nessa1 - I was just reading your response. I had to look back over what I had written. This thread was started a year and a half ago. My how things have changed in that amount of time.

I still struggle with the inner child thing. But I have learned in hind sight a few things. I will share those with you in hopes that it will help you on your journey.

I think back to T (therapy) I still have the same T (Therapist) as I did a year and a half ago, actually going on 3 years now. I recall setting in T and biting my nails as my H would talk because me mind was off somewhere else. I recall tears running down my cheek as my H talked(H = Husband) Those were times that I was exhibiting childlike behaviors. The T would let my H finish what he was saying and ask me what was going on in my mind. I didn't even realize that I nail biting or in tears.

At times my T would ask me "mentally, how old do you feel?" In the beginning I told her I felt like my mind was operating as a 3 or 4 year old at the time. I wanted 0 responsibility. (3 years olds don't have responsibility) as time passed I felt like a 7 or 8 year old. ( I need more things, and could handle more information) I was stuck at 12ish years old for quite sometime. That to me was a time of feeling like I needed alot of help and support, (as a 12 year old would). I have 3 kids in real life. I wanted to play with them, be there friend, do kid stuff, but I also recognized the need to behave more adult like. But for so long I just wanted to do what I wanted to do.

Thinking of where I am now, I suppose if you asked me how old do I feel mentally. (meaning what do I enjoy, what do I like to do, what amount of responsibility do I feel like accepting) I'd say I feel like I am 15 or so. (Which is the age in which I was raped, I found out that when I was 3 or 4 I was sexually abused.) I say I feel like I am 15 or so because I still an quite content to do kid stuff, hang out at the mall, turn the radio up way to loud, skip doing laundry in order to go outside and pet the horse and do what I want to do. But I am also at a place where I know that some of life's responsibilities fall on me. I am angry more often because of my own actions. The actions of others still affect me deeply. I am after all a 15 years old teenage girl. (only in my thinking from time to time)

In all reality I am a 40 year old woman with a husband and 3 kids. My kids are 16, 14, and 7. So I feel much like one of my own kids. Having kids around the same age as I feel allows me to fully embrace the way that teens think. I know eventually I will move past this stage, and one day I will grow up to be a woman. Until then I have learned that 15 is not such a bad age, even though bad things happened to me at that age.

I hope that this helps give you clarity. I think if someone tried to explain all this to me at the beginning of this process I would think that they are the crazy one not me. But having experienced this first hand, ti is very difficult to explain because it makes no since. But it does exist. One of these days I will be 40, I think I like being 15 right now. But who knows 21 could be fun to. Guess we will have to wait and see.

Good luck to you.