Comments on: 10 Ways You May Have Been Emotionally Invalidated as a Child

By: Nick

Nick — Sat, 05 Oct 2024 12:15:37 +0000

Dealing with my toxic parent, is very much like having a heavy wet blanket thrown over your head, every time you make the mistake of having your own opinions, or expressing yourself. Its like being gagged every time you want or need to speak!! If you manage to say anything, it is dismissed, invalidated, ridiculed, or otherwise ignored!!

Sounds simple, but being treated that way from childhood to adulthood, is Extremely damaging, and painful, more than I care to share here!!

By: Kerry

Kerry — Mon, 04 Sep 2023 02:50:22 +0000

I have just ordered your book! I too am a highly sensitive person…I am an artist and an art teacher and am going through an EXCRUTIATING divorce in which my husband WILL NOT validate my feelings. He has betrayed me in a way that he can not comprehend and so it is incredibly painful. He accuses me of being difficult. I have realized through this that I experienced this as a child as well…the invalidation. Although my parents were very present, they did not deeply understand me, and still don’t. They taught me my emotions are too much or are inaccurate. They often want to “fix” me and have me just get over it. I have suffered deeply as a result. I never even knew all of this was possible….I now get it. But I still can not get over being invalidated by someone I have trusted my entire adult life. I am hoping to find some relief in reading your book. He refuses to see any of his weaknesses and thinks he has done nothing wrong. I try to tell him about his conflict avoidance and lack of emotional awareness but he refuses to believe there is anything wrong with him. His whole family is like this so I don’t know why he can’t see it….

By: Lou

Lou — Wed, 09 Aug 2023 10:56:10 +0000

In reply to Leanne. There is no such thing as being born highly sensitive. we are born a blank canvas and early experiences effect our nervous systems and create the sensitivity. This is a trauma response, usually created by emotionally neglect. x

By: Featherless bird

Featherless bird — Mon, 12 Dec 2022 18:59:48 +0000

In reply to Jonice. I would love to read a blog on this topic as well. I think my well meaning parents had difficulty with me being very different than them in certain ways. I don’t think they like me having opinions of my own that are different from theirs. It made me unsure of myself, timid and lacking confidence and self awareness, feeling like I was always adrift with no purpose and lost.

By: Sue Finnerty

Sue Finnerty — Sat, 29 Oct 2022 00:00:32 +0000

In reply to Leanne. This is such a great perspective! My family was enmeshed so no individualality encouraged. If you had big emotions you were shamed. If you wanted a different choice then there was upset. The underlying question was why can't you be like so and so. A bit robotic and any showing up as yourself was not entertained.

By: Sue

Sue — Fri, 28 Oct 2022 23:54:30 +0000

In reply to Jonice. This is a great perspective. We are all different and unique. Looking back my parents didn't see us as individuals in their own right. To them there had to be a "sameness"...that we all had to agree with each other. Eye opening

By: Jonice

Jonice — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 13:15:16 +0000

In reply to Leanne. Dear Leanne, thank you for pointing out how hard it can be for parents to respond appropriately to a child who is very different from them. I will write a blog about that, in fact. Many well-meaning parents struggle with this.

By: jana

jana — Sat, 11 Jun 2022 12:07:22 +0000

In reply to TT. please divorce him ...if u have enough money . my father was just like this but a bit worse because he never took care of anything in the first place unless my mother yelled at him to do so .she is tired as well .im sorry but divorce that fucker, you deserve a nice life with someone who does not have issues on his own that need to be figured out first.

By: Leanne

Leanne — Fri, 10 Jun 2022 16:29:33 +0000

Keep in mind that every child’s ’emotional threshold’ is, always has been, and always will be different. So some parents may be trying to meet the threshold thar they would have considered acceptable as a child, even if their own child’s emotional threshold is lower or higher. I am, and have always been (ever since I can remember) highly sensitive, and so I have a much higher minimum threshold.

By: Evangio

Evangio — Thu, 12 May 2022 04:58:16 +0000

In reply to Michael.

Exactly the same happens to me and I feel some comfort when I hear that I am not the only one.. Total empathy and sympathy for you Michael.
…Plan your reconstruction with the help of everybody else ecxept your mum and stay alert when near her.
There is so much in that ….