Therapy for…
Adult Daughters of
Emotionally Immature
Parents
Maybe you could rely on your parents sometimes. Maybe never at all.
Your parents tried their “best”, or at least that’s what they tell you. But you look around at other families and feel like deep down, things should have been different for you. There’s probably always been some kind of drama or stress in your life related to your parents doing something. It could be one parent, or both, but you feel like you’ve always had to navigate around them and tailor to their needs, instead of it being the other way around. Perhaps you remember fantasizing, when you were young, about the day you could stop talking to them as an adult; a fantasy you might feel guilty about now.
Maybe you’ve already gone “No Contact” with them, or you’re thinking about it, or—most commonly—your parents are still in your life, and you’re trying to figure out what that is going to mean for you as an adult.
Regardless of which crossroad you’re at, it can feel daunting to navigate that alone.
But it’s time to prioritize what you need, maybe for the first time ever.
Daughters of emotionally immature or narcissistic parents tend to…
→ Always want to strive to be “good enough,” and struggle to meet that expectation.
→ Feel responsible for other people’s emotions or hate the idea of letting anyone down.
→ Feel disconnected from their own wants and needs.
→ Feel anxious and sick with guilt anytime they try to put up a boundary with someone.
Here’s How We Can Change That
Recovering from emotionally immature parents can be a long journey, but worth it in the end.
The process involves learning how the problems of the past have followed you, allowing yourself to grieve, and making new decisions for a less chaotic life.
When we have emotionally immature parents, we did not get to be the child we fully had the potential to be. Our light was overshadowed by a much bigger presence that had to outshine everything. As an adult, therapy can be an important space to learn how to accept the limitations of your parents, recognize that those limitations harmed you, and grieve the child you did not get to be. It can be an emotional process, which is where I come in.
When we explore your past, I am here to join you in that emotional process. When things feel dark, I teach you how to use your lantern—your inherent emotional strengths and skills—to light your way home to yourself. The lantern may seem broken now, but we can repair it.
You’ll learn how to deal with your parents in a healthier way that feels right to you, and we’ll reprogram negative messages you’ve internalized overtime about yourself. I know how scary and hard it can feel now, but the change is worth it when you make it happen.
Therapy can help you…
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We don’t get much of a choice in loving our parents and wanting their affection. Even if you’ve reached a place to acceptance, it can still kinda suck feeling like you’ve failed your parents.
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When your parents tell you that you’re always wrong and they always know best, it can be hard to trust your own judgement. Therapy is a place you can learn to separate your parents expectations for yourself from what you know is actually best for yourself.
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Therapy is where you learn to connect how your early experiences shape your current relationships, so you can start showing up in ways that drive connection between you and other people, rather than disconnection and dysfunction.
FAQs
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Briefly put, a parent like this is one that makes their child feel emotionally unstable and like they are never good enough to appease the parent. These parents ignore their children’s emotional needs for the sake of prioritizing their own, and sweep it under the rug when the child tries to get their needs met.
These parents are not evil, but their parenting style can have a lifelong impact on their children.
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It’s hard to feel loved when your first caretakers, the people you loved first, did not love you in the way you needed. They may have tried really hard to, but just did not know how. Their love may have been on the condition of good grades, academic accomplishments or extracurricular achievements, or your physical appearance being a certain way.
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This is something you have to individually decide for yourself, since it’s such a personal decision. We can explore this decision in therapy, and its potential impact on you and your life, but I cannot tell someone whether they “should” or “should not” do something that they are unsure would be in their best interest.
Decide who you can become.
“When in doubt, choose to live”