Every time my boyfriend leaves I feel sad.

Childhood rejection and abandonment issues can manifest in many ways during adulthood.  Sometimes in ways that we don't even notice. Working with your therapist to identify specific events when you felt abandoned early on is a good place to begin. Once you've got your target memories in place, you can begin to heal from these things.  You can begin reprocessing these events to file them more efficiently and effectively in your brain, thus creating new neuro-pathways to process current and future events in a healthier way.  You've taken the first step by identifying a troubling behavior and acknowledging its possible root cause.  The rest takes time, but self-awareness is a vital and fundamental piece of healing from trauma (and any other illness for that matter).

It is important that you have a therapist who you feel comfortable with.  Someone who takes the time to get to know you as an individual. There are several modalities of treatment that therapists engage in to address childhood traumatic events.  Sometimes, the mere act of saying these things out loud can alleviate symptoms and take the power away from them.  There is almost always an element of traditional talk therapy regardless of which modality you choose.  

Most therapists are trained well in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and will often ask you to identify faulty or distorted thinking patterns.  For example, when your boyfriend leaves, what is your automatic thought? (ie "He's never coming back", "I'm not good enough", or "something awful will happen to him").  They may challenge that thought or thinking pattern and ask you what evidence you have that those things are a possibility.  Solution-focused brief therapy interventions are often helpful and basically help you to identify all of the strengths you already possess from your past in order to get through difficult times now and in the future.  Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing therapy, if tolerated, basically simulates the Rapid Eye Movement period of your sleep cycle while you are awake in order to go through the memory, identify body sensations and emotions that come up while you are thinking about the memory, and typically results in alleviation in symptoms.  Of course these are very remedial and brief definitions and there are many more modalities that therapists use.  I strongly encourage you to research modalities of treatment that you are interested in.  Therapy is not a "one size fits all" sort of thing. 

No matter what modality of treatment you choose, the therapist/client relationship has proven to be the most notable predictor of outcomes.  Your therapist should be open to you asking questions of them, be accepting and non-judgmental, and should meet you where you are at. 

Addressing trauma history is not for the faint of heart.  It is hard emotional work and you will be exhausted on some therapy days. Make sure you prepare well by getting plenty of rest, taking time for self-care, and staying hydrated. 

Best wishes on your journey!

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Why do I get so emotional when my boyfriend leaves?

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