Emotional Self: Can Developmental Trauma Cause Someone To Lose Touch With Their Emotional Self?

Even though someone has a thinking and a feeling self, it doesn’t mean that they will be in touch with both of these selves. Instead, they can typically be in touch with the former but not the latter.

However, if this is just what is normal, they might not realise that they don’t have a very good connection with this other part of them. Yet, even if they are not aware of this, being this way is likely to have a negative impact on their life.

One Part

So, they can often feel lost when it comes to what to do in each moment and in their life as a whole. Consequently, they can be overly reliant on others for guidance and often do what they think they should be doing.

The outcome of this is that they can often experience a sense of being unfulfilling and as though they are on the wrong track. But, they can believe that there is nothing that they can do about it.

Another part

Additionally, they can find it hard to develop deeper connections with others and feel close to them. If they have a few friends, then, these are likely to be surface-level connections.

As a result, they can often have a sense of being on the outside and isolated from others. Due to this, they could be desperate to experience deeper connections with others.

A Key Component

What this illustrates is how important their emotional self is when it comes to them being able to live a fulfilling life. Without being strongly connected to this part of them, they won’t be able to operate as a whole human being.

The challenge, of course, is that until they become aware of what is going on, they won’t be able to change their life. In order for them to become aware of what is going on, they might need to experience something that is fairly significant.

The Catalyst

What could allow them to gradually see how out of touch they are from their emotional self is a breakup or the loss of a loved one, for instance. Something like this could cause them to come into contact with a lot of painful feelings.

Now, they could believe that how they feel has been caused by what has taken place but there is likely to be far more to it. What has taken place externally is likely to have unlocked pain that was held outside of their conscious awareness, in other parts of their brain and body.

Two Parts

There will then be the pain that they are experienced thanks to what has happened and then will be the pain that has no connection to what has happened. Nonetheless, what has happened will have undermined the defences that they had in place, allowing repressed pain to seep into their couscous mind.

If they were to become aware of this, they could wonder where this other pain has come from. What is likely to shed light on this is if they were to think about what their early years were like.

Back In Time

This may have been a stage of their life that was anything but nurturing, with it being a time when they were greatly deprived and deeply wounded by one or both of their parents. Throughout this stage of their life, they might have often been neglected and perhaps physically harmed.

To handle what took place, their emotional self would have been split-off and they would have left their body to allow them to keep together and function. Quite simply, if they had stayed connected to this part of them and remained connected to their body, they would have been overwhelmed and their life would have probably come to an end.

An Adaption

As they were powerless and dependent, they wouldn’t have been able to defend themselves or find help. This is why their only option would have been to lose touch with what was going on inside them.

Moreover, their conscious mind would have forgotten all about what happened. The trouble is that although adapting in this way allowed them to survive a brutal stage of their life, it will now be causing them to suffer unnecessarily.

Moving Forward

For them to reconnect their emotional self and get back into their body, they are likely to have a lot of pain and arousal to work through. This 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 therapist or healer.

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