Are You Addicted to Your Children?

Is it possible to be using our children addictively?

Anything that we use to get love, avoid pain, and fill up inner
emptiness can become an addiction – even our children! If your
children are your whole life – if you don’t have a strong
spiritual connection with a personal source of love and
guidance, as well as other relationships and interests that you
are passionate about, you might be using your children to fill
an empty place within you.

If you don’t have a partner or your relationship with your
partner is not fulfilling to you, and you don’t have deeply
connected and meaningful friendships, then you might be using
your kids as your major emotional connection. If you don’t have
hobbies or work that are compelling and fulfilling to you, you
might be using your children to give meaning to your life. If
you don’t have a daily spiritual practice that brings love and
comfort to your soul, you might be using your children to fill
this need.

If this is what you are doing, it is not good for your children.
It is a huge burden on children to be responsible for their
parent’s loneliness and sense of purpose. Children who feel this
responsibility often become caretakers, giving themselves up to
take care of a parent. On the other hand, a child burdened with
this responsibility may rebel and distance from the parent,
spending less and less time at home to avoid the burden of the
parent’s emptiness.

I grew up as an only child with a mother who had nothing
fulfilling in her life – other than me. Her whole focus was on
me, and because I couldn’t possibly fill her up in the way she
needed to be filled, she was often angry at me. I became a good
little girl, a good caretaker of my mother, but the result was
that I was a nervous and unhappy child, and wanted to be away
from my house as much as possible.

Our children need to be a part of our life, not our whole life.
We need to role-model for them what it looks like to take
personal responsibility for filling ourselves up. We need to
show them what it looks like to take responsibility for making
ourselves happy, rather than rely on them for our happiness.
Your children want to know that they are important to you, but
not so important that your well-being is dependent upon them.
You might want to explore the following questions to see if you
may be using your children addictively:

* Do you have a solid spiritual practice that fills you with a
sense of peace and gives meaning to your life?

* Are you expressing your particular talents in a way that feels
meaningful and productive to you and gives you a sense of
fulfillment?

* Do you have fulfilling emotional connections with other adults
- a partner, other family members or friends?

If you answered “yes” to these, then you are probably not using
your children addictively.

* Do you feel bored and useless when your children are not
around? Is it your children that give your life meaning?

* Is your sense of worth attached to your children’s
achievements? Do you tend to take it personally if one of your
children has a problem?

* Are you over-involved in your children’s lives?

* Are you overly sensitive if one of our children is angry or
distant? Do you find yourself trying to pacify your children
rather than set appropriate limits in order to avoid their
rejection?

* Did you choose to have children to share the fullness of your
love or did you have children in the hopes of getting love from
them?

If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, then there is a
good possibility that you are using your children addictively.
If this is the case, the best thing you can do for you and your
children is to move yourself toward a solid spiritual practice,
look for meaningful ways of expressing your talents, and develop
emotional connection and support from other adults.

About the author:
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the best-selling author and co-author of
eight books, including “Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By
You?”, “Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By My Kids?”,
“Healing Your Aloneness”,”Inner Bonding”, and “Do I Have To Give
Up Me To Be Loved By God?” Visit her web site for a FREE Inner
Bonding course: http://www.innerbonding.com