How Does Shame Develop at an Early Age?

Shame often begins during early childhood due to parenting styles and early experiences (see my article: Shame is at the Root of Most Emotional Problems).

How Does Shame Develop at an Early Age?

There are a number of factors that influence the development of shame at an early age including:

• Parental demands for perfection

• Lack of parental warmth

• Harsh criticism

Harsh Criticism and Shame

• Physical, emotional and sexual abuse

• Emotional neglect
  

• Witnessing domestic violence

• Emotionally unstable parent(s)

• Unpredictable or unstable parenting

• Parents who abuse substances or engage in other impulsive or compulsive behavior

How Does Childhood Shame Show Up in Adulthood?

Children who grow up being shamed will grow up to be adults who experience shame, which can affect all their adult interactions, including romantic relationships, familial relationships and relationships with work colleagues.

Shame during childhood often leads to repeating unhealthy patterns in adulthood (see my article: Why Are Childhood Trauma and Shame Affecting You Now?).

Here are some of the ways that childhood shame show up in adulthood:

Self Sabotaging Behavior: 

• Aiming too low

• Settling for less

• Self abandonment including neglecting your own needs to please others (see my article: Fawning as a Trauma Response)

Shame and Self Abandonment

• Avoiding commitment which can include fear of rejection and feeling inadequate (see my article: An Emotional Dilemma: Wanting and Dreading Love)

• Pushing away or distancing yourself from a romantic partner because you believe you're not good enough

• Perfectionism including striving for unrealistic and unattainable goals which adds to your feelings of inadequacy

• Decreased self care including neglecting your own needs which can have a negative impact on your mental and physical health

Sabotaging Relationships:

• Ignoring red flags in a relationship including dismissing early warning signs of an unhealthy relationship (see my article: Letting Go of Unhealthy Relationships)

• Shaming, controlling or domineering behavior to manipulate your partner and take the focus away from your own insecurities

Shaming, Controlling and Domineering Behavior

• Creating negative narratives including interpreting your partner's actions as a form of  rejection or disapproval--even when these actions are not

• Withholding feelings including avoiding vulnerability and conflict by withholding by emotions

Impact on Emotional Connection and Intimacy

• Problems relating to others because shame makes it difficult to develop and maintain healthy relationships (see my article: Overcoming Sexual Shame and Guilt Due to Cultural Issues)

Shame in Relationships

• Difficulty with vulnerability including fear of rejection or criticism which can make it difficult to open up to be emotionally vulnerable

• Fear of rejection due to shame which can lead to self sabotaging behavior and emotional distancing

• Difficulty with forgiveness due to shame can make it difficult to forgive yourself or your partner, which is an obstacle to feeling good about yourself and problems with relationship repair (see my articles: Learning to Forgive Yourself and The Psychological Stages of Forgiveness)

Getting Help in Therapy

Shame is a complex emotion which can be very challenging to overcome on your own (see my article: Overcoming Shame in Therapy).

Getting Help in Therapy to Overcome Shame

If you can relate to the signs mentioned in this article, you owe it to yourself to get help in trauma therapy.

A skilled trauma therapist can help you to overcome the debilitating effect of shame so you can lead a more fulfilling life.

Also See My Other Articles About Shame:

How to Overcome Shame Spiraling

Clients Struggling With Shame Can Leave Therapy Prematurely

What is the Difference Between Toxic Shame and Healthy Shame?

About Me

I am a licensed New York psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR, AEDP, EFT (for couples), Somatic Experiencing and Sex Therapist.

I have over 20 years of experience helping individual adults and couples (see my article: What is a Trauma Therapist?).

To find out more about me, visit my website: Josephine Ferraro, lCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at 917-742-2624 during business hours or email me.

 

What Unconscious Decisions Have You Made That Are Impacting Your Life?

In an earlier blog article, I wrote an article called Psychotherapy: Making the Unconscious Conscious.

In this article I'm focusing on how unconscious decisions can impact your life without your even realizing it.

What Unconscious Decisions Have You Made That Are Impacting Your Life?

Sometimes, you can get a glimpse of what these unconscious decisions are by paying attention to your internal dialogue or by looking at your dreams.  But much of the time, these unconscious decisions remain hidden away in the recesses of your mind.

Let's take a look at the following vignette, which is a composite of many cases with all identifying information changed, to see how these unconscious decisions can play out:

Ann
Ann was the first one in her family to go to high school.  Her parents and older siblings loved her and were very proud of her, but they would tease her about being "an egghead" because she was so dedicated to her studies.

Ann knew that they were teasing her, but she also felt that, as she got older and developed interests that her family couldn't understand, she felt she was moving away emotionally and intellectually away from her family.

This caused Ann a lot of pain.  She knew that her mother, who was the valedictorian of her class in 8th grade, would have loved to go to high school.  But her mother needed her to help support the family, so  Ann's mother was forced to leave school.

What Unconscious Decisions Have You Made That Are Impacting Your Life?

Ann's mother told Ann how she cried for days after she had to leave school to get a job as a store clerk to help the family.  Ann's heart ached to hear her mother tell this story.

Ann would try to show her mother what she was learning in school.  She hoped that her mother would take an interest and, in a small way, it might make up, at least on an intellectual level, for what her mother missed by not going to high school.

But Ann's mother, who was once a curious young woman, showed little interest.  Ann knew that, in many ways, her mother had been beaten down by life, and she felt guilty that she had opportunities that her mother didn't have.

When Ann's high school announced that they were going to have tutoring classes to help students practice for the SAT college entrance exam, her parents encouraged her to sign up.  But Ann was feeling increasing guilty that she was going to have the opportunity that her mother really would have liked when she was a young woman--a chance to go to college.

Without realizing why, Ann kept losing the information from the school and forgetting the deadline to apply.  And every time her parents mentioned it, she felt anxious.

Then, one evening, Ann's mother came to her room and sat on her bed.  Ann wasn't sure why her mother came to her, but she could see that her mother looked serious and had difficulty starting the conversation.

Finally, Ann's mother took her hand and began to speak.  She told Ann that she thought she knew what was going on with her lately.  Then, she proceeded to tell Ann that she wanted her to do the best she could do and go as far as she could go without ever worrying that she would lose her family.

Her mother told Ann that she thought she understood what Ann was feeling because she had similar feelings when she was a young girl and she had an opportunity to go to elementary school and junior high and her mother was illiterate.  Even though she loved school, she felt guilty that she had an opportunity that her mother didn't have and would have loved.

She told Ann that, even though she understood, she wanted Ann to go to the tutoring classes, take the SAT exam, do well and excel at college.

Ann always loved and admired her mother, but she realized at that moment that even though her mother didn't have a formal education, she was a wise woman.

Ann went on to do well in college and to get a good job in college.  But she continued to feel guilty whenever she had opportunities that her family didn't have, and this continued to be problem for her until she realized that she almost sabotaged an opportunity for a promotion with a sizable increase in pay in her company's California branch.

At that point, she knew she needed help, and she started therapy to deal with the guilty feelings that she felt were oppressing her.

Shortly after she began therapy, Ann had a dream where she was surrounded by family members who were pointing their fingers at her in anger.  Everywhere she turned, she saw her mother, father, and brothers and sisters pointing their fingers at her in anger.

As Ann listened to her family members angrily accuse her of thinking that she was better than them because she had a better education and she made more money, Ann closed her eyes, put her hands over her ears and began to cry.

When she couldn't stand it any more, she screamed, "I don't want to do anything that takes me away from all of you!"

At that point, Ann woke up in a sweat with her heart pounding.

During her next therapy session, Ann told her therapist about her dream.  The dream upset Ann very much, and she knew that it encapsulated the feelings she had since childhood.

As she and her therapist discussed the dream, Ann realized that, throughout her life, she had been giving herself the unconscious message that she didn't want to do anything that caused her to feel separate from her family.

She knew that her family really wanted her to be successfully, and her guilt was her own, not induced by her family.

Over time, Ann was able to work through her guilt in therapy.  She also learned that everyone goes through periods in his or her life where becoming an individual means being more independent from his or her family.  But she had another layer to this process because of her family's history and her good fortune to have opportunities they didn't have.

What Unconscious Decisions Have You Made That Are Impacting Your Life?

As she worked through this issue, she accepted the promotion in California and felt good about it.  Her family was also very supportive.

Unconscious Decisions People That People Make That Impact Their Lives
Unconscious decisions that people make can take many forms.  Often, they involve their relationships with family members.  But they can involve other aspects of their lives.

Guilt, fear, anger and mistrust are often involved with these unconscious decisions.

Because these decisions are unconscious, they're usually hard to discern.  But they might come out in dreams, as in the vignette above.  They might also become increasingly apparent as a person engages in self sabotaging behavior.

Getting Help in Therapy
If you feel there are underlying unconscious decisions you've made that might be affecting your life, you owe it to yourself to get help from a licensed psychotherapist who has experience helping therapy clients to discover and work through this issue.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Are You Hooked on the Roller Coaster of Emotional Drama?

Life has its inevitable ups and downs which we can't avoid.  This is a natural part of life and learning how to negotiate these inevitable ups and downs is part of becoming a resilient human being.  But when I refer to "getting off the emotional roller coaster," which is the title of this article, I'm referring to an emotional dynamic that goes beyond these common ups and downs.  I'm referring to a dynamic that goes through emotional cycles of exhilarating highs and despairing lows, which makes most people feel off balance after a while.

Hooked on Roller Coaster of Emotional Drama

But there are many people who are hooked on emotional drama.  They live their lives on an emotional roller coaster and don't realize that this is the dynamic in their life.

They often don't see that they're creating the emotional roller coaster with the decisions they make and the relationships they choose to be in.  Instead, they feel victimized by this dynamic because they don't realize that they can get off the emotional roller coaster.

Let's take a look at a fictionalized scenario based on a composite of many cases (without any identifying information):

Mia:

When Mia started therapy, she was living her life from one crisis to the next.  She experienced emotional highs when she felt she was in a wonderful relationship and her career was going well.  But these emotional highs usually turned to despair when her latest relationship fell apart and she lost almost every job that she ever had.

Mia felt victimized by these experiences--as if they were happening to her and she was powerless to have any effect on her life.

But as we looked closer at these situations, there was a dynamic that became apparent in almost all of them, which was that, to a large degree, Mia had a big part in creating the very situations which she lamented.

Her most recent relationship ended after her boyfriend was incarcerated for insider trading.  Initially, Mia said she had no idea that her boyfriend was involved in anything shady.  But as we looked at the early days of this relationship, there were plenty of "red flags" that Mia chose to ignore, including a long list of her boyfriend's sociopathic behavior.  

During the good times, Mia and her boyfriend lived in his luxury condo.  He lavished her with expensive gifts, and took her on expensive vacations.  But all of this ended when Mia's boyfriend was taken out of his office in handcuffs.  Then, Mia felt the depths of despair.  

Prior to this relationship, Mia was involved in a string of relationships that kept her on a continuous emotional roller coaster.  Each time there were "red flags" that she chose to ignore in favor of the emotional drama in the relationships.

Her career followed a similar pattern where Mia started out as a star at her workplace and then, through a series of self sabotaging behavior, eventually got fired.  Just like her lack of insight into the choices she made in her romantic relationships, she didn't see how she was sabotaging herself in her career.  

As we looked at her family history, it became evident that Mia's parents plunged the family into one crisis after another because of the decisions they made.  At various times in their lives, they went from having a fairly high standard of living to being nearly bankrupted.  

As Mia talked about the emotional roller coaster of her early life, she looked exhilarated.  Most people, who were not hooked on emotional trauma, would have talked about this type of family history with a lot of emotional pain.  But it was evident that Mia was hooked on the emotional drama involved in her chaotic early life.  And being hooked on emotional drama from an early age had become a way of life for her.

Although there were times when the drama became too much for her, as when her boyfriend was incarcerated, most of the time, without realizing it, she was hooked on the emotional drama.

It wasn't easy for Mia to see that she had a hand in creating the emotional drama or, at the very least, when she wasn't actively creating the drama, she was in denial about the early warning signs.

Many people, who are hooked on emotional drama, choose to leave therapy before they develop enough insight to change.  Getting off the emotional roller coaster which, in many cases, is all they know, is too threatening.

These people might blame the therapist or find other reasons for leaving therapy.  They often go from one therapist to another or one type of therapy to another.  But when the therapist tries to help them see their part in creating the chaos in their life, they leave rather than risk change.

Fortunately, Mia stayed.  But work was slow because she had such a blind spot and she was highly ambivalent, at best, about changing.  During that time, she got into another tumultuous relationship and she lost another promising job.

By then, Mia was getting tired of the highs and lows that her life.  At that point, she was more open to seeing her part.  But she was worried that her life would be boring without the emotional drama.  

Mia didn't know how to live her life without being on an emotional roller coaster, so we worked on helping her develop better internal resources and other ways to feel good about herself without resorting to creating crisis in her life or getting involved in chaotic relationships.

We also worked on helping her to mourn her unmet emotional needs as a child.  To begin doing this work, she had to develop the capacity to tolerate the grief without getting back on the emotional roller coaster to avoid dealing with uncomfortable feelings.

The work was slow and progress was often one step forward and two steps backwards.  But, over time, Mia discovered that she could lead a happy life without creating chaos or going from one emotional crisis to another.

Getting Help in Therapy

If Mia's story resonates with you, you're not alone.  You can get help from a licensed mental health professional to get off your emotional roller coaster so you can lead a more meaningful and fulfilling life without the drama.

About Me

I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist who works with individual adults and couples.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist.

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.

Are You Sabotaging Yourself With Negative Self Talk?

Negative self talk can become so automatic and persistent that you don't even realize that you're sabotaging your own efforts by giving yourself negative messages.  When negative self talk becomes so habitual, the more you engage in it, the more you reinforce this negativity.

Are You Sabotaging Yourself With Negative Self Talk?

What is Negative Self Talk?
Everyone has his or her own version of negative self talk.

Some people compare themselves to others unfavorably to others and then tell themselves that that they could never measure up to these other people.

Here are some examples:

• Comparing yourself to pictures of models in magazines and then berating yourself for being overweight or being as attractive as the models
• Comparing how much money you make to other people's high income, and telling yourself that you'll never have financial success
• Comparing other people's success and telling yourself that you'll never amount to anything

Aside from comparing yourself unfavorably to others, there are many other kinds of negative self talk that can act as an saboteur:

• Criticizing yourself when your efforts don't bring success immediately rather than trying again
• Telling yourself that you're unlovable or worthless
• Telling yourself that you're stupid

And so on

Where Does This Negative Self Talk Come From?
For many people, negative self talk starts in their family of origin.  If they had a critical parent when they were growing up, they internalized these negative messages.  Then, as adults, they continued to give themselves the same messages--often without even realizing it.

How Can You Change Negative Self Talk?

• Becoming More Self Reflective and Aware

The first step to changing negative self talk is to become aware that you're doing it.   In order to become more aware, you need to become more self reflective and begin to pay attention to your internal self talk.

Do you offer yourself encouragement or discouragement?

Step back and observe yourself.

If you realize that you've developed a persistent habit of being self critical, you need to also be aware that this habit is an obstacle in your path.

• Admitting to Yourself that Your Negative Self Talk is a Problem

Once you've become aware of your problem, the next step is to start making the connection between your negative self talk and the consequences that it has had in your life.

While external factors might play a role in your feeling stuck, in order to change, you need to also admit to yourself that you're sabotaging yourself.

• Taking Action to Change

Once you've become aware and admit to yourself that your persistent negative self talk has become an obstacle for you, you need to take action to change.  Awareness alone, although a very important first step, isn't enough.

Begin to challenge yourself, whenever you engage in negative self talk, as if you were someone else questioning your own negativity.  Ask yourself for objective evidence that what you're telling yourself is true.  Engage in your own internal debate.

Ask yourself what a good friend, who knows you well, might tell you.

"Act as if" the negative self talk isn't true.  So, for instance, if you're telling yourself that you'll never be able to complete a project for work, acknowledge that this is how you're feeling, but put that aside and act as if you can.

In my opinion, "acting as if" is different from "fake it 'til you make it" because by"acting as if," you'll eventual discover that you're not faking it at all--you're really doing it.

By "acting as if," you're opening yourself up to new possibilities both within yourself as well as in external your world.

Getting Help in Therapy
If these tips for overcoming negative self talk don't work for you, you could benefit from seeking help from a licensed mental health professional.

For many people, negative self talk is linked to childhood trauma where there was emotional and/or physical abuse.  As a result, the trauma keeps getting triggered in their lives now as an adult and often shows up in negative self talk.

There are licensed psychotherapists who specialize in providing therapy to overcome trauma, and finding a therapist with expertise in trauma can help you to work through the trauma and also help you to stop engaging in negative self talk.

About Me
I am a licensed NYC psychotherapist, hypnotherapist, EMDR and Somatic Experiencing therapist.

I work with individual adults and couples, and one of my specialties is helping clients to overcome the effects of trauma.

To find out more about me, visit my website:  Josephine Ferraro, LCSW - NYC Psychotherapist

To set up a consultation, call me at (917) 742-2624 during business hours or email me.