Needy Is Never Attractive

“You're a needy girl, I can tell when I look in your big brown eyes.
You want my world, but how can I do yours if I can't do mine?
…It's all about what you want, what you say, how you feel, how you play the game.
You're a needy girl, and you want my world.
I try to change, knowing it's not the same.
(Phone conversation)
"Hello? Hey what's up baby?
Yeah, I'm in the studio right now, I'll call you later.
Nah, I really can't talk right now, I'll just call you back, alright?
I-I can't talk right now, I'll just call you later.
Yo, what? Yo, I can't, look.. Yo, whatever!"

Chromeo, Needy Girl (2004)

Needy isn’t attractive. And yes, when we are feeling needy, someone can look into our big brown eyes and see the neediness. We project it. We project insecurity, emotional and physical deprivation, desperation, anxiety and the intense need for immediate gratification.

We may even look like an extremely distraught puppy. The problem is that neediness is cute in a puppy, but it’s repulsive in a human being. People pick up on the needy vibes we’re projecting and they themselves become anxious; anxious to escape from us.

I love the phone conversation midway through Chromeo’s song Needy Girl. It perfectly captures the neediness of the codependent crazies. When we are feeling needy we are completely out of control. All sense and reason fly out the window with our personal pride. We call someone (usually are chosen savior) and we don’t care how much we are bothering him or her. We don’t care that it’s only been a day or a few hours since we last called. We don’t care that they are busy, that they are at work or that they have a life of their own. We are an emotional mess and we need them to put out the fire of our anxiety, of our self-loathing, of our miserable existence!

And that’s all we’re concerned about. We don’t care that we are stressing them out and pushing them out of our lives, until they finally abandon us. And we aren’t interested in doing the one thing that would make all of the difference in the world: Helping ourselves.

We don’t want to go there. We don’t want to be responsible for us. We want someone else to do it all, make us OK, turn our lives around and ensure us of everlasting happiness. But we are the only one who can do that.

Next time we are feeling needy, what we really need is to ask ourselves “What can I do to help myself? What is this needy feeling telling me that I am neglecting about myself? How can I help me to feel better?” In asking these questions we need to search for healthy solutions, like “Maybe I need to go for a walk and talk with my Higher Power,” or “Maybe I need to get my finances in order, call my credit card companies and work out a way to pay my bills responsibly,” or “Maybe I need to take time enough to prepare some healthy food for myself so I think and feel better, instead of stuffing my face with crap that’s killing me.”

The proper answers to the questions above are NEVER “I need a drink,” or “I need a cheesecake,” or “I need to go shopping” or “I need to busy myself with work, work, work.” Those are addictive-medications, not solutions, and they create problems instead of solving them.

If we are feeling needy, we can also reach out and call someone other than a person that we are codependently attached to or obsessing over. We can call a member of our recovery group (Most recovery groups offer telephone sheets so people can help each other), or we can call a friend or family member we trust, or we can call a therapist. Talking with someone can help us regain mental clarity and emotional balance.

The important thing to remember is that we have to be responsible for our needy feelings. We have to meet our needs as well as we can and allow others to help us in ways that we can’t help ourselves. But we can never rationally expect someone else to rescue us from our neediness. That’s no one’s job but ours.