How Parenting Can Help You Heal Your Own Inner Child by Mia Barnes
Becoming a parent is one of life’s most beautiful moments. It can also cause complicated feelings if you have inner child wounds. Many new parents don’t realize how having a kid would exacerbate and resolve their childhood trauma. Learn more about how parenting can help heal your own inner child and embrace every moment of raising a kid.
What Is an Inner Child?
An inner child is the part of your subconscious that influences how you feel and think as an adult. It uses your childhood experiences as your primary filter. When I was little, my parents dismissed my emotional needs because I had four younger siblings who needed their attention. As a result, my inner child carried lasting emotional neglect wounds that made me feel undeserving of love in any relationship.
A person’s inner child thrives when they have healthy relationships with their mother or father during childhood. Life isn’t perfect, so inner child wounds are common. Getting in touch with yours will make parenting easier when triggers occur.
Signs Your Inner Child Needs Help
Raising a kid can cause triggers that affect your inner child. When my daughter got old enough to entertain herself, I found myself emotionally spiraling because she didn’t need me all the time. It triggered my inner child because my subconscious thought it proved how I didn’t deserve her love once she was old enough to choose something or someone else.
You might notice similar strong emotions come up if your inner child's wounds open up. Watch for symptoms like:
Intense emotional reactions to small things
Coping methods that aren’t healthy
Self-sabotaging behaviors regarding your parenting
A desire to distance yourself from your family
Low self-esteem
Meeting with a therapist to resolve your leftover childhood trauma is always the best option, but you may find that parenting also helps. It depends on your inner wounds and your parenting style.
How Parenting Can Heal Your Inner Child
Once you understand how parenting can help you heal your own inner child, you can form your routine around things that help both of you.
You Can Experience Play Together
Physical activity releases feel-good endorphins, which may be what you need to start healing from the depression connected to your inner child's wounds. Schedule plenty of playtime with your child. Going to the park, swinging in your backyard or even walking around your neighborhood are easy ways to get moving together.
You Might Validate Your Feelings With Purpose
Wounds leftover from childhood emotional neglect can reopen when you accidentally invalidate your child’s feelings. Think about the last time your kid started crying and you responded with, “You’re fine.” Practice validating your child’s feelings and processing them together to validate your own simultaneously. It could be exactly what you need to start healing your inner child's wounds.
You Could Appreciate Healthy Boundaries as a Family
Childhood trauma can also result from having no boundaries as a kid. No hard limits teach kids that anything can happen to them, which could have made them feel unsafe. Appreciate healthy boundaries by setting them for your whole family.
You could reduce everyone’s tech time by making dinner an electronic-free zone or filling your free time with play activities. The boundary on tech usage would bring your family closer together and heal that part of your mind that associates a lack of boundaries with less safety.
Heal as a Family
Parenting can help you heal your own inner child if you understand your subconscious wounds. Watch for triggers and respond with your parenting style. As I’ve done the same, I’ve found that my triggers are less powerful because my inner child feels just as loved as my daughter does.
Mia Barnes is a professional freelance writer specializing in postpartum wellness and practical family health advice. She has over 5 years of experience working as Body+Mind magazine's Editor-in-Chief. You can follow Mia and Body+Mind on X and Instagram @bodymindmag.