As a kid, you shouldn’t have been expected to be an adult.

Being handed responsibility we’re not ready for, especially when we’re kids, does a real number on our self-esteem. 

When we struggle to handle the responsibility we were handed, but which we shouldn’t’ have been handed— not because there was anything wrong or inadequate about us, but because kids shouldn’t be handed certain responsibilities, especially within the family structure— we often blame ourselves. 

After all, we were “trusted” with this responsibility, because we were so “mature,” right? And we failed. 

We don’t stop to think, it wasn’t fair to be handed this responsibility in the FIRST place. 

We don’t stop to think, kids can’t be marriage counselors for their parents. 

We don’t stop to think, kids REALLY can’t be adult relationship partners to their parents. 

We don’t stop to think that the fact that we were kids put very real intellectual, emotional, and even physical constraints on our ability to fulfill the responsibilities we were being handed— constraints that we couldn’t just ignore or “push through.” 

Kids can’t be adults, and shouldn’t be expected to be adults. 

But the f*ckd up thing is, in our culture, kids are often rewarded for being as adult-like as possible. 

We’re rewarded for being self-possessed. Or seeming to be self-possessed, anyway. 

We’re rewarded for handling our emotions, Or seeming to handle our emotions, anyway. 

We’re rewarded for looking and behaving like adults at every turn— while the truth is, we’re just…not. 

That fact can get lost on the adults around us. 

Adults seem to very often find it DELIGHTFUL when kids act like adults. 

We get rewarded and reinforced again and again for being adult-like in how we look and behave. 

But when we were kids, we were simply not adults. And we’re REALLY not our parents’ peers, emotionally, relationally, or otherwise. 

It’s harmful when the adults around us, forgot— or didn’t care— about that. 

You need to know that there was nothing wrong with you, that you couldn’t handle the adult expectations that were handed to you when you were a kid. 

There’s nothing shameful about not having been an adult, when you were a kid. 

Even if the adults around you were disappointed that you couldn’t do what they asked you to do. 

Even if you felt it was your responsibility to “save” the adults around you, or their relationships. 

Even if you’re convinced that you were, or are, “the exception”— that you “should” have been the one kid in the history of kids who “could” have lived up to the expectations of being an adult without serious emotional or behavioral consequences. 

It wasn’t your fault. 

And the fact that even now, AS an adult, you’re struggling with what was expected of you as a kid? That’s not your fault, either. 

When we were harmed as kids, we were harmed. That damage remains— and often intensifies— until it’s treated. 

Complex post traumatic stress doesn’t heal by accident. 

You should not have been in the position you were. 

You should have been understood and protected. Your role in the family system should have been respected. 

You should have been allowed to be a kid— without any shame for having to BE a kid. 

It wasn’t your fault. 

Really.