Fawning

I learned a new term recently!

LET'S BLOG ABOUT IT.

**NOTE: I am not an expert on the topics we are about to cover. As will be glaringly obvious in the near future. The following words are my thoughts, opinions and understandings.**

I have two dear friends who recently unveiled this term to me; "fawning". As I understand it, it is under the same umbrella (of Trauma Response) as fight, flight and freeze. When I was younger, all we were taught about was fight or flight response. Is it a result of dissecting categories too far into a splinter that we have double the terms now? Or perhaps they have always very much existed and we are just newcomers to the land they've claimed in some of our lives? Interesting, perhaps, but another consideration for another time.

Fight: someone calls you a nerd and you punch them. Either with your words or your body parts.

Flight: someone calls you a nerd and you gtfo, hoping beyond all hope you can outrun them.

Freeze: someone calls you a nerd and you cease. To move, possibly to think... on a good day it may come out as an inaudible stutter.

NOW the one we've all assembled to hear about:
FAWN: Someone calls you a nerd and you STRONGLY agree, laugh unthreateningly, smile (but don't show too many teeth!) and somehow end up complimenting them. Cut to the weekend: you've bothered them with no less than sixteen text messages asking them to go out. It's all a blur, really, all you can remember is the word "drinks" and something about "my treat".

...Blast. Not again.

I'm not quite sure where to begin on this, and I already have so many thoughts pouring out of my ears, and so, this may be a two-parter. For now? Let's relate.

I typically feel very uneasy about sharing my similarities with disorders, isms... generally anything that could be misconstrued as an attempt to affirm my "special-ness". My individuality, so true that I really am the only one of my kind. ("I'm sure you wouldn't understand.") I hate that guy. Well, not hate. I am uncertain I truly hate anyone, I just find those people really obnoxious and awful. And since I feel the same way about hypocrites, I shall do my best to refrain from emitting either personality. (Scout's honor.) On the other hand, I just-as-much-ly do not wish to become a bully and/or terrible individual who makes others with certifiable isms and disorders feel less than. Feel as though they are just looking for attention; trying to be special. Or worse - that there's something wrong with them and it's their fault.

Yuck.

Having said that!
I can relate to this, especially in my personal relationships. The general ones (co-workers, people one runs into at the coffee shop, strangers...) not so much. Why? Because these kinds of people very typically do not matter to me, or at least not as much. I still hope they have a lovely day, but will not hesitate to shut them down when I deem necessary.

I believe it started as a need to put everyone (who matters) at ease by way of self deprecation (I was doing it before it was cool!). I would make jokes at my own expense because I knew I could take it, it would disarm the people around me and help them relax by informing them that I do not think I am in any way above them. As well as displaying my sense of humor, which would convey that they could immediately expand the topic of conversation in general. Plus I loved to make people laugh. Tale as old as time.

The trouble is, I had yet to uncover the underlying instinct: that I thought I had to work for compassion/care/love. From anyone. Which sprung from unhealthy patterns with my immediate family, naturally. And when you mix the underlying instinct with the innate ability to put myself down to bring a smile to others' faces, you've got a recipe for disaster (or rather for... dis-order??). It bears mentioning that this "fawning" reaction is separate from the choosing to make the decision to manipulate situations and make people like you. This is not such a general insecurity; fawning is much more instinctual. It really simply springs from this (subconscious?) understanding that if one desires love, one must work for it. It is earned. And it is never to cease being earned.

As mentioned in my previous blog (Family: Security v. Freedom), I do not necessarily have to fret about my fawning instincts with my family; I don't have much of them, and the ones I know I have love me unconditionally. My friends? I have learned to just relax and accept and if they don't love me, well, I suppose that's that. My central downfall is my romantic relationships. I am getting better, but there are still times I cannot seem to shake this guttural drive. This need to bury myself for love. And as it goes, this is to seal my fate: will I never be in an equal relationship because I simply will not trust that someone is simply "giving" me their love? Am I to be perpetually damned to the manipulation of an insecure man who will - either consciously or unconsciously - make me earn it?

(Tune in next time! Same blog time, same blog channel!)