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4 Things People Don’t Realize You’re Doing Because You’re The Black Sheep Of Your Family

You live in the past.

Thought Catalog
3 min readDec 27, 2023
Simeon Asenov

By Molly Burford

Family members are often subconsciously assigned roles for how they fit into their individual familial structures. And for some people, this role ends up being the black sheep. Or, according to the Family Systems Theory, the “identified patient.”

The black sheep is a family member who has been designated as the odd one out. The problem child. The rebel. Because of this, the black sheep often feels out of place and misunderstood within their family. Later on, this can lead to interpersonal problems in the black sheep’s non-familial relationships.

If you’re the black sheep of your own family, people may not understand some of your behaviors. As such, here are four things people don’t realize you’re doing because you’re the black sheep of your family.

1. You struggle with low self-worth.

If you are the black sheep of your family, you most likely have low self-esteem as well. This makes enough sense. After all, while you were growing up, you learned that who you were was not enough. You were often pushed away, teased, or left out by your family which led you to believe that there was something…

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Thought Catalog

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