If You Had Controlling Parents Read Online Free PDF Page B

compelling.
    Investigating your past can be as private a process as you choose. It’s possible to let go of past limits and achieve new freedom with your parents without saying a single word to them. Lots of people have.
10. “It’s hopeless to think that I can change, given how long I have been this way. It’s hopeless to think my parents will ever change .”
    This statement reflects the perfectionistic, all-or-nothing thinking common in controlling families. Psychological change can be difficult and slow, but it is not all or nothing. While your parents may never change, your healing is not dependent on what they do. Your healing depends on what you do. Even a minor adjustment in your feelings, behaviors, and relationships can bring you huge payoffs.
    Identifying Your Parents’ Styles
    Nearly all controlling parents embody one or more of the eight “styles” of controlling parenting. These styles provide a “You Are Here” point on the map of unhealthy control.
    Identifying your parents’ styles can help you make sense of what didn’t jibe in your family. Remember the series of lenses an eye doctor alternates before your eyes until you find the ones that enable you to see most clearly? Recognizing your parents’ styles offers the right lens to bring into focus the underlying values and themes with which you were raised. The more clearly you view your family’s themes, the more readily you can become your own person.
    You may find elements of one or more of these styles present in either or both of your parents:
Smothering . Terrified of feeling alone, Smothering parents emotionally engulf their children. Their overbearing presence discourages independence and cultivates a tyranny of repetition in their children’s identities, thoughts, and feelings.
Depriving . Convinced that they will never get enough of what they need, Depriving parents withhold attention and encouragement from their children. They love conditionally, giving affection when a child pleases them, withdrawing it when displeased.
Perfectionistic . Paranoid about flaws, Perfectionistic parents drive their children to be the best and the brightest. These parents fixate on order, prestige, power, and/or perfect appearances.
Cultlike . Distressed by uncertainty, Cultlike parents have to be “in the know,” and often gravitate to military, religious, social, or corporate institutions or philosophies that allow them to feel special and certain. They raise their children according to rigid rules and roles.
Chaotic . Caught up in an internal cyclone of instability and confusion, Chaotic parents tend toward mercurial moods, radically inconsistent discipline, and bewildering communication.
Using . Determined never to lose or feel one down, Using parents feed off their children emotionally. Hypersensitive and self-centered, Using parents see others’ gains as their loss, and consequently belittle their children.
Abusing . Perched atop a volcano of resentment, Abusing parentsverbally or emotionally bully—or physically or sexually abuse—their children. When they’re enraged, Abusing parents view their children as threats and treat them accordingly.
Childlike . Feeling incapable or needy, Childlike parents offer their children little protection. Childlike parents, woefully uncomfortable with themselves, encourage their children to take care of them, thereby controlling through role reversal.
    Of course, most controlling parents are a combination of styles, with one, two, or three predominating. My father, for example, was a Perfectionistic-Cultlike-Using parent. And, as you will shortly discover, certain style combinations tend to go together—both within an individual parent as well as between controllers who marry.
    Next: Portraits
    The next chapters contain portraits of adults who grew up with parents having at least one of these eight styles. By matching your experiences against