{"id":78444,"date":"2026-03-12T13:21:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T13:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/spunout.ie\/navigator\/real-life-stories\/how-healing-my-inner-child-helped-me-stop-self-harming\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T13:21:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T13:21:21","slug":"how-healing-my-inner-child-helped-me-stop-self-harming","status":"publish","type":"real-life-stories","link":"https:\/\/spunout.ie\/navigator\/real-life-stories\/how-healing-my-inner-child-helped-me-stop-self-harming\/","title":{"rendered":"How healing my inner child helped me stop self-harming"},"content":{"rendered":"

TW \/\/ This piece discusses self-harm. Please look after yourself if you choose to read on. Our text support service details are listed below.<\/span><\/i>I was a self-critical child. I always strived for perfection even if it meant burning myself out. Obviously, this isn’t healthy behaviour and I think it was this unconscious normalisation of self-harming that started my journey.<\/span>I held myself to impossible standards to be who I believed people wanted me to be. There was never any purposeful external pressure placed on me but I craved identity. I was undiagnosed autistic, and my whole identity was formed by how others perceived me.\u00a0<\/span>I was the gifted child, smart beyond my years and I hated it. I hated how my peers looked shocked when I got a question wrong, I hated how they always expected 100% on all my tests and I hated how my growth was a failure if it was anything short of perfection.\u00a0<\/span>My childhood was stolen from me by these expectations. I forced myself into a box I couldn’t fit and I hated myself for it. It’s fair to say as I grew older, my inner child was hurt.<\/span>This showed itself in the form of self-harming. I was supposed to be perfect, every failure meant that I deserved to hurt, it was as simple as that. Many therapists told me that I was too hard on myself, I knew that but I couldn’t stop. All I could think was that little me would be disappointed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Being the adult I needed as a child<\/span><\/h2>\n

It was this relationship I had with pleasing my inner child that eventually became the thing that healed me.\u00a0<\/span>My amazing counsellor worked with me to heal my inner child. Since my childhood was one of achievement rather than being a child. There is an unhealed part of me that needs the validation and support that’s normally only given to a child. It was vital that I became the adult that I needed as a child.<\/span>When I notice myself belittling myself or critiquing myself for what I view as failure and my urge to self-harm takes over, I take a moment to imagine myself as a child. I picture this little child telling me what happened. When I see it from the perspective of a child who simply made a mistake, it’s easier to be nicer to myself.\u00a0<\/span>We deserve the love that we’d give to ourselves as children. Focusing on this has been the key to controlling my self-harming.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"","class_list":["post-78444","real-life-stories","type-real-life-stories","status-publish","hentry","reallife_topic-relate-to-others","reallife_topic-self-harm","reallife_topic-specific-mental-health-difficulties"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHow healing my inner child helped me stop self-harming - spunout navigator<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How healing my inner child helped me stop self-harming - spunout navigator\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"TW \/\/ This piece discusses self-harm. Please look after yourself if you choose to read on. Our text support service details are listed below.I was a self-critical child. 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