Growing up performing the tasks of a parent or taking care of a parent emotionally can be mentally and emotionally damaging for children.

If this resonates with you, you may have been parentified as a child. Parentification is a process of role reversal where the child is required to act as a parent to either one parent, both parents, their siblings, or maybe even the whole family. 

As we discussed in our blog on instrumental parentification and how to know when it’s a problem, parentification can have two different formats: instrumental parentification, where the child performs the tasks of a parent; and the other is emotional parentification, where the child takes on responsibility to emotionally caretake for a parent.

Both types of parentification often go together since the child carrying out instrumental tasks is also taking on an emotional burden simply by needing to anticipate and worry about the tasks that need to be done. But emotional parentification can also go beyond that into the realm of the child actually taking a primary role in caring for an adult’s emotions.

Emotional parentification can look a few different ways. If one parent’s emotions dominate a household and everyone has to tip-toe around them — for example, avoiding actions or words that could make that person angry, sad or depressed — then the child can feel responsible for managing that parent’s emotions while also emotionally supporting the other parent.

Emotional parentification is also happening when the parent turns to the child for the emotional connection they’re lacking with a spouse, friend, or family member. When they’re not getting emotional support elsewhere, parents can sometimes turn to a child and manipulate the situation so that their emotional needs get met.

Let’s say a six-year-old child is painting and he spills paint everywhere, which we all know is totally normal for children that age. When the parent sees the mess, they make it about themselves, getting very upset and sending the message — through exact words or via action and tone — that the child is bad, lazy, stupid, and careless.

“You’ve made such a mess for me,” the parent might say. “You’re always ruining my day!!”

This parent has turned a normal childhood accident into a crisis that focuses on the parent and shames the child.

Additionally, the child takes on the labels of being bad, lazy, stupid, and careless, and these can become part of the fabric of the child’s core beliefs. 

A particularly horrendous subset of emotional parentification is called spousification. I’ve seen this happen a lot of times when one parent is very absent, either working all the time, or alcoholic or severely mentally ill. Whatever the reason, that parent is unavailable to the other parent. 

When this happens, the “healthy parent” can co-opt a child to emotionally act as a spouse. The parent might confide in the child emotionally, relying on the child to do the things a spouse would do, thus emotionally bonding with the child in a way that’s not appropriate within a healthy family system.

If any of this sounds like your environment growing up, emotional parentification could be at the root of any struggles you’ve developed in adulthood.

Comment below if you have any thoughts or questions on emotional parentification.