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Toughcooki
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 08:54 AM
  #1
I was thinking after a meeting with my therapist, and trying to figure out a bunch of disconnected kinds of ways I'm dysfunctional, and I realized that I don't think I ever grew up. I feel like a child in an adult's body - bluffing my way through life but never growing into it. I have a child's fears, a child's coping mechanisms, a child's perspective of other people, a child's method of making decisions, a child's impulse control, etc. I think I never noticed this because when I was a child, I was very responsible, and had a lot on my shoulders. I was trying to act like what I thought adult acted like, even though I was a child. And now I actually am an adult (in my 40s) but I'm still trying act like I think adults act like, in front of the 'real' adults, but eating all the cupcakes if there's no one there to tell me no.

So - how the heck do I grow up? And what does that even look like?
Any self-help books would be great, or articles, or a name for this if there is a name for it, and any suggestions, ideas, first steps, anything. I don't want to feel like a child in a terrifying giant world forever.

Edited to add that I was diagnosed with PTSD and MDD a few years ago. PTSD from multiple traumas and near-death experiences.
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 09:34 AM
  #2
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Originally Posted by Toughcooki View Post
I was thinking after a meeting with my therapist, and trying to figure out a bunch of disconnected kinds of ways I'm dysfunctional, and I realized that I don't think I ever grew up. I feel like a child in an adult's body - bluffing my way through life but never growing into it.
IMO, though a bit of our "maturity" might be biological, most of it is probably based on our experiences in the world. It is a balance, on the one hand, if we are taken care of and coddled our whole life, we won't grow. On the other hand, when we are thrust in traumatic events we cannot handle, we can end up shutting down--either a part of us or perhaps, in very bad situations--many facets of ourselves. That you are in therapy should help you process, in part, some of these things that caused your growth to stop. Of course, you will continue to process these things even after therapy. I truly hope you are able to learn from all the hard things you have gone through and move on with your life. Lots of us are still immature in many ways. Hopefully, we never stop growing, no matter how old we are.
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 11:54 AM
  #3
i can relate at least in part to what you're saying. i too feel like i have never truly learned how to behave in the adult world and i still depend on my parents for many things. i don't have a lot of self-help books to suggest, there's one called "Feeling Good" but it isn't about adulthood, more about general depression. i completely agree with the wise and wonderful TunedOut about continuing your therapy to work these things through. Hopefully it will be of some help. Please do not give up. Sending many Safe, warm hugs to BOTH you, @Toughcooki, your Family, your Friends and ALL of your Loved Ones! Keep fighting and keep rocking NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS, OK?!
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 12:02 PM
  #4
you need to question the behaviour of someone who thinks the baby's done a pooh played on the children's station over here is a world chart-topping hit

seriously: it comes on and I'm singing aloud, tapping my toes, and wanting it again and again
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 12:04 PM
  #5
also I was never good at words and phrases

a bit passed the cat sat on the mat, but not by much..
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 12:54 PM
  #6
You said you were behaving like an adult in your childhood.I was too.Were you parentified?? Is that the reason,why you were responsible and acted like adult back then?? Please Google parentification and see if you can relate.Feeling like a child now......this may be the result of loss of a real childhood. Hugs
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 04:45 PM
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Lots of us are still immature in many ways. Hopefully, we never stop growing, no matter how old we are.
Thank you - yeah, I know everyone deals with immaturity, but I feel like mine is off the charts, and in all aspects of life. I can THINK - and am intelligent, but I react to everything like a child would, when I look in retrospect. I am trying to be more mindful to avoid the knee-jerk reaction issue, but it's exhausting.
I will keep plugging along though.
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 04:47 PM
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i can relate at least in part to what you're saying. i too feel like i have never truly learned how to behave in the adult world and i still depend on my parents for many things. i don't have a lot of self-help books to suggest, there's one called "Feeling Good" but it isn't about adulthood, more about general depression. i completely agree with the wise and wonderful TunedOut about continuing your therapy to work these things through. Hopefully it will be of some help. Please do not give up. Sending many Safe, warm hugs to BOTH you, @Toughcooki, your Family, your Friends and ALL of your Loved Ones! Keep fighting and keep rocking NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS, OK?!
Thank you. I can't even imagine stopping therapy - every session I find more things I didn't even know were issues, lol. I haven't ever been able to depend on my parents, for anything at all, so am totally self-reliant. But uncomfortable with it, and fearful of everyone. Ugh. LOL
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Default Feb 14, 2021 at 04:56 PM
  #9
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You said you were behaving like an adult in your childhood.I was too.Were you parentified?? Is that the reason,why you were responsible and acted like adult back then?? Please Google parentification and see if you can relate.Feeling like a child now......this may be the result of loss of a real childhood. Hugs
I was servantified (probably not a real term, but in my imaginary world, it means being made into a servant. I was required to cook, clean, launder, wait on, etc my family from the age of 8 yrs old. I was the youngest of 2.) but was never expected to care for my parents - just to take care of myself so that I didn't cause a problem by being sick, etc, stay out of everyone's way, and make sure that everything was done just-right at all times. All dishes done at exactly the same time for meals, for example, so everything's hot on the plate. Heaven forbid the green beans had cooled off by the time the chops were on the plate.
Before age 8, my responsibility was just to do as I was told, speak when spoken to, and stay out of everyone's way.

I don't know what a real childhood looks like, but I suspect mine had little resemblance, lol. Possibly that's what my issue is. My childhood was broken, so I didn't have a foundation on which to build anything else. Hmm.
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Default Feb 15, 2021 at 08:06 AM
  #10
I find I am still growing up. It's a bit late, though -- rewarding, but hard.

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Default Feb 15, 2021 at 03:10 PM
  #11
I know what your saying. As a young adult i felt fake. Like i was pretending to be an adult. I was a young mother. It didn't end well.

It dawned on me about a year ago i no longer feel like I'm pretending to be an adult. My baby is 18. I actually feel like now would be a mentally good time to become a parent. But now told I'm too old. I am an adult and feel like an adult.

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Default Feb 20, 2021 at 02:13 AM
  #12
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Originally Posted by Toughcooki View Post
I was thinking after a meeting with my therapist, and trying to figure out a bunch of disconnected kinds of ways I'm dysfunctional, and I realized that I don't think I ever grew up. I feel like a child in an adult's body - bluffing my way through life but never growing into it. I have a child's fears, a child's coping mechanisms, a child's perspective of other people, a child's method of making decisions, a child's impulse control, etc. I think I never noticed this because when I was a child, I was very responsible, and had a lot on my shoulders. I was trying to act like what I thought adult acted like, even though I was a child. And now I actually am an adult (in my 40s) but I'm still trying act like I think adults act like, in front of the 'real' adults, but eating all the cupcakes if there's no one there to tell me no.

So - how the heck do I grow up? And what does that even look like?
Any self-help books would be great, or articles, or a name for this if there is a name for it, and any suggestions, ideas, first steps, anything. I don't want to feel like a child in a terrifying giant world forever.

Edited to add that I was diagnosed with PTSD and MDD a few years ago. PTSD from multiple traumas and near-death experiences.
Growing up is a years long process punctuated by various experiences, both good and bad, that shape us into adults. I don't think there's a way "around" that process if you want to be a well adjusted human being.

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You're only given one little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it. ~ Robin Williams

Did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? ~ Pink Floyd
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Default Feb 20, 2021 at 01:54 PM
  #13
I totally relate to feeling like a child even as an adult. Thing is, most of my life I’ve thought that most adults were so boring! Only fairly recently I realized the error in my thinking and saw how I’ve let so many other people take advantage of me due to my insistence on not really growing up. So many of the things I used to believe were cool and interesting over the years have been rooted in my need to have a fun and emotionally safe childhood. Now, I realize that the calm and balanced adults that I used to think were boring are actually the happy ones. So in some odd way I think I’ve ended up in a similar spot not by being parentified, but by being neglected if that makes any sense.

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Default Feb 21, 2021 at 04:17 AM
  #14
My journey has been all over the place with regards to this. One thing, it's not a reason to beat yourself up. It's just the journey. I fall back on that I am highly developed in some areas and not very well developed in others. It's ok though, especially because you're aware and thinking about it. That's a step!

I was on a fast track in my late teenage years til age 21 and way ahead of my peers with growth and making opportunities for myself for real careers. Then I had a break.

My journey was almost my whole twenties I was trying to figure out how to live with alcoholism and mental illness. After college, my peers all jumped into carving out there place in the world and learning how to do it! Not only did I not, for reasons beyond my control, but those circles of friends were doing it together! They were probaby relating and growing in ways that were mutual and responsive to each other. I'm ready to try and grow now like you! However, I missed the movement all my peers took together to move out of adolescence. I just have to be smarter now and rely on myself and my friends to take a break from any judgement because I didn't go for it when they did. That's how I view it in my own mind.

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