Ever been told to get in touch with your inner child? Read below:
The Scenarios
The Past Projects to the Present
Lies of the Past
How to get Free
What does this have to do with DID????
A Special Note to Christians
What do you Think?
Scenarios:
You’re a grown woman going out with your sister to shop. When she comes to your door she looks at you and says, “Don’t wear that. It makes you look fat.” From deep inside you, a huge rage boils up. You HATE your sister at that moment, but why? She has always teased you about your clothes, and you never got that worked up.
You’ve been married three years, and it’s almost your birthday. A week before your birthday your husband announces that he was just offered a great opportunity to go deep sea fishing with some other guys, so he’ll be away next weekend. You realize that he won’t be here for your birthday, and you burst into tears. Why? Why is this a big deal?
The secret to unraveling these over-reactions lies in the past. Everyone has a past. Many people have had traumatic things happen in their past. What most people don’t know is that the beliefs and behaviors of today can be linked to those bad things that happened many years ago, especially in childhood. MANY, if not most, people can relate to some event in their lives when they over-reacted, as in the scenarios above. The “why?” question is answered in one’s past. All people experience unpleasant and difficult situations while growing up. However, not all people had the opportunity to process and heal from early, difficult situations. In supportive environments, even serious trauma can be healed in young children. In non-supportive environments, those issues go underground into the subconscious. Therefore, understanding the state of one’s remembered self (inner child) is critical to becoming a “whole” and healthy adult. According to some psychologists, everyone has an inner child. I know several people from abusive pasts who know their inner child, and they know their inner child is still hurting. For all people who have unresolved trauma from the past, God wants to heal you. And yes, I’m going to relate this to DID in a little bit. First, lets talk about what needs to happen if you have unresolved issues from your past.
A quick search on the web will yield a large number of articles and particular practitioners who deal with these sorts of unresolved childhood issues. It’s our understanding that some secular psychotherapists encourage one to get in touch with his/her inner child, even to the point of “holding them”, “encouraging them”, “allowing them to speak internally,” etc. No doubt all of that is helpful. Certainly most of us could have used some extra comfort as children. The problem is that comfort is not healing. The whole basis of this website is that God can bring total healing. Some people say that talking about the past helps to heal the past. That may be true, in part. Unfortunately, often the details of the past that are influencing a person may be too difficult to look at, or they may even be completely repressed. Sometimes with a little prompting, memories that relate to the present situation are readily brought up. But bringing up a memory isn’t healing. Finding the Truth in that memory is healing. It’s really tough to go back there, and most people don’t have the time, energy, or inclination to do this healing work. However, to God all of this is important work. One reason for that is that in traumatic situations people often get lies set in their inner being. A frequently, verbally abused child may now seem like a strong, successful person on the outside, yet he/she is that stupid, dumb, ugly, fat, unwanted…..person on the inside. The lies of the past still fester, and they are very hard to get rid of. To be truly healed, those inner lies need to be replaced by Truth. For God this is a simple thing to do.
How to get free: Over the past 50 years God has been revealing to many people all over the world His desire for all people to become free of lies and traumas from the past. One can’t just will to be healed. It doesn’t work (have I ever tried!!!!). Given tools to use and a relationship with Jesus, one can do some healing work by oneself. However, it’s quite helpful to get the necessary tools in collaboration with a friend, spouse, or counselor who is willing to work with you. There are many, many very good, yet similar, approaches to this, which I’ll list in a moment. The critical, central point of all of them is that Jesus knows what happened, and He knows the lies you believed in those difficult circumstances. In Christian inner healing Jesus Himself interacts with a person in their memories and heals the ancient wounds. Children naturally gravitate to Jesus, because of His gentle Presence. When approaching Jesus from your inner child, even people who are not Christian can have a visit with Jesus, if they ask. When a wounded inner child interacts with Jesus in an old memory, He shows them the Truth of what happened. An abandoned child knows Jesus was always there and loves her dearly. A child constantly reminded that they are imperfect, ugly, and unwanted learns how much she/he is loved and wanted by Jesus. Love flows out of Him into the child so that she/he knows that no matter what she/he does or looks like, God loves her/him. All of this healing immediately translates into healing of the adult. The lies of the past no longer affect the present because the lies have been replaced with Truth. If you let Him, Jesus will take you back to that memory and speak Truth to you. Having a person tell you the truth can be helpful, but there is total, complete, life-transforming change when the God who created the universe speaks directly to you. Ka Pow! You KNOW the TRUTH. You are an amazing, beautiful, well-loved person – always have been. Whatever the lies are God will reveal His Truth.
Sometimes the wounds that relate to a current emotional crisis are blocked. The memories are repressed. Therefore, there is no insight as to one’s current behavior. Thankfully, Jesus always knows where one’s wounds are hidden. Repressed memories are not a problem for the God who knows all things. When we allow Jesus to lead us, He will take us to the memory and expose the lies that we believed at the time regarding an incident. These sorts of repressed memories are often associated with severe trauma or sexual abuse. Nonetheless, healing occurs the same way. If the lie is that you didn’t deserve to live, Jesus shows you how He chose you to live and why. If the lie is that you’re forever dirty and unworthy because of incest, Jesus cleanses you, shows His anger against your perpetrators, and accepts you as clean and whole in Him. The examples could go on and on. While this is somewhat of an oversimplification of the process, in all Godly inner healing, the process and the answers come from The Lord. Jesus alone is Truth. He wants all of us to be healed from the past by understanding His Truth of who we are.
What are some of the tools? Basically, this is a list of healing ministries with which we have personal knowledge. There are many others out there, but for anyone reading this who says, “Yes, I’ve had this problem ever since X happened.” or “I vaguely remember something horrible when I was three, but I can’t think about it.” etc, here are some places where you can go for help. Theophostic prayer ministry, Elijah House, Restoring the Foundations, Immanuel, and Thrive. The first reference actually has a lot of self-help guidance. But you say, “I’M NOT CHRISTIAN. I HATE CHRISTIANS. I HATE JESUS. WHAT DO I DO?” Well, there is only one person with whom you can really have that conversation, and that is with Jesus. I know people who either don’t know or hate Jesus who have done theophostic prayer ministry, and Jesus healed them. He came to them. That’s because no matter what You think of Him, He absolutely loves You. He wants you healed. 100% guaranteed. If you want to know more about who Jesus is and you can get your hands on a Bible, read the chapter near the back of the book called “John”. John walked with Jesus. He knows Jesus. It’s a good read. Also, check out my page Statement of Faith and Salvation.
Now finally – WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH DID???? Well, everyone gets hurt. Most people have wounds from the past that really need to be healed. However, in DID the trauma is so severe that the child is presented with some irreconcilable conflict. Remember DID comes from severe, repeated trauma before age 8. When trauma causes an irreconcilable conflict that the child just can’t handle, there is dissociation. The worst conflict may be: I’m going to die/ I have to live. In that situation the mind dissociates and a part of the brain takes the traumatic event. The person who underwent the trauma now has no conflict. Everything is now just fine. Some dissociated part (Little) holds the horror of what happened. While the concept of an inner child in some ways resembles Alter Personalities, they are formed by quite different mechanisms. An inner child is not the same as a child Alter/ Little. A Little has been formed by dissociation to actually “fix” an irreconcilable event or belief in order to preserve the Original Self. We’ll be talking more about Littles in the next blog. Having an inner child does not mean you have DID. (For more information about Dissociative Identity Disorder you might look here.)
Despite the major differences in how trauma is cataloged in the brain (Inner Child vs. Little), God can heal it the same way. DID is healed using the same principles of inner healing, as described above, but maybe with a thousand fold complexity. Our experience is that Jesus often starts the process with Littles. Children naturally gravitate to Jesus, because of His gentle Presence, so even people who are not Christian can have a visit with Jesus, if they ask. When a wounded Little interacts with Jesus in a memory she/he holds, He shows her/him the Truth of what happened. An abandoned Little who believes she/he will never be fed again knows Jesus was always there, loves her/him dearly, and will provide for her/him. A Little locked in a closet because of a mistake learns how much she/he is loved and wanted by Jesus. Love flows out of Him into the Little so that she/he knows that no matter what she/he does or looks like, God loves her/him. All of this healing immediately translates into healing of the adult. Jesus can unite the child and the adult in love. Many times when a Little gets healed by Jesus she/he integrates back into the “person” from whom she/he dissociated originally, because having that memory dissociated is no longer necessary.
Here’s an example of how it works. Our entire life we’ve struggled with extreme anger when anyone corrected us. We were always silent, but we burned with anger and hatred for many days/ weeks. We had no idea why. Even the smallest correction filled us with rage. Eventually, we find out that we have DID, and our history has been extreme. In fact, we discovered that we had numerous Protector Personalities whose job was to deal with people who made us angry. We have been and are doing inner healing work with our Alters and Primaries. In retrospect it’s so easy to see how the rage and hatred against people who corrected us, even over simple things, were related to a lifetime of zero affirmation, extreme discipline, suicidal worthlessness, etc. Many Alters were affected, but working through all of those issues, especially with our Primary Presenter, has freed us from the anger and rage. All of these personalities now KNOW in the deepest place that Jesus Loves them. This has led to dramatic changes in our response to people. It took years and years to get there in a polyfragmented system, but is it so worth the effort!!!! What enormous freedom!!! No matter what anyone says, we KNOW Truth, and He KNOWS us in a close friendship sort of way. The name of Truth is Jesus. This is available to ALL people, everywhere. No matter how wounded. No matter what happened. No matter what you did in the past. Pornography. Prostitution. Incest. Marrying Satan. Drug addiction. Murder. Jesus can heal you.
I want to say a special word to any Christians who might be thinking about this for the first time. I think one of the most misinterpreted scriptures is Philippians 3:13-14 “Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself to have attained this. Instead I am single-minded. Forgetting the things that are behind and reaching out for the things that are ahead, with this goal in mind, I strive toward the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” (Net Bible) I can’t tell you how many times someone with good intentions quoted this scripture to help me “get over” DID. That scripture has NOTHING to do with inner healing. Nonetheless, I, in fact, have done exactly what that scripture is talking about. Here the author, Paul, is saying that all of his tremendous education and zeal to live the Jewish law perfectly is worth absolutely nothing to God. So he has let go of it. It doesn’t enter into his current life goals. I, too, was highly educated and acclaimed, but it was all a lie – the lie that who we are depends on what we do. The lie that Jesus would love me more if I did more for Him. This verse has absolutely nothing to do with healing from wounds in the past. In fact, it is essential that we examine our past to look for areas of unforgiveness, bitterness, hatred, etc. Jesus wants us free. We have to do this work with Jesus – everyone – even if you think you’re doing OK. There ARE areas in your past that need to be healed. It’s important work, if you do it with Jesus. Then you can be surprised by what people say or do, and you are no longer triggered, because you are completely secure in all aspects of your life with Jesus.
What are some examples of times you reacted way out of proportion to what was said or done? Did you have any immediate insight into why you overreacted? We’d love to hear some of your stories, and how you have or have not found freedom. Feel free to respond below or email us from our Contact Page.