How Healing Inner Child Wounds Can Free You From Chronic Symptoms

Healing your inner child wounds is a path to freedom and relief from your chronic symptoms and allows you to transform and thrive.

Your chronic mental and physical symptoms are a way for your inner child to feel safe, and in order to find relief from your symptoms, you have to give that inner wounded part of you what it needs.

Healing your inner child looks a little different for everyone, as the trauma and emotions surrounding your childhood shape your stress and impact how your body and mind cope today. 

To heal your chronic symptoms, you need to gently teach yourself how to heal and show yourself that it’s okay to heal and tend to these wounded parts of yourself.

Healing in all forms can be challenging and the same applies to healing your inner child wounds. Still, every step towards healing your inner child is a step closer to a soothed, de-stressed nervous system and relief from your chronic symptoms.

What is Your Inner Child?

Contrary to what it might sound like, your inner child is not an actual childlike personality or presentation of yourself. Instead, it’s a part of your subconscious that experienced and still remembers your childhood moments and emotions - both good and bad.

Your inner child is a part of your mind shaped by your childhood that impacts how your body and mind function today. And, like physical wounds from childhood, you can have inner child wounds that need healing or will continue to impact your life today.

Your inner child remembers the good stuff - like when you felt confident and accomplished after learning a new skill or when your parent was proud of you for doing something as simple as sharing with a friend.

But, your inner child also remembers the not-so-good stuff - like when you were bullied at school or lied to by close friends or family. When you were ignored or told you went good enough. 

The Impact of Inner Child Wounds on Chronic Symptoms

Often those bad memories that are imprinted into your inner child are showcased in your chronic symptoms. Outside of guilt and shame, you can experience symptoms like emptiness, depression, headaches, and even stomachaches, to name a few.

Your inner child wounds can even impact how you heal and regulate your nervous system. When you struggle with self-confidence and respect for yourself and your health, it’s harder to commit to healing your mind and body.

3 Ways to Reclaim Your Health By Healing Your Inner Child Wounds

Therapy, time, and commitment are the best methods for healing your inner child wounds - but, there are ways to start healing your inner child at home and at your own pace.

Once you’ve identified your chronic symptoms and the negative emotions you feel - sometimes unexplainably - it’s time to focus on methods to relieve your symptoms and reclaim your health. 

Here are three practices I recommend for healing your inner child wounds to find freedom from your chronic symptoms:

#1. Connect with Your Inner Child

You’re going to tackle the shame or guilt you feel in certain situations or actions and just embrace it and connect with your inner child. For example, playing - it’s okay to put aside the shame and just play.

Personally, I love to climb and play outdoors. When I need to connect with my inner child I go outside and climb. I climb trees and rocks and just push away the shame I feel and do what I love.

You don’t have to play either. Just do something that brought you joy as a child or connects to your childhood in a neutral or positive way. Something that connects to the spontaneity of making decisions or simply being a child.

#2. Nurture and Sooth Your Inner Child

Your wounded inner child is just that, a child. You have to remember to be gentle, to nurture and soothe your inner child rather than react in anger or fear. You have to console yourself and truly care to heal.

You’re gently tending to yourself and your emotions, you’re caring for these wounded parts of yourself left from your childhood, where an event or emotion left an impact so deep it’s lasted years. It deserves to be nurtured.

#3. Promote Physical and Emotional Well-Being

Part of healing is being aware of ourselves, our bodies, and our emotions. You have to take the steps to encourage and maintain your physical and emotional well-being. Recognize when you need to go out and take a break or a walk, or when you need additional support such as community or therapy.

Spend time learning about meditation and practices that can help you and your well-being. For example, learning practices that can activate the vagus nerve and help you feel less anxious and reactive, or somatic practices to help regulate your nervous system.

The Challenges of Healing Your Inner Child

Healing doesn’t happen overnight, it takes time and effort. Healing itself can be painful just as much as it is freeing - it’s a double-edged sword for some and the sweetest dessert for others. 

When healing your inner child, you have to remain consistent in your practices and find support when needed. You’ll have to be honest with yourself and open to speaking and thinking about your traumatic experiences.

Part of healing is removing the protective barriers our mind and body have put in place, which can lead to an upheaval in your daily life and routine. You can feel uncomfortable with how you have to retrain your brain and change yourself.

Your relationship with yourself and others can change. You find yourself recognizing behaviors and patterns that are toxic to yourself and your healing journey, ones that are nearly unbearable to face.

Even after healing your inner child wounds, you won’t erase your past. You’re equipping yourself with the tools to deal with your wounds. To move forward and reclaim your mind and body. You can still face situations that are triggering and require you to use what you’ve learned to push through and feel confident in your own mind.

Why You Should Consider Therapy When Healing Your Inner Child

When you’re experiencing chronic symptoms like pain, depression, and anxiety, it can be mentally and physically taxing to heal your inner child on your own and find relief from your symptoms.

Speaking from experience as a therapist who has gone through therapy, therapy provides guidance and a sounding board to deal with our problems and get down to the root of why we’re feeling what we’re feeling and the ways it affects us in our present.

Therapy can give insight into how we can connect with our inner child and heal - and not just in our therapy sessions. You can discover more about yourself than you thought possible and even discover that what you thought was your initial struggle to be something else completely. 

What Therapy is Right for You?

The right therapy for you will depend on the symptoms you’re experiencing and what you believe is the root of your problem, along with the type of support you want to receive. 

Trauma therapy can help you dig down to the root cause and help you understand and cope with your problems stemming from trauma. Trauma therapy is ideal if you’re experiencing strain in your relationships, difficulty concentrating and keeping up with daily tasks, trouble making decisions, anxiety, depression, or unsure of how to handle your emotions on top of chronic physical pain or illness.

You can also consider a program for healing such as the Mind-Body Healing Method. If you’re ready to start healing, but not sure which option is best for you, book your free intro call -> book your call here!