Raising kids is a complicated journey, as parents’ best intentions are tested by the daily realities of life. Any idealized goals parents hold tend to disappear when they’re faced with a kid whose backpack always goes missing five minutes before the bus arrives, as they’re trying to pack lunch and answer work emails and just hold it all together.
Whatever style a parent abides by, the underlying goals of parenting are the same: keeping kids safe and healthy, teaching them cultural values, and preparing them to be productive and successful adults. Yet sometimes, parents display traits that aren’t healthy or helpful, which means their kids usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. Parents might not realize that their actions and attitudes can affect their kids’ futures so strongly, which is why being conscious of how they treat their children is so important.
Here are 10 traits of parents whose kids usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults
1. They’re overprotective
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Being overprotective is a trait of parents whose kids usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. Of course, protecting their children is ingrained in a parent’s genetic code, but too much protection can actually hinder children’s emotional and cognitive development in ways that makes it hard for them to be independent and self-assured.
There are certain risks kids need to take in order to learn that they’re strong and capable. There are mistakes they have to make to learn that failing isn’t the end, but rather, a jumping-off point for learning something new. Licensed clinical social worker Cheryl Gerson reveals that raising emotionally resilient children requires letting them feel discomfort, which includes making mistakes.
“Kids need to realize getting what you want doesn’t always come easily,” Gerson explains. “If they can learn to bear the temporary uncomfortable feeling of being “wrong,” long enough to get curious about their missteps, your kids can develop a ‘growth mindset.’”
“We don’t help them grow by letting them bail out of anything that pushes their comfort zone,” she continues. “Our kids need us to teach them the value of staying with something difficult.”
Parents who shield their kids from every challenge that comes their way teach them that they can’t take care of themselves. Overprotective parents often raise kids who don’t know how to trust themselves, because they weren’t given the opportunity to do hard things on their own.
2. They don’t set boundaries
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When parents don’t set clear boundaries, their kids usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. Boundaries can be hard to establish and maintain as an adult, let alone doing so for yourself and your kids, at the same time. Yet kids need boundaries to feel safe. They need boundaries to guide them through the emotional ups and downs of growing up.
Teaching kids about boundaries means that parents have to be present and emotionally attuned to their kids. It means clearly outlining rules and following through on consequences when they inevitably test the limits. Pushing boundaries is part of a child’s developmental process, as frustrating as that can be.
Boundaries show kids how to be a person in a world that’s often confusing, even scary. Without boundaries, kids are set afloat without knowing how to protect their needs, which often means they have a hard time supporting themselves as adults.
3. They’re enabling
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Being enabling is another trait of parents whose kids usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. When parents make excuses for their kids’ behavior, they send the message that their kids don’t have to be responsible for their actions, even when they cause harm. Fixing kids’ mistakes for them doesn’t allow them to grow, learn, or change.
As transformational life coach T-Ann Pierce points out, “if you make up excuses for your child, your child will not learn to take responsibility for his or her actions.”
Parents who enable their kids by saying things like, “She didn’t mean it,” create adults who have a victim mentality, who grow up to say things like, “It wasn’t my fault.”
“Successful adults are responsible for their behavior,” Pierce concludes, which is why being an enabling parent doesn’t serve kids well in the long-term.
4. They’re critical
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Kids tend to internalize their parents’ criticism and grow up believing that nothing they do is good enough, and by extension, that they aren’t good enough as they are.
Being raised in a judgmental home can have a lasting impact on a child’s sense of self-worth, as they enter adulthood holding onto the belief that they have to be perfect to deserve love.
Certified coach Michele Moliter defines perfectionism as “a relentless pursuit of flawlessness and an aversion to making mistakes affects individuals from all walks of life,” noting that “the underlying trauma that created perfectionistic thinking comes in a variety of forms, and what it leaves behind can have a lifetime of negative effects.”
Moliter describes self-criticism as a psychological trap that limits people from reaching their fullest potential. She shares that replacing self-criticism with self-compassion is the first step to breaking free of that trap.
“Inward self-reflection and curiosity can help dial down the inner critics as you learn to give yourself self-love and acceptance instead,” she explains.
Moliter acknowledges that overcoming your harsh inner critic can be a lifelong process, one that requires many mindset shifts.
“Reevaluate your definition of success,” she advises. “Shift your perspective from seeking external validation and comparison to other people’s standards to prioritizing your own personal fulfillment and overall well-being through your unique contributions to the world.”
“Celebrate your efforts and achievements, no matter how small they may seem,” she concludes.
While being criticized as a child can negatively impact someone as they move into adulthood, they don’t have to stay stuck there, and can move toward a place of acceptance and self-love.
5. They’re not affectionate
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Withholding affection can negatively affect a child’s emotional and psychological development, which makes it hard for them to support themselves as adults. Humans are social creatures, which means we need each other to survive and thrive. Touch is our first language. Babies need to be held to learn to soothe themselves, and kids need to be shown physical affection to know that they’re loved.
Psychologist Dr. Sheryl Ziegler explains that being affectionate helps kids develop confidence and self-esteem and learn to express their emotions.
“Holding hands, rubbing their back, and sitting close to one another is another way to express interest and love is a beautiful lesson in communication and self-expression,” she shares.
Dr. Ziegler notes that showing affection has a “positive, long-term effect on the developing child’s overall happiness including decreased anxiety and increased mental wellness.” Kids who aren’t given enough affection usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults, because their sense of self-worth suffers.
6. They don’t model emotional regulation
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Parents who don’t model emotional regulation usually raise kids who have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. Emotional regulation requires people to notice how they’re feeling and process those emotions. People who can emotionally regulate know how to work through negative emotions and calm themselves down.
Intrinsic regulation occurs when someone regulates their own emotions, while extrinsic regulation is the regulation of someone else’s emotions. Kids aren’t born knowing how to self-soothe, rather, they need to be taught how to do so.
If parents don’t teach kids techniques for emotional regulation, they enter adulthood without those crucial skills, and often have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. According to a study published in the journal “Emotion,” emotional regulation is associated with greater well-being, income, and socioeconomic status.
Knowing how to regulate emotions not only helps people to maintain close relationships, it helps them get higher grades in school and achieve higher job performance. If a person grows up without any understanding of emotional regulation, they’ll have a hard time weathering the storms that come their way.
7. They have unrealistic expectations
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Parents might expect their kids to excel academically or be the star of their soccer team, yet even when those expectations are well-meaning, they can still damage their kids’ sense of self in the long term.
A study of more than 20,000 American, Canadian and British college students found that rising parental expectation and criticism is linked to an increase in perfectionism in college students. The study noted that parental expectations had a bigger impact on kids’ sense of perfectionism than criticism.
“Parental expectations have a high cost when they’re perceived as excessive,” lead researcher Thomas Curran explained. “Young people internalize those expectations and depend on them for their self-esteem. And when they fail to meet them, as they invariably will, they’ll be critical of themselves for not matching up. To compensate, they strive to be perfect.”
“Perfectionism contributes to many psychological conditions, including depression, anxiety, self-harm and eating disorders,” he concluded.
While setting goals is associated with success, those goals have to be relatively attainable. They also have to come from the kids, themselves, and not from their parents. When kids are pressured to reach goals that aren’t theirs, they can experience severe burnout or a lack of motivation, which leads to them having a hard time supporting themselves as adults.
8. They don’t prioritize self-care
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Many parents neglect self-care because they’re so focused on caring for their kids, yet doing so can harm both parents and their kids in the long run. When parents don’t take care of their own practical and emotional needs, they run the risk of depleting themselves on every level, and parenting from the trenches of burnout is significantly harder than parenting from a healthy place. Parents who don’t take care of themselves send a message that self-care doesn’t matter, when the truth is, it’s essential for people’s overall well-being.
Parents have to take care of themselves before they can adequately care for their kids. As practitioner David J. Palmiter Jr, PhD points out, parenting without self-care is like waiting to put on your oxygen mask when an airplane cabin loses pressure. “I see households all across America where the oxygen masks have long since dropped and all of the oxygen is going to the children,” he says.
Kids can sense their parents’ stress, which makes them stressed out, too. Modeling self-care as a stress management tool teaches kids that their mental health is worth tending to, which helps them lead successful lives as adults.
9. They’re inconsistent
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Kids need consistent parents to feel safe, both in a practical sense and an emotional sense. When parents are inconsistent, kids learn that they can’t be depended on for support, which can lead them to develop an insecure attachment style and struggle to have healthy romantic relationships as adults.
Having a sense of stability allows kids the security they need to explore their world and take risks. Kids who feel like the bottom might fall out at any time usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults, because they miss out on crucial aspects of their emotional and psychological development.
Kids learn how to trust people through their primary caregiving relationships. If parents aren’t consistent, kids have a harder time knowing who and how to trust, which can affect their relationships later in life.
10. They’re emotionally distant
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Being emotionally distant is another trait of parents whose kids usually have a hard time supporting themselves as adults. Kids need to feel connected to their parents in order to feel like they matter. They need open and direct communication and expressions of love and care, or else they don’t learn how to express their feelings or advocate to get their needs met.
Kids who have emotionally distant parents struggle to assess their own emotions and form strong relationships, which means they may have a hard time supporting themselves as adults.
Alexandra Blogier, MFA, is a staff writer who covers psychology, social issues, relationships, self-help topics, and human interest stories.
