9 Signs You Grew Up in a Dysfunctional Family

Have you ever felt like the adult in your own childhood? Or found yourself constantly fixing everyone else’s emotions — even now?

In this episode, we explore 9 subtle but powerful signs you may have grown up in a dysfunctional family. We’ll talk about parentification, emotional neglect, codependency, and the quiet ways childhood trauma can follow us into adulthood.

Whether you’re a cycle-breaker, an adult child of alcoholics, or simply someone learning to trust their own emotions — this is for you.

🕊️ You’re not broken. You’re a canary. And your sensitivity? It’s your superpower.

New episodes drop every Monday at 6AM!

For free resources and healing tools, watch YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@canariesinthecoalmines

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Hey, I'm Shannon Fellow.
Feel everything drama survivor.
Recovering party girl andboundary setter in this.
This is canaries in the coalmine.
If you've ever been called toosensitive, too dramatic, too
emotional, when really you werejust the first to feel that

(00:24):
something was off, you are notbroken.
You are not crazy.
You.
Are just the canary and aroundhere.
That's not a weakness, that's asurvival skill.
This podcast is for thesensitive ones, the cycle

(00:44):
breakers, the empaths, therecovering good girls, the
people pleasers, the one whomade everything okay for
everyone else by pretending thatthey were fine.
Every week, I'm gonna bring youreal talk, practical healing
tools.
And permission to trust yourinstincts even when the world

(01:05):
tells you not to.
We are gonna talk about healthyboundaries, drama recovery,
family dysfunction, how to stopgaslighting yourself and all the
things.
No sugarcoated, bs, no woowoononsense, just truth and a
little bit of dry humor to keepit realsies.

(01:27):
So whether you're hiding on yourbathroom floor right now or
finally sitting down withsomething, woo.
Warm in your hands.
I'm so glad you're here.
You are not alone.
You are not too much.
You are just the canary in yoursensitivity.
It's your superpower.

(01:47):
Let's in.
Have you ever looked around atyour life or relationships, your
reactions, your patterns, andthought, wait a minute, this

(02:09):
can't be normal, right?
If so, you are in the rightplace.
This video is for the cyclebreakers, the ones Googling.
Why do I feel responsible foreveryone's emotions at like 2:00
AM and the ones who grew upsurviving what they couldn't

(02:29):
name?
So let's name it.
Today we are walking throughnine signs that you grew up in a
dysfunctional home.
And spoiler alert, this doesn'tmean your childhood was all bad.
Just means that your emotionalneeds.
Probably took a backseat tosomeone else's chaos, addiction

(02:53):
control, or pain naming, this isnot about blame.
It is about freedom, becausewhen you understand the
emotional environment that yougrew up in, you can stop
internalizing the damage andstart healing it.

(03:19):
You were the grownup in theroom.
Did you feel like the parent inyour house, like the one who had
to keep the peace, read theroom, or pick up the emotional
slack?
This is a hallmark ofparentification when a child
takes on adult responsibilitiesor emotions too soon you.

(03:44):
Might have been praised forthis, for being so, so mature
for your age, but that wasn'tmaturity, that was
hypervigilance, dressed up ashelpfulness.
Did you know parentifiedchildren often grow into adults
with chronic anxiety and guilt.

(04:04):
Author Pete Walker calls thisthe emotional flashback zone.
The truth was a threat.
In a healthy family, the truthis welcomed in a dysfunctional
one, the truth is a threat.
Maybe you were punished forpointing out what was obviously

(04:26):
happening.
Maybe you said something like,mom's been drinking and then got
told, don't be so disrespectful.
Or you asked, why does dad yelllike that?
And then heard something like.
Stop causing drama.
You weren't crazy.
You were just the truth tellerin a system built on denial,

(04:51):
author, melody Beaty, rights indysfunctional families.
Denial is not just a behavior,it's a rule.
You didn't learn what you werefor, only what you were supposed
to fix when you grow up indysfunction.
Your identity gets tangled up insurvival.

(05:12):
You become the fixer, thepleaser, the quiet one, the
achiever, the lost child, but noone asked you who you were, what
lit you up, what made you feelsafe or creative or curious.

(05:35):
Gabor Mate says.
Children will often chooseattachment over authenticity
because to be yourself in achaotic home can feel unsafe.
You confuse chaos with normal.
If calm makes you feeluncomfortable, and chaos feels

(05:58):
more like home.
That's not just a quirk that'sconditioning.
Did you know.
Adults from chaotic homes aremore likely to seek out or stay
in high conflict environments,not because they wanna suffer,
but because their nervous systemhas adapted to high stress as
its baseline.

(06:18):
This doesn't mean you'redramatic.
It means your body learned thatcrisis equals connection.
You feel responsible for otherpeople's feelings.
If someone's mad, you assumeit's your fault.
If someone's sad, you have torush in and fix it.

(06:38):
You might even feel anxious whenother people are happy because
deep down you're waiting for theother shoe to drop.
It's like living with emotionalVelcro, like everything sticks
to you even when it's not yours.
You were taught to minimize ordismiss your pain.

(07:02):
Other people have it worse.
That didn't really happen likethat.
You are being too sensitive.
Sound familiar?
These messages are gaslightingin disguise and they teach you
to mistrust your own memory,your own experience, and your
own pain.

(07:24):
Brene Brown says quote, wecannot selectively numb
emotions.
We numb the dark, we also numbthe light.
You feel like a ghost in yourown life.
This one's hard to explain, butyou know it when you feel it.
It's the emotional dissociation,the numbness, the fog, the sense

(07:54):
that you're performing lifeinstead of living it.
Dr.
Bruce Perry explains when we'rein survival mode, parts of the
brain that allow connection,curiosity, and joy, they go
offline.
That's not failure.
That's your nervous systemtrying to protect you.

(08:15):
You were rewarded for abandoningyourself.
Where you praise for being theeasy one.
The one who never causedtrouble.
Never needed anything.
You had to silence your truth tobe acceptable.
You had to shapeshift to keepthat peace.

(08:39):
Now, you might feel like yourworth depends on staying
agreeable, capable, orinvisible, but your presence is
enough even when you're messy.
Unsure.
Have needs you.
Mistake, numbness for peace.

(09:00):
If you say, I'm fine, but feelflat, disconnected, or zoned
out, that's not peace.
That's frozen mode.
Dr.
Bessel, Vander rights, right?
Traumatized people, chronicallyfeel unsafe inside their bodies.

(09:25):
The good news, it's reversiblewith time movement and safe
connection.
Your aliveness can come back.
Before we close, I just wannaoffer you a deep breath and a
little bit of truth.
You didn't imagine it, youdidn't make it up, and it was

(09:50):
not your fault.
You adapted to survive thingsthat should have never been your
responsibility.
Healing is not about becomingsomeone new.
It's about coming home to whoyou've always been.
Reach out if you need support.

(10:12):
There's a CA.
There's Al-Anon, there's onlinetherapy, there's in-person
therapy.
There's so many books andpodcasts, animals rest.
You are not meant to heal alone.
And just so you know, I'm not alicensed therapist.

(10:33):
I'm just someone who has spentover a decade in recovery
learning, unlearning,journaling, crying.
Laughing, messing up, healing,and I'm just sharing what's
helped.
You are not too much.
You just were never givenenough.

(10:55):
You are not broken.
You are a canary in yoursensitivity.
It's your superpower.