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The wounded inner child also contaminates adult life with a low-grade chronic depression experienced as emptiness. The depression is the result of the child’s having to adopt a false self, leaving the true self behind. This abandonment of the true self amounts to having an empty place inside. I’ve referred to this as the “hole in one’s soul” phenomenon. When a person loses his authentic self, he has lost contact with his true feelings, needs, and desires. … Feeling empty is a form of chronic depression, as one is perpetually in mourning for one’s true self. … When our inner child is wounded, we feel empty and depressed. Life has a sense of unreality about it; we are there, but we are not in it. This emptiness leads to loneliness. Because we are never who we really are, we are never truly present. And even if people admire and hang on to us, we feel alone.

John Bradshaw. Homecoming. Reclaiming and championing your inner child.