Adulting: The struggle is real for kids involved in the child welfare system

As adults, we can joke about “adulting,” the many responsibilities and societal expectations that come with being over the age of 18: working a job, renting or owning a home (and maintaining it!), paying bills, feeding a family, and taking on parenting and caregiving roles.

But for many children and youth involved in the child welfare system who found themselves with these responsibilities, taking them on prematurely—in childhood—isn’t really funny but something that was necessary to their well-being. They stepped in when the adults in their lives didn’t (this is often called “parentification” or “adultification”).

Foster and kinship caregivers are often moved by these experiences to allow children unfettered play and to limit their involvement in all adult concerns. Yet at the same time, caregivers often do need children to participate in family life with certain responsibilities and chores. As a foster or kinship caregiver, you can best support a child or youth with a balanced approach:

Minimize focus on their past experiences of adultification. Although it’s important to acknowledge what a child or youth has been through, drawing too much attention to it may cause embarrassment or cast their parents in a negative light, which can cause distress or confusing/complicated feelings.

Recognize the positive impact of their experiences. Prematurely taking on outsized responsibilities can limit a child’s carefree and joyful experiences, but it can also foster strengths, such as confidence, a sense of being needed and wanted, overall autonomy, pride, agency, and trustworthiness.

The key is to create opportunities for children to RECLAIM their childhood—where  playing, exploring, and just being joyful is balanced with age-appropriate responsibilities, giving them space to grow and contribute in ways that support their sense of independence, confidence, and self-worth.

This quick tip about adultification was written by Michelle Mares with the assistance of ChatGPT for minor editing purposes.