ABSTRACT
Guilt and shame are very difficult emotions to talk about and yet many children and adults with long-standing mental health difficulties struggle with these feelings more than any other. Guilt and shame can be important emotions that are part of healthy relationships. Guilt and shame can exist in a toxic form associated with intense discomfort or anxiety. Toxic guilt and shame make a person feel unworthy, exposed, useless, bad and unhappy to their core. The feelings of healthy guilt and shame are thus based on important dependency relationships. Healthy guilt and shame are linked to specific behaviours and are short-lived feelings that are a critical part of the ways in which human beings learn to live in peaceful social groups. The important thing about healthy guilt and healthy shame is that it is part of a supportive relationship between a child and an adult, which allows for the legitimate needs of the child.
