💬 Ask Shanen Norlin about Breaking Generational Trauma [Licensed Therapist Column]

You swore you'd do it differently. And then one afternoon, in the middle of an ordinary moment — a meltdown, a mess, a back-and-forth that goes sideways — you hear something come out of your mouth that sounds uncomfortably familiar. Or you recognize a feeling in yourself you didn't expect: a tightness or a reaction that feels bigger than the situation.

This is what intergenerational trauma looks like in practice. Old patterns tend to show up in new relationships because they don't erase themselves when recognized. They need something more deliberate than awareness alone.

Breaking generational trauma while actively raising children is one of the more complex things a person can try to do. It asks you to heal and show up at the same time. To regulate your own nervous system while helping a small person regulate theirs. To parent intentionally on days when you have very little left.

Shanen Norlin is a clinical therapist, behavioral health specialist, and a member of Liven's Board of Health Professionals. She explains what breaking the cycle of generational trauma looks like, and where to start when you're already in the middle of it.

Key Learnings

• Awareness is the first step in breaking generational trauma, but it isn't enough on its own.
• A dysregulated parent cannot effectively help a dysregulated child. Taking care of your own nervous system is a parenting strategy.
• Trauma shows up subtly: heightened reactivity, difficulty tolerating certain emotions, falling into familiar patterns under stress.
• You don't have to erase your past to parent differently. You need awareness, support, and a willingness to explore yourself.

Here's what Shanen recommends to parents with unresolved childhood trauma to prevent those experiences from negatively impacting their children:

The fact that you’re asking this question already matters. Awareness is often the first step in breaking generational patterns. Many parents who carry unresolved childhood trauma worry about “getting it right,” but the goal isn’t perfection, it’s being intentional and willing to repair when things don’t go as planned.

Parenting will inevitably include moments of stress, overwhelm, and misattunement. What matters most is how you respond afterward. Repair can be incredibly powerful. This might look like acknowledging when you’ve raised your voice, naming your emotions in an age-appropriate way, and offering a genuine apology. These moments teach children that relationships can withstand conflict and still feel safe.

It’s also important to recognize your own nervous system. If you become overwhelmed or dysregulated, it’s okay to take a step back. A dysregulated adult cannot effectively help a dysregulated child regulate. Taking a break, using grounding strategies, or asking for support allows you to return in a more present and connected way. If you have a partner or support system, let them be part of the process. You don’t have to do this alone. Parenting while healing from your own experiences is a lot to carry, and shared support can make a meaningful difference.

Over time, unresolved trauma can show up in subtle ways like heightened reactivity, difficulty tolerating certain emotions, or falling into familiar patterns during stress. Working with a therapist can help you understand where these responses come from and build new ways of responding that feel more aligned with the kind of parent you want to be. You don’t have to erase your past to parent differently. With awareness and support, you can create a relationship with your child that feels safer, more connected, and more intentional than what you may have experienced yourself.

How to Start Breaking the Cycle

Shanen's answer holds something that a lot of parenting advice misses: healing generational trauma doesn't happen before the parenting. It happens alongside it. The two are inseparable, which is uncomfortable, but also where the opportunity is.

Tips on how to work with that rather than against it:

• Trauma-informed parenting isn't about never losing your patience or always responding calmly, but rather about what happens after you don't. Acknowledging a rupture honestly — e.g., naming your emotion, offering a genuine apology, and staying in the relationship— teaches your child something that a perfect reaction never could: that conflict doesn't mean the end of safety.
• The capacity to recognize when you've hit your limit, and to create space before you act from that place, is one of the most protective things you can do for your child. Grounding techniques, paced breathing, and body-based regulation practices all support this. Liven's in-app tools are built around nervous system regulation if you're looking for somewhere to start.
• Your reactivity will have its own shape: particular tones of voice that spike your nervous system, certain emotions in your child that are harder to tolerate, situations that echo your own childhood in ways that feel disproportionately charged. Naming these specifically with a therapist, or in Liven's smart Journal, for example, makes them workable.
• Shanen names this clearly: you don't have to do this alone. If you have a partner, family member, or trusted person who can share the load, let them. Parenting while doing your own healing work is a significant burden, and sharing that weight makes the work sustainable.
• Trauma rarely announces itself. It's more often a quiet slide into a familiar pattern, e.g., becoming more controlling under stress, shutting down when emotions in the room get too big, responding to your child's distress with something that looks like irritability but feels like something older. These moments are information. What you do with that information is where you break generational trauma.
• Understanding where your responses come from changes how available you are to respond differently. A therapist who understands trauma can help you trace the pattern to its origin and build new responses that feel aligned with the parent you want to be, rather than the parent you were inadvertently trained by.

You don't have to be fully healed to parent well. You just have to be willing to keep going.

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