How parentification can shape your adult life (and 9 tips to heal)
Clinically reviewed by Dr. Chris Mosunic, PhD, RD, MBA
If you felt like the adult in your childhood home, you may have experienced parentification. Learn what it is, how it affects adulthood, and 9 tips to start healing.
For many of us, growing up fast wasn’t a choice — it was a necessity. You might have been the one getting your siblings dressed for school or reminding your parents to sign permission slips. Maybe you were even handling dinner for the family before finishing your homework some nights.
If your childhood was centered around meeting the needs of others, often at the expense of your own, you may have experienced parentification.
While being treated like an adult can seem like a compliment at the time, this type of responsibility at a young age can affect your mental health and distance you from the experience of just being a kid. Which may lead to you being an adult who’s perpetually exhausted and can’t stop over-giving.
It’s important to remember that you are worthy even when you’re not useful, responsible, or in control. If you want to give your inner child a much-needed break here’s what you need to know.
What is parentification?
Parentification is when a child is placed in the role of a caregiver — emotionally, practically, or both. If a child is parentified, it means their emotional and developmental needs have been sidelined so they can support the needs of others.
There are two main types of parentification:
Instrumental parentification: With this type, a child is parentified by handling tasks way beyond their years. They may be in charge of making dinner, helping their siblings with their homework, or helping to buy groceries for the family.
Emotional parentification: With this type, a child is parentified by being the person their parent leaned on or confided in. They acted as their parents’ therapist, mediator, or peacekeeper.
Parentification often stems from a parent’s own struggles from things like unhealed trauma, illness, or lack of support. As a result of this parentification, the child could then adapt to stay safe, such as taking on more responsibility. Unfortunately, these adaptations can follow them into adulthood and shape the person’s relationships and sense of self.
What causes childhood parentification?
Most of the time, parentification arises in families where the line between adult and child roles is blurred. Often, it happens because the adults are overwhelmed or emotionally unavailable.
But there are some other reasons it could happen. Here are six common causes of parentification:
Parental mental health issues: A child could become the emotional anchor in a household where a parent is struggling with depression, anxiety, or trauma.
Substance abuse or addiction: Children often pick up the slack when addiction brings chaos into the home.
Chronic illness or disability in a parent: Even in loving families, kids could take on caregiving roles to compensate for a parent’s limited capacity.
Divorce, abandonment, or grief: In the absence of one caregiver, a child could be expected to support the remaining parent emotionally or even hold the family together.
Financial stress: When survival is at stake, kids could be expected to contribute through work, caregiving, or possibly logistical management.
Cultural or intergenerational expectations: Some families view emotional restraint and early responsibility as virtues, even when they come at a big cost to the child.
6 signs that parentification is still affecting you in adulthood
Having to become the parental figure at an early age can become a hard habit to break once you become an adult. In fact, many times, it shapes how you relate to others and how comfortable you are with your own needs.
Are you still feeling the effects of parentification? Here are six signs to watch out for:
1. You feel responsible for everyone’s emotional state: You’re typically the one scanning for tension or stepping in to fix problems. Even in healthy relationships, you feel pressure to manage how others feel.
2. You struggle to ask for help — or even identify what you need: You worry about being a burden or getting let down, so you stay self-sufficient, even when you’re exhausted.
3. Resting makes you uncomfortable: You push through illness, exhaustion, or emotional overwhelm because slowing down triggers an internal alarm that if you’re not useful, you’re not safe.
4. You’re stuck in burnout and don’t know how to step out: You’re the dependable one at work, and the one who remembers, supports, and shows up over and over, often without being asked.
5. Your relationships often feel lopsided: You end up in dynamics where you’re always giving and rarely receiving in return. Being the caretaker feels familiar or even comforting. But, over time, it leaves you depleted, resentful, and lonely.
6. You avoid conflict, even at your own expense: You silence your needs just to keep the peace. Being honest feels risky, so you become the master of emotional containment, even when it costs you connection, authenticity, or self-respect.
How to heal from parentification: 9 tips to live more on your terms
When you experience parentification at a young age, your nervous system may become conditioned to believe that your survival is tied to being useful and maintaining control. So it’s no surprise that kids with extended responsibilities often turn into hyper-organized or people-pleasing adults.
But you deserve to prioritize your own needs and not feel guilty about it. Here are nine ways you can retrain your nervous system and heal from parentification.
1. Name it without minimizing
The first step is acknowledgment. By giving something a name, like parentification, it validates your experience. It separates what happened to you from who you are. You weren’t a bad kid or a control freak — you were a child doing the emotional labor of an adult.
To help validate your experience, write out a timeline of moments where you felt responsible for others. This can allow you to witness and then understand your story clearly.
2. Create relationships that can hold you
Begin noticing which relationships feel reciprocal, and which ones are built around you over-functioning. Seek out people who are capable of meeting you halfway, both emotionally and practically.
This could mean building new friendships, or reevaluating how you show up in your current relationships. You could also let someone else plan the hangout and see how it feels to be on the receiving end.
Here are 10 signs you’re in a toxic friendship and how you can end it.
3. Practice asking for help in non-emergency situations
Many adult children of parentification only ask for help when they’re at a full-blown breaking point. But you deserve help even when you’re not in an emergency.
To get more comfortable with asking for support, practice saying things like, “Can you sit with me while I vent?” or “Would you mind picking something up for me?” Statements like this help build new neural pathways that tell you it’s safe to rely on others.
Read more: How to ask for help when you need it: 7 tips to gain confidence
4. Stop expecting yourself to be endlessly available
You don’t have to reply to every text immediately or be the emergency contact for everyone’s crisis. You’re allowed to be unavailable or simply done for the day.
To set some boundaries, try saying something like, “Hey, I can’t hold space for that right now, but I care about you and I want to check in when I have a little more capacity.”
💙 Put yourself first by listening to this session on Boundaries with Tamara Levitt.
5. Normalize doing nothing
One of the hardest parts of healing from parentification can be learning how to rest without guilt. But rest isn’t indulgent, it’s a necessity.
To train your body for more rest, set a timer for 20 minutes. Then, lie down, and breathe. As you do this, notice what comes up and then remind yourself that you don’t need to earn downtime.
For more on how to get the rest you need, explore these seven types of rest that can help you feel fully renewed.
6. Create rituals that reconnect you to yourself
When you’re used to living for others, self-connection can sometimes feel like a foreign concept. So, build rituals that are uniquely yours to remind yourself of the importance of taking care of yourself first.
Some rituals you could do are having a slow morning tea with no screens, journaling about what you need before checking messages, or going on a walk where you don’t track steps or listen to anything.
Read more: Feeling disconnected? 10 ways to reconnect with yourself
7. Learn to recognize emotional labor
Emotional labor includes anticipating needs, soothing feelings, and managing others’ experiences. You probably do it instinctively, but you don’t have to.
To try to break this habit, start noticing when you’re doing it, and then ask yourself, “Is this mine to hold?”
8. Seek out spaces where your needs are centered
Healing is relational. It requires being seen and supported by people who don’t expect you to take care of them. Therapy can be a powerful space for this, especially with a professional who understands childhood trauma.
But it doesn’t have to stop there. Support groups, chosen family, and even creative communities can also offer the kind of mirroring and attunement you may have missed growing up.
9. Redefine your idea of “goodness”
You may have internalized the belief that being “good” means being selfless. But true goodness isn’t about abandoning yourself. It’s about honesty, boundaries, and showing up from a place of fullness.
To reframe your mindset, say to yourself, “I’m allowed to be good and still have limits. I’m allowed to care and still choose myself.”
💙 Learn tips for building Radical Self-Compassion during this series with Tara Brach.
Parentification FAQs
What is an example of parentification?
Parentification can take many forms. It can look like a child being asked to take on household responsibilities, keep a parent’s secrets, or mediate an argument between adults.
If your parent came to you after a fight with their partner and used you as their therapist, that’s emotional parentification.
If you were expected to get your younger siblings dressed and off to school every morning because your parent was unavailable, that’s instrumental parentification.
What happens to a parentified child as an adult?
As adults, parentified children typically become overly responsible and uncomfortable with receiving support. They could also experience chronic anxiety, people-pleasing, perfectionism, and burnout.
Emotionally, they might feel a sense of resentment or confusion about their identity because they spent their formative years focusing on everyone else. Plus, many struggle with boundaries or feel guilty when they prioritize themselves.
Can you get help for parentification without therapy?
You can get help for parentification without therapy. Many people begin this process by reading books about childhood trauma and joining support groups. It can also be very powerful to journal about it, practice nervous system regulation, and have honest conversations with trusted friends.
In general, what matters most is creating space where your needs and experiences are finally allowed to take center stage — even if it’s only for a few minutes at a time.
But if, during this process, you feel stuck or overwhelmed, professional support can be a great tool.
Why does parentification happen in families?
Parentification usually stems from unmet needs in your parents’ own lives. Maybe they lacked emotional support, experienced their own trauma, or were overwhelmed by life’s challenges. It could also be a generational pattern.
In some cultures, putting children in adult-like roles is normalized or even expected, especially in situations where survival is at stake.
How do I set boundaries now if I was parentified?
A good place to set boundaries if you were parentified is to start small and expect some discomfort. You could do this by pausing before saying yes to things and checking in with your own needs. You could also limit how much emotional labor you offer in conversations.
You could say, “I want to be there for you, but I don’t have the emotional capacity to help right now,” This might feel awkward at first, but over time, your nervous system will start to learn that you’re safe—and not selfish—when you protect your energy.
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