If Your Inner Child Doesn't Trust You

[freakofnurture]

What to do? - Longish explanation ahead.

I feel she's up and about and I want to connect to her. The feelings coming from her are mostly sadness, distress, anxiety, desparation and loneliness. I know it would be good for me to talk to my husband about this, to open up, if only to let him know what's going on inside me. But I can't. The thought of telling him that I'm feeling unwell is scary. I don't see the use, emotionally, and I'm deathly afraid that he might disapprove of me or be annoyed with the way I'm 'acting up'.

I know those are old feelings, and that - aside from talking to my husband - I should do things that would cheer a 3rd grader up. But my Inner 3rd Grader can't be lured out of her moping by gifts, cake, baby animals, ice cream... She only gets aggressive and tells me that I don't even like her (which is true, but I don't dislike her neither) The only time she's distracted and calm is when she gets to draw with colour pencils; she's not particularly enthusiastic about drawing, too, though.

When I leave her alone she either goes to bed to daydream or stares at the little mossy swamp biotope that I grow in a yoghurt glass (no, that's not a euphemism for moldy food).

I sent her to my Inner Helper and she has no problem trusting him. I can actually feel her loosen up when she's with him, but as soon as I try to interact with her she snaps shut again, turns her back, and if she had spines she'd rattle them and prop them up to make me go away. Then it's back to moping and not wanting to do anything.

 

[Srain]

Does she come out to your therapist?? Because it could be that if you are able to take the time to get her to draw then maybe your tdoc and you might be able to figure out what she is trying to say.

Seems to me you know the answer, it's in your post. Taking the time to sit down and let her colour with pencils. She has something to show you. I'm not sure why this is the problem, a lot can come out of pictures if read right. Maybe she isn't old enough to communicate any other way. Maybe something happened when she tried to actually tell someone something about what was going on and asked for help. There could be a multitude of reasons why but this is the method she feels most comfortable and safe. .

Just my opinion but you may want to speak to your tdoc about it.

Rain

 

[Froggie]

How so interesting Freakofnuture, I also had a hard time with my inner child until I realized that the child thought she had to act and assume adult and parental behavior. I was depriving her of being just that ... a child. I still have vulnerability issues which I have to deal with, but I have found that when I'm around kids, my inner child becomes nutured and grows healthier. I still have to be firm when I get panicked as I know that it is my inner child that is automatically taking the commands so I have to tell her/me, it's not the child that has to deal with this but the adult or the parent ... depends on the situation. Don't despair, you'll find that communication link/canal with your child. Silly question ... do you trust her ?

 

[freakofnurture]

Does she come out to your therapist??

She beamed herself out of my consciousness some time before my last T session started. I tried to talk about her to my T, and it felt really odd.

Seems to me you know the answer, it's in your post. Taking the time to sit down and let her colour with pencils. She has something to show you

That's a good idea.

I let her draw twice today (to humor her, basically), both times until she got tired and 'left'. She drew/painted butterflies.

We had an 'argument' right after my T session, where she snapped at me that I was very cruel with her when I was an in-patient some years ago (back then I said that I wanted to 'pull out the hurting part of me, beat it up until it's silent and then carry on with my life'). I snapped back that I am her, and that if she hurts, I feel it just as bad as she does. She behaved a lot friendlier towards me after that, but now I think maybe she just shut down.

I keep questioning the authenticity of all she says and does, because, after all, she's a figment of my imagination. Now I think, maybe I should suspend disbelief and take everything about her at face value for the time being; you know, let her develop her own dynamic without any skeptic brakes on.

I'm not sure why this is the problem, a lot can come out of pictures if read right.

Yesterday she wrote 'My mommy is the best mommy in the world' a number of times (right after having written some not-so-nice things about me). It didn't feel wrong at the time, quite the opposite. It felt good, true, wholesome, safe even. She's the age when I used to secretly worship the ground my mother walked on because I was so thankful that she didn't actively show her dislike of me. I didn't like her, but on an instinctive level I knew it was essential for me to keep her obliged; so after school I often gave her flowers that I bought from my allowance after having doubled my way home to get to the flower shop. Sometimes I went an even longer way round to get to the fancier flowers on the other side of our suburb.

I think this could be part of the problem. That she doesn't understand that she's okay and her p*rents are not.

My T wants to try something in our next session to adress my Inner Child situation. She didn't give any specifics, but it will involve imagination. We'll see.

Maybe something happened when she tried to actually tell someone something about what was going on and asked for help.

That's definitely the case. She was invalidated, her perception was corrected, she was scolded, sometimes ignored, and always shown that she's unwelcome and not cared about.

I still have to be firm when I get panicked as I know that it is my inner child that is automatically taking the commands so I have to tell her/me, it's not the child that has to deal with this but the adult or the parent ... depends on the situation.

I still have to identify which feelings and behaviours are rooted in which part of me. Becoming silent and wanting to vanish into the background are definitelythe 3rd Grader's domain.

Silly question ... do you trust her ?

Doesn't sound silly to me.

On the emotional level I cannot trust, and I don't trust my own memories, thoughts and senses, so, no, I don't trust her at all.

On the intellectual level... I don't know. She's prepubescent. I don't think I'd apply a term like trust to someone on her level of moral development. What she does still depends largely on whom she wants to please and not on reflections concerning the social contract, human rights and the possibility of suffering.

 

[Abrasky]

I find my inner child started trusting me when she shared with me her memories, her pain and her happiness. It took 12 years of therapy, but well worth it.

My therapist said I just needed to get stronger. So perhaps it just means you need to do some more therapy which will help you be stronger.

 

[SimplyComplex]

My inner child doesn't speak :speechless: but I write her letters and that helps.

 

[kimba]

Hi everyone,
I am having a really hard time with this inner child stuff. I never knew I had one until she stopped me from talking about something in T last week. I didn't know what the story was until she told me I had ignored her long enough and she wanted to tell before I talked about things that happened later on in life. What she told me I typed up in detail and it still isn't everything. What i was going to talk about would have been more guilt and shame on top of what she knew about. She was awake and finally felt safe enough to talk.
I currently live alone so this isn't anything anyone could have "planted" in my head or anything. My mom died a couple of years ago and she is one who had a bad reaction when I finally told her about the abuse after we had moved away. This "we" "Little Kim" and me as "Big Kim" stuff is so beyond anything I ever thought I would experience. Now what? She is seven or eight and sits curled up with her arms locked around her knees.