How Growing Up In A Chaotic Household Can Affect Your Adult Relationships

Imagine this scenario: It's a Monday afternoon, and you're sitting in your room doing homework. Suddenly, you hear yelling coming from the living room. Your parents are arguing, and the intensity of the dispute is increasing. This isn't an everyday occurrence, but it’s been happening more and more. You try to put on headphones, but it doesn’t drown out the loud voices.

Your younger siblings enter your room, visibly upset. You put away your homework and attempt to distract them by showing them videos and cracking jokes. The argument finally ends after what feels like hours. You and your siblings muster the courage to venture out into the kitchen to find something to eat. Your parents are acting as though everything is normal, not acknowledging the tension that had filled the house earlier.

If you were to bring up the argument, you know exactly what they'll say:

• “The fighting didn’t involve you.”
• “We weren’t even yelling.”
• “You didn’t even see us.”
• “You’re really making a big deal out of nothing.”

So you decide to silence your experience and pretend like nothing happened.

One of the primary ways we manage a chaotic environment is by silencing our inner experience. You can endure more chaos when you learn to ignore that inner voice telling you this is too much or that you deserve better. This is a crucial survival skill for children living in chaotic, abusive, or toxic environments. It is necessary for them to survive the internal turmoil that comes with the chaos.

However, this skill can be damaging in adult relationships. If you learn to ignore your feelings and inner experience, you will have a lot of difficulty identifying when you are being harmed. When someone grows up in a chaotic household, they may struggle to create healthy adult relationships.

But remember, there is another way. It's never too late to learn healthier ways of relating to your emotions and others. I want to show you how.