So I’ve been doing some reading on Inner Child work as a method of working through past trauma. While parts of the process trigger the “bullshit alarms” ingrained from my father about “New Age crap,” I can see the merits and the potential for real change in myself (Man, I swear I need to be deprogrammed like someone who’s been brainwashed. At least the way brainwashing is portrayed in movies, because I have no idea how it really works).
The very basic idea is that “Inner child work involves self-discovery of all the emotions and memories one is forced to repress. The idea of inner child work is to get into contact with, listen to, and nurture inner children to find and heal the issues one may be facing in adulthood” (“Healing Trauma Through Inner Child Work”).
It makes sense. If I have a damaged inner child (or children), it makes sense that I still buy stuffed animals and the softest blankets I can find. It makes sense that when my husband and I have a misunderstanding, I cower in a fetal position with a blanket and stuffed polar bear. It makes sense that I often feel stuck in my interpersonal development, that I am somehow still 11 years old and only pretending to be an adult. And it makes sense that I cringe at loud noises and completely shut down if someone raises their voice at me. It’s almost like parts of me are stuck at different ages, different points in my life.
I’ve often felt fragmented.
I’m not suggesting I have Dissociative Identity Disorder (formerly Multiple Personality Disorder); I just mean that I don’t always respond in predictable, consistent, or age-appropriate ways.
Oh wow, so it just occurred to me that I respond differently depending on what memories are triggered by the situation. For example, if someone I see as an authority figure is angry and yelling at me or because of something I could be held responsible for, I freeze and do my best to be invisible and silent, so as not to provoke my father any further, because that’s where memory takes me. If someone is yelling at or hurting someone else, I feel a surge of protective anger and come to the defence of the person being attacked, like when 13-year-old me punched my father in the side and back to try to make him stop hurting my brother (See, my dad used to wrestle with my older brother to prove his dominance; it was okay when my brother was smaller and weaker, but when he started actually challenging my father, he would hurt my brother in order to win). If someone is hurt or panicking, and I feel I am responsible for them in the situation, I calmly deal with it, suppressing my emotional response. If someone is hurt or panicking, and I’m not in a position to be responsible for it, I become a small child, helpless and terrified, as though I’m cowering under a desk again, listening to my mother scream.
This makes so much sense. But where to start.
Holy crap, what a mess.
Maybe I should start with the basic question: What does my inner child (children) need?
To feel safe
To not feel alone
To be protected
To be cherished
To be heard
To be valued for existing
To be held
To not be responsible for everything
To not have such high expectations placed on her
To be allowed to be tired
To be allowed to fail
To be allowed to make noise
To be allowed to not have the answer, the fix
To not be completely prepared for every possibility
To not be in charge
To not have to manage everything
To be allowed to have an opinion
To be allowed to have needs and desires
To be creative
To be playful
To seek beauty
To explore
To breathe deeply and alone
To try new things
To be allowed to contradict, to disagree
To rest
To cry without judgment
To be able to say no
Well, that snowballed rather quickly. I started with one thing, and more and more just spilled out, things that I feel far more intensely than I realized. This is a little overwhelming.
I’m not good about allowing myself to need things, and that’s a long list of needs. I’m supposed to meet other people’s needs and wants, not my own.
It’s not okay to need. That’s selfish. And weak.
Ugh.
Search my past for unmet needs and try to meet them when I’m not allowed to even acknowledge that I have needs?
Simple assignment, right?
Ugh.