Should You Heal Your Trauma to Be a Better Parent?
New research shows that breaking the cycle has to start with you.
Although it’s hard to admit, there’s a direct correlation between the pain of our childhood and the parents we become in the future. Memories plagued by abuse, anger, or neglect can create parents who manifest these same behaviors and feelings in their own families. Want to raise happier children? Children who love, respect, and show gratitude for the sacrifices you’ve made? Heal your childhood trauma and commit to being a better caretaker for them.
Childhood is our foundation.
While we tend to think of our childhood as a light and responsibility-free time, it’s a time of major growth. We do most of our learning in early childhood, as we establish relationships with our parents and struggle to make sense of the world around us.
Our experiences in childhood form the prototypes that we carry in our relationships, our jobs, and even our connections with ourselves. It’s the foundation we grow or flounder on, and it directly affects the type of parents we become.
Our parents are a reflection of what we have the potential to become.
Several studies have shown that there is a direct correlation between a high-stress childhood and high-stress parenting later on in life. When our parents are distant, abusive, or overbearing, we can adopt those own traits in our parenthood (or course-correct into something entirely worse).
If we want to give our children better lives and a greater chance of succeeding, we must heal the pain from our past and embrace a better way to live and love.
Should you heal your trauma to be a better parent to your children?
Our parents are the first example of what it means to form a child-caretaker relationship. Likewise, the experiences we go through in childhood also inform how we view parenthood. When we undergo a lot of major or emotionally devastating traumas in childhood, it warps the way we see ourselves and the way we behave as parents in several ways.
For you to be the parent your child deserves, you have to break the cycle by first breaking free from these warped, trauma-linked parenting behaviors.
Increased aggravation
Parents who grow up in high-stress or abusive environments have been shown to become more “on edge” as parents in adulthood. According to studies, these parents were more irritated with their children more often and were even more likely to find their children annoying or grating. They also suffered from lower patience levels and greater aggravation with parenthood in general.
Troubled children
Childhood trauma is not something that occurs only in one generation. When we experience trauma early on, it impacts us in ways that are passed down to our children, both genetically and through learning. Those with a history of childhood trauma are more likely to have children with ADHD. Their children are also four times more likely to have mental health problems, which can stem from both genetic inheritance and repeated parenting styles.
Unintentional neglect
Not all trauma comes from overt abuse. Sometimes, it simply comes from a lack of the mental, physical, and emotional nourishment that you need as a child. When a parent emotionally neglects their children by being distant or self-involved, it creates cracks in their sense of self and their understanding of what it means to be a parent of fulfilled children. This unintentional neglect is very insidious because it is subtle and very often passed down from generation to generation.
An abusive nature
Although we may not like to admit it, we tend to take on both the good and bad traits of our parents. If they abuse us physically, sexually, or emotionally, we are very likely to take those traits on and use them against our children in very similar ways (Feiring, 2009). This taking-on of the abusive natures that were used against them is often subconscious, but always linked to an attempt by the brain to normalize and rationalize what happened to it.
Mental health issues
It’s no surprise that those with a history of childhood trauma often grow up and experience mental health issues in adulthood. These personal struggles with mental well-being can include general feelings of anxiety and depression, but they can also become even more complex and devastating. Giving our children happy lives requires us to face these issues and resolve them to the best of our ability.
Physical struggles
When we fail to resolve our childhood trauma, it can have a direct effect on our physical health. As our mental health declines, our physical health can erode, which makes it hard to happily parent a child who demands both attention and energy. For us to give our children the fullness of our hearts and bodies, we need to resolve the pain in our pasts and find ways to improve our own lives and mental well-being.
You have to heal to be a better parent for your child.
Your child deserves to have a happy, secure life — but that starts with you and the decisions that you make every single day. They are defenseless and innocent, so it’s up to you to make the right changes and see that you can provide them with what they need to thrive. You have to heal your pain to be a better parent for your child. You have to heal to be a better person for yourself.
1. Be honest about your past
Although it’s a hard first step, to heal our childhood trauma we have to first be honest about it. That can be a confusing process on its own, and one that takes a lot of time. Looking back through a childish fog doesn’t make it easy to remember or understand things as they are. As we peel back the layers, though, we can get to the root of our truth with our adult’s eyes.
You can’t move forward and forgive your past until you embrace it for what it is. It’s a bit like starting on a journey. You’ve got to get the map out and figure out where you are if you want to figure out the quickest way to get where you want to be.
Take off your rose-tinted glasses. It’s time for you to fess up to who your parents were and what happened in your childhood. Let go of that heavy mantle of shame you’ve been carrying for all these years.
Admitting what happened is not giving it new life, and it is not giving it power over the life you lead right now. Rather, it’s letting it go and committing to putting it squarely in the past where it belongs.
2. Want better for your child
After admitting to the truth about your past, you must commit to making life better for your child. This is one of the most powerful motivating factors to anchor ourselves to. By wanting better for your child, you can find your bravery and the strength to speak your truths with compassion and a desire to let go.
Want a better life for your child than the one you had? Look back at the lessons that your childhood traumas dealt you and consider how you can teach those same lessons to your child in a safer, more gentle manner.
We don’t have to slip from one brutal relationship to the next to learn to respect ourselves. We don’t need to be screamed at, dismissed, or otherwise abused to learn where our place in society is.
Consider that there’s a different way to raise your child than you were raised, then commit to that. You can spare them a lot of pain by healing your own.
3. Open yourself to outside help
They say it takes a village to raise a child, and that’s true. We have to admit, though, that a part of that village is those who help us — as parents — be better from the inside out. You can’t always heal alone, and you don’t have to. If you’re struggling, open up and know that there are people out there who want to see you thrive.
Recovering from childhood trauma is not always a process we can or should undergo alone. There’s a lot buried in that backyard and uncovering it can bring up powerful emotions that are traumatic to process of themselves.
Open yourself up to outside help. Reach out to loved ones you can trust and know that you can also reach out to a mental health professional. There are experts out there who can help you carefully navigate this process with the assistance of medical experts who can ease big transitions.
Never underestimate the power of those who have spent their lives helping others like you find their peace.
4. Separate yourself from the past
Too many of us become the people we feared in childhood because we spend so much time living in that space they harmed us in. We can’t live in the past and hope for a happy present. That’s not how it works. To build families that are authentic and joyful, we have to live in the present moment and release ourselves from the past.
You can’t be a good parent to your children in the present if you’re still stuck in the shadows of your past. At some point, you’re going to have to close that book and put it on the shelf. The lessons will still be with you, but you no longer need to be immersed in them to move forward or create your thoughts and beliefs.
Separate yourself from the past. You were not responsible for the things that happened to you in childhood, but you are responsible for the quality of parent you become in your own time.
Blaming the past won’t work when you’re confronting an adult child who wants to know why you hurt them. Take responsibility now and know that you are not defined by the things that happened to you when you were an innocent in someone else’s story.
5. Re-parent and re-program yourself
How can you be a good parent if you never had that example in childhood? (Knarvstrom, 2018) It’s a question that a lot of people struggle with, and rightly so. We mimic our parents in so many ways, and that includes our parenting styles. One of the best ways to change this, however, is by providing ourselves with a new parenting example. How can we do this? By re-parenting ourselves.
Be the parent you never had and use this to prove that you can be a better parent to your child. Love yourself. Support yourself. And prove that you can create an environment that is safe, secure, and established entirely on your terms (and in line with your own needs and values).
Re-program yourself and prove that parenthood is a conscious choice. Your parents chose who they wanted to be. The people who hurt you in childhood chose how they wanted to behave, and they chose the decisions they made.
Decide right here and now who you are going to be and consciously, intentionally become that parent in every second. Love your child. Nurture them and prove to them daily that you are a safe space in their lives.
You get to rewrite your ending. You get to build the family you deserved as a child.
Childhood trauma isn’t something that only affects our adult lives or romantic relationships. Though we don’t always think about it, it also informs our parenting style in many ways. If we want better lives for our children, we have to be honest about how our past is getting in the way. Then, we have to take focused and mindful action to course-correct and become more honest and open about the way we approach ourselves, our children, and our lives.
Be honest about your past and honest about the patterns that are coming back around in your parenting approaches. Once we’re aware, we can find realistic and practical ways to heal and resolve our trauma. Wanting better for our child can help inspire this forward movement and encourage us to reach out to those who can help us out of the hole of pain we find ourselves in.
As you work through the shadows, remember: that you are not defined by your past. The events of childhood are little more than lessons. They don’t define you or the parent you become right now in this moment. Be the parent you never had and prove to yourself that there’s a better way to love and nurture your child.
© E.B. Johnson 2023
References:
Feiring, C., Simon, V., & Cleland, C. (2009). Childhood sexual abuse, stigmatization, internalizing symptoms, and the development of sexual difficulties and dating aggression. Journal Of Consulting And Clinical Psychology, 77(1), 127–137. doi: 10.1037/a0013475
Kvarnstrom, E. (2018). How the Trauma of Childhood Abuse Affects Interpersonal Relationships, and How to Begin Healing — Bridges to Recovery. Retrieved 5 February 2021, from https://www.bridgestorecovery.com/blog/trauma-childhood-abuse-affects-interpersonal-relationships-begin-healing/
I am an author, coach, and podcaster who helps survivors create their ideal lives after trauma and relationship upset. Join my recovery mailing list for free weekly advice, or click the link below to learn more about me.
