Free Getting the Love You Want, 20th An. Ed. by Ph.D Harville Hendrix

limits were placed on your sensuality. Like most children growing up in this culture, you were probably made to feel embarrassed or guilty or naughty that you had a body that was capable of exquisite sensation. To be a “good” boy or girl, you had to psychologically cut off or disown that part of yourself.
    FORBIDDEN FEELINGS
    YOUR EMOTIONS WERE another prime candidate for socialization. Some feelings, of course, were not just permitted, they were encouraged. Oh, how hard your parents worked to get you to smile when you were an infant! And a few weeks later, when you laughed out loud, everyone had a marvelous time. Anger, however, was another matter. Temper tantrums are noisy and unpleasant, and most parents try to discourage them. They do this in a number of ways. Some parents tease their children: “You look so cute when you’re mad. I see a smile coming on. Give us a smile.” Others discipline them: “You stop that right now! Go to your room. I’ll have none of this back talk!” Insecure parents often give in to their children: “OK. Have it your way. But the next time you’d better behave!”
    It is the rare parent who validates a child’s anger. Imagine a little girl’s relief if her parents were to say something like this: “I can see that you’re mad. You don’t want to do what I ask. But I am the parent and you are the child and you need to do what I say.” Having her anger acknowledged would contribute to her sense of self. She would be able to tell herself, “I exist. My parents are aware of my feelings. I may not always get my way, but I am listened to and respected.” She would be allowed to stay in touch with her anger and retain an essential aspect of her wholeness.
    But such is not the fate of most children. The other day I was in a department store and happened to witness how abruptly a child’s anger can be put off—especially when it’s anger directed at a parent. A woman was doing some clothes shopping while her little boy, about four years old, tagged along. She was preoccupied, and the little boy kept up an insistent monologue in an effort to get her attention. “I can read these letters,” he said, pointing to a sign, “M-A-D-E.” He got no reaction. “Are you going to try on more clothes?” he asked. No response. The
whole time I was watching, she gave him only a few seconds of attention, and when she did she sounded annoyed and depressed. Finally I heard him say loud and clear to a store clerk, “My mommy was hurt in a car crash. She got killed.” This pronouncement got his mother’s instant attention. She shook her son by the shoulders, spanked him, and forcibly shoved him down on a chair. “What do you mean? I wasn’t killed in a car crash! Stop talking like that. Go over and sit on that chair and be quiet. Not another word out of you.” The boy was white-faced and sat without moving until his mother was done with her shopping.
    Inside his head, the little boy’s anger at his mother had been transformed into a vengeful fantasy in which she was killed in a highway accident. He hadn’t been the one to hurt her. At four, he had already been taught to disown his angry thoughts and feelings. Instead he imagined that she had simply gotten in the way of a car driven by somebody else.
    When you were young, there were probably many times when you, too, were angry at your caretakers. More than likely, it was a sentiment that got little support. Your angry feelings, your sexual feelings, and a host of other “antisocial” thoughts and feelings were pushed deep inside of you and were not allowed to see the light of day.
    A few parents take this invalidation process to the extreme. They deny not only their children’s feelings and behaviors, but the entire child as well. “You do not exist. You are not important in this family. Your needs, your feelings, your wishes are not important to us.” I worked with one young woman I’ll call Carla whose parents denied her existence