A Child Abuse Survivors Group Community Group
We survived child abuse, but the pain still remains and so do the other effects which can last a lifetime. We are often unable to find adequate help, and we are seeking answers that can help us understand what happened so that we can go on to lead normal lives. (Please note that this is a group for child abuse survivors only. If you are a professional in the mental health...
Were you raised by parents who rationed their affection based on how well you conformed to their rules? Were you rejected and given the silent treatment for days or weeks when you broke rules?
There is a lot of controversy over this subject. Surprisingly, there are psychologists and therapists who promote the use of conditional love toward children as an effective way to control them. Here's an article I found that discusses all this and talks about the hard evidence that conditional parenting gets results, but leaves children insecure and damaged.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/health/15mind.html
I was raised with this kind of psychological manipulation, and I think it's wrong to do this to a child. Children are not pets who can be trained to behave by using the same methods people use in training dogs. When love is something rationed out to control a person, it's not real. Eventually, children conclude that parents who used these methods to raise them didn't really love them at all...that their parents' displays of affection were faked.
There is a lot of controversy over this subject. Surprisingly, there are psychologists and therapists who promote the use of conditional love toward children as an effective way to control them. Here's an article I found that discusses all this and talks about the hard evidence that conditional parenting gets results, but leaves children insecure and damaged.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/15/health/15mind.html
I was raised with this kind of psychological manipulation, and I think it's wrong to do this to a child. Children are not pets who can be trained to behave by using the same methods people use in training dogs. When love is something rationed out to control a person, it's not real. Eventually, children conclude that parents who used these methods to raise them didn't really love them at all...that their parents' displays of affection were faked.
That difference is critical...controlling the child because he or she is valued...versus controlling the child because of a parent's own inner turmoil.