Deactivate Those Old “Recordings”
by Cherilyn Schutze
MEd., LPC, CCATP, CGC, EMDR Trained, DNMS Trained
3-minute read
WHEN PEOPLE DON’T GET THEIR EMOTIONAL NEEDS MET, IT CAN LEAD TO FEELINGS OF MISTRUST, ABANDONMENT AND INSECURITY. THIS IS ESPECIALLY TRUE WHEN CHILDHOOD NEEDS ARE NOT TENDED TO, WHICH CAN RESULT IN CHILDHOOD ATTACHMENT WOUNDS.
Where do we learn to trust and to connect with others? What is our first relationship in life? It is with our parents. As children, when our parents or primary caregivers don’t or aren’t able to meet our emotional needs, we can become fearful, mistrusting, develop low self esteem, establish a lack of confidence, and have difficulty forming meaningful, trusting relationships.
Childhood attachment wounds occur when we don’t get our emotional needs met as children, or even as infants. They can occur when good things that should have happened didn't happen. Examples of this include emotional neglect, abandonment, and parental mis-attunement: the parent’s inability to recognize a child’s emotional needs and then nurture them. The good news is that we can find healing through loving relationships, through nurturing others, through witnessing nurturing by others, and through a type of therapy called The Developmental Needs Meeting Strategy.
The Developmental Needs Meeting Strategy, or DNMS was developed by Shirley Jean Schmidt, and is based on ego state therapy which posits that we all have different parts of self and that “each of us must navigate several discrete identities and roles. For example, a woman might adopt the role of protector toward her children, but feel like a fearful or neglected child around her mother. Ego state therapy aims to identify these different roles and then integrate them into a coherent self.”*
This is not multiple or “split” personalities. We have one personality, with different aspects of self. For example, have you ever felt insecure, and questioned yourself—feeling like a child, when someone criticizes you, but at other times you’ve felt confident and self assured? These are different parts of self, filling roles in our lives. You may be a very competent/confident manager at work, but in social settings, you may lack self esteem, or feel awkward and inadequate. This is where the wounded child part might be showing up. At work, you are your most adult self: self-confident, self assured, decisive. But in social settings, you may feel less than, not good enough, out of place. When we have attachment wounds from childhood, oftentimes, child parts emerge -those can show up as feelings of inadequacy that are triggered from some wound from childhood. An example of this might be, say you studied hard for a test in grade school and you failed the test. Your parent or parents were very disappointed in you and maybe even belittled you. Instead of discussing it with you, validating your own disappointment, helping you learn from the incident and encouraging you, you were shamed and told you weren’t smart. That can be internalized as not being good enough, less than, or not smart enough. Fast forward to college and you fail an exam. You immediately feel less than, not good enough and not smart enough. All those old feelings of shame and inadequacy resurface. This is triggered from an old attachment wound that never healed. If that wound isn’t processed and healed within a short period of time, the brain makes a recording of it and files it away. So when something that feels familiar occurs, like failing an exam, or not getting a promotion at work, or being criticized by someone, the play button on the recording gets pushed and all those old feelings come back. Sometimes they are mild and don’t interfere too much with your life. Other times, the child part becomes bigger than your adult self and takes over, causing you to feel as if the old experience is happening in the present. You may experience overwhelming feelings that are difficult to manage, or difficulty feeling good about yourself, others and your world.
DNMS WORKS TO PROCESS THROUGH THOSE OLD RECORDINGS SO THAT THE PLAY BUTTON NO LONGER WORKS--THE OLD RECORDING BECOMES JUST THAT, A RECORDING THAT CAN’T HURT YOU ANYMORE.
Through DNMS, clients learn to recognize when that “old recording” is being activated. Clients develop internal, nurturing self resources to help heal attachment wounds and recognize that the old recordings, those feelings from childhood, are just that—old recordings that are not actually occurring in the present. Clients learn to nurture the child parts of self so that they are no longer triggered by past wounds.
DNMS can be a powerful tool in healing issues from the past that keep trying to inform the present. When we nurture the parts of ourselves that are stuck in the past, the future becomes a much brighter, healthier place to live.
“Having a need and getting it met adds a drop to the bucket of trust.”
Psychology Today, June 2021, by Ellen Hendriksen, PhD
If you think you may have childhood attachment wounds that interfere with your ability to trust, to love others and yourself, to manage emotions, or you find that you keep being attracted to the same type of people or things that don’t serve you, please reach out today to see if DNMS is right for you. (817)401-3940
(*goodtherapy.com https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/types/ego-state-therapy)
