Healing the loud inner critical parent

[Gabben]

Has anyone done this work?

Over the years I have been able to quiet the shaming voices of N parent. But lately, I have been hearing the critical spirit of my mom pounding into my head and heart.

My NM rarely praised me. As a matter of fact I am just coming more into the awareness that my mom was not really ever proud of me but proud of what I achieved because of her. My accomplishments as a child were stolen from me by my NM so that she could use them to help affirm her image.

The real pain and healing work is in letting go of desires that never got fullfilled. The desire for praise and affirming love that I am and was a good person, a wonderful person, at least to my mom, growing up, she was all I ever wanted to be good enough for.

These memories feel buried deep.

Over the years I have worked through grief at the loss of affirming love in young childhood, but, lately, I am seeing that my needs for approval and praise ran throughout my childhood and are still up begging for fulfillment on some small level. If I am seeking praise or positive recognition then I am setting myself up for major dissapointment when I am criticized in life.  No matter who or how loving the critic is, I will only see my losses of love, the holes, and the unmet needs for approval etc, which makes the loving care of others, who's truth is there not to hurt me or make me feel ashamed but rather there to give me something, something precious and wonderful in the way of freedom (and more). However, these days, I am so busy grasping my disorder of unfulfilled needs that I cannot see or hear the beauty of what loving others are trying to give me. As well as I can only hear the critical spirit of my NM pounding into my world, bringing up the pain that is seeking recognition and healing.

My heart feels sad at so many losses in my life: the loss of my job, the loss of friends, the losses of a lifetime, the losses of my children, the losses of so much that feels as if it just got pried out of my hands without my consent, the loss of my dignity. At times I feel overwhelmed with grief and sadness. This too shall pass. I've been crying so many tears, they feel releasing and healing. But I am still so wounded....will the healing process ever stop, I wonder. I feel like a two year old who is being asked to give up her blanky, stuffed teddy and pacifier without a visual of what I get in return.

My mom was a good critic of me, I was never good enough. Now I am healing the loss of what it felt like to not be good enough or the loss of what it would have felt like to just be average and be complete in being just average. I like being average, I want to just be average. I have to now just grieve the loss of never getting to be "just average." Which in my book is perfectly wonderful.

[Gabben]

The inner critical voice lingering from childhood makes me blind and deaf to truth in this world. The instilled voice of criticism is so loud I cannot hear love.

[Hopalong]

Hey, Little Lise...

how you doing?

Want to float a while?

It's a sweet night. Blunt heat of August past, the light is taking on that sharper gold of early autumn, a few bright leaves are dusting the walk.

Look. The watermelon's ready! It's dark and round and lovely, I hadn't noticed it in the weeds.

I'll save you some.

(((((((((Lise...))))))))))

Hops

[Gabben]

Hey, Little Lise...

how you doing?

Want to float a while?

It's a sweet night. Blunt heat of August past, the light is taking on that sharper gold of early autumn, a few bright leaves are dusting the walk.

Look. The watermelon's ready! It's dark and round and lovely, I hadn't noticed it in the weeds.

I'll save you some.

(((((((((Lise...))))))))))

Hops

((((((Hops))))) Thank you. It is a beautiful moon tonight.

awe.....thank you...little lise has been throwing her tantrums, I think that she has a fiesty spirit which for the moment seems to her liability, but, one day, perhaps, that fiesty spirit within will become an asset.

 

[Ami]

Dear (((Lise))))
 Your inner child is NOT throwing a tantrum. It is not bad or immature. It is her true voice. She is speaking the truth of her life.
 You are many parts--the giving ,self sacrificing person  who will go way out of her way for others and also the little girl who is crying for love.
 I hear them both and love you.                               Ami

[sKePTiKal]

Lise...
all grown-up and wise Lise... can be the guardian angel and champion of "little Lise"...

You can contradict the inner critic; you can yell BS! at it - and show evidence to disprove the old "not good enough"...
You can tell the "projection" of the abusive parent that it's a broken record, it's being unfair, mean, and unrealistic... and you can tell it to take a hike...

hit the road Jack... All grown up Lise isn't afraid of this babble from the projection...

... 'coz you know it's not true... the stream of abusive judgement...

... because it's NOT Lise - either little or all grown up

... the projection is WRONG

precisely because a projection is something about your mom - not you - that she pushed out into/onto you. That inner critic is describing ITSELF... but making YOU feel that it's about you.

God, I hope that makes sense, Lise... you seem very close to peeling off the projection... too.

[Gabben]

Dear (((Lise))))
 Your inner child is NOT throwing a tantrum. It is not bad or immature. It is her true voice. She is speaking the truth of her life.
 You are many parts--the giving ,self sacrificing person  who will go way out of her way for others and also the little girl who is crying for love.
 I hear them both and love you.                               Ami

Thanks (((Ami))). Thanks for this validation. I hear a voice, the NM voice trying to tell me that there is nothing to be upset about, that all is OK and that my huge emotional outbursts are WRONG! Oh the shame. I am wrong in the way that I act out, but my emotions are NOT wrong, I just need to get that balance of being OK with the strong feelings of indignation at the injustices, past and present, that are just what they are INJUSTICES, nothing that I can do about them but seek to validate my pain with tears and let go (and forgive), the rest is in God's hands. It is the cross, again, just being nailed or allowing myself to be nailed long enough so that child's unmeek spirit does not get a foothold to thrive, she was not wrong back then, but I am an adult...NOW.

It is that beatitude that I am trying to live, or a couple, blessed are the meek, blessed are they that mourn.

[Gabben]

... the projection is WRONG

precisely because a projection is something about your mom - not you - that she pushed out into/onto you. That inner critic is describing ITSELF... but making YOU feel that it's about you.

Thank you (((Amber)))

This morning, when I read your post I felt relieved; it was if the loud voice screaming in my head ran in fear because of your truth exposing that that voice is just a lie. That voice gets so loud.

Amber, you are correct in that this feels like the last layer of NM's projections, it is so distorting to my reality, all I can see is the BAD lise, the WRONG lise and just what a miserable failure I am, the way that my mom made me feel everyday, in order to clean herself off and keep herself from the awareness of her wrong and badness. It amazes me that I took on her shame dumping for so many years, quietly and blindly believing it, believing that I was all bad and all wrong.

This is one of the reasons that I was so wrapped up in the n-saints or the NT's projections and abuse, for so long, it was a triple whammy of confusion and a fight for mental and emotional survival as a child and as an adult. My NM used to tell me that I was mentally ill, when the courts tried to take me away from her that was her defense, that I had mental problems, it was so painful, that pain is surfacing, again, I was so powerless over her projections and distortions. The NT did tell others that I was mentally ill and much more, it was painful, all over again, like living my worst nightmare because she was telling peers and people that I valued this, it was triggering that fight for survival instinct, again.

Last night I recalled a memory of a counselor at a group home I was in while awaiting placement for a foster home, when I was 15. This counselor was so kind and loving to me, she saw that I just needed someone to acknowledge my pain. She would take me places: movies, shopping, parks, shows, just to spend time with me to show me that I was worth spending time with because I was SO damaged from the years of my mom's rages at me; I was sure that I was worthless and throw away material, the idea that I was not worth having anyone even look at me was a loud screaming voice. I am alway grateful to people who could see into me to see that I was good, just very lost and wounded, in need of TLC.

I still love my NM, she was just extremely lost and still is on many levels; my mom has love in her heart and some redeemable qualities that have helped me over the years, I think that my mom had mental illness and that she feels that deep shame at that because our society places such a burden  on people who suffer from mental illness, the shame of it. My mom has a good heart, people may have a hard time believing that but she can be loving and I would not be half the person I am if was not for some of the things that she DID do for me that were good. I just always hate having to spell out her abuse in order to get well.

[JudyK]

Dear Gabben,
  I think these feelings are so common in daughters of N mothers.  My mother was much like yours, critical of everything.  We were never hugged, kissed, or told we were loved, but WERE constantly lectured and harped to, about all the things we didn't do, to please her. Listen to your inner child, embrace her and love her, she needs you now.  Hugs, Judy

[seasons]

Lise,

I'm moved by your love and compassion for the mentally ill. Especially your acceptance of what your mother couldn't/wasn't able to give you.

It makes me smile to hear your mother at times in your (adult years?) was able to help you, mother you?  ((hugs and compassion for you both))

PR, Ditto.......expressed beautifully.

Blessings,
seasons xo

[Gabben]

Thank you ((Seasons))

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I think that  the "holes" where we did not get the love that we needed, whether is was recognition, praise, attention, empathy for our childhood pains, our emotional needs of comfort, etc., are like perpetual vacuums in our soul, sucking in all the dirt around us. Then, we have to perpetually clean off the dirt that we suck in and throw back out into the world for others to clean off. The solution would be to turn that black hole that sucks up the dirt of life towards sucking up real love and peace, not through manipulation but through prayer and turning my whole heart, broken with a black hole in it, still, towards God. God is the only love and peace that never lets me down; the more that I turn to him the more my vacuum cleaner heart spits out the dirt, or tears, and drinks in the real peace.

[Ami]

Thank you ((Seasons))

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I think that  the "holes" where we did not get the love that we needed, whether is was recognition, praise, attention, empathy for our childhood pains, our emotional needs of comfort, etc., are like perpetual vacuums in our soul, sucking in all the dirt around us. Then, we have to perpetually clean off the dirt that we suck in and throw back out into the world for others to clean off. The solution would be to turn that black hole that sucks up the dirt of life towards sucking up real love and peace, not through manipulation but through prayer and turning my whole heart, broken with a black hole in it, still, towards God. God is the only love and peace that never lets me down; the more that I turn to him the more my vacuum cleaner heart spits out the dirt, or tears, and drinks in the real peace.

Beautifully said, Lise. Thank you for that and all the love and comfort you give others!          Ami

[sKePTiKal]

Thanks, Lise. I truly hoped you heard my validation of you - and your own power to quiet the critic. Another thing that comes, when you realize that the critic (and origin) are wrong... is that it brings them down to human size: the voice of criticism, gaslighting, and abuse is just simply - wrong. And it loses it's power over our emotions and how we value ourself. Sort of like pulling the plug out of the socket on that old vacumn... ya know?

Blessings and peace...