CALLING HOME with Whitney Goodman, LMFT - Parentification: There Are No Mini Adults

Episode Date: February 25, 2025

In this episode, we explore how children are drawn into adult roles—whether through emotional or logistical parentification. We examine the family conditions that create these dynamics, share real-life examples, and discuss how these experiences impact you as an adult. We’ll also explore how the very skills you developed to survive can both help and hinder you later in life, and provide actionable strategies for reclaiming your inner child and healing generational patterns. Join The Family Cyclebreakers Club: www.callinghome.co/join Have a question for Whitney? Call in and leave a voicemail for the show at 866-225-5466. Follow Whitney on Instagram: www.instagram.com/sitwithwhit Subscribe to Whitney's YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@whitneygoodmanlmft Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome back to the calling home podcast. I apologize everyone. I'm a little under the weather again today. I know all of you, especially those with kids. You've been going through it this season with all of the illnesses. So please excuse my voice today. But we are going to go ahead and dive into this episode. Today I am talking about parentification, which for those of you that are not familiar, parentification, is when children assume adult responsibilities that are far beyond what is developmentally appropriate for them at their age. And there are two primary forms of parentification that we're going to get into today. It's emotional parentification and logistical parentification. And this matters because some family responsibilities are normal, but excessive burdens can deeply impact development. And certain events throughout the life cycle, like divorce, chronic illness, caregivers struggling, substance use, mental health issues among caregivers. While we don't want to stigmatize those issues, sometimes they are

handled in such a way that really contributes to the burden that the child is carrying throughout their development. So let's talk a little bit more in detail about what parentification exactly is. It is a process where children take on the roles and responsibilities that are meant for adults. And emotional parentification happens when a child's emotional and psychological needs go unmet and they are forced to manage things like the caregiver's feelings, conflicts, or even serve as a confidant. And I have another. episode on emotional incest that was really popular if you'd like to go back and listen to that because that's a more extreme version of emotional parenthification where the child is asked to

take on more of that confident role and serve more as a partner to the parents. So if that resonates with you, I would go check out that episode after this one. Logistical parentification is when a child handles physical or practical tasks, like managing the household, getting themselves ready for school, making sure that they're on time, getting themselves up early, cooking dinner for themselves that interfere with typical childhood activities are far beyond what they could be expected to take on. And I'm going to go into this a little bit deeper later, but this isn't like just giving your kid chores. It's giving a child tasks that they are unable to take on without it having a large negative impact on their life. And there are some scenarios or conditions within the

family that make this more likely to happen, right? So when there has been divorce or separation, there's been a death of a parent's chronic illness within the family, caregivers that have are unable to fulfill their roles because of a mental or physical issue or there's been excessive or problematic substance use. Let's dive a little bit deeper into emotional parentification. So emotional parenthification happens, of course, when children become involved in managing the adults in their household, particularly their emotions. And when they are doing this, their own needs and emotions are ignored. And so some key behaviors that you would have participated in if you were emotionally parentified. It would be things like intervening in

caregiver or marital conflicts, acting as a therapist or a confidant, becoming a surrogate spouse or significant other, and taking on the responsibility for a caregiver's feelings or serving as a scapegoat for their feelings. Like, you're the one that's always to blame. Here's a couple of life examples. So you would have a mom that talks to her 10-year-old daughter about her impending divorce and confides in her when she's sad. Or when mom and dad are fighting, 12-year-old Elizabeth helps them repair the relationship. She hates to see them fight, so she acts as the mediator. Or Jane's dad, who is struggling with depression. Every night he sits down with a 12-pack of beer and cries, Jane comforts him and encourages him instead of doing her

homework. Or we have Raoul, whose mom yells at people when she's angry and is constantly missing school functions. He apologizes for her, convinces people she's just stressed, and makes excuses for her absence to teachers. And so this is what I want you to pause and think. You know, have I ever felt compelled to manage the adult in my life, to manage their emotions? You know, as a child, did I feel like it was my responsibility to make sure that my parent was emotionally together. Was I the one that was really fulfilling the role of being their partner, their therapist, their emotional coach, making sure that they didn't get too upset or too depressed, making excuses for their behavior like I always felt on edge about their emotions?

and if you were in this role, thinking about how did this affect my need to care for others, to feel like I always need to be the one that's walking on eggshells, making sure that everyone is okay. What has that done to me in terms of my need to fix everyone around me and always be on high alert for their emotions. Do I feel like as an adult, I feel really responsible for the people around me, whether that's my friends, my partner, or other relationships in my life? The other type of parentification that I mentioned is logistical parentification. And this is when the child takes on physical or practical tasks that go well beyond age-appropriate responsibilities. So So when we're thinking about this, we're talking about cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, paying bills, administering medications, getting siblings ready for schools. And these tasks are more than just chores. They can consume a child's time, energy, and opportunity to play or learn. And I'll give you some more of those real life examples. So Ben's dad works long hours. At age 10, he is responsible for getting his two siblings up for school, helping them get dressed and feeding them.

Carly's 15, and her mom keeps forgetting to pay the electric bill. She's embarrassed when her friends come over. So Carly starts paying the bill on time for her mom. Jose's mom was prescribed medication. At age 12, he reminds his mom to take her medication daily and sets the pills up for her each morning. And so I want you to think about your childhood and ask yourself, was I burdened with responsibilities that left little time for being a kid? did I feel like I was responsible for so many things that it interfered with my academic performance, my social life, my emotional development, did it feel like I was being given tasks

to manage in my home that I had no idea how to do and no one was helping me do? And so this is one of the biggest differences between like a chore or a responsibility in the home that is helping a kid grow and learn new skills and legit. parentification is that the kid can accomplish the task that they are being given when they are being set up for success with a chore. They are not feeling deeply overwhelmed, under-resourced, and unable to complete that task. And that task is not causing them so much stress and distress that it's making them completely unable to be a child. And so we have to remember that in order for chores and these types of developmental tasks to be positive, they have to also be integrated with

a child's ability to learn and grow and also live through the developmental stage that they're in. Logistical parenthification ultimately causes a child to grow up too quickly and to feel very overwhelmed by the tasks that they're having to take on. And so it comes at the expense of them doing all of these other things. Now, I think that the most challenging part about talking about parentification is that we often move into this place of like, if my parent did this to me, then I must qualify them as bad or that they were intentionally harmful. And a child being parentified does not mean that they had bad, evil parents who wanted to do

this to them. All of our caregivers are going through things in life and we will go through things in life for those of you that are parents that cause the child to take on more responsibility in the home or to be parentified in some ways. And there's actually some good data out there on families who go through things like a cancer diagnosis or an illness and that when children go through this experience and they are given more responsibility, as long as it's backed up by understanding and awareness and the parents saying, I know that you're taking this on and I can see how difficult it is for you and that there is an attempt to help the child and there's recognition, then it can actually create a lot of growth for the child. When it becomes more dangerous

is when the caregiver is really unable to recognize what the child is going through and they feel that it should be the child's responsibility, that it's actually not that bad. They're downplaying it. The parent is highly unreliable. So we're going to see worse outcomes, you know, among parents who have severe persistent mental illness or substance use issues that are completely unable to care for themselves or the child and they are doing nothing. to improve that situation. It may be unintentional or even well-intentioned. They may think that they're doing it to help the child grow or that's the story that they're telling themselves, but sometimes the outcome is still ultimately harmful and you as the adults are having to work

through that. And so some other common reasons for parentification that are not necessarily a parent's quote-unquote fault, you know, would be a lack of resources, a caregiver who was parentified themselves. We've talked about struggling with illness, substance use, or mental health issues, and inability to self-soothe or limited awareness of healthy boundaries or what is appropriate for a child, especially if they were given those responsibilities and they believe that it made them who they are today and it ultimately had this really great positive outcome. And this is why parenthification can run in families and it can be something that is passed down through generations. I now want to talk about some of the adaptive, positive strategies that

you may have developed as a result of parenthification, and then we're going to get into some of those consequences or more negative outcomes. So it is important to acknowledge that the skills that you developed as a result of parenthification helped you stay afloat during difficult times. And there a couple of adaptive strategies that you really could have developed that can help you in adulthood sometimes. You may have become extra compliant and believe that staying out of the way would earn you love. And this has helped you, you know, suppress your needs or figure out how to get what you need on your own without asking others, right? You may also be an achiever and know how to work towards your goals. You may be really good at helping others or you've

become very self-reliant. You may also have developed great empathy and listening skills and that can be super helpful. But there are, of course, negative outcomes to all of these, right? If we learn that not having needs was rewarded rather than asking for what you wanted, you may have a lot of trouble asking for what you need. You may strive for perfection to avoid disappointment, believing that your love depends on your performance. You may feel like a failure when you couldn't save people and feel like you always just need to help a little bit more. That self-reliance can also turn into believing that you can only depend on yourself or that your value is in your ability to get things done. You may have also learned that other. You may have also learned that

others' needs were louder and more important than your own. And this is where I would invite you to reflect you on how these strategies served you and how they may be harming you in adulthood. And so when we talk about the adult outcomes and consequences that can happen as a result of parentification is, you know, many parentified children report feeling like they are a failure as adults. They continue to feel overly responsible for others' needs, and they are disappointed when they can't fix or save someone, including their parent or their family member. And we talked about this strong sense of extreme self-reliance and sometimes isolation. What we do know about parentification is that the younger a child is when they're parentified, the more profound

the impact is going to be on their development. And also, the parentification may lead to more adaptive outcomes versus destructive outcomes depending on factors like age, family connectedness, and protective influences. So I talked about that research that was done on families that experienced a cancer diagnosis or an illness. And when the family was really connected and there was empathy and understanding and awareness of what was going on, some of that parentification actually led to more adaptive outcomes. And so some of those adaptive outcomes, just to recap, when parentification is balanced with

support, you're going to see the development of things like self-reliance, problem-solving skills, responsibility, social competency, and resilience, and a sense of being helpful and needed that actually results in more self-worth. But when a child is overburdened, And there is not that level of awareness or support. They may not be able to even complete their own developmental tasks that they need to get through at that age. So we might see some delays. There's an increased risk for depression, anxiety, and physical health issues. And they may struggle with difficult adult relationships, issues with anger or passiveness, perfectionism, and struggles with emotional regulation, impulse control, and sleep. the children who are typically most affected by parentification are those that were exposed to problematic parental substance use, chronic mental or physical illness, high conflict environments or instability. And those are the ones that we see across the data that are more impacted. What I do want you to remember, though, is that none of this was your fault

and you were learning how to survive in difficult circumstances. Let's look at how you can begin healing and reclaiming your life after experiencing prerentification. The first thing that you can do is, of course, go to therapy, you know, learning some of these therapeutic strategies to help you increase yourself compassion and recognizing that a lot of the things that you were doing and are still doing were just, survival strategies that you adopted and were necessary, that can be really helpful. I also find that people who were parentified kind of sit in these two extremes. Some really need structure because they did not have a lot of structure. So they need things like bedtimes, schedules, meaningful and safe structure. Other people really struggle with play and freedom because they had to be so structured and diligent as kids.

So learning to incorporate moments of play in your life, taking a class, you know, being outside, running, like exercise, all of this stuff using your body can be really, really helpful for kids who are correctified. It's also good to find community, you know, joining a community like calling home where you can find other people who share your values and you've been through things like this can be very helpful. So going to our website at callinghome.com and joining the Family Cycle Breakers Club might be a great way for you to find that community in an easy virtual way.

It's also great to develop safe personal space and honor your boundaries. So a lot of people who were preemptified grew up in unstable homes that were not physically or emotionally safe. And so developing that for yourself can be very, very helpful. The biggest takeaway here is that I, I want you to know that parentification helped you survive, but it does not have to dictate your future. And this is where I like to tell people that it's good to get to know, you know, the parts of the inner child that was parentified.

And so a lot of you have this inner critic that feels like everything is your fault. You're not doing enough. You're not enough. Then you might have this inner soldier that protects you for. danger and shows up when you need it most. One of the biggest parts of the parentified child is the mini adult. The mini adult feels like we have to do and be everything, grew up too fast, and has trouble with having fun. So that's the one that might struggle with that freedom and play. The other part is the helper that wants to be useful and feel useful and is in tune with the

needs of others. And then there is the neglected child that feels lonely, unseen, wounded or scared. And the adapted self, which is the part that I really want you to learn how to embody in adulthood, which is good at getting things done, responsible, resourceful. Like, we want to keep that part of you that learned that during parenthification. And so healing from parentification really means recognizing what parts are showing up and when. None of us are all of one thing, right? We all have parts we embrace or push away depending on the circumstances and all of these roles have value and serve you in different ways. So like that inner soldier can be really helpful. That helper can be great. That adapted self. Like these are all good,

helpful parts of the parentified inner child. But we have to figure out which part is kind of taking over when it's best for each of those parts to speak up and making sure that one part is, isn't like the strongest. Okay. So if you take away anything from this episode, it's that I want you to know that those good parts can come out. They can be the strongest parts. And that a lot of what you did that isn't working anymore today is a survival strategy. If you are listening to this episode, the day it comes out on Tuesday, February 25th, I want to let you know that we are starting a new monthly topic at Calling Home. And if you're not familiar with how things work at calling home, every month we do a deep dive into a topic that is affecting families and especially

adult family relationships. And so for the month of March, we will be talking about having a family member who struggles with their mental health or who has a mental illness. We're going to be covering things like how to set boundaries, how to interact with your family when they are not doing well, how to get them help, how to make sure that you feel like you're allowed to take care of yourself, even when your family member is struggling. And we will have focused groups every Wednesday for the entire month of March for family members of those who have a mental illness or a mental health condition. If you would like to join us for the month of March, you can visit callinghome.co and join the Family Cycle Breakers Club.

I will put links to this in the show notes as well, and I hope to see you there. We add a new article, worksheet, video, and script or guide for a specific situation every Monday, and those will be sent directly to your inbox so you don't even have to go to the website and find everything. We like to make things very convenient and easy for you. So I would love to see you next month. Visit callinghome.com to join the Family Cycle Breakers Club. Thanks, and I'll see you all again for another Q&A episode on Thursday. The Calling Home podcast is not engaged in providing therapy services, mental health advice,

or other medical advice or services. It is not a substitute for advice from a qualified health care provider and does not create any therapist, patient, or other treatment relationship between you and Colin Holm or Whitney Goodman. For more information on this, please see Calling Home's terms of service linked in the show notes below.