The Effects Controlling Parenting
Parenting can be the most frustrating, exasperating, confusing job you will ever experience but it can also be very rewarding. The most difficult task for a healthy parent is striking a balance between guiding control and permissive freedom. The easiest way to parent is either by avoidance and neglect or by the opposite extreme “Control”. These extremes, both, result in a lack of healthy parenting, guidance and providing your child with the life skills to be an independent and successful adult. When you find yourself parenting by control it is because you are feeling out of control. When you feel out of control you are experiencing a sign that you are lacking the skills to parent effectively. You are lost in how to get your child to, “act right”. Or perhaps you fear your child will act out in a way “you perceive” will cause them harm, so you react out of your own fear, and begin to control them with threats, bribes and manipulation and empty promises.
Research is clear that children raised in rigid controlling families grow up to have a variety of emotional difficulties, resulting in a life long struggle to overcome the effects of their controlling parents. The child is left with feelings of low self esteem, difficult with confidence and decision making, ambiguity, loss of the sense of knowing right from wrong without an authority to guide them, dysfunctional and often abusive controlling relationships that mimic their relationship with their parents, difficulty with being responsible, and taking on adult roles and following through with tasks, careers, relationships. The child’s need for inner control can result in eating disorders/substance abuse or other mental disorders of control such as anxiety/OCD characteristics, passive/aggressiveness, personality disorders or disorders of helplessness such as depression and suicidal thoughts/intent.
Signs of an over controlling parent:
1. The child lives with a feeling they cannot do anything right and all aspects of the child’s life is judged by the parent based on their needs rather than the child’s needs, abilities or desires. The child feels a pressure to be perfect for fear they will disappoint their parent. They then lack the ability to develop inner self esteem and confidence.
2. The child is not allowed to question the parent’s authority, rules, or their responses. No means No and there is no explanation given because they are the parent and the child is left with the inability to make decisions effectively on their own.
3. The parent uses threats, intimidation or manipulation to make the child do what they want them to do and the child is left feeling trapped and helpless.
4. The parent does not give the child choices but gives the child their rules to follow. Do what I say and not as I do. The child then has difficulty with critical thinking and decision making. This keeps the child in the trap of waiting for the parent to tell them what to do for fear they will not do what the parents wants them to do.
5. The parent lacks empathy for the child’s developmental age, emotions, needs or desires. The child learns they are not important.
6. The child is discouraged from expressing any negative emotions and are discouraged from any argument of their point of view. The child does not develop the ability to think for themselves and they believe their feelings should be disregarded.
7. The parent will avoid being wrong even at the child’s expense and will not apologize even when it is obvious. This leads to difficulties determining what is right and wrong and a questioning of reality. They develop an inner belief they are always at fault and they can fix it, make it different if only they try hard enough.
8. Support and encouragement of a child’s exploration of the world are discouraged and may be forbidden unless the outcome is positive and the parent can take credit. They keep their children from responsibilities, making decisions, experiencing outside activities appropriate to their age and development. This can lead to irresponsibility, impulsivity and never feeling their achievements are their own.
9. The child has little privacy and is discouraged towards independence with activities, friends and future endeavors. The parent wants details of the child’s life that is under their radar. The parent lacks the ability to balance parental guidance and providing a child with appropriate freedom. The parent’s fears drive them to need full disclosure as to the child’s whereabouts to the point of seeking the information from outside sources. The child grows up with a feeling of paranoia even when they are no longer responsible to others.
10. The parent’s need for control can become so great that they use physical abuse, verbal and/or emotionally threats and abuse or sexually abuse as a means of threat and manipulation if the child does not follow their rules.
1. The child lives with a feeling they cannot do anything right and all aspects of the child’s life is judged by the parent based on their needs rather than the child’s needs, abilities or desires. The child feels a pressure to be perfect for fear they will disappoint their parent. They then lack the ability to develop inner self esteem and confidence.
2. The child is not allowed to question the parent’s authority, rules, or their responses. No means No and there is no explanation given because they are the parent and the child is left with the inability to make decisions effectively on their own.
3. The parent uses threats, intimidation or manipulation to make the child do what they want them to do and the child is left feeling trapped and helpless.
4. The parent does not give the child choices but gives the child their rules to follow. Do what I say and not as I do. The child then has difficulty with critical thinking and decision making. This keeps the child in the trap of waiting for the parent to tell them what to do for fear they will not do what the parents wants them to do.
5. The parent lacks empathy for the child’s developmental age, emotions, needs or desires. The child learns they are not important.
6. The child is discouraged from expressing any negative emotions and are discouraged from any argument of their point of view. The child does not develop the ability to think for themselves and they believe their feelings should be disregarded.
7. The parent will avoid being wrong even at the child’s expense and will not apologize even when it is obvious. This leads to difficulties determining what is right and wrong and a questioning of reality. They develop an inner belief they are always at fault and they can fix it, make it different if only they try hard enough.
8. Support and encouragement of a child’s exploration of the world are discouraged and may be forbidden unless the outcome is positive and the parent can take credit. They keep their children from responsibilities, making decisions, experiencing outside activities appropriate to their age and development. This can lead to irresponsibility, impulsivity and never feeling their achievements are their own.
9. The child has little privacy and is discouraged towards independence with activities, friends and future endeavors. The parent wants details of the child’s life that is under their radar. The parent lacks the ability to balance parental guidance and providing a child with appropriate freedom. The parent’s fears drive them to need full disclosure as to the child’s whereabouts to the point of seeking the information from outside sources. The child grows up with a feeling of paranoia even when they are no longer responsible to others.
10. The parent’s need for control can become so great that they use physical abuse, verbal and/or emotionally threats and abuse or sexually abuse as a means of threat and manipulation if the child does not follow their rules.
Parenting takes patience and a well thought out parenting plan (see Parenting 101: How to develop a parenting plan) of what beliefs and healthy behaviors you want your child to learn. It takes dedication; follow through with consistency and integrity, teaching and guiding your child to learn appropriate life skills to succeed. Parenting needs to be your number one job and all your other obligations are means to achieving your number one job…raising your child to be an independent, successful and healthy, productive adult.
If you feel you are a controlling parent, get help and assistance now. It is never too late to mind the effects to your child even if they are now adults. Google information on healthy parenting, attend workshops and seminars on parenting and/or seek out professional guidance. Your life and the life of your child will greatly benefit from you learning to be a healthy parent. You will see the benefits of a closer relationship with your child. Your child will trust you, confide in you and turn to you for guidance and their emotional and developmental needs. When you let go of your fear and need for control you will actually sense a greater feeling of control. You and your child will reap the benefits now and in the future.
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