What Do Children Owe Their Parents?

Our first relationship in life is usually with a parent. This early experience sets the blueprint for how we approach people for the rest of our lives—the traits we value, our tolerance for vulnerability, and the walls we build up.

But parent-child dynamics are more complicated than people are willing to admit, especially parents.And when they’re a burden, they’re often one that a child shoulders alone, as the actor Jennette McCurdy did. In, McCurdy discusses her mother’s abuse, but the book is about a more complex question, : “what, if anything, a child owes a caregiver who mistreats them.”