The Trauma That Hurts People Most (And Never Gets Named) | Patrick Teahan

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When we think about childhood, they need such cuddling and connection or something like that. But for a lot of childhood trauma survivors, that got really wrecked. It's a problem in a way, because what is— what they will stay in if they can't connect with tenderness, they will be stuck in bitterness.

He's a clinical social worker and one of the most trusted childhood trauma educators in the world. Please welcome Patrick Teahan.

A lot of childhood trauma is around abuse of perception.

What does that mean?

Either like, we're fine, we're a great family, nothing is wrong, meaning like, I'm a bad kid. Or that can happen directly, sort of saying to a kid, you're a bad kid. Or the child could be neglected and come up with that on their own.

What's the type of trauma that usually hurts people the most?

I would say that—

so when someone has childhood trauma, what is it actually doing to them inside of them when they have it? And why can't they see it and maybe don't have words for what's happening?

Yeah, um, the first part of the question was, what is it doing to them?

Yes, when someone's experiencing childhood trauma, what is that doing to them inside of their body?

Um, just off the top of my head, I mean, there's so many ways that we can kind of talk about it, but really in a simple way, what it's doing to them is disconnecting them from the world and disconnecting them from themselves. And shame is usually going to be the culprit of that. We can look at shame as like if it was a buffet, like you walk into a Golden Corral and there's one protein, like that's the shame. And then all the other emotions are going to be related to that protein. All the other side dishes— curiosity, anger, joy— are complicated by that shame. So they're disconnected from the world. You know, they don't feel like they have a seat at the table in life. They do a lot of hiding, doing a lot of like, what we can take from the neurodivergent community is a bit of like masking, pretending, and not feeling authentic. So they're disconnected from the world, and then disconnected from themselves, from a place of not— to that last point, not knowing what their emotions are, as well as struggling with the sense of self. Like sort of what we talked a little bit about earlier, sort of like having one identity as I'm really good at cooking and that's all I am. I'm really good at music, that's all I am. And that's not really an identity, that's a performance.

So it's like a skill you've developed, right?

When you strategy— yes, strategy, a skill. And people really get messed up when that's been taken away. Like if you get fired from a job or if you get— if you have a breakup, And then that identity is breaking down. But what a healthy identity would be, just sort of like, you know, that you're a certain type of person and you have your goodness that you don't lose no matter what happens to you. So disconnected from the world, and then a big disconnect from self, from self and emotions.

If someone has developed a strategy or a skill and they tie their identity to that strategy or skill instead of tying their identity to the goodness of themselves, yeah, what happens in life?

What happens in their life is they become almost like secretive, even if they're not, you know, like they're pretending to assimilate in life. But their world might become small. Like in my case, I started playing drums when I was 11, weirdly not because I was interested in drums. I mean, I liked like Phil Collins in the '80s and stuff like that. But I wanted something to separate me from the other kids. I wasn't good at sports, I wasn't good at school, I didn't feel lovable at home, and I wanted something to make me very visible. And it worked. It really worked. But the great strategy, you know, really good strategy. But I also fell in love with playing drums, and it gave me a sense of like, oh my God, I can do this, you know. And it really— but, you know, that was at 11. By the time I was 19, it stopped working. I be— like, because our world becomes very small when we rely on a performative, like, identity kind of a thing.

Why does it stop working at 19? Because you probably in 8 years— yeah— mastered it to a certain level to get certain results, and you probably got pretty good at it. And sure, you got people to pay attention and people cheering for you at the, you know, school band or whatever it is. Yeah, you're getting success, right?

And I— but I was also like, at 16 guys in their mid-20s hired me to play drums. So it was really like a boom, you know, they really got me out of all that deep pain. But why it kind of stops working is it's a little bit of like that song, Is That All There Is, you know what I mean? Where the drums, playing the drums didn't help me with my relationships that only lasted 6 weeks because I was a mess. You know what I mean? Playing drums didn't help me feel good about myself in the way that I needed to. Playing drums didn't connect me or afford me the authenticity and the intimacy I wanted from other people. So it's just, you know what I mean? Like, and it was in a sad way, like I could go and play drums in clubs around Boston and feel amazing and have great nights, but I would still go home and there'd be myself at home, you know?

You were disconnected from yourself.

Yeah. And disconnected, but also feeling less than than the rest of the world. So then it becomes a little bit like addictive and it'd be, you just, with these feelings, like I don't really feel like I belong anywhere. Um, but I can always rely on my drums, but I don't really feel like I belong anywhere, you know?

So you mentioned something about the neurodivergent, uh, community, I guess, like masking.

Yeah, yeah.

Individuals who are considered neurodivergent. Are those individuals who are considered neurodivergent, is that developed through trauma in their life, or is that more of a born personality trait? That they have?

That, I believe, I'm not an expert on it, but I believe it's, it's just an organic thing that, that they are sort of born with.

Yeah.

And it's in what is kind of fascinating about it is what I was talking about there is childhood trauma survivors kind of have to assimilate to what they assume the normative world is. And someone who is neurodivergent, they have, they've probably like childhood trauma survivors, they felt like they were born different and they have to mask into a neurotypical world. Which in a way is traumatic in and of itself. Do you know what I mean? Because it's just sort of like if you have to— and we can relate to them in a way with childhood trauma. Like, I felt like a weirdo kid. I felt disconnected from everybody, but I found ways to sit at the lunch table and be liked by other kids. And folks who are neurodivergent, they have to kind of mask in a way and pretend to be neurotypical or show up to the neurotypical world, which is just kind of shit. And they wake up to it and they're just like, I just want to be me. You know what I mean? So there's, there's like a Venn diagram of overlap there that we can learn from each other. And to complicate it more, to be neurodivergent is to have your own series of trauma in and of itself. Because like, when you think back to what year did you graduate high school?

2001.

2001. And growing up in the '90s, how sensitive was the school system around kids who were odd or different?

It wasn't sensitive.

No, it was traumatic. You know what I mean? So like, we all—

I was put in special needs classes. Yeah. It was like, that was traumatic.

Yeah, just even the name of it of itself is just sort of like, it's just awful. It's what I call double whammy trauma. And double whammy trauma is a lot like if you're a son of, or a child of immigrants, and you have to be the translator and you're different than the society that you're growing, or you're neurodivergent, the double whammy is you have to sort of mask and pretend and, and sort of meet the neurotypical world. And the neurotypical world is kind of saying, this is the way to be. And if you're not this, I don't know what to tell you.

Yeah. In our society, our culture that you're in right now, this is the way you're supposed to show up.

Yep.

Yeah.

Right. And just think even in the '80s, like sort of when, when children would be in special needs school or something like that, it's just like, It was something really horrific, like taken away into a different class and just put in—

That's what it was.

Like separated and you were—

I was separated in a different classroom and during like recess, I'd go in during lunch, during recess, I was like in a separate classroom with me and essentially the other kids who were like in wheelchairs. And it was like me and that. So kind of like the other classmates would walk through, you know, remember we were talking about like traumatic events that we remember and how both of us remember so much traumatic events over the good events in our life.

Right.

Even though I know there were good events and I can really focus on them and think about them, reflect on them. But there were so many more traumatic events.

Yep.

And even just maybe it's not even that big of a deal, but at the time it felt like a big deal, right? I experienced it as a big deal when kids would walk by and laugh of me in the special—

Well, that is a big deal, right?

Yeah.

At that time, maybe if I'm an adult and that happened now, I'd be like, okay, whatever. I know who I am. But at that point—

True.

You know, at that point with that 9-year-old brain, I didn't understand.

But a 9-year-old brain also without power.

Zero power.

You know? So as an adult, we have the power to have a debit card and our own thoughts about ourselves and whatever. But depending on like what the school says or a parent says or whatever, we have no power to sort of, you know, it's just kind of like this horrific, like you get what you get and you don't get upset kind of a thing, you know? But back to that, world. And I think what I really love, I get joy from, is sort of my son who's 15. The schooling has changed over time, that they've slowly— I mean, it's a work in progress— but woken up to sort of this idea of just like, why are we separating kids when they should all be together? And there's even a culture of better parenting that people are waking up. There's like parents watching my channel, they're watching your channel. Like in the, in the '90s, we had a couple books.

Yeah, that was it.

And they were like secret on the download. There's like Judith Herman, and then there's like John Bradshaw.

You know what, talked about therapy also in the '90s or '80s and '90s. Therapy was like so taboo, you know. It's like, yes, you were messed up if you have a therapist.

What was interesting about that is, I love that you brought that up, um, it was taboo in crappy families. But people in the '90s were pretty into therapy. Really? Like, when I was— I moved, I left the suburbs to go live in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and I was kind of not— I was not launched from home. I kind of escaped home or like catapulted out of home. And I go from like really blue-collar, abusive, suburban kind of place to— I'm now in a city right side of like outside of Harvard University, everybody is doing breath workshops. People are going to a place called Bread and Circus, which became Whole Foods, and they would buy organic stuff in bulk, you know what I mean? And like, they would just— people were living— they would go to this, they would go to retreats and learn Reiki. I learned Reiki in the '90s. But when you're growing up in it separated from that, there was a good therapy kind of culture going on. You can see it in like the in the old Oprah shows of, you know, there'd be John Bradshaw and he would be doing these, this amazing work educating people about childhood trauma. So, but I relate to what you just kind of said. I wouldn't have known anything about it, you know what I mean? Because it's just sort of like everybody around me, there's just like, what? Do you know what I mean?

Breath workshops and yeah, just suck it up. Yeah, suck it up. And right. Well, you know, most people, they think about trauma or they picture trauma as some big event that happened to them, right? Some big event.

Singular, right.

But the quiet everyday stuff often does the most damage for a lot of people.

Yeah.

What's the kind that wrecks people the most and they never even name it? What's the type of trauma that usually hurts people the most?

Yeah, I, that's a tricky one to name. But I would say that the, the most is sort of, the most is about for the individual. And the first video I did on my channel was about critiquing the ACE study. And we've all heard about the ACE study. The ACE study is, it's a good sort of study to measure the effects of health over time for people who grew up in childhood trauma.

What's the ACE study?

It's a very simple sort of test that's kind of like, um, I'm gonna draw a blank on the questions, but one question always sticks out to me was like, did you grow up with a parent who was incarcerated? Did you spend 3 days out of the week hungry? It was just kind of like the, what I, with my critique of the test is sort of say like, well, that's extreme trauma, but there's this wide spectrum of trauma. And what I learned from my mentor, Amanda Curtin, was there's kind of blatant trauma, which is the trauma that I grew up with, like growing up in bars and domestic violence. And there was a death of a sibling. There was just this loud stuff, big stuff, big stuff, big T. But then there's sort of what happens though, from what we, what I learned from my mentor, if you come from a tricky family where there's no really emotional attachment and everything is performative, maybe even affluent or whatever, or there's just, you know, there's not a parent that's like in-your-face alcoholic or drug addicted or violent, but they're massively a little bit covert narcissistic or depressed or something like that. And here's the kicker. Is I had an easier time in psychotherapy because my trauma was blatant.

You could name it.

I tried to avoid it or I tried to minimize it with a therapist. But you know what I mean? Like, I remember my first session, which I'm writing about in a book with my therapist. You know, I'm talking about how my mother would drive around drunk driving with kids in the car. And she was like, that's not okay. And that was the first time I kind of heard it. But then I quickly would sort of say like, oh, you don't understand my mom. She had a hard life. Do you know what I mean?

Justifying.

So I would be still justifying it. But for the person that comes from that tricky family, they kind of have a very tricky mindf going on because they would be sitting in a group comparing themselves to me. So the person who comes from a trickier family is going to have a harder time maybe looking at this stuff because it wasn't loud. But the other kicker is in my group work when I was practicing, when I would have somebody sitting down, they had a tricky family, sitting down to somebody who had a, um, a very blatantly abusive family, the symptoms are exactly the same. There's anxiety, there's depression, and neither party knows how to do intimacy. So in some ways, it doesn't matter so much about— I mean, there's definitely healthy parenting and good enough parenting, and every family has a bit of stuff, so that's perfectly fine and good, but in a way that the trauma symptoms are the same despite the severity, which is kind of mind-blowing. Do you know what I mean? Yeah.

So when someone lacks the ability as an adult to be intimate or to truly open up or to go deep, what is that typically saying about their childhood? Um, as I would be curious about, like, if everything's on the surface or if it's all like, right, superficial talk or it's all fluffy but then you're never able to actually answer a question about something, or you don't remember painful moments, or you're not able to actually express those deeper painful moments, or just real moments, just being authentic.

Yeah.

What is that saying? Yeah.

Um, well, I couldn't when I started therapy. I would again minimize, or, or I would really believe what my mom's story about what happened was. Do you know what I mean? So it was a little bit like brainwashed. So there's this other piece about it. But when someone— if I would have a client that was sort of surfacey, I would know that that's a strategy. And I would also know that they might be a bit dissociative from what happened to them or their emotions. But in a way, it's very, very common. Usually they would be showing up to come see me knowing a little bit in that way, but I don't know if I'm answering your question.

Yeah.

What is underneath that? Like, what is, what is it saying about someone's childhood or someone's life if they lack the ability, if they lack the ability to be real with you? Unless, yeah, maybe after months and you finally crack them open, it takes— it's so much work to get someone to actually say something real.

Two ways we can look at this. We can look at it as modeling in the home. What were their parents like with emotions? What was the emotional culture in the home? Do you know what I mean? Like, in a way, like, you would make sense if that same person grew up in a home with like screaming, door slamming, and then 2 seconds later is like, who wants brownies? Because the parent isn't being real about it. And to take it on a tangent— sorry, forgive me, I'm full of tangents— um, a lot of childhood trauma is around abuse of perception.

What does that mean?

It means that like, um, either like, we're fine, we're a great family, nothing is wrong, or that can look like, um, you know, abusive perception, meaning like, I'm a bad kid. Or that can happen either sort of directly, sort of saying to a kid, you're a bad kid, or the child could be neglected and come up with that on their own. So when someone is sort of struggling with authenticity and not being able to kind of do that, I would be curious about who taught them to be on the surface. So that's one thing over here. Or they figured out a good way, like from like what we said earlier, to assimilate into safe zones. What— how's the weather? I'm fine. It wasn't that bad. Like when I showed up to therapy, I was operating in a safe zone because I didn't want to dip down into anything. And shame will do that in a way that we will try to contain it as much as possible. And anytime we're trying to contain who we feel like we are or what really happened to us, like we're in an inauthentic place. But in the group work that I do in RRP is there's a warm-up to that, that they're in a the— what I was practicing is sort of, it would be 8 people in a room. We would start off going over handouts about childhood trauma and getting people to sort of share. So there was a thawing around that authenticity. And the best part is when someone really struggled with it, it would become a group issue.

How so?

In a way, like, there's an exercise in that work of doing a genogram, where you put together your family tree of dysfunction, and you show up and you literally put it up on the wall. Wow. And you present, this is my family.

Oh man.

From a place of truth telling.

Wow, of course. Yeah.

And you get feedback from your group members, you get feedback from the therapist. I'll never forget, I've done, I've done 3 genograms in my life in different groups, each one equally as powerful.

Of your own family dynamics.

My nuclear family system of origin, 3 generations, grandparents, nuclear family. Here's the alcoholism. Here's the immigrant stuff. Here's, yeah. The, the sexual abuse. Here's the weird dynamics. Here's my siblings. You're just laying it out and you're sharing it with, with 7 strangers. Well, but you know them.

Yeah, you know, you've built relationships.

You've known them for 6 months at this point.

Okay.

But what I'm getting at is sort of, that is an exercise of a slow, slowly getting people to become more authentic, to be able to share. It's really intimacy work in a way, but you feel like you're gonna throw up on your shoes when you present in that way.

Yeah. And do you ever see people trying to like diminish what certain—

that's what the work is about.

It's like, oh, my mom, she had a hard life, so, you know, right, trying to defend.

That's what I did when I presented the first time.

Yeah, sexually abused me, but it was not their fault, you know.

That's how it works. Where I'm, I'm up there and I'm again more talking about my, um, my mother's emotions about what my dad did to her than what was like for me as a child. And somebody in the group gently called me out on it when I, when I presented that. And the person was sort of like, I'm so proud of you for doing that, but I feel like you're protecting your mom still, right?

Oh man.

Yeah.

So there's, you know, in a way, like, what I love about group work is when someone is on the surface, there's two things. They've been conditioned to be on the surface, but they don't know how to be real. And that 3.5-year group work is a whole exercise. It has 3 goals. It has finishing business with our family of origin. It is reparenting the inner child. And it's intimacy work. But intimacy work is an internal and an external kind of a thing. And towards the end of this stuff, it gets kind of heavy in a way of real conflict stuff, you know.

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So how do we resolve the dynamics or the relationship with the work with our parents?

Mm-hmm.

How do we get to that place? Let's say someone isn't able to do 3 years of group therapy.

Yes, right.

That's— and do you ever get finished with your parents? Like, in the work that needs to be done to heal the relationship with your parents?

I think you can in a good enough way.

Yeah.

And my experience, my path was about being in that group. Um, but for people who don't have access to that, or it's a tall order, you know what I mean? It's, it's funny, when I was 20, I was in such a hole when my therapist was like, would you like— I have one spot in a group, would you like to join it? It's 3 and a half years. I was looking around going like, I got nothing going on. Oh yeah, you don't even know.

Free at that time.

Yeah, yeah, I was, you know what I mean? So all the time in the world, you know, like I was just waiting tables and playing the band, you know what I mean? Like, and really lost in a lot of pain, but It's so funny that you bring— that you mentioned that. I, and I developed a 6-month model of that group to give people an introduction because it's a tall order.

Yeah, it's a lot.

Get in there, 3 and a half years, 20, you know, 2029, you know, a lot. So it's a lot, but it was the best thing I ever did in my life, you know. Um, it takes about a good 20 years for us to get really trauma conditioned in an unhealthy family. So when you look at it that way, 3 and a half years isn't really a long time.

Um, but first, how do we heal that relationship with our parents? Like, what does it take for us, instead of saying, all right, I'm gonna do— I guess the question is, what needs to happen within us to feel like we've healed the relationship with our parents enough that it doesn't hold us back from being our authentic selves anymore?

Great question. Like, are you referencing the actual ongoing relationship with our parents, or do you mean like the internalized, internalized experience?

That we need to have, heal, or feel in order to feel like, okay, I can navigate my past relationship with my parents and my present relationship with my parents now, no matter what happened.

If we can do enough work on ourselves where the deep part of us, what I would call our inner child or our subconscious, when that part of us knows that I was a good kid, and I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Not from an intellectual awareness place, because anybody can tell themselves that. But when you know in your internal core, and you have a good sense of self enough, of like, my mom and dad were wrong about me. You know, I don't, I don't wish them ill. They were just not really well people. They did a number on me. But I think also too, like with over time getting to that place and in your deepest core self. Not again, it's really— people get tripped up. They could say, well, I'm already there, do you know what I mean? Then I'm like, how's your love life? Yeah, do you know what I mean? Like, the proof is in the pudding about sort of like where— if when you feel like you're, you're done in a good enough way is if you can live your life in a totally different way. And that's going to also involve the internal stuff, right? Yeah.

Do you have intimacy now as an adult?

Right.

Do you have general harmony in your relationship? It doesn't mean it's gonna be perfect, but do you feel peaceful enough to have intimacy?

Yeah. Do you have friends? Do you have a good feeling about humanity instead of being so like, ugh? You know what I mean? I'm not sort of saying it all has to be that, but I'm kind of fascinated by this about this like, final frontier of like, what does the end result of a lot of work look like? And I still, I still get triggered in my life, but I know it's not real. Yeah. And I can, it'll last an hour at most, not like 7 days the way it used to, you know, so it's like that kind of stuff. But when that internal part of you knows that you were a good kid and you have goodness and you have a seat at the table in the world, that's what the end result might look like. And group, groups are not like whatever, whatever gets you there, like whatever gets you through the night. Is kind of that. But I see a lot of people, because they don't really know, and I'm not criticizing them, I see a lot of people out there convincing themselves that they've hit that point. And then they, it's like Lucy with the football, life keeps kind of beating them up a little bit, you know? So.

You said there's kind of 3 parts to this healing process. The first one was, you know, doing the work with your parents and kind of like—

Finishing business, yeah.

Finishing business with your parents. Yep. Whether they're alive or not alive, or you speak to them or not.

In the therapy room.

Yeah, yeah.

Not one, not with them, with yourself.

Yeah.

Right.

The second part is reparenting the inner child.

Yep.

So how does someone learn to build a relationship with the younger version of them who was neglected, abused, abandoned, or had a number of emotions around feeling not good enough, shameful, guilty, and like they didn't belong.

Yes.

How does someone as an adult connect or reconnect with that version of themselves emotionally so they feel safe moving forward?

Yes. In a con— that's something I will not take on a tangent. In a concrete way, um, pictures of your younger self. There's a tool that I teach called dialoguing. Which is you're journaling on paper between your dominant hand and your non-dominant hand.

Oh man, jeez.

You're speaking with your subconscious. And that's—

Well, also your handwriting is like a child on your other hand.

Right, which is another fascinating, very fascinating thing.

Oh my gosh.

Blew my mind. A lot of clients have this experience. They will write from their inner adult, their dominant hand, in block lettering, and their inner child writes in cursive.

Oh my gosh.

And there might be wounding around that cursive kind of a thing. I had a client from India, this broke my heart, where they were not— they were, they were being schooled in a Catholic school where they were not allowed to use their left hand. Everybody had to be right-handed. So that's like another thing over here about it. But pictures of yourself, a stuffed animal, um, um, the dialoguing. Also, what is very RRP, the, the therapy that I do, Relationship Recovery Process, is very tactile. Watching the shows that you watched when you're a kid, you know, like maybe even some, even the, some of the foods. Um, so there's a bunch of things that's a lot like jump-starting this, but everybody shows up to that work differently. Some people, you know, depending on their trauma, they may be like, I do not want to parent my inner child, that's somebody else's job. Some people have an immediate connection and the inner child is just like, where you been my whole life? It's amazing, you know. And there's like a easy way that they, they don't struggle as much with it. Other people who might struggle with being dissociative might struggle feeling like, how do I get a toehold in there and get that jump-started relationship going? And then to complicate it further, their inner child might be angry. I don't like adults. I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to be parented.

Wow.

So a lot of that is the nature of that work.

If someone is not willing to have a relationship with the younger version of themselves, the inner child, Yeah. What is not available for them the rest of their life if they always—

That's a great question.

If they always block it out.

Yeah.

They don't have a relationship with the younger self or they're just angry about their childhood.

They will get stuck around tenderness, that they will not experience tenderness in a way that they might need compassion for themselves, compassion for their inner child, a tenderness towards their partner. A tenderness for other children, just general, like when we think about childhood, like you're a new dad yourself, it's sort of like, they need such cuddling and connection or something like that. But for a lot of childhood trauma survivors, that got really wrecked. And they're grossed out by it. Like, I don't want nothing to do with it. And that's a stuck place that we, I may have to really press and lean into a client to get them to hit a grief spot about it. Do you know what I mean? To the point where I've had to say somebody like, you know, this is your inner child, a picture of them, Do you know what I mean? Would you tell them that they're worthless or they're not worth your time? You know, so it's a really— it's a problem in a way, because what is— what they will stay in if they can't connect with tenderness, they will be stuck in bitterness. They will be stuck in brokenheartedness. Do you know what I mean? So like, when they're— you'll see it, you know. Have you ever known somebody in your life when their partner gives them a kiss on the, on the cheek, or there's a wedding or something like that they make a joke about it, do you know what I mean? Or they sneak out of it a little bit.

They don't embrace it.

They don't lean into it. They don't— they may have to, you know, some people, it's almost like I think about like Seinfeld characters, you know what I mean? I'm not saying these people are bad. We're just kind of saying like there is—

it's disconnected.

Just telling me that in their childhood, the family might have been super sarcastic, toxic, and acidic about connection. So it's one of the hardest things too, next to when the inner child— when the inner— when the person's inner adult wants to connect with the inner child, and the inner child is just like, I don't know.

Wow.

And that's another barrier, you know. But, but when people don't do this— and one other place that I talk about this is inner child work is just a language vehicle.

Yeah.

Um, for people who are like, you know, child work, you know, it's nothing, what, you know, like, I just don't— it sounds so foofy or whatever, or it sounds so precious, you know. Which I get, then I would just flip it semantically to say like, okay, then, or even when someone says, I don't have an inner child, my inner child died a long time ago. I don't, you know, like I don't operate on that kind of wavelength or whatever. I say, do you have an amygdala? Do you have a limbic system? You do. You have an inner child. It's just, it's just your emotional memory system. And you also have, and other people will sort of say like, I can't find my inner adult. I can barely function. I will never find my inner adult. And I'm like, you have a prefrontal cortex that works all the time. You know what I mean? Like, you get triggered for 3 days and then you rally and get out of it. That's when your prefrontal cortex comes up online. Prefrontal cortex is just your inner adult. It's more functioning part of you. Mm-hmm. And that's the part of you that's gonna start to have a conversation with your limbic system, specifically your amygdala, which is like the file cabinet of all the bad stuff.

If an adult has an emotional reaction to something that triggers them, whether it be in an intimate relationship, a friendship, a parent, a coworker, people around the world, normal life, whatever, something they see online, if something emotionally triggers them often, what does that say about them if they're emotionally triggered consistently?

That they probably need to do some childhood trauma work.

Is it all tied to, like, I think I heard Gabor Mate say, if it's hysterical, it's historical. And if someone is having a hysterical reaction or some type of emotional charge around it, right, then there's some type of history tied to that feeling that's causing the trigger. I'm not saying we go around and we're just numb to life and we have no emotion to anything, but if something is constantly triggering you so much, yeah, to focus on it, right, you're saying that there's some type of history or trauma that needs to be healed.

Yes, and I love what you just— the, the Gabor Mate quote's beautiful. Also, Carl Jung said neurosis is just evidence of suffering, you know. So when we think about someone who's neurotic, like, sort of like, you know, like, like, you know, we all have our stuff, but, you know, I had a friend years ago who's like, I— no sharp knives in the sink, you know what I mean? Because they have this fear of whatever. And that's like more of a persnickety kind of trigger. But like, I used to get so triggered. I was sort of a rager, a fight response, took everything personally. I was so in bad shape that I would take it personally that people were not walking fast enough in front of me on the sidewalk.

Dude, I know that.

You're just sort of like, what? You know, I'm impatient, you know what I mean? Like, there's just a thing there. But like, it might, it might be part of just my personality I was born with, but it's definitely about people being thoughtless and oblivious, which is the household that I grew up in. So when people are thoughtless and oblivious around me— historically, not anymore, now it's kind of lovely where I'm just— if someone doesn't hold the door open for me in a simple way or whatever, I'm like, oh, maybe they had a lot of stuff going on. But it used to be like, you son of a bitch.

Yeah, yeah, disrespect me. I'm gonna leave you.

Or just even being like so nauseated by humanity, which is sort of like another kind of thing. But when someone is triggered in a place is, first of all, do they know that they're triggered? Because a lot of people who like, I don't, triggering, whatever, I'm just, I just don't like it when people don't hold the door open for me. You know what I mean? So it's kind of, it's the hardest thing in my work is telling somebody that they're triggered, or asking them or trying to, or get them to be warmed up to this idea about— I don't, I typically work with people, or when I was working, that they would, I would, I started screening, like, I needed them to know that something was up in childhood, because I would hit dead ends with people if they, I just want to be better with my boss, and if they didn't really know that, but when someone is triggered, I think more times out of the week, than not, then they might have stuff to really kind of look at. And I'm not saying people are very protective about their emotions. Like, they're in a bad marriage, their boss sucks, the traffic around LA, you know, like all of it. You know, when you kind of maybe ask them— first of all, never sort of say, are you triggered? Because that's, that's triggering. Yes. Um, there's a morality, like, you're sort of— when we ask somebody if they're triggered, it's almost like we're asking, are you out of control right now? You know what I mean? Or, you know, So it, it really depends on their awareness of it, their buy-in to it, their defensiveness around it, and their shame. But like, if you're— the world is crazy, the world is really triggering. But I often think with childhood trauma, this might be the best way to talk about it, is like a Spinal Tap thing, like our amps go to 11. Where to be a human, it's annoying if you're having a bad day, like you've got like a 6-month-old in a carriage and someone doesn't open up the door for you and you're on 2 hours of sleep. You're going to have feelings about it. But for childhood trauma, if you were raised by someone who was very narcissistic or thoughtless, oblivious, very selfish, or very just really out of touch or whatever, there's that added, you know, energy to it. There's that added charge to it. And what was wild about doing group work is I had this realization when I started doing it. It's kind of like I would talk to my therapist, Amanda, like, I think I'm triggered like 24/7. And she's just like, that's pretty common for us.

Wow.

You know, we're not out of our minds, like we still function on a level, but like anything you see that bothers you, it bothers you and you hold on to it. And I was bothered. Yeah.

Yeah. And you hold on to it and you talk about it and you ruminate about it and you're like, how could they do this?

And I also come from a family of complainers. So another strategy was to like, you know, if I was triggered and I'm still growing out of this is to like to bitch about stuff. Do you know what I mean? And it's just like, it's not a great way to connect with people or complain in that way, but that's like what my family was like.

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If someone has experienced emotional, verbal, or sexual abuse in childhood, How does that shape the inner voice that someone carries with them for the rest of their life?

Yeah. It's going to affect them in a way of inner voice about, am I worthy of protection? Do you know what I mean? Like, if there was sexual abuse, am I worthy of— you know what I mean? You can rightfully so get really bitter and really brokenhearted in that way. And the inner voice stuff is my— I learned this from my mentor— is that we look at the present through the lens of our childhood. So we look at the present, look at the present through the lens of childhood.

We look at the now, what's happening right now, through the lens of what happened to us in childhood, right? Interesting.

So that, you know, like, I— if, if I grew up in verbal abuse, emotional abuse, and physical abuse, is, um, this would happen to me a lot, is like when I would try to be positive or try to make a connection with somebody and it just wasn't gelling, I would either make that personally or evidence that I was a POS. So that's looking at the lens. And in a way, what's not there is just like, maybe there wasn't chemistry with that person, maybe that person had something going on. It was about me. So that inner voice becomes— the inner voice is a lot of like confirming the old stuff in the present.

Gosh.

You know?

So healing the inner child is the work. That is like, because everything about the present, if we are experiencing the present day through the lens of all of our memories of childhood, and if our memories of childhood were typically focused around the energy of we are bad and wrong, or we were taken advantage of, or didn't have things like everyone else had them, or we were outsiders, then that is how we look at our life today. Yes. It doesn't leave us until we mend that relationship. We heal those memories. We reconnect with that and either grieve the things that we didn't have, find meaning in those things, heal that relationship, act now as the adult in the room. Like, hey, I got us now. You went through this, but you don't have to go through this moving forward. If we don't do those things, what I'm hearing you say, is we're always going to be suffering at some level.

Yes, I don't want to be sort of like— that was well said, you know, always suffering on some level, not trying to attack your language, but it's just sort of like, as we get older, things mellow, which is good, and we can learn things about awareness, about like, oh yeah, I'm triggered in that way. But you're right in the way that there is some kind of deep primal work, I think, that needs to sort of happen in that way. And that reparenting is kind of like Little Patrick, it sounds goofy, but little Patrick, what did it take you back to when that person didn't open the door for you? Little Patrick, what does it take you back to when she broke up with you after 6 weeks? Because that's like a pattern for us, you know what I mean? Little Patrick, what does it take you back to when you didn't get the promotion? Do you know what I mean? Because childhood traumas, like, these are things that are like life on life's terms. But when we grow up in childhood trauma, in my 20s in a breakup, that would put me in a hole where I feel like maybe someone who didn't grow up with childhood trauma, they'd be sad, they'd be depressed for like 2 weeks or whatever, then they might get back out there and whatever. We're in it for like 8 months.

Oh yeah.

Do you know what I mean?

Like years.

Yeah, right. You know, and those are all warnings, not warning signs, but it's just like there's a beautiful crisis that happens to us where trauma bites us in the ass. And what is— it's hard about that, but it also gives us the answers. Do you know what I mean? Like, in, in this, this book that I'm writing about this 3-and-a-half-year group that I did in my early 20s, is I sat down with a fellow waiter and he would just notice. He's like, you know, you're— he's a friend, you know what I mean? Are you okay? What's going on with you? And I just spilled the beans with him. Um, and those— that was a moment where everything was catching up with me. So it feels bad when trauma bites you in the ass, But it's the best moment. It's the absolute best moment.

Yeah. And I really believe like the greater the pain you have, the greater the purpose is on the other side of that. If you lean into it.

That's beautiful.

You know, you went through intense pain, you went into the healing journey and you wanted to be a therapist or learn about human psychology and understanding how to help others going through similar or worse pain than you.

Yes. So inspiring to see my therapist. This is what you do?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, exactly.

And super inspiring. Yeah.

Do people from dysfunctional childhoods unconsciously seek out partners who feel familiar, who are also dysfunctional, even if familiar means painful or disconnected? How do we break that pattern also if, if people do that?

Great question. Absolutely, yes. Um, but it's a weird thing. I learned from my mentor that replicating trauma and being triggered is not a choice.

It's not a choice.

Not a choice. So we might, you know, we might look at the person, you know, we've all had friends. I've been that person too. It's like, why are you dating your fourth alcoholic who lives in their car? You know what I mean? Like, why are you dating beneath you? Like, what is— what is up with— what is up with that? We gotta talk about that.

It's not a conscious thing. We don't have control over that.

Two things. It's familiar, but the reparenting stuff and the group therapy stuff is sort of— no one protected you from those situations. So it's not like we're attracting those folks. They usually just kind of happen to us in a way.

So interesting.

So it's in a way, like, you know what I mean? Like, it could be wrapped up. The inner child might want to rescue a parent. The inner child might want to be available to really difficult people. You know, like, this is all very patternized, but what's missing behind it is the parenting around it is, you know, and I got this from my therapist, it's like, you know, what are you doing there? That's not good for you. You know, we need that in our homes when we're kids, not in a controlling way, sort of like, you know, you're 10 years old and it's like, you know what, honey, like, you, you want to be friends with Joe, but Joe invites you over and he's never home. He calls you and then he gets distracted, and that's like happened 7 times and you get so upset. Stop going, you know what I mean? Or like, I love you so much, I, I think I want you to love yourself so much that you have friends that show up for you. You're like, oh, you know, like it's just sort of like we— no one grows up with that. So it's not so much that the person is a magnet, you know, because we can have this nasty belief like I'm always going to be caught with people that are attracting bad people, or that it never works out, or whatever. And that there's this— it's, it's just more about it's very familiar And I think if we ask anybody caught in that pattern, these people just show up on your doorstep. But it's not that you're a magnet, it's that you are too available to it when it happens. Because, because no one has taught you, it's just sort of like, you know, I love you so much, I don't want you to take that on. And that's the message that I had to learn in therapy and then take that to my inner child, because I would do that. I would date very I mean, it's also— I was in my 20s, and anything goes in your 20s. But I was also dating women that I could take care of if they were a little bit messy, if I could, like, if I could make them happy. And that's definitely related to Mom.

Wow.

And they would be really out there and really messy, and that was my jam. And that's very, very common.

You saw the potential of what they could be. You're like, oh, you're beautiful, you're talented, but if I can help you see it, right?

But if there's a fantasy that woman's like, oh my God, you got me to stop drinking, and get out of me and my roommate situation, whatever. But the, the goal for me, for someone to say, you're an amazing person, you are my savior, because no one would say that before. My mom, I was trying to do that with my mom, but she could never sort of say that or whatever, you know. It's just like we all have these strategies about how to get love.

Wow.

You know, so really the, the real main lesson for the listener, if you have a pattern of people who are difficult or messy or it never works out or whatever, it's not that you're attracting them It's just like no one ever told you you could look elsewhere. And I often— I'm big on this. This last piece is healthy people are intimidating, and they should be. Yeah, healthy people to date. Because in a way, like, as childhood trauma survivors, I don't know if you had this— I didn't know what to do with healthy people. Do you know what I mean? Like, people would be like, I'm gonna go play tennis, I'm gonna go to the beach this weekend, I'll take care of myself, and, you know, like, whatever, and I'm just gonna, you know, they would be doing healthy things and I would feel, oh, that's definitely not for me, you know what I mean? Like, I would just— I would be more, um, you know, it'd be— it'd be a funny thing if you were just like, I'm going tennis, I'm doing this, gonna go to the beach, gonna hang out with my friends, haven't seen my friend in a while. What are you gonna do this weekend, Patrick? I'm like, I'm gonna rip butts in a coffee shop and drink way too much coffee and read my self-help books.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Do you know what I mean? And like, people eventually— I started to warm up and be more involved with healthy people doing healthy things, but like, I didn't, didn't grow up like that.

Yeah, I guess the question around that is, why does a healthy relationship often feel wrong to someone who grew up in a dysfunctional home? Yeah, like, why does a healthy person feel scary to someone who grew up in a dysfunctional family?

Love it. Because from— in my case, hypervigilance hates the absence of a threat.

It hates safety.

It hates calmness.

It tastes peace. Peace and harmony.

I don't like it.

Isn't that interesting?

Yeah, I don't, I don't like it. I mean, like, it's sort of—

I felt that way most of the time.

Yeah, like, where I don't— it was, you know, eventually that group was so good for me because it started to really kind of train me to be like, hey, you don't have to be reactive to people's moods so much. Do you know what I mean? But hypervigilance is such a big part of us. You know, like, I would— if any, anybody listening in the audience want to make a comment, is how much do you watch your partner's emotions? How much do you watch the emotions of others? How much do you focus on that? You know what I mean? And that's telling us— but in a way, we can, we can, in a healthy relationship, we can feel bored. We can build stories in our head that if things are going too good, like, are you cheating on me?

Like, all that stuff is, is really, I think, the inner child who is hypervigilant, their job is to look for a threat, you know, because my wife, she's always like, we've been together for, I don't know, 5 years now, uh, married last year, but I've been together 5 years, and she's always like, God, I wish I would have met you like 10 years ago, like, I wish I'd met you soon because we would have had so much fun together. And, you know, and I said, I always tell her, like, I wouldn't have been ready for you. Yeah, you would have been too peaceful for me. You'd been like, I want— I wanted peace in my mind, but I never— I never went for peace. Yeah, I wanted to make something that was chaotic more peaceful, but I never went for peace, if that makes sense. Yeah, like peace felt boring to me. It felt like, uh, I'm not really into this, and I didn't know how to communicate it. I just thought like, something's wrong with this person. I know, because I didn't understand it, right? I didn't understand.

What do you mean you're fine?

Yeah.

You mean you're, you're always happy?

Yeah. Yeah. Right.

And I always tell that I'm like, I wouldn't have been ready for you if I would have seen you 10 years ago before we met. I would have thought maybe you're like, yeah, you're pretty, but I wouldn't have been attracted to you.

Yes.

What's attracted?

That's fascinating.

It's a different energy.

Right.

And now I'm, I'm attracted to her because peace is the thing I crave the most. It's what I want as my baseline.

Right. This stuff is so powerful. I love what you just sort of said. I wasn't attracted to healthy women.

No.

And the attraction, I think, was coming from— that's for other people over there, you know what I mean? Like, in a way, but I was, I was attracted if things could get kind of messy. If, uh, if you could be mad at me and I could convince you, that was like a familiar place as well. But it's a fascinating thing. Like, in a way, I, um, I've said to many in these conversations with clients who are talking about their dating, was like, sort of like, I might sort of say, I would love to see you with somebody who you're intimidated by, who you feel might be a little bit unattainable, who you feel might be a little bit too calm and there's not enough crazy going on there or whatever. For that reason, like, there's a fascinating thing about sexual attraction related to replication of this stuff.

Interesting.

Yep.

I want to shift it to relationships with loved ones and parents and family members.

Sure.

I feel like there's this big movement, or maybe more people are talking about it now, about going no contact with a parent, a sibling, a family member. When do you know if going no contact with a loved one or a family member is the right thing to do?

Yeah.

Wow.

Yeah, I had thoughts about it. In a way, ideally, is when someone is really struggling with a toxic parent is they're trying to grow and change. They're trying to heal this stuff. And I find that there's usually this pattern that when they go home for Thanksgiving, when the mom texts them like 7 times in a row, like, why aren't you getting back to me? It is a major barrier to their healing. Like, no one can really heal fully if they're in an abusive relationship.

Constantly being triggered.

Yeah. And it's complicated because there's a present relationship with the parent now and so much history. Behind it. So ideally, like, on paper, um, in the way that I did no contact was the idea around— I need to— this was the case for me, like, I was spinning my wheels, I was lacking progress in my therapy that I was spending money and time on because my mom would do her usual stuff and it would really just trigger me for a week straight. It was just a very, you know what I mean? So my approach to no contact, and I got help around it, was, um, I need to just do this work right now, and I will let you know when I'm done with this work. And I made it kind of about me.

Wow.

And that was— in my case, that worked.

How did she take it?

We're just indignant and defiant, and you know what I mean? How dare you? Like, like, usually how— usually they all do. It's not in, in anyone's defense, you know what I mean? Getting a letter like that from your child is like, who's gonna react strong? Like, you know, like, unless my whole life—

yeah, poured it into you, this and this.

Yeah. Unless that parent is just like insightful and aware. Do you know what I mean?

If they were insightful and aware, they'd probably would have had a different relationship with their child that wouldn't cause no contact.

True. But we've had people who, um, the parent was an active alcoholic, got into recovery, changed everything, but their child was an adult now and they paid for the therapy. So that, you know, like, that's— there's all kinds of stuff, you know what I mean, in the zeitgeist of this stuff. There is just sort of like—

that still means they weren't aware and conscious at the time when their kids were growing up.

But talking about a living amends, you don't even talk about making good on something, right? So, um, so how long did you go no contact for with your mom? 3 years.

Wow.

And then I opened up the door, and then she— I changed, she hadn't. Of course, more abuse, more stuff. I was much more in, more in my body, more empowered.

Wow.

Needed to cut her off again. Um, and then a pattern I, I had a, you know, I'm in my third no contact episode now of— yeah.

Wow.

That's the pretty much the final one, sort of. It's been since my son was one, and it was around my son.

Wow.

Around that time. So there's usually, for the childhood trauma survivor, like, they have tried, and there's just like, there's— I, you know, the— to be blunt, in the zeitgeist of mental health, the conversation I'm happy to talk about it with you, but the overall conversation is like, there's just such an impasse that it's almost dumb. Not almost dumb, it is a dumb kind of a thing because the estranged parents are over here, the adult children are over here. Do you know what I mean? And there's not a lot of, no matter what articles or episodes come out, there is just profound deep understanding, usually on the estranged parent side from, you can hear it in the indignant kind of a thing. One thing that I would like to see is I've I personally believe when it's safe, I personally believe that estranged parents should know why. But that's complicated because that parent may not be safe to know why. So that's what I mean about the impasse kind of a thing. Like, you know, I would want to know why.

As a parent.

As a parent. But there's this dumb story of just like, I don't know what I did. My kid just cut me off. And then they won't even talk to me. And then they make them that to be a moral issue. They don't even talk to me. They must be weak and brainwashed and, and that kind of stuff. So that's what I mean about it being kind of a complicated thing.

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So you, you had no contact for 3 years while you were starting to heal in your early 20s.

Yep.

And then you reconnected with your mom And then a period of time went by and you did no contact again.

Yep.

And then you reconnected again. How long was that time period the second time?

Um, I don't remember.

It was like less than a year, more than a year.

It was 9/11. My sibling got married and there was just, you know, I had changed and she hadn't. But what was a weird thing and a good thing about it, as we get more and more healed, your tolerance for abuse from other people really gets lessened. So that was in, you know what I mean? Like, there's just like the road becomes more narrow around that stuff, which is both a good thing, but you're good at creating boundaries. Yes.

As you heal.

Yeah.

Hopefully you learn the ability to create a boundary when something is unsafe or unhealthy.

Yes.

And there's probably a gray area of, uh, they continue to say these things that are kind of a maybe not fully abusive, but I just have to put up with it. And do I want to have my parents or parent in my life, knowing they're going to say things that I either need to accept them— maybe I don't accept them, but I can deal with it to have them in my life or so that they're— they have grandkids in their life. But what is the line that's crossing where it's a boundary that now it's unsafe or it's emotionally abusive? Not just mom or dad is kind of like a jerk. Yes, it's learning to like navigate that problem, which is tricky.

Super tricky. That was really well said. And that's really the crux of it. In a way that, you know, if you've changed and your parent has changed, if that was math, the equal sign after that would be superficiality. And some people, we can do enough work on ourselves and we can accept that it's going to be superficial.

If they haven't changed, your parent has not—

if your parent has not changed, then it's like, okay, you go home to Thanksgiving dinner, mom is still slamming things, dad is still drinking in the basement, the siblings, everything is superficial. First of all, that's going to feel worse now that you're healed, which is a good thing. But some people, um, in a way, they can accept that and they can go to Thanksgiving dinner and, and being able to be loving in a way, knowing they're not going to get the family that they need from them, right? That's the superficiality thing. They're not going to in any relationship, whether that's romantic or whatever, sort of like if we, you know, It's sort of like you always hear like, well, we broke up, we were together for 5 years, but we're friends now. And if there's bad blood or there's no changing or that kind of a thing, it's just, it's not going to really go that deep. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. So it's just in a way, but there are, it's also to point out that no contact is not for everybody. It is not. I personally view it as just a place and time for you to get some healing work and then you can go and try like in my experience, but some people have such horrific abuse that that's not even a thing. You know what I mean?

So is there ever a place, or what would it take for you to go back into contact with your mom? Like, what would need to happen?

Yeah, and that's a beautiful question. And without me forcing it or controlling it or whatever, but I would need my parents to, um— this is a fascinating question. When I, when I think of, of people you know, reconnecting with a parent, I would just simply need my mom to tell the truth. I wouldn't really need her to maybe get sober. I wouldn't need her to maybe change in a way. But I would be able to open up the door and have a dialogue if she's honest, if she's just kind of saying, you know what, you know, you were after me about my drinking for years. And I know that things were really fucked up. And I defended myself forever or whatever. And I know that that's why you needed to do what you need to do. Just honesty. In a way, I think what's tragic about all this no contact stuff is, you know, in a way there would be more connection without all the taking it personally, with all the defensiveness, do you know what I mean? Like, of sort of— there's also the power dynamic. Um, estranged parents kind of like to say, okay, I'm not perfect, but you were a hard kid.

Of course.

Do you know what I mean?

And it's just kind of back on you.

There was a power dynamic going— this doesn't— how it works, I'm helpless. Yeah. It's a little bit like— it's like a little— it's a weird analogy, but it's a lot like the CEO who's just like, yeah, I was steering this ship, but Bob from accounting was a real fuck-up. Yeah, so that's why all that embezzlement happened. That's how that sounds, you know?

No accountability.

No accountability. No, like, I was leading the thing, it was under my watch.

Yes, I take full honor.

I wanted this whole CEO job or whatever, and what— it's a reflection upon me what other people do.

Yes. What does healing your inner child do to your nervous system, and does this have physical health benefits when someone does that inner child healing work?

It definitely can. What it does to the nervous system is around, I think, space and time in a way that our triggers are just like a hurricane, you just have to wait it out. Or a snowstorm, you just have to wait it out. You know, like, ask anybody who has childhood trauma, it's just like, I was triggered by this email from my boss. And even when they're insightful, they're like, fuck, I'm now going to be in this for 3 days.

Wow.

You know what I mean? That one-word sentence, where's the thing on the share drive? And they're just like, uh, you know what I mean? They know I'm gonna be probably in this for 3 days obsessing about this, upset. My stomach's going to be upset. Do you know what I mean? I'm going to be dissociated. I'm not going to know where my keys are. You know what I mean? Like, all of this stuff. But inner child work takes that 3 days to a half hour. Yeah, 20 minutes.

Yeah.

By— you have to understand what your child is about. Do you know what I mean? Like, that, that's a lot of insightful work that a lot of— it took me a while, but you— that's something people can really practice. What does it take you back to? What does it take me back to when my boss sends me an email that's just one word? There's no thanks, there's no exclamation for this, nothing. You know what I mean? Like, it takes me back to always being in trouble. It takes me back to having to read somebody's mind. It takes me back to all this stuff. And a lot of people out there aren't aware of what it takes them back to. And a lot of people are like, well, does it always have to go back there? It usually kind of does if you grew up in weird stuff. It usually does because your inner child is like, I'm in trouble again. Now I gotta figure out how I'm in trouble and why I'm in trouble, and then forget why and then find out again.

You know, always have that feeling like I'm bad, I'm wrong, I'm in trouble. Like, oh, that was like day-to-day life.

Yep.

I didn't even know how to get out.

Right. But what's beautiful and effective is to do some inner child dialoguing as that person is sitting down at their job. Is you're not in trouble. Our boss is just that kind of one-sentence kind of guy.

Yeah.

And at the end of the day, you know, if you can, if you can connect with the charge about a narcissistic parent or things going bad or whatever, or reading somebody's mind, if you can put that over here and you're just like, well, my boss Mary is just busy and that's how she rolls, she's not a great communicator. Yeah. Like, there's no harm, no foul in it, and you're not in trouble. Um, that's what I really love is when people would start to kind of say like 20 minutes. I was triggered for 20 minutes, not 4 days, 3 days.

It's great. Um, I have a couple final questions for you. How can, how can childhood trauma affect someone's ability to manifest and create the life they want?

Um, it— when I, I often had this analogy at the end of that group that I did, I was at sea level with the rest of the world. Meaning I wasn't drowning in the deep end of the pool, flailing around, but not— I had so much shame I couldn't ask for help. You know what I mean? I felt very— like when we started at the beginning, I felt very separated from the rest of the world. Yes. And it's been a lifetime journey to like, sort of like, as I'm sitting here with you, do you know what I mean? Like, there's a place for you in the world, Patrick, and you can say and do good things. So childhood trauma really separates people from that. But it feels really good to just know that you're just another bozo on the bus in a good way, but also that you, you have a seat at the table of, of opportunities that your inner child used to say, oh, that's not for me, that's for people who are smarter or brighter or whatever, you know.

Yes.

Yeah.

So it makes you believe you have a seat at the table, which is good too.

Yep.

And what is the link between childhood trauma and imposter syndrome?

Rooted in shame, kind of the same thing. Imposter syndrome, it's often, I think, you know the Radiohead song Creep? You know, I'm a creep, I don't belong here. That really kind of is like you, we identify with that song so much because I just picture a guy on the date with a beautiful woman or something like that and he's like, I just don't belong here. You know, that's to me trauma. Imposter syndrome is just really kind of where the inner child is sort of saying, see, I don't belong here. And what I tell clients when I was practicing about if they were going to be about to join a group, I was sort of saying, pay attention to what your inner child says in the first group, because usually the inner child says, I'm not messed up enough to be here, or I'm too messed up to be here. Meaning they will find ways to say that's for other people. I don't belong here. I'm not good-looking enough, smart enough, or whatever. I don't come from the right pedigree, you know what I mean? Or whatever. But like, I grew up in bars, do you know what I mean? And I, I lived that way my whole life of just sort of hiding and masking, and I don't belong here, that kind of thing. Or just trying to pretend that I belong here when I really didn't, right? So when you really feel in your core, not from a narcissistic place or an egoic egoic place that you are just a person in the world afforded the same things. I mean, there's also privilege wrapped up in that, so it's complicated for other people as well. But that's kind of like what I think about it, that you— it's a, and it's a beautiful arrival when you're like, I deserve this job. Do you know what I mean? Like, I'm capable. I'm, you know what I mean? I nailed the interview or whatever. But the inner child used to sort of say, they didn't like me, they didn't, they didn't make eye contact.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like you said, we— what was the quote you said? We look at the present through the lens of our childhood.

That's Amanda.

Yeah. This is your mentor? Yeah. Yes. Mm-hmm. I've got a couple of final questions again for you, but I want people to check you out on social media and your website, patrickteahan.com. They can get more information. Also, you have a great YouTube channel with a lot of great content they can check out as well. Yep. Patrick Teahan Official on social media, Instagram, YouTube. TikTok. And again, your YouTube's been a really helpful resource for so many people. So I want to acknowledge you for, man, the trauma that you've been through, but also turning that into a healing journey and the lessons you've learned on how to share this with others who've gone through similar things or less or worse things than you, and how to interpret these things, heal these things, and live a better life. So I want to acknowledge you for the work that you're doing.

Thank you.

And all the content you share as well.

Thank you very much.

Of course.

Yeah.

This is a question I ask everyone towards the end, Patrick. It's called the 3 truths. So imagine hypothetically you get to live as long as you want, but it's your last day on this earth and you get to create anything you want from this moment until that last day. But for whatever reason, in this hypothetical question, you have to take all of your work with you. This episode's gone, your videos are gone, books you create, gone from the world.

Yeah.

But on your last day, you get to leave behind 3 things that you know to be true. 3 lessons that you would share with the world? I call it 3 truths. What would those things be for you?

I think the, the thing that I said earlier about tenderness, about really being able to sort of, um, for everybody out there to know that they were just like a beautiful spark and a good kid, like what you see in your own daughter, you know, and I think sort of like when you see that innocence and whatever, because it's sort of like everything kind of is dialed into that, you know what I mean? Like, that we— if we can sort of lean into that, that would be one thing. Um, another lesson would be— it's just kind of funny. Um, when I was 13 years old and having a strategy and trying to cope with things, um, I grew up with alcoholics, but I learned something from alcoholics, and that is this kind of like 'it, I'll try it.' And in a way, like, I had that same attitude whether it was like a bong hit or acid or drinking in the woods or whatever. But that same energy was sort of like, 'It, I'll try undergraduate,' you know what I mean? Like, 'It, I'll apply for this job.' Um, so there is, you know, it's not like you can wait until you feel like you can take a risk. You just have to sort of throw something against the wall, and even if you look foolish, is being able to do that. And that's something I weirdly feel grateful for the trauma that I went through is, yeah, I'll try anything. You know, whether that was like when the therapist was like, you know, a few years later, it was like, do you want to try, you know, when I'm 14, do you want to try blotter acid? I'm like, yeah. You know, when the therapist is like, you want to do a 3.5-year childhood trauma? Yeah, why not?

Try it out. Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay. That's the second thing.

And I'm big on this, and I think in social media, I think social media does things to us that is dark. And in a way, I would— I want childhood trauma survivors, and they may not be ready, which I get. I wasn't ready. I was not ready to hear things like positivity. I was not ready to hear things like, um, energy work or, or, or spirituality. There was— I had such a reaction to that stuff for many different reasons. But what I'm trying to say is like, you know, I don't think it lands well, but I want childhood trauma survivors to look for the good in humanity in a way, because to their experience, and they're right, humanity got ruined. Trust in people and that kind of a thing. I think social media really amps that up with the way that we go after people. And sometimes we have the, you know, it's good to go after people or whatever, but it's a device that becomes entertainment for the downfall of humanity. Where I want people to sort of, you know, look, look around for people's smiles, as goofy as that sounds, you know, look around for the nice— I was walking out of Starbucks right out of here, and it was just like interchange of this woman coming in and I was coming out, and she held the door. She was just, sir, you know, it was really like whimsical. It was like really fun kind of a thing, you know what I mean? Like, I'd love for that. I love that. I love seeing families out there enjoying each other.

Yeah.

So Do you know what I mean? But like, when I was really wounded, that was just like evidence that I couldn't have that or something like that, right? So, wow, I want people to lean into it and force themselves a little bit. That's beautiful.

And Patrick, the final question: what's your definition of greatness?

Um, the definition of greatness is not just Knowing that your parents were wrong about you, however that looks, but surpassing how you feel about you. So greatness, you know what I mean? Like, they're— the work that I do is— I love, I love sitting with you, I love talking about this stuff, but my real joy comes from, again, knowing that I was a good kid.

That's beautiful, Patrick. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

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