“I wanted to be chosen so badly, I never stopped to wonder if they were worth choosing.” – Unknown
The desire to be chosen comes from a strong need to feel like you matter to someone, especially when early experiences with caregivers leave lasting emotional marks. A silent, unconscious undercurrent in my life has been a desperate longing to feel that I mattered in someone else’s eyes. I now know this is a result of the programming I experienced in childhood. This deep wound comes from my struggle to connect emotionally with my parents. They were physically present but emotionally distant, preoccupied with their own problems, and unable to provide nurturing and support.
Growing up, I often felt invisible due to my caregivers’ emotional unavailability. My father was consumed by alcoholism and other addictions, while my mother, deeply affected by his behavior, channeled all her energy into trying to control him. When her efforts failed, she turned to her own addictive behaviors as a coping mechanism.
The Invisible Child: Navigating Love and Unavailability
Amidst the chaos in my childhood, I lacked adult guidance and had to rely on my imagination to understand what was happening. I convinced myself that if I wasn’t noticed, I must not be deserving of time and attention. I found myself constantly competing for my parents’ love and attention, which was often overshadowed by their struggles with alcoholism, workaholism, obsession with others, chronic worry, and fear. These issues consumed them, leaving them unable to fulfill my emotional needs.
This belief made me feel insignificant and caused profound loneliness and despair. These feelings were frightening and made me feel unsafe. With no one to turn to for guidance or to discuss my unwanted loneliness, I started pursuing a sense of safety to escape these emotions. I pursued this safety by constantly seeking my parents’ approval and hoping they would choose me to fix these feelings. I was always looking outside myself to fix these feelings because no one was available to show me how to regulate or cope with such negative emotions.
The wound of not being chosen led me to continuously chase my parents’ unavailability. Without realizing it, I began to believe this was what love looked like. Love was “chasing it down,” working hard for it, longing, and hoping to get even a little. Love meant rejecting my own needs and absorbing everyone else’s big emotions to get some connection and attention. Love became inconsistent, unpredictable, and transactional.
Losing Myself to Be Chosen and Perpetuating My Loneliness
The need to be chosen became a deep-seated belief: I would never be someone’s first choice. Subconsciously, I began to abandon my authentic self, creating a new persona that I thought people would like and choose. If that didn’t work, I would change myself again. This meant altering how I looked and acted.
I developed skillful ways to manipulate situations to be chosen, but with each change, I drifted further away from my true self. I became the girl who molded herself to fit others’ expectations, always seeking validation but losing touch with who I really was.
From Neglect to Need: Uncovering the Roots of Relationship Choices
Throughout my life, I found myself repeatedly drawn to men who forced me to compete for their attention, whether it was with another woman, their addictions, or their workaholism. These men were emotionally unavailable and avoidant, mirroring the exact dynamics I experienced with my parents.
My father, an alcoholic, was consumed by his addiction, while my mother was perpetually preoccupied with her own concerns, leaving me to feel I had to compete for emotional connection.
In my relationships, I was unconsciously trying to recreate and resolve these childhood wounds, hoping that if I could win the attention of unavailable men, it would somehow heal the pain of being neglected and overlooked by my parents. Instead, I found myself trapped in a painful cycle of longing and rejection, constantly chasing after the emotional connection that always seemed just out of reach. This pursuit only perpetuated a painful cycle of yearning and rejection.
Subconsciously, this was my understanding of what true love meant—after all, this was what my parents showed me love was, right? This chase was all too familiar to me—as it mirrored my early understanding of love.
Unavailable relationships grafted onto my nervous system like a hand to a glove. Embedded within me was a belief that love was a pursuit where we never had enough, always striving to be chosen by others. It took time for me to recognize these ideas were deeply rooted in my subconscious.
From Childhood Wounds to Adult Relationships: My Distorted Views on Love
Here’s a front-row seat to the corrupted belief system that can develop through conditioning in younger years about what love is and what it looks like. This list reveals how early experiences can shape an understanding of love, rooted in the desperate need to be chosen. These beliefs often carry into adulthood, shaping relationships for years and leading to exhaustion and burnout.
Beliefs About Love Rooted in the Need to Be Chosen
Love is something I have to chase:
- Stemming from the constant need to pursue my parents’ attention and affection.
- Belief that love is always out of reach and requires relentless effort.
Love is hard work:
- Based on the idea that I must work tirelessly to earn love and approval.
- Reinforced by the continuous struggle to gain my parents’ emotional availability.
Love is scarce:
- Formed from the belief that there is never enough love to go around.
- Driven by the feeling of always competing for limited attention as a child.
Love is about rejecting my own needs:
- Rooted in the habit of ignoring my own needs to cater to others’ emotions.
- Learned from trying to manage my parents’ big emotions to gain any connection I could get.
Love is inconsistent and unpredictable:
- Resulting from the erratic and unreliable nature of my parents’ behaviors, addictions, and affection.
- Reinforcing the idea that love cannot be counted on.
Love is transactional:
- Developed from the belief that love must be earned or traded for something.
- Originating from manipulating situations to gain my parents’ attention.
I am never someone’s first choice:
- A deep-seated belief that I am not worthy of being a priority.
- Manifested in the constant creation and alteration of personas to be liked and chosen.
I must change myself to be loved:
- Belief that my authentic self is not enough to earn love.
- Led to altering my appearance, my behaviors, and my life to fit others’ expectations.
I must manipulate situations to be chosen:
- Developed from the need to skillfully maneuver to gain attention and validation.
- Resulting in a further drift away from my true self.
How These Beliefs Were Rooted in My Need to Be Chosen
Wound of Not Being Chosen:
- Constantly chasing my parents’ unavailability cemented the belief that love is something to be pursued.
Abandoning My Authentic Self:
- To be chosen, I created and recreated personas, leading to a loss of my true identity.
Seeking Validation:
- The need for validation from my emotionally distant parents instilled the idea that love must be fought for.
Absorbing Others’ Emotions:
- Trying to manage my parents’ big, chaotic, and immature emotions taught me that love means rejecting my needs to fulfill others’.
Awakening to Healing: Escaping the Cycle of Unavailable Love
By continuously chasing unavailable love and altering myself to be chosen, I created a dysfunctional belief system that distorted my understanding of what love truly is.
Realizing these patterns has been crucial in my journey toward healing. I’ve come to understand that my pursuit of love was rooted in a deep-seated desire for consistent connection, which was lacking in my childhood. Breaking free from this cycle has helped me to seek healthier relationships and find healing from past wounds.
From 2017 to 2023, my life took a tumultuous turn as my last two relationships ended in failure, leaving me emotionally shattered and at the lowest point I had ever experienced. I felt utterly broken, fragile, and paralyzed by despair. In my anguish, I began to piece together what had led to this devastating outcome. Anger consumed me—I felt cheated by fate, overwhelmed by a sense of unfairness. It was as if history was repeating itself, and I couldn’t comprehend why this was happening “again.”
It all felt so incredibly unfair. I was sitting in a garden one day, talking to God about how angry I was and trying to sort out my pain. Suddenly, I heard a clear voice in my head say, “Call Heidi.” Heidi, an online speaker and expert in love addiction and codependency flashed into my mind. Driven by a desperate need for understanding and healing, I immediately sought her out and committed to her transformative six-month course. It was a pivotal decision that marked the beginning of my journey towards healing and self-discovery.
This marked the beginning of my quest for answers. As I reflected on my relationships, I started to recognize striking patterns, particularly in the last one, which was notably worse. It became clear to me just how emotionally unavailable my partners were, and how their unavailability worsened over time, leading me deeper into emotional turmoil.
This low point was crucial for me to confront and understand my deeply ingrained and distorted belief system. In hindsight, I realize that these two failed relationships were necessary for guiding me back toward clarity and healing.
The ending you never imagined becomes the beginning of the life you always dreamed of. What seemed like a tragic setback at the time turned out to be a blessing in disguise. At 44 years old, I found myself crawling out of yet another failed relationship, selling my home, and moving back in with my mom. It felt like a personal failure then, but looking back, I see it marked the beginning of my transformation. This ending drastically changed the course of my life, leading me straight into my true calling: coaching. I began working on my mindset and dismantling my old belief system. I let go of outdated stories and beliefs that no longer served me. Each rejection became a launching pad, propelling me toward the life I lead today.
I began my journey to stop chasing others and started choosing myself. Through this process, I’ve grown to love rebuilding my life. I’ve developed a new set of values centered around unconditional self-love and a commitment to never abandon myself. Techniques like self-parenting have empowered me to set strong internal boundaries, using discernment in relationships to decide if someone is worthy of my choice rather than seeking validation from them.
Call to Action: Get Started with Coaching
Thank you for joining me on my journey of understanding and healing the wounds left by absent parents and unmet childhood needs. If you resonated with this and want to start on your own path of healing and personal growth, here are some steps you can take:
1. 1:1 Coaching on Healing Childhood Wounds: If you’re ready to dive deeper into healing your younger self and addressing unmet needs from childhood, consider booking a personalized coaching session with me. I specialize in supporting women who have experienced:
- Absent parents
- Inconsistent role models of love
- Emotional and physical safety issues
- Severe neglect or abandonment
- Childhood household chaos
- Emotional and physical abuse
2. Subscribe for More Content: Stay updated on future articles and resources focused on healing childhood wounds, building self-worth, and fostering personal growth by subscribing to my newsletter, which will deliver regular insights and tips straight to your inbox.
Together, we will reflect on your emotional blueprint, acknowledge what your inner child went through, and work towards stopping self-abandonment. My goal is to help you rebuild self-worth that may not have been properly nurtured in childhood so you can feel whole, happy, and at home in your life again.
Let’s embark on this journey of healing and empowerment together. Your past does not define you, and your future holds endless possibilities for growth and happiness. Here’s to embracing your journey and nurturing the resilient, empowered woman within you.
