When Helping Hurts: Understanding Caretaker Parts in Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy

“I feel responsible for everyone’s emotions." “If I don’t show up, everything will fall apart.” “I’m always helping others, but I’m exhausted.”

Do these statements sound familiar to you? If so, you’re likely meeting a Caretaker part. The Caretaker part is one of the most socially rewarded, yet often internally burdened parts in the IFS model. In the health professions, they are incredibly common, and I would argue they play a large role in what people usually refer to as "burnout". Caretaker parts often get praised for being selfless, generous, and dependable. But behind the applause is often a story of overextension, resentment, and a deep fear of what might happen if they ever stopped caring for others.

In Internal Family Systems (IFS) Therapy, we come to see that caretaking isn’t just a personality trait, it’s a protective strategy rooted in early relational dynamics, shaped by systemic influences, and driven by powerful internal beliefs. When we view caretaking within the IFS framework, we can explore the aetiology of caretaker parts, how they show up in our lives, and how we support them in healing.

What Are Caretaker Parts?

Caretaker parts are managers in the IFS model, parts that take proactive steps to prevent emotional pain. Their mission is often to maintain relational harmony, prevent conflict, and ensure that others’ needs are met (often at the expense of the person's/system's own needs).

They might present as:

• The friend who always listens but never shares.

• The partner who anticipates everyone’s needs but never asks for help.

• The therapist who holds space for others but avoids their own inner world.

• The child who becomes the emotional support for a struggling parent.

Caretaker parts are often skilled, attuned, and genuinely compassionate, but they are also overburdened, vigilant, and driven by fear. Beneath their helpfulness is often a belief that their worth is contingent on their usefulness or that attending to their own needs is selfish or dangerous.

The Origin story of Caretaker Parts

Caretaker parts are adaptive responses to early relational environments where emotional attunement was inconsistent, conditional, or absent. Here are some common origins:

1. Parentification (aka "emotional incest")

Many caretaker parts emerge in childhood homes where the child had to take on an adult role that was way beyond their developmental statge. So, they had to become the “adult.” This could be due to a parent’s mental illness, addiction, absence, or emotional immaturity. The child’s parts took on the role of caring for parents or siblings to create a sense of safety and predictability. Kenneth Adam's book, "Silently Seduced" sees this as the parent actually co-opting the child as a pseudo-partner, and terms this "emotional incest" which put a much darker spin on the dynamic.

2. Avoidance of Abandonment or Rejection

Caretaker parts often form in systems where love and connection were conditional. If the child learned that love was only available when they were helpful, compliant, or emotionally attuned to their parent's needs, a caretaker part may have stepped in to ensure attachment bonds weren’t broken.

3. Cultural and Intergenerational Messaging

In many cultures, especially those that emphasise collectivism or sacrificial roles (such as women in patriarchal structures), caretaker parts are rewarded and idealised. This has the potential to create a legacy burden, where the part internalises not only personal experiences but also ancestral expectations of caregiving, loyalty, and self-denial.

4. Trauma Response

Caretaker parts may arise after trauma—not just as helpers, but as protectors against chaos, violence, or emotional rupture. They may believe, “If I keep everyone else okay, I’ll be safe.” This belief can become deeply embedded and persist into adulthood, long after the original danger is gone.

How Caretaker Parts Show Up in Life

Caretaker parts often shape core patterns of relating, especially in families, friendships, and intimate partnerships.

Common signs of active caretaker parts:

• Difficulty setting boundaries without guilt (e.g,., I'm doing the wrong thing by setting a boundary)

• Over-functioning in relationships.

• Attracting or staying in relationships with underfunctioning or emotionally unavailable people.

• Chronic exhaustion or resentment.

• Feeling anxious or guilty when not being "helpful".

• Struggles with receiving care or support from others.

• An identity tied to being “needed” or “the strong one.”

Importantly, caretaking is not the same as true caregiving. The former is often compulsive and fear-driven; the latter is rooted in true open-hearted compassion, and choice.

The Inner Cost

Even when outwardly successful or admired, people with strong caretaker parts often feel:

• Invisible: “No one sees me, only what I do for them.”

• Resentful: “I’m always there for others, but no one shows up for me.”

• Empty: “I don’t even know what I want or need.”

• Trapped: “If I stop, everything will fall apart.”

These feelings can be subtle or deeply buried. But over time, they erode connection to Self and external others, leading to burnout, depression, or somatic symptoms.

Working with Caretaker Parts in IFS Therapy

In IFS, just as we do with any other type of extreme part, we don’t try to eliminate caretaker parts, we take time to build relationships with them. We take time to befriend them, understanding their role and underlying positive intention, appreciating their tireless service. It is within the safe haven of the Self to Caretake Part relationship, that we can help the Caretaker unburden old roles, and support them in transforming into more balanced, trusting, and joyful versions of themselves.

Here’s how this process can potentially unfold:

1. Getting Curious, Not Critical

Many clients usually are highly blended with their Caretaker parts (I am a Caretaker, that's just who I am) or, initially frustrated with their caretaker parts (I want to get rid of it). Therapy begins by helping them notice the part without being taken over by it. We ask questions of our clients, like, “Can you notice the part of you that feels responsible for everyone, and become curious about it?” We gently shift from to compassionate inquiry (“What’s this part afraid would happen if it didn’t take care of everyone?”)

2. Appreciating the Intention

Caretaker parts are often working overtime to protect the system. When we appreciate their role without trying to change them, and only in this safe Self-to-part relationship, can they begin to relax. Statements like “I see how much you’ve been doing to keep things safe” or “You’ve been so loyal to this system” can be deeply relieving to Caretaker parts.

3. Exploring Their Origin Story

Once the caretaker part feels seen, we often ask: “When did you first start doing this job?” This opens the door to discovering the exile it protects, often a young part who felt unseen, unworthy, or abandoned. Caretaker parts are frequently protecting exiles who equate love with service, or who carry shame about needing anything at all.

4. Accessing and Healing the Exile

With the caretaker’s permission, we help the client connect with the exile it protects. These are often deeply tender sessions, where grief, longing, and self-neglect surface. The goal is to witness, validate, and eventually unburden the exile’s pain, often tied to unmet childhood needs.

5. Unburdening and Releasing Old Roles

After the exile is cared for, the caretaker part is often ready to release its extreme role. We help it let go of the belief that it must over-function to be loved, or that everything depends on it. Sometimes this involves releasing a legacy burden, such as “I must always be strong,” “I am responsible for others’ emotions,” or “My needs don’t matter.”

6. Inviting a New Role

In IFS (and in life), caretaker parts don’t disappear, they are invited to transform. Once unburdened, they often want to support the system in new ways: being a wise nurturer, an intuitive guide, or someone who brings care without self-erasure. We ask: “If you didn’t have to carry this role anymore, what would you like to do instead?”

Caretaker parts are born in environments where emotional safety was uncertain, where worth was tied to usefulness, and where connection required sacrifice. They are creative, devoted, and resourceful—but they are also tired. IFS Therapy offers these parts a new possibility: that they can be appreciated without being overworked, connected without being responsible, and loved without needing to earn it. And for the person carrying them, it offers a return to balance—a life where giving and receiving, care and boundaries, self and other, are held in harmony.

You don’t need to stop caring. You just don’t need to do it alone from a fearful place.

About the Author

Sean Cuthbert is a Clinical Psychologist, Psychology Board of Australia (PBA) Approved Supervisor, Certified IFS Therapist, and IFS-I Approved Clinical Consultant in private practice in Melbourne, online throughout Australia, and internationally. He provides 1:1 therapy for clients, and supports professionals through individual and group supervision/consultation.