grahamg
Old codger
- Location
- South of Manchester, UK
I found the following article recently and thought it might be of interest here:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fixing-families/201903/4-key-ways-your-childhood-shapes-you
Quote:
Emotional wounds
"Emotional wounds are about what you particularly learned to be sensitive to in growing up. It is usually one or two of five things: criticism, micromanaging, feeling neglected, not feeling heard or feeling dismissed, not being appreciated. We all walk out of our childhoods with something.
As a child, your only ways of coping are to get good á la first-born; get angry, á la second-born; or withdraw, á la often the middle-born. And like the birth order, you bounce off your siblings — my brother is the good one, my sister the angry one, I’m the quiet one. The consequences here are that you bring these coping styles into your adult relationships and when you feel wounded, do what you learned. The problem is that this often triggers the other guy’s wound (you withdraw because you feel criticized, the other gets angry because he feels neglected) and the cycle feeds off itself with each person feeling wounded and operating out a childhood brain.
And if these wounds come from trauma — abuse, severe neglect, grief, and loss — this adds another layer: When we are traumatized we instinctively, though often unconsciously, decide how we need to be in order to protect ourselves from such pain in the future. Here we decide not to get close to others, to not trust, to cling so others don't leave, to try and be perfect, to put up a wall of anger.
Family climate
Or you become hyper-alert. This is often the childhood default for growing up in an unsafe environment: your parents arguing all the time or your mother being anxious and yelling; your dad drinking and knowing his moods could change in a nanosecond; there never-ending tension though you could never quite figure out the source. And so your only defense as a child is to always be on guard — to stay on your toes and try and adjust to the emotional weather. Here the oldest child tries to walk on eggshells better, the second child is always ready to pick a fight, the middle retreats to her room, the baby cries and waits for someone to take care of him."
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fixing-families/201903/4-key-ways-your-childhood-shapes-you
Quote:
Emotional wounds
"Emotional wounds are about what you particularly learned to be sensitive to in growing up. It is usually one or two of five things: criticism, micromanaging, feeling neglected, not feeling heard or feeling dismissed, not being appreciated. We all walk out of our childhoods with something.
As a child, your only ways of coping are to get good á la first-born; get angry, á la second-born; or withdraw, á la often the middle-born. And like the birth order, you bounce off your siblings — my brother is the good one, my sister the angry one, I’m the quiet one. The consequences here are that you bring these coping styles into your adult relationships and when you feel wounded, do what you learned. The problem is that this often triggers the other guy’s wound (you withdraw because you feel criticized, the other gets angry because he feels neglected) and the cycle feeds off itself with each person feeling wounded and operating out a childhood brain.
And if these wounds come from trauma — abuse, severe neglect, grief, and loss — this adds another layer: When we are traumatized we instinctively, though often unconsciously, decide how we need to be in order to protect ourselves from such pain in the future. Here we decide not to get close to others, to not trust, to cling so others don't leave, to try and be perfect, to put up a wall of anger.
Family climate
Or you become hyper-alert. This is often the childhood default for growing up in an unsafe environment: your parents arguing all the time or your mother being anxious and yelling; your dad drinking and knowing his moods could change in a nanosecond; there never-ending tension though you could never quite figure out the source. And so your only defense as a child is to always be on guard — to stay on your toes and try and adjust to the emotional weather. Here the oldest child tries to walk on eggshells better, the second child is always ready to pick a fight, the middle retreats to her room, the baby cries and waits for someone to take care of him."