"The disgust you feel at someone else's neediness may be the size of that need you were never allowed to have."
If this resonates with you, what follows may help you see something about yourself.
SeekerThere’s a woman on my team, Priya, and every time she asks for reassurance I want to leave the room. “Did I do this right? Are you sure it’s okay?” It’s constant. It makes my skin crawl.
GuideWhat’s the crawl like? Not what she does, the feeling in you.
SeekerLike watching someone beg. It’s undignified. Just do the work and stop fishing. You’d feel it too.
GuideMaybe. But I notice you want me to sign off on it. Like it matters that I agree she’s unbearable.
SeekerBecause she is. Is that not allowed?
GuideIt’s allowed. I’m just staying with the fact that “she asks for reassurance sometimes” and “I want to flee the building” aren’t the same size. The gap is the interesting part.
SeekerSo it’s my problem. Great.
GuideNot a problem. A clue. Disgust is a strong word for a coworker who checks her work.
SeekerIt’s not the checking. It’s the neediness. The needing to be told. There’s something weak in it. Needing someone else to hold you up.
GuideSay that again. “Needing someone to hold you up.”
GuideYou said it like it’s the worst thing a person can do.
SeekerBecause it is quite honestly. You handle yourself. You don’t hang off other people going please please tell me I’m okay. Nobody was there to do that for me and I turned out fine.
GuideThere it is, the rule. Handle yourself, nobody’s coming.
SeekerDon’t do the therapy thing.
GuideI’m not naming anything you didn’t just say. You said nobody was there and you turned out fine. That’s a lot to carry into how one coworker asks a question.
SeekerI didn’t have the luxury of asking. If I’d walked around like Priya I’d have been eaten alive. You learned fast or you didn’t get anything.
GuideSo she does the thing you weren’t allowed to do.
SeekerThat’s completely different. She’s not in danger. She just, she just gets to.
SeekerAsk. She gets to ask and someone answers her. And it’s fine.
SeekerI don’t, I don’t ask. That’s the whole point, I don’t do that.
GuideI’m not going to tell you what that is. But you went from disgust to “she gets to” pretty fast, and those don’t usually sit next to each other unless something underneath is a bit tangled.
SeekerIt’s not envy. Don’t say envy. I’m not jealous of a grown woman who can’t function without a pat on the head.
SeekerThe pat on the head. I said it like it’s pathetic. But I don’t actually know what that feels like. To ask and have someone just, answer you, easily. I genuinely don’t.
SeekerThat’s not, I’m not going to sit here and cry about a coworker. Forget it.
GuideYou don’t have to do anything with it. It’s just louder now than “she’s unbearable,” isn’t it.
SeekerA little. I don’t like it.
When did you learn that needing something from another person made you weak, and who taught you?
What actually shiftedDisgust at other people's neediness often points back at a buried need, not at their weakness. For some, needing was made shameful early, so it survives only as revulsion when someone else shows it openly. When that is the pattern, the contempt is usually the size of the need itself, not a judgment of the person who showed it.
Keeping the direction yoursIf you read back the conversation: notice where the guide quietly became the one who knows — naming things, settling them. That feels normal because it happens so often. It's also where your own sense of direction can go quiet. SelfChatter adds a second voice that just makes those moments visible, so the direction stays yours.