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Welcome back to Transform Your Mind to Transform Your Life, the podcast. This is Life Coach Myrna Young, and you're listening to Five Minute Fridays with Coach Myrna. Today I want to talk on the topic: what are the four childhood traumas and how they shape the woman you became? So, as we start off, I want to ask you a question. Have you ever reacted to something and later wondered, why did I respond like that? Why did that comment cut me so deeply? Why you shut down instead of speaking up? Why love sometimes feels unsafe? What if I told you that those reactions didn't start today? They started in childhood. Today we are talking about the four core childhood traumas, the silent imprints that shape how you love, how you trust, and how you show up in the world. And most importantly, how you can begin to heal them. Because yeah, why talk about them if I'm not gonna give you tips on how to change them? So the first thing I want to talk about is setting the foundation. Childhood trauma isn't always what we think it is. It is not just abuse, it is not just neglect. Sometimes it is what didn't happen. The love you didn't receive, the safety you didn't feel, the validation you were denied. Trauma is not the event, it's the impact the event had on your nervous system. And many of us are walking around as adults still trying to resolve wounds from a younger version of ourselves. So, what are the four childhood traumas? Let me break them down for you. Number one is abandonment trauma. This is the wound that whispers, I am not safe to be left. This could come from a parent physically leaving, emotional absence, inconsistent love. As a child, you learned people leave, so I must cling, chase, or fear being alone. As an adult, this can show up as fear is rejection, overattachment in relationships, anxiety when someone pulls away. You may even find yourself loving people but always waiting for them to leave. Listen, I just read Matthew Perry's book, Friends, Lover, and a Big Terrible Thing, I think that's what it was called. Don't quote me. But in there, Matthew Perry stated that he started drinking at 14 and became an alcoholic at 21, right? And even though that he was 10 seasons on friends and making all the money in the world, had all the women in the world, including Julia Roberts, his core problem was abandonment because at five years old, his mother put him on a plane with a sign that says unaccompanied minor to visit his dad in LA. And that core rejection, abandonment stayed with him throughout his life. The reason he died at 53 and never married, didn't have any kids, was because that abandonment, that fear of abandonment followed him throughout his life. He left women before they can leave him. That's the reason that he left Julie Roberts. He walked away from that wonderful, beautiful relationship with the most fantastic woman because he felt not good enough and he wanted to do it before she left him. That plays in so many relationships. The abandonment, right? Whenever I heard the term abandonment, I thought that someone physically left. You know, fathers abandon their children, mothers walk out and their spouses and leave the children. That's what I thought abandonment came from. But abandonment, like I mentioned, was it's just something you didn't have. Maybe you had um, you know, um, my husband talks about all the time the fact that, you know, his father loved him, he didn't feel abandoned, but he was a star football player and his father worked all day and couldn't come to any of his football games. Maybe that's his issue. He maybe doesn't even realize it, that this abandonment follows you all around. So the first one is pretty big. So think about the what I how I broke it down and maybe go back and see if you have any abandonment issues. Rejection trauma. I would have put this as number one, but apparently, abandonment is the biggest issue that we see. Rejection, this is deeper than abandonment. Like I just said, I think about it because somebody physically rejected you. Rejection says it is not that they left, it's that I wasn't wanted. This can come from criticism, feeling like the black sheep, emotional invalidation. As a child, you internalize something is wrong with me. As an adult, it shows up as people-pleasing, perfectionism, fear of being seen. You shrink because being fully yourself once felt unsafe. Yes, I hate rejection. You know, I I it's one of the things that I struggle with because, yes, I mean, I don't recall any rejection as a child, right? But I've been cheated on as an adult and uh with men, and uh, you know, I I had you know adopted kids that ran away because they wanted their burnt mother. So yes, rejection is is deep to me. It it cuts. And you know, it's one of the ones that I I struggle with. But yeah, rejection is is is a deep thing because, yes, it's saying that there's something wrong with you. Betrayal. Huh, my goodness, we're talking about all the big ones here today. This is the wound of broken trust. It comes from caregivers who lied, promises that weren't kept, feeling manipulated or unsafe. As a child, you learned I can't trust the people who say they love me. As an adult, this shows up as control issues, difficulty trusting partners, hyper-independence. And you may say, I don't need anyone, but underneath that is a heart that learned it couldn't rely on anyone. So I'm hyper-independent, so it could come from betrayals. I didn't mention that I was being cheated on several times in my adult life. So yeah, I depend on me. So, but yeah, as a child, you know, we talk about childhood trauma, but childhood trauma is usually compounded by adolescence trauma, young adult trauma, even middle-aged trauma. They're all compounded on each other. It's like the domino stack, right? Neglect trauma. Yes, this is the one that I think shows up a lot in childhood. This is the one that's often invisible, but it's powerful. Neglect is not what was done to you, it was what was not done to you. No emotional support, no affection, no guidance. As a child, you learned my needs don't matter. As an adult, this shows up as difficulty expressing needs, feeling emotionally numb, accepting less than you deserve. You became the strong one because no one showed up for you. I'm reading this book right now that's called Art of Exceptional Confidence. And on the chapter where the guy's talking about asking for what you want, when you were neglected as a child, you learned not to ask for what you want. You learned to people please, you learned that you know your needs don't matter, right? So you never ask, you shrink. So, yes, learn, we've gotta learn to ask for what we want, right? In a relationships, at work, anywhere, right? You need you need to say it and not be people pleasers. So, how does the trauma show up today? Here's the truth: these wounds don't stay in childhood, they show up in your relationships, in your boundaries, in your self-worth, in your ability to really receive love. You're not too sensitive, you're not too much. You are responding from a place that was never fully healed. Getting back to the Matthew Perry story, he talked about vodka filling all the holes, right? The holes that came from abandonment and neglect as a child. A lot of times we try to fill those holes with a lot of things, looking for love in the wrong places, pills, alcohol, promiscuosity, anything that fills the holes. But yeah, the holes are never filled until you heal the wound, right? So, what is the path to healing? Healing doesn't mean blaming your parents, it means understanding your patterns so you can change them. Healing begins with awareness, recognizing your triggers without judgment, compassion, speaking to yourself the way you needed someone to speak to you, reparenting, giving yourself the love, safety, and validation that you didn't receive. Self-love is powerful. Yeah, you love you, God loves you. You know, that can be enough, right? Choice. You choose new behaviors even when they feel uncomfortable. Because here's the truth you are no longer that child, you have power now. I was reading somewhere somewhere the other day where people are saying that, yeah, when you were a child, you needed someone to take care of you. But as an adult, you can take care of yourself, right? So you don't have to worry about abandonment because hey, if they leave, you the you know, Beyonce says, you leave on the left, and someone is gonna come in on the right. You don't have to worry, let them walk away if they want to, because you can take care of yourself, you are whole alone, you don't need anyone to complete you. That's a bunch of crap, right? You can complete yourself, you love you, God loves you, and that's really all you need, right? So as we close, I want to let you know that your trauma may explain you, but it doesn't define you. You were not broken, you are a woman who adapted to survive, and now you have to learn how to thrive. So today I want you to ask yourself, which one of these wounds do I carry? I hope you don't have all four, right? And what would healing look like for me? Because healing is not about becoming someone new, it's about coming home to who you were always meant to be. So if this episode spoke to you, share it with another woman who needs to hear this. And if you're ready to go deeper, stay connected because we're not just talking about healing, we're walking the journey together. So keep coming back to the Transform Your Mind to Transform Your Life podcast where we walk along with you to heal your childhood trauma, to heal the wounds that you've been carrying all along. Because once you recognize them and give them love, you can heal them. Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of Five Minutes Fridays with Coach Mirna. Thanks again. Until next time, Namaste.