Reviews tagging 'Toxic relationship'

Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson

21 reviews

mads_reads_books's review against another edition

emotional informative reflective sad

5.0

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Content Warnings

Minor: Abandonment, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Addiction, Alcohol, Gaslighting, Grief, Toxic relationship, Child abuse, Physical abuse, and Panic attacks/disorders

julleah's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative reflective medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Mental illness, Emotional abuse, Religious bigotry, Bullying, Child abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Physical abuse, and Toxic relationship

glitterdeww's review against another edition

informative reflective fast-paced

4.0

An informative read that can shed light on past and present relationships.  While the author does mention various aspects of mental health and neurodivergence, the book sticks so closely to the concepts of emotional maturity that I felt some nuance may have been lost while discussing all that makes up an individual person. Some of the examples felt a bit black and white, also shirking nuance for the sake of a crystal clear analogy. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Toxic relationship

Minor: Child abuse

kateywaldhart's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, and Grief

glassdanse's review against another edition

challenging hopeful informative reflective fast-paced

5.0

I think a lot of people would benefit from reading this, even if they themselves are not the children of emotionally immature parents. it isn't an easy read for sure, it made me cry many times and brought up some painful memories. equally, it felt freeing to be so validated, to be finally able to describe my experiences and to get some tangible coping mechanisms for the future.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Toxic relationship, and Domestic abuse

hale7's review against another edition

emotional hopeful informative reflective medium-paced

3.75

Really helpful for people looking to understand their emotionally immature and/or malignant narcissist parents or guardians. Doesn’t hold enough nuance for people of the global majority. Most of the emphasis on the book is how to maintain a relationship with these parents, and didn’t spend enough time on adult children who have already done these steps and are needing to move to low/no contact. Attachment theory would be a helpful addition

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship

Moderate: Mental illness, Domestic abuse, Abandonment, Child abuse, and Gaslighting

_fallinglight_'s review against another edition

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

2.0

Too much ableism to take seriously and it got increasingly repetitive that I felt I was not retaining anything by the end bc I kept zoning out. It was revelatory though, that for all their faults, my parents were emotionally mature when it came to raising me and made me feel I mattered. Like my dad hits most of the emotionally immature, externalizer checklists (lol) but in general he was surprisingly attentive to me growing up and not in a manipulative way or anything like in some of the examples provided here. So I thought I was gonna end up trashing my parents but no, I'm actually surprised that they were PARENTS parents to me. Who knew? So my focus went on how this book is so ableist and dunks on neurodivergent people ridiculously a lot, why are people praising it so much? Also, when she starts describing externalizers vs. internalizers it felt like reading the horoscope and she kept referecing old, Cold War era studies. But after reading this part in the book, it's not surprising.

Human emotional immaturity has been studied for a long time. However, over the years it has lost ground to an increasing focus on symptoms and clinical diagnosis, using a medical disease model to quantify behaviors as illnesses suitable for insurance reimbursement. 

That sounds red flaggy to me idk. And to reach her hard set conclusions this dr. has to be super simplistic and conveniently ignores a bunch of social, racial, economic and mental factors. Like I don't pretend to know more than her but the book feels incomplete to me bc of that, but maybe I'm just talking out of my ass.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Ableism, Emotional abuse, and Toxic relationship

akvolcano's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative reflective slow-paced

4.5

Great book! Provided a lot of language to help articulate my experience. Had a lot realizations. Would recommend and would read again!

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Transphobia, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Abandonment, Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Body shaming, Toxic relationship, Sexual assault, Confinement, Chronic illness, Death, Ableism, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Pregnancy, Misogyny, Infidelity, Hate crime, Gaslighting, Emotional abuse, Drug use, Bullying, Stalking, Sexual violence, Sexism, Grief, Mental illness, Domestic abuse, Toxic friendship, Physical abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, and Injury/Injury detail

shima707's review against another edition

Disturbingly useful

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Content Warnings

Minor: Toxic relationship, Child abuse, Abandonment, and Emotional abuse

malachinelson's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

4.0

Informative book which describes emotionally immature parents, their children, their relationships, childhood and adult difficulties, remediation, and tools for success. Very hopeful and difficult book to read. 

I only wish that the book was longer and slower paced. It moves too quickly and lacks deep exploration of some issues. It is lacking on the intersection of emotional immaturity and race, gender, social class, etc.

I read it every few years as a way of checking in with my own personal development as I continually navigate relationships with parents and friends at various levels of emotional maturity.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Adult/minor relationship, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Drug abuse, Addiction, Homophobia, Misogyny, Suicide, Alcoholism, and Child abuse