11 Gaslighting Phrases Parents Use To Belittle Their Adult Children's Emotions
Healthily supporting your adult kids may look different, but it's still equally important.
fizkes | Shutterstock The transition from adolescence to adulthood can be difficult for many parents with adult children to navigate, especially alongside the organic disconnect and changing boundaries that follows. While healthy parents cope with this change with open conversations, new hobbies, and boundaries of their own, insecure ones tend to rely on toxic behaviors and coping mechanisms that sabotage their relationships with their adult kids.
Many of the gaslighting phrases parents use to belittle their adult children's emotions stem from this insecurity and fear. Not only do they not feel "needed" to the same extent they did when their adult children were young, they're forced to step back from direct parenting in an uncomfortable way. By recognizing these behaviors, parents and adult children alike can learn to set better boundaries to protect this coveted relationship as well as their own emotional well-being.
Here are 11 gaslighting phrases parents use to belittle their adult children's emotions
1. 'When are you going to settle down?'
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Holiday gatherings and family events can already be anxiety-inducing and lonely for single adult children, especially in a family that places an unnecessary emphasis on traditional family expectations and romantic relationships.
If you're a parent, recognizing that you might have used this phrase in passing, even with good intentions, with an adult child, consider removing it from your conversations. Not only does it feel belittling to an adult child who's capable of making their own decisions and looking out for their best interests, it can feel dismissive.
They are choosing to spend time with you, so they deserve to feel appreciated for how they showed up as they are.
2. 'You don’t know what you're talking about'
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By suggesting that their adult children are incompetent or unable to make decisions on their own, parents try to grasp at the feeling of "being needed" that often comforted them earlier in life. When natural disconnect occurs in a parent-child relationship into adulthood, it's natural for this change to feel uncomfortable and difficult to navigate, but dismissing and invalidating a child's independence isn't the way to cope.
Healthy parents rely on open, honest, and vulnerable conversations with their kids to navigate this disconnect, setting new boundaries and embracing new challenges from a supportive perspective, rather than a belittling and insecure one.
3. 'You're overreacting'
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According to Harvard psychologist Dr. Cortney Warren, parents with narcissistic tendencies may use phrases like this to invalidate and dismiss their adult child's emotions, trying to re-assert their superiority and control over vulnerable conversations.
While it might be difficult to recognize behaviors like this in a relationship with someone you're supposed to be able to trust fully, the healthy people in our lives will always make space for your emotions, even when it's occasionally uncomfortable or awkward.
The gaslighting phrases parents use to belittle their adult children's emotions often revolve around insecurity, with parents who feel misunderstood, less worthy, or uncomfortable when they express their own emotions, so they actively work to suppress and invalidate others.
4. 'You're right, I'm a horrible parent'
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Blame-shifting the uncomfortable emotions they feel in the face of open and vulnerable conversations, some insecure parents rely on a phrase like this to victimize themselves in the face of their adult children.
When a parent refuses to take accountability for their actions and mistakes, they not only spark resentment with their kids, but they encourage them to stop speaking altogether. If you can't have an open conversation founded on trust, understanding, and basic active listening skills, there's no room for growth or comfort in a relationship.
5. 'You're not making any sense'
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Rather than contributing to a culture in a conversation centered around understanding by asking thoughtful questions, actively listening, and cultivating a safe space for emotional vulnerability, parents may rely on phrases like this to take a back seat in their own relationship with their adult children.
By dismissing their concerns and invalidating their opinions, this phrase has the power to spark resentful feelings and further disconnect, making both parties feel misunderstood.
While it can be difficult to learn to navigate a changing relationship with an adult child, especially parenting from a distance, like author of "The Art of Holding Space," Heather Plett, suggests, embracing vulnerable conversations with open arms and support can make the world of a difference.
Even when it's uncomfortable, find ways to be there for your child, even if it means embracing subtle nonverbal cues or asking thoughtful questions.
6. 'It didn't happen like that'
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According to a study published in Psychology and Aging, a great deal of parent-child tensions later in life are caused by unhealthy conversations about childhood experiences and trauma. When an adult child feels comfortable enough to discuss struggles or trauma from their childhood with a parent, it's important they're met with support, even when parents may not agree or share the same recollections of an event.
By suggesting that an adult child is misremembering or "overreacting" when being vulnerable in this way, parents not only belittle their child's emotions, but erode the trust that's necessary for a healthy relationship to thrive.
7. 'Let's not ruin the day'
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By suggesting an adult child's emotional expression or presence may ruin a gathering or social event, insecure parents actively belittle their adult child's emotions, sometimes without recognizing it in the moment.
Often intended to protect a parent's image to others, phrases rooted in insecurity like this one tend to spark resentment and mistrust in relationships, urging adult children to take on an inauthentic identity to best suit other people's comfort, rather than their own.
8. 'You really should be more like...'
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The toxic spiral of comparison culture is already something many adult children are subjected to in their daily lives, feeling drawn towards external validation and praise in ways that can damage their self-worth and confidence.
To feel pressured into it by a parent only enhances those feelings of unworthiness, cultivating a space where adult children feel the need to mask their true identity, struggles, and life from their parents to seek compassion.
While these feelings of inadequacy and insecurity are often sparked in parent-child relationships early in life, they can evolve and continue to plague connections in adulthood as well, encouraging healthy and self-aware children to disconnect with their parents to feel a sense of authenticity and peace.
9. 'I told you so'
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Rather than opening up an honest conversation about an adult child's struggles or listening to their qualms, toxic parents may use a gaslighting phrase like this to assert their superiority or misguided sense of confidence over a situation.
Instead of supporting, a phrase like this actively undermines an adult child's autonomy and decision-making skills, creating resentment and disconnect that damages familial bonds.
Like therapist Patricia Morgan suggests, conveying this "I knew better" attitude never safeguards healthy communication; in fact, it tends to erode trust and understanding in a relationship, encouraging adult children to feel unheard and disrespected by the people they're supposed to feel most safe with.
10. 'It was harder for me at your age'
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By suggesting that your adult child's struggles aren't valid or they're being "too sensitive" by expressing their feelings about something plaguing their life, parents can indirectly belittle their adult child's emotions.
Even when your adult child is struggling, it's possible to listen, encourage them, and validate their discomfort without suggesting that they "have it easier than you," like experts from the Lartney Wellness Group explain. Insecure parents may also use gaslighting phrases like this to self-soothe themselves, searching for a sense of validation in their kids, at the expense of their relationship.
11. 'You'll understand when you're older'
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Not only is this phrase demeaning to an adult child with their own independence, experience, and personhood, it can be emotionally invalidating for someone seeking support or compassion from their parents to feel like they're not being heard.
Like Newport Institute experts suggest, one of the biggest determinants of parental estrangement with adult children is emotional separation, where neither party feels heard or understood by the other, causing more disconnect and resentment to build up.
Rather than suggesting your adult child is incapable of handling and managing their struggles now, find ways to actively support and listen to them, even if it means being prompted for advice or words of encouragement.
Zayda Slabbekoorn is a staff writer with a bachelor's degree in social relations & policy and gender studies who focuses on psychology, relationships, self-help, and human interest stories.