Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Dr. Lindsay Gibson
Between July 2020 and September 2021, I read the three books Dr. Lindsay Gibson wrote on emotional immaturity:
These books, written for (as the title suggests) adult children of emotionally immature (EI) parents, provide wonderful insights into the psychology of EI people. Regardless of the emotional level of your parents, these books are a must-read for everyone. Why? Gibson kindly and directly delivers clear insights into EI behavior, which applies to any adult in your life.
The first book, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents, describes behaviors you potentially experienced with EI parents. You may also experience these ongoing behaviors with your parents as well as coworkers, friends, and neighbors. Emotional immaturity is quite common once you see the behaviors as outlined by Dr. Gibson. This book focuses on healing yourself first.
As you move to the second book, Recovering from Emotionally Immature Parents: Practical Tools to Establish Boundaries and Reclaim Your Emotional Autonomy, you learn the tools and tactics to deal with EI people in your life. Gibson approaches the material to focus on what you can do (or not do) to deal with EI adults. This book focuses on being true to yourself while understanding how to manage your interactions with EI people.
The last book, Self-Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: Honor Your Emotions, Nurture Your Self, and Live with Confidence, deals with caring for yourself in ongoing relationships with EI people. These techniques are grouped by where and when you may encounter EI people to use the book as a reference guide. If you are close to someone who exhibits EI behaviors, you can flip to that section. If you work with EI people, there's a section for coworkers. This book focuses on how you nurture yourself and your identity once you've worked on healing from childhood trauma.
I love this trilogy of books. Gibson does a superb job of sharing direct context about EI people. She pulls no punches about EI people's damage but gives space to encourage growth and break the multi-generational trauma.
This series is a must-read for everyone, whether you deal with EI people every day or occasionally. Emotionally immature people are everywhere, and seeing these behaviors in others, and yourself, is invaluable for growth and improvement. Take the time, read, reflect, and improve.