My adult children don’t speak to me – I blame their therapists

[IwantToRetire]

NB - this is not about trans children, but thought some of the experiences seem to be the same, and the article seems to focus on mothers ...

“They have all talked to therapists in the various places and countries they’ve lived. They all seem to speak the same ‘therapy language’, talking about ‘toxicity’, and ‘boundaries’. It seems like a witches’ cauldron of dark forces feeding the whole scenario. The children seem happy to carry on with blaming us for anything and everything that doesn’t tally with their unreasonable expectations of us.”

“[Therapy encourages] people to do things for their mental health, and what’s best for them, and relationships are now governed on the basis of whether or not they promote one’s happiness. The idea of previous generations that you cared for your family, that you had duty to them, has been replaced by a more self-centred perspective.”

Where does therapy come into this? “The goal of therapy is often to not feel so guilty or obligated or responsible for other people’s feelings. Your obligation is really to yourself and your own happiness. I don’t think a lot of therapists have really reckoned with the harm that can be done by supporting or encouraging estrangement.”

“There’s been an enormous expansion in what gets labelled as harmful, abusive, traumatising, and neglectful behaviour in general. I often see adult children who have different ideas of what constitutes mental illness and harm and abuse, trauma and neglect, compared to the parents. I see parents so confused, because they think: ‘But I gave you a great childhood, I’d have killed for you.’ The idea of trauma has become more subjective, so that if you say that someone has traumatised you, then they have traumatised you.

“I see things get labelled ‘traumatising’ or ‘triggering’ which would have, to previous generations, been seen as the normal slings and arrows of family life. Therapy has given adult children a much bigger stick with which to beat their parents, and the parents – particularly those who feel they gave their kids a far better childhood than they experienced themselves – are left confused.”

Just a few paragraphs from a much longer article at https://inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/adult-children-dont-speak-to-me-blame-therapists-3158291

Can also be read at https://archive.ph/3BENZ

My mum struggles with technology, I've shown her how to use vinted and how inpost works and things like that plus lots more. I asked my sister if she could help as well, she said she couldn't because of her boundaries and that I should just leave her to it.

For context my sister is in another country and I'm not so I asked for something she could help with whilst I help with things in person but no.

What's the reason you disagree with leaving your mother to her low-tech life, @Allmyfavouritepeople?

So she was triggered by having a baby about her own mum's lack of nurturing/attitude towards her and venting about it, wanting validation and understanding, and you told her her anger was unhealthy/misguided/not helping? Oof. Please tell me I'm completely off base (I probably am, just want to understand).

Because she doesn't want a low tech life? She wants to sell things online like many people do but didn't understand how Inpost, for example, worked because she's used to stamps and written addresses.

Yes, you are completely off base and have taken what I said in the worst possible way - its hard to believe your comments are made with good intention behind them. I said nothing about her status with regards to children. And I said nothing to her in the session like this -

• you told her her her anger was unhealthy/misguided/not helping?

I had spent many sessions validating her. And exploring her anger and listening to her story. But no reputable therapist would leave someone at that point. Because staying there is not healthy for them.

it's the only circumstance in which professionals are constrained to accept a patient's self-diagnosis and treat them accordingly

But others have suggested this isn't true, ie that (sometimes) the therapist has a vested interest is helping the child sustain the concept of them being the one hard done by.

The parents' struggles are irrelevant, in the sense that the parent isn't the one in the room with the therapist.

This only confirms the impression that in validating the child's perception of what had or is happening isn't helping them understand.

A large part of our life is in fact recognising that 99% of the people we interact with do not view or experience the world as we do. So that stated we grow up from being the child that had tantrums because we weren't getting our way / getting others to do what we wanted.

No wonder some resort to NC. As that practice could only lead to a total disconnect. Good or bad parents will still be who they were, rightly or wrongly thinking they had done the best they could for their child. And the child has a whole list of things the therapist has validated as saying of course if that's how you felt your are right to feel sad, angry, or whatever.

Its like walking into another room from your parents, having a conversation with somebody totally different then coming back into the room where your parents are and making statements based on the conversation with the other person. And then wondering why the parents are looking at you and wondering what on earth you are talking about.

Sorry I didn't mean to be quite so negative but so many of these statements make no sense in how life is actually lived.

I suppose if you see it as a belief set it sorts of work. In your head you have this whole perception of what is happening, but in actuality it is only in your head, as everyone around you hasn't the first idea of your perception.

its like one of those ads for some sort of medicine or warm underwear where a person is shown swanning around with a little heat bubble around them.

Edited to add: Once again I am not saying this about those who have suffered abuse.

And: Do therapists has a code like first do no harm?

I don't think the main issues from "therapy speak" comes from people who see actual therapists, but from people consuming a lot of therapy content online.

My DM had an abusive upbringing and was a very difficult mother at times. In trying to understand it, I ended up falling into a Tumblr hole of young women trying to unpick their childhoods that turned into a toxic mix of absurd expectations for parents and almost a hierarchy of victimhood. It encouraged hyperfocusing on resentments, with no challenge to perspective whatsoever.

I extricated myself, thanks partly to actual therapy which contextualised my experiences, and create a healthy adult relationship with my mother. However, I still see so much content, now on Instagram and TikTok that is again what I consider to be irresponsible faux-therapy which tries to engage viewers by fermenting grievances. And if you click on one, the algorithm feeds them to you, an ongoing narrative of how to blame your parents for all your disappointments.

Sorry, I thought PD was same as PND. No ill intentions at all - please please don't take offence, I was/am fascinated how therapy works and what you do if you are "stuck." Probably because I am in some ways so was projecting (but cannot afford therapy). No offence meant x

Thanks for that @BehindTheSequinsandStilettos I get it now and appreciate your response. No, not Post Natal Depression, but rather a long history of personality based problems indicating a disorder. As I said, the lady was so stuck, but could not see how she was making her problem worse for herself. I would suspect that she had previous failures in therapy - it is not very common, but you do come across people who have a long history of seeking therapy who will also tell you that all therapists are useless and no one has ever helped them, and then when you start delving a bit you can see that, similar to the actual article, it is not that no one has ever been able to identify the problem, or even seek to help the client with it, but rather that they dont want to change/give up their anger. But therapy, at its heart, is about change. The actual form that takes is different for everyone and this is where the skill comes in. It is a hard thing to do with these kind of adverse early experiences - you dont have to forgive, or forget, or even understand why someone did what they did to you. But all of those things can be helpful in their own way if you choose them. Whatever feels right for you, maintaining your victimhood and stoking your own sense of grievance by going over and over the same things will always be detrimental to your MH. And a good therapist will try to help you with that.

As I said in my post about the mother and her daughter, some people cannot ever see their own part in their problems. Its truly very sad, because those people are usually miserable.

Also in another post in MN I wrote something about my own dysfunctional family of origin. I have actually seen up close the consequences of staying in your anger or trying to move on from it.

@IwantToRetire the vast majority of parents brought up in therapy do not give a crap about how the child felt/feels , for various reasons, deliberately or not.

The therapist does. It's mainly WHY people go to therapy. So someone actually listens and acknowledges . It's literally their job, to explore those feelings, to help their client express them , work through them, analyse them etc.

Their responsibility is to the person in front of them, not Suzie the mother of 3.

Would I fuck pay to explore why my mother is a shit mother and hear more minimising and excuses.

Not that I go to therapy, because that's another disordered thinking left over from my childhood. I can't even if I wanted to/needed to. I can barely go docs for actual physical issues.

PS - there are great resources out there, if you cannot afford therapy. But there is also some provision on the NHS (very limited numbers of sessions but can be helpful to start you along the way), or charities that may offer low cost or free counselling. If you look online or in books, just look for actual clinical psychologists or trained therapists, check their accreditation or license status. As I said, in the UK, anyone can say they are a therapist. But that means they can be spouting crap like the spiritual awakening someone mentioned above.

If you want to understand dysfunctional family dynamics, Dr Ramani on Youtube has lots of great videos. Even if you think your parents were not narcissistic, there is a lot of stuff in family dynamics which mirrors what Dr Ramani talks about. Worth looking at. Hope you get the help you want.

as we grow up from being the child that had tantrums because we weren't getting our way / getting others to do what we wanted.

I expect you actually meant to be belittling here, OP.

Bear with me while I reference my own story again.

My father continually, forcefully told me I was ugly, useless, fat & thick.
He beat me every two or three weeks. He also hit my mother and siblings.
My mother exhorted me, as a child, to understand Daddy was stressed, tired.
I did. Understanding his distress didn't change anything.
It did, however, make me extremely tolerant of abuse.
I had dysmorphic anorexia because I believed I was fat.
I didn't turn up to half my A-levels because I believed I was thick.
I married two abusers. My best friend was another.
I didn't realise that I'd never been fat or thick until my 40s.
I didn't realise my relationships were abusive.
I took it for granted that all men hit their partners.

After starting therapy, I hated my mother for a while. She's the reason I loved unconditionally, making every excuse for the violence and contempt my husbands showed me.

She knew no better. Times were different then and, more crucially, her concept of love incorporated suffering. It was more like adulation.

My dad knew better. He was unable to be better because he was so damaged by his own upbringing.

As their dependent children, we had no options to walk away or capacity to help our parents become more emotionally secure.

Your apparent assumption that trying to unravel the effects of a dysfunctional childhood amounts to 'tantrums' seems a little, let's say, over-defensive.

I should probably add that very, very few people had any idea that we lived in an emotional maelstrom. My parents were always being complimented on our family!

Would I fuck pay to explore why my mother is a shit mother and hear more minimising and excuses.

Its not about minimizing or excuses bad or abusive behaviour. Some people may choose not to want to understand why their parent acted as they did. But the post above is a great indication of how questioning and exploring can lead to different conclusions about different parents. Therapy and the process of it is about helping the client, the person in front of you, move on to a place where the abuse/trauma does not define their entire life and existence.

I hope you will also be able to access some therapy and support in the future.

This is a very interesting thread and the responses are excellent and thought-provoking.
I'm in a position of considering going NC with my mother, and also considering therapy (but I can't afford it). I'm worried that therapy may confirm my suspicions about my mother and validate my feelings, then I'll actually have to face it all. I'm also aware of the current 'trend' around therapy and worried that I've been sucked into an echo-chamber of narc mothers, toxicity, no contact, boundary setting etc. This article makes me feel like 'that child', the ones whose mother did her best and it's not up to my 'high standards' (which I think are pretty basic).

'As their dependent children, we had no options to walk away or capacity to help our parents become more emotionally secure'

This speaks to me so much to me. As an adult, I've done everything I can to make her feel more emotionally secure. It's still got me nowhere.

The thing is, I know why. Mostly nurture, and some nature. She's incredibly stubborn and can't ever be wrong. So there will never be a compromise or meeting of the minds because listening to me and accepting it (never mind apologising) would mean she was wrong, and she's never wrong. Even if there's a glimmer of acknowledgment it all gets excused with "I did my best/what I thought was best" (God this phrase makes my teeth itch) so it's still not her fault.

I'm capable of apologising and owning my shit. She isn't.

Round and round it goes.

May I recommend a book, @User543211? It can be hard going sometimes.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Home-Coming-Reclaiming-Championing-Inner/dp/0749910542

Thanks for your grace there halloween and the youtube rec. I just read back my post and I do sound like a rhymes with witch, thanks for understanding (it was phrased poorly) and for your subsequent posts x

I am sorry to here that. IME most people with crappy parents will never get an apology or acknowledgement. Good therapy is about making peace with that situation and moving on in a way that is helpful for you. It may be NC. It may be LC and development of ways to relate that protect you and your MH. It would not include minimizing or denial. I hope you find the way forward that is best for you.

It ran in the family until it ran into me is something I read some years ago and stood by. There are reasons people go no contact with family. It is not to be minimised or glossed over. It is the most horrible hurtful thing to do is walk away from the people you love the most but it is equally if not more hurtful to know that you are walking away from them because they treated you this way. Therapy is great but in my case and so many cases the decision to go NC came before the therapy.

@Atethehalloweenchocs thanks. I'm ok. Not great but ok and managing pretty well, with the occasional rant and brain dump here and there.

@NowImNotDoingIt and @BehindTheSequinsandStilettos - I dont know how to find the flowers emoji, so this.....

Oh thank you op for posting this.

A moment of sanity amongst the cries of “ she’s a narcissist: go NC”; “ he’s abusive: LTB.” “ She’s passive aggressive: you don’t need her toxicity.”

There is just so much aggression and destructive anger wrapped up in a totally self-centred attitude fuelled, as this article says, by the language of therapy. ( I tend to think of it as the language of pseudo-psychology the way it gets belted out ineptly by so many). And all the good, solid, meaningful values seem to be totally absent in a self-centred generational slice of society at present ( and it isn’t the younger teens).

They think they know it all. They can jump in anyone the moment anyone opens their mouth and declare what’s wrong with their comments, or diagnose them on the spot. They know it all, yet they seem so lost. So full of themselves, yet so brittle and broken. So superior, yet so needy and incomplete.

I honestly think this post must resonate with so many. Mine are a bit younger ( but I have cousins/ siblings in this age bracket) and the only hope I can see is that the children who are children/ young teens now seem slightly freer of this generational affliction.

Agree entirely.

I have some understanding as to why my parents behaved the way they did. I've not found it helpful to know this. Ultimately I can understand why they behaved as they did, but they could have chosen to behave differently - and they didn't. Reasons are not excuses.

Like many adult children from toxic families, a lot of my realisation has come after having children of my own - because I simply can't dream of treating my own children like my parents treated me. That's why this "doing their best" rhetoric doesn't sit well. Putting a roof over your child's head, making sure they are fed and paying for birthday presents and occasional nice days out is a fairly low bar of parenting (and I'm really saddened that some on this thread haven't even experienced this) - it does not mean you have done your best as a parent.

But surely the most important thing is they meant well? I don't really see how well meaning parents can be particularly hurtful or damaging. They may have done things you disagree with, but surely, if you know they were trying to do their best for you, you just forgive that, and hope your own children will forgive you too