🎠What it means to have grown up with an emotionally unstable parent
Growing up with an emotionally unstable parent meant living with someone whose mental health struggles became the gravitational center around which your entire family orbited.
You may have never known which version of your parent you'd encounter from day to day—the loving, present one or the person consumed by their internal battles. Their mood swings, paranoia, depression, or manic episodes might have dictated the emotional climate of your home. You became an expert at reading the subtle signs of their deteriorating mental state and learned to absorb their emotions like a sponge, making their feelings your feelings to maintain some sense of connection and control.
This experience gave you extraordinary empathy and emotional intelligence, but it blurred the boundaries between your feelings and everyone else's. You may now find yourself feeling responsible for others' emotional states, losing yourself in other people's problems, or struggling to know where your responsibilities end and others' begin. The unpredictability of your childhood may have left you constantly scanning for signs that relationships are about to become chaotic or disappear entirely.