Sitting with my Inner Child

“SITTING WITH MY INNER CHILD”

When I started on the healing journey as I call it from my abusive childhood, one very important tool that I learned to do is sit with my inner child.  I am a child abuse survivor, physical, sexual, and verbal.  I was raised by pedophiles, my mother being one of them.

At the age of 61, I still carry many scars from the abuse I suffered so long ago.  Every day I work to undo the years of damage that was done to me and reclaim my life.  But as we all know, as survivors, it’s not an easy process.  It takes diligence and a lot of hard work to face the past and heal.

One thing that I have been doing is sitting with my inner child.  I had heard of this method before as a way of healing but had never put it into practice.  And sitting with my inner child was not a conscious decision on my part.  One day that five-year-old little girl that I once was literally reached out to me for comfort.  And it happened in a very interesting way. 

A couple of years ago I started to get this strange feeling.  I would call it a yearning, a yearning to wrap my arms around someone or something for comfort.  And this yearning happened several times a week, out of nowhere.  I had no idea what was going on, so one day I decided to sit with it and see what I could come up with because that feeling wasn’t going away.

It didn’t take me long until I started getting answers.  As I sat there with my eyes closed, suddenly I saw myself at the tender age of five.  I remember that was the age that I felt the loss of my mother’s love the most acutely. 

I loved my mother with such an intensity back then that, to this day, I still struggle to find the words for how I felt.  I literally was obsessed with her.

My greatest wish at that age was to sit on my mother’s lap with her arms wrapped around me so I could soak up the love and comfort that only a mother could provide.  Unfortunately, my mother was not person.  She was an angry, combative, abusive bully who had absolutely no motherly instinct.  My mother never wanted me, and that was a fact that she often reminded me of during my childhood. 

But as a child, it was unfathomable to me that my mother didn’t love me, especially since my love for her was so great.  It seemed the harder I chased after her for love and acceptance the angrier she became and the more she pushed me away.

We moved often when I was growing up.  In fact, we moved so often in my childhood that I lost count of how many houses and states we lived in.  Moving was always a very traumatic and painful thing for me because I had to leave behind so many people and things in my childhood that I wasn’t ready to let go of.  I wasn’t able to form relationships with my extended family, nor did I get to form connections with childhood friends.  I grew up a very lonely and depressed child.

The day that little girl that I once was came to me, I knew exactly what she needed. 

And in my mind’s eye, I wrapped my arms around that little child and hugged her tightly to me, just like I did to my own children when they were that age.  As I held her, I told her what a good little girl she was, how sweet, how kind, how funny.  But most of all, I told her how very loved and special she is, things that I so desperately needed to hear at that time in my life.  This went away after a couple of weeks, and that made me feel her needs were met. 

I am going to be moving soon.  Not far, less than five miles from where I live now.  Since I moved so much as a child, I have to be very mindful of how I approach any move I make as an adult so it doesn’t overwhelm my nervous system.  The new apartment I am going to move into is a good one for me, in a quieter area of town and closer to the barn where I board my horse.  I look forward to the move.  I am ready for a change. 

Well, once I made that decision to move, guess who popped up again?  That little five-year-old in me!  I wondered why she came back.  Is she feeling the vulnerability and fear that another move always brought on and is seeking comfort?  I have no idea what the motivation is, but let me tell you, as soon as she showed up in my mind’s eye, I immediately wrapped her in my arms.  I sat with her, assuring her, comforting her, loving her, anything I felt she needed to quiet the fear.    

It occurred to me one day that this child that shows up in my mind is not the only version of me that needs reassurance.  I look at the pivotal (most painful) points in my life, both as a child, a teenager, a young adult, a middle-aged woman, all those earlier versions of me that suffered so badly during those years also need love, comfort and reassurance.  And I sit with them as well.

My fellow survivors, sitting with your inner child is an amazing tool for recovery, and I highly recommend it.  I really wish I could have done this sooner, but I realize healing happens in its own time.

Photo Credit: Unsplash

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