cshell

A --> B is not the same as B --> A.

That is, abuse may cause some of these personality traits to show up. But just because those personality traits are there doesn't mean you were abused. I think only children show a lot of the traits of the "parentified child"... this doesn't indicate abuse, this could just indicate that they spent more time around adults than around other kids and learned their behaviors from them.

I would just think through other possible causes before deciding my personality traits come from "abuse"... that's a harsh word that I feel should be used carefully. I would not use it to describe "just shit that happened."

But I'm ridiculously anal about language. :)

Remember these personality traits come from kids that are in therapy because they were abused. These are the personality traits that come out of those children. That's not to say normal healthy adults won't have some of these traits. Shyness is a trait.....but that doesn't mean a non abused person wouldn't be shy. They use these traits to try to understand and help children through therapy. Part of the reason I have traits of the parentified child is because my parents made me take care of my brothers after school and sometimes on the weekends and I didn't get to spend time with my friends. Instead, I was helping them with their homework, cooking their dinner, and washing their clothes. Does that make me abused in that instance......no. But it does give me all those traits. All kids have shit to go through when they're young.....parents aren't always perfect and sometimes say or do stupid things without thinking about how it will effect their children. But it doesn't mean they are abused. I have stories for you if you want to know what I really went through that I can share with you personally if you want to know.

You're probably right that abuse is too harsh a word. "Poor parenting" is a better phrase. And not to get all "woe is me" and thinking what a shitty deal I had in life, but looking back at stuff my mom did (or didn't) do in my life, I think I have a justifiable right to be pissed off. Not in an I want revenge sort of way, just in a now I know where this bottomless pit of anger comes from. Now that I know where it comes from, maybe I can be angry for a little while, or go thru the stages of grieving for the childhood that I thought I had (but didn't) or for the childhood I'd have wanted (and the person I could have been had I had that childhood) - if I can do those things, then maybe I can let go of the anger and hurt and move on. Then I'd have happy sunny things to post instead of dark depressing things.

The above comment was directed at Meta's comment.

This one is directed at Tonya's - I did ask how much of the traits above were just me anyway. I don't really think I was abused per se, but it explains many of my coping mechanisms if I look back at things that happened in my childhood - hypervigilance because I never knew where the next explosion of anger was coming from (and I was always trying to head it off if I could), hypochodria (though I don't do this anymore) because in my house being "sick" was how you got attention.

I don't know that all of the traits are bad or that I'd give them back if I had the chance. I like being a caretaker when people will let me - the trick is to balance that with asking for help when I need to be taken care of. And perfectionism, while it CAN get in the way, is something that distinguishes me from my peers in terms of the type and quality of work I do, and I value that in myself.

Meta's right too - as an only child, I grew up around adults more than other children, so I picked up their communication styles and did things they valued (being quiet and polite, etc.). Again, many of those traits are probably just me. But also to be fair, in looking back over my childhood last night - I found a lot of things that as an adult I look at with a raised eyebrow.

I'm not trying to either diagnose myself from the stuff that Tonya's posting about, or trying to let myself off the hook for my own behaviors/personality traits and my culpability in the things that happened to me, but something about the various things she's posted does resonate with me, and I think I'd be stupid to not use that information to sift through how I think/feel/react to things. And while I can be a bit histrionic at times, have you ever seen me be less than level-headed about things in my life (in the long run)?

Another thing is that while it looks like I'm laying all the blame on my mother's doorstep, she's not the one responsible for the specific abuse that I'm thinking about (which is the bigger reason that I'm screwed up about many things). I just think that some of the pieces are coming together for me about how my life has progressed (from childhood thru young adulthood to now) and why - because I didn't have the tools to deal with some of these issues until now.

well... one thing to remember about abuse is that it doesn't have to be intentional. and that abuse really doesn't have a firm line of distinction or a clear cut definition. verbal explosions, neglect, unrealistic expectations, inconsistent consequences, etc, might not be considered "abuse" alone, but in combination or depending on the context of the situation can be profoundly damaging. also, a person's response to a situation isn't just a response for that instance alone, but a response that's been built on from previous experiences as well.

so that what may seem to someone a fairly innocuous event may have devastating effects on another person that may have a history related in some way to that particular incident.

abuse, in of itself, has fuzzy boundaries. nonetheless, people have had to come up with hard definitions for legalistic purposes. it's like sexual harassment.... we all can tell when something is wrong, but in court, you have to be able to prove that there was a hostile working environment. in a similar way, abuse has been defined in court terms and psychological terms, but one can't forget that all these are merely guidelines to an individual working on their own personal history.