I first learned about Childhood Emotional Neglect when my first therapist recommended the book Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson. This book was a gamechanger for me and began explaining so much. For me, this is probably the most complicated piece of the puzzle. I still feel like I haven’t even scratched the surface here. It can be lonely. Because Childhood Emotional Neglect and C-PTSD go hand-in-hand, I hope you’ll find some of these resources and quotes helpful.
What the Experts Say: Childhood Emotional Neglect and C-PTSD
“Children, especially highly sensitive children, can be wounded in multiple ways: by bad things happening, yes, but also by good things not happening, such as their emotional needs for attunement not being met.”
Dr. Gabor Mate
“If you’ve spent many years not being validated, you’ve probably suppressed sadness more than any other emotion.”
Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson
“After childhood neglect, you are left with ‘I am not that loveable. I’m not worth your time. I don’t really matter.'”
Dr. Jacob Ham
“The most traumatic aspects of all disasters involve the shattering of human connections. And this is especially true for children. Being harmed by the people who are supposed to love you, being abandoned by them, being robbed of the one-on-one relationships that allow you to feel safe and valued and to become humane—these are profoundly destructive experiences. Because humans are inescapably social beings, the worst catastrophes that can befall us inevitably involve relational loss. As a result, recovery from trauma and neglect is also all about relationships—rebuilding trust, regaining confidence, returning to a sense of security and reconnecting to love. Of course, medications can help relieve symptoms and talking to a therapist can be incredibly useful. But healing and recovery are impossible—even with the best medications and therapy in the world—without lasting, caring connections to others.”
Dr. Bruce Perry
“A child who grows up with no reliable human source of love, support and protection typically falls into a great deal of social unease. He ‘naturally’ becomes reluctant to seek support from anyone, and he is forced to adopt self-sufficiency as a survival strategy.”
Pete Walker
“Neglect is when you feel distress. Every child who feels distress seeks comfort and proximity to their caregivers. And it’s how this caregiver responds in that moment that matters so much. Does the parent recognize that this is a bid for comfort?”
Dr. Jacob Ham
“Children who are emotionally neglected then grow up to have a particular set of struggles. Because their emotions were not validated as children, they may have difficulty knowing and trusting their own emotions as adults. They may have difficulty understanding their own feelings, as well as others’. Because an important part of themselves (their emotional self) has been denied, they may find themselves feeling disconnected, unfulfilled or empty. They may have difficulty trusting or relying upon others. Many describe feeling that they are different from other people; like something is wrong with them, but they’re not sure what it is.”
Dr. Jonice Webb
“Internalizers read people closely, looking for signs that they’ve made a connection. This isn’t a social urge, like wanting people to chat with; it’s a powerful hunger to connect heart to heart with a like-minded person who can understand them.”
Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson
“Early abuse and abandonment forces the child to merge his identity with the superego, the part of the child’s brain that learns the rules of his caretakers in order to get and maintain acceptance. However, because acceptance is impossible in the CPTSD-engendering family, the superego gets stuck working overtime to achieve the impossible. Perseverating on finding a formula to win over her parents, the child eventually embraces perfectionism as a strategy to make her parents less dangerous and more engaging. Her one hope is that if she becomes smart, helpful, pretty, and flawless enough, her parents will finally care for her. Sadly, continued failure at winning their regard forces her to conclude that she is fatally flawed. She is loveless not because of her mistakes, but because she is a mistake. She can only see what is wrong with or missing in her.”
Pete Walker
“Being internalizers, they’re embarrassed to ask for help and instead try to solve problems on their own. They hate to feel like a bother. Being emotionally invisible is not okay for any child, especially sensitive and emotionally attuned internalizers.”
Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson
Books
- Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience (2022) Dr. Brene Brown maps 87 of the emotions and experiences that define what it means to be human. Honestly one of the best books I have ever read. I’d recommend it to everyone.
- Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving (2013) Pete Walker states that emotional neglect is THE core wound in Complex PTSD.
- Good Inside: A Practical Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be (2022) Dr. Becky Kennedy teaches parents to raise resilient kids with empathy, validation, and emotional attunement. She is active on social media channels and on her podcast. Such a great read for parents.
- Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents (2015) Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson wrote this book for emotionally lonely adults whose feelings were dismissed during childhood by parents who were emotionally unavailable.
Podcasts about Childhood Emotional Neglect and C-PTSD
- On the Therapy Chat podcast, Laura Reagan interviews Dr. Jonice Webb in Understanding Childhood Emotional Neglect. Themes include depression, anxiety, loneliness, feeling defective or invalid, and growing up when emotional needs are not met. They discuss how emotions affect relationships and connection.
- I also deeply connected with the episode Recognizing and Healing from Emotional Neglect on the Complex Trauma Recovery podcast.
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