FSA Recovery Affirmation: Honoring Our Needs

Reclaiming our right to have - and express - emotional and relational needs

As adult survivors of Family Scapegoating Abuse (FSA), we often carry deep-rooted patterns of minimizing our emotional and relational needs. In a family dynamic where we experience rejection, shame, and blame due to systemic issues and problems lurking beneath the surface, we learn early on to suppress our feelings to avoid further rejection, criticism, shaming, or emotional neglect and abandonment.

The intense shame associated with having perfectly healthy needs can make it feel dangerous to express vulnerability, and as a result, we might carry the weight of this conditioning into our adult relationships.

In truth, our emotions are not burdens, and our relationship needs are typically not “too much”. Having emotional needs and relational needs is a fundamental part of being human. Yet, for those of us who have experienced family scapegoating, the fear of past family dynamics repeating themselves makes it difficult to trust ourselves or others with our feelings. The harmful messages we received as children taught us that our needs were either invalid or burdensome, and that we should constantly hide them in order to avoid conflict or further psycho-emotional pain. These beliefs, however, are not truths—they are the scars of the past.