Origin of Dysfunctional Family – Dysfunctional Parenting

Parenting is hard, and often, parents carry their own unresolved wounds into the way they raise their children. Dysfunctional parenting happens when caregivers, despite their best intentions, are unable to fully meet their child’s emotional, physical, or psychological needs.

This doesn’t mean parents are “bad” or unloving—it often reflects their own struggles, circumstances, or a lack of tools to do things differently.

Dysfunctional parenting creates a dysfunctional childhood and, thus, a dysfunctional adult. In turn, it shows up as a dysfunctional parent. The effects of dysfunctional parenting are far more insidious and long-lasting than we think. They create a Generational pattern known as Generational Trauma.

Most of our therapy clients find that their dysfunctional behaviours, addictions and relationship issues emanate from childhood, especially dysfunctional, unmindful and unkind parenting. Unfortunately, this parenting style is unconscious and gets passed on from one generation to another undetected. Only showing up as genetic ailments and negative traits like greed, corruption and lack of empathy or conscience.

Sometimes, a child will overcompensate as a parent trying to distance itself from those memories. This might create a narcissist or, simply put, a brat. On the other end, over-protective parenting creates a delicate child unable to handle the harshness, grit and monotony of everyday life. Such an adult would eternally want to remain a child. Running away from responsibility. Of life, work or relationship. Some children get attention only when they are unwell or in trouble (negative attention of a hypercritical parent), so such a child will like to stay in problems, troubles or ailments instead of making empowered choices towards a complete cure. Often, they are forever in therapy or under medical care.

Parents can be controlling in the name of discipline and abusive under the guise of anger. Humiliation, domination, abandonment, criticism, obligation, belittling, fear, shame, guilt-tripping and intimidation are common tactics in dysfunctional parenting. Children learn by observing, even though they hate being treated badly, they end up treating others or themselves the same way. A hateful parent creates a hateful child, as childhood experiences fill the child with hate not just for themselves but also for the world, relatives, neighbours, and spouses.

As a rule, parents teach by example knowingly or unknowingly – not by what they say but by what they do, as how they behave. That makes parenting such an important role. Unfortunately, most parents are unconscious of their behaviour and its impact. Often, dysfunction is not intended rather, it is systemic, part of the family system, showing up as a family scapegoat.

Sometimes, parents are absent physically, emotionally or spiritually. Numbed-out, unemotional or cold parents make children dysfunctional later on. Looking for love, in surrogate parents all lifelong, the neglected or abandoned child repeatedly keeps getting disappointed.

Self-love is the road to freedom. Yet this is the most difficult thing to learn, considering we have never seen it exemplified and thus have no template to emulate!

Some children are burdened with the unfilled or rampant ambitions of their parents, and they live the life their parents designed for them. Feeling empty and saddled by the vanity of such parents, they become perfectionists, gradually ruining not just their relationships but also their health.

Often well-meaning and sometimes passive-aggressive parents train a child to be the family flagship or mascot, nice boy or good girl, thus caging the child in a perpetual stereotype. Suffocation and self-repression ensue, and in time, autoimmune disorders. They remain people pleasers, running after mirages.

Some parents are self-absorbed, leaving children to fend for themselves with no sense of boundaries or values. They only bother about their social image and privately display dark traits. Many parents keep their children from making independent choices; as a result, they never develop a choice-making mechanism. Many such parents never allow their kids to become independent, fearing they would lose control, and they keep them subservient  – clipping their wings.

Physically, verbally or emotionally abusive parenting makes children equally violent or angry adults and sometimes more. Or they will be vulnerable to rewounding in personal relationships, so remain distant or aloof and feel safe in introversion. Violence and fear are learnt behaviour. And can be unlearned. Sometimes extreme neglect and abuse, just like over-pampering, turns the child into a brat, even a narcissist.

Self-destruction is a common symptom of the products of parenting, which slowly destroys the spirit of a child through domination and admonition. Then, there is sexual abuse, which has a disastrous impact on sexuality and adult sexual relationships.

Children cover up, hide and distort their life story to make it palatable, but wounds remain.

It’s tough for many to unlearn and learn to reparent oneself through unconditional self-love. But Inner Child Healing offers a solution of empowering the inner self one choice at a time through mindfulness.

However, the healing journey of a hurt child ends in accepting the flaws of a parent. Instead of expecting or pushing them to change, meeting them where they are helps us find peace. Just as forgiveness and Shadow Work does. Two powerful tools in healing. Some people aren’t able to get out of their darkness, hurts and thinking patterns. It’s ok.

Do not try to be idealistic here. We may be supposed to love back our parents unconditionally even though they didn’t. Be unconditional, but safeguard yourself. In case a parent is toxic. We have to be practical and do the best we can, as they did.