Relationships
Parent/child
A parent and child is one of the most powerful relationship labels. It carries assumptions about authority, responsibility, obedience, protection, respect, independence, and care. These assumptions often shape behaviour before what is actually happening is seen. What follows are examples of how the parent-child role can influence interaction, and how the same situation may be met when the role is no longer the primary reference point.
Examples:
The guilt trip
A mother says, 'After everything I've done for you, this is how you treat me?'
Through the role
The child feels responsible for the parent's emotional state. Guilt appears. The focus shifts from what is actually true to relieving the parent's discomfort. The child abandons their own clarity in order to restore the appearance of harmony.
Through connection
The words are heard, but the pattern is also seen. The parent is experiencing expectation, disappointment, fear, or frustration and expressing it, often unconsciously, using emotional manipulation.
The child does not conform to the role of the guilty and caring child. The emotions behind the words can be acknowledged without accepting responsibility for emotions that are not their own. Compassion for the parent's state is experienced, as well as clarity, calm and equanimity.
Being told off
A parent criticises their child for a decision they have made.
Through the role
The child immediately becomes 'the child being told off.' Feelings of guilt, shame, disappointment, or deflation arise. The parent's disapproval is experienced as something powerful and significant.
Through connection
The child remains present with what is happening. Anger may be present. Disappointment may be present. Strong opinions may be present. These are simply seen for what they are. The parent is not experienced as an authority figure whose approval determines worth, but as a human being having a reaction to a situation. The child's response comes from clarity rather than guilt, and from understanding rather than defensiveness.
The parent's identity through the child
A parent defines themselves through their child’s achievements, behaviour, or choices.
Through the role
What the parent defines as success or failure in the child’s life becomes success or failure in the parent’s identity. Pressure is placed on the child, even subtly, to live in a way that maintains the parent’s sense of self.
Through connection
The child is seen as life expressing itself in human form. Joy in their enjoyment is shared, but not possessed. Their life choices are not used to stabilise the parent’s identity.
Child acting destructively
A parent becomes aware that their child is acting in ways that are harmful or destructive.
Through the role
The parent feels responsible, guilty, and pulled to fix or rescue. The child is seen as someone who must be protected. Support, including financial support, may continue in a way that sustains the pattern.
Through connection
The situation is met as it is. The child is seen as a human being acting in certain ways, not as someone to be saved through obligation. Response arises from what is actually here rather than from what the role dictates. What is given, what is not given, and how engagement happens is no longer shaped by 'parent and child,' but by the actual nature of the relationship.