Is There A Manual For Parenting?

Q: "What are the unhealthy parents? Do we do this with everyone who hasn't met our standards? Can parents be difficult? Can adult children be difficult? Is there a manual for any of this? Are we distinguishing purposeful hurt vs. flawed people who are generally good? I think people get discarded too quickly these days. I'm not advocating for abuse, but I'm also not advocating for discarding people like trash. Part of growing up is being able to talk candidly to another human, let them know what hurt us, and look for ways to move forward. Learning to manage relationships is a skill we all need."

I think we actually do know what unhealthy parenting looks like. We sometimes talk about it as if it's a vague, impossible-to-define thing, but it's not. An unhealthy parent is one who cannot take accountability. Who doesn't have the ability to listen, to see someone else's perspective, or to apologize. Who may be engaging in physical, verbal, or sexual abuse. Who seeks to dominate, control, and exert their will over their child well into adulthood.

These aren't my personal definitions. They come from decades of research and experts around the globe. And yet, we still tend to act like we each get to privately decide whether we're being unhealthy toward someone, like it's more about our intentions than our impact. As for whether there's a manual, there actually is, and has been for a long time. There are tens of thousands of parenting books. And while they may not be specific to your child, we have a very clear understanding of what harms kids. The ACE Study (Adverse Childhood Experiences Study) showed us what harms children and what is traumatic to them. We can act like we don't know, but we do.

Do I think there's nuance when it comes to adjusting our expectations of people? Absolutely. We often expect one person, or a very small number of people, to meet all of our needs. Sometimes a parent can only meet a small percentage of those needs. Maybe they can fix a flat tire, watch the kids, or loan you money. But they're not the person you go to for emotional comfort, shared interests, or deep friendship. For a long time, TV and movies sold us this image of the all-encompassing parent: this best-friend, enmeshed relationship. That's what a lot of people want, and it's simply not realistic, because you are two different people with different needs, personalities, temperaments, and desires.

As for the question of purposeful hurt versus flawed people who are generally good, it's not that only your impact matters; your intention certainly counts. But even if you didn't intend to hurt your child, you still can. And what I'm seeing over and over again is adults telling their parents, "What you're doing is hurting me. I don't like it. I want you to stop," and the parent won't stop. They just keep saying, "But I didn't mean to." And at some point, that stops being enough.

I understand the fear of a movement that encourages people to be discarded too quickly. But I think a lot of that perception comes from seeing one argument, one side of the story, maybe less than 1% of what's actually happened. In reality, for many people, it has taken years, sometimes decades, to get to the point of distance.

Learning to manage relationships is a skill we all need and that we all need to improve. Part of growing up and being human is being able to talk candidly, to let people know what's hurt us, and to look for ways to move forward when possible.

But here's what I keep seeing: the responsibility for repair almost always falls on the person who has already been trying. The commentary tends to go in one direction: "Give them grace." "Forgive them, they don't know any better." "They're trying." Instead of asking the other person, "Hey, someone in your life is raising a concern. What are you doing to meet them in the middle? What are you working on?" Both people have to do this work. And what I often find is that the burden of repair is deeply lopsided. We're often looking at someone who has been trying to fix this relationship since childhood.

I hope to see you in a group at Calling Home (Join The Family Cyclebreakers Club) soon.

Whitney Goodman, LMFT

Calling Home Founder

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