When a member of the family is addicted, it can negatively affect the entire family. The addicted family member might do some things that other members do not agree with. Hence, this might cause resentment or bad blood between both parties.
If a child is addicted, there are chances that their parents contributed to their condition in one way or the other. Parents who are intentional about the health and well-being of their children are likely to know when their children are showing tendencies of addiction.
Here are some of the ways on how parents might enable addiction in children.
Make excuses or lie about their behavior
One of the ways that parents use to enable addiction in their children is by lying or making excuses for them. If their child does something, one of the parents might shield them from the other parent to avoid getting disciplined.
When parents continue to do this, they are encouraging their children to continue some of these habits because they cannot get punished for it.
Allow them to neglect responsibilities
Sometimes, children might need to carry out some responsibilities which might be important to their health and well-being. But some parents might prevent them from shouldering such responsibilities.
For instance, if a child is supposed to undergo physical exercise, and they give certain excuses, some parents might let it slide to avoid offending them.
Blame their addiction on something else
Another way to know that parents can be enablers when it comes to addiction in children is when they blame their condition on someone or something else.
Instead of finding a solution for them, they will keep playing the blame game. The parents might even blame one another for their child’s addiction.
Inability to follow up with boundaries
Children can get addicted when their parents refuse to follow up on setting boundaries. For instance, a child can get addicted to games when their parents set some measures in place to control their screen time, and they don’t follow up on it.