Hearing about the “inner child” for the first time in treatment can be confusing. The idea that some past, younger version of ourselves is thriving, or more often times trying to survive, inside of us seems nothing less than ridiculous. We might be any age by the time we get to trauma treatment or working with a trauma therapist. Though we are in our young adult or full adult years, there is a chance that part of us feels stuck in the past. Traumatic events have frozen our childhood, teenagehood, and younger parts of ourselves in time. Try as we may to “grow up” we remain toxically attached to this vacuum of time and space existing inside of us. Our age, maturity, and life experience has nothing to do with it. Whatever the mechanisms behind this phenomenon, the existence of the inner child is real- more real for some than others.
You can see an inner child at work when you pay close attention to others’ behaviors. When an inner child is on “good behavior”, they are elated, joyous, happy, free, and imaginative. You can find unadulterated glimmers in grown ups eyes, hear squeals from decades past, and see the glow of an untainted, promising future. On the other hand, there are times when the inner child is struggling. They aren’t behaving “badly”, but behaving out of hurt, pain, and their needs not being met. The behaviors of an upset inner child are the behaviors learned from genetics, environment, personality, and trauma. You can hear temper tantrums, associations which don’t make sense, blaming, refusing to take responsibility, avoiding, or panic and hysteria.
Until we learn what the inner child is, realize we have one, and come to get to know our inner child, or inner children, we are ultimately ruled by them. Our inner child is like a level of our subconscious, constantly dictating to us, trying to get our attention, and attempting to act through our conscious actions. For many of us, our inner children have been locked away in dark devices of our compartmentalized mind. Trauma has put our connection to our inner child in a safe place to protect us from the memories that sweet child was forced to obtain. Discovering and building a relationship with our inner child is a challenge, but a worthy cause. The more we connect with an inner child, the more we connect with ourselves and heal the trauma of our lives.
At The Guest House Ocala, we welcome everyone who has experienced trauma and, as a result, is suffering from addictions, mental health disorders, or other manifestations. Our programs are custom tailored to the specific experiences and needs of each client. Everyone has a story. Change yours today. Call us at Call 1-855-483-7800.