HEALING FROM A TOXIC PARENT

RE-PARENTING YOURSELF

Our parents are held to a responsibility of nurturing us, creating stability in our environment, setting examples for us to follow to know what is right and wrong, protecting us from harm, to provide us with our basic needs, our emotional and psychological needs unconditionally.

Given that we find ourselves as adults knowing that they fell short. Some did as much as was in their arsenal of comprehension, some were so damaged and never healed and they were so toxic that we lacked so much in our upbringing.

Healing from this trauma is the only way out. Most of the time it\’s healing without closure, healing without apology and even healing without actual separation. You will need to meet your needs and re-narrate your story.

Here are a few ways you can do that:

Forgive and Let go completely- Forgiveness is an important step in any form of healing. Knowing that you were denied something in your childhood that was somebody else\’s responsibility can be a tough thing to come to terms with. Betrayal, rejection and everything else that comes with toxic parenting isn\’t justice. Learn to find a way to let go of the whole experience completely. Yes, you were wronged and you are probably owed but you can only take control back by letting go of the whole responsibility.

Learn to not take it personal – the great thing about the Healing journey is that you realize how much hurting people hurt others. Toxic mums are little girls who didn\’t receive the best care growing up and their resolve is to continue the cycle. But you can make a choice to let the pain stop with you. It wasn\’t personal for them but you are going to be intentional. If the toxic parent is still in your life, remember to set great boundaries, maintain them and shrug off their projection, manipulation and criticism as just their own issue that has nothing to do with you. There is a battle happening inside them and its in no way your responsibility.

Learn to meet your own needs – you have to make peace with the fact that a toxic parent may not give a healthy form of support, especially emotionally. Already as an adult, you should learn to be independent of anyone when it comes to your emotional needs. But more importantly, don\’t place yourself up for disappointment by expecting them to meet your needs that they have never met before.

Find your own independence – If you are still reliant on your mother especially financially, start making long term plans to move out and to stay in your own space. It is difficult to set boundaries when you are still in a position to be controlled using finances and sustenance.

Forget about confrontation– everyone who has had an injustice done to them finds themselves hoping for a moment where you can tell off the person you hold responsible for the injustice. That never works though, and if it an apology you want, most toxic parents never reach a true resolve. Don\’t even try to pay them back by trying to be mean to them. Be the difference and kill them with an insane amount of kindness.

Grieve the loss – When you realize the person you hold most dear is toxic and that all their years of gaslighting has been a façade, it is like a death of sorts. Death of your perception that your childhood was not what it should have been. Take time to grieve the experience. Go through the motions, cry, be angry, go through denial and finally acceptance. Grieve the loss.

Re- narrate your whole upbringing – When discovery happens, it is normal to feel like a victim but you have to find your survival story. Retell your story where you are a survivor and as well find a way to thrive through everything.

God and spirituality -I am a Christian, I do derive my self worth from my Creator the author of everything including my very existence. Being a believer allows us to have an anchor, someone we can believe and rely on other than ourselves especially when everybody else fails.

Therapy – A therapist ( like myself) has been trained to deal with exactly what a child of a toxic mom is going through. It is therefore pretty prudent to seek professional assistance some type of help to handle the impact of what has happened and to continuously work on thriving even after.

Creating and Maintaining Healthy boundaries – This is a very essential part of the whole healing process. Elaborated more on another blog (click here)

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