Patrick Teahan
Welcome!
I provide education on childhood trauma, conduct research, and advocate for healing from childhood trauma.
**PLEASE READ** My videos are for educational purposes only. Information provided on this channel is not intended to be a substitute for in-person professional medical advice. It is not intended to replace the services of a therapist, physician, or other qualified professional, nor does it constitute a therapist-client physician or quasi-physician relationship. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call a local emergency telephone number or go to the nearest emergency room immediately.
Learn more about Patrick Teahan, at linktr.ee/patrickteahan
Posts
Patrick Teahan
I think, as both humans and childhood trauma survivors, we are vulnerable to drama in the form of flipped scripts. I believe the most prevalent byproduct of childhood trauma is the damage to our intuition and perception. Both contribute to our vulnerability, and we will take shame when someone refuses to acknowledge their part.
Here are some examples of such flipped scripts:
*We bring to light in the family the abuse from a parent or sibling, and we're shamed for not seeing the perpetrator's reasoning or inability not to be abusive. They can't help it, so you're bad for bringing it up.
*We confront a partner about emotional abuse or taking advantage of us, and we are attacked for not being understanding enough of their situation or that they have to do it in response to our problems or who we are.
*We ask for reciprocity in one-sided and exploitative relationships, and we're told that we are making things about ourselves.
Whether we are currently in such relationships or reflecting on them, it's healthy to see the pure audacity and hypocrisy instead of our inner child being vulnerable to shame and buying into a flipped narrative.
It's not bitter or self-righteous to rightly feel how amazing it is that some are entirely removed from insight, accountability, and empathy. Feeling the audacity for the first time, for many, is a healthy process.
Have you ever been in a place where you bought flipped scripts due to shame? What might be a trauma belief that contributed to taking in the shame?
2 hours ago | [YT] | 629
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Patrick Teahan
When a child grows up in an abusive, dysfunctional, or toxic family, they often get stuck in many developmental processes.
One crucial process that gets stuck is the human right to become a person in safety. (sense of self)
In my own experience in doing a RRP childhood trauma group in my early 20s, I was able to resume that stuck process and gradually build a sense of self, and reclaim the lost qualities I was born with. I had a lot of help from my fellow group members and my therapist.
While the wording might sound a bit clinical, in short, in my trauma group, safe people were able to challenge me to show up in an authentic way that was not safe to do in my family. I learned it was ok to be me and that there actually was a "me" in there... somewhere.
Becoming someone just got paused. As little people, we didn't have caretakers who had a sense of themselves, and we took on a survival version of ourselves. The mirroring was also off - how could we not struggle with who we are?
When we do our childhood trauma work, reparenting the inner child, unpack our families, and reclaim some community. It's like hitting the play button, and we can pick up where we left off. It's a process and doesn't happen overnight, just like development.
It's not broken. It's not impossible.
We can return to ourselves at any age - often for the first time since birth.
Watch out for an upcoming long-form video on rebuilding a sense of self after childhood trauma.
What do you think?
1 day ago | [YT] | 2,460
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Patrick Teahan
Like with many other issues, when one is deconstructing family-based abuse and childhood trauma, we start to dial into cognitive dissonances that we were unable to fully name before doing work on ourselves.
A toxic parent tends to operate with an aggressive self-righteousness that has a lot of power over us as children.
As we heal, this power diminishes the more we see the hypocrisy underneath that shaming energy.
Parents who have never attended therapy often act like they are experts on how therapists should behave and what the outcomes of treatment should be. When we examine that and take that in, the audacity and entitlement are mind-blowing.
Childhood trauma survivors are often in therapy because their caretakers refuse it. Some parents go, but from my practice experience, it's significantly rare.
Therapist content creators who work on family systems and childhood trauma, like me, are often criticized by such parents about our ethics in guiding people to boundaries when they are in abusive relationships. It is difficult to hear from possible perpetrators, who usually demand that our only function is to keep families together and work things out.
"Working out differences" from those who don't go to therapy is often code for you to revert to being submissive again.
In my past work in community mental health and homeless services, identified domestic violence perpetrators also had significant opinions on how therapy should go for their victims.
If you still struggle with their opinions, remind yourself that a healthy parent would want what is best for you, even if that means discussing family and family dynamics.
What has been your experience?
2 days ago | [YT] | 2,123
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Patrick Teahan
Just a gentle and inappropriate reminder - fuck the aw-too-bad crowd.
Whether online or in our personal world, we've all heard the aw-too-bad crowd's get tough or die sentiment...
"Aw, too bad you had a bad childhood. Who didn't?!"
"Jesus, grow a backbone. No family is perfect."
"Boohoo, my parents neglected me.
I was beaten, and you don't see me complain!"
My thoughts on these empty and handed down clichés when I see them come up range in the following:
*Who taught them to have such a lack of empathy?
*How do they not see the irony that they're triggered to the fight response by others expressing and processing abuse?
*How is their love life and intimacy?
*Do their children feel safe with them?
*How sad is it that they were abused and believe it's natural and warranted, or that it made them better equipped to be in the world when they're not doing so hot?
They want others to be just as miserable, too. A part of them sees it as unfair that others are talking about their abuse when they committed to telling themselves the abuse didn't matter.
Fuck that crowd.
We don't have to take in the self-righteous tough attitude as brave when it's just shaming others and avoidant of pain.
3 days ago | [YT] | 2,439
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Patrick Teahan
The Gottmans have gifted us with the four horsemen of the apocalypse in a couple's intimacy.
1) Stonewalling
2) Criticism
3) Defensiveness
4) Contempt
Contempt is at the root of this post, as it often manifests as self-righteous energy aimed at those around us, regardless of whether we are close to them.
For those of us who overreact in situations or bring bazookas to toothpick fights, where did we learn that? Did you grow up with it? Do you value it?
For those of us with a partner who does this, you probably feel like you're in trouble even where there isn't a fight.
Self-righteous energy is often learned and is the reserve of childhood pain that is aimed at others directly or in our private thoughts.
We must look at it and figure out where it came from.
How did your parents treat each other?
Did you grow up in a family of screamers?
How did one of your parents treat others when they made mistakes?
Did you and your siblings start to do it to each other?
The problem is that being self-righteous feels good at the moment—we have control and the upper hand, but we don't have intimacy or the kindness we were born with.
Those caught up in it often have to decide what they value and recognize they were set up for contempt and self-righteousness.
It's essential not to pass it on.
What do you think?
4 days ago | [YT] | 2,284
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Patrick Teahan
Children often feel that they are an extension of their parents, and if our parents are abusive, toxic, or dysfunctional, we can carry deep shame from our proximity to them and the damage they created.
Those who grew up with:
*a manipulative, charming parent
*a duplicitous parent
*an alcoholic parent
*a hoarding parent
*a highly codependent parent
*a socially off parent
...can still feel like they are an extension of who that parent is in the world
On some subconscious level, our inner child worries that we are like them.
Part of healing is recognizing our separateness. We are none of those things, behaviors, or personalities, but we were very much wrapped up in them without choice.
If you’ve ever wanted to crawl into the woodwork because your parent was making a scene or was highly embarrassing in an objective way, you might have felt like an accomplice to the mess in real-time.
Another example is how we feel about the family name and that we carry that name.
In reparenting the inner child, we must remind them that they are their person and no longer have to explain, cover up, or feel wrapped up in a mess.
As children, we were often the only ones holding the shame and apologizing to the world for it when the adults were busy creating the mess.
You’re your own person now. You no longer have to answer for the mess that you had no choice but to be exposed to.
You can be sovereign now, and you can also reinvent the meaning behind your name.
What do you think?
5 days ago | [YT] | 3,217
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Patrick Teahan
We've all heard such statements from partners, friends, siblings, coworkers, and even strangers. Get over it already...
Whenever you hear something dismissive and invalidating, question the source by specifically considering the person's health and well-being.
How are they doing with their intimacy?
Are they entangled in a dysfunctional family?
How insightful or self-aware are they?
Do they shut down their own emotions
and the emotions of others, such as their children?
What bothers them so much about someone processing
what happened to them? Why is your work a threat?
How is their ability to be vulnerable or self-actualize?
Are they aware that their criticism of you is part of having a fight response?
What are they fighting about?
Emotions?
Would you go to them for emotional advice and walk away feeling seen?
It probably could be better, given how they respond to the vulnerability
of another.
Considering the source is an effective way not to let our inner child feel ashamed of wanting to tell the truth about growing up.
6 days ago | [YT] | 3,512
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Patrick Teahan
It's important to know what kind of family you have.
Healthy families are focused on care in the present to set children up for success in the future. Keeping children in a safe harbor involves everything from healthy attachment to protection to emotional honesty. We are tethered into healthy caregivers in a good way until we're ready to go out on our own.
A toxic or abusive family isn't focused on the children's success. The focus is often rooted in chaos or drama, where the children are often caught up in the parental storm - on a short chain to "family."
In our adulthood, a healthy family still provides a safe harbor through emotional connection and shared support. When life happens, members still have a safe and sound enough place to go to be vulnerable.
For those in the toxic family, the storm never really ends.
*The alcoholic stepdad has to come to the wedding, or mom won't go, and it's the same old.
*You're required to still be the responsible parent to your parent or sibling, and it doesn't matter if you are struggling in your own life.
*A simple visit returns to the old gross dynamics, and we leave triggered and disconnected, wondering what could have been done.
We have tethered to the family's anchor as their storm drags us around, damaging our worth.
What was that storm for you?
How does it play out, and most importantly - where does it leave you?
1 week ago | [YT] | 1,915
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Patrick Teahan
We all start here, I believe.
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"I don't know if it was that bad..."
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That question bridges our inner feelings of knowing something was up, but we tend to confuse ourselves for not having the following factors to guide us:
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We don't have a frame of reference about a healthy family system - only hints.
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We don't have specific help to guide us through figuring out what is abuse.
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We don't have the family we grew up being real or honest about what the family is really like.
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We don't have the support to go through the dark period of admitting to ourselves that we weren't safe as children.
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But you can ask yourself, would you put a child through what you went through? Your answer may be what you need to start your recovery.
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What do you think?
1 week ago | [YT] | 3,747
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Patrick Teahan
Things I NEVER hear clients say:⠀
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"One day, my father left with me because my mother starting hitting me.
He saved me from her."
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"My father took over...got me a therapist and a lawyer after my assault, and he stayed with me for two weeks."⠀
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"My father helped me feel safe when my brother was doing drugs."⠀
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"My father promised to be there at pickup, and I knew I could rely on him. It was our special time."⠀
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"My father refused to ever have his father-in-law near us again..."⠀
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So much of processing our childhood trauma is leaving out the grief that those phrases I just listed might bring up for you. ⠀
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It will forever blow my mind when my therapist stated, "your father could have left your mother and taken you with him, just about her drinking and driving alone. He had the power to do that." ⠀
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But my father was not that man.
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My therapist was getting me to process and look deeper at worth and accountability.⠀
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I think we write these men off in our stories, but part of the grieving process is not only grieving what happened, but also grieving what was missing. The absent father becomes an acceptable and intangible whatever in our story and in our society.⠀
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Imagine where we'd be if he protected, loved and engaged?⠀
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Imagine what that would do for the world? ⠀
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I see more and more of it and love seeing father's be father's. It brings me great joy and great evidence. It's out there but still too rare. ⠀
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What do you think?
1 week ago | [YT] | 3,248
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