How Your Emotionally Immature Parents Made Life with ADHD Harder

Welcome to the Outsmart ADHD podcast. I'm your host, Jamie Cutino, board certified occupational therapist, two time TED speaker, ADHD coach, ADHD advocate, and reality show contestant. Now, let's talk about ADHD.

 Hello, gorgeous human. How are you doing today? How are you feeling today? There's been a lot going on. We talked about a lot of heavy shit last week, and I'd love to say it's going to get a little bit lighter, but it's going to kind of go deeper, isn't, isn't like interpersonally, you're going to be thinking about things.

Last time we talked about a lot about what's going on in the political climate, and we're going to talk, be talking about some interpersonal stuff this time. And I'm so sorry. It's not going to be super fun for you, but you're going to learn a lot from it. And I bet you're going to think about your childhood differently.

I bet you're going to think about your parents differently. I bet you're going to think about yourself differently. I've thought about the advice that a lot of people give, which is to batch record your podcasts. And I thought that sounds great as far as making sure that there's always an episode that goes out on time.

Because if you've been following me for a while, you know, I went like four whole months without posting shit. Now that I've restructured my business and I'm going to be, less burnt out, it's going to be more, you know, More consistent, but I just simply don't like to batch record because I want to talk to you about something that I'm passionate about that I might be going through in my life.

And I feel like to be authentic, it's better to talk about what's actually going on and hear passion behind my voice versus, you know, chat, GBT, give me something to talk about with. My people. So this week, we are going to be talking about emotionally immature parents and specifically why your emotionally immature parents made life with ADHD harder.

Now, if you're listening to this thing, okay, why are we talking about emotionally immature parents? I am 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 years old. Maybe your parents aren't even around anymore. Regardless, you might feel like, okay, Jamie, I've gone to therapy. I've dug into this. I know how my parents fucked me up. And I'm working on, on fucking it.

Hang on, pause. I'm right there with you. I've been in therapy on and off since I was 14 years old. I'm 30 now. And I am. Now understanding the cross between emotionally immature parents having late diagnosed or late understanding, whether it's clinical or self diagnosis, of ADHD. Even if you weren't late diagnosed, just seeing how having an emotionally immature parent And ADHD affects you in adulthood.

I have seen this time and time and time and time again with all of my clients. I don't think I've had one client that I've worked with who hasn't expressed a story or a pattern of emotional immaturity in their parent, whether they know it or not. A lot of you may not know it because of the nature of emotionally immature people.

So. What is emotional immaturity? Emotional immaturity refers to an individual's ability to manage and understand their own emotions effectively or respond to the emotions of others in an appropriate manner. Characteristics of emotional immaturity often include a lack of empathy, difficulty in maintaining relationships, impulsive behavior, a strong relation to, oh sorry, a strong reaction to criticism.

And an inability to cope with psychological stress. Emotionally immature individuals may also struggle with self regulation, leading to behaviors that are often considered inappropriate for their age or the given situation. Now, if you're listening to that, And thinking, well, fuck, that sounds like me. I struggle with all of those things because of ADHD.

Hang on, hang on. We're not talking about you right now. We're talking about your parents. Yes, people with ADHD do struggle with regulating emotions, but that is not. What we're talking about right now. We're talking about a parenting style and which your parents pretty much neglected all of your emotional needs and how that translated to.

not getting the support that you need to help you with your ADHD. Okay. So let's talk about some signs that you may have had or have emotionally immature parents. I've got a list of five of them. This is not an exhaustive list. If you're looking for a deeper understanding of being an adult child, adult child of emotionally immature parents, I highly recommend the book Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, and also the like, helper book that comes with it, which is Self Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents.

But let's go through a few examples of this. Number one. They invalidate or dismiss your emotions. Emotionally immature parents, they don't acknowledge, deal with, or regulate their own emotions. So, if you're bringing up something that's emotional, they often shut it down. They might sweep it under the rug, or put a band aid over it.

Now, let's say an example of this is that you share something extremely heartfelt in a text message, and they respond with a funny cat video. This happened to me recently. Oh, it's no secret now that I'm having a tough time with my in laws. I sent a long heartfelt message, a vulnerable message, to my mother in law.

Stating how the political climate is going to not going, not only going to affect me, but people that I love, how it's going to affect my career how it's going to affect my rights. And also came out to her as someone who was bisexual. And she responded with, the first message was something along the lines of like, Thanks for sharing, it helps us to understand your perspective.

That's it. And then she sent a funny cat video about 24 hours later when I didn't respond to it. Invalidating, to say the least, dismissive of emotions when they're not meeting you with the same emotional intensity, or at least an acknowledgement of how hard it is to say those things, that's emotional immaturity.

And I know that it seems like, you know, that's not a big deal because it's what you were raised with, but what I'm telling you is that this is not how a healthy parent treats a child. Alright, let's look at another example. Number two, everything revolves around how they are feeling. If you're upset, well, actually, they are upset because of how you just made them feel.

You'll see this often if you're having an argument with somebody. And You are expressing something that was hurtful to you and then they talk about how you made them feel. If we want to go back to the example of, you know, coming out as queer and then not having it accepted they can turn around and say, you know, you made me feel bad because you never shared that with me and how would I have ever known and how do you think that makes me feel as a parent that you couldn't come to me or that you didn't come to me and I always, you know, create this environment for you.

Emotionally immature responses. If you have like light bulbs in your head and you're thinking of times, trust that feeling, trust that feeling. Another example of this could be if you're addressing childhood hurts, instead of them taking any responsibility, they say, well, I'm just the worst mother in the world, aren't I?

Or the worst father in the world or the worst parent in the world. And they make it about them. They seem to have a way to always bring it back to them. Number three. They train you to focus on logic versus emotions. So, an example of this is that you, Don't trust your gut feeling to not spend time with a specific family member.

But you've been taught that family comes first, always. And if you deny your emotions and go with logic, they can program any logic that suits their needs. This is a tactic used by emotionally immature parents. They probably don't realize that they're using it as a tactic. Maybe they're just repeating what they've been taught.

But if you teach a child not to go based off of their emotions and their instincts, and to go based off of logic, you can program any logic that you want into a developing child's brain. So they will always feel like they are enmeshed in whatever logic that you have trained, or that they have trained you with.

This is why it is It's so hard to break out of deep childhood wounds. They were quite literally programmed into you. You did not choose it. And as you're a child and you're growing up with this framework in this, in this frame of reference, and this is how they are expecting you to behave, it teaches you to, through adulthood, to ignore those feelings, which makes it even harder when you see a red flag from someone.

And you feel like you can't address it or a yellow flag. It makes it really hard in romantic relationships when you feel like I feel icky and I feel like I've been wronged, but I don't think I can really say anything because logically X, Y, Z, you had emotionally mature parents. If this is ringing any bells.

All right. Number four, you become their emotional support. An example of this is my husband is his mother's go to person when she's upset and she's having issues with her husband, her kids, her body, any other shit. He is the go to person. When you're in this position, you become the fixer. Because you learn that if you don't fix, everything will become chaos.

Evidence of this is you feel like you're taking up too much space when you have any emotions. You start sentences with, This might be dumb, but, And I didn't even realize that this is a reason that I do that. I do that all the time. It's something I'm consciously working really hard to break. Another piece of evidence, Of this is

my husband shared with me that when he was a kid, his mom would threaten to leave if everybody didn't do the chores, his two other older brothers wouldn't do the chores. He would end up doing all of them. And because he was. And that fear is what drove him to action of, you know, doing all the chores so that she'd be happy she would stay because biologically you don't want your parent to just leave you.

It's painful to think about.

So if you find yourself running to fix problems and be their emotional support all the time, while denying your own emotions, very, very common in adult children of emotionally immature parents. All right, number five. Their actions revolve around image. Example. You're on your way to an extended family, gathering.

You're on your way to an extended family gathering, and a big fight happens on the way there. Your mom blows up at you and your siblings, your dad sits there quietly letting it happen, and you're told to put on a smile before going inside because God forbid you show that you have emotions. With emotionally immature people, they're very focused on their image.

How is this going to look to other people? This is oftentimes their first concern above your emotional needs. People that can't handle and resolve and soothe themselves, they're sure as fuck not going to do it for you. They don't have the ability to. It would take a lot of therapy and a lot of understanding of what they're doing and conscious breaking of those patterns to do that.

Until then, they're not going to do that for you. So, they focus on image. Another example of this could be a parent that says, I don't know what I'd ever do if I had a gay son. Because clearly, this affects the parent more than the queer person themselves. Heavy sarcasm intended. And they have an image to uphold in their church community and immediate and extended family.

This is something that we've gone through with my in laws. We both came out as queer to them. And instead of really being supportive, They weren't. His mother has said this so many times, I don't know what I'd ever do if I had a gay son. And Now she's gonna have to fucking deal with it. Image being the forefront.

Very common. In parents that are emotionally mature. So how does this affect ADHD? Because this podcast isn't about emotionally immature parents. It's about how is this affecting my ADHD life? Well, let's talk about it. You've been taught that everything is your problem from the jump. So what happens when you're having trouble in school?

That's your problem. What about holding down a job? Yep. That's your problem. Again, if you're burnt out at work because you didn't realize you get a hundred percent of your dopamine from work. That's your fault. And what about when you don't know how to set boundaries with your boss? And that means you're working weekends for the entire month.

That's your fault. Again, it makes it harder to advocate for yourself and get help because you believe that you are the root cause of every problem in your life. You've not had caregivers come at issues with the lens of what's actually happening here. You've been taught to put a bandaid on issues, and that means that you're looking for the next productivity app or ADHD tip to unfuck your life.

Internalized ableism in the form of, I should be able to do this. Disregarding that you have a disability, which is never able to be overcome with brute force. And since you've not made it, and since you've not been made to feel like you are worthwhile, you've not sought out support that would support you and your ADHD brain.

Whew! That was a lot! And I'm really sorry that If you're still listening, you're probably in this position. You've been made to feel like this. I wish it wasn't so fucking common and the people that I attract who come from tumultuous childhoods, there is something that you can do about it. You can get the support that you need to heal these childhood wounds and create a life that supports your ADHD brain.

A. K. A. my freaking coaching. In my coaching, we dive deep. We get into the root causes quickly. And then we deal with them. And if you're ready to unfuck your life, a life that you didn't fuck up, but your parents fucked up by not showing you that you're worth getting the support that you need to thrive in your business, your career, your relationships, then it's time to talk.

There's a link in the show notes to get in touch with me. I'm super excited to meet the version of you six months from now that loves their life, feel supported, and has proven to themselves that they were worth it the entire time. Until next time, my friends, bye now.

 Are you a high achieving woman with ADHD looking for a coach or maybe an event coordinator looking for a wildly captivating speaker? Perfect. Go to OutsmartADHD. co. That's OutsmartADHD. co to get in touch. And before I forget, would you mind taking a minute to share this podcast with someone you love? It would mean the world to me.

Thanks my friend. Until next time.