Adults - forgiving your parents

[Unsureaboutforgiving]

Before I start, I just want to say I don't believe my parents were the sole (or even partial) cause of my ED.

I had a very severe ED - anorexia, becoming bulimia - for well over a decade, starting at around 15 and culminating in adult treatment at the Maudsley. It completely ruined my teens and my twenties, despite being a high achiever on the surface. (Think finishing uni and holding down a job whilst vomiting 12 times per day and thinking about nothing but food etc.). I was suicidal multiple times in my twenties and still have precarious mental health (well hidden). I never blamed my parents, in fact I stopped telling them anything after the incidents detailed below but now I have my own children, I cant get over their actions towards me.

• never took me to seek help from a doctor aged 15, despite becoming aware that I definitely had an ED and being approached multiple times by concerned third parties asking if I was OK.
• I tried to ask them for help when I was really struggling again at uni with bulimia. They made some sympathetic noises but did nothing.
• told then a GP had prescribed fluoextine (as a treatment for bulimia) whilst at uni. They said it was ridiculous and they didn't see someone who was depressed.
• knew I was going into treatment at the Maudsley but there was seemingly no recognition that I had continued to suffer deeply for over a decade.
• told them about the debt I got myself into buying food to binge on. No reaction (I was 18).

I'm really struggling to get over this apparent lack of care now I have my own children. My parents think I'm high achieving and they've done 'well'. I can barely bring myself to be around them right now. I feel so sad for how alone I was during that awful time. Does anyone have any similar experiences or can offer a different perspective- maybe I was expecting too much?

Hi.
I know I'm late to the party but your post 100% summed up how I feel about my parents.
I managed to hide my ED for years from them and when I finally told my mum (after she made a comment about how I shouldn't be eating cake with thighs like mine) she said "I always knew there was an issue with food". Yet she never said anything and continued to comment on my weight.
I asked her why and she said she just didn't know what to do. I can understand that but to continue making comments on my weight is unforgivable.

Like you I now have my own children and I just can't imagine ever treating them the same.

My relationship with my parents is strained. I tolerate them for the sake of my children (who quite like them) but I will never let them look after my children unsupervised as I don't trust either of them after my mum told my LO that she had chubby legs. My LO was 1 at the time and obviously had no idea but for me it was just confirmation that my mum hasn't listened to anything I've ever told her about my ED.

As a sibling of someone with ED (and other MH issues):
My sibling fully puts the blame on our parents for doing nothing. Always on about how they ruined her life for ever.
My (and my other siblings) perception is that (especially) my mother maybe didn't give much "useful" help as she didn't know how (this started in late 70s) but she was absolutely devastated by what was happening to my sibling. All her energy and attention was always on my sibling.
I am bitter towards my sibling and have more recently broken all contact with her as I felt she was a bad influence on my children as well.

How can your parents not be at least the partial the cause of your eating disorder.....even if they didnt have issues around food/weight issues/dieting etc around you, their dismissive and uncaring attitude very likely caused you mental health problems such as emotional insecurity which are central to EDs.

Becoming a parent definitely makes you question and see the flaws in your own experiences of being parented.

You say no chance your parents have suffered an ED but then you say they are extremely focussed on fitness and exercise - which can be just another manifestation of the same thing. Same coin, different sides. You’ll often find EDs going through families like this.

We have EDs running through our family like a horrible thread from my great grandmother right down to my daughter. I tried so hard to break the chain so my children didn’t suffer in the same way but it’s very difficult and both have had their battles. Like you, I blamed my parents for their stiff upper lip, don’t talk about it, pretend I’m fine approach. I think they thought if they ignored it it would go away, as was the advice in those days. My mother even went so far as to say to me, when I tired to confide in her, not to be so silly because we don’t have things like that in our family! Looking back I think she was protecting herself - and thought she was protecting me - from something she couldn’t handle facing.

But now history repeats itself and my daughter is on her second stint of intensive therapy for anorexia. And it’s hit home to me what an impossible task it is to get right when caring for a loved one in this position - even though I’ve been there myself. For one thing, it’s incredibly triggering, and on top of that you are utterly terrified of your actions making things worse. I’ve done my best, I hope I’ve been a listening ear, ive tried really hard to be the best support I can but I know I’ve got it wrong at times. I’ve at times not known whether to make her eat or whether that would make it worse. I’ve not known whether to give credence to her saying she is fat or tell her that she’s skin and bone and have her think I am discounting her feelings. It’s a horrible tightrope to walk - and I’ve had anorexia myself so I have a better understanding than most parents.

The ED clinic is saying research shows at least a genetic predisposition. I nearly cried when DD told me that as, as a parent you can’t help taking the blame and feeling a failure. Your parents may have been unable to deal with those feelings.

it does sound as though your parents should and could have been better in their dealings with you and I’m not excusing this. But you are very angry at them and I hope you can be brave enough to explore this with your therapist as I think working through it will help you gain insight. Therapy has helped me so much, to forgive both my parents in their dealings with me, and to forgive myself with my own child. Because neither end is easy.