People Who Grew Up Feeling Severely Neglected Often Carry These 7 Hidden Habits Into Adulthood
Childhood neglect leaves marks that don't always look like trauma.
Valerie Elash | Unsplash As many of you know, I have an issue with being fairly heavily neglected by people around me — especially relatives. I mean, my family didn’t even show up to my weddings, and there were three attempts to make them come by.
The last attempt even had the family member asking me to drive them to and from the wedding, an hour away. So it’s not a matter of urgency. They just really didn’t care. Of course, people still insist they “love” me. Suuuuure.
I only really get attention paid to me if I’m screaming, crying, or on the verge of dying. That’s so much love, right? This level of “love” from my family has had a deep effect on me. That’s to be expected. Emotional neglect (or really any kind of neglect) has profound effects on people, especially if it’s happened since you were a kid or if you’ve been alone for an extended period of time.
In recent years, the number of people who qualify as neglected seems to have skyrocketed. With it come behaviors that can be baffling to others. Much of the behavior is easy to understand once you know the full story, but that’s not always true.
While you might know about the tendency to people-please, use substances, or cling, you might not understand other behaviors. Let me shed light on some of the more unusual reasons why severely neglected people behave the way they do.
People who grew up feeling severely neglected often carry these 7 hidden habits into adulthood:
1. Being loud
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Most people know that neglected people tend to do things that get attention, even if it hurts them in the long run. Some of the most “feral” kids you see (the ones setting fires or stealing or breaking things or getting violent) are that way because they’re so attention starved that they’ll take any attention, even if it’s negative.
Being loud is a bit more subtle. Most of us who are neglected or overlooked by people around us are very loud because we have to shout just to get people to listen to us. These days, I can’t tell when I’m shouting or not. I just got used to having a loud-as-heck voice.
2. Not showing up to other people's personal events
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I don’t go to weddings anymore because I know that if I go, I’ll be unable to hold my mouth shut, and I’ll drag everyone into a horrible mood. Why? Because the anger I feel from being shafted on my own special day boils up every time I see a frilly wedding dress or bridesmaids fawning over a bride.
People who are neglected often hold a lot of rage and hurt over special days like this, especially if the people who were supposed to care for them put effort into others’ days but not theirs. If your friend was a product of a neglectful home, don’t hold their absence against them. It’s not that they hate you. It’s that they hate what they don’t have, and they don’t want to make a fool of themselves or burn bridges.
3. Asking to hang out then flaking
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So, I’ve been doing this recently — especially after I got triggered by people ghosting me. A lot of people who were neglected and who dealt with crippling loneliness have this issue where we genuinely don’t feel worth loving anymore.
So when people ask us to go somewhere, it takes a huge leap of faith on our end. A huge one. Because having that invite dangled in front of us, then incinerated with a no-show, can be absolutely devastating to us.
If it happens a lot, like it did to me in the past month, what little belief we had in ourselves and our worth as a person just dissipates. We want that affection. We desperately want that companionship. If they’re like me, they literally dream of it, going so far as to force themselves to sleep so they can at least feel loved in their dreams.
But we just don’t believe people will show up, or we think people are just doing it because they feel they have to. So we often bail or make up an excuse not to go because it’s easier.
I’m afraid to ask people to go out with me anymore. I’m afraid to ask for affection because it often feels so fake when you have to ask. It feels even more hollow when you have to actually crash out for people to realize you’re that starved, or when the only way to get anything is a mechanical hug from someone who is “supposed” to care.
If you’re noticing this behavior, the best thing you can do is straight up insist on having that person show up. Ideally, you’d keep an eye on them and check up on them fairly regularly. Trust me when I say that severely neglected people appreciate this far more than they often can let on.
4. Explosive outbursts
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I keep saying this, but it always falls on deaf ears: people who are neglected generally don’t do well with emotional regulation. This is for a variety of reasons. First off, we were never taught how to regulate emotions. Second, one of our most basic needs is not being met. Third, there’s often a lot of anger and resentment pent up there.
Most of us try to excuse ourselves or stop this from happening. We may just duck out of sight, or we may ask for space. Or something. Even so, it’s not always doable, and then people roll their eyes because the neglected person’s acting out again instead of just sitting there, smiling while they’re patently ignored.
5. Hoarding and shopping tendencies
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So lately, I’ve started to notice a common theme among a lot of the people I know in my shoes. They tend to be deeply materialistic or even have hoarding tendencies. It makes sense, though.
When you can’t get comfort from humanity, getting comfort from material things can feel like a quick fix. It’s why retail therapy is a thing. Besides, when you’re at a store, you can talk to the shopkeeper, and for some of us, that’s the closest thing to an outing that we can get.
I knew of one girl who always wanted a man who would just buy her flowers, just because. So, she’d always buy herself flowers because she got tired of having that request ignored. She often had three, four, or even five bouquets at her home.
I tend to buy large quantities of food because I’ve had periods of food insecurity. So stockpiling food makes me feel secure, even though I can’t possibly eat it all in a normal timeframe. As weird as it sounds, materialism can also be a desperate attempt to get the love, affection, inclusion, and approval they never got before.
I’ve also heard of one very wealthy guy — obscenely so. He bought a $300,000 car and would drive it, top dropped, throughout New York City. He was always hoping that women would just randomly ask for a ride from him, because he couldn’t figure out how to approach them without feeling that fear of rejection.
6. Studying languages and psychology
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Though this might be a “me” thing, when I was younger, the worst feeling in the world was knowing I was hurting but being totally unable to explain to people why. Even now, it feels like no matter how many times I say it, I can’t quite get people to listen.
So I try to make a point of learning the right words to use — concise ones. I started to learn languages as a way to maybe try to find a new way to communicate with others. Sometimes just being the only person in a group who can translate something makes me feel better, and more importantly, heard.
7. Picking up and leaving without a word
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I’m not going to lie. I will most likely go fully no-contact with certain family members because the dynamics of my family don’t change. Had I not lost my apartment, it’d have happened even sooner.
I keep asking for certain things, my needs get put last, I flip out after it happens, people will do something for once (often by throwing money at me without a second glance), then it goes back to the way it was. Rinse, repeat.
When a person keeps noticing that they’re being ignored in a group or otherwise just not treated well, they eventually get the hint. People who are products of extreme neglect will often ask what they did wrong, why people are treating them that way, or try to mend things.
And when that doesn’t work? They generally learn to just disappear. So if you’re wondering why someone stopped hitting you up, that’s why. A lot of us just learned to not go to events unless specifically asked, not to speak unless spoken to, and to just go off.
Most people who get to that point tell others how they feel, repeatedly. Y’all just didn’t listen. They felt you didn’t want them around, so they decided to just keep shrinking until they just disappeared from you.
Ossiana Tepfenhart is a writer whose work has been featured in Yahoo, BRIDES, Your Daily Dish, Newtheory Magazine, and others.
