Is it too late for me to ever feel taken care of?

[Anonymous]

I find this weird that you want to be taken care of in your 50s. I am 51 and don’t expect that from anyone. I think perhaps it is just a yearning for what you feel like you have missed out on. You need to look forward and I agree with pp that a therapist would help with reframing things for you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel you OP. I have always craved a mother figure who can love me unconditionally and offer guidance on life (my mother was very neglectful and emotionally stunted). I now bring comfort to myself, I realized I don't need a loving mother to turn to, I turn to myself. And to nature. I take such glory in a nice breezy day.

Same, but there are times when I wish I had an emotional connection with a wise, loving mother or father. I've done fine turning to myself, but I've been challenged attaching to others. DH is the only person in my life who has shown up as this person and I’ve often failed to acknowledge or appreciate it.

This resonates. Especially hard with Mother’s Day coming up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel you OP. I have always craved a mother figure who can love me unconditionally and offer guidance on life (my mother was very neglectful and emotionally stunted). I now bring comfort to myself, I realized I don't need a loving mother to turn to, I turn to myself. And to nature. I take such glory in a nice breezy day.

Same, but there are times when I wish I had an emotional connection with a wise, loving mother or father. I've done fine turning to myself, but I've been challenged attaching to others. DH is the only person in my life who has shown up as this person and I’ve often failed to acknowledge or appreciate it.

no one wants to act like your mom or dad, and is is evident when you expect that from them, impossible to hide. It comes across as neediness and wanting to be babied. no one is going to want to do this for another adult, especially one who has done grown woman things like get married and have kids.

[Anonymous]

Good Lord, OP, you are an adult, act like you are!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel you OP. I have always craved a mother figure who can love me unconditionally and offer guidance on life (my mother was very neglectful and emotionally stunted). I now bring comfort to myself, I realized I don't need a loving mother to turn to, I turn to myself. And to nature. I take such glory in a nice breezy day.

Same, but there are times when I wish I had an emotional connection with a wise, loving mother or father. I've done fine turning to myself, but I've been challenged attaching to others. DH is the only person in my life who has shown up as this person and I’ve often failed to acknowledge or appreciate it.

no one wants to act like your mom or dad, and is is evident when you expect that from them, impossible to hide. It comes across as neediness and wanting to be babied. no one is going to want to do this for another adult, especially one who has done grown woman things like get married and have kids.

The type of person you are thinking of (who demands to be babied and tries to turn people into their mother/father figure), are not self aware though. OP is self aware about her needs, what happened in her childhood, and also respectful of boundaries (understanding she cannot expect her children to fill this need). She is wounded though, as someone who was abused/neglected as a child. You might consider having some empathy for that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good Lord, OP, you are an adult, act like you are!

In what way is OP not acting like an adult?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel you OP. I have always craved a mother figure who can love me unconditionally and offer guidance on life (my mother was very neglectful and emotionally stunted). I now bring comfort to myself, I realized I don't need a loving mother to turn to, I turn to myself. And to nature. I take such glory in a nice breezy day.

Same, but there are times when I wish I had an emotional connection with a wise, loving mother or father. I've done fine turning to myself, but I've been challenged attaching to others. DH is the only person in my life who has shown up as this person and I’ve often failed to acknowledge or appreciate it.

no one wants to act like your mom or dad, and is is evident when you expect that from them, impossible to hide. It comes across as neediness and wanting to be babied. no one is going to want to do this for another adult, especially one who has done grown woman things like get married and have kids.

The type of person you are thinking of (who demands to be babied and tries to turn people into their mother/father figure), are not self aware though. OP is self aware about her needs, what happened in her childhood, and also respectful of boundaries (understanding she cannot expect her children to fill this need). She is wounded though, as someone who was abused/neglected as a child. You might consider having some empathy for that.

The people who are self aware are always looking for that care from their friends and family, they cannot help it. The constantly strategize to be "cared for", that is all they do. Being non self aware about this means this need never is one you would conceive of having.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good Lord, OP, you are an adult, act like you are!

Seems like she has been acting like an adult since a young age, taking care of her family and now anonymously asking for advice on a forum. You fail as a person, pp.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel you OP. I have always craved a mother figure who can love me unconditionally and offer guidance on life (my mother was very neglectful and emotionally stunted). I now bring comfort to myself, I realized I don't need a loving mother to turn to, I turn to myself. And to nature. I take such glory in a nice breezy day.

Same, but there are times when I wish I had an emotional connection with a wise, loving mother or father. I've done fine turning to myself, but I've been challenged attaching to others. DH is the only person in my life who has shown up as this person and I’ve often failed to acknowledge or appreciate it.

no one wants to act like your mom or dad, and is is evident when you expect that from them, impossible to hide. It comes across as neediness and wanting to be babied. no one is going to want to do this for another adult, especially one who has done grown woman things like get married and have kids.

The type of person you are thinking of (who demands to be babied and tries to turn people into their mother/father figure), are not self aware though. OP is self aware about her needs, what happened in her childhood, and also respectful of boundaries (understanding she cannot expect her children to fill this need). She is wounded though, as someone who was abused/neglected as a child. You might consider having some empathy for that.

The people who are self aware are always looking for that care from their friends and family, they cannot help it. The constantly strategize to be "cared for", that is all they do. Being non self aware about this means this need never is one you would conceive of having.

No, you are starting from the fallacy that everyone starts out in the same place. They don't.

We are talking about people who experience abuse/neglect as children and have a need for something that other people (who were not abused/neglected) do not. The need exists for someone like this whether acknowledged or not, whether they understand why they feel this longing or not.

OP has gone to therapy, worked through her childhood, come to understand her own psychology. She speaks of forgiving her parents (and understanding they their behavior was a result of their own dysfunctional upbringing). She speaks with acceptance of her spouse's limitations in this area, and a great deal of thoughtfulness in why she may have self-selected adult relationship that don't involve a lot of caretaking. She also explains that she does not view her children as an appropriate source of caretaking, wanting to break the chain of abuse.

OP sounds like someone who almost never asks people for caretaking, because she learned as a child no to expect it. But she still has a need for it, a deficit from early childhood. It's a difficult problem to solve.

The other path for someone like this is to do none of the therapy and self work, have no idea why they feel this deep sense of longing for caretaking, and just run around demanding it from every relationship -- romances, friendships, kids, neighbors, coworkers. To never ask why they do this and to externalize the problems it causes, blaming others for being selfish or mean.

That's not what OP describes at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you have a close group of friends?

I have some close friends, yes. I can talk to them about serious things and they are there for me if I ask. But I think I self-selected for the people in my life to be kind of self-contained and not the sort to overtly care for friends. Again, because earlier in adulthood I found that behavior so foreign I didn't trust it. I assumed if someone was very caring towards me, it was a lie. I now understand it's not that. I do have one friend who was like that towards me early in our friendship but learned not to be that way because it made me edgy and she respected my boundaries (a great friend!).

But I'm in a different place now and wish I had this experience but it's like a prior version of me arranged my life to ensure no one else takes care of me. I don't know how to undo that.

I had a very bad childhood also, with emotionally immature, addicted, personality disordered abusive parents.

I’ve done therapy extensively and worked out a lot of the why and how and for me, worked past the deep seated belief my parents instilled that I was a bad child who didn’t deserve their time or love.

I also spent my adult life caretaking for others and have not really experienced any in return.

I feel that yearning that you feel and personally, I don’t think it goes away. I don’t think we can totally fix the damage that is caused by not being nurtured in childhood. We can reparent ourselves to a certain extent but we can’t repair entirely our lack of solid attachment in early childhood.

I’m just practicing radical acceptance for how I turned out given all the trauma I experienced, and trying my best to love my persistent insecurities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am mid-40s and had a dysfunctional, abusive childhood. My parents also come from dysfunctional, abusive homes and they are what therapists call emotionally immature. I have forgiven them for my childhood. It was what it was.

The upshot is that no one really took care of me when I was young. I had to figure stuff out for myself and look after myself. I got so good at it that as an adult, I was suspicious of people who were very caring and kind. I married a good man but he iss stoic an unemotive. He is a good partner but is not tender and does not caretake with me or the kids. I am the caretaker in my family and I think I'm pretty good at it-- I just give my kids the stuff I know I missed out on and it seems to work well.

I've also been in therapy fory childhood and I have found ways to care for myself and extend kindness to myself. They call it reparenting. I do think it's important and I do that, though it is different than being cared for by someone else.

But as I approach 50, I find myself thinking about how I've never really felt taken care of, and how this still impacts me. I think it would be good for me to feel cared for in this way, even if only for a time.

Is there a way to feel truly cared for, at my age? Is think I'm going to get a lot of suggestions to go to a spa but I've done that and it's not the same. I am looking for a kind of emotional support, not physical care.

Is this a lost cause? Do I just need to let it go?

That's sad, because it is and because you are stuck in past. Past is just a story, move on like an adult. Do self care and/or seek therapy if needed and possible.

[Anonymous]

I get it, OP. I feel like this from time to time for reasons stemming from my childhood. It feels particularly acute around certain times of the year like Mother's Day, my birthday, and Christmas. I also feel it when life is really weighing me down for whatever reason. My DH is supportive and caring toward me, but that's a different relationship and will never fill that void for me. I also find a lot of comfort in being a mother but again, that's something different.

The reality is that you likely won't ever feel cared for in the way that you are missing. So while it might actually be too late for you to feel taken care of *in that way*, you have to find ways to move on and heal that void (or come close to doing so). Childhood trauma runs so deep, as you know. Maybe it's worth reexamining the work you've done up to this point in time to deal with that, including the reparenting, to see if you need to go back to that for a bit. Or perhaps you need to work on the acceptance piece of it. It certainly seems like something to continue exploring in therapy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am mid-40s and had a dysfunctional, abusive childhood. My parents also come from dysfunctional, abusive homes and they are what therapists call emotionally immature. I have forgiven them for my childhood. It was what it was.

The upshot is that no one really took care of me when I was young. I had to figure stuff out for myself and look after myself. I got so good at it that as an adult, I was suspicious of people who were very caring and kind. I married a good man but he iss stoic an unemotive. He is a good partner but is not tender and does not caretake with me or the kids. I am the caretaker in my family and I think I'm pretty good at it-- I just give my kids the stuff I know I missed out on and it seems to work well.

I've also been in therapy fory childhood and I have found ways to care for myself and extend kindness to myself. They call it reparenting. I do think it's important and I do that, though it is different than being cared for by someone else.

But as I approach 50, I find myself thinking about how I've never really felt taken care of, and how this still impacts me. I think it would be good for me to feel cared for in this way, even if only for a time.

Is there a way to feel truly cared for, at my age? Is think I'm going to get a lot of suggestions to go to a spa but I've done that and it's not the same. I am looking for a kind of emotional support, not physical care.

Is this a lost cause? Do I just need to let it go?

That's sad, because it is and because you are stuck in past. Past is just a story, move on like an adult. Do self care and/or seek therapy if needed and possible.

Some of these responses are very ignorant and limited. I think a lot of people have some healing to do, maybe.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP have you ever had the opportunity to take care of someone else? It is rewarding and it helps a person shed the need to be the cared for person.

I am a mother of two children and take care of them every day, yes. I also spent years caring for my parents. I also volunteered with kids for many years, coaching at a camp and providing reading tutoring.

I think caring for others can be healing but no I do not think it replaces the need to feel cared for.

It doesn't replace that need, but it can shift your focus away from it, for sure. You probably need some talk therapy and some SSRIs.

[Anonymous]

Be careful what you wish for. If you get an illness or disease, someone will take care of you, and you wouldn't want that. So just be happy you don't really need to be taken care of. Also you must be forgetting ways in which you were cared for. Someone probably changed your diaper and taught you how to eat solid food. Someone paid for the roof over your head.