There is a child in me but I am not pregnant.

February 14, 2008 12:27 PM

Therapyfilter: Help a logical scientist understand “inner child” work.

Background: I am a mid-thirties female. I’m a happy, optimistic person with many close, rewarding friendships, a great career, interesting (to me) hobbies, and generally lots to look forward to. I think I have a great life. I was engaged when I was in my late 20’s, but he died. Recently I realized that I am, er, commitment-phobic when it comes to men and intimacy, though not in other aspects of my life.

I grew up in a home with two alcoholic parents and a father who was physically (not sexually) abusive. My way of dealing with this is not to think about the past, but to focus on my bright future. Until this point, it has served me well. However, I have realized I might want a life partner, and something is getting in the way of that.

I found a great therapist who does Transactional Analysis therapy. After two sessions she claims I am self aware and very motivated to change and work – and I am. I am kind of a go-getter. Yesterday she told me that in order to “heal my wounds” I needed to “nurture my inner child” and tell her what a great job she did getting me here. (I am sure there is more – that was the broad stroke summary).

OKAY THEN. I am trying, I really am. Inner child? I want to embrace this and understand it, but I am a scientist and I am having trouble making this leap. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? Does anyone understand this? I can’t “get” having a little girl inside of me *still*. Has anyone else made this connection who can help me? IT peeps? Other scientists?

To add a bit that may help: The inner child bit is really woo-woo for me, but I am spiritual and meditate, so I am not so concrete that I am averse to anything I can’t see/feel/touch. I want to make this work, but have a feeling my tendency toward a concrete orientation might frustrate my therapist and myself. By the way, I am not claiming that inner child work is somehow nonscientific or illogical. I just don't know anything about it and it doesn't resonate with my bench science background. Thank you.

posted by anonymous to human relations (21 comments total)

maybe you need a new therapist. it seems to me that if she can't adequately explain the work she wants you to do, there's no way you'll see improvement.

fwiw, i also do not dwell on my childhood and its hurts, and i'm okay with that. i'm not a therapist, but i am sure there is more than one way to come to terms with your past.
posted by thinkingwoman at 12:34 PM on February 14

Check out ACA for some ideas about what one might expect a person with your background to feel. It's a differnt tack than you're taking, but having multiple lenses with which to examine ourselves is always useful.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:35 PM on February 14

I had a situation that was a little bit similar, in that I had a childhood background of abuse and it consequently meant I was gun-shy with close relationships and kept sabotaging my life. Anyway, when I had the "inner child" mumbo-jumbo thrown at me, I asked and the therapist explained that it was really a way of trying to come to terms with my past. Yes, bad things happened and the child I was then had coped in one way; I had to learn to accept that the coping that I did as a child was fine and right for the child, but that I had to learn new ways to play as an adult.

I didn't encounter a younger tigerjade on that struggle; rather, I learned to look back and close that book.
posted by tigerjade at 12:48 PM on February 14

I think that if you think your therapist is great then you shouldn't throw her out for one comment (per thinkingwoman's suggestion). You might want to check out a writer named John Bradshaw (his big book was "Homecoming" and he used to do PBS specials in the 1980s). He popularized the "inner child" thing, and my mom (who is very sensible but who also grew up in an alcoholic household) was a fan. I'm not an expert on this subject, but I think maybe you're being kind of literal about the "child inside you" thing. (Which is to be expected, given the kind of person you are!) It's more a way of thinking about why, for example, you might get into patterns with men *because* of the ways of relating you learned as a kid. It's acknowledging that that kid you used to be is still a part of you, and her ideas and experiences inform the woman you are today. So it's worthwhile to spend some time thinking about her, and to acknowledge that some of her needs (for approval, love, respect, attention, etc.) that you squash down today are actually still there.
posted by moxiedoll at 12:53 PM on February 14 [2 favorites]

How do you think? Do you self-talk? What's your inner monologue like?
I had the inner child explained to me like this - at any point in our lives we are the sum of our experiences and certain developmental ages stick with us over time. You probably hear from your inner child when you really, really, want something or are disappointed. She might not come through in words, but instead may come through as a feeling of disappointment or desire. How you handle this is how your ultimately treating yourself. If, for something you really want you tell yourself "that's dumb, you don't need it," you're being very harsh to your inner child. How would you treat a child in that situation? It's better to nurture than to demean. Nurturing doesn't mean giving in necessarily - it means recognizing the feeling, and the urgency of your inner voice that's expressing that feeling and responding gently and fairly.
posted by plinth at 1:03 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

Okay, here's my best shot at a "rational" explanation. Others may add much more, but this is the kernel of my understanding. (Please correct me if I get part of it wrong, folks.)

Cognitive therapists/psychiatrists divide up a person's psyche into three "ego states:" The Parent part, which involves taking care of one's emotional and physical needs; The Adult, which covers the rational/intellectual/problem solving part of us; and The Child, which involves very basic emotions, impulses, creativity and world view that we developed as children. All adults have these three ego states, to one degree or another.

Many people who experience trauma as children end up with a Child ego state that is kind of stuck, and this can create problems in forming relationships later in life. The idea is that this ego state needs to evolve through cognitive processing in order to function as a healthy part of one's ego. Not thinking about the past is a coping mechanism that protects us from past pain, but keeps us stuck in the emotional place of a child.

Once we can recognize the trauma of the past and process it, we can become "unstuck," and the old patterns will cease to affect our present life.

It is an approach that worked pretty well for me, though it's kind of an ongoing process. My experience is unique, because everyone is different. But it involved admitting that I suffered abuse, talking a lot about the anger and bitterness I felt, and also the extreme sadness. The abuse left me with some irrational fears, and I've had to face those. It also left me with a core feeling of worthlessness that I tried not to acknowledge, and avoiding it just made things worse. Anyway, now I'm blathering.

Hope this makes some sense, and is helpful. Good luck!
posted by shifafa at 1:09 PM on February 14 [2 favorites]

P.S. The title of your post cracked me up.
posted by shifafa at 1:09 PM on February 14

Yeah, the "inner child" has totally foofoo connotations to me, too, like there's some kid in pigtails blowing dandelions in my psyche that I'm supposed to hug.

But from what I've read and how I understand it, it's a lot less magic-crystal that that. You might want to Google "Adult Children of Alcoholics"... there's a lot of good info out there.

Here's a particularly useful link:

http://www.recovery.org/acoa/whois.acoa.html

The idea behind undoing the damage from a crappy childhood... and the whole inner child thing... is that as a child, you were trained -- both directly through rewards and punishments and through modeling -- to behave in ways that worked for you in that family.

It's like if you got a black belt in karate from a dojo, and could kick the ass of anyone in that dojo. Your skills work... in that environment.

Then you move, go into a new dojo, and suddenly, you're getting your ass kicked by the green belts. The dojo owner sees your form and is horrified -- who taught you to fight that way? It's all wrong! That would only work against people trained in the exact same crappy method!

So you have to forget everything you learned about karate and start over from the beginning, under the new master who actually knows what he's talking about.

That process of starting over from the beginning is what they're talking about with the inner child. You're learning life skills, not karate, so you don't need a replacement Master... you need a replacement parent. Unless you fancy joining a cult, that job has to be filled by you, with help from your therapist.

You have to re-parent yourself. You figure out what is normal (that's what the therapist is there for), become your own child for a while, and re-raise and re-train yourself with non-dysfunctional methods.

You're basically doing cognitive-behavior therapy on yourself; the you that's doing the therapy being the outer adult, and the you that's getting it being the "inner child".
posted by Gianna at 2:12 PM on February 14 [10 favorites]

Inner child, guide, angel, intuition, higher self are all the same words to describe your soul. Every single living being has one but often we are not even aware of its existance until a painful experience stirs us. There are many appoaches to connecting with your soul, first though educate yourself on the concept. A beginning....
posted by watercarrier at 2:18 PM on February 14

It would be a very good idea to talk with your therapist about your questions, and not only because you're not sure what she's talking about. Your normal way is probably to use logic, do some research, and figure things out for yourself. You're bringing this preference with you into therapy, but you might want to try out a new method and say, "This isn't clear to me... help me with it."

One very cool thing about therapy, when it's working, is that it gives you a lab in which to overcome some habits you learned as a child -- habits that might be interfering with your happiness as an adult.
posted by wryly at 2:24 PM on February 14

From my perspective, it's really not about being childlike or feeling like you really want to fingerpaint.

It's about the literal, rational fact that in an abusive household, BY DEFINITION you did not get the emotional attention that you, as a child incapable of independence, needed. If your parents had starved you of food, your body would likely still have effects years later, and your relationship to food would probably be skewed. Perhaps your physical growth would be stunted. You might need more of certain nutrients in order to make up for the malnutrition.

In cases of abuse, the emotional growth can be stunted because the child was starved for affection, and as an adult there are still lasting effects. Just like with malnutrition, you need to give yourself affection and attention to make up for what your childhood lacked.

Therapy has helped me to realize that when I'm afraid of or angry at someone close to me, it's usually a functon of that "malnutrition," and giving myself attention has helped my relationships immeasurably.
posted by desjardins at 2:37 PM on February 14 [3 favorites]

Gianna's explanation is excellent.

While most of us get crappy parenting in one way or another, children of abusers and alcoholics and other very unstable people learn a lot of survival mechanisms that help us grow up and get out of the house in one piece (yay) but that don't necessarily help us form good relationships as adults (oh. crap.)

Examining those mechanisms, understanding where they came from, why they were necessary then and are not necessary now - those are all good things.

It is actually really, really hard to unlearn those lessons, and to some extent you're always carting around your inner eight year old anyway. As evidenced by the fact that when my father turned up unexpectedly one afternoon, my husband and I, in the time honored tradition of children of alcoholics, coped with this turn of events by hiding under the stairs and pretending we weren't in. We were 32 at the time.
posted by DarlingBri at 2:50 PM on February 14 [3 favorites]

There are some great explanations in this thread. It might be best to focus on them and ignore any claim that the child that you once were never really grew up and is somehow trapped in time, still stuck in misery. That's how it was presented to me, and I think it was actually harmful. I wanted to get better, not think I had misery permanently implanted in me.

I finally found a therapist who simply said, "What your parents did was wrong. Do you understand that?" No, I didn't. I thought I deserved that treatment. Major revelation, no inner child required.

Now I see it as others here have said: I learned coping techniques that worked once but don't work in my current world. So I need to be patient with myself and retrain. I love the dojo metaphor.
posted by PatoPata at 3:07 PM on February 14

"Inner child" is just a metaphor that some people have found useful for describing aspects of their mental life. It's not a scientific concept, and your skepticism is healthy and wise. The utility of metaphors is subjective, so if this one doesn't work for you, I think it's your therapist's job to try and re-articulate her insights in a language that is familiar and clear to you. I think you've done well to consult others for their sense of this metaphor. Perhaps it makes sense now, and in that case you should run with it. But if it's at all muddy or fails to resonate with your experience, I think you should just be frank and tell your therapist this way of speaking doesn't work for you.
posted by limon at 3:15 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

You've got to be willing to look at the past. Can you recall the pain of your childhood? Do you cry or get emotional in your sessions with your therapist? Because if you don't your defenses are pretty high, and this inner child talk might just alienate you. But I'll give you an outline of the concept: It might help to look at some old family photos first to bring back the memories. Now, close your eyes and think about a somewhat painful but somewhat typical scene from the household of your early childhood. Imagine, in as much detail as you can, where in the house all the members of your family are, and what they were doing there, thinking and saying. Now locate the child version of yourself in this scene. Imagine your clothes, what you looked like. Describe what you were doing and thinking and feeling. Try to remember whatever emotions you might have been feeling, and how you were trying to cope with what was going on around you. Try to actually recall the feel of those emotions as deeply as you can for as long as you can. Now stop. Picture yourself, as you are today, observing the scene. Can you see how much distress that little girl is in? Imagine you can magically appear at the side of your childhood self. What does the adult version of you want to do or say to that little girl, or to your parents or other members of the family? That little girl is your inner child. The thinking is that as a child you developed all kinds of self-defenses to mask and handle the pain you felt, and that while you needed them at the time to preserve yourself, as an adult they're making it hard for anyone to get close to you. And to dismantle those defenses you need to admit to the pain and hurt that the little girl (inside you) felt that made her/you build them in the first place. Too woo woo?
posted by tula at 3:32 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

I'm a therapist, although I don't do TA.

I was going to write what limon wrote, for the most part. Your therapist's explanatory framework should be useful to you, or you should discuss ways to make it useful with your therapist. I think it's fine to ask other people what they think your therapist meant, but I think it will ultimately be more useful for you to think about it and discuss it with your therapist. That's not because there's anything magical about therapy (or any therapist), but because I think that one of the ways therapy works is by prompting us to examine our familiar images of ourselves through intimate conversation with another person, and their stated and unstated views of things we already have pretty firm opinions about. A good therapist elicits our reflection, and not the reflection of a bunch of people on the internet, except insofar as they might prompt our reflection.

(As an aside, I have to say that no psychiatrist of cognitive therapist I've ever encountered or read divides the ego up in the way shifafa recounts, although there may well be some who do somewhere. The later part of his or her comment about becoming "unstuck" is a frequently used metaphor in therapy, although, again, usually not with cognitive therapists or psychiatrists.)
posted by OmieWise at 3:36 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

Think of how trees grow, adding layer after layer on the outside. No matter how big the tree gets, the original sapling is still in there somewhere.

It's sometimes useful to think of personalities in the same way.

I've also found the analogy interesting when thinking about the damage one accumulates over a lifetime. A tree can look perfectly healthy on the outside, but if you look at a cross-section of it you can see exactly what years there were fires or disease. Just because the tree got bigger doesn't mean the damage went away.

There are obviously quite a few other ways of considering human development, but this particular one has always been what I've thought of when the "inner child" thing is brought up.
posted by tkolar at 3:41 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

You've got to be willing to look at the past.

I'm sorry, I feel like I have to respond to this. There is no evidence to suggest that this is true, and some evidence to suggest that it's a bad idea. One of my major areas of interest is what works in therapy, what makes therapy effective and why. What we know through oft-repeated studies is that therapy works (effect size ~0.80), that it works relatively quickly, and that all therapies work about the same (only ~0.20 effect size difference between some different modalities at different times, which works out to at most about a 1% difference in outcome attributable to modality). The things that contribute to good therapy are positive extratherapeutic change, relationship with the therapist, a plan for how to change (which includes the therapists allegiance to a modality that makes sense to the patient), and expectation for change. There is no evidence that "remembering the past" per se contributes to improved outcomes, and since it's not a part of many modalities (CBT, cognitive, psychiatric medications) it seems to contradict the null hypothesis that all therapy works equally well. There are some studies that people who are doing well can end up doing better after entering therapy, and there are at least two plausible explanations for that: a regression to mean, and losing focus on the things that work to examine the things that previously didn't.

By all means, if talking about the past helps you to move toward the future, go right ahead. The notion that it's necessary, though, is not borne out by the research and ultimately constricts the usefulness of therapy.


posted by OmieWise at 3:48 PM on February 14 [3 favorites]

I saw a therapist for a few years to work through the negative fallout of a series of traumatic experiences that had happened to me over the preceding 5 years. When I recounted some of the painful stuff from my childhood and teenage years, he pushed me to express how I felt about "that person", the younger me who had those experiences. He wanted me to confront negative feelings I had toward my past self and try to forgive her.

At the time I felt a lot of resistance towards this approach. But after a few years of reflection I see some wisdom in it. I also tend to look forward in time more than backward, and I create a large mental separation between the person I am now and the person I was when I was younger and bad things happened to me. But compartmentalizing the past self and blaming it for the bad things that happened does not absolve me from feeling the pain. It creates an artificial separation in my sense of self.

Ultimately we are all the products of the people we once were. Becoming comfortable with reflection on one's past selves is essential before one can put to rest the pain from past experiences - and to get out of the trap of avoiding new experiences that remind us of past pain. It was only when I could reflect on my younger self from a more objective standpoint that I could see clearly that some of my choices led to bad things happening; some really bad things happened to me that I did not deserve; and on the whole I was not a bad person then, just human and a little unlucky.

That is the seed of validity that I see in the "inner child" philosophy. It's not that I literally have a personality fragment with the mentality of a child. But when looking back on past experiences (especially from childhood) it's important to remember that what I would expect of myself now is not necessarily what I would have been capable of then.
posted by rhiannon at 6:53 PM on February 14

You've got to be willing to look at the past.

I'm sorry, I feel like I have to respond to this. There is no evidence to suggest that this is true,

I was specifically answering Anonymous question of what "inner child" means, and how she might wrap her head around the concept. That was what she asked, after all. What I meant was that to use the inner child approach to therapy she would need a willingness to look at the her past, which she sounded somewhat reluctant to do. It sounds to me like if she doesn't want to deal with her childhood her current therapist may not be right for her.
posted by tula at 9:41 PM on February 14

It's a metaphor that works for your therapist. It may be that it doesn't work for you, and you should make sure your therapist knows that. Unfortunately, most therapists and social science types in general don't realize that the explanatory principles they use are metaphors, so they use terms as if they really mean something (e.g., energy, power, ego, etc.) instead of understanding the utility of these terms comes from their metaphoric value.

The inner child metaphor refers to those parts of our personality that act and think like children, i.e., non-rational, impulsive, joyful, immensely sad, sentimental, and on. If you want to experience these personality states, something that works for me is to watch a movie or TV show that was around when I was a kid - a movie like Bambi or an episode of Mr. Rogers. In very short order, I'll find myself transported to ways of thinking and feeling and experiencing that seem very child like.

What your therapist is saying is that when you were an actual child, you were hurt and probably baffled by many of the things that happened to you when you were growing up. Your therapist believes that some of those hurt feelings still exist "inside of you" (another metaphor, btw) and that your way of coping with those hurt feelings was to avoid experiencing them. When she's telling you to get in touch with your inner child, she's asking you to remember and narrate some of the stories of your upbringing focusing on the feelings you had at the time while the events were occurring. She's also telling you that she thought the strategy of avoiding feelings was helpful to you while you were growing up, but that as a coping style, it's outlived its usefulness and that it's standing in your way of your relationship now.
posted by jasper411 at 9:56 AM on February 15 [2 favorites]