(electronic music)
- Hey everybody, happy Thursday.
Now today we're gonna talk about toxic parents.
Before we jump into that, are you new to my channel?
Welcome.
I put out videos on Mondays and on Thursdays,
so make sure you're subscribed
and have the notifications turned on
so that you don't miss out.
But let's get into some important topics
because I received a question and it says,
"Hey Kati.
"I have a really difficult time with my parents
"and I'm just not really sure if you can shed some light
"on how to deal with parents that are so toxic."
I've gotten this question from a lot of people
because A, there are parents and B,
sometimes we live with them, and C,
it makes it really difficult and we also love them
and it's just so complicated.
But I have a lot of helpful tips that will hopefully
get you to a healthier and happier place
and maybe even make the relationship better.
And my first tip is to get into therapy.
And I know that may not be available to all
but I've also done some videos in the past with Better Help.
It's a great resource online for therapy.
So that's something that if you can't access it
where you are, maybe that's another way to gain access
to therapy, but also if you're in a school program,
you can go to your school counselor and they can refer you
to someone, or if you are an adult and have a job,
a lot of them have HR departments and you may have an EAP,
it's called an employee assistance program
which offers free therapy.
Or you can call your insurance and get a list.
There's a lot of ways to get therapy,
so don't feel like it's impossible,
don't feel like it has to be expensive.
A lot of therapists will work on a sliding scale,
but it's just really vitally important that we get
into therapy so that we have a place to vent
and to talk about all that we may be going through
and most importantly, to get some support.
And I know that a lot of people just say,
"Hey, get into therapy, it's really important."
But just, hear me out for a minute and I'll tell you
kind of why I believe it is so important.
I think therapy helps because the relationship is different
than any other relationship we've had.
The relationship we have with a therapist is one-sided,
which in normal life isn't healthy, but in therapy,
it is so vitally important to making therapy work
because the therapist is putting that whole hour
or two hours a week or however long you see them
towards you and understanding you.
Which means you get to tell the story from your perspective
and there's no one judging you and there's no one saying,
"No, that's not how I remember it happening,"
or, "I don't know, your mom actually seems pretty nice
"when I see her."
No one's back talking you.
No one has any perspective, a therapist only knows
what you tell them and that can be really healing,
not to mention that a therapist isn't gonna yell at you,
they're not gonna lash out.
It's not a scary place, it's not a romantic thing,
it's a very benign, healthy, happy conversation
that you can have in this safe space,
free from any judgment or anger.
And I know that that seems really crazy
but if any of that's happening in therapist,
if your therapist is angry or anything like that,
that means it's a bad therapist.
I have a whole video I'll link in the description
about how to know if you're seeing a bad
and a good therapist so we make sure
you get put with the right one.
But therapy can be healing because that relationship
is different, and so just trust me when I say
it's really important.
And I honestly believe therapy can help any of us,
but if we have a really toxic parent
or even just a toxic family environment,
having a space that is ours, where we can talk about
how we feel and how these things are affecting us
can be really, really healing.
So I encourage you, do it today, reach out, speak up,
and get the help that you need and deserve.
And my second tip is, set and uphold boundaries.
Now I know a lot of you are gonna say,
"Hey, my parents won't respect them
"and they'll step over them
"and it's just not even worth doing."
It's always worth doing, and here's why.
Boundaries, in a perfect world,
would be something that we would be able to
communicate to another persona and they would respect it,
and they would uphold them with us
and they would understand.
But in a toxic environment,
it's important because it protects us,
as the person setting up the boundary.
Let's say we have a really abusive,
whether it's emotionally, physically, sexually,
doesn't matter, parent in our life or just toxic,
just coming in and telling us shitty things about ourselves,
which is really emotional abuse by the way.
But if they come into our room and do that to us,
maybe we study at a friend's house,
maybe we stay at the library at school.
I would limit the amount of time that you spend at home
and then I would look into maybe getting a lock on my door.
If it's okay.
I don't want you to be in an unsafe,
I don't want to create a more unsafe environment for you
like physically or emotionally,
but I would spend the least amount of time around them
and I would try to communicate as much as you can
to what safe is for you,
but that you wish that they would talk to you this way,
or it's really hard for me to communicate with you
when you yell, or whatever you can say to
start letting them know what's okay and not okay for you.
And I know that that doesn't work in every scenario,
but boundaries are always important,
even if the boundary is, I'm not gonna be at home
for more than two hours at a time unless I'm sleeping,
because it's just too much for me.
Or, I know when that one parent gets home,
and I can leave, I can join that one club
that meets at that time, that will get me out.
There's a lot of things that we can do to minimize our time.
If we don't live at home, it can be,
I'll only talk to my mom or dad, whatever parent it is,
when it's on my terms.
And so I'm not gonna ever pick up the phone when they call,
it's only when I call, and that's just a boundary
I'm gonna set up because when they call,
they're always yelling.
I don't know what it is but you're gonna have to
take some time to recognize what is upsetting to you
because boundaries, our body tells us when
someone's crossed our boundaries.
It usually makes us really uncomfortable,
we can get really rigid, or we can shrink down.
We can physically feel when a boundary's crossed.
That's why, start paying attention to that.
Start noticing what it is they do or say
or what things they said in motion with other people
in our family that we find so upsetting
and then I would minimize the amount of time
you're engaging with that kind of behavior.
And find ways that you can kinda distance yourself from it.
And it all depends on whether you live with them or not,
but you can figure it out.
If we don't take care of ourselves first,
we're not gonna be able to engage with people
in a loving, healthy way.
So don't let that one person in your life
take that from you.
It's okay to set up healthy boundaries,
and if they earn trust and respect back,
we can alter the boundaries as needed.
They're a living, breathing thing we can change as we go,
but we're gonna need to protect ourselves first,
and so recognizing when they overstep, how we feel,
and then placing them and upholding them
and communicating them as much as we can,
whatever keeps us safe, is really important and imperative
when dealing with a toxic parent.
And my third tip, save your money and get out.
If we live with them, I know this only pertains
to if we live with our parent but I know that
a lot of you told me you do and you can't get out.
Save your money and get out.
We have to keep ourselves safe, and I know a lot of you
are like, well my siblings are still there.
I know this is hard, but you don't have to keep
dealing with the emotional abuse or the physical abuse
or just the toxicity of your family
to protect your siblings.
I know that's hard.
But they're on their own and you're on your own.
Yes, if you get out, you could have them come live with you
if you can afford it, but we just need to get you out.
And also think about the kind of,
if you're the oldest child in your family,
you're a role model and you're showing them
that it's okay to speak up and get out.
That family life isn't healthy,
'cause we don't want them to think that that's normal
and something they should strive for.
We want them to know it's not okay,
and so in a way by leaving, you're actually showing them
that you can be courageous,
you're demonstrating all the things you're hoping
that they will do too, and so save your money.
Get a part-time job.
This could even be moving in with another family member
or a friend, get out as soon as you can,
because the longer we're in a toxic environment,
the harder and harder it is for us to tear ourselves
out of there and the more we start to believe
all the negative, nasty things they say about us.
But trust me, they're lying.
They just feel shitty about themselves,
and it's overflowing onto you.
But you don't have to take it.
So save your money, get out as soon as you can.
And my fourth tip is figure out what you want
from the relationship.
You, not anybody else.
Not what society says a relationship with a parent
should be like, not what your friends have
with their parents, not what you've seen before.
I want you to consider what you want
and what you need from that relationship.
Take some time.
I would journal, I would go for a walk
and just think about it, whatever helps get your mind going
in a safe place, I want you to just consider what you need.
And then, maybe write a letter that you don't send to them.
Or maybe start journaling about how it feels
to recognize what you need from them,
and maybe that's upsetting.
Maybe you're upset about how much you need from them
or how little you need from them.
Give yourself some time to kinda process it through
and recognize this.
And then the second step is to take what you need
and want from them and I want you to compare it
to what they're able to give.
And I know this is hard and I would actually recommend
this part be done with a therapist because
it can be really sad and it can be really hard.
But it can also be something that you do on your own.
I would just encourage you to take the time to do that,
because often we have these expectations of what
a parent should be and what it should look like.
But this is what they're able to give us.
But then this is what we maybe need.
And so we're gonna have to find some middle ground
where there are certain things that they are able to meet,
like maybe we just need to have some kind of
relationship and that means that we need to call our mom
or dad like every two or three weeks
for just like 20 minutes 'cause we just can't cut them off.
We're gonna have to figure out where we can meet
in the middle because there is gonna be that middle point.
It's just gonna take us a little while to figure it out,
so that's why we start with what we need
from the relationship, and then we consider
what they can actually give us and we try to kinda
meet in the middle in a place that feels okay
where we won't be constantly disappointed
or put in a toxic environment,
but we're also cultivating the relationship
that's important for us.
And just take some time.
It's all about you and what you need, nobody else.
And my fifth and final tip is get other support.
Whether that is a therapist, and that was my first tip
was to see a therapist but that could be a therapist
but I'm also talking about other friends
and other family members.
Maybe you have other family who also agrees
that that parent is a total jerk
and they don't like them either.
It might be good for you to have someone you can talk to
about it and they also know the person,
so it kinda gives you a little place
to commiserate about how terrible it is.
But if this toxic parent is an alcoholic
or a drug addict, there's also Al-anon or Alateen,
which are free support groups for family members
of those who struggle, who have addiction issues,
and that can be really, really helpful too.
Even if you're not comfortable speaking up
in a group setting, it can just be really healing
to hear somebody else share their story
and you can see some of the similarities to your own.
And it reminds you again that you're not alone
and nothing's wrong with you.
And I know people are always scared to join groups
but it can be the most healing when it comes
to addiction because addiction affects the whole family.
So just make sure that you're getting additional support.
Whatever that could look like for you,
maybe it's groups at school.
Maybe it's joining, I don't know, going to meetup.com
and joining on another group over there,
or maybe you join an intramural sport,
just make sure you have other things going on
that keep you busy, keep you out of the house
if you live with them, and give you new support systems,
new friends and people around you that you can talk to
about all you may be going through because I find, overall,
the more we talk about something,
the less power it has over us.
The more we keep that toxic parent a secret
and think that it speaks poorly to us,
the more it's gonna affect us and so I would just
encourage you to start sharing with those you trust
and love and start talking about it more and more
until it loses any of that emotional power over you,
because that's really what the whole process
in therapy is about, is to get us to talk about something
and to express what's going on without it having any
emotional charge for us.
And so the sooner we can start doing that,
the sooner we'll start feeling better.
I hope you found that helpful.
I know so many of you are stuck with toxic from members
and stuck in homes where you just feel trapped.
But know that you're not stuck forever
and we can get you out.
Hopefully these tips, those five tips kinda help
set things up for you and give you a perspective
and some next steps you can take
to work towards a healthier and happier life.
This video has been brought to you by the Kinions
on Patreon.
If you would like to support the creations of these
mental health videos, click the link in the description
and check it out.
But as always, let me know in the comments.
Have you been in this situation?
Is there something that I missed,
something that you wish I'd talked about?
Let us know in those comments down below.
And I will see you next time.
Bye.