How to heal abandonment trauma
- schoolofjoypodcast
- Apr 17
- 3 min read
Why Healing Childhood Abandonment Means Grieving What You Didn't Receive and Feeling the Rage
The burden of my past traumas has felt enormous these last couple of months. I carry a deep scar—an abandonment wound—that whispers:
I will be rejected.
And that fear has shaped how I move through the world.
How that manifests itself is in my ego mind writing others off, being mean and bitchy about them in my head. I was asked to acknowledge this wound deeply these last few days, to face the deeper truth behind this ugly pattern.
The truth is, a child part of me is trying desperately to keep me safe.
The Child Part Trying to Keep Me Safe
“If I cast people aside before they can hurt me, then I'll be safe."
This is what my inner child believes.
But that isn’t true. The pain still sits there, underneath.
The deeper truth is that I’m still grieving what I needed as a child but didn’t receive. To be seen, to be unconditionally loved, to be held close in my pain, to be loved despite it all.
Not to be rejected.
I still seek this unconditional love from others, but I remain highly sceptical, always alert to other people’s behaviour, seeking proof that they too will let me down.
And when I feel that they do, when they don’t meet my unrealistic, impossible expectations, my inner child says:
“You see! I told you!”
This is no way to live.
Why Understanding Isn't Enough: Inner Child Healing
When I drilled down to the truth of this, I realised how much burden I still carry from my past.
Whilst I understand all this on a mental level, there’s a missing piece of this puzzle.
I need to grieve.
I need to feel.
I need to accept and let it be a part of me.
I need to hold it in compassion.
I need to stop trying to fix it with my ego mind.
From Thinking to Feeling: The Body Knows
Emotion was trapped inside me, surfacing in waves—tears would begin, then my mind would rush in, trying to solve the unsolvable. My ego wanted to understand.
But understanding isn't healing.
But then one day, when sharing in a voice note with my dear, safe, close friends, the tears started to come, like a river.
I decided it was time to allow.
To get in my body and let the energy flow and move within me.
The Embodied Experience
So, I put on some music that I knew would help me cry. I put my headphones in and shut myself away, with the curtains closed, and allowed the feelings to flow.
Integration: Somatic Healing for Trauma
There was grief—such deep grief. There was rage—unapologetic, ancient rage. There were tears, a river, flowing out of me.
I danced, I sang, I prayed, I allowed my body to move and stretch and hold itself.
Then came compassion, so much compassion.
And so much gratitude for my beautiful body that has carried me on this journey so far. Unending gratitude for my ego mind—that fierce protector—for trying so hard, for doing such a good job.
Because I'm still here.
Years of depression and so much not wanting to live, and I’m still here.
Stronger and braver and more connected than ever.
The Loneliness of Deep Healing Work: Self-validation after childhood trauma
Why am I sharing this?
Sometimes the path to healing looks like tears and rage and all the ugly stuff. Facing that is brave, and sometimes, I’ve found, it can feel deeply lonely too.
The deeper I heal, the starker the gap becomes—between me and the relationships I've carried my whole life. What weighs heavily on my heart is this: The adults who loved me—who truly did—also couldn't hold the truth of my pain.
They gaslighted my experiences because opening to that truth would have meant facing their own.
I'm learning to grieve both their love and their limitations. I’m navigating my love for them alongside the realisation that, at times, they perpetuated the problem.
I’ve spent so long doubting myself.
I’m in the process (and it is a process, that’s still very much ongoing), of learning to trust myself.
To validate myself.
To validate that the pain and suffering I experienced (and still do).
But that throws those relationships into question, and it's painful, requiring a reconfiguration that feels scary and leaves me fearing loneliness.
Healing abandonment trauma requires grieving, feeling, self-compassion and community.
That’s why our joy circle is so important. This is not an uncommon experience. And we need one another along this crazy journey of healing and self-mastery.
Thank you for being here. In this space, you're not alone in the burden.
And that changes everything.
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