Learning how to love my child is learning how to love the world.
The Magical Child within You
BRUCE DAVIS, PH.D.
When we first fall in love, things always seems to be perfect. As new lovers we are always certain that our love is different, our love will last forever. It’s so easy to believe this when everything feels so wonderful.
After a few months, though, fears usually start to set in, and very often a codependent system begins to develop. When our Adult and Inner Child are not bonded, the seeds for a codependent relationship are sown even before we meet—we cannot just put aside the fears that create codependence, no matter how much in love we feel. Sometimes a relationship will be working well right up until a couple gets married, because the fears of abandonment and engulfment may only be associated with the commitment of marriage. Most committed relationships, however, show the symptoms of codependence within the first six months of meeting.
Lovers have some of the same conflicts as spouses. Like spouses, lovers suffer from fears of loss of self, loss of other, of not being enough, of not being adequate. They may fight over time; over triangle relationships, when one partner is married or in another committed relationship; over money, sex, or each other’s children. Difficulties over responsibilities concerning money and chores often arise when one partner moves into the other’s house.
Lovers who are not in a committed relationship often feel very insecure and their insecurity leads them to act out their narcissism or caretaking. Without Inner Bonding, lovers will continue to act out their fears with codependent behavior, often going from one lover to the next and never understanding why it never works out.
Alexis, an advertising executive in her mid-thirties, short, round, blond, with sparkling blue eyes, had been in a relationship for six months with Brendan, who was also in advertising and in his mid-thirties. Alexis had been in therapy with me for some time before she decided to have a session with Brendan. Here is what she said about the difficulties that she didn’t know how to resolve:
Whenever Brendan mentions anything about sex with his ex-wife, I get really hurt. I’ve asked him not to talk about it to me, but he still does sometimes. (Belief: Brendan is responsible for my feelings.) I think it’s rude and insensitive of him to continue to do that, and I don’t know what to do about it. (Belief: I can control what he does by making him wrong.)
I asked Brendan what he was feeling about the situation:
I try to remember not to talk about that, but sometimes it just comes up in the course of our conversation. I don’t know what to do. One of the reasons my wife and I split up was that there were so many things I wasn’t allowed to talk about that I felt I was always walking on eggs. I tried to be careful of her feelings, but it got so I couldn’t stand to be around her. In my own therapy I realized I was caretaking her. I don’t want to do that with Alexis, but I don’t know what else to do. I really don’t want to hurt her. (Belief: I’m responsible for Alexis’s feelings.)
I spoke with Alexis about the fact that her upset feelings were coming from her own fears and beliefs, and that instead of trying to get Brendan to change, she could explore her own feelings. I told her that if she kept trying to control Brendan and he kept trying to comply, they would eventually end up just like Brendan and his wife. I asked her if she was willing to dialogue with her Inner Child, and she was.
Alexis then brought up another issue: Sometimes Brendan withdrew from her. When she would ask him why, he would just say he was “tired.” She knew that wasn’t the real reason, and she wanted to know why he withdrew and why he wouldn’t talk to her about it.
MARGIE: |
But pain is not bad, even though it hurts. Emotional pain is a teacher. It’s there to let us know that there may be false beliefs that need exploring and to tell us that we may be behaving in a way that isn’t good for us. It’s the Inner Child’s way of letting us know that we are not taking good care of ourselves. If Alexis was in pain because you needed space, her Adult would not be taking good care of her Child by allowing her Child to feel rejected by your legitimate needs. It means that she is operating from a false belief that says, “If he needs space from me, he must not love me,” or, “If he needs space from me, I must be doing something wrong, or I must not be good enough.” Her pain gives her an opportunity to explore and heal these false beliefs. |
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If you caretake her by not being honest and by giving yourself up, you rob her of the opportunity to learn. Being honest about your own wants and needs is always loving, even though it doesn’t seem so at the time. |
BRENDAN: |
I see that, and I see where I need to do some work with my Inner Child. This one is really hard for me, but I don’t want this relationship to end up like my first marriage. I want to be able to be honest. |
Resolving his fears of pain and the belief that he is responsible for Alexis’s pain is a process that takes time. For Brendan it means doing what it is he is afraid of, that is, being honest about his wants and needs, and being there as a loving Adult to reassure his Inner Child that he is not bad or wrong when Alexis is in pain or gets angry as a result of his honesty. As he does this over a period of time, his own fears of pain and of being wrong when someone else is in pain will gradually diminish. If anything is to change within him, his Adult has to be willing to take the action of being honest.
ALEXIS: |
I can see where my work is, too. I guess as long as we each stay open to doing our own work, we’ll be okay. I can see that if I want Brendan to be honest, and I do, I have to take responsibility for my own pain rather than blame him. |
Even if Brendan does manage to be honest with Alexis, if she continues to make him responsible for her feelings, he will eventually get tired of this and leave the relationship if he is taking good care of his Inner Child. It is not loving to ourselves to stay in a relationship where we are blamed for another’s feelings. If Alexis did that, she would prove to herself that she is not good enough, her original false belief. But if Brendan is honest and Alexis takes responsibility for her own pain, their relationship will grow and deepen as they each grow.
Bridget, red-haired and freckled, is a therapist in training. As part of her training, she attended a one-month, intensive residential workshop on hypnosis, where she met Homer and Homer’s girlfriend, Sally. As Bridget explained to me:
Homer and I became friends early in the workshop, and when it became apparent to me that we were heading toward becoming lovers, I asked Homer to tell Sally what was happening. It felt uncomfortable to me to be sneaking around with Sally in the workshop. He said no, that there was no point in hurting her since we didn’t know where all this was leading. I went along, ignoring the warning voice of my Inner Child.
We did become lovers, and now we are all back in town and I’m feeling awful. Homer still wants to see me, but we have to sneak around. He make lots of excuses about why he can’t spend more time with me, and he’s constantly breaking our dates.
I asked Bridget to dialogue with her Inner Child:
Bridget recognized that her Adult had given her Child away to Homer because Homer was so sweet and loving and her Adult believed that Homer could take better care of her than she could of herself, a false belief. She realized she had abdicated her personal responsibility and had instead made Homer responsible. Now she was angry at him for abandoning her, when in fact she had abandoned herself.
Bridget explored her false belief that someone else could make her happy, that someone else could take away her pain and be a better parent for her Inner Child than she could be for herself. She saw that she was expecting Homer to be all that her parents had not been, rather than being willing to do that for herself. She realized that her aloneness was more from the inner abandonment then from the outer one.
Also, Bridget saw that she was feeling like a victim of Homer’s choices. She was waiting around for his calls and hated having to hide their relationship. Bridget was angry at him for making Sally more important than her after he had told her how important she was to him and how much he loved her. She felt helpless to do anything about Homer’s choice to continue to be dishonest, and it was clear to her that the arrangement was not making him unhappy.
Bridget was very much in love with Homer. It was the first time in years that she had connected so deeply with anyone on so many levels—emotional, intellectual, and sexual. She felt if she lost him she might never find another man with whom she felt so compatible, and she was tired of being alone.
A painful choice had to be faced: Was she willing to lose herself to keep him, or was she willing to risk losing him to retain her own integrity? Her Inner Child made it clear to her that losing herself was not worth having any man. As much as she loved him now, if she continued to give herself up, the anger she was already feeling would eventually replace the love.
Through her dialogue with her Inner Child, Bridget came up with the behavior that felt most loving to her Child: She decided to tell Homer that she was not willing to see him anymore until he was honest with Sally. Also, she did not believe he was merely protecting Sally’s feelings, but was really protecting himself; if she went along with it, she was colluding with his and Sally’s codependent relationship.
Homer was quite surprised by her decision and tried to talk her out of it, but she stood her ground. She told him not to call her for one month and at the end of that time she would hear his decision. Bridget went through much grief at letting go of the relationship, but she also felt very inwardly powerful. Her self-esteem went up significantly as well.
At the end of the month, Homer called to tell her that he still loved her. He said he realized that she was right about his relationship being codependent, and that he was going to go into therapy to deal with it. He made it clear that he was not going to do anything different regarding his relationship with Sally at this time.
Bridget then worked with her Inner Child to help her accept that she had to move on with her life and not wait for Homer. If she waited with the hope that he really would go into therapy and “see the light,” she would again feel like a helpless victim. She accepted that she had fallen in love with a man who did not want a committed relationship with her and realized she had actually known this from the beginning. She chose to ignore it because of her false belief that Homer could take care of her better than she could. She decided she no longer wanted to do this in future relationships.
A couple of months later, Homer called Bridget and wanted to see her. Bridget agreed. Seeing him again brought up all the in-love feelings. She ended up in bed with him, convincing herself that things would be all right.
Days passed, and Homer didn’t call her. Bridget realized that she had again abandoned her Inner Child. She had heard her Child’s inner voice before she made love with Homer, saying, “Wait, this will hurt me,” but chose to ignore it. Now her Child felt that Adult Bridget had not protected her and was feeling depressed.
Bridget saw that much of the depression in her life had come from not listening to and protecting her Inner Child from painful situations. She saw that her Adult was still having a hard time wanting and accepting full responsibility for her Child, a common experience for most of us.
Two weeks later Homer called to tell her that their relationship was over. Bridget’s self-esteem took a nose-dive and she came into her next session feeling awful.
Dina and Nick came in for therapy together because they were fighting all the time and couldn’t figure out why. They knew they loved each other and wanted this relationship, yet found themselves breaking up at least once a week.
Dina, in her early thirties, had been married before and had two young daughters. Tall and dark, she had worked as a model before having children. She had been quite successful in her work, had received a fair amount of money from her divorce, and was receiving child support. She wasn’t wealthy, but she had enough money without working to support herself and her children.
She had met Nick about a year before coming in for therapy. Nine months after meeting, they decided to move in together. Nick moved into Dina’s house, and that was when the problems started.
Nick was five years younger than Dina and was working as a manager in a supermarket. Before meeting Dina, he had gotten himself into debt through unwise use of credit cards and was spending most of his money paying this off. Dina and he had agreed on what he would contribute to their expenses, but he never seemed to have the money. In addition, he made commitments to do chores around the house, but never seemed to get around to them.
When these things happened, Dina would blow up and Nick would get silent or leave the house. Later they would try to talk about things and Nick would promise to do better, but soon the same things would happen. Dina’s anger was getting more and more intense and Nick was doing less and less all the time.
Dina’s father died when she was three years old, leaving her mother with very little money. Her mother worked long hours and was generally bitter and angry when she was home. Dina’s mother would yell at her, criticize her for even very minor infractions, and often hit her. When her mother wasn’t abusing her, her older brother was. Dina grew up feeling unloved and unprotected, always waiting for Daddy to come and make things better.
Dina learned as a little child to caretake her mother as a way to avoid some of the punishment. In her first marriage Dina was also a caretaker, allowing her husband to abuse her, never standing up for herself. Her husband would yell and criticize her, just as her mother did, and Dina responded just as she did as a child, always trying to do better. She was devastated when her husband finally left her.
With Nick she started out as the financial caretaker. When he did not give her what she wanted emotionally in return for the financial caretaking, she took on her mother’s role, the narcissistic end of the codependent system. She became the one to yell at and criticize Nick; and the more he allowed it, the angrier she got.
As Dina became immersed in her Inner Bonding work, her grief at the loss of her father and being so abused by her mother and brother surfaced. For weeks she cried deeply, allowing the old pain to move through her and be released. She realized she had always thought it was her fault that her mother and brother abused her and that she had hated her own powerlessness. Now she was projecting this hatred onto Nick, abusing him as she had been abused. She saw that she had even begun to take her rage out on her own children.
Also, Dina realized that she did not value her Inner Child; she had treated her in much the same way she had been treated by her mother and brother and believed her lovability lay in caretaking Nick financially. She was afraid he would leave her if she didn’t support him, and at the same time she resented him and felt used.
Nick also came from an abusive childhood. His father had been brutal with him, often flying into out-of-control rages. Nick was not only afraid of his own anger, because he had no role-modeling for setting limits on it, but he was also terrified of Dina’s anger. As soon as she yelled at him, he became a frightened child, immobilized and withdrawn. He couldn’t fight back, not only because he did not know the limits of his own anger, but also for fear of losing Dina. He felt deeply bonded to her, as she did to him. In spite of their problems, they had fun together and cared deeply for each other.
Nick was also afraid of being controlled by Dina, as he had been by his father. He entered the relationship with a lot of resistance, which he had developed as a child in response to his father. As soon as Dina and he moved in together, his resistance to helping her clicked in and he started withholding by not giving her money or doing chores. She further exacerbated his resistance by getting angry when he didn’t do things her way, confirming to his Inner Child that she was just like his dad.
Nick and Dina were both operating as abandoned children, as are all couples locked into a codependent system.
Dina came in the following week much encouraged. Leaving Nick alone when he was closed and resistant rather than yelling or lecturing opened the space for him to initiate the discussions and even to do more of the chores. She saw that as soon as she tried to control him, he became more entrenched in his position—a classic power struggle. She found that walking away rather than engaging him was a real challenge for her. It was hard for her to give up that attempt at control. Giving up the control became possible only when she showed up as a loving Adult for her Inner Child. As soon as her Adult abandoned her Child, allowing her to believe she was being personally rejected, her Child immediately moved into her addictive need to control.
Nick found that remembering to tell his Child the truth took a lot of practice. His habit of retreating was so deeply entrenched that it took many months of consistent work before he was able to remember to show up for his Child at the time he was feeling trapped. By doing his Inner Bonding work daily, he slowly learned to be more present in each moment, more aware of his feelings and of how to handle them.
Dina and Nick’s codependent system did not change overnight, but it did change due to both of them being deeply committed to their Inner Bonding work.
Candace and Peter, both in their late thirties and both writers, came in for therapy only four months after they met. They were already caught in a codependent system that threatened to destroy their relationship.
Candace complained that Peter didn’t spend enough time with her, while Peter complained he needed more time with his work and friends—that Candace needed too much from him. He was on the verge of ending the relationship when Candace suggested they came in for therapy.
When Peter was twelve years old, his father died suddenly of a heart attack, leaving his mother feeling helpless and distraught. Peter was the oldest of four children and the only son. Peter’s mother clung to him for comfort and support, putting him in the position of the caretaker. In addition, his mother’s energy was somewhat seductive, an energy that frightened Peter and from which he emotionally withdrew.
Peter, left without a father and with only his mother to rely on, learned to take care of her as a way to feel safe. By being there when she needed him, he was able to ensure himself that she would be okay, that he would not lose her and be left alone. Looking back, Peter realized that he lost himself and allowed himself to be smothered and controlled by his mother out of his fear of losing her.
In his previous relationships, Peter had chosen women who did not make demands on him and with whom he did not feel emotionally connected. By dating women he could not really fall in love with, he ensured himself that he would not be smothered and controlled by them. But inevitably he got bored with them and would move on to another relationship. He had been married twice, both times to women he did not love, but with whom he felt safe from being engulfed.
Now, for the first time, he had fallen madly in love, and all his fears of being controlled and smothered were surfacing.
Peter, a screenwriter, was a man of great talent. He not only loved his work, but had many hobbies and activities that were important to him, such as mountain climbing and cross-country skiing, which he liked to do with his friends.
Within weeks after meeting Candace, he began giving up some of the activities that were important to him and not having enough time for his work. He found himself caught, just as he had been with his mother, between his fear of losing Candace and his desire to pursue the other things that gave him pleasure. As much as he loved Candace, he was ready to leave the relationship. Whenever he expressed his desire to spend time with friends or be alone, Candace would get hurt or angry. When he gave in he felt trapped and resentful; and when he didn’t he felt guilty because he believed that he was responsible for her feelings.
The only way he knew to deal with his trapped feelings was to leave the relationship. However, each time he had decided to leave, he felt depressed and missed Candace. Each time he came back into the relationship, he felt trapped and smothered.
Peter did spend time dialoguing and going to CoDA meetings. Over the next few months, we continued to explore his childhood experiences, including the terror and grief he felt when his father died. Because his mother was so dysfunctional, Peter never got to feel his own feelings of fear and loss, and now he allowed his Inner Child to feel and grieve, which is what leads to the healing of pain.
Eventually, through much practice with dialoguing, Peter was able to be there for his Inner Child when he felt trapped and responsible.
PETER: |
It’s getting easier to do what I want to do without feeling guilty, and it’s getting easier to tell Candace what I want to do without sounding hard and rejecting. In the past, because I was so afraid of her reaction, I was very distant when I’d tell her what I wanted. She felt rejected as much by my distance as by what I wanted to do. |
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Now, most of the time, I can gently and lovingly tell her what I want. When she gets upset, I can tell her I don’t like her lack of support without feeling guilty. It’s amazing—when I don’t act lovingly and I abandon my Child, I immediately want out of the relationship or I want to date or go smoke grass. That’s when I realize my Adult isn’t there. |
When Candace was four years old, her father left her mother for another woman. Candace’s mother blamed Candace and her younger brother for his abandonment. Candace had been very bonded to her father and couldn’t understand why he left her. She rarely saw him and concluded that she was not good enough for him.
When she was an adult, she found out from her father that her mother did everything possible to keep him away, including lying, telling him that Candace didn’t want to see him. Her father had participated in some illegal actions in his business, and her mother threatened to tell the police about it if he came around. So Candace rarely saw him after he left.
In addition, her mother would lie to her, telling her that her father was coming. Candace would sit at the window for hours waiting. When he didn’t come, her mother would degrade him and call him names, further eroding Candace’s trust in men.
Even though Candace now had a good relationship with her father, she had enormous unexpressed grief within her Child over his original departure. It took months of dialoguing before her Inner Child felt safe enough to let her in on the deep pain of that abandonment. As she slowly opened to the pain, she saw that her whole life had been centered around avoiding that abandonment pain, that her hurt and anger were the ways she had learned to attempt to control the men in her life so they would not leave her. As long as she was unwilling to feel the abandonment pain, she had to protect against it with her controlling behavior.
She had been terrified to feel that abandonment pain, fearing that it would overwhelm her, that it would be endless, that it would make her crazy. But as she learned to be there for the pain of her Inner Child, she found that she could handle it when her Adult was present. Knowing this enabled her to grieve and heal much of her old pain. However, she found that she was still hurt and felt abandoned whenever she wanted to be with Peter and he had other plans.
Candace found that when she took responsibility for making herself happy rather than relying on Peter, as well as taking responsibility for any abandonment feelings that came up, she was able to be much more supportive of his work and other outside activities. Not surprisingly, when she let go of trying to control Peter and get him to be with her, she found he wanted to be with her more often.
As you can see from the examples about spouses and lovers, when both people are willing to do their Inner Bonding work, codependent relationships can move into recovery fairly quickly. You can also see from the examples that it is possible to shift a codependent system when only one person is willing to do the work, but we never know whether the relationship will get better or fall apart.
Whenever one person changes, the other has to change in some way. There is no guarantee that when you decide to do your own work your partner will eventually open, but that is always possible. It is equally possible that your changing can lead to the end of the relationship. It is always true that in order to be there for ourselves, we have to be willing to risk losing the other. Very often one partner is initially unwilling to do their Inner Bonding work, but comes in for therapy as the other partner changes. When we are unhappy in a relationship and our partner is unavailable for inner work, we have to decide if it’s worth remaining unhappy to maintain the relationship or if we’d rather risk losing the relationship to find our own wholeness.