Written by: Romana Hrivnakova, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Every child needs to be loved unconditionally by their parents. However, you might have noticed early on in your childhood that to feel loved and accepted by your parents required you to suppress your authentic self and develop a false self that was more acceptable and that gave you the desired love. Your parents' rejection of your authentic self was the most severe trauma you could have experienced as a child. And your inner child carried this trauma into adulthood, causing you to question who you are, keeping you stuck in a cycle of repeating poor choices (e.g., choosing toxic people as friends and partners), and reacting impulsively instead of maturely.
What is an Inner Child?
The concept of the inner child has been explored since the late 19th century in the work of various influential psychologists and psychoanalysts, such as Carl Jung, Sigmund Freud, Donald Winnicott, and Eric Berne, and more recently in the work of Alice Miller, John Bradshaw, and Richard Schwartz. They might have used different terms (e.g., child archetype, child ego state, wonder child) to describe this phenomenon, but they all acknowledged the inner child as a crucial part of who we are.
Even though this idea of the inner child has been around for a long time, you might find it challenging to imagine a little child within you who still yearns to be loved and accepted. However, we all have an inner child who is obviously not physically but figuratively real. This innocent part of yourself reflects who you were when you were born – a joyful, curious, and creative individual. But if you experienced a traumatic event, were neglected, rejected, ignored, or abandoned as a child, your inner child carries all your repressed feelings, unmet needs for love and safety and memories from your childhood that still continue to inform your behaviour and decisions, impact your relationships and how you feel as an adult. Your inner child is a representation of yourself at different points in your childhood. Thus, you have inner children from various ages (infant, toddler, preschool, school-age, and adolescent), and they can have both positive (e.g., curiosity, spontaneity, and playfulness) and negative (e.g., stubbornness and over-independence) traits, depending on your past experiences.
Rejection of Your Authentic Self
As a child, before you suffered trauma or attachment injury, you were naturally spontaneous, imaginative, courageous, and excited, and you lived in the now. You didn’t think about who you were supposed to be; you just were. You did what made you happy, and you freely expressed your feelings. You were your true authentic self.
You wanted your parents to love you unconditionally, but you might have noticed that who you were did not fit into who your parents wanted you to be. For instance, you might have observed that your father was nicer to you when you were quiet. He responded to your anger or cries with frustration, or he would raise his voice and tell you to go and see your mum and leave him alone. You might have also noticed that your mum was in a better mood when you were laughing, and she would often hug and kiss you. However, she didn’t like it when you were crying, and she was never affectionate when you cried. Sometimes she would even leave the room and leave you alone. You noticed how these different responses made you feel and adjusted your behaviour to feel loved and accepted. You suppressed your expression of emotions and would never cry in front of your parents, even if you wanted to, to avoid feeling rejected.
The ”Don’t be emotional” message is just one example of many messages you might have received from your parents. Other things your parents might have told you were, “ Stop making so much noise!”, “Why can’t you do anything right?”, “Leave me alone!”, “Why can’t you be more like your brother/sister?”, “You ruined my life!”. These messages would be of different importance to you, and along with the words, various tones, gestures, and your parents’ emotional expressions would be attached to them. You would think a certain way about each message, and you would experience certain emotions about them. Moreover, the consequences of what would happen if you did or did not follow these messages would determine their impact on your sense of self.
So, think about that small and innocent child you once were and how much you wanted to be loved by your parents. But all you could feel was that who you were and how you expressed yourself was rejected by the very people who were supposed to love you unconditionally. How did you, as a small child, deal with this rejection? You were powerless and dependent on your parents for survival. You needed to stay attached to them. So, you became who your parents needed you to be. You created a False Self to cover up and protect your true authentic self that was shamed and rejected to survive in your environment, avoid the pain, and stay attached to your parents.
How Did You Develop Your False Self?
Your early sense of self, this idea of who you were as a child, did not develop on its own. It developed within a relationship with your parents and was based on your observations of how you were perceived by others. Your early sense of self has continued to adapt throughout your life within the relationships you formed; however, your early perception of who you were is crucial in how you move forward in life.
The importance of our early sense of self was emphasized by Dr. Donald Winnicott, a prominent 20th-century pediatrician and psychoanalyst, who claimed that if who we were as children was not accepted, we developed a False Self to protect our vulnerable True Self. This False Self develops at a very young age when we are the most vulnerable.
As a child, you had lots of needs that you were unable to meet through your own resources, and you depended on your parents and others to fulfil those needs. However, if your parents couldn’t respond adequately or sufficiently, you might have started to believe that your needs and desires were not acceptable, and you adjusted your behaviour to stay connected with your parents and to avoid feeling inadequate, rejected, and unlovable.
For instance, as a child, you might have often run to your mum when upset, but she rejected your request for comfort by walking away. At some point, you stopped seeking comfort from your mum and started to act like you were fine. You learned that running towards mum when upset didn’t get you what you needed. But standing still and showing no emotion that would make your mum uncomfortable helped you seek proximity and connection to her. You developed a False Self, “I don’t need anyone”, and suppressed your need for comfort, love, and affection. Your True Self’s initial desire, “I want my mum to hold me and comfort me.” got pushed by the now stronger False Self “, I don’t need anyone”, out of your awareness and into your unconscious. Being repeatedly exposed to these experiences might have led to you becoming overly independent because you learned that you could not trust others to be there for you.
Adult Children
Have you ever talked to a 5-year-old in the body of a, let's say, 40-year-old? I know this might seem like a strange question, but I can guarantee you that you have. And you probably talk to them every day. And when their 5-year-olds trigger your emotionally wounded inner child…well, just picture two 5-year-olds with unmet emotional needs in different stages of a tantrum or in different modes of shut down attempting to have an adult conversation and make adult decisions. The way you respond to them in those situations that remind you of some painful event from your childhood will be the same as your original response (e.g., you get defensive, protective, shut down, or become quiet).
Sadly, many of us were hurt as children, and our inner child carries all our unmet childhood needs, unresolved traumas, and unhelpful patterns into adulthood. I used to work in a homeless shelter full of 5-year-old boys and girls who were sent out into the big and scary world and were told to act like men and women. Every day they tried to deal with grown-up problems and engage in grown-up relationships while being constantly influenced and guided by their inner children who were rejected, abused, abandoned, and neglected.
We don’t all end up homeless. And maybe because of that, it might be more challenging for you to realize that you are repeatedly influenced by your wounded inner child. You look like an adult, you seem to have it all together or at least you are coping, but you might be unaware that many of your emotional responses and behaviours are controlled by your inner child. Moreover, you might use destructive coping strategies (e.g., drugs, alcohol, gambling, shopping, cheating, food, procrastination) to cope with what happened in your childhood (e.g., abuse, emotional neglect, attachment wounds) or did not happen (e.g., lack of love, affection, or validation), often without realizing it.
“I believe that this neglected, wounded inner child of the past is the major source of human misery.” – John Bradshaw
At times, you might have said to yourself, “I’m an adult now, not a small child. I should know better.” Well, physically, you changed; you grew. However, your unresolved feelings, original responses to unresolved traumas, and coping strategies that helped you feel safe when you were a child are still ingrained in your body and mind. And they still affect you because your inner child carries your past memories. Thus, you need to heal your inner child to help yourself connect with your authentic feelings and needs and to resolve the emotions and trauma held in by your inner child. Moreover, you need to heal your inner child to avoid parenting your children with your frightened and wounded inner child in charge.
In the next article, I will share more about how to heal your wounded and lost inner child.
Visit my website for more info!
Romana Hrivnakova, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Romana Hrivnakova works as a Psychotherapist in Toronto. Romana has extensive experience working with individuals who use substances to cope with childhood trauma, overwhelming emotions, or painful life experiences. In her 13 years of working as a mental health and addiction professional, she obtained various degrees and diplomas; however, she places her experience of working in a homeless shelter in the UK for 9 years above all her qualifications. There she witnessed the terrible consequences of childhood trauma, attachment injury, and people’s desperate attempts to cope with what happened to them (or did not happen and should have happened) in their childhood. This experience and her childhood challenges and life experiences inspired Romana to help her clients connect with their wounded inner children and help them react to present and future challenges as adults rather than wounded children.
Resources:
Bradshaw, J. (1990). Homecoming: Reclaiming and healing your inner child. Bantam Books.
Jackman, R. (2020). Healing your lost inner child. Practical Wisdom Press.
Stewart, I., & Joines, V. (2012). TA Today: A new introduction to transactional analysis. Lifespace.
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