Therapy for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
Emotionally immature parents are those who struggle to manage their own emotions, which means they could not consistently manage yours either. Not because they did not love you, necessarily. But because they weren’t able to do what you needed and children have no way of understanding that at the time.
What children understand instead is that something must be wrong with them.
If you grew up with emotionally immature parents, the effects don’t stay in childhood. They follow you into your adult relationships, your work, your sense of self. Often it takes years to make the connection to where it all started.
Does any of this sound familiar?
You have a relentless inner critic that turns small mistakes into evidence of fundamental inadequacy. You find it difficult to know what you actually want or feel, separate from what other people need. Your relationships follow familiar painful patterns. You have a deep fear of conflict or of taking up too much space. You carry a persistent sense of being too much, or not enough, or somehow both at once.
These are not character flaws. They are entirely understandable responses to growing up in an environment that could not consistently meet your emotional needs.
What working with me looks like
This work is not about blaming your parents. Most emotionally immature parents had emotionally immature parents of their own. The patterns run deep and the damage is rarely intentional. Understanding where something came from and recognising the impact it all had is different from excusing it and you are allowed to grieve what you did not get.
In our work together we will explore the patterns that developed in childhood and how they are showing up now. We will look at the beliefs you formed about yourself: about whether your needs are valid, whether you are allowed to take up space, whether love is conditional on performance, and we will begin to examine whether they are actually true.
I work relationally, which means the therapeutic relationship itself becomes part of the work. For people who grew up without a consistent experience of being genuinely seen and heard, having that experience in therapy is not a side effect. It is often central to the healing.
Where helpful, I also integrate EMDR, particularly for clients where the emotional impact of childhood has become stuck in the body and nervous system in a way that talking alone has not shifted.
About me
I am Alice Tew, a BACP Accredited Psychotherapist with over a decade of experience. Work with adult children of emotionally immature parents is at the heart of what I do, both professionally and personally. I understand this territory from the inside, not just the theory.
I work online via Zoom with clients across the UK. Sessions are £110 for 50 minutes, held weekly.
Ready to talk?
You’re welcome to check my online availability and book online. You can also email me at hello@alicetew.com and I will aim to respond within 48 hours.
