Phobic Avoidance | Inner Child Work Gone Wrong
"Eww"
That's what she said when I asked her to check inside to see how the little girl inside of her felt.
"Gross, don't ask me to look at her. She's so annoying and needy".
I looked up at Jaqueline and paused.
"Hmm, no one taught me that clients can have a bad reaction to this "Inner Child" intervention", I thought to myself.
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I thanked Jaqueline for letting me know how it felt to notice that and honored her request - we didn't go further with that intervention.
Supposedly, according to what I was taught, she was going to feel love for that little fragile girl inside of her, and she would scoop it up with love and offer it compassion and love.
When Inner Child Work Is Complicated
I took the session notes to my supervisor later in the week at my regular scheduled time. I learned so much in that session - about how "doing inner child work" takes sensitivity and nuance.
When The Inner Wounding Hurts
Working with our clients' inner experience can be deeply meaningful. Often, our clients hold deep rooted beliefs, memories, emotions or fears on their emotional template - stemming from younger years or previous experiences. Sometimes, there is a particular time frame or a certain phase of life where they had an unmet need, or where they were badly hurt.
When the adult in front of us cannot magically nourish the inner child
Prematurely jumping to "comforting" an inner child, a memory or an emotion can leave the client feeling confused- or pushed, to comfort themselves before they know what is actually going on .
Factors To Consider:
If your client has a strong reaction to their inner child, or to an inner experience that is going on inside of them, you want to pause and slow down.
Some of our clients have not had anyone who was emotionally attuned to them so connecting "inwards" can feel odd.
They may have had someone in their life who was disgusted by their expression of emotional needs or shamed them when they expressed vulnerability.
They may be disconnected from themselves so the first step needs to be simply connecting with them (the adult) before going to the inner child.
Their inner child may not yet feel safe with you- the therapist - or with the adult self (the client).
I learned a lot that day.
I learned about Phobic Avoidance - which is when someone feels "phobic", avoidant or scared of their inner experience. And that in itself is information about their relational template. And no, that does not mean we skip the inner child and ignore it.
But it means then we use different ways to develop a therapeutic alliance with the client, their inner child and work on reducing the Phobia of Inner Experience as part of the therapy work.
Jaqueline did, eventually, listen in to her inner child.
It was hard for her. The pain that little girl held was big. It was heavy. There were tears and stories. And Jaqueline needed to be ready. She needed to soften the phobia around her inner experience so that it felt safer to go there. And, she also needed me to earn more of her trust before we went to that raw place in her childhood.
With time and good clinical guidance, we did great work.
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Want to learn more about working with Phobic Avoidance?
You can help your clients know that yes, they are totally normal -even if they don't just want to "scoop up" their inner child.
You can work with them on that - and honor what feels right to all parts of them (inner child and adult self) while cultivating compassion and inner love - in a slightly slower and different way.
Trauma Therapist Training
In our Trauma Training we review this in detail.
Listen in to the video below for more.
Warm regards, Esther