Let’s do a little experiment. Let’s try to remember a hug, a kiss or an act or situation where you knew you were loved. Let us remember the situation, the inner warmth that comes from the chest and expands to the rest of the body. If we speak of love, let us relive the sensations that ran through every part of our being.

Now let’s imagine that this situation will never happen again, that no one will reciprocate your affection or even that what you experienced is nothing but a lie. How would we feel? That is what happens to those people who are afraid of not being loved .

The need for love and affection

We all need to love and be loved. To feel affection is a need that the human race has had since the beginning of its existence, and that deep down is a basic survival mechanism in a gregarious species like ours. It is a need that we have since the earliest childhood, and that will mark the way in which we perceive ourselves, others and the world in general.

Thus, affection is one of the elements that help us to understand the world and our own identity , being a basic need. But not everyone loves us, nor does everyone like us: throughout our lives we are going to be rejected, ignored or avoided by someone, just as we are not going to love everyone.

It is something that usually does not take away our sleep, but under certain circumstances some people sometimes extrapolate to their immediate environment and to humanity as a whole: it can awaken the fear of not being loved.

Now, having on occasion the fear of not being loved or of being rejected is not something strange depending on the situation we are living in. The fear of not being loved can arise for practically anyone at some point in life, but if we are faced with a constant and persistent fear over time it becomes a problem that causes serious difficulties for the person who suffers it.

Fear of not being loved: the basics

The fear of rejection or not being loved obviously generates a great deal of personal suffering. The person becomes focused on pleasing others and seeking the approval of the environment, or avoiding putting his or her fear to the test. In many cases, the way of acting is even shaped and adjusted to what others demand, becoming chameleon-like in order to please.

It is frequent that although these people wish to be loved and cherished, they unconsciously look for signs that confirm their fear, being much more likely to attribute gestures, ways of speaking, jokes or attitudes to the dislike they consider others have for them. Thus, the fear of not being loved goes in most cases along with the fear of being rejected.

Another aspect that can be relatively frequent is that those who have a permanent fear of not being loved feel strange, out of place, as if they do not belong to any of the environments they are in. They may also feel empty and lacking in anything that makes them interesting. It is usually linked to a lack of self-esteem or self-acceptance.

Also, in some cases, relationships with others based on fear of being unloved stop focusing on what we like about the other person to focus on what he or she will think of us and to make those thoughts more favorable to us. In other words, the relationship ceases to be sincere to be a (sometimes desperate) search to be loved by someone. In short, it can go from “I want you around because I want you” to “I want you because I need you”.

How can someone act out of fear of not being loved?

One of the most frequent consequences of the fear of not being loved is that the person who has it focuses excessively on pleasing others . Based on this need, they may assume a submissive and/or dramatic role, seeking to attract attention continuously or doing almost everything that is asked of them or supporting humiliation in order to have someone by their side. In these cases it is even possible that the person denies and cancels part of his way of being in order to please, assuming a different role from the one he would normally take.

Another possible consequence of this fear is the opposite of the previous one. Paradoxically, the fear of not being loved can also cause the person who suffers it to avoid contact with others and become socially isolated in order to avoid a possible rejection that clearly indicates (from his or her perspective) that he or she is not loved.

What does it come to?

Although people with this fear do not have to have suffered any kind of problem at a vital level, the truth is that it is much more frequent in subjects with some characteristics and concrete experiences.

People who are afraid of not being loved often have very low self-esteem and little appreciation of themselves. They tend to underestimate themselves and see themselves as unimportant . In most cases they are insecure and have a high sensitivity that makes them feel very strongly. Sometimes they have unrealistic expectations about themselves or about the world, setting themselves goals that are too high to achieve or expecting everyone or at least those they know to like their way of being.

In many cases we are dealing with people who have suffered some kind of abuse in childhood or throughout their development. Overly rigid or punitive parenting guidelines can make them feel inadequate and inferior.

The opposite extreme, overprotection by the family , can also generate this fear when they go outside and encounter an environment that protects them and treats them in the same way. And we are not only talking about family abuse: also the experience of continuous school harassment or bullying can be (by itself or accompanied by other abuses) one of the causes or motives that can generate the fear of not being loved and being hypersensitive to rejection.

Another frequent reason is the existence of abandonment: children who have been abandoned by one or both parents or who have grown up in social institutions may feel unloved by the environment and come to believe that no one or very few people can do so. It can also arise after a break-up or after several love rejections.

Possible consequences

The persistent fear of not being loved can, as we have mentioned above, have more or less severe consequences on the person’s behaviour.

One of the possible problems is that they engage in behavior that actually leads to being unappreciated. Excessive avoidance of contact or the continuous emission of behaviours that seek to attract attention may end up causing them to be rejected in the end or their contacts with others to be merely superficial, which in turn will encourage fear and continuation of their behaviours. Thus, an effect of self-fulfilling prophecy would be generated: even if the person was not initially rejected, his way of acting when thinking such a thing generates that he ends up being rejected.

Another problem is exhaustion: not being able to be yourself and forcing yourself to be something you’re not wastes a lot of resources, which in the long run can lead to anxiety and depression. It can also lead to social phobia.

It can also lead, in extreme cases, to accepting or not reporting specific abuses. For example, in many cases of women (or men) who suffer mistreatment by their partners, these abuses are not reported because of fear, both of the possible consequences and of being left alone without that person (something that on the other hand many aggressors tend to promote by distancing the victim from her close environment). Or even if there is no direct abuse, it can also occur in the academic or work environment or even at the level of family and friends, putting up with abusive treatment and degrading conditions or simply not acting as they are to be liked.

If the fear is permanent and is established early in life, it can cause problems in the acquisition of an integrated identity , or even lead to the emergence of personality disorders. Two of the most typical examples are dependent personality disorder and histrionic personality disorder, although other problems such as narcissism may arise among other elements of this fear.

Can it be changed?

People who suffer from the fear of not being loved (understood as something permanent and not as something specific that, we repeat, can happen to almost anyone) are also often afraid that this situation will be perpetuated and never change.

However, the truth is that this fear can be treated. Training in social skills and assertiveness can be useful for this, as well as cognitive restructuring of beliefs (about themselves and others) and dysfunctional expectations. One can work on the fact that personal relationships do not depend only on the subject and his/her behaviour but also on the other party, as well as try to generate alternative interpretations of what the subject considers evidence of not being liked.

It is also useful to show that rejection is something that we all experience at some time, and to relativize the importance of this fact. It can even be useful to put us in the worst scenario and decatastrophy that someone does not want us.

The practice of role-playing and expressive therapies can allow the patient to manifest the suffering that this fear causes them. The use of behavioural treatments is also very useful (although the latter may be difficult for the patient to assume). Finally, group therapy can be a useful and effective mechanism to help the patient improve their situation when facing fear in a social way.