Many years ago, I saw parts of a movie called Ella Enchanted (some spoilers to follow). It follows a woman named Ella who was cursed as a baby to be obedient to a fault. She does whatever anyone tells her to do, even if she doesn’t want to do it or if it breaks the laws of physics. Recently, I realized how that idea can be an allegory for a specific trauma response that I’ve dealt with for most of my life: fawning.
In short, fawning is a trauma response in which you give in to whatever someone else wants in the hope that they will not hurt you or will stop hurting you if they are already doing so. This is often learned as a kid in order to stop abuse from parents. As sad as that is, it’s even worse when fawning continues into and throughout adulthood. This creates all kinds of issues with people pleasing, failing to stand up for oneself, giving in to bad things, rejecting good things, and so on. In the worst cases, this occurs in every relationship, whether familial, friendship, work, social, etc.
Although I’ve had plenty of experience with all of the four main trauma responses, fawning is by far my most common response. I’ve long felt intimidated by others, whether out of hoping they’ll like me or at least avoid hurting me, so it’s been far too easy for me to put their wants ahead of my needs. Some particularly traumatic experiences and misguided self-improvement work have exacerbated this. It got even worse after my dog Sawyer died. Since then, it’s been overall harder for me to say no, set and maintain boundaries, and avoid going along with others’ expectations of me due to the pain of Sawyer’s death and life without him. Even though this has eased up some as I’ve healed, it’s still worse now than it was when Sawyer was still alive.
There is some good news. Last Saturday, the Plushie Dreadful fawn I ordered arrived. He’s brought me so much comfort in the short time he’s been here. I named him Little Ian, both because he reminds me of how I was as a kid and also so that I can comfort both of us by saying nice, sweet, gentle, and loving things to him and myself by extension (both present me and my inner child) when I call him by his name. That’s been so helpful lately.
I also started rereading Boundaries by Henry Cloud and John Townsend and picked up Letting Go by David Hawkins from where I left off a few months earlier. Aside from bringing up lots of painful emotions, they’ve also been great reminders of wonderful things that have helped me tremendously in the past and have given me new ideas on how to remove the fawn response. It’s too soon to know if there’s been any lasting change from getting back into them, though.
My hope is that Little Ian, those wonderful books, and more emotional and boundary work will gradually bring me more confidence and peace. It’s hard to say if that will happen, given how much I’ve struggled with fawning throughout my life, and how each small amount of progress seems to be more than offset by a huge regression later on. Whether it happens soon or much farther down the road, I hope that they will help me to become free, just as Ella was able to become free after breaking her curse. I hope to have good news to report on this soon.