The Consequences of Unresolved Emotional Wounds in Families

Many of the issues we struggle with as adults have roots in the experiences we had as children. Emotional wounds in families are the main contributor to the abandonment trauma, trust issues, fear of intimacy, and persistent guilt, shame, anger, and depression we must deal with decades later. It’s a challenge to confront these wounds.

In many cases, family members are not open to acknowledging, discussing, or confronting them. We must be prepared to venture without them as we confront our childhood experiences so that we can heal, grow, or simply move on with less baggage.

Hurt People

It’s never a simple thing to confront the past. It would be so much easier if we could simply focus on our flaws and failings and work at improving them. Of course, that is an option. However, so many of the issues that affect us and our relationships have a deeper context that we can’t ignore.

The problem with unresolved trauma is that it cannot be contained. We try to repress painful memories and avoid certain triggers, but trauma always seeps out and affects those closest to us. Whether it’s in the way we communicate or in the way we handle our emotions, our behavior is affected by our past.

The same is true for our family. Our parents and relatives were affected by the trauma of their parents, and so on, for each generation. Emotional wounds in families are passed on through the generations until someone ends the cycle.

The Consequences of Unresolved Emotional Wounds in Families

In the natural world, when someone has a deep wound but leaves it untreated, it tends to spread and cause more issues. Over time, what started as a minor issue can pose a serious health risk. Emotional wounds in families are similar. If ignored, over the years and decades, they begin affecting the relationships between family members, eventually poisoning people against each other.

We can never fix other people, and we do not resolve trauma by seeking justice or leveling blame at others. We must take responsibility for our healing and work on ourselves until we are emotionally healthier. A good place to start is by learning some of the ways these emotional wounds might have affected us. Here are some of the most common ways that emotional wounds in families affect us as adults.

Stuck Emotions

Parents who never speak about, acknowledge, or make space for emotions cause serious problems without knowing it. They likely grew up in a similar way, and unless we notice the pattern and change it, we will pass it on. Simply suppressing emotions does not make them disappear. In some cases, pushing your emotions down and never expressing them makes them more intense and difficult to manage.

Growing up in an environment where people never acknowledged their emotions often makes for frustrated, dysregulated, anxious adults. We never learned to identify our emotions, let alone how to express them. Now we feel many things, but we can’t say what or why we feel like we do. Our inner world needs words and expression.

A helpful practice is to buy a journal and begin to log our emotions. It helps to have a physical book to write or draw in, because that involves different hemispheres of our brain and engages more of our body. Whenever we want to identify our emotions, we will write down an event in the middle of the page, and then try to identify each emotion we felt in that moment.

For example, we might reflect on a romantic date we went on. We might identify emotions we felt, such as joy, excitement, and anxiety, but we might also have felt shame and embarrassment at some point in the evening.

When we begin to identify the emotions we feel and the context we felt them in, we begin learning more about ourselves. We see patterns where particular emotions appear in certain instances. We learn that it is natural to feel certain things, and that sometimes it is perfectly safe and even positive to express what we are feeling.

Persisting Guilt

One of the most common emotional wounds in families is being made to feel as if our needs do not matter. We grow up obeying, pleasing, and catering to the demands of everyone else, with no space to express our needs, wants, or preferences.

We are only truly comfortable when we receive the same quantity of affection or attention from the people who matter the most, even when that is very little. Receiving less than normal affection or attention makes us feel hurt and angry, and receiving more than usual makes us feel guilty or ashamed.

Part of healing this particular wound is to lean into the discomfort and make demands. We are allowed to take up space and use our voice. Our needs are as legitimate as anyone else’s. We can assert ourselves in the lives of those who should care for us.

Feeling Responsible for Others

Feeling as if other people’s comfort and happiness rest on us is an emotional wound. Emotionally immature parents cause their children to grow up too soon. The dynamic flips, and at some point, the child takes care of the emotional needs of those older and more capable. This is a wound that will not heal until it is addressed.

The way to address a wound like this is simply to stop. Other people’s emotions are not our emergency to respond to. Their moods should not be dependent on our performance. Our priority is to ourselves, and sometimes we will disappoint people. The worst that could happen is that they withdraw from us and stop using us for their stability.

Constant Anxiety

Some people have disorders that cause them to feel constantly anxious. However, anxiety is often caused by emotional wounds in families. Our childhood might have been so chaotic and intense that now stability feels suspicious. We can never fully relax because it feels like something will go wrong at some point.

This is the sign that our nervous system is charged and ready for disaster. We deserve comfort, peace, and space to relax. We must learn to be productive without relying on chaos to drive us. Our nervous system needs to have a break. When this wound begins healing, we will find that we have a lot more physical energy and focus than we would have expected.

Turn It Around

Your hurts matter, and your experiences are valuable. Perhaps you have never been told that and have a hard time believing it. Perhaps you have spent your entire life shrinking yourself down to stay out of the way. You were not made to live in dark corners, being fed crumbs of affection. You matter, your needs are valid, and you have every right to receive all the good things you give to others.

Your past affects your present, but it does not have to dictate your future. You have been in survival mode for many years, and now it is time for you to learn how to live. Some wounds from trauma run deep, and it takes a lot of effort to resolve them.

You are worth the effort, though. It can be overwhelming even to begin addressing any of these things, but you are never truly alone. Someone is always available to help you find healing and wholeness.

It’s not easy to confront the consequences of trauma without help, and sometimes we simply need to share the burden with someone who cares and is equipped to help. If you would like to meet with a counselor to discuss these things, please reach out to us. You may find a counselor in our online catalog, or feel free to ask someone from our reception team for help.