When growing up in an abusive household, the feelings of the child get lost as the child adapts to the wishes of the parent or caregiver. It is imperative that those feelings get restored for the adult to function in a healthy manner in the adult world. Let’s dive into this subject to know what happened and how to correct it.

The child becomes an ego

Children by their nature want to receive unconditional love and be loved by their parent. This does not happen when love is conditional and has to be earned by an adult who maintains the child’s safety and sense of belonging. If a child does not feel safe, that is equivalent to death, and no mammal wants to die as they are being formed. This causes the child to adapt to the parents’ needs and wants while putting their own needs and wants in a secondary position. Showing certain feelings, such as anger or disgust, threatens the child’s safety, so they dismiss those feelings and suggest they don’t get angry, which results from the ego they’ve formed for adaptation and survival.

The adult unconsciously follows the script

Later on in life, the adult follows the same script learned as a child. They try to live up to being the good guy or the patient one. Not realizing they appear half-human to a healthy person, they say absurd things about how the feelings they’ve put into their shadow are not their own. This is a fake existence that causes resentment, which they deal with in private when no one is around to threaten them.

recognized feelings

The feelings recognized across world cultures include happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, fear, disgust, and contempt. The feelings most likely thrown into the shadow and deemed unacceptable by the parent are anger, disgust, contempt, and sadness. The child gets made fun of or told they cannot be those things, which threatens their safety and gets incorporated into their ego.

“Feelings are important communications from the body about what is happening to the individual.”

Knowing how to interpret feelings, rather than disowning them, is important in the healing process. If the feelings are not felt, they come out in other ways through depression, anxiety, and other sicknesses in the body.

recognizing and interpeting feelings

The individual must know how to recognize and interpret feelings that arise in the body. Happiness means the body responds positively to external stimuli. Sadness is the opposite, where the body responds negatively. Anger suggests that a boundary (rule of your life) has been violated. Disgust is a feeling of revulsion or strong disapproval by something unpleasant or offensive. Surprise is a response to something unexpected. Fear is the feeling of a violation of physical or psychological safety. Contempt is a feeling that a person or thing is beneath consideration or deserving scorn. When these feelings arise in the body, ignoring them can have long-term detrimental effects on the individual.

Reclaiming your feelings

To reclaim your feelings, you must integrate all aspects of yourself. You must be willing to sit with yourself in silence and isolation, without judgment, and to allow the feelings to rise, be experienced, and pass through you. You must learn and integrate what your body is communicating to you when the feelings arise. This is part of shadow work that integrates the disowned aspects of yourself to become a whole human being. You are allowed to be angry; if you are never angry, you are not human.

Conclusion

Reclaiming your lost feelings takes time and effort. It may require detaching from the ego you’ve formed to fit into the world. It is a lonely process, but one that will help you thrive on the other side. You will be better for it and will feel whole as you walk your path throughout the world.