Early Deprivation: What Can Happen If Someone Had A Mother Who Couldn’t Mirror Back Their Value?

Even though someone needed a mother who was able to see and reflect their worth back to them, it doesn’t mean that they had a mother who did this. However, if this were the case, they might not realise this now that they are an adult.

Yet, if they are not aware of what this stage of their life was like or the impact it had on them, they can be aware of certain symptoms that have arisen as a result. If they are, they can see that they often feel low and struggle to do things.

One Conclusion

Due to this, they can believe that they suffer from depression. This could be put down to them having a chemical imbalance, or they may believe that they were just born this way.

The outcome of this is that they could end up being put on medication or using a brain training device. If they were to go down this route, it might be easier for them to function better, but they won’t get to the root of what is going on for them.

Another Direction

Alternatively, they could end up working with a therapist. If this is the case, this could be a time when they will take a closer look at the thoughts that they usually have and what they believe.

They can then find that they often experience negative thoughts about themselves and have a number of disempowering beliefs. So, instead of being on their own side and their own best friend, they will be against themselves and their own worst enemy.

Two parts

For example, the voice in their head could often say that they are worthless, no good, and not good at anything and that other people don’t like them. Additionally, they could believe that they are worthless, useless, incapable and unlovable.

If they can relate to some, if not all, of these thoughts and beliefs, it is not going to be a surprise that they often feel down and struggle to take action, among other things. What is going on inside them will need to change in order for them to create a life that is worth living.

One Approach

After replacing their negative thoughts with positive thoughts and questioning what they believe, they may find that their inner world gradually changes, and so does their behaviour. Then again, they may find that this approach doesn’t really work and that they still spend a lot of time feeling rough.

What can occur to them is that by changing their thoughts, they are simply denying how they really feel. If so, what can then occur to them is that their thoughts are not purely creating their feelings; their feelings are playing a part in them having certain thoughts.

Another Angle

Now, if they were to stay with how they feel and to think about when they first felt this way, what might enter their mind is that they often felt this way as a child. They might see that their mother was often mean and cruel.

Throughout this stage of their life, their mother might have often criticised them, humiliated them, put them down, ignored them, and even physically harmed them. She would then have been anything but nurturing, with her greatly undermining them.

In A Bad Way

What this is likely to show is that their mother was a deeply wounded human being who unconsciously projected her disowned shame and self-hate into them. Most likely, her mother and/or father had treated her in the same way during her formative years, which caused her to develop a disconnected, unfeeling and inflated false self.

Thanks to how disconnected and out of touch with reality she was, she wouldn’t have been aware of what she was doing or how destructive her behaviour was. Deep down, though, she would have believed that her child was worthless, unless, incapable and unlovable, and deserved to be punished.

Straight In

But, although their mother was a deeply wounded human being who was seeing her own disowned self inside them and couldn’t see them clearly, they wouldn’t have realised this. As they were egocentric, they would have believed that their mother was mirroring back who they were.

It was then not that their mother was a deeply wounded human being; no, it was that they were worthless, unless, incapable and unlovable. What their mother mirrored back to them would then have largely formed their view of themselves.

A Lie

With this in mind, the view that they have of themselves has no basis in reality; the truth is that they have inherent worth and are lovable. For them to know this, though, there will be the conditioning that they will need to question, and there will be pain for them to face and process and unmet developmental needs to experience.  

This pain and these needs will have been repressed during their formative years when they were greatly deprived and deeply wounded, and will have stayed inside their brain and body ever since. Facing and integrating this inner material will take courage, patience and persistence.

Awareness

If someone can relate to this and they are ready to change their life, they may need to reach out for external support. This is something that can be provided with the assistance of a therapist or healer.

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Oliver JR Cooper
http://www.oliverjrcooper.co.uk