Letting Kids Be Kids

     This blog post is a little near and dear to me.  As we talked about this concept of Parentification in class today it really struck a cord in my heart and pulled at my strings a little.  Parentification is when you have a mom and a dad in a parental subsystem.  In a normal family unit they are the head of the house and have a relationship separate from the children.  In parentification there are sometimes circumstances where the child is brought up and out of their role and is included into the parent adult world.
     This isn't always a bad thing, sometimes children can bring good things to the table but most of the time this can make the child feel a lot of responsibility and stress for matters that they should not be a part of at a young age.

Here is a list of some things that I feel children shouldn't have to deal with while growing up:

• Financial Stress of the Family
• One Parent Venting about the Other 
• Any form of Marital Issues Going On 
• Parent's Job Stress 
• And anything else you might think of that is individual to your family that might inappropriately stress out your little one.

Security and consistency is important for children. These issues listed up above if felt by the child make them grow up so quickly.  They feel the burden of adult responsibilities that should be talked about between the husband and wife...not with the child.  Help you kids, enjoy being kids. 

     It is understandable how this parentification might occur in your family.  When an individual feels stressed the most common way for them to try to release some of that stress is for them to bring other people in on the stress to share the burden.  Somehow this never fails to lesson your individual stress. It is good to learn some better support systems.  You have that spouse there to help and council with.  Try to strengthen that relationship and use them as your partner to discuss concerns with rather than using your child as your first line of defense.  You might not see the effects that this could have on your child right away, but they are very likely to resurface later in life.  

     If this sounds familiar to you, if you might have experienced this growing up.  It can be undone.  It might be difficult, but I loved talked about Contextual Therapy in class.  It is okay to feel upset about experiencing this as a child, it might be normal to feel like you missed out on something, but you need to work on forgiving your parents for this.  The ability to forgive can be found by looking at your parents through a bigger aperture, by looking at them in their full context.  Look at your mom or dad through the generations by which they were raised.  Through the generations that influenced them in influencing you and forgive them of this.  We all have a reason (even if it is buried somewhere deep within us) for why we handle situations in the way that we do.  Forgiveness is the only answer to finding solace.  Instead of looking at what you might have missed out, look within yourself to find what you can improve upon from how you were influenced.  The next generation can be different.

p.s. I forgot to mention that it is also important to still hear your child's voice and to involve them in family councils and decisions.  They should not feel that they are responsible for the whole adult decision, but they can feel like their opinion matters in your ultimate choice.  Family budgeting is great! But don't make your child worry if you are in a financially hard spot, that is an adult concern, along with any marital issues.