The Concept Of An Inner Child... Not Really Buying It

[Hashi]

As a more general thought, it's useful for me to use the Orphan Child archetype/personality trait as a reference point when looking at what people have said here. It helps me is in knowing what type of "child" I am. (Orphan Child is not a "bad" trait to have, by the way. Any trait has positive and less positive qualities. Orphan children can be resourceful, adventurous, independent-thinking and very good at taking care of themselves.)

Even if I had had decent parenting, I would probably never have been a puppies and princesses type child, or even much of a hugs and kisses child. I remember someone giving me a teddy bear when I was very little and even at the time I didn't see the point of it. I think that was my personality and not trauma related, I've heard a lot of people saying that a cuddly toy was one of their few comforts as an abused child. I preferred a book.

So a cuddly toy is not going to help any part of me now, not even the child part. The cuddly toy example is a very basic one, but it's representative of some more complex dynamics about inner child work for me. Some approaches don't fit with me. I think it's important for me to be aware of things like that, because it helps me understand what works for me and what doesn't.

This is why I don't see my therapist as a mother figure or caregiver. I need my therapist to be an ally. I don't want my therapist to direct the therapy, tell me what to do or push me, I want her to facilitate me finding my own way. I don't want her to hold me (literally or figuratively), I want her to hold the space around me and let me be in it. I'm always going to trust myself more than anyone else, and it's better to work with that rather than against it.

So if I do any inner child work of any kind, I need to bear this in mind. What might be needed by one person doing inner child work could feel smothering or disempowering to me. It might actually feel invalidating. I often feel a lot of frustration at some things that are talked about, and I'm starting to think that's not because there's anything wrong with them or wrong with me. It's that they aren't right for me.

That gives me a reference point for thinking more about what has been said in this thread. It's so useful to have these different viewpoints on inner child work. I'll be back...

 

[Abstract]

lifelong

not something that I would try to alte

I realised that when I read up and that changes the approach a lot.

helps me understand what works for me and what doesn't.

On reading what I read I could really see why it is so important for you to be allowed to have your own path and to learn to trust that. Why it is so important for you. I am still figuring it out but I don't think it's right for everyone. I think some people need their perspective challenged.

that's not because there's anything wrong with them or wrong with me. It's that they aren't right for me.

I very much agree and I have to say that I thought the archetype concept would be extremely helpful for a therapist in helping them decide how to approach someone. Its almost like a cheat sheet! ;)

 

[Hashi]

the archetype concept would be extremely helpful for a therapist in helping them decide how to approach someone. Its almost like a cheat sheet!

Yes it is, and sometimes I'm in danger of using it to be manipulative because I can spot other people's archetypes. I try to use it only constructively, of course :troll: It can cut through a lot of time and trouble. For example, working recently with an Eternal Child I knew that the easiest way to stop him whining was not to reason with him but to distract him by changing the subject.

But it's most helpful when dealing with yourself. When I learnt about my own archetypes everything fell into place for me. It explains my world in a way I couldn't grasp otherwise. I get the impression that people who click with similar work, like Internal Family Systems, have the same sort of experience of it.

I am still figuring it out but I don't think it's right for everyone. I think some people need their perspective challenged.

I still get my perspective questioned by my therapist, but it isn't forced on me. I think an Orphan Child characteristic that I have is a willingness to make use of anything I can lay my hands on. I'm open to suggestions and guidance, in fact I need them. I may decide emphatically that something isn't for me, but I will listen first and weigh things up. Also, I do know when I need to work on something and then I don't avoid it - I already trust myself on both those things. I'd find it impossible to have a therapist who thought they knew better, lol. I can understand that other people might feel differently for themselves.

Currently my therapist is "banned" from talking about inner child stuff. We've been leaving out childhood stuff altogether because it's been too destabilising. However she will say something like, "To explore that we would need to talk about your childhood" and then leave it to me to decide whether to or not, rather than pushing me to. So far, I've decided not to, but I'm thinking the time is coming when I need to talk about it. Ugh. That's why I started this thread, though, and it's really helpful.

 

[Abstract]

everything fell into place for me.

Lucky you! I seem to have more than one and they are bullying each other! :depressed:

But seriously I did find it interesting and enlightening reading it.

Its a shame I am so "unspiritual" as I think that would interfere with this type of treatment for me. And I am terrified of parts work as I feel split already.

 

[nimkekaa]

Inner child work for me has been very positive and I did have a lot of childhood trauma.

It really took off for me when I remembered a certain traumatic event in my past and then found a photo of myself at that age. I then looked at the little girl (8 years old in this incident) and realized that she was so young and looked so small and innocent. I was asked to ask that little girl (really just look inside myself) and ask her what she wishes the adults in her life would have said or did for her when this event happened.

It was really weird because I knew exactly what she wanted. She wanted someone to tell her that it wasn't her fault and that she did nothing wrong etc. So then I looked at the photo and told her the things I wanted to hear that I knew she wanted to hear. It was very powerful healing. It was like having someone truly understand what I needed.

Then afterward when I thought of that event things were easier. You could say that I healed my inner child, or that I helped myself understand what I needed (that nobody else really understood or could give me) and gave it to myself.

I don't know if that makes sense but I really struggled with the term inner child work also. I didn't feel like I had a separate person inside of me that was a little child. But I did have a piece of myself that was scared, confused and couldn't move past that event until it healed. Thinking of the pain that I went through when I was 8 years old and putting a face to it of a little sweet girl made it easier for me to let go of some of the guilt etc that my adult self seemed to force on a little child.

I love inner child work, the way I have experienced it.

 

[rainy_daze]

So a cuddly toy is not going to help any part of me now, not even the child part. The cuddly toy example is a very basic one, but it's representative of some more complex dynamics about inner child work for me. Some approaches don't fit with me. I think it's important for me to be aware of things like that, because it helps me understand what works for me and what doesn't.

This is why I don't see my therapist as a mother figure or caregiver. I need my therapist to be an ally. I don't want my therapist to direct the therapy, tell me what to do or push me, I want her to facilitate me finding my own way. I don't want her to hold me (literally or figuratively), I want her to hold the space around me and let me be in it. I'm always going to trust myself more than anyone else, and it's better to work with that rather than against it.

@Hashi: When I read that post Hashi, it made me think that you are very self-aware, in terms of knowing who you are (for example, archetypes) as well as what type of support you need from your therapist. I have found the more honest I am with the counsellor, the more in control and safer I feel to share with her. There has been only one kind of work I didn't understand and made little sense to me, and the T agreed that by no means was her approach a "one size fits all". I like that you actually banned your T from talking about the inner child or childhood until you are ready. It's good to have a person who can be gentle in their approach and understand that it is ultimately your decision what and when you share.

I don't know much about Child Archetypes, they sound very interesting, so I will read about them. Thank you for explaining your understanding of them and how they have worked for you as concepts.

 

[Hashi]

Thinking of the pain that I went through when I was 8 years old and putting a face to it of a little sweet girl made it easier for me to let go of some of the guilt etc that my adult self seemed to force on a little child.

This makes sense to me. I do have to remind myself when I judge myself at any age that I could only think and act within my capabilities at the time. I expect this is a factor for myself as a child too, but haven't gone that deeply into the trauma yet to even be aware of it.

I helped myself understand what I needed (that nobody else really understood or could give me) and gave it to myself.

I get confused by the idea of giving myself something that I needed then. It's a real struggle for me to get my head round the idea. What I needed was for the situation to be different, or for me to be away from it. I'm not sure that I blamed myself. Maybe I did, but if so I don't remember. I only remember being stuck, powerless and furious, hating everything around me and spending most of my time deliberately dissociating in order not to feel.

All I'm aware of is that I wanted to be out of there, grown up, no-one making me do things. I used to make angry lists in my head of the things I wouldn't do to my children when I was grown up. How can I give that to my child self? In a way, doing child work seems more like taking away what I wanted as a child. She finally got out, and now I'm going back?

I think I'm probably not understanding.

love inner child work, the way I have experienced it.

You're a good advert for it, you sound so positive. Who knows maybe one day I'll work this out and be saying the same... I hope so!

 

[Hashi]

I have found the more honest I am with the counsellor, the more in control and safer I feel to share with her.

This is the same for me, exactly.

Thank you for what you said. It's the responses in this thread that are helping me put all this together into a new awareness.

 

[JustBe]

Hashi, I get where you're coming from as I too spent the better part of my childhood and all of my adolescence wishing to be grown up and making my own decisions. I too have no idea if it's a good idea to go back and talk to that younger self or if I'll just be opening up a new can of worms.

 

[Hashi]

Thanks, Movin'On.

I've also just read this from earlier (since I'm now going backwards through this thread):

your whole notion of being a child is to be grown up at all times, and as an adult why would you want to go back to feeling like a child, you would feel you were being treated as a young child when it is clear you are not a child?

Thank you for both for understanding.

It feels like it might be unsafe, or unwise, or inappropriate, to "connect" to myself as a child. I don't know how much of that is discomfort/distress that it would be good to work through, and how much is an inner warning that I should pay attention to. I have little stability when it comes to talking about my childhood, and think I might need a lot of distance while doing the work.

It has to do with the stage of development that you're in.

It might be to do with stages of child development,

I'm being challenged in more ways than one with this topic! I'm really, really not enthusiastic about theory but I did look up Piaget because you and other people have talked about stages of development.

This was rough to think about. I started to wonder how I managed to develop anything in any way. I think my delayed developmental stages must have bunched up together instead of happening more or less in sequence. Would that make sense? I know this is true of some external things, for example I ended up learning to talk at the same time as learning to read - it was a single process for both those things together. I'm having to remind myself that somehow my mind managed to find its way through that, because reading about the developmental stages I'm having to stop myself from worrying about what my brain's now missing.

In terms of this resulting in some sort of inner child, inner mess seems more like it. I'm trying not to feel like some sort of weird creature. Has any one experienced their inner child as a scrambled mess? Or something a bit scary? People always seem to refer to innocence and vulnerability. If I have an inner child, right now it's feeling more like a little Frankenstein monster.

Urgh, this stuff is horrible. I know it's necessary to look at it in some way, though.

 

[Abstract]

little Frankenstein monster.

Oh Hashi. It is not.

Something occurred to me. I hope I am not misunderstanding anything but if I am feel free to correct me. To me when we are born we automatically have worth and value and ... effectiveness (for want of a better word). You would have and do have all these regardless of what your environment was. I believe we all do.

Maybe it is like building a brick wall. No one handed you the correct bricks at the correct times and you had to use what you found when you found it. Being in that situation doesnt make you less human or less whole as human being. You were resourceful and build a wall regardless. You used your strength and your creativity to do that.

Now that you are an adult (or if you prefer to look at it this way - now that you are in a position of having access to more resources) you can go back and look at if you want to replace any bricks or mortar. Giving yourself what you possibly didnt have then is not a sign of your worthlessness and is rather another step towards using your resources to provide yourself with what you need.

Would that make sense?

Yes it does and I think it can happen at any time. Sometimes something hasnt been possible at one point but it will be later as we have new resources. Remember that you are the same person you were before you read the developmental stages.

Oh and I just looked back at what I wrote and I am not just saying all that as a way of addressing your abandoned child and it is just genuinely what occurred to me. ;)

Urgh, this stuff is horrible.

I think you are doing a great job of picking your way through all this.

Or something a bit scary?

Yes. I struggle to look at it at all.

 

[nimkekaa]

I get confused by the idea of giving myself something that I needed then. It's a real struggle for me to get my head round the idea. What I needed was for the situation to be different, or for me to be away from it.

I tell myself that I can't change what happened but as an adult what would I say to an 8 year old that has been abused.

I would tell her that it wasn't her fault. I would tell her that the adult was suppose to protect her and not hurt her and that there are adults that will protect her. I would tell her that I will keep her safe etc..

If you do this while looking at a picture of yourself then it's amazing what you start saying to the little girl in the picture. It's almost like I can remember what I wish someone would tell me. Like I can remember what I was thinking and all the questions I had about what was going on.

Then I closed my eyes and still picturing myself as an eight year old girl, I talked to my dad. I asked him why he did the things that he did. I told him that it hurt me and confused me. I told him that I never wanted any of it and that I as an innocent little girl. I told him that I thought he would protect me and instead he hurt me.

When I was little I was too scared to say anything. I lost my voice and I have found great comfort in finding my voice and speaking out what I am feeling and thinking. Its almost like I was sure that I would die or something bad would happen if I spoke the truth and then once I did and the world didn't end I released some of my anxiety.

I think there are many ways to do inner child work and like any kind of therapy nothing works for everyone. But I have seem many people who find a lot of healing in this.