Deteriorating relationship with parents

[lime10]

I'm mid 30s, born to East Asian immigrant parents who settled in the UK when I was little. Close to 30 years later, they remain surprisingly East Asian in culture and outlook, whilst I feel mostly British.

My parents have always had a stereotypically East Asian parenting style: controlling/overbearing, worried about everything, slow to praise but quick to criticise. Also, and I'm not sure if this is cultural or just them: they don't take any interest in the things I clearly care about. They never ask me about long-standing hobbies of mine, and when I share with them something I've made/done, the response can be pretty muted or nonexistent.

I had always just taken it, but in recent years have started to challenge them, which has caused a lot of friction. The overbearingness is annoying, but the lack of interest is hurtful. It hurt me as a child, and the hurt seems compounded now by time and repetition. I can't work out if I'm too sensitive and need to cut them some slack, or if I should stop expecting so much, or what. I constantly feel a mix of anger and also guilt towards them - angry with them for not being the parents I want, and guilt for not being the nice, patient, compliant daughter they want.

Does anyone have a perspective they can share to help me resolve my feelings? Particularly, anyone from a similar cultural background?

Thank you

Mt step father is asian and I went to live in his country when I was three.
I have two half sisters.
Children didn't play with toys, they were displayed behind glass in display cabinets, we had to work every evening for hours until bed (school work), it was all about exams, exams, exams.
God help us if we spoke to a male or showed any flesh. We'd get a beating if it was even suggested, we were seen and not heard.
Emotions were never discussed, nobody ever praised you for anything unless you were an A+ student and really excelled then you were shown off but if you were average like me you were pretty much ignored.
There was no going out, or parties or having friends over, no going shopping without parents.
I came back to the UK to do A levels and quite honestly I am different to all my peers, find it hard to make friends and don't feel like I belong here even though I am white British.
My sisters were lucky they were still young when they came back so are much more westernised and were allowed more freedoms.
I have accepted that they were all raised like that for generations and cannot change, it's too ingrained and they extremely repressed.
They can't change, I'd just accept it and live your real life outside of the family, that's what I do. It only makes then uncomfortable and causes rows.

This sounds so tough Lime I really feel for you. The conversation with your Mum showing disinterest doesn’t seem hopeful, but could you have a heart to heart with her in person? Change is possible if they want it to be.

Thanks all, and especially @BarbedBloom for your friend's perspective. Some people of East Asian descent seem so forgiving/understanding of their parents who behave/parent the way mine do, but I just can't seem to. I don't know how they do it! They're saints. There's so much resentment in my heart.

I completely agree it would be better for my mental health to just close myself off from them (they live an hour's flight away so we don't see them much anyway), but I'd feel so much guilt. I know they already think my attitude towards them has changed over the past few years (for the worse, in their view), they've said as much, and I already feel very bad about that. I will perhaps look into speaking to a professional about some of this stuff.

@Haretodaygonetomorrow that's an idea. I think I'd start sobbing uncontrollably! I remember quite a few years ago we had a phone conversation when my mum made me feel worried/sad about being single at the time, and I cried, and she went completely silent on the phone and then asked if I'd composed myself yet. I felt dreadfully sad about that response for a long time, and obviously still remember it today. I also had a call recently with my mum when we talked about her parenting, and I revealed how some aspects really upset me (but acknowledged that I was perhaps a sensitive child). She seemed surprised, but then said she felt the same about her mum, but that at the same time she understood her mum came from a different generation, and that I should understand that too. That I will 'feel differently' when she's gone. I felt that response really minimised what I said to her tbh, and felt very sad.

Your parents have probably been hurt by a similar upbringing. The hurt keeps echoing down the years, across the generations. It’s really sad isn’t it?

One of my friends has a family from HK. She said her mum never hugged her. Is that cultural or just breathtakingly cold? I have no idea but that is going to leave a heavy mark for sure. Whats’s “normal” for a certain culture could be considered “abusive” in another.

Psychotherapy might be very useful, particularly someone who is versed in cross-cultural issues. It sounds like your parents will never nurture you in the way you would like/ need. Specialising in attachment theory might be interesting too.

Sorry OP - it sounds very hard

'and I cried, and she went completely silent on the phone and then asked if I'd composed myself yet'

OP, how would you feel if a friend told you that story? Would you expect your friend to buck up and get on with it, or would you empathise with your friend at getting such a cruel and cold reaction?

I would express horror if a friend told me that. And indeed a friend expressed horror when I related this story to her straight after it happened.

I just really want to get across though the context. They grew up in a culture that didn't encourage talking about emotions, and their parents didn't talk to them about emotions. I increasingly get why they are the way they are. And PPs are right, they are unlikely to change, so I must change my emotional response to them. I do want to be fair to them too, and recognise their context. If I don't, I think I'd end up just cutting them out, and I would likely regret that when they die.

We're often a lot kinder to other people than we are to ourselves, which is why I brought up the friend example. A legacy of having parents like yours (and mine) is that you become well trained to think of them and their feelings before your own, and to deny your own needs. That's really not a healthy place to be in

I didnt want to cut my parents out either, and I havent, and that still feels like the right decision. I have hugely shifted the boundaries though, so that the relationship is more on my terms, and I dont feel so engulfed by them. I still feel guilt from time to time, but it's so much less intense than it used to be. I couldnt have done any of that without professional support in the form of psychotherapy. If you're in the UK, you can Google BACP (British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy) to find someone in your area. I cant recommend it enough

As Lottapianos says you’ve been brought up to put your needs second to others, so you’re wondering if you can help them as well as yourself. Social conditioning is extremely effective but your parents could have chosen kindness, your mother has revealed to you that she is resentful of her treatment so why shouldn’t you be treated the same?

I have a Malaysian friend who told me that if she fell and hurt herself when she was a child her mother’s response would be ‘why are you so stupid?’ She tries hard to stop treating her own children in the same way, but I know she struggles.

Find some talking therapy, do some reading, find activities and pastimes that make you feel positive about yourself. Find affirmation from other places. Your parents have not been the parents you needed them to be, you are allowed to have that feeling. Be very cautious about who you share that feeling with though, most other people find it a hard concept to discuss.

Hi Lime

re your comment:-

"She seemed surprised, but then said she felt the same about her mum, but that at the same time she understood her mum came from a different generation, and that I should understand that too. That I will 'feel differently' when she's gone. I felt that response really minimised what I said to her tbh, and felt very sad".

Her response is indeed an excuse along indeed with minimising the effects on you. She had a choice re you and chose to do instead what was done to her by her own parents. And as for her comment that you will feel differently when she's gone well I would advise you not to go down that rabbit hole.

No its still no excuse for the ways in which you've been treated; instead of seeking the necessary help she merely carried on the same old treatment that was meted out to her with you. She never sought the necessary help; those other friends of yours are not saints but have been conditioned to accept this from their unyielding parents too.

Every family is a complex network of a whole spectrum of positive and negative feelings – from love, pride, joy to jealousy, guilt and anxiety.
It’s a constant flow of the full range of human emotions. These emotions are connected to different needs, values, rules and beliefs.

But very little of a family system is immediately visible, on the surface. You have to go deep to see families’ hidden rules and emotional drivers. The deeper you go, the more you discover.

Hidden rules and underlying beliefs are the ones that drive attitudes, judgments and perceptions. These hidden rules and beliefs are often expressed in terms of “shoulds”, “oughts” and “supposed to’s”.

On the final level of communication, these beliefs can also be expressed as direct rules of what to do and what not to do.

In reasonably mature and caring families, the underlying beliefs and rules are formed in a direction where the feelings and needs of all family members are taken into consideration. The rules are reasonable and provide ethical and moral structure to a child’s development.

On the other hand, in toxic families the underlying beliefs and unwritten rules are almost always self-centered and self-serving in big favor of toxic parents.

In toxic families, the rules are based on a bizarre and distorted perception of reality, putting children in a place where they can be easily abused.

Examples of such toxic beliefs are:

Children should respect their parents no matter what
There are only two ways to do things – my way and the wrong way
Children should be seen but not heard
It’s wrong for children to be mad at their parents
And examples of unspoken toxic family rules can be:

Don’t be more successful than your father
Don’t be happier than your mother
Don’t lead your own life
Don’t ever stop needing me.
If children don’t obey these rules and toxic beliefs, parents react by inflictive punishment or withdrawing their love.

Consequently, children blindly obey abusive family rules, simply because they don’t want to be punished; and even more, children don’t want to be traitors to one’s family by not obeying, no matter how awful their position is.

And this from Emerging from Broken has stuck with me too:-
"The next time you tell yourself something must be wrong with you because you have been discounted, rejected, abused, devalued, ignored, dismissed and broken and everyone has convinced you that the problem is ‘you’ remember that just because “everybody” says “it’s you”, doesn’t mean they are right. And just because people agree with certain practices in dysfunctional families, doesn’t mean those practices are right either".

I went NC (no contact) with my mother and my siblings 3 years ago. My DF passed away years ago and was the only person in the family who was kind to me.

I only wish it hadn't taken me over 50 years to finally throw in the towel with the lot of them. Life is too short to waste another minute on people who do nothing but make you feel like shit.

My (Asian) mother was abusive, and my siblings learned from her that I was the family punch bag. These things run deep. I now understand that I "survived" my childhood. That is how I see myself. A survivor.

They have all tried to "reach out" to me but they can piss right off, because it will only be a matter of time before the pattern returns. I am totally done with all of them.

In my heart I have forgiven all of them for their behaviour, but I will never forget, and I will never go back.

Thank you everyone. @Lottapianos May I ask what you've done to redshift boundaries? My difficulty is, it's not like my parents are ringing me all the time or turning up unsolicited hurling abuse. I always ring and message them, and (have been conditioned to?) do so regularly or suffer extreme guilt. Is it a matter of retraining myself to build in some distance? Another complexity is that my parents live in the UK (but an hour's flight away from us) and don't have any friends here - again, by choice I think, as their colleagues and neighbours have tried to befriend them from what I've seen - so I feel like they must be lonely and a bit sad, and feel bad for them.

@AttilaTheMeerkat thank you so much, that's really thought provoking and there's a lot to unpack. I have saved it to mull over

Lime10, I used to phone them weekly, but it was fairly excruciating. My dad would do endless monologues about what he had been up to, but show barely any interest in what I had to say. My mother withholds, so that meant long silences and single word responses to what I said. My therapist helped me to ask myself why I was putting myself through these calls. So I stopped, and since they never phone me, that was that.

I visit them once a year, and that feels like enough. I used to visit 4 times a year. They never visit me

I never ever share anything with them that is personal, emotional or important to me. Nothing where their withholding of support, or lack of response, could hurt me. I guess I just stopped trusting them. I feel that their love and approval are conditional on me doing what they want or need me to do, and I'm not prepared to be their puppet anymore

None of this was remotely easy, and in fact, I went through a long process of grieving for the relationship I thought I had with them. This was absolutely brutal, and probably the toughest thing I've ever been through. It set me free though. I no longer feel like their playing, and I dont feel powerless in our relationship. I ask myself what I WANT to do, not what do they EXPECT me to do. It's very liberating, but has been incredibly sad, lonely, and hurtful along the way. Honestly, for me it all started with finding a good therapist. This is dark, painful stuff, and having professional support with disentangling it all is invaluable

Oh, and your parents having no friends- that's 100% not your problem. They are adults, and they have choices. Some parents expect their children to provide all of the joy and meaning in their lives, and dont expect to put any effort in or take any responsibility for themselves. That is a huge and very unfair burden to put on a child. I understand the guilt you feel, but it is not your role in life to make your parents happy

Ah yes, those awful phone calls, every Sunday evening, almost exactly the same. Excruciating, and the feeling afterwards of relief that it was done but scraping my self-worth off the floor.

@Lottapianos - my goodness me. You have so hit the nail on the head. The grieving and guilt was awful, desperately sad, just as you describe. But the liberation once you emerge through the other side has been worth it.

Have a hug Sicario! Yes, its utterly awful. The grief was gut-wrenching, and felt endless. Absolutely worth it though, to get my life back. I'm so glad you made it through too x

Lime

Do look at BACP and consider finding a therapist to work with. Re those people I would choose someone who has NO familial bias about keeping families together despite the presence of mistreatment. Also these people are like shoes, you need to find someone who fits in with you. Interview such people too carefully and at length before choosing to go with any particular one.

You need to look at boundaries re your parents and work out exactly what is and is not acceptable here to you re them. You already have physical distance, you need to establish mental distance as well. You are a person in your own right and you matter!. Again you will have to grieve for the relationship you should have had with them rather than the one you actually got.

BTW my DHs parents have no friends either and there are good reasons why that is the case. They did not want them so did not try (they being narcissistic saw no point in having people as friends) and people after trying (and failing and or feeling used in the process by them) actively avoided them. They also wanted to live vicariously through their own adult children and looked to them to care for them and otherwise look after them.

Lottapianos - I remember you from previous writings (my DHs narcissistic parents are so similar to what you describe, these types really do work to a well worn script) and am glad to read that you have indeed come a long way.

It is indeed not your problem your parents have no friends.

Thank you so much Attila. Your wise words have always helped me x

I really appreciate everyone's input, and I really hope this doesn't sound like I'm not listening - I am! - it's just this thinking runs again what I've believed my whole life.

A key issue for me is:

• I have no doubt my parents love me and have always meant well
• they have sacrifices along the way, for what they believed would mean a better life for me (and for the family)
• they weren't brought up in a culture that valued talking about emotions and listening to children
• they have continued with that culture despite moving to the UK, whereas I've adopted a very much western style of thinking

Given the above, it feels unfair to hold them responsible for their parenting and hurt inflicted on me, as they always came from a good place. Or is that the wrong way to think about this situation?

My friend who's parents are from Pakistan has wonderful, kind and supportive parents, so I think you are just unlucky. They are traditional insofar as clothing, food, arranged marriage etc, but they are nice people. Your parents are just awful sounding but not that unusual, so many parents just shouldn't have had children.

You are the important person here. Your peace of mind and happiness. Your parents are nasty people. Just cut ties as best you can. Distance yourself more and more, and don't feel guilty. Don't let them dictate your happiness.

'it's just this thinking runs again what I've believed my whole life.'

Totally understandable. This stuff takes time to get your head around. It sounds like you have been conditioned to always think of them before yourself, to neglect or ignore your own needs in favour of theirs, to be grateful for the sacrifices they made (which were their choice to make, not yours). None of this conditioning can be undone in the blink of an eye

Try very hard to hold on to your feelings though. How does your parents behaviour make you feel? They have worked very hard at undermining your feelings so this may be difficult to stay with. Do you think you deserve to feel hurt / sad / excluded / shamed / anything else you feel? Whatever you feel is real, and it's there for a reason, even if your parents dont approve. Again, professional support is completely invaluable with all this. It's hard, painful work, so go easy on yourself

@lime10 - I think it is part of the healing process to accept your parents are who they are and cannot (or will not) change. To accept that and forgive them, and to accept that there is nothing you can do to change the situation, means that you can stop beating yourself up.

I agree that therapy and counselling could be helpful if you can find a good therapist. I was lucky with the one I found.

One quote that I live by from the late, great Muhammad Ali:

"I don't have to be what you want me to be. I'm free to be what I want."

They ARE responsible for the hurt they inflicted on you. They just didn't know any better. YOU know better.