CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES discussion: someone made the incorrect comment in the chatbox that a family was broken up because they were "too poor not to work so much." Let me clarify the family WAS NOT broken up. Additional services were provided such as daycare services, parent education classes, etc. When child protective services are called, that call is not to break up the family. The call is to have the emotionally, psychologically, and possibly sexually inappropriate dynamic investigated so that the family can re-align themselves with what is healthy for the child. Not all situatons result in a family being broken up. And when the family is with a good therapist, child protective services ensures those sessions continue and that parents are properly educated moving forward. It's sad but so many people have the wrong idea of child protective services. Child abuse means the kids can be removed from the home if it is proven to have happened. General protective services within child protective services helps families meet the needs that the children should not meeting on their own.
It is like some sort of vampirism. In my case, there is no end to it. I had to take care of my own 6 year old self, care for my siblings, all of us care for father. Then care for his girlfriend, her relatives and their interests, then his new kids, then their interests and girlfriends, even after father's death I am still accused and slandered for being a bad daughter and sister because now a brother got kids and of course I ought to be devoting my life to raising them too and being a servant to his sloth spouse. While I am treated like a lesser being, someone who must always strive to atone for existing. Un-bloody-believable entitlement. Generation after Generation of brats, a garden of toxic patriarchy.
Being parentified was a major factor in my choice to not have children. At the age of 24, I feel burnt out from having to compensate for my childhood and the incompetance and emotional immaturity of my parents. I'll probably be compensating for the rest of my life...sigh. On a side note, I do think growing up with emotionally immature adults caused me to have far greater patience with people than most.
Thank you for sharing this perspective. So many of my clients feel this way but have been too afraid to own this reality. It's a healing process for you indeed. I'll be talking about this tomorrow. Join me!
I also have a great deal of patience, but I never made the connection to being parentified. Interesting. My patience and even-temper actually bothers people to the point that I notice they try to push my buttons on purpose because they want to see me lose my patience. I never give them that satisfaction, though. I just remind myself that the people doing this to me are emotionally immature, and I refuse to give them power over me. I usually end up ostracized from a group because of it, but I've learned to not let it upset me or make me feel less than. Once they realize they won't get a reaction out of me, then they move to mind-reading. By that I mean, they start to assume what I am thinking and they decide that I think I am better than them (which I don't, I am a humble person). It took tons of healing, therapy and videos like these to get to this level of not internalizing what negative people think of me or working hard to change their negative minds.
@mindovermatter8920 You are not alone in those experiences. I've noticed people trying to get reactions out of me as well. It's as if they're bothered by my aloofness, which is a trait directly tied to all the bs I had to deal with as a child. I think it bothers them because they're insecure and are opposed to what they don't understand - people like ourselves who have been traumatized by our childhoods. People have told me that I'm hard to read and that makes them uncomfortable. Other people's insecurities are not my problem. I have enough of my own 😊. I'm glad you found some relatability in my experience. That's hard to come by it seems. No one wants to openly talk these things. Society isn't there yet.
My parents get away with this bc they paint themselves as victims & gaslight me. It’s diabolical & cruel, yet so subtle. My dad i truly think is narcissistic, maybe sociopathic, im not sure, but he is sadistic. He was also parentified in childhood, as was my mother, so the cycle does indeed repeat. This is such a crucial discussion for educating people. Thank you again, very much!
Really enjoy your videos and live, just cannot see them live usually. Thank you for all you are doing! At 61 I am learning how this issue was part of my childhood.
Another really good topic. How. common is it for a mother to expect her daughter to emotionally meet her needs , then the mother becomes. Intimately or sexually Inappropriate towards her daughter or daughters? Also, I'm the oldest of 5 . I was the scapegoat and designated patient. My middle sister was parentified by both parents. She was favored and the golden child. So is the favored. Child more parentified? She was groomed to take care of our brother (;the youngest). She also was groomed. To cook , clean and was groomed to ensnare moms boyfriend. (Through her looks and entertaining. Him through acting out and flirtation. )) its Really sad, because .....boundaries. Get blurred. And children play a role without even knowing they are playing a role. You've been put in a role and you grow up so fast.
Thank you! So glad to hear that. That's a good question. I'm not sure on the research on this yet. We, as the field of psychology, are very behind in terms of researching these "sub-topics." I call them sub-topics because we do talk about trauma, family, and dysfunctional behaviors in psychology, but the field fails to research all of the other topics under these headings.
Myself & many of my friends are parentified. We come from families of people who are oppressed systematically/historically. From this, i can deduce, even without research data, that the amount of parentification in america is devastatingly large. Technology raising kids instead of their parents is another thing that really really massively reproduces parentification bc companies are absolutely legally allowed to take parents away from their children for the sake of hypothetical profit. & if the family financially struggles, it’s not even a question of “will my kids be okay while i work?”, it’s “i am living in an economic system that doesnt care if i am able to meet my childrens’ needs, bc i’m being essentially blackmailed into working long hours to make ends meet financially.” So ya i’m not even a licensed or educated psychologist, nor psyche major, but i see that there is an absolutely devastating amount of parentification that keeps this abusive society running on a daily basis. If it weren’t for us parentified children, our parents wouldn’t make it & neither would we. We’d be crushed under the weight of their egos & fed through the lifeless machine of capitalism for profit. Quite the bleak existence, i must say. & parents are hardly ever, if ever, held accountable for this type of abuse. If they are, children are typically left to continue raising themselves through multiple icebergs of trauma & sometimes even left to suffer in the foster “care” system. America is designed for narcissistic people to get away with incalculable amounts of abuse & torture, while everyone else, especially their scapegoats, suffers in their place. Something i don’t see mentioned literally at all though, is that there is no amount of psychotherapy that will stop the historical systemic oppression of capitalism from mass reproducing narcissism, sociopathy, & trauma. This entire society is designed for this hell to be everlasting. & therapy will not save people from it continuing to be legally allowed to happen. Where are the unions full of psychotherapists pushing for the government to be overthrown to save billions of innocent lives from totalitarianist oppression? It’s actually quite impossible to heal from massive amounts of trauma when the entire planet is being enslaved by capitalistic, totalitarian dictators who want nothing more than the ultimate power to execute anyone who they see as a threat to their ultimate power. Therapy will not save people from this. There also need to be massive movements of health professionals pushing for public education concerning psychology & mental health, so that we don’t end up with a massively reproducing amount of serial killers in the near future. Anyway, i always appreciate these lives & videos. They are very informative & i do believe people should have access to information about psychology for free, so thank you very much. 😅😊
Could being parentified result in infantilizating, your own child, unintentionally? Or "babying" would be a more accurate term. The other day my 12 year old washed dishes and approved of me taking a midday nap, and the guilt was so overwhelming. I encourage his independence and individuation, but so easily feel like a failure when he has to do things like that.
Yes it can. That's a great question. It's also a dynamic that happens in most families when both parents are present. The only parent you have left may not be able to carry everything and has always been the "immature" parent. Parentifying a child under these circumstances may be the only way to survive, escape reality, or ignore reality.
CHILD PROTECTIVE SERVICES discussion: someone made the incorrect comment in the chatbox that a family was broken up because they were "too poor not to work so much." Let me clarify the family WAS NOT broken up. Additional services were provided such as daycare services, parent education classes, etc.
When child protective services are called, that call is not to break up the family. The call is to have the emotionally, psychologically, and possibly sexually inappropriate dynamic investigated so that the family can re-align themselves with what is healthy for the child.
Not all situatons result in a family being broken up. And when the family is with a good therapist, child protective services ensures those sessions continue and that parents are properly educated moving forward.
It's sad but so many people have the wrong idea of child protective services. Child abuse means the kids can be removed from the home if it is proven to have happened. General protective services within child protective services helps families meet the needs that the children should not meeting on their own.
It is like some sort of vampirism. In my case, there is no end to it. I had to take care of my own 6 year old self, care for my siblings, all of us care for father. Then care for his girlfriend, her relatives and their interests, then his new kids, then their interests and girlfriends, even after father's death I am still accused and slandered for being a bad daughter and sister because now a brother got kids and of course I ought to be devoting my life to raising them too and being a servant to his sloth spouse. While I am treated like a lesser being, someone who must always strive to atone for existing. Un-bloody-believable entitlement. Generation after Generation of brats, a garden of toxic patriarchy.
Being parentified was a major factor in my choice to not have children. At the age of 24, I feel burnt out from having to compensate for my childhood and the incompetance and emotional immaturity of my parents. I'll probably be compensating for the rest of my life...sigh. On a side note, I do think growing up with emotionally immature adults caused me to have far greater patience with people than most.
Thank you for sharing this perspective. So many of my clients feel this way but have been too afraid to own this reality.
It's a healing process for you indeed. I'll be talking about this tomorrow. Join me!
I also have a great deal of patience, but I never made the connection to being parentified. Interesting. My patience and even-temper actually bothers people to the point that I notice they try to push my buttons on purpose because they want to see me lose my patience. I never give them that satisfaction, though. I just remind myself that the people doing this to me are emotionally immature, and I refuse to give them power over me. I usually end up ostracized from a group because of it, but I've learned to not let it upset me or make me feel less than. Once they realize they won't get a reaction out of me, then they move to mind-reading. By that I mean, they start to assume what I am thinking and they decide that I think I am better than them (which I don't, I am a humble person). It took tons of healing, therapy and videos like these to get to this level of not internalizing what negative people think of me or working hard to change their negative minds.
@mindovermatter8920 You are not alone in those experiences. I've noticed people trying to get reactions out of me as well. It's as if they're bothered by my aloofness, which is a trait directly tied to all the bs I had to deal with as a child. I think it bothers them because they're insecure and are opposed to what they don't understand - people like ourselves who have been traumatized by our childhoods. People have told me that I'm hard to read and that makes them uncomfortable. Other people's insecurities are not my problem. I have enough of my own 😊. I'm glad you found some relatability in my experience. That's hard to come by it seems. No one wants to openly talk these things. Society isn't there yet.
My parents get away with this bc they paint themselves as victims & gaslight me. It’s diabolical & cruel, yet so subtle. My dad i truly think is narcissistic, maybe sociopathic, im not sure, but he is sadistic. He was also parentified in childhood, as was my mother, so the cycle does indeed repeat. This is such a crucial discussion for educating people. Thank you again, very much!
Really enjoy your videos and live, just cannot see them live usually. Thank you for all you are doing! At 61 I am learning how this issue was part of my childhood.
You're welcome and thank you so much!! I'm hoping I can do some live chats next year at different times during the day to engage with more of you.
😊thank you love!! Missed this chat but am in the replay!
You are so welcome!!
Another really good topic. How. common is it for a mother to expect her daughter to emotionally meet her needs , then the mother becomes. Intimately or sexually Inappropriate towards her daughter or daughters? Also, I'm the oldest of 5 . I was the scapegoat and designated patient. My middle sister was parentified by both parents. She was favored and the golden child. So is the favored. Child more parentified? She was groomed to take care of our brother (;the youngest). She also was groomed. To cook , clean and was groomed to ensnare moms boyfriend. (Through her looks and entertaining. Him through acting out and flirtation. )) its Really sad, because .....boundaries. Get blurred. And children play a role without even knowing they are playing a role. You've been put in a role and you grow up so fast.
Thank you! So glad to hear that.
That's a good question. I'm not sure on the research on this yet. We, as the field of psychology, are very behind in terms of researching these "sub-topics." I call them sub-topics because we do talk about trauma, family, and dysfunctional behaviors in psychology, but the field fails to research all of the other topics under these headings.
Myself & many of my friends are parentified. We come from families of people who are oppressed systematically/historically. From this, i can deduce, even without research data, that the amount of parentification in america is devastatingly large. Technology raising kids instead of their parents is another thing that really really massively reproduces parentification bc companies are absolutely legally allowed to take parents away from their children for the sake of hypothetical profit. & if the family financially struggles, it’s not even a question of “will my kids be okay while i work?”, it’s “i am living in an economic system that doesnt care if i am able to meet my childrens’ needs, bc i’m being essentially blackmailed into working long hours to make ends meet financially.” So ya i’m not even a licensed or educated psychologist, nor psyche major, but i see that there is an absolutely devastating amount of parentification that keeps this abusive society running on a daily basis. If it weren’t for us parentified children, our parents wouldn’t make it & neither would we. We’d be crushed under the weight of their egos & fed through the lifeless machine of capitalism for profit. Quite the bleak existence, i must say. & parents are hardly ever, if ever, held accountable for this type of abuse. If they are, children are typically left to continue raising themselves through multiple icebergs of trauma & sometimes even left to suffer in the foster “care” system. America is designed for narcissistic people to get away with incalculable amounts of abuse & torture, while everyone else, especially their scapegoats, suffers in their place. Something i don’t see mentioned literally at all though, is that there is no amount of psychotherapy that will stop the historical systemic oppression of capitalism from mass reproducing narcissism, sociopathy, & trauma. This entire society is designed for this hell to be everlasting. & therapy will not save people from it continuing to be legally allowed to happen. Where are the unions full of psychotherapists pushing for the government to be overthrown to save billions of innocent lives from totalitarianist oppression? It’s actually quite impossible to heal from massive amounts of trauma when the entire planet is being enslaved by capitalistic, totalitarian dictators who want nothing more than the ultimate power to execute anyone who they see as a threat to their ultimate power. Therapy will not save people from this. There also need to be massive movements of health professionals pushing for public education concerning psychology & mental health, so that we don’t end up with a massively reproducing amount of serial killers in the near future. Anyway, i always appreciate these lives & videos. They are very informative & i do believe people should have access to information about psychology for free, so thank you very much. 😅😊
Could being parentified result in infantilizating, your own child, unintentionally? Or "babying" would be a more accurate term.
The other day my 12 year old washed dishes and approved of me taking a midday nap, and the guilt was so overwhelming.
I encourage his independence and individuation, but so easily feel like a failure when he has to do things like that.
& boy is it draining
Yes, I see that in so many of my clients.
can this happen after the death of your other parent who was the mature parent?
Yes it can. That's a great question. It's also a dynamic that happens in most families when both parents are present. The only parent you have left may not be able to carry everything and has always been the "immature" parent. Parentifying a child under these circumstances may be the only way to survive, escape reality, or ignore reality.