A reality check on Parenthood

James E Swain in his research paper titled ‘Becoming a parent’, described Parenting as “a foundational component of secure attachment, may be considered in different ways as a state of mind, a culturally elaborated stage in life, a personal choice, a psychological and biological transition, and a highly evolved necessity for the species.” It depicts how our society perceives parenting to be an absolutely fundamental ‘next step’. So naturally, a lot of people sign up for this without any contemplation and end up manifesting poor parenting. In my experience of being a Clinician, I have seen a lot of parents telling me that they never introspected deeply and honestly within themselves about ‘why and when’ of this stage of life. They were blindsided by years of cultural conditioning and intergenerational trauma wherein, they are trained into being clones of their predecessors. As a human race, how many of us ever wonder if we are ready to be parents in the most psychologically sophisticated way possible?

Ideally, parents should provide a deep unconditional and nurturing environment to the child wherein the child has enough space to flourish, but, parents with unresolved trauma, do not have the emotional stability and healthy coping tools to provide healthy parenting. Consequentially, the roles of parent and child are reversed which interferes with the healthy development of the child.

Sometimes this can be seen in a phenomenon called ‘Parentification’ where the child takes up the role of a parent. Mother discussing with her daughter about how she is unhappy in her marriage and the young daughter comforting her or father constantly telling the kids about their poor financial condition expecting them to act maturely. Parentification in its extreme can be seen in the form of a parent’s substance use issues, parent suffering from some kind of mental illness, parent having some serious medical condition, abuse or neglect. Children feel responsible for the damage and are rewarded for acting mature than their age. This can be quite emotionally damaging for children.

Instances like these make one wonder if there should’ve been a proper course and exam to qualify and become a parent.

At ‘Every Mind Matters’, there is no course, but we try and provide awareness and training workshops to new and old parents for honing their parenting skills. After all, learning never ends.

References: Swain J. E. (2011). Becoming a parent: biobehavioral and brain science perspectives. Current problems in pediatric and adolescent health care, 41(7), 192–196. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cppeds.2011.02.004