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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think that if you’re over 30 and still blaming your parents for everything, it’s time to grow up?

85 replies

DenimHare · 14/03/2025 09:44

At some point, your trauma isn’t your parents fault anymore - it’s just your personality.

OP posts:
NewMarmiteJar · 14/03/2025 23:47

Disagree. However it is up to us to do our absolute best to re-wire our emotional responses if we can and break the cycle of abuse.

Lilyhatesjaz · 15/03/2025 00:07

I was brought up by parents who mostly did a good job, they got some things wrong but they loved me and my siblings very much and always did their best for us.
Some things they did get wrong and some of these have affected my personality but I can get over any of this because they actually did their best.
I think this is very different from families where abuse and neglect happened, I don't think this can really be got over at any age it is always there in the background I have a friend in her 70s who is still suffering from mental health issues stemming from childhood.

thepariscrimefiles · 15/03/2025 07:35

BlondiePortz · 14/03/2025 09:50

So i presume people posting on here are prepared for their children to keep on blaming them?

If I had been physically, emotionally or sexually abusive to my children I wouldn't expect them to just 'get over it'.

However, if I were the sort of parent that did those awful things, I probably would totally downplay them and dismiss the trauma that it caused in my children and maybe I would tell them that it's time to grow up.

Agix · 15/03/2025 08:01

My trauma has become my personality and self - that's part of the problem with actual trauma from abuse and neglect. Left untreated, it does absolutely become part of who you are. Uncontrollably. That's why it's an illness.

I have panic attacks over nothing - I'm not a worrier, I won't be worried about a god damn thing, but I'll still have panic attacks and the physical symptoms and feelings of anxiety attacks where there is absolutely nothing wrong. I'll dissociate randomly too, lose whole days, feel like I'm living in a dream world and losing my grip on reality.

Not because anything has happened, but because cause my brain chemistry is now fucked. A whole childhood and most of adulthood living in fight or flight mode has messed up how my brain operates.

I can't control it. It is happening in my brain, but I can't just stop it happening. It's not a choice. I live a very gentle, nice, secure and safe life now... But I'll still wake up with night terrors and panic attacks.

I'm in treatment for it, and have been told it can be reversed but will take actually participating in the psychodynamic therapy and a lot of time. I've had many rounds of CBT before which havnt done anything ... Because it's not a problem with how I'm thinking. I'll think and feel perfectly safe, but somewhere subconscious in my brain thinks otherwise apparently. It's too engrained, it's how my brain as been moulded.

It's still my parents fault. They can't fix it for me, that's up to me and my doctors, but it's still their fault.

And possibly undiagnosed autism maybe but we don't know yet, havnt been assessed yet, but it's been asserted by my medical professionals that I could be autistic. So that on top of abusive and neglectful parents.

maddening · 15/03/2025 08:06

True abuse and neglect - yabu

Where it is just a personality thing - yanbu

LushLemonTart · 15/03/2025 11:57

I've reported this thread as I think the op is nasty and goady. To me this could be very triggering.

PoppyRoseBucky · 15/03/2025 12:43

TheAmusedQuail · 14/03/2025 09:56

So you're making totally different mistakes. Have no doubt, you kids will claim damage of some type. Do you want to pay for it, forever? Because that is the example you're setting your children.

I think there's a massive difference between making normal mistakes and being a genuinely shitty parent, though, isn't there?

Most people aren't holding normal parenting mistakes over their parents heads for generations, and most people on this thread know that. Everyone makes mistakes and no one is perfect.

My parents made mistakes, but I'm not damaged by them. However, if my parents were neglectful, emotionally, physically or mentally abusive, I'm not sure I could say the same.

I can't believe there are people pretending to not know the difference.

thepariscrimefiles · 15/03/2025 15:56

LushLemonTart · 15/03/2025 11:57

I've reported this thread as I think the op is nasty and goady. To me this could be very triggering.

I think this thread is targetted at the sort of goady fuckers that leap onto every thread with helpful comments such as 'get a grip', 'grow up' and, my personal favourite, 'you seem like hard work'.

Mary46 · 15/03/2025 15:59

Not always op. Some people here had awful childhoods. Its like saying oh my mum is difficult/nasty. If you havent experienced that you have no idea what its like.

TheAmusedQuail · 17/03/2025 20:42

PoppyRoseBucky · 15/03/2025 12:43

I think there's a massive difference between making normal mistakes and being a genuinely shitty parent, though, isn't there?

Most people aren't holding normal parenting mistakes over their parents heads for generations, and most people on this thread know that. Everyone makes mistakes and no one is perfect.

My parents made mistakes, but I'm not damaged by them. However, if my parents were neglectful, emotionally, physically or mentally abusive, I'm not sure I could say the same.

I can't believe there are people pretending to not know the difference.

I know people IRL who had completely normal childhoods who are holding stuff over their parents heads in adulthood. More than one actually. I genuinely (in a non-goady way) think it's a bit of an epidemic. I think it runs alongside the 'going no contact' epidemic too.

I do appreciate that others disagree with this POV of course.

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