39 - Children need to be children

      For some reason around the time my children were in their early teens, I fell into the trap of using them as my counselor.  Of course, I don’t remember my children jotting down my fury, nor did they spit out wise solutions. They sat and pretended to listen. Sometimes Kyle or Nicole would try to help me see their father’s side, but my metal window shutters were slammed shut. That was a horrible thing to do to my children.  There could have been so many teaching moments where I talked about the need to forgive or shared how I was trying to see their father's side. These are lessons that would have been worthwhile teaching. 

     Sadly, I learned that behavior from my mother many moons ago before I even considered having children. My parents always had a fiery relationship, but when I started 9^th grade, their fighting increased.   I remember my mother’s harsh words and her judgments toward my father. 

Your child cannot be your counselor.

    According to psychologists, confiding in your child on a regular basis can be damaging to their long-term emotional health.  Sharing your awful day occasionally won’t harm them, but sharing adult problems regularly, as if they were your best friend, forces them to take on adult roles.  Your children are not your therapist or confidant. Parents and caregivers must be at the top of the hierarchy in the family system, or children can get confused.  Children are not adults; therefore, you must filter your conversation.

     Psychologists believe that sharing adult concerns creates a significant amount of stress upon children because the parent has made their child responsible for looking after their emotional and psychological well-being, so the child holds back their needs, such as playing with children their own age. In addition, researchers found that children who were used as a therapist had an increased risk for anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and substance abuse and had difficulty solving simple life problems.

       Author Gregory Jurkovic, in Lost Childhoods: The Plight of the Parentified Child, wrote: “that children who take on parental roles during their formative years are later plagued by interpersonal distrust, ambivalence, involvement in harmful relationships, and has a destructive sense of entitlement as adults.”

      Yes, it’s true that children who take on more adult-like roles can have positive outcomes, such as a strong work ethic, resiliency, and confidence.  But when taken to the extreme, kids can take their assumed responsibility for parenting and become anxious, trying to care of the unhappy parent and family. They end up compulsively overworking to juggle their responsibilities at school with their role of confidant at home. 

    Of course, it’s wonderful for parents to share what happened during the day with their beautiful children, but you have to think before you open your angry mouth and spew out things that are not age-appropriate, nor things that a child should have to be dealing with. Find a therapist.