Abandonment Quotes

“Wherever you will go,
I will let you down,
But this lullaby goes on.”
― Sarah Dessen, This Lullaby

“...I will exile my thoughts if they think of you again, and I will rip my lips out if they say your name once more. Now if you do exist, I will tell you my final word in life or in death, I tell you goodbye.”
― Knut Hamsun, Hunger

“Absence is a house so vast that inside you will pass through its walls and hang pictures on the air.”
― Pablo Neruda

“A generous heart is always open, always ready to receive our going and coming. In the midst of such love we need never fear abandonment. This is the most precious gift true love offers - the experience of knowing we always belong.”
― Bell Hooks, All About Love: New Visions

“You left me."
Not realizing until I've said my final good-bye and closed the door behind me, that he's not referring to the past.
He's prophesying our future.”
― Alyson Noel, Blue Moon

“We walked to meet each other up at the time of our love and then we have been irresistibly drifting in different directions, and there's no altering that.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

“Perfectionism is the unparalleled defense for emotionally abandoned children. The existential unattainability of perfection saves the child from giving up, unless or until, scant success forces him to retreat into the depression of a dissociative disorder, or launches him hyperactively into an incipient conduct disorder. Perfectionism also provides a sense of meaning and direction for the powerless and unsupported child. In the guise of self-control, striving to be perfect offers a simulacrum of a sense of control. Self-control is also safer to pursue because abandoning parents typically reserve their severest punishment for children who are vocal about their negligence.”
― Pete Walker

“Go oft to the house of thy friend, for weeds choke the unused path.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

“The sun does not abandon the moon to darkness.”
― Brian A. McBride, Dominion

“Recently abandoned women can be complicated.”
― Elizabeth Kostova, The Historian

“Just — just to be clear,” he said. “You want to leave Tonks at her parents’ house and come away with us?”
“She’ll be perfectly safe there, they’ll look after her,” said Lupin. He spoke with a finality bordering on indifference. “Harry, I’m sure James would have wanted me to stick with you.”
“Well,” said Harry slowly, “I’m not. I’m pretty sure my father would have wanted to know why you aren’t sticking with your own kid, actually.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

“Since the earliest period of our life was preverbal, everything depended on emotional interaction. Without someone to reflect our emotions, we had no way of knowing who we were.”
― John Bradshaw, Healing the Shame that Binds You

“And what if---what are you if the people who are supposed to love you can leave you like you're nothing?”
― Elizabeth Scott, The Unwritten Rule

“Not belonging is a terrible feeling. It feels awkward and it hurts, as if you were wearing someone else's shoes.”
― Phoebe Stone, The Romeo and Juliet Code

“When loneliness is a constant state of being, it harkens back to a childhood wherein neglect and abandonment were the landscape of life.”
― Alexandra Katehakis, Mirror of Intimacy: Daily Reflections on Emotional and Erotic Intelligence

“I was alone. I had no one. No mother, no father, no brothers, no sisters, no grandmas, no grandpas, no uncles, no aunties, no cousins, and no tribe. I’d seen the children at the orphanage laugh or cry when they received news about a family member. I would never receive such news and no family would laugh or cry for me. That day I understood with sharp clarity that I didn’t have a mother who wanted me.”
― Maria Nhambu, Africa's Child

“I clung to books and words because, unlike people, they’d never abandon me.”
― Ruta Sepetys, The Fountains of Silence

“Now, now." He smiles, "Don't you worry 'bout a thing. Damen's right where you left him. Though I must say I can't believe that you left him. I underestimated you. I had no idea. Though I can't help but wonder how Damen would feel if he knew. I bet he underestimated you too.”
― Alyson Noel, Blue Moon

“every loss, every mistake, was seared into her soul, creating a different kind of tattoo, one made from rage and abandonment, heart break and tears”
― Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

“Leaving would imply suitcases and empty drawers, and late birthday cards with ten-dollar bills stuffed inside.”
― Julie Kagawa, The Iron King

“The person whom you really, really love may not be here anymore. And you might be feeling lonely, but, there are people in this world who really, really love you, so shouldn't that equal it all out? So, please don't ever think that you're alone. I'll be watching over you. I'll always be watching over you. I promise to always watch over you. You're not alone.”
― Yuuki Obata, We Were There, Vol. 1

“The fear of abandonment forced me to comply as a child, but I’m not forced to comply anymore. The key people in my life did reject me for telling the truth about my abuse, but I’m not alone. Even if the consequence for telling the truth is rejection from everyone I know, that’s not the same death threat that it was when I was a child. I’m a self-sufficient adult and abandonment no longer means the end of my life.”
― Christina Enevoldsen, The Rescued Soul: The Writing Journey for the Healing of Incest and Family Betrayal

“The feeling of abandonment overwhelmed me as I realised that no one had waited, or cared where I was.”
― Emily Williams, Letters to Eloise

“There must be different kinds of loneliness, or at least different degrees of loneliness, but the most terrifying loneliness is not experienced by everyone and can be understood by only a few. I compare the panic in this kind of loneliness to the dog we see running frantically down the road pursuing the family car. He is not really being left behind, for the family knows it is to return, but for that moment in his limited understanding, he is being left alone forever, and he has to run and run to survive. It is no wonder that we make terrible choices in our lives to avoid loneliness.”
― Charles M. Schulz, You Don't Look 35, Charlie Brown!

“Abandonment doesn't have the sharp but dissipating sting of a slap. It's like a punch to the gut, bruising your skin and driving the precious air from your body.”
― Tayari Jones, Silver Sparrow

“Mỗi lần rời khỏi một nơi nào đó, thật khó để phân biệt, chúng tôi bỏ đi hay chạy trốn.”
― Nguyễn Ngọc Tư, Cánh Đồng Bất Tận

“...in addition to feeling sick and tired and feverish and nauseated, I also felt forgotten. And there was no easy cure for that.”
― Sarah Thebarge

“The sun loved me again when it saw that the stars would not abandon me.”
― Jenim Dibie, The Calligraphy of God

“When he left us, he stole all the words.”
― Alex George, Setting Free the Kites

“It was more likely the fear of emptiness, of being left alone in a shadow world when everyone else abandoned me, each for his or her own reality, a desperate urge for action, for once in my life to take my fate in my hands. I wanted a place in the real world, wanted something concrete, tangible to cling to - something that was visible to others. I said to myself that I'd had enough of substitutes.”
― Ebba Haslund, Nothing Happened