Month: January 2021

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Trauma from Emotional Agony

How will I know if I am in agony? Sounds like depression to me. Sounds like something happened like “I lost my job,” I am getting a divorce, I am pregnant and the father does not care about the baby, my house burned down, no insurance of any kind. This leads to trauma and emotional agony.

So many difficult problems in this world that could place you in turmoil. Where to go from here?

In today’s world, there are so many things that can affect us, even everyday things, the car did want to turn on this morning, had to call work can’t come in, need to fix the car by tomorrow, in order to go to work, to pay rent and bills. No work, no money, no money, no food, no roof over my head. If I go on, I could have a heart attack!

I feel overwhelmed, all this, and all this so early in the morning, can things get any worse? (oops, should not have said that to the universe), Well, might as well do a couple of loads of laundry, this will help me catch up with a little of my chores. Why is there still water in my washer? Lost it! “Hi mom, why are you home?”

Who does not feel “rage” at this point? Uncontrollable rage. This is the part when someone, bigger than you, needs to come in and hold you down or sit on you until your energy is exhausted. Do you feel better? No, now your overly overwhelmed by guilt, intense shame, and you hate yourself.

You may think you are just reacting to your car, now your washing machine, and everything cost money, that you really don’t have. Life is so unfair.

I believe we have all been there or have been so close to feeling like this. Have you ever had a day like this?

Have you ever asked yourself, “Am I having some sort of mental breakdown?” If you must ask yourself this question, then you are still sane enough to ask yourself this question.

In other words, a person going crazy, would not ask themselves this question.

A crazy person or an insane person would not be asking the question. They would be blaming someone else or would not know or acknowledge that they “maybe” were insane or going crazy.

This could be called “emotional agony” you could consider it like being an onset of a mental illness. Have you heard that lots of things are considered to cause cancer? The same with mental health concerns. It could be a mental illness but it could just be symptoms of life’s struggle.

Some people may feel some negative emotions like sadness, where am I going to get money to pay for my car to get it fixed? Now my washing machine is not working, can I afford to have someone come and look at it?

I will have a co-worker come and pick me up for work, take the bus, something. I am embarrassed to ask. Will they think I am an incapable person? But I have to do something in order to get to work

Now you are trying to solve your problems, that’s a good sign. So, you call a co-worker and they said yes, but only until you get your car out of the shop. That will work for right now.

Things are looking up. But if you are feeling like you need help, please do not hesitate to get professional help. Join a support group. Especially, if you are feeling depressed or overwhelmed still.

There are many resources to help, you just have to look in your community. Ask those at the support group, they know what you are going through.

Here are some pointers if you need to evaluate yourself, just be honest with yourself.

No one will know except you.

  • Am I feeling paranoid and believe that someone is making this happen in my life?
  • Am I so depressed that it is affecting my daily routine?
  • I want to be left alone, don’t want to talk to friends or relatives.
  • One moment I am OK, the next moment I am crying for no reason.
  • I am gaining weight, which makes me more depressed. Overeating.
  • I am not sleeping well; I wake up worrying about my bills and problems.

If you are irritable frequently, get someone to talk to that you trust. Get an appointment with a therapist. Talk to a counselor or mental health professional who knows about emotional agony, emotions that you can work with to help yourself.

  • Aromatherapy.
  • Meditations, breathing exercises.
  • Try yoga, exercises, dancing, running in place.
  • Finding a running friend, it is not safe to run alone.
  • Writing down your feelings.
  • Please do not use alcohol or drugs, they only make things worse

Remember that you are not alone. Who knows? At the support group, you just meet someone who knows how to fix the washing machine. You will never know unless you get up, get out, and try. May our Creator, give you prosperity and health.

Many blessings to you.

 

 

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Flashbacks of Trauma

Have you ever had flashbacks from terrible events or a traumatic event that happened to you in the past? Even as a child, but now you are an adult? Or as an adult, the flashbacks just keep you almost paralyzed as if you were re-living the entire tragic event again.It’s a trembling cold experience. As if it happens all over again. How do you stop it? You wake up and you finally realize it is not happening, even so, your heart is racing.  It is scary. You’re breathing heavily.  It is a great feeling when you realize it was a flashback. I wish it would stop!

 

A flashback can be controlled with hypnosis, relaxing, and getting something, like a stone, an aroma, keeping something in your hand to touch as you start to feel a flashback starting to come into your space. It affects your mind because it is a memory.  That is why I suggested hypnotherapy.

  • Telling yourself that you are now safe, the traumatic event is over, you are now safe and in a safe place.
  • Look all around you and memorize a certain picture frame, furniture, the color of your drapes, in your living room or bedroom.
  • Tell yourself, that when you see these things, depending on where you are “you are safe.”.
  • Using something you can touch as a grounding tool. Especially if you are not at home.
  • If going out of your home take someone you trust with you. Your friend, a significant other who knows what you went through.
  • Ask for help, professional help is best.

Carry something in your hand, your pocket, around your wrist to bring you back again and feel safe. You can also use your senses to bring you back. You look around you until your senses tell you where you are, as you look around you will see something familiar, or know just where you are at and tell yourself you are safe.

All this will become easier and easier and the flashback will ease or will only last a couple of seconds and then they will disappear altogether.

It becomes easier if you get professional help. Here are some of my own tips and that worked for me.

  • Identify your triggers. When I smelled cigarettes smoke, when I passed by someone smoking, was a trigger.
  • Talk to yourself, letting yourself, know that you are safe.
  • Take deep breaths.
  • Do not get upset with yourself. Or feel embarrassed.
  • Carry peppermint candy or something smelling like peppermint. This smell is very soothing.
  • Get professional help.

Remember the old saying” If at first, you don’t succeed, “Try try again.” It doesn’t mean beat yourself up, and try the same old way again…It means recognizing your error and try again another way until you get it and do it the correct way. Right?

We sometimes do not accept the idea that we “don’t deserve” to be well, happy, joyous. There is an inexhaustible supply in the universe. Our own belief in lack and limitation is the only thing that is limiting us.

What belief is limiting you?

You are not alone. You may feel alone, but you are not. Join a support group and then you will see how many of us are survivors. Of all that we are going through. Please, get help. Join others who have survived our traumas and have moved on to help others survive their pain and sufferings.

May our higher source, give you courage and strength, to get healing because it’s necessary in order to be a survivor to get above all of your pain. God bless.

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Blocking Trauma

Sometimes, we just don’t feel like dealing with some stuff in life and ignore things. Like having to do laundry, a project that will take time to start and finish, and so you are waiting for the right time to start it. You put it off until you have like a couple of extra days or extra hours.

When does anyone have that kind of time?

I am a busy person, so I have to make time if I am to use that much time. So I avoid making that kind of time. If I wait, I will not work on my project and I will not have that kind of time until I retire.

Avoiding is what many of us do best. It is just going to take up our energy, planning, and whatever else it takes right?

How about dealing with what hurts us?

That is even a worse and more painful emotional ordeal, that we have to deal with. So sometimes, we pretend the pain is not there. Which, is really worse.

Blocking Trauma

So we block it. You really have to be a very strong person to pretend something did not happen. Like an assault, rape, violence, or something so hurtful, it is hard not to feel the pain or the suffering.

Some people start taking pain killers, some take street drugs, meth, ecstasy, cocaine, alcohol, weed, or pot takes a lot more marijuana to kill pain, but if combined with other drugs, that could help too.

Some people use food. Food is a very good source of feeling another kind of emotion that covers up the underlying emotion. This makes you have a calming, numbing, and relaxing feeling, which, it makes you feel free from the pain from past trauma.

What happens is the brain will adjust to the feeling, so that it will become necessary to eat in order to avoid the pain and suffering. Because it feels good to your taste buds, fills you up with the eating and tasting, and produces hormonal responses that fill you with a warm sense of feeling love, protection, and security.

This avoidance of blocking the pain is only temporary.

Throwing yourself into your job, to avoid dealing with the pain and suffering of the traumatic event, is good, but again this is only temporary. You may think this is working and you are beginning to feel like all is going well.

But you are not getting a good night’s sleep.

Sleep is very important for anyone’s life. You were having trouble falling asleep, now, you are awakened by nightmares or flashbacks, even at work, while you are busy and not thinking about the traumatic event. Along with flashbacks, you are having intrusive thoughts, they come out of nowhere. You may ask yourself, “What is going on?”

 Are We Listening to Our Bodies?

You may think you are doing well, but remember your body and mind remember what you have been going through. That means they want to be healed by all this; they want your attention to this situation. Left unattended, it will soon affect your health. It will start with something little like a headache, bellyache, slight pain in your chest, bladder infections, and the symptoms may go away, only to come back and stay longer.

If you go see a doctor, he will come up with his own conclusion of what’s happing to you and will try to cover up the problem with medications that come with less than desirable side effects.

Would you believe your body is trying to tell you something? Do we listen?

Make up your mind, to the point of being as courageous as you can be. You are setting a goal to live each day in the real world. It will help you set a goal to live each day in a direction of reality. This will help you make specific choices of recovery. To recover, you should also know that you are not alone.

It is important that you understand that your healing is going to probably be a difficult one.  Seek the help of others. You will probably not be able to overcome these paralyzing feelings without the help and support of others.

One of the most common characteristics of a person who has experienced emotional injury is to have the tendency to be left “alone”.  This is the depression talking. It is very important, that we recover to a healthy life, a healthy us, a healthy you.

It is vital for you to find a good counselor or someone who will treat you with emotional safety and will encourage you and understand you when you fail. Someone who has experience with trauma and its effects.

It has become a rule for me, that we can not do all this on our own. We need each other as survivors, including our Creator as we believe in, our higher selves, our spirit guides, our angels. We need a purpose to live.

Once you have reached your goal, teach someone who would like help in healing as well. Reach out to others who are suffering as you were. Give yourself a purpose.

Many blessings to you. May God give you courage and strength.

 

 

 

 

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Listen to Your Body

 

Sometimes, we want to forget about some things that we did in the past or something someone did to us, which gives us shame and guilt. How would you do that? Things we do not want to remember, pop up at times, just by talking about any particular subject and your memory jumps to it as if you accidentally pressed a wrong key on the computer and another subject matter comes up.

Particularly, if it was something you don’t want to remember about. Something you don’t want to remember in the first place. Especially if it has to do with trauma.

If something happened to you that you did not plan out as you wanted it to, and turned violent, disturbing to you. What do we learn from that? You missed judged your situation, You cannot trust yourself to make good judgments? You live in a world you no longer trust or believe in?

When you are thinking about all this, did you feel pain somewhere? You’re stomached? You started to get a headache,  bad breath, your body started to get chills, your heart started to race, or do flips flops. What is your body trying to tell you?

If you are about to give a speech in front of many people, wouldn’t your stomach tell you your nervous? it would feel funny, make noises, that tells you your hungry, maybe, you just need to make a potty stop. Those are just some ideas that we automatically make.

We are familiar with some of the signals we receive from our bodies. What would you do if you received a signal from your body more often than usual? Could say “where is that coming from? It’s on this spot, by the… you just might go to the doctor and give yourself a “peace of mind” check-up.

But you just might be diagnosed with something only the doctor could guess of what it could be. I started taking a new vitamin for my heart and it was affecting my energy, I started to get diarrhea, as well, I stopped eating some foods that I thought were causing the diarrheic effect. I had to try everything I had taken within that week.

Finally, I realized it was a new vitamin that I had started taking, it was too strong, so I cut back and that helped. It turns out that is what it was.  Knowing your body is very important. Sometimes, as well-meaning, as your doctor is, he could give you something that will have a long list of side effects, and find out by doing your own investigating is the best.

YOUR BODY IS TRYING TO TELL YOU SOMETHING!

  • Awareness is the first step to stop trauma blocking and pain.
  • Ignoring negative impacts in your life.
  • Finding comfort in food – weight gain. Why am I gaining weight?
  • Why did I attract Cancer, dietetic, this illness, or that illness?
  • Create a wellness plan, where will I start?
  • Find a way to stay emotionally healthy (meditation, yoga, exercise, or dance.)
  • If you can afford it, get professional help.
  • Search for information on the internet, read stories about other survivors.
  • First of all, and very important – Join a support group.
  • GET HELP!

All this is not going to be easy. You have gotten into some unhealthy habits and it will take time to change for the best and to heal from your body’s disruptive way of managing itself. Please give it time to heal.

You have separated your body parts from feeling altogether. Take your time to listen to your body. If you get a “gut” feeling about something, 85 percent of the time, you are right.

Get to know yourself, and don’t say “this is the way I am” because we can all change ourselves for our higher best. That saying is just for people who don’t want to do anything better for themselves. Of course, you do have a choice, stay sick and tired, or go out and do something productive with your life. Start gardening, ground yourself to the earth, by playing with the dirt itself. You will start the healing process. God bless.

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Is Taking the COVID-19 Vaccine Traumatizing?

We are all still under quarantine and restrictions, the poor, sick, and weak.  This virus has spread and now it is a global virus and the world as a whole is infected. “As a whole.”  How did this happen? No one really knows. There are many questions, the elderly, children, and people, in general, are dying. How did this happen? Now dogs, too?

There are so many questions and no answers. Now, we have a vaccine almost a year later. I was watching some doctors on YouTube saying some of the doctors had discovered a cure early on when we first heard about coronavirus, but I did not hear anything more. Why is this virus hurting millions and millions of people, their jobs, and businesses? It is like a Horror movie, like the movie “outbreak”.

I was reading this article that said they were all excited because of the vaccine. There are two different vaccines, one from Pfizer and a second from Moderna. I understand that there are other vaccines that apply different approaches to taking care of the COVID 19, but the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) needs to approve them and are going through them as quickly as possible.

As I understand this, there have been some shipped and people have been vaccinated. Especially, with those people who are at higher risk.

Does this mean we can go back to our regular lives?

No. 

A doctor, MD, and assistant professor from Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at St. Johns Hopkins School of Medicine said, “To put this crisis behind us and go back to life as we know it”, “we need 80 percent of the United States population to get the vaccine, and it could take a year.”

It was stated that some people will not be able to get the vaccine until June of this year. How traumatizing is that, for those who are affected with the COVID-19 today?

As I understand it, the vaccination will begin in three phases.

First Phase

Because there are limited doses right now, it will be given to the higher risk people first, the health workers, the elderly, and the nursing home staff.

Second Phase

Once there are more doses of the vaccine, they will continue with the high-risk population, and then the vaccine will be distributed to the clinics, doctors’ offices, pharmacies, and other medical facilities.

Third Phase

In phase three, and if there are enough vaccine doses, it will be available to everyone. It also depends on where you live, and who gets what.

Phases will vary by what state you live in. Those decisions will be made by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, along with the Governments, the local ones, where you are living.

Are You Safe Getting the Vaccine?

It is claimed that 73,000 people who participated in the trials of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine clinical trials, did not experience “serious safety concerns.”

Also, you will probably need two doses of the vaccine. The longest the vaccines last is 21 to 28 days. You will still have to take precautions at least two weeks after the last vaccination. Just to be safe. Social distancing and wearing a mask and avoiding traveling.

These restrictions will still be required due to only 10 percent of people having the vaccine, they will not be protected from getting the COVID-19 and could be reinfected, yet it could be a good possibility.

The vaccine will cause body aches, chills, fever, and swelling in the vaccine shot area. They recommend not to take anti-fever medication or painkillers for at least six hours after your vaccine shot.

Once Vaccinated, Can I Go Back to My Normal Life?

No.

And here is why: The vaccine is not made to prevent you from contracting the virus. It is simply to prepare your body, as a defense, so that you do not become infected and resulting in a life-threatening illness. When the COVID-19 has eased its presence in your community, then officials or the FDA advisory panel from the COVID-19 may lift the restrictions.

Should I Worry About Allergic Reactions?

Yes.

They said if you are allergic to anaphylaxis. If people have an allergic reaction to food, drugs, or vaccines they should not take Pfizer’s vaccine. In mid-December 2021, The FDA will be working with Pfizer to make a determination on this point. The General reaction could be like being allergic such as reactions to eating peanuts or getting a vaccination for the flu. Symptoms could include hives, swelling of mucous membranes of mouth and tongue, difficulty breathing, a drop in blood pressure, and toxic shock.

I have taken vaccines that cause me to have muscle spasms, and I thought I was having a heart attack. That was the first time I had taken a vaccine, the second time I tried this again and my reaction was worse.

Making this decision will be a hard one for me.

May God bless us all and continue to protect us.

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Does Yelling Affect Our Children Later in Life?

Who has not yelled at their kids? Does Yelling Affect Our Children later in Life? Raise your hands! I know I have. Does this traumatize your children? According to ACEs (adverse childhood experiences), it does. When my children were little, I’d yell and they would start crying. You would think I slapped them or something…

Do you remember when your mom yelled at you? I do.

I knew I was in trouble. My mom did not have the patience to yell. She would grab us by the hair and used our hair as a steering wheel and directed us to what she wanted us to do. My poor mom had way too many kids. Starting with me, to the 7 youngest. Taking care of the kids was everybody’s responsibility. Anyway, if moms yelled at their kids, they would cry even more. I have heard moms yelling at their kids all the time. In fact, I experimented.

One of my kids asked, “Mom, why are you always yelling at us?” O answered, “Because you guys don’t do as I ask if I don’t yell.” Sure enough, I had done laundry, and I asked the kids to come and put their clothes away. They were playing video games on the T.V., I thought they had not heard me.

I went into their room and asked them to get their clothes and to put them away. “In a minute, mom”.

30 minutes later, they were not in the laundry room to get their clothes. So, I had to yell at them. Did they come? Yes, they came running in.

I explained to them, “See how yelling works? Just talking to you kids doesn’t work.”  I probably got them used to me yelling at them. How sad was that?

What happens when you are yelling all the time?

Children will think you just don’t love them. Your kids will believe that you are mad at them all the time. “What did I do wrong, now?” I believe, children will get used to you yelling at them and it will be just another form of communication. Right?

I had a client who talked like she was yelling all the time or in a tone of voice like she was frustrated with you. When she came to me for another problem, I thought she was upset at me for something she did not apricate me saying to her. But as I started to understand her better, that was just her normal tone of voice.

My client complained about her co-workers not liking her. I could understand now what the problem was.  It was her tone of voice, as she appeared to be a very unhappy lady. Her children got the blunt of her angry, unsatisfied-with-life tone of voice. In our sessions, she’d use that tone of voice with me too.

We practiced changing that. Now she is more conscious of that tone and makes more of an effort to make audible adjustments. She said when she sees me, it triggers her to check in on herself. But I said to start with her children and her husband instead and had her husband remind her.   She didn’t like the way he’d correct her, so that did not always work. It was a look he’d give her, that worked.

Research has said that parental discipline, like yelling, can have a bigger impact on kids than we believe. We could be creating more emotional issues in the long run. If we start yelling at our kids it might make our kid’s behavior even worse. Sometimes it makes you think you have to yell more just to try to correct it. And the cycle continues.

Now, your kids start talking like their parent’s talk, using a harsh tone of voice and yelling at each other. You try to stop them, but they learned it from you. Now they have that bad and ugly habit. How are you going to change that? You have to be the example and admit you were wrong in talking/communicating with them in this way in the first place. Yes, it is your fault.

Children feel hurt, scared, or sad when their parents yell at them. This verbal abuse had the ability to cause deeper psychological issues that they carry into adulthood.

Yelling has the same symptoms as traumatic incidents. As adults, they could develop illness, depression, anxiety, and other symptoms that can lead to worsening behavior, destructive actions, like drug use, or bad choices in picking destructive relationships.

Our children are very special to very many of us. If you have been yelling at your children the change can happen. Especially if you know that your child can be traumatized and ill effects will be suffered in adulthood.

If you are suffering from anxiety and depression yourself, please get help. Sometimes, we hurt those we love the most. Talk to someone you trust or a mental health professional.

Try to ease your stress by listening to some positive relaxing music, take a break from your hectic environment. Have your husband fix dinner, have someone responsible watch the children for a few hours. Do what you must to relax and stop yelling at the children. Prayer, meditation, yoga, whatever it takes to keep children healthy.

God Bless you and give you courage and strength.

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Military, Children and Trauma

You might not need to imagine the stresses the children of military people go through.  It must be very devastating, the pain and worry they go through. I can only go by my relative’s painful stories. My sister, who died of cancer and a broken heart, had a son who went into the military just after high school. That was just about the time war broke out in Iran/Iraq.

My nephew and his cousin decided to enlist together. They were shipped out to Afghanistan. I can just imagine, what my poor sister was going through. Worried about her son. I remember my nephew saying, when he was in battle, it was like killing his own relatives. Some of them looked like they were his brother, Chuy, and his uncle, Isidro. This pretty much traumatized, my nephew.  “It felt like I was killing my own family.”

My nephew is now severely traumatized from his experiences in combat. My other nephew never made it back home. He was killed in combat.

I also worked with a co-worker who was in the military as well, I was to review, him, but meanwhile, he had to be deployed to war in Iraq, as well. He ran the facility like the military. He was a supervisor of a cleaning crew for our facility, using a whistle he’d gather up the crew, made up by some of our clients, part of a work-for-pay program used for experience in preparing them for work and a resume.

 

He controlled everyone with a whistle, “I want everyone here by 1600 hours”. He always used military time. When he left, I saw his itinerary that he had left behind and written it down for me.

He wrote down an hour-by-hour plan for his family at home as well. I could not believe he ran his home and his kids the same way as a military camp,  I wonder, how that worked out for him? He had four children and was in the process of adopting a black child. Secretly, I always worried about his adopted child.

Last I heard, my coworker, made it home safely, but he had a mental breakdown. But they saved his job for him. If he ever recovered, his job would be waiting for him.

Military children, sounded like they have it worse. They are constantly moving, leaving friends and relatives behind. Especially when dad has to go to other areas of the world. I had a girlfriend whose father was an important Army soldier and they had him move to Spain. She was born there and had dual citizenship.

When she came back into the United States, and ready to retire, she had to hire a lawyer, just to get her retirement, to get proof of her citizenship. Dad too ran the family like the military camp.

My friend told me stories, how dad did not want her to date others from those countries. She said she left the family at age 16 and came back to the states. She had a hard time getting information to prove her dad was assigned to Spain and was born there, but mom and dad were U.S. citizens.

How does all this affect the children?

Some want to follow in their parent’s footsteps. Others have a different idea of family happiness and do not want to do what their fathers did.  Worry the family like that.

It is hard enough if there is a war, but to move and leave all the friends and family. Statistics show that some of the family kids, especially the males in the family, become drug addicts or alcoholics. The trauma becomes too much.

Does the military teach you to speak with love?

How does it teach you, how to speak to your child, wife, people in general? I don’t think so.  There are harsh rules and regulations you should not bring home.

  • Military only- teach men and women, to become a person who has to survive if you are at war.
  • Military education and training- a process that intends to establish and improve military roles.
  • Recruit training, which makes use of various conditioning techniques.
  • To re-socialize trainees into the military system,
  • Ensure that they will obey all orders without hesitation.
  • Teach basic military skills.

Do these sound like family orientation roles?

Why, then do family men and women, believe a home should be run like this?

Because the military ingrains these rules into our men and women, so intensively, that it has to become an everyday regimen to survive a crisis for war. Understandably. But what does it have to do with having to raise a loving family? Two completely different roles.

Some military men and women get it, some don’t.

Of some of the clients I see, they share common characteristics.

You think that by now there would be help for fathers and mothers to get briefed by a physiologist or receive some form of family counseling before going home and re-trained for civilization outside the military life.

May God protect us at all times. With or without war times. May God forbid.

 

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Do You Have an Inner Child to Heal?

Healing your inner child? Does this sound weird to you? I know this could sound a little strange. But think about it when you were little did you not sometimes pretend you were like from outer space? You played games with other children your age. Did you ever pretend you were somebody else? Superman, wonder woman, part of the flintstones.

Of course, you did, it’s something like remembering your childhood. Or can you remember? We could take you back to a time when as a child, been happy. I remember being happy, playing with my dog. I remember loving that dog.

Sometimes, he wanted to play most of the time. I enjoyed playing with him. He would lay in the dirt and I would rub the dirt on his belly. I know he loved that, even though he did not say it in human language, but his tail would wag a lot and he would have a big smile on his face.

So, taking me back to those happy times, makes me happy. The inner child also holds the joy, innocence, and confidence, we once had remembers that time, remember when you wanted to climb that fun looking tree, and everyone thought you were going to fall, and you didn’t because you just felt like you were not going to fall.  That was confidence. and a good day.

Working with some of our inner child trauma is to try to bring up some of the things that traumatized us when we were small. Sometimes, it is best to discuss these memories, with a professional. Some of the memories could be too much for you to remember on your own.

Try talking to someone you trust. Especially if you just need to talk about what you are learning about your past. Or with someone, who was with you at that time, like a brother or sister, especially if they were not the tormentors.

Speak to your inner child

Seeking a therapist or Mental Health professional is always the best thing to do. Pick someone who has worked with people’s inner children and had good results.

It’s quite interesting when you try to get your inner child to converse with you. Your inner child might not trust you, so, talk to this child with respect and if this child can trust you, this child will talk to you.

Meditation is good for getting in touch with your inner child. Have patience, you will catch yourself remembering things you did as a kid. You could learn many things. Tell your inner child, not to worry about something you know now as an adult, turned out well. Sometimes, your inner child will appear without you really realizing it.

Write a letter to your inner child

Write down questions you may have or have the need to ask, write down how your Inner child felt as a child when certain trauma was happening. Write a letter to your inner child and explain to the child how you survived. Have the inner child write you a letter having an inner child go back to and cover each stage in your life.

How did the inner child feel at age one, or when the child started to walk and explore the world around him. Was he still confident? I suggest that when your inner child starts writing you, use your left hand.

In this way, you can physically see different handwriting. In its writings, you will actually feel your inner child’s words differently.  You just might feel silly doing this, but you will soon see how healing this is.

Please do not forget to talk to somebody, about this experience with someone you trust. Validate with a trusted friend, therapist, or mental health professional. For a breakthrough, you will need to bounce what happened off someone who can validate you.

You must understand that those repeated words in your mind that keep repeating the same negatives.  You must remember that those negative repeating words were placed there by those who cause your trauma as a child. Parents, teachers, bullies, or whoever it must have been.

Give yourself positive and loving confirmations;

  • Every day in every way, I am healing.
  • I will allow myself to be happy today.
  • I am healing every day.
  • Inner child, I am grateful you are in my life.
  • Sometimes, if I’m feeling sad, just thinking of you makes me feel better.
  • I am proud of the person I am/have become.
  • We have survived.
  • Inner child, we are a team you and me.
  • I love your laugh and your smile. (let’s see that again)
  • Nothing will stop me from loving you. (to inner child)
  • You are an important part of me.

You will be surprised by the outcome, the healing, of taking care of your inner child. Please allow your inner child to come out and play. To get to know who you really are now. Whom is part of you. It sounds silly, but it works, we all need this kind of healing in our lives. Healing our present with healing our past.

GOD bless and many healings to you.

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Parents fighting, cause children Trauma?

Who did not grow up without seeing your parents fighting? I wished none of us did see our parents arguing. Sometimes it got ugly. My father would beat my mom. I never heard my mother argue with my father or yell at him.  But I did witness him hitting her. Parents fighting, cause children Trauma?

When I first started going to school, we were told that here in the United State men could not beat women, it was against the law. I was told that in school. How amazing! That women had protection.

Well, the day came when I decided to use that “right.” To my surprise. The next thing, I knew, a police car was in front of our house. My father started to beat my mother. I got on the phone and called the police.

I wished there was a law against beating your kids back then. I have gotten the beating of my life, from my father. But it was worth it. My father did not go to jail, because my brothers saved his ass. He came back inside the house after the police drove off and like a big bear, asked who called the police!

Of course, all my siblings were afraid of him and all eight little fingers pointed at me. I got a beating from him. But it was worth it! saving my mom at least for that one day.

Does all this screw up a kid? Of course, it does, I grew up a very angry kid. Up to a very angry adult as well. I had a lot of healing to do after I grew up as an adult and after my kids were grown. (That’s another story).

As children, we, become hostile with other children, distraught, hopeless, again angry, we develop behavior problems at home and school. Sometimes, children do not sleep well. Sometimes, children who are raised in a conflicted environment, develop troubles forming healthy relationships, even sibling relationships go to an extreme. Been overly protective of becoming over-involved, distant, and disengaged.

All of this can cause trauma in our children and affect every inch of their lives. Developing serious illnesses when they are adults. More recent studies show that other physiological systems in our bodies are damaged as well. The autonomic nervous system helps us to respond to threats, which react to as our brakes that calm us.

Now as parents, we know how destructive conflicts can be. We avoid to think how it can affect our children, we forget how it was when we were children, how we felt when our parents fought.  I wish, there was someone to of reminded me how it felt when we were kids.

Sometimes, children get in the middle of the fights and they could get more damaged or physically hurt. As single parents, we must be very careful, with what is worth more, if not the health of our children. If we have girls in our family. We must be careful with what kind of partner we bring into our home.

I was very religious back then, I married someone from my church, thinking of a Christian man, someone who claimed to love God. I thought my girls were safe.  So, moms, please be very careful, who you bring home. Now and days, you will never know.

My world was always better when my little ones were in it. Sometimes we get together and reminisce. “I am sorry” “please forgive me..”  But we love each other even more. Many Blessings for that and to you.

 

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Inner Child Tantrum

Out of the blue, out of nowhere, I reacted, I think I could have stopped myself, but I didn’t. I was making myself a dress on my sewing machine, that did not get the stitch size I wanted, the needle also broke the thread, the bobbin was skipping stitches. I worked on this machine for more than an hour. All of a sudden, I felt this uncontrollable anger and frustration overcome me, that I picked up the sewing machine from the sewing table and through the sewing machine across the room. To my surprise, it did not break. You’d think I would have stopped there, right? Thanking God, it did not break. No, it frustrated me even more. I went to the drawer where I keep an extra hammer and finished breaking and smashing it.  Did I feel much better? Yes (at the moment).

But now I needed a new sewing machine. Did I understand why I did that? No, I am only 5 years old, why should I understand why I did that? Your inner child can pop out anytime, and can say things in a way that is really not how we wanted things to go. What I really should have done was “step… away… from the… machine!”

These reactions start to become our behaviors, our coping abilities, that we bring into our adulthood. These reactions become normal for us, but come across as an overreaction by others or a tantrum, a tizzy fit from an immature adult.

What happened to me to lose my temper like that? This is the part where you start looking into yourself. What else was happening to me at that age? Why am I so angry? How far into my past must I go? Should I talk to someone about this reaction? A therapist would be good.

I understand that a psychotherapist could be a good fit. Inner child therapy, called inner child work, focuses on this type of work. This is what I learned.

First, I had to acknowledge that mom did the best she knew how to raise me, with the experience she had and what she learned in her life. As I did with my children. Since my youth, I grew to be a strong individual, and my inner child found a safe place inside me. But when she feels threatened, frightened, or unsafe, she reacts defensively.  A developed survival reaction.

As I review the overreaction, there was no apparent threat to my life, but my inner child obviously demonstrated uncontrollable anger.

When we are young, it is hard to make sense out of what was happening to us during the abuse we suffer as a child. So, we find ways to bottle up those feelings of emotional trauma. Creating many emotions like anger, frustration, and feeling the injustice of many things, which I must investigate within myself by journaling memories that I remembered. Talking about what I remembered and talking to my therapist about it and how it made me feel.

My inner child is all about me. The innocent part of me, and all about my feelings. Now, it is about how together we can move on.  Together we can heal the injustices, the pain, and the hurts.

  • Bring together the child with the adult.
  • Give my inner child the space to have serious feelings and not shut them down.
  • By giving her love and taking care of her basic needs.
  • Communication without anger.
  • Remain true to me and my inner child during a stressful situation.
  • Self-honoring and setting boundaries (this could be hard).
  • Showing self-love and respect to each other.

I will give my inner child the love and acceptance she longs for and invite her to have an honored and safe place to stay in at this current time, where we can share our lives in harmony. A life where my inner child can feel safe, secure, and loved.

May God give us love and protection to both of us.