Are you a people pleaser?

Do you ever worry you’re a people pleaser? Do you wonder where it comes from? This is actually a normal trauma response! Not always, but often it’s because we try so hard to anticipate and control the feelings of those around us because we wanted to be able to do that as children. We found safety in keeping things calm around us. We felt out of control when a parent would get upset so we try to stop those around us from feeling unhappy with us now because that feels safe.

We often see this in kids whose parents argued a lot, had mental health concerns, were emotionally unavailable, had a more behaviorally difficult child in the home, etc.