independence

The Idyllic Life of an only child (part 2)

I have received a number of emails as a result of my post last year “The Idyllic Life of an only child” which I would like to share, although the emails were posted as a response on the webpage above. I particularly wanted to share this post  as it very balanced and makes useful points, specially around the impact of emotionally distant parents, in a thoughtful fashion. Hello everyone, I am an adult only and as I reflect on my childhood and teenage life with emotionally distant parents – who, in all honesty I believe didn’t plan for a baby, had no real solid careers each, and therefore probably didn’t really want one; in my father’s words “She (mother) wasn’t doing anything so she thought she would have you” – I can truly say that being ‘only’ HAS affected me negatively. I do not care (but am willing to listen [...]

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Jane: Some thoughts on how to break the ties of enmeshment (part 4)

I am so happy to have found your site. Being able to read the stories of other onlies further helps me to understand my feelings and not feel alone in my struggles. I am an only child to a divorced mom/dad.My mom had poor relationships with her mom/dad/siblings and never dated or remarried. To say that I was and am the focus of her life is an understatement to say the least. I am now 37 years old and this constant battle of trying to exert my independence and live my own life is becoming more and more overwhelming. I have 4 children of my own and need her support but the more support I am given the more enmeshment I feel. My emotions are often confusing for me as I feel grateful and intimate with her but then angry and frustrated too. What advice would you provide for me [...]

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Are only child adults difficult partners? (Introduction)

Of course not! I want to take up the challenge offered by ChildOfonly in June 2012: ‘Does Bernice have any suggestions about how to get an only, of whatever age, to start beginning to gain perspective on life?’ I am always very pleased when I get responses to my posts. I do try and incorporate them in updates on new topics or as a result of further ideas that are raised by people’s responses. This series of posts have come out of my thoughts concerning a previous post: ‘So how does the only child adult deal with conflict?’ The responses received from this post were primarily from women who wrote about partners who can only deal with conflict by walking out, as Asmira found: “It was not until I had been married for a few months that I realised this grown up only child didn’t know how to deal with conflict in our relationship. [...]

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Is being independent such a good thing?

Western culture and American culture particularly prizes the independent personality – the man and presumably woman – who can get on with his/her own life, make his/her own decisions, be self–sufficient, go it alone, beholden to know one. Only children can be brought up to be particularly independent, sometimes by design, at other times a result of being on the periphery of their parent/s relationship. (The opposite, of course, is the only child who is overly protected, coddled and who is anything but self – sufficient – however this post is not about them!) Learning to be independent is a good thing as we cannot expect to rely on someone all of the time – this has been a problem with some Chinese only children who have been so cocooned from the harsh realities of life that they often have a sense of entitlement which makes living with others hard. [...]

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My parents are my life..but when they die..

This is the first time I have reached out to research “being an only child” I do often think about it and I was glad to find your website. It is hard to know if being an only is what has made me the way I am or is it just emotional problems stemming from many experiences in my life. I do however, know this; I despise being an only and have pictured in my minds eye, the concept of having a brother or sister to the point that I really think (for a second) I could feel what it “felt” like to have that. Sounds a bit crazy, but is true. It has brought me to tears. I find I feel very lonely, especially when other friendships OR relationships are not meeting my needs. Both of my parents (in there late 50″s) have health problems that I bear wastefully [...]

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Life Stages: Infancy

Life Span Theory has been popular as it shows us what the expectations and challenges are at different stages in our life. The theory is based on the idea that during our lives we go through developmental stages and that each stage has unique characteristics, which serve as the building blocks for the next stage. If the tasks of one stage are not complete we take them into the next. I thought this was an interesting model to adapt to the psychological development of only children who grow up without one of the significant social and emotional resources that help to navigate these crucial developmental stages – that is siblings. Undertaking in-depth interviews with adult only children over several years, the importance of looking at three areas of the only child experience was highlighted.  The first is the internal world of the only-child; the second is the inter-subjective world that [...]

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What else can we learn from only child research?

Part 2 In the previous post: Research in the West and China – are only children different? I discussed the rather contradictory facts from the research carried out by both US and Chinese researchers. Let us look at these contradictions further and see what we may learn. If we look at China: Poston & Falbo’s criticised the Chinese psychologists for holding negative stereotypes of only-children, as they did in their US research. Similarly they conclude that only-children are at a slight advantage over those with siblings, as they stated in the US. But it appears to me, that research, at least in China, has been politically useful with regard to the one-child policy and of course this is publically funded which I image is also the case in the US. What is particularly interesting to me is the cultural bias all research contains. In China where collectivism and achievement is [...]

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Only-child Challenges and How Counsellors Can Help. ©

The Journal of Counselling Children and Adolescence: October 2006 by Dr Bernice Sorensen An only-child’s experience of growing up without siblings may mean that they are unprepared for many of the emotional and social demands of formal education. Even as young adults, an only-child can find the tension between their need for separateness and togetherness difficult to negotiate. Counsellors can offer a great deal to these young people when sensitive to some of the challenges they face. A recent article in the TES (1) reported that most teachers did not think only-children had special problems. However, a new project was set up to train ‘listeners’, in the Durham area found that 50% of the first referrals were only-children. My own experience of only-children is three-fold. First as an only-child, I am well aware of the challenges I met interacting with others and negotiating both friendships and intimate relationships as a [...]

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