It wasn't until I was much older that I realized what an angry person I was. As a parentified child, I had learned to push my anger down because it interfered with what I felt I had to do and with who I thought I was. But I was angry.
I was angry for having been emotionally deserted. I was angry about having my childhood shattered. I was angry about not getting what I needed and watching my friends get what they needed, when they needed it. I was angry about the disintegration of my mother, a disintegration I had to watch from the time I was five until I was thirteen. By the time she finally bottomed out, I was shattered and I was completely and totally angry. I had a chip on my shoulder and was unapproachable a lot of the time.
And then I buried that anger. I hid it as deep as I could so that I never had to look at it again.
Unfortunately, it came to bite me on the butt fairly often, often when triggered by something in my day to day life.
And finally it caught up with me.
At the time, I thought this was a bad thing. I had all this anger and it was ruining my peace of mind. It was eating me from the inside and it had made me a person I really didn't want to be. Getting it out wasn't easy. I often didn't recognize it. In fact, I didn't recognize most of my emotions, but least of all anger or hatred. It took me a long time to understand what they were and how they felt.
After many years, I was able to recover from and let go of my anger and forgive the people who had hurt me. I always wanted to, but somehow, I think that holding onto the anger gave me power. I had so little power, but being angry was empowering and I enjoyed it in a way. But eventually I let it all go and I became a peaceful person.
Parentified children are angry children and they grow into angry adults.
Please email for a REVIEW COPY.Bad Girls Club has been added to the Pacific Northwest Special Collection at the University of Washington Library and the Ted Hipple Special Collection at the University of South Florida.
BAD GIRLS CLUB (not connected with the TV show) is a roller coaster ride that will put you into the head of a parentified child who is fighting to save her life. If you've ever wondered what it's like to be that child or if you were that child, you'll find yourself in these pages.
I was a parentified child and this blog is a lot about that and also about the things I've learned and done as a result of that experience. I've published two books, (Save Me, A Young Woman's Journey Through Schizophrenia to Health, Doubleday; Bad Girls Club, Blooming Tree Press) both about parentified and abused children which have been well received by educators and mental health experts.
"This book is a must read for school counselors, school psychologists, school nurses and all those interested in providing education and intervention for youngsters trapped in similar family dynamics and unable to free themselves."
Jan Tkaczyk MA School Counselors Assoc. Adjunct Professor, UMass. Boston "Bad Girls Club is as riveting as Dave Pelzer's A Child Called It books, but is far better at exploring the psychological reasons why the abused remain so loyal to their abusers." Midwest Book Review  parentification, child abuse, young adults, abandonment, shame, vulnerability
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