Dear Dee,

Despite having some deep childhood wounds which I am aware of, I know I have a lot of people who love and care about me.

That’s wonderful!

However, it seems to me that there was a particular person (or more of them?) who didn’t love you and didn’t care enough for you in your childhood? More specifically, they didn’t want to get to know you. I say this because you mentioned several times the pain of your work colleagues not putting an effort to get to know you:

They barely ask me anything personal like how was my weekend or birthday and I feel like no one has put in effort to really get to know me or care.

I want to feel connected in a team and know I’m part of a work family.

And then I blame myself for being upset that they don’t like me because I’m not showing them who I really am.

How I do let go of all this fear and constant craving of external validation? Especially from co-workers who don’t truly know me?

My guess is that you are re-experiencing the pain of rejection, or perceived rejection, by a particular person or persons in your childhood. You would like to be liked and accepted by your work colleagues and be a part of a work family. But your colleagues don’t seem to accept you into their family… in your eyes, they don’t even want to get to know you. As a result, you feel rejected and you freeze (I am extremely reserved at work and almost get social anxiety), not being able to act spontaneously and “not showing them who I really am“.

Does this sound plausible to you?