of new relationships, but it is carefully disguised in excuses like: “He just doesn’t turn me on.” Or “I don’t feel any chemistry.” Or “She’s too nice to hold my interest.” Or “I need more of a challenge.”

Abandoholics tend to swing back and forth between fear of abandonment and fear of engulfment. You’re either pursuing hard-to-get-lovers, or you’re feeling turned off by someone who IS interested in you.

What is Abando-phobism?

Abandophobics are so afraid of rejection that they avoid relationships altogether.

Abandophobics act out their fear of abandonment by remaining socially isolated, or by appearing to search for someone, when in fact they are pursuing people who are unattainable, all to avoid the risk of getting attached to a real prospect – someone who might abandon them sooner or later. There is a little abandophobism in every abandoholic.

For both abandoholics and abandophobics, a negative attraction is more compelling than a positive one.

You only feel attracted when you’re in pursuit. You wouldn’t join any club who would have you as a member, so you’re always reaching for someone out of reach.

How do abandoholism and abandophobism set in?

These patterns may have been cast in childhood. You struggled to get more attention from your parents but you were left feeling unfulfilled, which caused you to doubt your self-worth. Over time, you internalized this craving for approval and you learned to idealize others at your own expense. This became a pattern in your love-relationships.

Now as an adult, you recreate this scenario by giving your love-partners all of your power, elevating them above yourself, recreating those old familiar yearnings you grew accustomed to as a child. Feeling emotionally deprived and “less-than” is what you’ve come to expect.

Why does the insecurity linger?

Recent scientific research shows that rather than dissipate, fear tends to incubate, gaining intensity over time. Insecurity increases with each romantic rejection, causing you to look to others for something you’ve become too powerless to give yourself: esteem. When you seek acceptance from a withholding partner, you place yourself in a one-down position, recreating the unequal dynamics you had with your parents or peers. You choreograph this scenario over and over.

Conversely, you are unable to feel anything when someone freely admires or appreciates you.

This abandonment compulsion is insidious. You didn’t know it was developing. Until now you didn’t have a name for it: Abandoholism is a new concept. Insecurity is an aphrodisiac.

If you are a hard-core abandoholic, you’re drawn to a kind of love that is highly combustible. The hottest sex is when you’re trying to seduce a hard-to-get lover. Insecurity becomes your favorite aphrodisiac. These intoxicated states are produced when you sense emotional danger – the danger of your lover’s propensity to abandon you the minute you get attached.

At the other end of the seesaw, you turn off and shut down when you happen to successfully win someone’s love. If your lover succumbs to your charms – heaven forbid – you suddenly feel too comfortable, too sure of him to stay interested. There’s not enough challenge to sustain your sexual energy. You interpret your turn-off as his not being right for you.

How about following your gut?

If you’re an abandoholic, following your gut is probably what got you into these patterns in the first place. Your gut gets you to pursue someone who makes your heart go pitter pat, not because he’s the right one, but because he arouses fear of abandonment. And your gut gets you to avoid someone who is truly trustworthy, because he doesn’t press the right insecurity buttons.

Enrich your mind. Follow your wisdom. But until you overcome your abandonment compulsion, don’t follow your gut – it will only get you into trouble – because your gut tells you that unavailable people are attractive.

How do you recover from abandoholism?

Abandoholics are well represented at Abandonment / Outer Child Workshops where they receive lots of support and get to practice effective pattern-busting abandonment recovery tools within a safe group setting. Abandoholism is also explored in TAMING YOUR OUTER CHILD and the WORKBOOK. Take heart, this Outer Child pattern, tough deeply embedded in primal abandonment wounds, can be overcome!

How to Overcome Traumatic Shame?

We all have shame. It’s part of the human condition. We consider shame to be traumatic because it has an ongoing impact on how we feel about ourselves and function in the world. Shame works silently within. Its corrosiveness diminishes our self-esteem and confidence.

1) We all have shame. It’s part of the human condition.

2) Shame and primal abandonment are reciprocal. Whereas Abandonment is the fear of disconnection, Shame is feeling unworthy of connection. Their relationship is cyclical. They reinforce each other.

3) Some of us are more shackled by shame than others. At any given time, depending on triggers, we operate somewhere along a silent shame continuum.

4) We consider shame to be traumatic when it has an ongoing impact on how we feel about ourselves and function in the world.

5) Shame works silently within. We tend to keep it hidden. We hide it from others, and if we can, ourselves.

6) Shame has a corrosive impact in that it can interfere in our self-esteem, confidence, and goal-achievement.

7) Shame is the primary source of performance anxiety. It holds us back from shining our light on the world.

8) Shame is the source of our inhibitedness, uncertainty, inability to reach our potential – all additional recursive sources of shame.

9) Shame is responsible for the insecurity that sabotage our relationships.

10) Shame triggers self-doubt when someone – anyone – disconnects from us or walks away (Is something wrong with me, something I’m lacking, something I did wrong?).

11) Self is the main tool for negotiating our way through life. Traumatic shame represents bruising to that Self. Its impact is therefore devastating.

12) Shame is trauma because it is based in primal abandonment fear (you fear abandonment because you feel unworthy of being kept), which triggers fight or flight response.

13) Once the mammalian brain is aroused to a state of emergency, however subliminally, we react by falling back on automatic, over-learned old defense mechanisms.

14) Shame’s myriad defenses become self-defeating, causing us to keep repeating the shame trauma. These “repetition compulsions” as they are called in the field of trauma, interfere in our lives.

15) Shame begets shame. It interferes in our ability to reach our potential. Failure to reach our potential is yet another source of shame.

16) Clinically speaking, shame is dissociated, detached from consciousness.

17) We react to shame triggers that we are not necessarily conscious of.

18) Shame dissociation is occurring at the very moment that it is arousing performance anxiety. We don’t necessarily feel this shame as shame; we feel it as anxiety, a rush of adrenaline, rage perhaps, the urge to do well, relief if we are succeeding, distress if we are not.

19) The primitive logic of the shame itself – the negative message that we’d incorporated into our sense of Self (I’m really not good enough, I’m unworthy) – that part often remains detached from consciousness where we can’t get to it.

20) Shame’s dissociative nature explains why the rational mind is not able to resolve shame so easily.

21) In the course of any normal day, on a subliminal level, the raw human nerve of shame can twinge when we feel even slightly dissed, overlooked, criticized, excluded, ignored, misunderstood, invisible, rated, judged, ‘diagnosed’, unheard, condescended to, unappreciated, taken for granted, not chosen, not reciprocated with, or given unsolicited advice. These and many other seemingly minor triggers can affect our mood, level of confidence, even our posture and facial expressions without our being aware of it.

22) We’ve been developing personality defenses since childhood to cope with and assuage shame.

23) Personality itself can be seen as a defense against shame.

24) Looking across the shame spectrum, on one side we can see the people-pleasers, perfectionists, co-dependents, people who keep a low profile, those who wear masks and guises to cover up how they feel about themselves. On the other we can see the attention-seekers, extraverts, the overtly confident, people who enjoy the spotlight and thrive on performing.

25) Being the class clown may be a diversionary tactic to camouflage shame. So might be being the bully, or victim, or top athlete.

26) The spectrum also includes those who boldly display shamelessness, examples of which are prominently on display in our political arena. Keeping one’s dukes up and showing audacity in the face of criticism can be a well-fortified defense against traumatic shame. This might seem praiseworthy to those who feel a little “less than, “put down”, or who are shy, inhibited, easily shamed. They might secretly idolize and wish they could be more like the shameless person who can lead with brazen, unflappability.

27) We developed our defenses early on as autonomic, knee-jerk, habituated reactions to shame.

28) These defenses tend to become maladaptive in adulthood. For example, “avoiding” helped us survive an emotionally turbulent childhood, but doesn’t serve us well when we have a term paper due. “Overeating” helped compensate for not feeling good about ourselves in childhood, but doesn’t help us now when we try to stay fit and trim.

29) Even when we are fully aware of how destructive these old behavior patterns are, we find them difficult to break because the trauma of shame has set these defense mechanisms into the deep structure of the brain.

30) Why does shame hide behind a wall of secrecy? We’ve learned to become ashamed of our shame.

31) We don’t want our shame it to show lest it red flag us (blushing be damned!).

32) If we don’t hide the shame we feel within, people would know that we are (or a significant part of us is) inherently unworthy, not enough, not special, inadequate, incapable, insignificant, puny, ineffectual, helpless, dependent, pathetic, inferior, not up to par, different, weak and powerless, damaged, dysfunctional, a failure, disgusting, repulsive, ugly, and more.

33) These are feelings, and fleeting at that, but to the rigid closed brain system of the unconscious mind, they seem like facts.
34) A part of us firmly believes the efficacy of these shame messages.

35) What to do about it? Thanks to the pioneering work of Brene Brown and other clinicians, shame is becoming more conscious, less taboo. We are beginning to recognize the shame within us and own up to it as part of being human.

36) In fact, any clinicians emphasize that talking about our shame, bringing it out into the light, is good for us.

37) Psychology literature from the past had long suggested that therapists ought not use the word ‘shame’ with their clients, presuming it to be too emotionally charged with taboo, too toxic an image to invoke in the mind, in other words, too shaming.

38) Sigmund Freud had mostly avoided addressing shame directly.

39) The current literature on shame discusses how little had been written about the subject in the past.

40) Clinicians have since uncovered many of hidden facets of shame and developed techniques for bringing shame out of the shadows.

41) Clinicians are finding ways of treating the trauma of shame.

42) This offers a beginning.

43) An important area that needs to be added to the body of work is connecting shame to its primary source in primal abandonment fear.

44) Abandonment and Shame are joined and reciprocal (I’m ‘not enough’ to compel my loved one to stay with me forever – I will be abandoned).

45) Shame-reduction involves tapping into the emotional resources within the primal wound of abandonment.

46) The outer layers and manifestations of this wound are diverse and deceptive in that they guide us away from this primal source.

47) Therapy can go off on tangents about everything else except the deep root of shame itself (“I’m angry at my friend for dissing me”).

48) Without shame-directed therapy, people are left to heal themselves with easier-said-than-done platitudes or self-help prescriptions.

49) People might also spend endless hours in an uninitiated therapist’s office.

50) People blame themselves if their therapy and self-help efforts don’t work, heaping more shame upon themselves.

51) There is a more direct and effective path to take. It is safe and instantly rewarding and works directly with the originating source of shame and abandonment.

52) We can approach shame with a few simple tools that involve doing, i.e. Targeted sharing about shame and primal fear one-on-one or within a group; Guided visualization to arouse our imagination in creating positive images for the brain; Using tools to connect to the primal emotional core; and Commencing a healthy new relationship to Self through Separation Therapy 53) Shame-reduction therapy heals and empowers the Self to bulldoze through our emotional stumbling blocks and shine our unique, individual light into the world.

What are the 40 Features of PTSD of Abandonment?

Key features include: Fear of abandonment. Difficulty forming primary relationships. Intrusive insecurity. Debilitating shame. Trust issues. Self-defeating patterns.

Now see 40 features of PTSD of Abandonment: Please see my comments at the end of item # 40.

An intense fear of abandonment.
Difficulty forming primary relationships.
Intrusive insecurity that interferes in your love life, social life and goal achievement.
A tendency to repeatedly subject yourself to people or experiences that lead to another loss, another rejection, and another trauma.
Shame – any feeling of rejection or failure can trigger deeply embedded feelings of shame.
Difficulty with trust.
Tendency toward self-defeating behavior patterns that sabotage your love-life, goals, or career.
Anxiety with authority figures.
Heightened memories of traumatic separations and other events.
Conversely, partial or complete memory blocks of childhood traumas.
Intrusive reawakening of emotional memories stemming from childhood losses – i.e. feelings of helplessness, vulnerability and dread – without being able to recall the original events.
Low self-esteem, low sense of entitlement, performance anxiety.
Feelings of emotional detachment, i.e. feeling numb to current or past losses and disconnections.
Conversely, difficulty letting go of an ex, difficulty letting go fof feelings of rejection, longing, and regret.
Difficulty letting go period (like a dog with a bone) over a conflict with another, a disappointment, etc.
Episodes of self-neglectful or self-destructive behavior.
Difficulty withstanding (and overreacting to) the customary emotional ups and downs within intimate relationships.
Reaching impasses – trouble working through the conflict with others.
Extreme sensitivity to perceived rejections, exclusions or criticisms.
Emotional pendulum swings between fear of engulfment and fear of abandonment: i.e. On one hand you feel ‘the walls close in’ if someone gets too close, and on the other, you feel insecure, love starved – on a precipice of abandonment – when you become unsure of the person’s love.
Tendency to feel hopelessly hooked on a partner who is emotionally unavailable.
Conversely, tendency to ‘get turned off’ and ‘lose the connection’ by involuntarily shutting down romantically and/or sexually with a partner is fully willing.
Emotional anorexia or emotional bulimia: difficulty feeling the affection and other physical comforts offered by a willing partner, i.e. you ‘keep them out’ or ‘push them away.’
Tendency to have emotional hangovers ‘the morning after’ you have had contact with an ex.
Difficulty naming your feelings or sorting through an emotional fog.
Abandophobism – a tendency to avoid close relationships altogether to avoid risk of abandonment.
Conversely, a tendency to rush into relationships and clamp on too quickly.
Difficulty letting go because you have attached with emotional epoxy, even when you know the person is not good for you.
An excessive need for control, whether it’s about the need to control others’ behavior and thoughts, or about being excessively self-controlled; a need to have everything perfect and done your way.
Conversely, a tendency to create chaos by avoiding responsibility, procrastinating, giving up control to others, making messes, and feeling out of control.
A heightened sense of responsibility toward others, rescuing, attending to people’s needs, even when they have not voiced them.
Tendency to have unrealistic expectations of others coupled with heightened reactivity when they don’t live up to them.
Self-judgmental, self-critical: unrealistic expectations toward yourself.
People-pleasing – excessive need for acceptance or approval, setting yourself up for a lack of reciprocity within your relationships.
Fear response to people’s anger, which unwittingly sets you up to being disrespected by or even ‘controlled’ by them.
Co-dependency issues in which you give too much of yourself to others, put them first, and feel you don’t get enough back.
Tendency to act impulsively without being able to put the brakes on, even when you are aware of the negative consequences.
Tendency toward unpredictable outbursts of anger, sometimes burning bridges to important social connections.
Conversely, tendency to under-react to anger out of fear of breaking the connection, or out of an extreme aversion to ‘not being liked’.
Negative narcissism – preoccupied with self-criticism and worry over how you are perceived by others

Any of these issues can emerge in the aftermath of abandonment trauma stemming from childhood and adulthood losses and disconnections. The post traumatic symptoms of PTSD of Abandonment share sufficient features with PTSD to be considered a subtype of this diagnostic category.

As with other types of post trauma, PTSD of Abandonment is neuro-psycho-biological condition, a so-called “limbic disorder” or “disease of the amygdala” with symptoms that range from mild to severe. Its earmarks include:

• Intrusive feelings of insecurity – a major source of self-sabotage in primary relationships and in goal-achievement. • Tendency to compulsively reenact abandonment scenarios through repetitive patterns (i.e., abandoholism – being attracted to the unavailable). • Diminished self-esteem, heightened vulnerability, and an easily triggered sense of shame.

PTSD of Abandonment leaves its victims with a need to buttress their flagging sense of self with defense mechanisms that can be automatically discharged and whose intention is to protect the narcissistically injured self from further rejection, criticism, or abandonment. These habituated defenses tend to become maladaptive in that increase the need for immediate gratification which forestalls the achievement of long-range goals – a vicious shame cycle.

Victims tend to have emotional flashbacks, flooding them with feelings ranging from mild anxiety to intense panic in response to triggers that they may not be conscious of. Once abandonment fear is triggered, they can feel momentarily overwhelmed, and some experience what Daniel Goleman calls “emotional hijacking” – a difficulty reining in one’s emotions. If emotional hijacking occurs frequently enough, its chronic emotional excesses can lead to unsparing self-criticism, as well as give rise to secondary conditions such as chronic depression, anxiety, obsessive thinking, isolation, negative narcissism, and addiction.

The list above is designed to be descriptive rather than exhaustive of the many issues related to PTSD of Abandonment. If you’d like to have input into the description of these features, please contact me to share. Your submissions will be held in strictest confidence.

How is Borderline Different from PTSD of Abandonment?

Distinguishing Borderline Personality Disorder from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of Abandonment

Since abandonment features prominently in both diagnoses, people with PTSD of Abandonment are often misdiagnosed as Borderline. Someone suffering a painful breakup can go into an emotional crisis severe enough to resemble a full blown borderline episode, complete with suicidal ideations, substance abuse, and other self-destructive behaviors, at least in the early grief stages.

Borderline vs. Abandonment Trauma

There is a significant overlap between borderline personality disorder (BPD) and post traumatic stress disorder of abandonment (PTSD of Abandonment). In attempting to distinguish them, we are met with a lot of fine lines and nebula. Since there is a stigma attached to BPD, defining the difference is a worthy task on behalf of those whose symptoms are specifically posttraumatic to abandonment. Worthier still would be trying to remove the stigma, but this challenge is addressed in another article.

Complicating an effort to differentiate between BPD and PTSD of Abandonment are three things: 1) Abandonment trauma is cited as an etiological factor in the development of borderline personality disorder. 2) Abandonment stressors are known to trigger borderline episodes. 3) PTSD of Abandonment is not yet recognized as a diagnostic category, so the mental health community lacks a framework for distinguishing BPD from posttraumatic abandonment syndrome.

Needless to say, since abandonment features prominently in both diagnostic categories, quite a few people whose symptoms of PTSD stem from abandonment trauma are labeled borderline. For the most part, this designation is a matter of how you define borderline. Certainly people going through an acute abandonment event – let’s say their partner has rejected them, unilaterally ending the relationship – can find themselves in an emotional crisis severe enough to resemble a full blown borderline episode, complete with suicidal ideations, substance abuse, and other self destructive behaviors – at least in the early stages. Additionally, many people with a history of childhood abandonment trauma can exhibit patterns of projective identification, self-sabotage, and emotional instability that extend into adult relationships. Fear of abandonment can create a vicious cycle and become a self fulfilling prophesy.

But heightened vulnerability to abandonment triggers and emotionally destabilizing patterns are present with both diagnostic categories. What then might separate them?

In my estimation, a significant difference has to do with the degree to which the intense emotionality warps the individual’s perception of reality and how tenacious that altered perception remains – whether or not it is amenable to reality testing. If it is a matter of extremes, I will refer to people with extreme borderline versus those with abandonment trauma, to avoid the pitfalls of ambiguous overlap in the middle of the continuum. If the idea of a continuum has any validity, and as yet not enough is known to make this claim, I like to think of all of us as having cracks in the psychic egg shell; those of us with PTSD have some yoke encrusted around the cracks, and those of us deemed ‘borderline’ could use some yoke replacement therapy.

In another article I outlined fourty features of PTSD of Abandonment. Here we can summarize it as a syndrome in which people have heightened emotional arousal to abandonment triggers. Previous emotional traumas have conditioned them to detect signs of rejection, dismissal, or not being deemed “good enough” to which they involuntary react with the Fight Freeze or Flight responses.

Anyone who survived childhood – that’s all of us – has some degree of arousal to abandonment triggers owing to the fact that abandonment is a primal fear, universal to the human condition. Depending on our earlier history of loss, neuro-biological constitutions and other factors, some of us go on to develop greater sensitivity to abandonment than others. When the emotional reactivity is intense and persistent enough to interfere in relationships and quality of life on an ongoing basis, a label of PTSD of abandonment pertains.

People with abandonment trauma tend to react to lovers, family, friends, or therapists through a lens that warps reality in such a way that they perceive slights and injuries that may not have been intentional and/or belong in the eye of the beholder. When a slight does occur, they are primed to notice it, perhaps feel it keenly, have an involuntarily emotional reaction to it. During the arousal period, people with abandonment trauma view the situation through a prism that can be momentarily distorted by emotion. But as the embers cool down, they have access to an internal reservoir of insight and self awareness that allows objective reality to help balance their perspective.

In extreme borderline, the distorted perception through the warped lens becomes calcified. When someone struggling with borderline is triggered and lashes out at another, he tends to rewrite the history of the circumstances in a way that seeks to justify his emotionally charged behaviors. The new story features him as the injured party and the other as the perpetrator, a fabrication that his mental apparatus may perform automatically, without his conscious intention or awareness. Regardless, once rewritten, the individual believes the story. He accepts it as reality, clings to it. And he will defend it.

Let’s look at the case of Jaclyn who joined a group of old college friends for a reunion in the Bahamas. She had recently lost her job, then her boyfriend, and had to move back with her parents, and was lonely and at loose ends in her life, so she looked forward to feeling like her old self with her old friends. At first things went well on the trip, but at some point Jaclyn noticed that some of her friends seemed to have relationships with each other and had closer ties than she had to any of them. As time went on, she began to feel on the outside, invisible, sometimes excluded from the dyads and triads that formed informally while they were all hanging out. She tried to snap out of feeling isolated, but kept noticing that they weren’t drawn to her that her ideas and needs didn’t seem to count. Finally the dam broke and she spoke up about it, but her friends reacted defensively, refusing to admit that they were actively ignoring her or being unkind. She claimed they were dismissing her feelings, invalidating her reality, and she went back and forth with them on this. As the dispute intensified, she felt evermore criticized and rejected. Devastated, she packed her bags and stormed out.

Months later, her friends tried to tell Jaclyn what they thought had “actually happened” on the trip, who “actually said what to whom,” and who “actually initiated” the conflict. Jaclyn interpreted this group consensus as a sign that they had conspired to create this story. She told them that they were in denial – lying – and that pinning the blame on her was further proof that they were ostracizing her and being cruel.

What would happen in a parallel universe where Jaclyn had access to a greater resource of self awareness (yoke) with which to gain a bigger picture? In this alternate version, Jaclyn remained hurt following the trip but some doubt prevailed. Had she been too shaky and vulnerable to positively engage her friends when she was with them? Had her hypersensitivity help to create the situation? Had her strong emotional reactions sparked their angry responses? As she gained a broader perspective, she allowed for gray areas and multiple realities to emerge into her recollections of the event. She realized she could agree to disagree with some of the group’s perceptions. She tried to imagine how they may have felt when she lashed out at them. Had she really said those things? Maybe she’d blocked that part out. She still felt insecure but realized the value of attempting to make amends with them. Coached by her therapist, here’s what she said when she met with them– before they had a chance to barrage her with their inevitable critiques:
“I realize this is my issue, and I’m responsible for my reactions. I’m trying to grasp the impact I had on you when I started to get angry the way I did. As I calm down more and more, I realize a lot of what happened had to do with how raw and vulnerable I was feeling, that it probably had nothing to do with you. I wish I felt strong enough to welcome you to tell me how my anger made you feel. I’m not quite ready yet because I’m still feeling shaky and defensive and insecure, but I’m working my way out of it slowly.”

This second version would be difficult for extreme borderlines. Their re-written story solidifies into an incontrovertible reality, one which consistently holds others to blame and minimized their own behavior. The tenacity with which borderlines believe their story can create irreconcilable differences in perception – impasses that thwart conflict resolution and alienate them from others.

Therapy techniques help to incrementally dismantle the borderline structure. Through tools that help them calm down their emotional arousal, borderlines build an open system where alternative viewpoints and feedback from others can be tolerated and integrated. Recovering people learn to practice unconditional self acceptance, rigorous and fearless ownership of their own behaviors and character defects, and radical acceptance of reality on its own terms. They accept that their perception of a given event may differ from others and that it can safely co-exist with theirs so that relationships can become emotionally tolerable and sustainable.

What Distinguishes Abandonment from Other Types of Grief?

How is Grieving a Death Different from Other Types of Grief?

The feature that distinguishes abandonment grief from all others is the damage to self-esteem. We turn our rage about being rejected against ourselves. This accounts for the severe depression and self-injury involved in abandonment.

Abandonment overlaps with bereavement in that they both involve loss. For the abandonment survivor, the loss is just as disruptive and painful as it is for any other type of grief. Closure is incomplete because the person has not died, but has chosen not to be with you. Rejection, withdrawal-of-love, criticism, and desertion create a devastating personal injury. ‘Being left’ cuts us all the way to the core. We lose not only our loved one, we lose our sense of self.

As abandonment grief progresses, it burrows deep within where it can silently leech away at our self-esteem. But abandonment has not been legitimized as its own special type of grief. Everybody seems to know about the initial pain caused by abandonment. It is the latter stages of its grief that have gone unrecognized. Yet it endures, generating sadness, self-doubt, insecurity, and fear –sometimes indefinitely. Unresolved abandonment can interfere in future relationships.

Understanding this grief and the wounding process you have been through helps you assess damages from previous losses. The Akeru exercises help you put this awareness into practice.

Learning about the stages of grief specific to abandonment provides helps focus energy where you may be stuck. S.W.I.R.L. lays out the stages of the abandonment cycle – Shattering, Withdrawal, Internalizing, Rage, and Lifting. Those stuck in SHATTERING from earlier separation traumas tend to be chronically insecure, unstable, self-destructive, prone to addiction and borderline functioning in their object relationships, as well as other psychiatric conditions.

Those stuck in the WITHDRAWAL stage of earlier separations tend to suffer chronic feelings of emptiness and longing, exhibiting dependency and co-dependency disorders. Many seek mood altering experiences and substances. Palliatives range from food to people to drugs to self-help books – – anything to medicate the emotional urgencies impinging from within. The need for quick-fixes sabotages our clients’ ability to delay gratification and achieve long range goals.

Those stuck in INTERNALIZING have low self-worth, tend to turn anger toward themselves, are prone to self-doubt, self-depreciation, excessive shame, depression, dependency. They have feelings of worthlessness, difficulty making decisions, and a heightened need for immediate gratification. They have a constant need to assuage an emotional chasm of guilt and shame. They tend to idealize others (including the abandoner) at their own expense. They tend to create a caste system, positing themselves in the lower caste. This internal short-circuit causes them to underachieve, creating a vicious cycle of self-depreciation and unfulfilled life.

Those stuck in RAGE are plagued with emotional reactivity. They exhibit Outer child behaviors that sabotage primary relationships. Outer child, a new concept introduced in JOURNEY, represents the part of personality that acts out the fear and anger of the INNER CHILD. Outer child goes on the warpath for all of the cumulative losses and rejections going all the way back to childhood. Outer acts out against innocent bystanders — their significant other and sometimes, even against their own inner child. Outer child tends to take emotional hostages rather than form healthy relationships. Outer child is the self-centered nine-year old within all of us.

Those stuck in LIFTING have lifted above their feelings from previous losses. They’ve disengaged from their most vulnerable feelings, creating a barrier between their internal and external selves. They’ve formed emotional calluses over their wounds and suffer problems of dys-intimacy, displaced emotional center, and feelings of detached isolation. They’re hard to reach emotionally. Abandonment trauma’s emotional numbing causes many to develop a pattern of abandoholism -- being “attracted to the unavailable.” ‘Lifters’ sometimes cause their partners to feel isolated, unloved, or emotionally frustrated.

When we go through a current abandonment, we have most difficulty with the stage in which we were stuck from previous losses. Learning about where our emotional ‘hot spots’ are empowers us to focus our recovery effort where it is most needed. There is an Akeru that corresponds to each stage that helps us work through their unfinished business.

Read Article on the Five Phases of Grieving a Death

How to take the 200-item Outer Child Inventory?

We all have an Outer Child -- our hidden self-saboteur -- "the devil on my shoulder"
Outer Child is the selfish, obstinate, impulsive, self-centered part of all of us.
Outer Child acts out your inner child’s feelings, especially its abandonment feelings.
Outer Child encompasses all of the outward signs of your inner child’s vulnerability – the scars, the warts, the defenses that manifest outwardly.
Outer Child actively ignores you, especially when you try to tell it what to do, like “Go to the gym.” Outer just goes right on eating potato chips and lounging in front of the television.
Outer Child wears many disguises, especially in public. Since other people's outer children are usually well hidden, you may have thought you were the only one with an outer child.
Outer Child is the hidden “Chuckie” of the personality. Even the nicest people we know can act like an eight year old with a full blown conduct disorder (perhaps not in public) when they feel rejected, dismissed, abandoned.
Outer Child is sandwiched between the inner child and the adult.
Outer Child steps right in and takes over when we least expect it. You have every intention of handling a particular situation in a mature, adult manner, but Outer handles things its own way and leaves you holding the bag. Like, you decide to calmly express a grievance to a friend, but Outer gets worked up and starts bringing up the past and creating a drama.
Outer Child interferes between Big You and Little You. It blocks the perfectly decent relationship you could otherwise have with your self. In other words, it blocks self-love.
Outer Child has a hole in its pocket when it comes to either anger or money. Outer must spend it.
Outer Child is in everyone because we all have emotions that trigger automatic defense mechanisms and learned responses.
Outer Child is like the annoying older brother who constantly interferes in your life in the guise of protecting (overprotecting) you.
Outer Child is developmentally between eight and twelve. Self-centeredness is age-appropriate for Outer Child.
Outer Child is your own personal wolf dressed up in Little Red Riding Hood’s clothing. If you look closely enough, you see Outer’s whiskers sticking out.
Outer Child goes undercover in public. Some people are better able to hide their Outer Child than others. Of course, some Outer Children are easier to hide than others.
Outer Child becomes most powerful when there is an internal disconnect between head and heart – between your Adult Self and Inner Child.
Outer Child loves chocolate and convinces you that it’s good for your heart. Likewise with wine.
Outer Child is most able to dominate your personality when you’re going through a vulnerable time. Stress energizes Outer Child. People with extremely stressful, traumatic childhoods tend to have very stressed out inner children and therefore very active Outer Children. Some people are ALL Outer Child.
Outer Child throws temper tantrums and goes off in tirades if feels even slightly criticized, rejected, or abandoned.
Outer Child is a puppeteer. If you’re not a strong enough adult, it will pull all your strings.
Outer Child is OUT of control. Outer Child is Dennis the Menace.
Outer Child acts up when you are tired, cranky, hungry. Stress arouses Outer Child.
Outer Child thrives on denial. Denial is how Outer defends itself.
Outer Child doesn’t like to do things that are good for you.
Outer Child would rather do something that will make you fat or broke than thin or fiscally responsible.
Outer Child talks about your friends behind their back.
Outer Child hates it when your friends talk about you behind your back.
Outer Child represents the defense mechanisms. If you happen to think of personality as a defense, then, Outer Child would represent the personality.
Outer Child can't hide from your spouse or children. They get to see it in action. That is what nuclear family is all about: the mutual exposure of your Outer Children.
Outer Child’s favorite disguises is 'compliance.' Outer uses compliance to confuse others into thinking that it doesn't want to take control. But don't be fooled – Outer Child is a control freak, even if a subtle one.
Outer Child acts pure and innocent to show other people up.
Outer Child has OPD – obnoxious personality disorder.
Outer Child can become so obstreperous at times, you wish you could ship it off to “Outer Child Care.”
Outer Child can’t commit in relationships because it’s always ‘looking to trade up.’
Outer Child has ‘bigger is better syndrome.’
Outer Child goes in for quick fixes and feeds its emotional hunger with things like shopping, sex, sugar that in the end leave you more in-need.
Outer Child is emotionally disturbed at times. Outer’s excuse is that it’s only reacting to what you’ve been through (this may be true), but don’t blame Outer; it doesn't take well to criticism.
Outer Child is negatively attracted to the faults of others. Criticizing others is one of Outer’s most socially off-putting features.
Outer Child projects its faults on your mate.
Outer Child projects its shortcomings onto your children.
Outer Child is famous for “taking other people’s inventory.”
Outer Child is Queen of Da Nile. Denial is Outer’s favorite defense. If all else fails, just deny it.
Outer Child needs to keep you in denial so it can continue doing what it wants to do.
Outer Child takes revenge against the Self. It sees itself apart from Self and creates a schism between Big You and Little You whenever an opening presents itself – that is, whenever you lose touch with your feelings.
Outer Child loves to tattle. Badmouthing someone and exposing shortcomings is deeply satisfying to Outer Child.
Outer Child can see everybody else’s shortcomings but its own.
Outer Child thrives on chaos, loves crisis, and lives to create drama.
Outer Child enjoys playing the victim, that is, when not playing the martyr.
Outer Child enjoys making the other person wrong. Outer sometimes makes the other person pay for the wrong (though they are probably innocent).
Outer Child distracts you when you’re trying to get something done.
Outer Child is a world class procrastinator.
Outer Child makes huge messes that take forever to clean up.
Outer Child makes you late for appointments.
Outer Child loses things and blames it one of your children.
Outer Child can find an excuse for anything.
Outer Child goes off to make a phone or run to the mall call instead of letting you finish what you’re doing.
Outer Child tries to look cool and makes you look foolish.
Outer Child wears a mini skirt at 65.
Outer Child is the 'yes but' of the personality.
Outer Child is reactive rather than active or reflective. It is defensive rather than open to feedback, self-justifying rather than self-aware.
Outer Child is never wrong and must never be told so, or it will bite someone’s head off.
Outer Child hates asking for either help or directions. It would rather get you frustrated or lost.
Outer Child explodes when it encounters difficulties with its own abilities, such as when you’re trying to assemble the new barbeque grill. Inner Child is feeling inadequacy, arousing the latent fear of being deemed unworthy of love and left behind – a primitive fear residual of our Clan-of-the-Cave-Bear days when banishment meant death.
Outer Child has a favorite feeling: anger. In fact, all of the other feelings like sadness, hurt, loneliness…well, they all make Outer angry.
Outer Child acts like a tyrant, but is secretly a coward, afraid to assert its needs appropriately.
Outer Child splits its personality between home and office. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – nice at work, a tyrant at home – or vise versa.
Outer Child under-reacts when a friend steps on your toes. Outer pretends to be gracious: “Oh, that’s all right…” but holds onto the anger for the next twenty years.
Outer Child specializes in blame. If it has an uncomfortable feeling, somebody must be at fault.
Outer Child is a people pleaser with ulterior motives. It will give others the shirt off your back. But what does it expect in return? Everything.
Outer Child is not old enough to care about others (in spite of its considerable acting skills). Only the adult can do that.
Outer Child tests the people it looks to for security – to the limits.
Outer Child tests new significant others with emotional games. One of its favorite is playing hard-to-get. Outer Child thinks hard-to-get makes it more loveable, even when it leaves your partner confused and agitated.
Outer Child is the addict, the alcoholic, the one who runs at the mouth, runs up your credit cards – the one who overdoes everything.
Outer Child’s favorite emotion. Anger is energizing. And self-justifying.
Outer Child is charged to DO something about anything that makes you angry. Anger is Outer’s excuse to strike out.
Outer Child, when angry, can become blood thirsty, its rampage fueled by adrenaline and other brain chemicals that increase your impulsivity and decrease your reasoning capacity.
Outer Child reacts to all pain with anger. Anger is secondary emotion. When you stub your toe, it hurts. Pain. You scream in anger because you’re angry at the pain.
Outer Child reacts to emotional pain this way also (i.e. your lover is withholding). Outer directs its anger at the person triggering it or any inanimate object that gets in your way.
Outer Child uses crying as a manipulation. But this ploy is so automatic, primitive, and unconscious, that if you call out Outer on it, it becomes indignant and cries louder.
Outer Child criticizes others to keep the heat off of itself.
Outer Child uses almost any diversionary tactic, no matter now convoluted or unattractive, to keep your vulnerability out of sight.
Outer Child has a phony laugh to cover up stray feelings.
Outer Child is passive aggressive.
Outer Child doesn’t have enough self-control to delay gratification and do the right thing.
Outer Child’s favorite mottos: Buy now, pay tomorrow. Cake now, diet tomorrow.
Outer Child’s mission is to avoid your having to feel inner child’s feelings, especially feelings like hurt, loneliness, disappointment or abandonment.
Outer Child can't stand waiting, especially when waiting for a new lover to call.
Outer Child takes your lovers as emotional hostages.
Outer Child expects a new lover to compensate it for all of the hurts and betrayals inflicted by old relationships dating all the way back to childhood.
Outer Child springs into action when it doesn’t get acceptance or approval.
Outer Child will demand, defy, deceive, ignore, balk, manipulate, seduce, pout, whine, and retaliate when it can’t get someone’s loving attention.
Outer Child doesn’t see the above as contradictions.
Outer Child uses people places and things as props in its own melodrama.
Outer Child takes internal feelings and creates circumstances in the outside world that manages to externalize them.
Outer Child insists on an unreliable car which breaks down a lot, so it can displace your internal feelings of helplessness and frustration on the old rattletrap or your incompetent mechanic.
Outer Child gets hooked on lovers who cheat, so when you catch them, rather than find someone more trustworthy, Outer revels in righteous indignation and get to scream your bloody guts out.
Outer Child chooses substitutes for the parent who made you feel abandoned in childhood.
Outer Child’s constant trouble-making motivates you to get stronger – to become a better adult. That’s how your adult self gains power – by wresting it away from Outer.
Outer Child happens to be an award winning actor who believes its own act. You’re not always sure if this is the real you or your Outer Child disguised as you. This makes it hard to recognize the true face of your own Outer Child or anyone else’s.
Outer Child wants to skip the work involved in any self-improvement plan and get straight to the benefits.
Outer Child wants everything the easy way – in pill form if possible – rather than have to DO something constructive like perform the behavioral steps of a linear process.
Outer Child remains idle, holding out for the next magic pill.
Outer Child believes catharsis is a magic pill and gets you to wait (in vain) for a ‘break-through’ rather than let you work on changing your behavior.
Outer Child balks at going through any process that takes time. It tries to convince you that to change behavior, awareness is enough – that insight alone will change you– that it’s not necessary to have to actually DO anything differently.
Outer Child believes that to change, all you have to do is sit and read and talk and think about yourself and your behavior patterns will spontaneously change for the better and you will turn your life into a bowl of cherries.
Outer Child has a covert agenda: it works unconsciously to maintain your patterns. Becoming aware of your Outer Child defenses helps you readjust the mechanisms causing the dysfunction. Outer reacts to this by trying even harder to reinstate these patterns.
Outer Child gets right in the middle when we try to start a new relationship and acts over-needy.
Outer Child may be found in our mates. Sometimes we marry a person who acts out our own forbidden Outer Child wishes – sometimes this boomerangs and our mate’s Outer acts out against US.
Outer Child may be found in our children’s behavior. When we get into power struggles with our actual children, we find ourselves battling our own Outer Child (because our real-life children aggravate our Outer Child). Sometimes we secretly encourage our real children to fulfill our hidden 0uter Child needs. They act out the anger we can’t own up to.
Outer Child strives for its own self interest while pretending to protect Little You. But Outer wants one thing only – its own way. Outer is devoted to its own self-interests. Some of us hide this selfish part better than others.
Outer Child plays selfless to cover up selfish desires.
Outer Child bristles when someone accuses you of being selfish. This means Outer’s disguise isn’t concealing enough. (Your inner child is afraid people won’t like you if they can see your selfishness.)
Outer Child has searing insight into other people’s self-centeredness, but not its own.
Outer Child is jealous when other people fee entitled to display their selfishness openly. Outer watches from the sidelines, weighed down by its selfless armor.
Outer Child can be very cunning, putting its best foot forward when pursuing a new partner. It can act the picture of altruism, decency, kindness, and tolerance.
Outer Child can also be seductive, funny, charming, full of life, and pretends to be interested in the other person’s feelings. Then when Outer succeeds in catching its prey, it suddenly becomes cold, critical, unloving, and sexually withholding.
Outer makes us pity the person willing to love us.
Outer Child gets a headache just on time for the boudoir.
Outer Child enjoys breaking rules. Your best friends may have very dominant Outer Children, which makes them a lot of fun to hang out with.
Outer Child strives for independence through misguided efforts like power-struggling with You! You wish your Outer Child would get its act together enough to leave home. Wish away, but don’t count on it. (Unless you follow the program.)
Outer Child gains strength during dormant periods when you’re between relationships. Then, when you become interested in a new person, Outer swoops in and acts out your insecurity in convoluted, embarrassing ways that jeopardize everything.
Outer Child tries to defeat the two major tasks of intimacy: Task one is to get your inner child to become friends with your mate’s inner child. Task two is to make sure you don’t take each other’s Outer Children too personally. But Outer prefers to beat up on your mate’s inner child and go head to head with her Outer Child.
Outer Child identifies with Groucho Marx: It would never join any club that would have you as a member.
Outer Child has enough vanity and pride to try conquering an emotionally dangerous lover, one who is potentially rejecting, distancing, and abandoning.
Outer Child thinks emotionally unavailable people are sexy.
Outer Child is attracted to people’s form rather than substance. Outer finds status more attractive than integrity or kindness.
Outer Child can’t resist the emotional candy of a hard-to-get-lover. This goes against what’s good for your inner child who needs someone capable of giving love, nurturance, and commitment. But since when has Outer Child ever cared about what’s good for Little You?
Outer Child refuses to learn from mistakes. It insists upon ‘doing the same things over and over and expecting different results’ (slogan from Alcoholics Anonymous).
Outer Child locks horns with your mate’s Outer Child. The two Outer Children try to control each other’s behavior, which is hopeless and can become very loud. Your best bet is to find something for your Outer Children to do other than interfere in the relationship. If you can’t ignore them, send them out to play.
Outer Child gained strength during times of isolation, loss, disappointment, and abandonment – when there was no one available to mitigate your pain. That’s when Outer Child stepped up its defense mechanisms.
Outer Child is defeated by consciousness, thrives on unconsciousness.
Outer Child’s motivation is what clinicians call ‘unconscious motivation.’
Outer Child is Crusader Rabbit, but with ulterior motives.
Outer Child believes laws and ethics are for everybody else.
Outer Child obeys rules only to avoid getting caught.
Outer Child can dish it out but can't take it.
Outer Child is holier than thou.
Outer Child beats up on other people's inner children – especially the inner child of a significant other. Outer also bullies your own inner child.
Outer Child tries to get self esteem by proxy – that is, by trying to attract people who have more status or bigger egos. Outer likes to be liked by a big shot.
Outer Child can deliver a subtle but powerful blow if it perceives a social slight, no matter how small.
Outer Child can express anger by becoming inconveniently passive.
Outer Child finds someone who is committed and attached – someone easy to take for granted – and then treats him badly. Why? Outer doesn’t have to defend against the constant fear of being abandoned. Your inner child’s fear of abandonment was the only reason Outer developed a pleasing persona. When this fear is dormant, its true persona rears its head.
Outer Child keeps up an endless protest against any reality it doesn’t want to accept.
Outer Child can stay in protest mode no matter how much you try to let go, accept a loss, or face an unwanted reality.
Outer Child protests against homework, returning library books, taxes, rejection, global warming, and death.
Outer Child refuses to stay on the rock (reference to Black Swan: 12 Lessons of Abandonment Recovery), unlike Little You. Outer climbs down and picks up a hatchet and goes on the war path.
Outer Child has a chip on its shoulder which it disguises as assertiveness. Outer Child becomes ‘Outa.’
Outer Child (Outa) develops a ‘tude’ to keep people at bay. It’s trying to overprotect your inner child’s feelings of loneliness and vulnerability.
Outer Child hides its thorns when it wants to and can smell like a rose.
Outer Child has been gaining strength since the terrible twos. Its development got stuck somewhere between eight and twelve – the age when you no longer took rejection, dismissal, or neglect sitting down. Outer will continue to gain power until your adult self gains enough strength to tame its behavior. The program helps you drastically lower your Outer Child-to-Adult ratio.
Outer Child doesn't obey the golden rule.
Outer Child obeys its own 'Outer Child' rule: Get others to treat you as you want to be treated, and treat others as feel like treating them.
Outer Child needs to be disciplined, but don’t expect limit-setting to go smoothly.
Outer Child provokes anger in subtle ways, then accuses the other person of being abusive.
Outer Child loves to play the injured party.
Outer Child submits so it can seethe at being dominated.
Outer Child is master at making the other person look like the bad guy. Outer knows how to wear the white hat cocked at a jaunty angle.
Outer Child is emotionally allergic to triangles, especially when you’re caught in a triangle between someone you love and someone they love (such as your partner’s daughter from his first marriage or your girlfriend’s ongoing ‘friendship’ with her former boyfriend). Triangles get Outer all bent out of shape. When your inner child feels jealous and threatened, it triggers your Outer Child to go haywire and make you look like a nutcase. That’s when you know you’ve been triangulated.
Outer Child is a self-trasher. Outer hopes other people will come to its rescue.
Outer Child is empowered by self abandonment.
Outer Child has a default diet – comfort food. Outer is addicted to carbs.
Outer Child likes to see itself as a freedom fighter, but while it’s off raising hell, you wind up in shackles.
Outer Child tries to speak for Little You. You think you’re tuning into your feelings, but you’re really listening to Outer Child trying to manipulate you.
Outer Child seeks emotional salve from others.
Outer Child is highly principled: it scrupulously obeys the pleasure principle.
Outer Child is a hedonist.
Outer Child finds that satisfying the sweet tooth is the most immediate way to get pleasure – it’s instantaneous.
Outer Child is a champion of pleasure and will valiantly smuggle cookies to your bedroom, especially when you’re dieting.
Outer Child is a fairness junky. It fights for what it considers fair. Outer has been known to commit injustices (and declare war) in the name of fairness.
Outer Child springs into action when it senses someone recoiling; it gets to practice what it knows best – its excellent groveling skills. Practicing this game of approach-avoidance “scratches the itch” of your old abandonment wounds, but it leaves your inner child hurting from bigger blisters.
Outer Child believes that when heartbroken, the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else (paraphrased from Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love).
Outer Child can become so shrill that people can’t tell whether you’re whining or secretly having an orgasm.
Outer Child loves to associate with other Outer Children so that it can satisfy all of its indulgences without feeling guilty.
Outer Child turns your life into ‘Ferris Beuler Day’s off.’
Outer Child uses projection as a defense. Outer projects your shortcomings onto other people to keep the focus off of itself.
Outer Child is an environmentalist when it comes to a ‘good catch’ – it just likes to tag them and then throw them back in (submitted by workshop member at Esalen Institute in 2006).
Child loves to shrug and say, ‘Whatever…” but this is disingenuous. It is trying to get people to let their guards down to gain control of the situation. Your inner child is afraid of getting beaten in a power struggle, so your Outer Child pretends it has no preferences. But all the while it’s fastidiously keeping score.
Outer Child believes what it wants to believe. It has a wishbone where it should have a backbone (paraphrased from Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat Pray Love).
Outer Child is always looking for love insurance and refuses to believe there is no such thing.
Outer Child might chase after someone who is very hard up and become his ‘caretaker’ in hopes of becoming so valuable that the poor slob will never want to leave you. But this strategy of ‘having the edge’ backfires like all of Outer’s other schemes (the other person resents feeling ‘obligated’ and ‘less-than’) and you wind up abandoned (again).
Outer Child is a perfectionist. Your Adult Self has a hard time reasoning with this nit-picking perfectionist.
Outer Child’s perfectionism has strings attached. It’s a form of bargaining. It’s saying, “If I’m perfect enough, I deserve to be rewarded.”
Outer Child’s perfectionism contains a built-in vice grip; if you don’t get rewarded, Outer’s iron fist may protrude through its velvet glove.
Outer Child prepares for a dinner party by ripping through your closet searching for something perfect. Clothes you liked yesterday are suddenly unacceptable. You bite anyone’s head off (family member) that comes near you – because you need to be perfect.
Outer Child refuses to accept the simple fact that you, like everyone else, has imperfections, inadequacies, lackings, and shortcomings. We are all bent twigs. The knuckles, knots, and bends in our twigs are what give each of us our special contours and distinctiveness. Nope. Outer wants to be free of knuckles and knots – perfect.
Outer Child is an egotist who tries to hide it in all sorts of disguises like altruism, moral superiority, righteous indignation, benevolence.
When Outer does something spiteful, it hides behind altruism, moral superiority, righteous indignation, and benevolence.
Outer Child can be self-spiteful– make you miserable in order to punish someone else. For instance, Outer can keep you heartbroken forever just to prove the injustice of the breakup. Outer puts you through all of this because it thinks being miserable is a way to get even with your ex. It is behaving like a spoiled, self-spiteful brat toward You, the adult, just to say “So there!” to your ex. As illogical, primitive, and totally self-defeating as you know this to be, Outer goes right on perpetrating its siege of self-spite, undeterred. (Self-spite is what young children do – an early sign of a fledgling Outer Child).
Outer Child is attracted to People, Places, and Things in the world of form. Outer belongs almost exclusively to the form world.
Outer Child prefers form to substance. In fact, Outer can’t appreciate substance unless it’s wrapped in impressive form. Outer is impressed with form.
Outer Child is impressed with people’s confidence because confidence has good form. Outer can’t recognize someone’s intelligence, competence, or wisdom unless it is conveyed with charisma and confidence. Some of the wisest people convey neither charisma nor confidence, but instead may evince a searching, self-effacing demeanor, so thanks to Outer Child culture, they go unrecognized.
Outer Child’s attachment to form leaves Little You in jeopardy of being surrounded with false truths, substitute fulfillments, and counterfeit love.
Outer Child springs from the mammalian brain.
Outer Child writes your life with the blunt instrument.
Outer Child is visually triggered and primed to follow the herd. It is instinct-bound, driven by the need for immediate gratification, and hell bent on satisfying your primal emotions.
Outer Child reacts to abandonment with rage. When love is involved, abandonment rage can trigger Outer Child’s most destructive, dangerous, and self-justifying behaviors. In fact, abandonment rage has been responsible for most of the infamous murder-suicides so often grabbing headlines.
Outer Child’s behavior ranges from mild self-sabotage all the way to criminal destructiveness.
Outer Child can gain control so early that the individual doesn’t develop any true empathy or compassion for himself or others. The extreme Outer Child is a sociopath.
Outer Child needs to be understood, owned, and overruled by an airtight coalition between your inner child and your adult self.
Outer Child holds the key to change. Inner child beholds your emotional truth but can’t change (because it’s developmentally too young to overcome its passivity). When you catch your Outer Child red-handed, wrest the key from its hands and unlock your future.
Outer Child becomes your friend and ally. But first you have to help it reach maturity by mentoring, teaching, and guiding its prodigious energy.

I hope this inventory inspired you to get in touch with your Outer Child.

Are you a Therapist Looking to Treat Abandonment Trauma?

It is true: Abandonment trauma and its aftermath of self-sabotage and shame have not been sufficiently studied or understood.

Post traumatically, abandonment has the ability to implant a wound deep within the self that works insidiously to drain self-esteem from within, deepening shame. Abandonment’s invisible drain of self-esteem remains unconscious – a hidden shame reservoir that left unresolved leads to patterns of self-sabotage (repetition compulsions).

Getting to the taproot of the primal wound of abandonment is the key to treating abandonment trauma. Tried and true methods such as traditional psychotherapy, CBT, or trauma reduction techniques have surely helped but haven’t been able to significantly heal the wounds of primal abandonment fear and shame.

Abandonment trauma involves a thwarting of attachment energy (the powerful force that maintains propagation of the species). With abandonment trauma (separation trauma) in childhood (ranging from the universal birth trauma to parental desertion and abuse), the child is thwarted in its attempt to maintain a steady attachment to an object. In adulthood, people going through abandonment include those whose attachment energy is thwarted because perhaps they have lost a relationship, fear losing someone's love, or feel despairing of ever finding a relationship.

Abandonment Recovery works with this thwarted attachment energy by provided the client with a new object to attach to, one who will never desert, betray, or reject them – and that object is the SELF.
This transformation does not happen by osmosis; it involves tools and effort sustained over time.

As therapists, we are in a position to support this deep healing process. We help our clients build a powerful new relationship with themselves.

What does the picture usually look like for our clients?

Our clients try to rebuild their self-esteem by doing ‘esteemable’ things, but the INVISIBLE WOUND OF ABANDONMENT is always working to siphon it away. The special type of grief unique to abandonment can burrow underground where it continues to generate low self-esteem, depression, obsession, shame, addiction, isolation, and self-defeating behaviors (outer child patterns).

As we have seen, many abandonment survivors have difficulty forming primary relationships. As therapists, we endeavor to help them get to the root — the underlying abandonment wound – to gain self-acceptance, perspective, and emotional wisdom. Working from the inside out, we help them mitigate the impact of abandonment traumas from past and present wounds and promote significant personal growth – emotionally and behaviorally.

See "How do I get Professional Training and CEs?"

How can I get Professional Training and CEs?

Training in Abandonment and Outer Child techniques is experiential. You learn by fully participating in one of Susan’s workshops designed for abandonment survivors as well as therapists, practicing the program’s hands-on exercises and sharing feedback within a supportive group setting. Whether the workshop is ONLINE or in person, Susan creates a safe, open, working, life-changing process within the group. Susan also offers professional seminars, more didactic in nature, through university or professional programs.
Continuing Education Credits (CEs) are available to participants of all of the workshops and seminars, whether through university or professional organizations, Kripalu, Esalen, and other venues where the workshops and seminars are presented. Susan also offers CE documentation for her ONLINE abandonment workshops which developed during the Pandemic.
Abandonment Recovery Component: Through training you learn how to: • Help people through the five stages of abandonment (Shattering, Withdrawal, Internalizing, Rage, and Lifting (SWIRL). • Practice techniques that heal abandonment survivor’s damaged relationship to self. • Practice Akeru – a program of hands-on exercises that help people heal and grow through each stage of the SWIRL process. Outer Child Component: • Target Outer Child patterns of self-sabotage. Outer Child is an overarching concept that encompasses defense mechanisms, character traits, knee-jerk reactions, habits, and compulsions – all of your maladaptive behavior patterns. • Identify Outer’s emotional triggers. • Connect dots between automatic defenses and primal abandonment fear. • Learn exercises that redirect attachment energy toward learning healthy new “automatic” behaviors. • Practice using new power tools to break through obstacles, change behavior patterns, and propel you forward. Advanced Clinical Training: Through a combination of didactics and experiential training, you: • Discern acute abandonment crisis from chronic patterns such as mood or anxiety disorders, as well as long standing outer child patterns of self-sabotage. • Learn about Traumatic Shame • Learn about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of Abandonment • Learn about how PTSD of abandonment differs from Borderline Personality Disorder • Learn new information from neuro-science upon which new treatment approaches are built. • Distinguish normal (albeit intense) abandonment grief from the onset of major depression. • Identify acute symptoms of the emotional crisis of abandonment, including: Re-emerging symbiotic feelings Increased risk-taking Neglected self-care Anorexia Suicidality Panic Need to self-medicate Borderline regression and other forms of acting out • Identify chronic (versus acute) symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of Abandonment. In “Journey from Abandonment to Healing (pages 41-42)” I outline a complete list of 40 of abandonment’s posttraumatic symptoms, which comprise what I have come to call the “outer child syndrome.” Outer Child Syndrome: • Difficulty forming primary relationships • Rejection-sensitivity • Poor self-image • Addiction • Co-addiction • Chronic insecurity

See "Are you a Therapist looking to Treat Abandonment Trauma"

What are the Five Phases of Grieving a Death?

...His death put an immediate end to that life and propelled me into a second journey through loss. These journeys were within a decade of the other – first through abandonment and the second through bereavement . But grieving Paul’s death was a very different experience. It even felt differently in my body, hormonally, physically different... Click for complete article

How do I Begin the Akeru Exercise Program of Abandonment Recovery?

Complete instructions and guidance are offered in the books, workshops, and videos. See "The Program" on Menu

How do I Send Susan my Personal Story?

You have the option to submit your own personal abandonment situation to me privately (in 200 words or less). My colleagues and I carefully read all submissions and uphold strict confidentiality. Due to volume we are unable to respond to your stories personally.

By telling me your abandonment story, you are adding your voice to the growing data I’ve been collecting for over 20 years on the impact of abandonment and its aftermath of self-sabotage.
Your submissions have contributed to insights and information within my books and recordings. Whereas all of the anecdotal research data I collect are preserved in their original form in confidential files, during any publication of materials, the situations and patterns you describe are disguised and scrambled to protect your identity.

Thank you for contributing your stories to this work. I hope you have enjoyed seeing them in print (without disclosing your identities) and that you feel satisfaction in knowing that they help others feel less alone.

For upcoming publications, I am looking for submissions that describe your current abandonment situation, the earlier losses and traumas that still impinge in your life, and/or the ways you self-sabotage (your Outer Child patterns). Contact Me

How do I send Susan my Outer Child Patterns?

You are welcome to privately share with me your Outer Child patterns of self-sabotage and how they interfere in your life (in 200 words or less).

My colleagues and I carefully read all submissions and uphold strict confidentiality. Due to volume we are unable to respond to your submission personally.

Be assured that the patterns and situations you submit are always disguised and scrambled within my publications to protect your identity.

I am grateful for your contributions to my 20-year anecdotal research project on abandonment and its aftermath of self-sabotage.

For inspiration, see our 200-Item Outer Child Inventory compiled through your entries over the many years. Thank you for contributing to my work on self-sabotage and abandonment. You are helping others feel less shame for their humanness and less alone.
To Send me your Outer Child Patterns, please Contact Me.