How Can I Heal From Being Abused as a Child?

The damage caused by child abuse doesn’t stop when you are able to get away from your abuser, or even when you are able to fight back. The lessons learned by abused children are twisted and brutally unkind, and they can stick deeply in your psyche. Building a new and better world view will take a great deal of work and therapy.

Coping With the Emotions

When the people who are supposed to protect you are actually the most dangerous people in your life, you lose the ability to trust. You may also have severe problems in understanding how to love someone who isn’t abusive to you. Some sufferers of childhood physical and sexual abuse choose to be isolated rather than reaching out for companionship and may develop clinical depression symptoms, chronic anxiety or eating disorders.

Healing the Mental Trauma

Even if you learned as a child or discovered as an adult that what you suffered in childhood wasn’t normal, you may have a hard time finding out exactly what is normal. Building healthy friendships or trying to connect in a positive way with adult siblings can be a challenge. As a child, you learned that relationships could be dangerous. You may need to seek counseling as you try to determine how to seek out friendships and romantic relationships. Child abuse often manifests as various mental illnesses that can be improved with therapy. Be aware that this therapy may force you to take a good hard look at the damaging lessons your childhood taught you so you can build a better story for your future. These lessons will be fresh and painful. Be gentle with yourself.

The Abuse Stops With You

Too often, those who suffer abuse feel that they should be able to get over their childhoods and move on without help. However, an abusive childhood can impact brain activity or even your physical health throughout your life. You may suffer from PTSD, struggle with high blood pressure or even have a cardiac disease that may tie back to the abuse that you suffered. A childhood of fear is damaging and destructive. To build an emotionally healthy future, counseling may be needed to help you to understand and celebrate your own worthiness.

 

The lessons taught by wonderful parents can last a lifetime, but so can the lessons taught by your abuser. To build your own healthy future, be ready to seek help. Talking with siblings can validate your concerns, but being abused in childhood puts you at the bottom of an unhealthy well of understanding your place in the world. A counselor can help you climb out.

Please review the services we offer and we hope that we can help in your recovery and improvement!

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