Understanding the Lived Experiences of Adolescents with Parents with Psychiatric Disorders of Stigma

Approximately 23% of teenagers worldwide live with parents suffering from mental illness. These teenagers often bear the burden of the family and are often more involved with their parents than they are well-being. These teenagers believe that their family is not "normal" due to their parents' psychiatric disorder. The stigma of the presence of mentally ill parents can even affect the future vitality of these people and overshadow aspects of their personal lives and lead to isolation and severe communication limitations. Although research on the children of parents with mental illness is growing, few researchers have investigated the experience of parental mental illness stigma in adolescents. Hence, this study uses an interpretive phenomenological method to answer the study question about The meaning of the stigma of parental psychiatric disorder will be done from the perspective of adolescents.

This research is hermeneutic phenomenology. A study on 13 teenagers whose parents had psychiatric disorders. They were selected by purpose-based sampling. In this study, unstructured interviews were used to collect data and the data analysis process was interpretive phenomenology.

"Hellish life" is the main theme of the phenomenon under study, which includes three sub-themes of "childlike parent", "lonely cocoon" and "one step to death" and their supporting common meanings.

Growing up with mentally ill parents can have a negative effect on children. The results of this study can help shape interventions and policies to combat and prevent stigmatization of these children.