Emotional immaturity

[Redwaters]

Hi - I'm wondering really what this phrase means to you, and how you think it manifests itself? Have an uncomfortable feeling it applies to me.

Someone who freaks out / withdraws when their partner or a close friend cries is emotionally immature, in my opinion. As are people who cannot identify their own emotions, for example those who act angry when they are actually ashamed or feeling insecure.

Why do you blame your Dad?

It must be hard to feel settled and make new friends every time you move. Are you happy with your job now, and in that career?

I think I am emotionally immature. I haven't managed relationships well in my younger years, also long after I was an adult in every other way. I felt for a long time that there was something wrong with me, but in the last year or so, I have looked back and realised a lot of my behaviour has been immature rather than weird in any way.

There have been a lot of different things going on in my life which I feel have made me grow up emotionally over the last couple of years, so I feel that I am much more mature in my behaviour and responses now than before. I am still aware of it though. I have no idea why it has taken me so long to grow up emotionally when I have been a well-functioning adult in other areas of life for almost a couple of decades.

I blamed him for leaving - that upset me a lot.

Thank you for letting me 'talk'.

Thanks. How do I do that? :)

Seeing as you are reflecting on yourself shows a higher level of consciousness/maturity - IMO.
Talk to a professional if you feel that this is impacting on your life.

Contrary to received wisdom, I actually think it takes a great deal of emotional maturity (and courage) to blame your parents instead of yourself.

As pp have said, you sound like you have a decent level of self awareness, which not everyone is blessed with. What if your parents were to blame for setting up certain psychological patterns in you? What if your behaviour as a young adult was a pretty much inevitable result of the things you learned on an unconscious level from the way they treated you?

Our unconscious is way, way more powerful than many people realise, often much more so than our conscious mind, and nobody shapes our unconscious the way our parents do.

It's still your responsibility to deal with the legacy though of course. If you were just saying "my parents made me like this and there's nothing I can or will do about it" then that would be emotionally immature, yes. But I don't get the sense that's what you're saying. You sound like someone whho does want to take responsibility for herself but is just a bit stymied, and, I would guess, struggling with a rather negative sense of yourself. More negative than you deserve!

Thanks. That's really kind.

Hi everyone - we'll just move this over to relationships now for the OP.

Thanks BeccaMumsnet

Hello OP,

When I think of emotional immaturity, I tend to think of people who can't fulfil their own emotional needs and instead rely on others to do that.

EG the woman who says "I'll have a baby because I want someone to love me."
Or the man who says "My wife isn't making me the centre of her universe so I'll have an affair."
Or the woman who says "I've had a stressful day at work so I'll shout at my children to offload the stress."
Or the person who says "I haven't got a boyfriend/girlfriend and that's why I'm unhappy."

I don't think you sound immature (emotionally or in other ways.) You do sound a bit afraid of being tied down and that's probably related to your parents splitting. Counselling is expensive - but it's also an investment in yourself, and one that you deserve!

BTW I'm 42 and still cry at Disney films

Well, that's uncomfortable reading to a point as I do see myself there.

My parents didn't split, sorry - my father left after my mother's death, leaving me with my grandmother which was tricky. I felt very rejected.

OMG that's dreadful! That's not just rejection, that's complete abandonment - one way or another you were abandoned by both your parents at the same time, although obviously your mother didn't choose to do so, but for your father to choose that in those circumstances... You must have felt so unloved/unlovable.

No wonder you move around all the time. If you don't get too close to people, they can't abandon you.

pocket makes a good point, counselling is an investment in yourself. You must be carrying a lot of hurt inside, and quite naturally so. None of what happened was because of you, your father made that choice because of his inadequacies as a parent and as a human being.

I know exactly what you mean about an investment in myself, but just the same, if I am honest, I do feel I reached a point with my counsellor which was really helpful but couldn't go beyond that (I hope that makes some sense!)

I try, now, as an adult, not to be too harsh on my dad. He was lost in grief himself (I say this to explain rather than excuse.)

Unfortunately though it did influence a lot of my behaviour afterwards. For one thing, I became pretty overweight in my late teens due to never having had stable family meals and as a result lacked confidence. I also became something of a spendthrift to compensate for not feeling loved or pretty or girly - if I could buy myself the sort of thing a parent might buy me as a gift or the sort of thing an ordinary pretty girl might buy for a night out - well, I was that person. I didn't wear half the stuff I bought.

I did lose weight, eventually, but it didn't change me.

Gosh, OP, that must have been so hurtful to go through. Yes I understand your dad may have done what he thought was best at the time and was undoubtedly not making very good decisions in his grief, but it's horrible to think of you feeling so abandoned. And it makes sense where those bad habits may have arisen.

I suppose the question is, are there things about yourself/your life that you are unhappy with and want to change?

It's not necessarily a bad thing to want to be footloose and fancy free - however if you do want to have children at some point, then you probably need to start making some changes to facilitate that.

Your big advantage is that you seem to have a lot of self-awareness, and therefore are in a much better position to plan your life and self-development than someone who just goes blundering through not talking about myself at all

To me emotional immaturity is caused by not learning, or not wanting to learn, from past experiences. I think it means the person stays crass, needy and self-absorbed.

Is the reason you're asking that some has described you in this way? If so, the fact that you're wondering probably means it's not true!

"Reward myself with 'treats.'"

Nothing wrong with treating yourself. I'll bet even David Cameron buys himself some wine gums if he wins the election.

Thanks. No, no ones accused me of emotional immaturity - I suspect most would say the opposite.

I wish I could explain what I meant. It's more who I was than who I am, yes who I was haunts me still.

Cheap talk eg huge romantic gestures but not able to do "for better for worse" stuff.
Always blaming others or feeling entitled (lack of give and take).

Those would be my big 2.