I Am Fascinated By Human Behavior
[c=#BF0000]The Addicted Parent [/c]
What harms children of functional, addicted parents is this: they are behaving like two people. And the child cannot always predict which side of her addicted parent is going to show up. When caught up in their addicted behavior, they forget to parent. They are temporarily asleep on the job, and so can be mean, frightening, immature, selfish or inappropriate.
Children of addicted parents experience the lack of predictability as highly anxiety-provoking. As adults, they are therefore at significantly higher risk to have anxiety disorders and to become addicts themselves than are people who were raised by non-addicted parents. Being a good parent most of the time and a horrible parent once in awhile creates insecure, anxious adults who are just waiting for things to go wrong.
What harms children of functional, addicted parents is this: they are behaving like two people. And the child cannot always predict which side of her addicted parent is going to show up. When caught up in their addicted behavior, they forget to parent. They are temporarily asleep on the job, and so can be mean, frightening, immature, selfish or inappropriate.
Children of addicted parents experience the lack of predictability as highly anxiety-provoking. As adults, they are therefore at significantly higher risk to have anxiety disorders and to become addicts themselves than are people who were raised by non-addicted parents. Being a good parent most of the time and a horrible parent once in awhile creates insecure, anxious adults who are just waiting for things to go wrong.
