The Mother Wound and Father Wound: Healing trauma at it’s source.
You don’t need to replay your past traumas in today’s relationships. If you had a parent or set of parents that were unavailable to you when you were a child; you probably experienced an attachment trauma. The most chaotic attachment style happens when you wildly swing from complete independence to overly dependent behavior with your partner, children, family, or friends. When you choose to reflect on your life you can avoid a lot of future pain.
What does the mother and/or father wound look like when you’re the parent?
Excessive criticism
Asking for emotional support from your underage child
Acting like your underage child’s friend instead of the parent
Can’t give warmth and security - emotionally unavailable
Love your underage child based on conditions
Lack empathy
Poor boundaries
Emotionally, physically and sexually abusive
Demeaning
Overly demanding
Prioritize work, addictions, another child or partner over your underage child
How do you know your attachment has gone awry?
Many times children grew up with parents who were unable to emotionally engage with their children. Your parent may never have asked “how are you?” It may be the way your grandparents interacted with your parents. It often is a generational wound. With a distracted or emotionally distressed parent, all your parents could do was provide shelter and housing. Sometimes a parent was absent because of death, illness, domestic violence, poverty or substance abuse. The nurturing parent was a person that your read about or saw in your friend's parents or other adults in your circle of community.
What effect does the mother and father wound have on you?
A few deeply rooted beliefs that children experience are they are unlovable, will be abandoned, and are unworthy of care. Sometimes this brings on long-term anger or bitterness, other times insecurity, resignation, or numbness. Some adults walk around with constant anxiety. You may engage in people-pleasing behaviors without ever knowing yourself, your desires and preferences, gifts, and full potential.
How to heal from the trauma?
It’s important for each mother or father to do their own psychological work. They need to heal, grieve their losses, come to terms with their sacrifices, and set their children free. You are not your parent’s therapist. As an adult chlld, you can do these things for yourself. Some ways that a therapist can help is doing parts work with Internal Family Systems (IFS) or mind/body work. These tools allow you to reclaim the emotional needs you surrendered as you were growing up. You can stop using emotions, ie grudging or powerless, that don’t serve you anymore. Instead you can turn to God and yourself to be the parent and offer yourself the protection, provision, wisdom and comfort you missed out on.
The value of healing from trauma of parental wounds?
The freedom of not being responsible for other people’s feelings and actions.
Loving yourself and having compassion for others
Emotional engagement with partner and children
Healthy attachment - times of closeness and times of being apart without losing sense of the bond you have with people that you love
Develop an internal parent, a relationship with God, that offers love, support, and comfort to your younger self
Tenderly responding to your children’s needs
What’s the next step in trauma therapy in Denver, CO?
It takes courage and love to take the next step and ask for support. The pain of staying where you are is too much. You are willing to reopen the past to build up the new you. Call 720-577-5985 today for your free 15-minute consultation with your trauma therapist in Denver.
