Lindsay C. Gibson

parents negatively affect their children, especially children who are emotionally sensitive, and shows you how to heal yourself from the pain and confusion that come from having a parent who refuses emotional intimacy.

Emotionally immature parents fear genuine emotion and pull back from emotional closeness. They use coping mechanisms that resist reality rather than dealing with it. They don’t welcome self-reflection, so they rarely accept blame or apologize. Their immaturity makes them inconsistent and emotionally unreliable, and they’re blind to their children’s needs once their own agenda comes into play.

Once you understand their traits, you’ll be able to judge for yourself what level of relationship might be possible, or impossible, with your parent. Knowing this allows us to return to ourselves, living life from our own deeper nature instead of focusing on parents who refuse to change.

Internalizers are highly perceptive and sensitive, with strong instincts to engage and connect with other people. You’ll see whether this personality type fits you, especially the traits of tending to feel apologetic for needing help, doing most of the emotional work in relationships, and thinking about what other people want first.

These parents may look and act perfectly normal, caring for their child’s physical health and providing meals and safety. However, if they don’t make a solid emotional connection with their child, the child will have a gaping hole where true security might have been.

Emotional loneliness is a vague and private experience, not easy to see or describe. You might call it a feeling of emptiness or being alone in the world. Some people have called this feeling existential loneliness, but there’s nothing existential about it. If you feel it, it came from your family.

Emotional intimacy involves knowing that you have someone you can tell anything to, someone to go to with all your feelings, about anything and everything. You feel completely safe opening up to the other person, whether in the form of words, through an exchange of looks, or by just being together quietly in a state of connection.

Emotional intimacy is profoundly fulfilling, creating a sense of being seen for who you really are. It can only exist when the other person seeks to know you, not judge you

They’re uncomfortable with their own emotional needs and therefore have no idea how to offer support at an emotional level.

Such parents may even become nervous and angry if their children get upset, punishing them instead of comforting them. These reactions shut down children’s instinctive urge to reach out, closing the door to emotional contact.