Early Deprivation: Why Would Someone Not Be Supported When They Talk About Their Abusive Childhood?

If someone has gradually become consciously aware of the fact that their childhood wasn’t very nurturing, they can have the need talk to some of the people in their life about it. Now, this can be a time when the friends and/or family members that they tell are very understanding and supportive.

The people who they tell could also be shocked and make it clear that they didn’t deserve to be treated as they were. After receiving these kinds of responses, they could be both relieved and grateful.

Uncertainty

The reason for this is that they might have feared that this wouldn’t have taken place. Instead, they might have feared that they would end up being criticised and even ignored.

But, as this hasn’t taken place, it is to be expected that they would feel relieved and grateful. They could make it clear to these people how thankful they are and this has had a big impact on them.

Another Scenario

Alternatively, when they speak to their friends and/or family, they might not be very understanding or supportive. The people who they tell could be shocked but they could soon change the subject or they could invalidate them.

So, they could be told that what they are talking about didn’t happen and that they are just remembering things. Or, they could be told that they can’t say things like that and be treated as though they are trying to cause trouble.

The next part

Assuming that something like this takes place, they can end up feeling guilty, ashamed and then let down. But as they will have opened up about a stage of their life that was very traumatic, and is still impacting them, this is to be expected.

What might enter their mind is that they are making it up or that they did the wrong thing by opening up. They might then decide to just keep what they went through to themselves and try to carry on as normal.

It Makes Sense

However, but even if this is what takes place, it probably won’t be long until they start to think about what happened to them as a child. The reason for this is that, as this stage of their life will have had a big impact on them, they won’t just be able to forget about it and live their life.

There will be the impact it had on their mind, emotional self, and brain and body. If they do think about what happened before long, they can also start to wonder why the people in their life responded as they did.

A Natural Outcome

Also, they can wonder why they thought about how they were making it up and were doing the wrong thing by opening up. If this is what did take place, it can be because of what they experienced as a child.

This may have been a time when their feelings, thoughts and perceptions were often criticised, dismissed, and ignored, which would have caused them to doubt their own reality. And as for them doing the wrong thing by opening up, this can because this was a time when their mother and perhaps father made out that everything was fine in their family and presented a false narrative to others.

The Other Part

By opening up, then, they would have simply gone against their early conditioning, not done anything wrong. As to why the people in their life responded as they did, it can be due to a number of reasons.

First, it can show that, thanks to the idea that they have formed of their mother and perhaps father, they don’t want to see them differently. If they were to do this, it would undermine their view of them and cause them to experience unbearable tension.

Another Reason

Second, some, if not all, of them might have had a childhood that was very similar to theirs.  Nonetheless, although this is the case, they might not be ready to face up to what this stage of their life was like.
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This is not to say that they are choosing to block it out and that how they reacted was a conscious choice. No, it is that their conscious mind will have forgotten about what happened, thanks to repression, and how they react would have taken place automatically.

Self-protection

It was then not that they were trying to undermine them; it was that they were unknowingly doing what they could to make sure pain and unmet developmental needs didn’t enter their conscious awareness, as this would have undermined their ability to keep it together and function.

It then wouldn’t have mattered if someone else had said the same thing to them, as the response would have been the same. Therefore, how they responded had nothing to do with them.

Moving Forward

Taking all this into account, for them to gradually change their life, they may need to reach out for external support. They will have beliefs to question, pain to face and process, and unmet developmental needs to experience, among other things.

This will take courage, support, patience and persistence. 

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