lack of empathy – COURAGE COACHING

If you have become estranged from your parents, it’s important to remember that this can be a very vulnerable place to be. Making the decision to become estranged from your family may alleviate some of the instant emotional pain after a huge argument, however, many people find that estrangement is a constant battle in their life, as it can cause them to endlessly think about their situation, even if they do feel an initial sense of relief.

Some people become estranged from their parents because they have been emotionally, physically or sexually abusive during childhood or beyond. This is a difficult decision to make but sometimes a necessary one. It’s immensely tricky to continue a healthy relationship if there has been abuse, and it can be extremely risky to continue a genuine relationship with this family member without the right professional intervention and support.

Others become estranged with their parents or siblings due to conflicts about religion or sexuality. This can also be especially painful, as the adult child isn’t able to truly be who they are. Authenticity is crucial for a happy life.

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Grieving the estrangement from a parent, no matter what the circumstances, is a very important part of healing from it, as the loss of an accepting & healthy parent is an extremely painful experience, even more so than normal grief. Nothing will ever fill the void of not having had what every child so rightfully deserves. Comfort, validation & unconditional love. Realising that a parent was never truly able to love & accept you, is utterly heartbreaking.

Even if there was abuse, children never stop loving their parent unconditionally and never stop hoping that their parent will change. This is the main reason adult children remain in contact with a parent, despite any abuse that may have occured. They will always long for the unconditional love they never had. In cases when the abuse or invalidation was constant, the trauma bond will also be why the adult child finds it hard to cut ties with their parent.

If the adult child isn’t able to fully grieve the loss of a healthy parent, they will not be able to move forward in a new relationship with them. If the parent continues to be abusive, shows no remorse, shows no understanding and doesn’t make any attempts to make amends, then it is healthier for the relationship to end.

In both cases of estrangement and remaining in contact, grieving is essential. Grieving helps lift the intense painful heaviness of not having had your needs met in childhood. It helps lessen the anger, frustration and injustice.

Most importantly, the adult children who end up going ‘no contact’, have to learn to live with the ‘early death’ of their parent before that parents actually dies. They have to continue living their life, without any communication or knowledge of how that parent is. They have to swallow the grief that creeps up from time to time, during holidays, birthdays, Mother’s day, Father’s day and during other emotional times in their life.

Those adult children who were lucky enough to have had good childhoods, with unconditionally loving parents, will never truly understand the deep pain of those who didn’t have good childhoods.

Family estrangement is a huge challenge and living with it requires support in more ways than one. It is important to have counselling from time to time and to be surrounded by understanding friends or a partner that can truly empathize. Lastly, it is crucial for the estranged, to feel the sadness that emerges and be self-compassionate as much as possible.

Love Athina ♥

69125-quotes-about-self-reflection

This quote speaks to me in so many ways..

Through coaching, I aim to guide people find their answers through enabling them to self-reflect on where they are at currently and where they want to be. Self-reflection is very important in the process of change, as is persistence (which I talked about in this previous blog post- The importance of persistence).

The driving force behind change, is when an individual is able to look at their current life and notice that there is something negative popping up for them. If we feel negative or sad about something, then this can be the one thing that pushes us to make lasting change. If we don’t have self-awareness however, we remain stuck in a sad or negative existence and just keep repeating the same mistakes or habits over and over again.

As a survivor of complex trauma, I luckily became self-aware from a young age. I noticed I was struggling more than other children at school and had really low confidence. I found it very difficult to focus on school work the older I got and when I hit 15 I was already very depressed.I used art & poetry as a way to self-soothe and manage my emotional pain and luckily sought therapy when I was 17.

Over the years, with extensive therapy, I learned to tap into my emotional self-awareness even more. I continued to question my choices and behaviours and realised that actually it wasn’t my fault I was so sensitive and depressed but actually that my parents were both narcissistic, specifically with NPD. I was diagnosed at 29 as having Complex Post Traumatic stress and was told by my therapist that I was incredibly resilient and able to self-reflect a lot more than most of her clients. I left the session that day happy to be someone with self-awareness and wouldn’t change this for the world!

Self-awareness is incredibly hard for people with NPD, as well as the ability to feel empathy for others. When a healthy individual hurts others and causes them distress, they usually genuinely apologise and try to make a change for the better. For people that are aware of their actions, of their flaws, are sensitive to their body sensations, sensitive to their health and are also able to make sensible choices, change comes more easily.

What are your thoughts? How destructive have you found people that lack self-awareness?What difficulties have you had? Are their times when it took you a few failed attempts to finally have an epiphany about an unhelpful behaviour you may have had?

Thanks for reading

Much love Athina ♥