Some childhood wounds don’t announce themselves loudly.
They show up quietly in adulthood—in the way you flinch when someone raises their voice, in your inability to make decisions without second-guessing yourself, in the persistent feeling that you’re never quite good enough.
Strict parenting often comes from a place of love and concern. Parents believe they’re setting their children up for success, teaching discipline, preparing them for a hard world.
But the line between structure and control, between discipline and dominance, is thin. And when that line gets crossed repeatedly, the effects last long after childhood ends.
Here are eight things strict parents do that their adult children end up resenting for decades.
1) Demanding obedience without explanation
“Because I said so” might end an argument in the moment, but it plants seeds of resentment that grow for years.
When children are expected to follow rules without understanding the reasoning behind them, they learn that their questions don’t matter. That curiosity is inconvenient. That blind obedience is more valued than critical thinking.
This creates adults who struggle with decision-making because they were never taught to evaluate situations—only to comply. They either become overly dependent on external authority or swing to the opposite extreme, reflexively rebelling against any guidance.
Research links authoritarian parenting with children who are less resourceful, less confident, and less socially adept than their peers. These patterns don’t disappear with age—they just become part of how someone navigates the world.
The resentment comes from realizing, as an adult, that being taught to think would have been more valuable than being taught to obey.
2) Using shame as a disciplinary tool
Strict parents often resort to shame when children fall short of expectations. Public criticism, comparisons to siblings or peers, statements like “I’m so disappointed in you” or “you should be ashamed of yourself.”
These moments burn into memory in ways parents rarely intend.
Shame is corrosive. It doesn’t teach better behavior—it teaches that you’re fundamentally flawed. That your worth is conditional. That making mistakes means something is wrong with you, not just with your actions.
Adults who grew up this way often carry deep-rooted feelings of inadequacy. They’re perfectionists who can never measure up to their own impossible standards. They struggle to accept compliments or believe they deserve good things.
The resentment builds when they realize their self-esteem was damaged by the very people who were supposed to build it up.
3) Controlling every aspect of their lives
Some strict parents dictate everything: what their children wear, who they spend time with, what activities they pursue, what they eat, how they spend their free time, even what they should feel or think.
This level of control denies children the chance to develop autonomy, make mistakes, and learn from natural consequences. It sends the message that they’re incapable of managing their own lives.
When these children become adults, they often struggle with independence. They either remain dependent—constantly seeking approval and direction—or they overcompensate by refusing help and isolating themselves.
Studies show that children raised by authoritarian parents may exhibit difficulty making their own decisions and often struggle with low self-esteem. The psychological impact extends well into adulthood.
The resentment comes from realizing how much time was lost learning to trust their own judgment.
4) Invalidating emotions
“Stop crying.” “You’re being too sensitive.” “There’s nothing to be upset about.” “You’re overreacting.”
Strict parents often view emotions as inconvenient or as signs of weakness. They don’t allow space for feelings, especially negative ones.
Children learn to suppress what they feel, to hide vulnerability, to distrust their own emotional responses. They grow into adults who have trouble identifying what they feel, expressing emotions appropriately, or asking for support when they need it.
This emotional suppression doesn’t make feelings go away. It just pushes them underground where they manifest as anxiety, depression, relationship problems, or physical health issues.
The resentment surfaces when these adults realize that learning emotional intelligence would have prevented years of struggling to understand themselves.
5) Setting impossibly high standards
Good is never good enough. There’s always something that could have been better, some way they fell short, some reason why their achievement doesn’t quite count.
Strict parents often set standards that are developmentally inappropriate or impossible to meet consistently. And when children inevitably fail to reach them, the disappointment is palpable.
This creates adults who are driven but never satisfied. Who achieve success but can’t enjoy it. Who constantly move the goalpost further away because no accomplishment feels sufficient.
They exhaust themselves chasing an unreachable standard that was implanted in childhood. They struggle with perfectionism, burnout, and the nagging sense that they’re failing even when they’re objectively succeeding.
The resentment comes from realizing that they were set up to feel like failures no matter what they accomplished.
6) Using love as leverage
“If you loved me, you would…” “After everything I’ve done for you…” “You’re breaking my heart by…”
Some strict parents make love conditional. Affection, approval, and warmth are withdrawn when children don’t meet expectations. The message is clear: you must earn love through compliance and achievement.
This creates adults with anxious attachment patterns who believe they must constantly prove their worth to be loved. They struggle in relationships, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, unable to believe someone could love them unconditionally.
They may also replicate the pattern, either by choosing partners who withhold love or by struggling to show unconditional love themselves.
The resentment builds when they realize that healthy love doesn’t come with strings attached, and that they deserved that from the beginning.
7) Punishing rather than teaching
Strict parents often focus on punishment rather than guidance. Mistakes are met with consequences designed to hurt—physically, emotionally, or both—rather than opportunities to learn and grow.
Children don’t learn how to do better. They learn how to avoid getting caught.
This creates adults who struggle with moral development. They either have rigid, black-and-white thinking or they reject moral frameworks entirely because they associate them with punishment and control.
They might lie reflexively to avoid consequences, even when honesty would serve them better. Or they might punish themselves mercilessly for minor mistakes, having internalized that harsh voice.
The resentment comes from understanding that they were taught to fear consequences rather than to understand right and wrong, to make choices based on values, or to learn from mistakes.
8) Refusing to apologize or admit mistakes
Perhaps one of the most damaging patterns is when strict parents never admit they’re wrong. They never apologize, never acknowledge when they’ve been unfair or harsh, never model accountability.
The implicit message: parents are infallible, and children have no right to feel hurt by their actions.
This teaches children that authority figures don’t have to take responsibility for harm they cause. It normalizes relationships where power imbalances prevent accountability. It makes them doubt their own perceptions and feelings.
As adults, they may struggle to set boundaries, to advocate for themselves, or to expect accountability from others. They might also have trouble apologizing themselves, having never seen it modeled.
The resentment runs deep because they realize they were denied something fundamental: the acknowledgment that their hurt mattered, that they deserved repair, that even parents make mistakes and should own them.
Conclusion
Strict parenting isn’t inherently abusive, and many strict parents genuinely believe they’re doing what’s best. They often parent the way they were parented, continuing patterns they never examined.
But impact matters more than intention. And the impact of overly strict, controlling, shame-based parenting extends far into adulthood.
The resentment that adult children feel isn’t about holding grudges or refusing to move on. It’s about recognizing how deeply these patterns shaped them—their self-worth, their relationships, their ability to trust themselves and others.
Understanding where these struggles come from is the first step toward healing. It doesn’t require confronting parents or waiting for acknowledgment that may never come. It means doing the work to develop the skills that should have been taught: self-compassion, emotional regulation, healthy boundaries, unconditional self-worth.
Many adults who grew up with strict parents spend years undoing the damage before they can build healthier patterns. That’s not weakness. That’s resilience.
And while the resentment may never fully disappear, it can transform into understanding—both of the harm that was done and of the possibility of choosing differently.
