inner child/ may trigger

bluebell · Newbie

inner child/ may trigger

HAVOCA · Trustee

I hope I don't sound too angry in this reply! But if I do I'm angry in the same way that you should be angry. You sound as though you are directing all of your anger at your inner child. You need to grip your anger and direct it at your abuser. Don't direct it at work, your marriage, the little girl inside, but at the abuser. Hate the abusers by all means, but don't take it out on your little girl. That little poor innocent girl, that is lonely and hurt inside. Only you can protect her and bring her along now. So do it and tell yourself you love her. Stop hating and wishing 'if only'. HATE THE ABUSER. Show me a child anywhere in the world that deserves to be hated, that deserves to be abused, show me just one and I'll conceed the point - but I bet you can't!

Forgiveness has two meanings. If you look it up in a dictionary it breaks down as;

1) to cease to feel resentment against an offender
2) to give up claim to requital from an offender; to grant relief from payment

These two meanings have two clear paths in the healing process. One is to give up your anger and no longer hold the abuser accountable for the abuse or blame them in any way. The second is that you no longer try to get some kind of compensation from the abuser. You give up trying to gain financial compensation, a statement of guilt, an apology, respect, love, understanding - anything. Separating these two aspects makes it clearer to see what is necessary in order to fully heal from childhood abuse.

So forgiveness of the first type is not an essential part of the process, although the latter element needs careful consideration. This part of forgiveness is more like acceptance. You've accepted that the abuse damaged you and you've accepted you can make a difference and change the way things have been. You now have to accept the way things are and move on down the healing route. There isn't a mad rush to do this, it's just another leg to your journey.

Some people struggle with this especially when they remain so angry. The anger and the forgiveness aren't incompatible, none of this pardons or excuses the abuser in any way.

The other type of forgiveness that is essential in my mind is self-forgiveness. You need to forgive yourself for having needed, for being small. You must forgive yourself for coping in the only way you knew how. As one woman said in 'The Courage To Heal': I've had to forgive my genitals for responding, I've had to forgive myself for not being able to second guess my Father and avoid the abuse'.

You have to forgive yourself for the limitations you've lived with as an adult. You must forgive yourself for the time you need now to heal, and you must forgive yourself, as generously as you can, all your compassion and understanding, so you can direct your attention and energy toward your own healing. This forgiveness is what's essential.

Don't forgive your abusers, never forgive them - always hold them accountable for their actions. Hate them. But, you have to forgive yourself.

Stay safe

Jamie

amanda · Experienced Member

Hello Bluebell

You've probably guessed what I try to say does not come easy and I worry I say the wrong thing but here goes Listen to what Jamie says you must learn to love and nurture your inner child to enable you to move on never blame yourself you were a little child an innocent little girl who should have been protected your abusers were wrong and never believe different. I have nearly destroyed myself at times with sheer hate and anger turned at myself it has taken a good therapist to work with me in turning the self destruct button off and at times of distress I still slip back but I now manage to work through it I will never forgive what they did to me and that anger often explodes but I am learning to direct it please Bluebell give that little girl the love she is shouting out for because it is only ourselves that can do that now.

I hope this makes sense and you don't mind me answering

Take gentle care

Amanda

segelov · Experienced Member

Dear Bluebell

How I feel for you! how I feel for that little child, that child needs you to show the love for it that it never had as a child. That child did nothing wrong, it never asked to be abused. When a child is born it is totally dependent on its parents, and it needs a lifetime of love. It is not able to fend off attacks of any sorts if it was not taught to do so. Please do not blame your inner child for what happened to you, it is not her fault, the blame must lie squarely at the door of the perpetrator/s. Please as the two previous replies learn to love your poor defenceless inner child.

No child deserves to be harmed, all children deserve love and nurturing so that they in turn can learn to love and nurture.

Please look after yourself.

hazel · Veteran Member

hi bluebell

i was really moved by what you said about yourinnerchild because thats exactly the way i've been feeling. people kept saying to me 'nuture your inner child' 'love your inner child' and i'd be thinking 'i dont want to, she's a whinging little monster thats caused me nothing but trouble and i hate her'. it felt really powerfull to be angry with her and i thought it hurt less to be angry with her, it felt safe because i thought i had a firm grip on my feelings. so i know something of how you feel and i'd like to thank you because not many people have admitted to me that they hate their inner child and ive felt very alone.

things are starting to move forward a bit now with me and my I.C, it was hard in the beginning to like myself as a child so what i did was i began by thinking of my I.C as another child, one that i didn't hate, i found it easier to like this other child and found it easier to listen to what she wanted.

bit by bit i could begin to see myself in her, and see that actually i was strong as a kid, and pretty and funny and all these wonderful things that people tried to stamp out of me. now i dont have to pretend she's someone else. its a rocky relationship sometimes because she can be a grumpy so and so but i think she's got the right to be.

just one more thing, if you give yourself a hard time about this you'll resent your I.C even more. this resentment and anger is something that has been shown to you and your child by other people so it has now become part of the process you must move through to learn to love yourself again so try to do it gently because you so deserve some love.

big hug to you and your little girl, i think she's desperate for it xx

ellie · Senior Member

Hello Bluebell,

I have been looking at this forum since it started and reading your comments has jump-started me to become a member and participate.

I have felt and still have periods when i feel exactly as you do. I also feel that as a child i was weak and passive, I never tried to stop what was going on. I feel increadibly guilty that i stood frozen to the spot while my father physically abused my brother, I never tried to help or stop him.

Agreeing with Jamie self forgiveness is the key and it takes time. My T has said that i need to forgive myself first, she suggested that i think about how i would respond to my own children if they were in this situation. I think of them at the age i was when these things happened, would i blame them as much as i blame my inner child? do i think they would do it differently? would i think they were weak and pathetic and should have stood up for themselves? This supports what Hazel has said and i find it quite useful when i'm being hard on myself and blaming myself for things that happened.

Hope this helps. Take care and give yourself time, it will get better.

Ellie.

bluebell · Newbie

thank you all so much for taking the time and effort to reply, i really am grateful. you deserve separate replies but i don't feel as if i can give those the time and effort they deserve at the moment, so i hope you will forgive me. soon as im feeling ok i will try to do that, take good care of yourselves,

bb

liz · Experienced Member

Dear Bluebell

I've only just read your posting which you wrote a while ago now concerning your inner child and the amount of anger and hatred you have towards her. Maybe with the comments that others wrote I hope that maybe you have been able to reach out and begin to relate to this small hurting child within.

However I appreciate what you wrote and could identify with you so strongly. I go through phases when I am more able to reach out to my inner child and feel compassion towards her. Equally I still struggle big time with this.

I still struggle with the whole concept of love. As a child I wasn't loved unconditionally and as an adult I'm still searching for what was never there then. I'm still mourning for all that wasn't available to me then. It feels like I'm mourning for both the child then and the adult now.

What I'm trying to say isn't coming across very clearly. I can't get the words out because there are too many overwhelming emotions around for me. I'll try again when I can.

However - somethign else Jamie mentioned in the same posting is all about Self Forgiveness and that was spot on. Thanks J for bringing all that to our attention. And I quote:

"You need to forgive yourself for having needed, for being small. You must forgive yourself for coping in the only way you knew how........you have to forgive yourself for the limitations you've lived with as an adult. You must forgive for the time you need now to heal...."

I think this is where I'm at if you like. Work to take to my therapist. I find it so difficult to forgive myself for having needed. I needed love and attention and I just feel so full of shame. Why do I feel that I should have been able to manage on my own? I was a child for God's sake. A teenager but a child nonetheless. I think the sense of shame comes about because I just view the whole thing of what I did during the abuse as being totally sordid and dirty and MY frigging FAULT. I didn't say no, it feels like I allowed him/them to totally degrade myself. Can't say anymore.

I so want to move on with all of this but get so stuck with it all. I'm not sure I've really made any sense with my ramblings. Take the good bits and discard the rest......

Bluebell I wish you well on your journey. I think some of what I've said is aimed at everyone here - I certainly don't want to burden you.

liz x

Frog · Experienced Member

Hi Bluebell,

I have just read your post to, and have to say a while back I felt ezactly the same, I was so ashamed of my inner child I hated her I really did I wanted nothing to do with her, she was everything I hated.

But Jamie is right, and the love of your inner child will come in time, I never thought it would but it does, in my experience.

Now I see my inner child I hold her hand and she has now grown up with me when shes scared I hold her hand and tell her your ok your safe now.

I can't remeber how I began to love her although I worked on it alot with my therpist, but I know it was great when I loved her finally.

Don't worry you will love her understand she was innocesnt young, and deserved to be treated with love and kindness, you were abused and shouldn't have been our gaudians adults have a resposinbility and they used that against you, they are the ones to blame, as jamie said, he's so right. And YES they are ALL WRONG, YOU ARE RIGHT!

Sending Big Hugs if thats ok with you.

Frog