What your children need
Your child will have trouble learning, self regulating, remembering, adapting or focusing without this basic provision. Take it from a therapist who works with the inner child.
Unfortunately, dysfunctional families are more the norm than unusual. In family systems, the dysfunction of the parents flow on to the children as they take on roles to keep the balance. Even if you do not think your family has dysfunction, read on… you never know what insights you might get.
A note about scapegoating. Most of us like to blame one person saying ‘but there is only one screwed up one.’ Many of us like to blame the family scapegoat - but if there IS a scapegoat, there is likely dysfunction throughout the family. I am not pulling this out of my a$$, this is a well known concept; one of the family systems as a social system theorised by John Bradshaw who is a really well known counselor.
Emotional Abandonment is a type of Abuse
In this post, I want to address something other than the usual sort of abuse. We think of abuse on children as sexual or physical. Emotional abuse is less easy to pinpoint and so rampant, we sometimes don’t think of it as anything unusual.
This does not make it less damaging.
Emotional abuse occurs when we stop/interrupt/gaslight our children regarding their emotions in a way that the child grows up unable to rely on their own emotional experiences. The true self is forced to hide as the child takes on roles to maintain the balance in a dysfunctional family.
Emotional abuse also happens when adults blame children for their behaviours or outcomes. If a parent is angry and beats a child, I have heard all too often ‘What did you do to deserve it?’.
Emotional abandonment happens when young children are deprived of their supply of (a very normal and healthy) narcissistic supply of mirroring and echoing. A child that is there to please the parent instead of developing his own needs is abandoned because the child is now taking care of the parent’s needs. (And actually when a child takes care of a parent’s emotional needs, it has an icky term called emotional incest.)
Long term exposure to this form of abandonment create a dysregulated nervous system which inhibits executive function.
Your child will be unable to learn, have self control, remember, emotionally regulate, adapt or focus. All the flash cards in the world cannot create an intelligent child without this basic provision of Love.
What Children need
Mirroring
As children, we formed our identities and values through the responses of our primary caregivers. Belonging is such a core need that children will tear away parts of themselves that elicit rejection from you.
So the words you say to them about them and your actions, be it of love or neglect, inform them of who they are and what they are worthy of. Are they worthy of being themselves?
This bring me to..
Acceptance
What is love if not unconditional acceptance? Many don’t understand this. We are human and because of our own experiences, are unable to love unconditionally as much as we have so much love for our kids. Accepting our own limitations instead of judging ourselves will bring us closer to loving unconditionally.
When you physically punish, reject, withdraw affection for an action by your kids, they learn that they cannot act in a certain way and be accepted by you. Very commonly in Asian families, kids learn that they are difficult to love if they do not perform to a certain standard. Kids have been learning that some emotions are punished and must be blocked. Read about this impact here.
Religion unfortunately does enforce this. Anger is painted particularly bad - even though it is actually a protective emotion. I’ll go so far to say that there are no bad emotions. Emotions are energy that inform. They can also cloud clarity and learning if the person is unable to discharge certain emotions by blocking themselves from experiencing it.
Acceptance allows your child to blossom in their unique design. Celebrating their uniqueness allow them the assurance for them to be themselves in the world. The opposite, is a child that has to create a false self. Children do this because they require your acceptance to be taken care of. It is natural and it is a law of development. People with false selves suffer from chronic low grade depression…or melancholy. No matter what they do, how much they achieve, and how much approval they finally get from their parents for being who their parents want them to be… their dissociation from their true selves will always emerge as a longing, a loneliness …a void.
Modelling
Parents model what it is to be a man or a woman. Children watch their parents and learn how to relate intimately with the other, how to fight fairly, how to communicate, how to express emotions, how to love.
Rupert Sheldrake’s Theory of Mind states that the mind includes the morphic field that is around a person which exchanges information with others consciousness-es. Even if you suppress your feelings, your children innately know what is going on. Gaslighting them on their suspicions create a sense of insecurity that they can never rely on their own experiences. This raises anxious adults who are always second guessing themselves.
Time and Attention
Loving your child is giving your child time and attention. Being there for a child is catering to your child’s needs. It is not about being in the same room. It is undivided attention of getting to know the child entirely. When children are not given time, they are shamed into believing they are unworthy. The child is worth less than his parent’s time in work or alcohol or parties or whatever else. It is that simple, yes.
I believe women feel so much guilt leaving our children because something deep inside us is saying NO even when the world is saying ‘Go Back To Work’. This is yet another way of us denying our instincts.
Am I saying all moms should be stay at home moms? No. I do not believe that only women can be primary caregivers. Men have the capacity too as well. However, the type of nurturing women provide is actually really suited for the first 7 years of a child’s life.
The importance of the Primary Caregiver
Studies show that it is important for infants and toddlers to have a consistent primary caregiver for the first three years of their lives. The primary caregiver is the one with the most facetime and touch time with the child. Even if you are making all the decisions for the kids, as long as you are doing it from afar, you are not the primary caregiver. Caring involves time, touch, conversation, play and other forms interaction.
I do not mean to incite guilt. I want to highlight the damaging effects of rewarding productivity at work over nurturing of children at home.
In places like Singapore, there is a danger of leaving children with the domestic help as you pursue work because you think being a mother is about… the housework. No.
Listening
Loving your child is Listening to them. Children know what they need and they will tell us. They must know they deserve to be heard.
Sometimes parents react harshly to their kids for their wants. (Oh, I’ve been there. Probably.) This is because we have ourselves been denied when we had certain feelings or expressed what we wanted. We react unconsciously because we have not gained the emotional maturity to provide without being triggered.
In harsh terms, we are adult children with our inner child needs having never been met. If this is something you suffer with, definitely reach out to work through this. You may think it is about willpower. However, most of the time your outbursts and uncontrollable rage with your child is a temporary regression. In other words, you were in a hypnotic state regressing back to your youth. So be kind to yourself and seek help.
The Subconscious Led Therapist is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, please consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Every post is crafted with love for the world I would love for my children to grow up in.
About Lorraine (more)
I am a Subconscious-led Therapist experienced in bringing to your awareness the subconscious cause of your feelings and behaviours. We will work together to resolve the issue and change the patterns in your life through reprogramming.
Book a free consultation here to chat - is going into The Subliminal State right for you?