Releasing Emotional Blocks (for people who grew up with emotionally unavailable parents)

Imagine waking up in the morning and loving your life. Feeling deserving. Feeling light and confident. Feeling like you can handle anything that the day ahead brings your way.

Did you feel like that this morning?

What about yesterday?

Be honest.

When did you feel like that the last time?

Was it a long time ago?

Or never?

Emotional blocks can feel like something is weighing you down, day in and day out. Like something is draining your life force out of you, bit by bit. Drop by drop.

It can feel like a constant backdrop of sadness, frustration, or anger that had been suppressed over time.

Or like detachment and numbness.

It takes a lot of energy just carrying it around.

Where do these suppressed emotions come from?

One of the causes is having grown up with emotionally unavailable parents. Parents who weren’t able to provide a safe and nurturing environment, an environment where children could freely express how they felt, and where their feelings got seen and acknowledged.

Growing up with emotionally unavailable parents often leaves deep scars that last well into our adult years.

The effects can manifest in all areas of our life, dictate our responses to various situations, determine our levels of satisfaction, happiness and confidence, and shape our relationships with both others and ourselves.

Recovery from this pain and from its consequences too can be a life-long journey.

Essentially it doesn’t matter what may have been the cause of the parents being unavailable to you when you needed them the most. When you needed them to comfort you, to hear you out, to encourage you, to show you love and support, or just to give you a hug.

The parents may have been being busy with work and had to spend a lot of time away from home.

Maybe they were ill or severely depressed.

Maybe they struggled with alcoholism or other addictions.

Maybe they were narcissistic or abusive.

Maybe they had a messy separation, or one of the parents left the home altogether.

Maybe because of some circumstances a parent couldn’t be in your life at all.

Or they were busy raising your younger siblings.

Or maybe their attention was so much on their own emotional needs because of their own unresolved childhood trauma that they couldn’t be there for you even if they tried.

At the end of the day it doesn’t matter what the cause was.

It doesn’t matter what prevented them from being a loving and effective parent.

No matter the reason, the results on the child are often the same.

The child has learned that their emotional pain was not important.

And the child learned to cope with it on their own whichever way he or she could.

The easiest, most available coping strategy for a child was to decide that what they felt wasn’t important, and to suppress their emotions.

To push them down as far as they could.

This strategy may have been effective for that point in time.

But then it continued running on the background into adulthood. And now it’s a cause of a lot of unnecessary suffering.

As we are living our adult lives, these mechanisms running in the shadows of our beings are truly destructive.

How many adults out there are feeling emotional numb.

Or worry about each and every thing every day of their lives.

How many have difficulties forming meaningful relationships or fear intimacy.

Or have difficulties standing up for themselves and setting healthy boundaries.

Or people-please in a constant, exhausting search for external validation.

Or struggle with addictions, anxiety, or low self-esteem.

Feelings of unworthiness and undeserving can be especially damaging. They can cause repeating patterns of underachievement and self-sabotage, both professionally and socially.

So what can be done? Is there a way to heal from this?

What does the path to healing look like?

The first step is of course to acknowledge that there is a problem.

And also to know that help is available.

If you are experiencing any of the symptoms above, let’s find out whether their origin was rooted in your childhood.

Luckily, there is a number of therapy methods today that can help you heal.

It can bring a massive shift in your well-being, and have you overcome the destructive patterns of the past.

It can bring along new personal growth, emotional resilience, and fulfillment.

It can give you the new ability to form deep, meaningful connections both with others and with yourself.

Releasing emotional blocks is a powerful transformational experience that can facilitate your healing, helping you recover from the consequences of growing up without a warm and emotionally available parent.

It is never too late to start on this journey.

As these blocks dissolve, clients often feel a physical sensation of a weight that they have unknowingly been carrying suddenly lifting off and leaving their bodies.

Feeling whole again.

Feeling lighter.

As they progress in their healing, they find themselves getting more open to experiencing life, trust, joy, and intimacy.

They are able to set better boundaries, and to feel more compassionate towards others.

They feel more resilient in dealing with life's challenges, and trust themselves to be able to do so.

Ultimately, this journey toward emotional freedom leads you to a renewed sense of self-worth, healthier relationships, and living a more authentic and fulfilling life.

Today is a good day to start on this journey. You’ll be glad you did.

Coming up: What is emotionally unavailable parenting

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