WHAT IS THE MOTHER WOUND? The bond between a mother and her child is so strong that British psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott believed that there’s no such thing as an infant, but only an infant and their mother. He believed that a child’s sense of self is built by the kind of a relationship that they have with …
What is Codependency?
I was a codependent for most of my life. Desperate to be loved, I jumped from one long-term relationship to another, from a very young age, most of them being abusive. I was desperate for friends, so clingy and needy, I either put up with bullying and toxicity even in adult friendships, or drove any …
The Window Of Tolerance
The Window Of Tolerance is a concept originally developed by Dr Dan Siegel, MD, in his 1999 book, The Developing Mind, to describe the optimum zone of ‘arousal’ for a person to function in every day life. When we are operating within our window of tolerance, we can effectively manage and cope with our …
The Fawn Trauma Response – Are You A People Pleaser?
I have been a people-pleaser for most of my life. Not trusting my own judgement, so relying on others to tell me what to do. Ignoring red flags in people, trying to see the best in them. Which has got me into many dangerous situations, and stuck in a cycle of toxic friendships and abusive …
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Reenactment and Trauma
In his book ‘Homecoming: Reclaiming and Championing Your Inner child‘, John Bradshaw relays a story of how, as a grown adult on holiday with his wife and children, something didn’t go his way, and before he knew it, he had stormed out of the accommodation, and was pacing up and down in a new hotel …