How do I forgive them?
This isn’t really a question of whether or not they deserve forgiveness. It’s about accepting my past, that for better or worse my parents made me the person I am today, and recognising and making peace with that helps me move forward. I understand all of that. Personally on an intellectual level, it’s not that hard to recognise the pragmatic value of forgiveness, but the emotional side of it is something else altogether.
It’s not that my parents are bad people, it’s just that they succumbed to the same pitfalls of parenting that a lot of Asian parents seem to be susceptible to.
I guess you could say I was the ideal Asian son, up until highschool at least when the rebellious phase started to kick in. I won a medal in the maths olympiad, I always got the best grades in class or thereabouts, I excelled in extracurriculars, in fact I’m pretty sure none of my parents or my older siblings even achieved half the things I did when they were at that age. I understand how conceited this sounds but they raised me in an environment of harsh competition, and I’d like to think if we were to compare ourselves at similar age or life phase, if we were to compete against each other, I’d comfortably come out on top even with me having the handicap of growing up in an uncertain time. I’d like to think I did well given the lack of example to follow, and all the reward I received was an even higher set of expectation. It’s all just infuriatingly hypocritical.
I’m 20 now. I haven’t talked to them in almost a year. I don’t depend on their support anymore, financial, emotional (not that they’ve provided any) or otherwise. I don’t really need their approval to do the things I’m meant to do in life, nor do I need their guidance. But still I feel a lot of anger towards them. Any mention of them or even little things that remind me of them still evoke intense emotions in me, which has been problematic since I own a business serving the Asian community. Every now and then I see older customers or business connections who just remind me too much of them and I’ll just admit I’ve started to resent my heritage as well. Initially I thought this anger would be a steady source of motivation for me, but I’ve come to realise that it weighs me down more than it pushes me forward.
So how do I forgive them?
14 comments
Therapy can help with this. Learning to forgive isn’t for their sake, it’s for yours. It can help by understanding that your parents themselves were products of their own upbringing and culture which made them into who they were, they simply never knew or learned any different on how to be.
And when you look at it from that perspective, it can be easier to feel compassion and even pity for them, for being products of such a harsh and repressed emotion environment. It’s sad that they were raised the way they were, and sad that they may never come to understand the ways in which it was emotionally negligent, but they are victims themselves of their own upbringings and cultural conditioning. And if you can start to see them as victims themselves rather than just horrible perpetrators, it can be easier to have compassion for them and ultimately forgive them.
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I think framing it as “forgiveness” might be part of the problem. Because that might feel like validating their treatment of you, or pretending it didn’t happen, or that the ends justified the means, or…something. They aren’t your heritage, they aren’t other couples, they’re two flawed people. Maybe they did the best they could, maybe they *didn’t* do the best they could. Maybe your anger is warranted! But holding onto it doesn’t help your life now. Like the saying goes, “resentment is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die”.
Not nearly the same sort of relationship, but I had a friend who basically went off the deep end and blew up our friendship of 20 years. She had her own issues, and I can recognise that her behaviour might not have been her “fault”, but still her responsibility. I’ve not “forgiven” her, because what she did was basically unforgiveable, or certainly made our friendship untenable. But it’s in the past. I think forgiveness is…kind of overrated, like the onus is on the hurt one to “be the bigger person” or whatever. I don’t think forgiveness is needed to move forwards.
Acceptance is different. You can accept the reality of where you are, without feel like you owe your parents credit. I mean for the sake of a bad example, say somebody endured a vicious assault and it inspired them to study the law, become a very successful lawyer, and get their assaulter locked up. Does the assaulter deserve any sort of “credit” for their victim’s career success? Of course not. Just because a set of circumstances or decisions set events in motion that end up positively, doesn’t mean those circumstances are any less unpleasant or have more value than they did at the time.
In practical terms, like with any negative thoughts…practice. You aren’t defined by your feelings, you don’t have to let them consume you or spend endless time ruminating on them. Doesn’t mean you can magically make them disappear either. But you can limit the time you spend thinking about it. You can practice being angry for a short while and then putting that aside. Trying to lock it away in a box and pretending it doesn’t exist won’t work, it’ll find a way out. But you can metaphorically put it on a high shelf, glance at it, remember it’s there, but then look away. It’s not “wrong” to feel angry at your parents. You’re allowed to! But moderate it. Don’t try and go cold turkey.
I can kinda relate but in different ways. My parents got divorced when I was 14. It broke my brother and I. We coped in different ways. My parents made tons of mistakes during that time. My mom poisened me against my dad blaming him for everything. She was also an alcoholic. My dad was a workaholic and never spent time with us. He would also vent his anger at me over trivial things. Brutal emotional and verbal abuse. My teenage years really were the hardest time of my life. At 19 I went to college and thats when the excessive partying and drug use started. At 25 I finally left the party I went to when I was 19. I became sober and delved into my reasons for using copious amount of drugs to medicate myself. I realized all this and you know what? I came to the understanding that no one is perfect. My parents did hurt me a lot but they are better now. I had a choice. To allow the past to define me, and to hold onto that resentment, or to finally let go and start to heal.
Over the last several years of my sobriety I have had deep and emotional conversations with both my mom and dad. I delved into their past as well to try and understand their choices better. It really helped us to connect again. I dont know how but during that process I forgave them both. I no longer dislike them nor resent them for hurting me all those years ago.
Today I have a great relationship with both of them.
I am still kind of the black sheep of my family, with atypical goals and aspirations, in an extended family full of overacheivers and highly successful people, but my parents support my lifechoices and respect me enough to understand that I am the master of my own destiny and only I can decide what to do with the time given to me. No one else.
I hope this can help you my friend. Holding onto resentment is like deciding to drink poison because you hate someone else.
All the best out there! Rooting for you ♡
Someone below mentioned empathy, and I think that’s a good starting point. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to terms with a lot of stuff that I was unhappy about when I was younger. Being a parent made me much LESS critical of my own parents; there were things that they did which were good, and things which were bad. Did I do better? Hard to say.
I think therapy would help, and the goal there is to get a more balanced view of what happened; allow you to carry forward the parts that are valuable to you while setting down the things that are not. As the other poster said, acceptance is probably a better term for what you’re looking for.
We are, all of us, imperfect people in an imperfect world.
I will add as a follow on (though you don’t seem to indicate this type of issue) that excessive emotional, physical, or psychological abuse may lie outside of your ability to overcome in the sense of developing a healthy relationship with your parents (or anyone). Again, we can accept the past as real without treating it as good/valuable, etc.
I hope that you can find a way to make peace with yourself and your parents.
Oh….
best advice is to do something for yourself. Years of looking over your shoulder and fearing abuse has clearly taken its toll. sounds like you had a big argument and that’s why you haven’t spoken to them for some time.
You had an abusive childhood and the old customers give you flashbacks which is quite normal.
Clearly you got to the point where you ceased communication with mum and dad which I guess is good.
You just need a way to deal with the feelings you are experiencing.
SAdly there is no easy way, you just acknowledge them and find a place in your mind for them.
nothing that a psychologist can really do for you if I’m honest.
Sounds like you’re emotionally further than a lot of people are with complexities like this.
I had parents that weren’t really interested in being parents (my mom did well with little kids but it was a disaster once we all got above 10 or so) and my dad worked long hours and watched TV. I can’t recall any conversation of substance I’ve ever had with him and I’m 40 years old and have tried.
A therapist told me it’s OK to both mourn for your lost childhood while also understanding parents are just humans relying on what they were taught and what they went through to raise their children. I guarantee my childhood was easier than theirs, even though it was garbage, relatively.
I don’t have a lot of answers. I’m lonely and miss a family I never had. My sister also is nuts, my brother died of cancer at 29 (and was the only person I related to at all in my family) and there is just nothing they can give me and they never made a real effort.
For instance, my parents are happy to have me come over or even live with them if I need. If I need them to drive 5 miles to see my new house though, that ain’t happening. Anything that requires effort or being out of their comfort zone is completely off the list.
I got married last year and they stayed for 90 minutes because the wedding was in the scary city and they didn’t want to get a hotel, even if I set it all up for them. I’ve never even heard of someone getting married and having their parents leave after 90 minutes, it’s not even a thing that happens. That really set in stone what I am to them and is the last time I’m going to let them hurt me like that though. My dad is 82 and will pass in the next 5 years or so, I’m sure. My mom is younger than him and she made her choices and had the opportunity to do better, she chose herself and my dad over her kids once again (not to mention having a son that already died with me being the last son left).
My wife hates my mom and she loves everyone. It’s hard to carry this baggage your whole life. I also found that I didn’t want kids, probably because I’m still so mad about the childhood I never had and giving a better childhood to a new human. I know that’s a screwed up way to think, but it’s not something that everyone can get over.
20 is pretty young, and you have a young man’s outlook. That isn’t expressly a negative thing, it is just one of those things where we know that your perspective should and will change with years. So be patient with yourself. Like, young man outlook causes us to do things like start your own business and strike out on your own full of piss and vinegar. That is the good part, if you asked me to do the same I would be near panic. Emotional moderation, seeing things from other’s perspective, understanding who your parents are, understanding where they came from, understanding they [no parents are] are not perfect, etc. That is all perspective that matures in the male brain at like 25 years and up.
Having said that, if it is weighing you down then find someone you can talk this out with. It could be a therapist, but it could also be a trusted friend, maybe someone who has personal experience with being in a similar situations. I don’t disagree with therapy, but men often don’t really need to go that far. They just need to talk things out. We usually associate talking things out with women, it seems very feminine in our hyper-masculine macho world. The reality is men love to talk and we are good at it.
I used to harbor some resentment towards my parents for similar reasons (especially during high school and college) but as I got older and went through similar life challenges, I began to understand why they raised me the way they did. I can’t really blame them now as I’ve learned more about their humble upbringings and just how stressful it is to raise a family.
Maybe it’s just all part of the acceptance phase of life. Its taken me about 15 years to reach this phase where I am thankful more than anything. Life is too short to hold in feelings of anger or resentment.
I mean you’re 20, yes, but your perspective will probably change a lot in the next 5 or 10 years.
Sure you’re talented academically, but I wonder how well you do in your interpersonal relationships. Do you socialize a lot? Do you have an SO? Life isn’t only competing for first place or some other award.
Your parents have pushed you to be successful so that you can enjoy a high living standard and not have to worry financially. That requires discipline and drive. Are you mad that they instilled these values in you? What would you have rather been doing instead? Doing drugs and having sex? There’s still plenty of time for that if you want.
Having strict parents is tough, but based on what you’ve written I don’t see anything that merits your “needing” to “forgive” them. They held you to high standards. So? You’d be worse off if they had been permissive and let you sleep in and screw around. Use your abilities and make something out of yourself.
You don’t have to forgive them.
You DO need an outlet for the anger.
Look, forgiveness is NOT a one-way street. There has to be SOME sense that both parties are working towards a central place, rather than one party bending over while the other stands pat. There has to be SOME kind of atonement for a wrong done…heck, even just RECOGNITION for a wrong done…on the part of the party to be forgiven, or the whole thing is just capitulation, not forgiveness.
In other words, forgiveness really does need to be EARNED.
I’m guessing your parents, if confronted by the reality of your feelings, would either be mystified or would double down on self-justification. And I think you know this, which is why your anger is still so intense.
So maybe try a different tack….forgive YOURSELF. Forgive yourself for giving in and perhaps even enjoying their obsession with achievement. Forgive yourself for not confronting them and standing your ground and facing them. Forgive yourself for picking the easier path in life by avoiding them. Forgive yourself for the fact that they’re still in your head after all this.
Because in the end, it was probably the only path you had. Whether or not they are products of a culture, they DID have the choice to veer from that path, especially when they saw it wasn’t working for you. And they’re most likely perfectly at peace with that choice.
So…allow yourself to NOT forgive them. You might be surprised at how much anger you shed when you do that.
So continue on the path. Be successful on YOUR terms, not other people’s. If your current life gets you there, carry on. If you feel you’ve built a new cage to replace the old, tear it down and start again. But cut the ties, but the hope, cut everything that binds you to them, and get to a place where you need no validation other than your OWN opinion to be satisfied with the things you do.
At that point, I think you will be able to look to your parents with compassion, if not forgiveness. Though you will still probably need to limit your contact with them to slightly LESS than the amount of time it takes for them to get under your skin.
Boxing or martial arts might help with the anger. More fun than therapy.
In your childhood your parents are perfect. Supermen.
In your teens you begin to see their flaws. You realize that you are smarter than them. They’re not so cool as you thought.
In your 20s you really see how their flaws have limited not only their lives, but your own as well. Blame gets thrown around a lot here
In my 30s, I’ve come to understand that we are ALL a product of the sum total of our experiences in life. You begin to be able to trace back their flaws to specific events in their lives that changed them forever. You begin to forgive their flaws not as a missing quality, but as an external source influencing them in a negative way.
We are all just human. They are a product of the world they grew up in. If we grew up in that time we would probably be the same. Don’t forgive their actions, as some won’t be forgivable. Forgive them, as humans. They learned how to express love a certain way. It’s wrong, but I would bet that they are trying their hardest the only way they know how. We were lucky enough to have learned a better way, but don’t fault the old dog for not knowing. You have been watching them grow up too bro
I’m 30, raised by Asian parents somewhat similar to what you experienced (at least until my parents got divorced but that’s another story).
I’m guessing your parents are immigrants. If they are, then they have probably seen things you’ve never seen. Hardships and struggles that make them think their children have to grow up to be successful at all costs or end up like that. If Asian parents could trade their children being resentful for guaranteed success, they would take it every time. Those are the many types of sacrifices Asian parents are willing to give up.
At the end of the day, it’s not really forgiveness. It’s acceptance, and after a many years your parents will grow old and you’ll wish you patched things up sooner, because unless your parents are total shitbags, the very fact that they’re still here makes the world just a bit warmer.
I’m not sure if this will help, considering you already understand the pragmatic value of forgiveness, but consider this. Forgiveness is not for them, it’s for YOU. It’s not that they receive your forgiveness. It’s that you no longer allow your feelings to burden you. The next time you’re feeling that anger, stop yourself in the moment, think about what’s making you angry, and why your emotional response is anger. Think about how that emotion is affecting you in that moment. If it’s not helping you, then focus on letting go.