Have you ever felt like an outsider and does your gut feeling tell you, it might have something to do with the abuse, you survived?

Loneliness can be real tough to cope with on the healing journey. Not only because you might  need to distance yourself from the abuser, but also because sometimes you might feel the need  to retract from the world. You need time to heal and you need time to find yourself again.

If you’ve been abused while growing up, you might have been ostracised by your own family and as a consequence felt like an outsider all your life. There seems to  be a vicious rule that when you’re the one being picked on, your surroundings get the impression that this is just the way you’re supposed to be dealt with – even if they are usually not abusive people at all. In a very twisted way, this even makes sense. If you do not pick upon the person, everybody else is picking on, you’ll become an outcast yourself. It is a survival strategy within social circles, like families, friends or a workplace.

For the victim it quickly becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, a vicious circle and worst of all – it will become their  programming. It will leave them feel inadequate, worthless and alone.

Human beings are designed to socially interact and validate each other. It fuels our very being, our soul. We are social beings and being left outside of the circle is just not a healthy option. 

Some therapist would say that you need to give that validation to yourself. This is true, of course. But I’m sorry, I just don’t believe we can survive a lifetime just doing that –  we need to validate ourselves for sure, but we also need to surround ourselves with good (in the truest sense of the word) and loving (again, in the truest sense of the word) people, who are willing to support us. 

If you are denied the support, the love or in some cases the bare recognition of your existence, your soul will inevitably suffer.

Once this false and horrible programming has been induced, our experience will be pretty much the same, everywhere we go – school, work or social gatherings. It doesn’t really matter where and when it started, as long as you believe in the message that you are the proverbial black sheep and that you don’t deserve to be part of the team. 

In turn, abusers will sense that about you and knowingly or not, they will sniff you out as someone ready to be abused. The bully at school just as much as your narcissistic co-worker or your psychopathic boss. You may figure out decades later, that your childhood friend has not invited you to certain gathering on purpose, just to keep you out of the loop. Or you may come into the office saying good morning to everybody and get no response whatsoever. They will just ignore you, because that narcissistic co-worker has been talking badly about you and now they believe that you are an awful person. 

You might ask the professor a question, after a lecture at your university and have them brush you off, because that fellow psychopath student has a personal relation to them and has been talking smack about you. People often just don’t realise that they are being manipulated.

It could really be anybody ostracising you, while you are left out in the cold, having no idea what you’ve done to deserve this. 

It is a technique abusers use on top of the initial abuse, to keep you isolated. It is, of course, abusive in itself to intentionally and under handedly put someone in the position of an outsider. 

And then the vicious cycle starts. You feel like an outsider and that you don’t really belong – anywhere. You may develop a need for solitude in the disguise of peace and quiet, as people don’t seem to want you being around anyways. 

If you were the scapegoat in your family, part of the abuse might have been that your feelings were never validated. When you needed help or support  you were ignored. At a family reunion, you would be the only one not included in all the fun and chatter. But again, there are unfortunately many other settings like your workplace, school or circle of friends where this might happen to you. And it can get to a larger scale, where you just don’t feel accepted by society as a whole. 

That’s when it might become your own choice to retreat to find your strength again. You seek solitude, because you might be scared to burst into tears publicly at any time, if triggered. You become doubtful about who you are and even question your right to exist. 

So, if you have a background like this – be it your upbringing, school, work or your circle of friends etc., it is really important to find a new family. Don’t lock yourself away – I have done that for sure and it made things worse. It is better to look out for those good people and they are to be found everywhere, just like the abusers. I promise! 

If you don’t feel like you can connect to people at work or school, you can find support groups online, you can join meet-up groups or talk to a therapist. This may not sound like much, but  it is a start. It is the first step into your new life. I know from personal experience that it will help you cope. And more and more you’ll be able to attract a new circle of people, who will be there for you just like you will be there for them. 

Because you deserve it, you deserve better, you do deserve to be a part of life! You are worthy, you are loveable and your existence matters!