A lack of true unconditional love in childhood isn't just challenging—it's traumatic. This type of trauma is known as relational trauma. Children who feel that parental love may be taken away at any moment experience chronic, ongoing anxiety and stress. And these feelings don't usually go away as they get older.
Specifically, compared to people with less skin hunger, people who feel more affection-deprived: are less happy; more lonely; more likely to experience depression and stress; and, in general, in worse health. They have less social support and lower relationship satisfaction.
It can be difficult to feel loved, cared for, or liked.
If you had negative childhood experiences of neglect or abuse, it can create a core belief that your true self is not acceptable or even damaged. Therefore, it can make you feel unloved even when loved.
For example, a lack of physical contact may increase feelings of stress, anxiety, and depression. One 2017 study highlights that affectionate touch promotes psychological well-being. Therefore, it is possible that a lack of contact could put a person's mental and emotional health at risk.
Some mental health examples include depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, or even obsessive compulsive disorder. When someone is under distress due to an imbalance of emotions, then they are less like to show their partner affection.
Emotional withholding is a form of passive-aggressive behavior which qualifies as emotional abuse. Partners often resort to withholding affection as a form of punishing the other person even if they might not realize it.
“Simply put, avoidant abuse is someone willingly withdrawing affection with the specific goal to hurt your feelings or control you. It's a form of psychological abuse that's particularly cutting, since humans need love and affection in order to feel happy in a relationship.”
When you don't get enough physical touch, you can become stressed, anxious, or depressed. As a response to stress, your body makes a hormone called cortisol. This can cause your heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, and breathing rate to go up, with bad effects for your immune and digestive systems.
The effects of touch starvation can be widespread and may include increased symptoms of anxiety, stress, depression, and even physical health conditions. For example, heightened stress levels result in the release of cortisol in the body which can raise heart rate and blood pressure.
Intrusive memories
Recurrent, unwanted distressing memories of the traumatic event. Reliving the traumatic event as if it were happening again (flashbacks) Upsetting dreams or nightmares about the traumatic event. Severe emotional distress or physical reactions to something that reminds you of the traumatic event.
Initial reactions to trauma can include exhaustion, confusion, sadness, anxiety, agitation, numbness, dissociation, confusion, physical arousal, and blunted affect. Most responses are normal in that they affect most survivors and are socially acceptable, psychologically effective, and self-limited.
You may have more emotional troubles such as: Feeling nervous, helpless, fearful, sad. Feeling shocked, numb, or not able to feel love or joy. Being irritable or having angry outbursts.
unaffectionate Add to list Share. Other forms: unaffectionately. Someone who's unaffectionate is cold, unemotional, or unfriendly. If you were hoping for a cuddly pal, you might be a little disappointed in your unaffectionate guinea pig. You can also call an unaffectionate person aloof.
Being touch starved is also known as touch deprivation or skin hunger and it is more common than you think. This phenomenon can result from various factors, such as social isolation, personal circumstances, or even cultural norms that discourage physical affection.
Being averse to hugs can also result from trauma, experts believe. “These experiences are all stored in the body, and they interfere with experiencing pleasure from touch… When trauma is stored in implicit memory in the body, people don't like to be hugged or touched.
“People who have higher levels of social anxiety, in general, may be hesitant to engage in affectionate touches with others, including friends.” And the fear of someone 'reaching out'—literally and figuratively—can make that discomfort even worse, she warns. There's also a cultural component to being hug avoidant.
Your stress levels can go up
When you go without your usual interactions—like hugging, cuddling, kissing, etc. —your brain also starts to release more of the stress hormone, which is called cortisol, Dr. Jackson says. As time goes on and you don't receive physical touch to relieve it, you will start to feel wound up.
Touch deprivation can increase stress, depression, and anxiety, and lead to numerous additional negative physiological effects. Individuals who go without positive physical touch for a long period can even suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Touch deprivation, or skin hunger as it's sometimes known, is a condition that arises when we have little or no physical contact with others. This condition appears to be more prevalent in western countries, as we tend to engage in friendly touch less often than in other parts of the world.
One of the most common ways psychopathic individuals toy with their victims is through a manipulation tactic known as withholding. After they idealize you in the honeymoon phase, they begin to deliberately withhold elements of the relationship which directly contribute to intimacy and a sense of personal security.
People who gaslight may withhold in the relationship. This may involve a cycle of giving then withholding affection, sex, compliments, money, or even celebrating special occasions.
Withholding is similar to gaslighting as it makes you feel shut out, unimportant, isolated, ignored and disempowered. It is especially damaging because the victim often doesn't recognize it as a form of abuse. Instead, they believe they are not worthy of getting their needs and desires met.