The Despair State

I often slip into this state at the smallest signs of rejection. Daniel Siegel writes: “For example, if an individual has been exposed to repeated neglect as a young child, a state of despair may have been activated and engrained. In this excessively low energy state, perceptions of the world are marked by a sense of rejection; emotions are filled with shame and hopelessness; memories may evoke previous experiences of being rejected; a model of the self as unlovable and of others as unavailable may be activated; and there may be a behavioral tendency to withdraw. Because this state of despair has been repeatedly activated, it will be more likely to be activated in response to even minor signs of rejection, such as a friend’s or therapist’s not returning a phone call on time. The change in state in response to this environmental context is a function, in part, of this individual’s history. The entire cluster, however, can quickly become the dominant information-processing mode at such a moment, giving the individual a sense of massive rejection and despair far exceeding the initial stimulus and not having any clear, consciously accessible connection to experiences from the past.”