Growing Up Too Fast: Parentified Children
What are parentified children?
You’ve probably heard people say that because of their life circumstances as children, they had to “grow up too fast.” This isn’t just a figure of speech—what these people are often referring to (whether consciously or not) is the phenomenon of parentification. Parentification happens when a child is forced to take on the role of caregiver, and this can happen to varying degrees.
Some children are expected to care for their siblings or their parents by cooking meals, cleaning the house, or managing their schedules—and oftentimes this is perfectly well-intentioned. Plenty of families don’t have the resources to allow adult caregivers the time to take care of these responsibilities, and they may be passed onto the older child(ren) as a result. This passing along of concrete tasks is called instrumental parentification.
Parentification can also be much more subtle; perhaps you were expected to hold or manage your parents’ emotion, or maybe you were an only child who inadvertently became the “third person” in your parents’ relationship, resolving their conflicts. This is known as emotional parentification. Caregivers of parentified children may be single parents and/or parents working multiple jobs, they may be navigating a disability or mental illness, they might be struggling with drug or alcohol use, or they might simply need emotional support and struggle to maintain boundaries in communicating with their child(ren).
Many people who were parentified children were not acknowledged or thanked for the responsibilities they took on, and likely do not (or for a long time did not) recognize that the roles they assumed had an impact on their development as an individual–but they very likely do affect the way these folks navigate the world as teenagers and adults.
How does this show up later in life?
Adult parentified children are as unique as any other adults, but may have some tendencies or thought patterns in common as a result of the roles they took on growing up. These might include:
A feeling that your actions are what make you valuable. Ideally, our relationships with our caregivers in early childhood teach us that we are worthy and deserving of love simply because we exist. However, if your relationship with your parent(s) involved ongoing responsibilities, that notion of inherent value might not have been internalized–especially if you weren’t thanked or acknowledged for completing those tasks. As a result, many adult parentified children feel a constant pressure to perform, achieve, and serve, oftentimes in order to prove to themselves and others that they are worthy of love and care.
A tendency toward being a caregiver or running the show. You learned to take care of others from a young age, it’s only natural that you would internalize that sense of responsibility as you grow older. For many parentified children, there is even a sense of comfort in the role of being a caregiver; you might struggle to trust that others will attend to their responsibilities or your needs, and you’d prefer to “just do it yourself.” After all, you’ve been depending on your own abilities for most of your life. Perhaps you feel a “need” to be in control. Some people with this tendency toward caregiving find that they choose friends or partners who tend toward dependence on others. As neatly as these two roles may appear to fit together, this match can easily lead to resentment and burnout down the road.
A heightened sense of empathy, and a sense of responsibility to facilitate this between others. Whether you were instrumentally or emotionally parentified, you learned from a young age to be attuned to the needs of others. You very likely have strong empathic tendencies, and may seek to please others before yourself. If you were a parentified child by virtue of being pulled into your parents’ relationship or arguments, you might find yourself frequently taking on the role of conflict mediator between friends as an adult. Your heightened sense of empathy enables you to do this effectively–even though very often, this is not your job.
A higher chance of navigating anxiety, depression, and other mental health vulnerabilities. Losing out on a “carefree” childhood takes its toll, and this is even more so the case if you carry a heightened sense of responsibility and distrust of others into adulthood. Sadly, it’s unsurprising that for many people this translates into anxiety, depression, and other mental health concerns.
This sounds like me...what do I do now?
If you identify with some of the qualities listed above, and/or can recall taking on responsibilities as a child beyond what’s ideally expected of young people, you might have navigated a parentified childhood. You deserve support, to learn that you are inherently worthy, and to release the sense of responsibility that may follow you around between environments and relationships.
Meeting with an affirming therapist is one way to revisit early memories (if it feels safe to do so), to validate negative feelings about early experiences and responsibilities, to identify how these have carried forth into your adulthood, and to begin to shift thought patterns and behaviors that are no longer serving you.
Another option, whether you are in regular therapy or not, is to tend to your “inner child.” Your inner child is the part of you that is youthful, carefree, and in touch with your most basic likes, dislikes, and emotions. Many of us, parentified children or not, have learned to hide our feelings when they seem unmanageable or undesirable (such as anger or sadness). Your inner child is able to feel these things and express them–in fact, they can’t help but do so.
When you get back in touch with your inner child, you can apply the caregiving skills you’ve learned from so early on in life to someone who really needs and deserves them. Some questions you may ask yourself are:
How do you wish you had been able to live as a child?
How do you wish you had been taken care of?
What activities excited you, and what sensory experiences helped calm you down?
Do you have any memories of your childhood before you were parentified? If so, what are some of those memories? What was that time like for you?
What did it feel like to simply be a kid?
How do you wish you had been thanked/shown you were loved + appreciated as a child?
For tips on how to nurture and reparent your inner child, check out this blog post from October 2019.
BLOG AUTHORS ALL HOLD POSITIONS AT THE GENDER & SEXUALITY THERAPY CENTER (G&STC). THIS BLOG WAS WRITTEN BY G&STC THERAPIST IN TRAINING SULA MALINA. FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT OUR THERAPISTS AND SERVICES PLEASE CONTACT US.