There often comes a point in therapy where I gently reflect something back to the person I’m working with: that the way they’re treating themselves looks a lot like the way they were treated growing up by emotionally immature or emotionally unavailable parents.
No matter how gently I frame it, it can be a real jolt to realise.
This isn’t about blame. You adapted to the environment you were in, and those adaptations made sense at the time. But awareness is usually where change begins – so if any of what follows feels familiar, try to meet it with curiosity rather than another reason to be hard on yourself.
1. Keeping busy so you can stay disconnected from your emotions
There’s a couple of things happening here. One is that we’ve come to believe that if we can just work harder, achieve the next thing, become special somehow, that the praise, acceptance or love we think we’ll get will fill that hole in your heart.The other is that the busyness provides a great distraction from the thoughts and emotions that come up when you stop.
How to stop: Start with short breaks – practice just sitting still for a minute at first and if it’s really too hard, seek support.
2. Putting yourself down on a regular basis
We all have an inner critic. I find it helpful to think that on an evolutionary level, it’s the part of us that uses shame to keep us in line with our community for survival purposes.
When your inner critic is running your inner world, filling your mind with self doubt and self loathing, it can be a sign of emotional neglect – that you didn’t receive the emotional care you needed as a child.
How to stop: Start just with noticing and respond neutrally – “There’s my inner critic again”.
3. Telling yourself your feelings are silly or irrelevant
Being raised in a family where people didn’t know how to respond well to emotions can cause so many problems in later life. Emotions are normal, healthy and important signposts to issues that need to be addressed.
Emotionally immature parents may respond by judging or dismissing emotions as childish or unnecessary. When we take emotions seriously, we can balance our emotional mind with our logical mind and make healthier decisions.
How to stop: Remind yourself that your feelings matter and be curious about what’s behind them.
4. Prioritising everyone else’s needs except your own
In emotionally healthy families, parents are able to regulate their emotions, giving them the capacity to focus on their child’s needs.
In families where emotions are not managed well or life circumstances shift the focus away from the child’s wellbeing, there can be a role reversal where the child starts taking care of the parent. This can also be a family pattern – having a parent who prioritises everyone else first will teach you that that’s the way to do things.
How to stop: Start by considering the idea that your needs matter as much as everyone elses.
5. Denying yourself the possibility of connection and support from others
When you have been hurt or let down by the people who are supposed to care for you, it’s a really understandable response to shut down and keep people out of the vulnerable parts of you. This people pleasing is a great short term strategy but in the longer term can keep you isolated, lonely and trapped in traumatic beliefs.
How to stop: Therapy for emotional neglect can provide you with a safe space to be heard, to go at your pace, to be supported with the emotional struggles you’ve coped with by yourself for so long
***
Recognising these patterns is not the same as being stuck with them. They developed for good reasons, in environments that didn’t give you much choice. But you have more choice now than you did then — and with the right support, things can genuinely shift.
If you’ve been managing the weight of this largely on your own, and you’re ready to do something different, I work with women who are tired of being their own harshest critic and want to understand where that started.
You can find out more about working with me here, or send me an email if you have questions. There’s no waiting list and we can usually get started quickly.
I’m Alice Tew, a BACP accredited psychotherapist with twelve years of experience working with women who feel too much, think too much, and have spent most of their lives being told that’s a problem.
I work online, there’s no waiting list, and if anything in this post resonated, my inbox is open.