1 00:00:02,000 --> 00:00:10,000 Kati Morton - MFTI 2 00:00:10,000 --> 00:00:14,000 Hi there, it's Kati and I'm back again for this week's video 3 00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:19,000 Now, I'm just trying to mix up kind of how I do my videos, sometimes I get tired of standing 4 00:00:19,000 --> 00:00:22,000 in the studio with a plain background. Ugh! 5 00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:26,000 So we are mixing it up today. It is actually nicer to sit, to be honest. 6 00:00:26,000 --> 00:00:28,000 I feel more comfortable. 7 00:00:28,000 --> 00:00:32,000 But, today's video comes from some requests I've gotten. I believe this came from youtube. 8 00:00:32,000 --> 00:00:38,000 But, if not, I'm sorry. But today's topic is fear of abandonment. 9 00:00:38,000 --> 00:00:44,000 Now, I know that many of us struggle with us and I think it would be safe to say that everybody, 10 00:00:44,000 --> 00:00:51,000 at some point in their life, struggles with this because we do become attachted to people in our lives. 11 00:00:51,000 --> 00:00:55,000 Whether it's a parent or a best friend or a boyfriend, girlfriend, what have you 12 00:00:55,000 --> 00:01:01,000 and we get scared that they might leave sometime, right? Because we love them and we care about 13 00:01:01,000 --> 00:01:08,000 them and they are very important to us, and so that fear can sometimes make us do crazy things. 14 00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:11,000 Or it can even freeze us, where we can't even show them how much we care. 15 00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:14,000 Do you kinda know what I'm talking about? 16 00:01:14,000 --> 00:01:19,000 I know that a lot of you struggle with this and the reason being, from the therapeutic mind, 17 00:01:19,000 --> 00:01:28,000 if I'm talking as a therapist for just a minute, is that a lot of people with eating disorders also struggle 18 00:01:28,000 --> 00:01:31,000 with borderline personality disorder. 19 00:01:31,000 --> 00:01:33,000 And I don't know if any of you have heard of those terms, and if you haven't, 20 00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:39,000 don't even worry about it. But, those of you that maybe have been diagnosed with or known 21 00:01:39,000 --> 00:01:45,000 someone that has borderline personality disorder, they have a lot of trouble with this. 22 00:01:45,000 --> 00:01:48,000 Fear of abandonment is kind of what runs their life a lot. 23 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:53,000 And there are ways that you can recognise that you are struggling with it 24 00:01:53,000 --> 00:02:02,000 the first being that you kind of use your emotions and you're maybe your self harm behaviours 25 00:02:02,000 --> 00:02:07,000 as a way to blackmail someone. 26 00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:10,000 Now, what I mean by that is that almost emotional blackmail, like 27 00:02:10,000 --> 00:02:15,000 "If you don't do what I need from you, I'm going to kill myself, I'm going to overdose, I'm going to cut, 28 00:02:15,000 --> 00:02:22,000 I'm going to purge, I'm going to restrict, I'm going to whatever", right? 29 00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:28,000 We use our behaviours as a way to kind of blackmail them into doing what we want them to do. 30 00:02:28,000 --> 00:02:31,000 So, that's one way that you can kind of notice when you are doing things like that 31 00:02:31,000 --> 00:02:36,000 that you are engaging in this behaviour because of your fear of abandonment 32 00:02:36,000 --> 00:02:41,000 and just recognising that it is actually, that that's actually what you are worried about. 33 00:02:41,000 --> 00:02:47,000 About them leaving. It has nothing to do with this cutting, purging, binging, whatever behaviour. 34 00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:55,000 Also, another way, you can notice if you or someone else is acting out, is leaving relationships all the time 35 00:02:55,000 --> 00:02:58,000 You know those people who jump from relationships a lot? 36 00:02:58,000 --> 00:03:04,000 And I had a client actually who did this all through middle school, high school, through to college, 37 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:08,000 until we really got to talking about why she wouldn't stay with anybody for more than a couple of months. 38 00:03:08,000 --> 00:03:14,000 And her, she was honest with herself, and said "I'd rather leave them than have them leave me". 39 00:03:14,000 --> 00:03:19,000 Okay. Well that gives us something to work with, right? 40 00:03:19,000 --> 00:03:25,000 So just start noticing things that we do because of our fear that someone is going to leave. 41 00:03:25,000 --> 00:03:28,000 Okay? That is kind of the first step. 42 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:36,000 There is a lot of information about this topic, but I want to kind of keep it short to this one video. 43 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:38,000 And like I say, you can always leave comments below, let me know. 44 00:03:38,000 --> 00:03:42,000 And for my next video about this topic, if you feel that there needs to be a next video, 45 00:03:42,000 --> 00:03:45,000 you can let me know what you need more information on, okay? 46 00:03:45,000 --> 00:03:50,000 So we are noticing things that we do, whether we leave people really quickly, 47 00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:56,000 or we kind of emotionally blackmail them into coming to see us and spending time with us or, 48 00:03:56,000 --> 00:04:02,000 if someone threatens maybe to leave us, we threaten with a bigger, "I'm going to cut myself, I'm going to 49 00:04:02,000 --> 00:04:07,000 kill myself, all that stuff." Noticing that. But what do we do? 50 00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:11,000 Okay, so we do that. "Man, I do that all the time. Crap." 51 00:04:11,000 --> 00:04:16,000 Well, things that can be really helpful - spending time talking to our loved ones. 52 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:23,000 I know that sounds obvious, but just talking. We are not forcing them to do anything. 53 00:04:23,000 --> 00:04:27,000 We are not asking anything from them. We are not abandoning them, leaving them before they 54 00:04:27,000 --> 00:04:34,000 can leave us. We're spending time, we're enjoying the fact that we have people in our lives 55 00:04:34,000 --> 00:04:38,000 that are that important, okay? I know that sounds really simple, but that is usally the first step. 56 00:04:38,000 --> 00:04:43,000 And you can also make a list. Sometimes it helps to make a list of the people that are important to us. 57 00:04:43,000 --> 00:04:49,000 And journal about your feelings and if you have worries about them leaving you, what that 58 00:04:49,000 --> 00:04:52,000 would be like, to think it through. What would cause, why it would be caused? 59 00:04:52,000 --> 00:04:58,000 I know that it sounds silly to actually engage in that, but it can actually be helpful 60 00:04:58,000 --> 00:05:04,000 because we are playing it out without it actually happening and it gives us the ability to 61 00:05:04,000 --> 00:05:10,000 slow down, look at the situation and realise 'that person is there. They are there for the long haul. 62 00:05:10,000 --> 00:05:12,000 They care about us because of this, this and this'. 63 00:05:12,000 --> 00:05:18,000 And it can not only help us feel a little bit more secure, but it can also help build our self-esteem. 64 00:05:18,000 --> 00:05:26,000 So those are the first couple of ways that we can kind of counter-act our acting out because of our 65 00:05:26,000 --> 00:05:31,000 fear of abandonment. Is that clear? 66 00:05:31,000 --> 00:05:37,000 And another thing that we can do, just another quick tip, when you are worried that somebody is going 67 00:05:37,000 --> 00:05:42,000 to leave, or you are contemplating in that moment of time when you are going to call and you are going 68 00:05:42,000 --> 00:05:46,000 to blackmail, you're going to dump them, you are going to cut that friend out of your life, or whatever. 69 00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:53,000 Stop for a second and I want you to start journalling, I want you to write. I know that you are like 70 00:05:53,000 --> 00:05:57,000 "Kati, shut the heck up about that journal, I hate that journal". 71 00:05:57,000 --> 00:05:59,000 But I want you to write down what triggered it. What was it? 72 00:05:59,000 --> 00:06:05,000 Cause just like our eating disorders and our urges to binge and purge or whatever, 73 00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:11,000 there are triggers to this. It could be, they said that they'd meet up and they let you down. They 74 00:06:11,000 --> 00:06:17,000 didn't show up on time. Maybe they made a time to get together with you and then they cancelled. 75 00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:25,000 There are different things that will trigger this in us, and we will respond, either fight or flight, right? 76 00:06:25,000 --> 00:06:27,000 We either fight to get them to stay or we run away. 77 00:06:27,000 --> 00:06:33,000 We need to know what those triggers are so that we can work on them. 78 00:06:33,000 --> 00:06:37,000 We have to know what we're working on. It's the same as your eating disorder. 79 00:06:37,000 --> 00:06:40,000 If we don't know what's even causing it, what emotions are the most anxiety-provoking 80 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:46,000 and make the urges come full-bore, how are we going to get better, right? 81 00:06:46,000 --> 00:06:52,000 So what we're going to do, we are going to recognise the ways we counter-act our fear of 82 00:06:52,000 --> 00:06:57,000 abandonment, we are going to write about our triggers and we are going to remain in contact 83 00:06:57,000 --> 00:07:01,000 with people. We are going to call people who we care about. We are going to engage in conversation, 84 00:07:01,000 --> 00:07:07,000 help build that bond so that we feel a little bit more secure, okay? 85 00:07:07,000 --> 00:07:11,000 So I hope that's really clear. As I always say, leave your comments below. 86 00:07:11,000 --> 00:07:14,000 Don't forget to subscribe to my channel. 87 00:07:14,000 --> 00:07:17,000 I would love to get the feedback and I love hearing from all of you and all of your ideas for 88 00:07:17,000 --> 00:07:22,000 video topics and things that are interesting to you. I love getting that information. 89 00:07:22,000 --> 00:07:29,000 It's so helpful. And just think, by you giving me an idea for a topic, you are helping other people too. 90 00:07:29,000 --> 00:07:31,000 It's kind of a cool community that we are creating. 91 00:07:31,000 --> 00:07:34,000 And don't forget to check out my website, katimorton.com. 92 00:07:34,000 --> 00:07:37,000 for more information. I posted a workbook on there recently and you can download it for free. 93 00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:41,000 So check that out and let me know what you think. 94 00:07:41,000 --> 00:07:45,000 And just keep coming back as we work, one step at a time, towards a healthy mind and a healthy body.