Did I Cause Your Outcomes?

 Did I Cause Your Outcomes?

As we learned from “Did I Cause Your Feelings?”, it is both possible to contribute to someone’s feelings, and not be responsible for them. The same goes for someone’s actions or outcomes. For example, you might punch someone, which leads them to punch you. If you hadn’t punched first, they likely would not have punched back; we can say you caused a fight. However, we CANNOT say that you are responsible for your adversary’s decision to punch you. They were not forced to fight back, and have the ability to choose their own actions.

The same goes for outcomes, such as ending up in jail, developing mental illness, getting divorced, etc. Kids with parents who are divorced, mentally ill, incarcerated, or emotionally distant are at greater risk of having similar circumstances. But are parents responsible for these outcomes? I use the term “responsible” to mean that the parents should be blamed, they should feel ashamed, and their value as a parent should be evaluated based on the outcomes of the children. They may feel grief, or even healthy guilt, but these are distinct from shame (see “Grief, Guilt, and Shame”).

I assert that they are not responsible. Here’s why:

-People’s responses are beyond your ultimate control. If I take away my child’s car keys because he broke the rules, and he reacts by overdosing on heroin, am I responsible for his actions?

-People’s responses are uncertain. I never would have known that my son would react that way. I did my best to deliver the consequences in a gentle and loving manner, but it still produced an extreme outcome. If I had known some better way to do it (perhaps informed by the parenting research that comes out next year?), I’m sure I would have done that. Even if I yelled and spanked my kids because that’s all I knew from my own upbringing, I still wouldn’t be responsible for the outcomes. Even if the research shows generally negative effects of these behaviors for children, I cannot predict how any individual will be affected. And again, if I had better parenting resources, I would have used them.

-Even if a response is predictable, I have a right to decide whether my actions are just. If you threaten to kill yourself if I break up with you, I do, and you go through with it, am I responsible for your death? NO. Because I have a right to make relationship decisions independently of the actions of others. I can feel sad for your loss, but I don’t have to blame myself for it.

-Many children who are severely abused by parents rise above their trauma to become productive contributors to society. Can their parents claim responsibility for positive outcomes? Is it fair that they could only take responsibility if the outcomes were poor?

-Conversely, should a parent who implemented the best parenting research available with the purest precision and empathy be held responsible if their child ends up dealing drugs?

-Lastly, if you believe in God, and that God is a parent, then God is a mediocre parent, at best, if we are basing our evaluation on children’s outcomes.

But, all this is not to say that parents should not keep trying to be helpful, should not feel proud of their child’s positive outcomes, and not feel grief with their child’s less-positive outcomes. The point is that parents ARE responsible for doing the best with what they have. This doesn’t mean giving all you have to the point of martyrdom (which isn’t helpful for anyone), but working toward an appropriate balance of self-sacrifice and self-care (which will teach your kids to do the same). That’s all anyone can ask. And, if parents find they have hurt or influenced their child in some regretful way, they should try their best to make repairs, but should not feel shame for parental inadequacy.

And who gets to judge if someone did the best with what they have? You might think we could judge ourselves, but I find that many people have an inaccurate evaluation of their own character; they judge themselves unfairly. If you believe in an all-knowing being, I think they would be the only fair judge. So what can we do? Give indiscriminate compassion to ourselves and others. Even if you had an accurate view of how hard you tried, it would not be a heavy dose of SHAME that would motivate you to improve and make repairs with your kids, but COMPASSION.

*This same principle applies to all relationships. As a therapist, I am responsible for doing my best to help someone, and repairing if I hurt someone’s feelings. But if I take responsibility for all the bad things that happen in people’s lives, I discount their agency, feel shame, and sometimes make them feel like I’m responsible for their actions, which just hurts everyone.

So, it isn’t logical to beat ourselves up for kids’ negative outcomes or gloat over their successes; they are ultimately responsible for themselves. But logic aside, you may still feel parenting shame. This is not something people are born with. You were made to feel responsible for people’s actions and outcomes at some point in your life, and the message sunk in—not because it is true, but because it felt true. How did this message get internalized? Who sent it, either directly or implicitly? What experiences did you have where the false message felt true? We can call this a form of trauma, but like all traumas, it can be healed.

See “Why Kids Blame Themselves” and “Are You Accidentally Shaming Your Child?”