#adult children of immature parents

[taint3dvirgin]

🌸 My current state

[machineryangel]

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, Lindsay C. Gibson

[femmefatalevibe]

Hi I was wondering how do you deal with a toxic family member? How do you handle situations in which they are manipulative and gaslighting you?

Validate your own emotions and experiences

Practice emotional differentiation. Prioritize your own feelings and goals

Learn the psychology behind guilt-tripping, shaming, and people-pleasing & how it's used to manipulate/gaslight children of narcissistic & other types of emotionally immature parents

Implement the "grey rocking" technique during conversations (be "boring' and emotionally flat; don't give them the emotional reaction they crave)

Go as low contact as humanely possible (no contact is the best option). Never initiate a conversation unless its absolutely necessary (logistical issue, emergency, etc. if needed)

Keep them on an information diet. Don't tell them anything about your life that is not vital for them to know

Don't try to change their minds. Just say "You're right," and disengage

Set boundaries on conversation topics/them criticizing your character. Say "I'm not engaging in this conversation." Stop replying, hang up the phone, or walk away

Live your life with them out of sight, out of mind as much as possible. You deserve to live in peace and be happy, no matter what these toxic family members say

Hope this helps xx

[tanadrin]

You're not wrong about anything wrt cost of flying, but man is it bracing to wake up to a reminder that I can never ethically see most of my loved ones in-person again.

hmm. i think this is also the wrong way to think about it. flying is not a sin. being in some indirect way responsible for a certain amount of carbon emissions does not Taint Your Soul. and absolutist frameworks for this kind of thing are not helpful to anybody, least of all the people who actually might already be contributing to fixing problems like this through positive behaviors, like voting or political organizing.

the problem with carbon emissions is that they're a difficult to solve collective action problem, where a lot of the incentives point in a harmful direction, not that they are Fundamentally Immoral, and i think that's an important distinction to make, because i think a handful of semi-scrupulous individuals flagellating themselves and depriving themselves of things that would make them happy in the long run has no real effect on big problems like this. you not seeing your family is not going to fix global warming! and there are not enough people who are willing or able to act on guilt alone to refrain from flying that it's going to meaningfully dent emissions from the air transport sector.

what we need are policies that shape collective decisionmaking. this is why a fat carbon tax (especially when coupled with a rebate for lower-income people) can be a useful policy: it might make it harder to fly to visit family, but it won't make it categorically impossible, and it will reduce air travel in general, or encourage finding lower-carbon alternatives that allow people to travel just as much, like high-speed trains or, i don't know, some kind of fancy jet fuel that emits less CO2.

honestly, if you vote consistently for pro-environmental policies and parties, if you donate a bit of spare cash from time to time to the same, and/or if you are minimally politically active in other ways, and you're not, like, the CEO of BP in your professional life, you are fine. go, free from sin. if everyone did that, the problem of carbon emissions could be solved in a few years. now, you might go, "but not everyone is doing that!" well, not everyone is sitting at home miserable because they missed seeing grandma on her deathbed; that won't solve global warming either. in fact, it will do even less to solve global warming, because it is (and i say this with compassion) an anxious, guilt-ridden, useless gesture meant to salve your own spirit, not actually a contribution to solving the problem.

in general, i am really opposed to letting a vast and nebulous sense of guilt on big, systemic problems shape your personal behaviors. none of the behaviors that these feelings of guilt ban ever contribute to significant or systemic improvements in the problem--guilt is not building nuclear plants or preventing oil from being drilled. and in my experience, the kind of people who feel this guilt are prone to anxiety, maybe as kids were made overly responsible for the emotional state of people around them, and thus feel an outsized sense of responsibility in other areas of their life, and they mistakenly think that 1) this is a healthy way to go through life, 2) if they don't go through life this way they're a Bad Person, and 3) most people (or most people they think of as Good People) feel this way.

i wish to free people from this burden. there are no individual solutions to big collective action problems! and if reading about global warming, or racism, or poverty, or any other big social problem fills you with an enormous sense of guilt and has you wracking your brain for ways you can help by cutting/reducing/abstaining from things in your life, congratulations, you are one of many people in this world who can be at least 300% more selfish and still be a certified Good Person. so, uh, chill.

[wellconstructedsentences]

When you’re going through a breakdown, a good question to ask is what is actually breaking down. We usually think it’s our self. But what’s typically happening is that our struggle to deny our emotional truth is breaking down.

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson

[mindfulparentingproject]

"You wouldn't be who you are without your trauma."

No. Fuck that.

I am who I am because I pulled myself out of the hell I was brought into and decided I was not going to become like the people who hurt me.

[anatidephobia]

whole life convincing yourself that you’re emotionless, cold and unbothered only to realise many years later that you created that version of yourself because in reality you couldn’t bare the thought of being vulnerable in any way

and when you finally realise that it’s not something to be proud of you also realise that it’s too late to re-learn everything

you feel great shame because you finally see that you weren’t actually strong - all of it was a weakness. the thing you hated the most. you couldn’t embrace it

and worst of all - you realise that you’ve become exactly like the person who hurt you in the beginning

[usunezukoinezu]

''Hate is a normal and involuntary reaction when somebody tries to control you for no good reason. It signals that the person is extinguishing your emotional life force by getting his or her needs met at your expense.''

-Lindsay C. Gibson, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents

[machineryangel]

Mothers Who Can't Love: A Healing Guide for Daughters, Susan Forward with Donna Frazier

[dubu-dood]

From Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents (2015)

[softpastelqueer]

“Emotionally immature people, on the other hand, often take pride in their lack of this skill. They rationalize their impulsive and insensitive responses with excuses like “I’m just saying what I think” or “I can’t change who I am.” If you confront them with the fact that not saying everything you think is a sign of good sense or that people can’t mature without changing who they are, they will probably respond with anger or by dismissing you as ridiculous.”

- Lindsay C. Gibson, Adult Children Of Emotionally Immature Parents

[raeiyyn]

1 & 2. Lindsay C. Gibson, "Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents" // 3. // 4. Katherine Fabrizio, Our Heart // 5. albertlaw's picture via flickr // 6. Father John Misty, I love you, Honeybear // 7. bojack horseman (02 x 1) // 8. Karen Thompson Walker, The Age of Miracles

[tyhi]

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents

Lindsay C. Gibson

[mindfulparentingproject]

To all abuse survivors, just a reminder:

Your trauma is still valid if...

1. You don't have detailed memories of what happened.

2. Nobody knows.

3. You were not physically/sexually abused.

4. No one else recognizes that the person (or people) who hurt you is/are an abuser.

5. You have some good memories with that person.

6. Your abuser was your parent or other family member.

7. You haven't been diagnosed with PTSD.

8. You are able to live a healthy and happy day to day life.

9. You don't want to talk about it.

10. Other people don't understand what you're going through.

[f--e-u-e-r-t-r-u-n-k-e--n]

"Emotionally immature people are easily overwhelmed by deep emotion, and they display their uneasiness by transmuting it into quick reactivity. Instead of feelings things deeply, they react superficially. They may be emotionally excitable and show a strong sentimentality, perhaps being easily moved to tears. Or they may puff up in anger toward anything they dislike. Their reactivity may seem to indicate that they’re passionate and deeply emotional, but their emotional expression often has a glancing quality, almost like a stone skipping the surface rather than going into the depths. It’s a fleeting reaction of the moment. Dramatic but not deep." —Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, Lindsay C. Gibson.

[brandnewpastelroad-moved]

You aren't a bottomless pit of ceaseless demands.

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, by Lindsay C. Gibson