The thing I just reblogged, and something I've seen a lot, says that folk who suffered parentification as childred are very emotionally mature.
I disagree.
Parentification made me very adept at noticing and reacting to other people's emotions.
Which is an important aspect of emotional maturity, but FAR from the whole picture.
Parentification also taught me to ignore and suppress my own emotions and responses to them.
Parentification prevented me from learning how to feel my emotions, how to name them, how to respond effectively to them.
Parentification taught me to be reactive to others emotions, to take them on as my own burden. It taught me to believe my interpretation of events over what others say about their feelings.
Parentification prevented me from becoming emotionally mature.
At my core parentification left me still a young child, unable to face anger and other volitle emotions with anything other than placation(in others) and self-loathing(in myself).
KEY parts of emotional maturity are knowing yourself and knowing when you need to respond to others.
Parentification prevents that learning.
In order to heal from parentification one has to develop emotional maturity. Has to unlearn enmeshment, has to self-parent appropriate responses to emotions, both others' and ones own.
Parentification stunted my development.
I became emotionally aware and mature in spite of it, not because of it.
