BOUNDARIES IN COMMUNICATION WITH PARENTS

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

No matter how old I am, no matter how many hours of personal therapy I have gone through and no matter how I understand the true meaning of words and implications, I almost always cry when talking to my dad.

When I call him to chat, I hear the same thing:

“I've seen your photos, have you recovered, when will you take care of yourself? If this continues, you will become a lonely fat girl”- with my weight of 48 kg and with the fact that I have been living with a guy for a year, so that you understand!

“When will you go to work?”, “Are you tired, why aren't you doing anything?” - despite the fact that I have been working two jobs seven days a week!

And I cry, cry in the store, at home, at a party, everywhere, tears are rolling in a stream, because everything he says hurts and hurts me - this is psychological aggression, and it makes no sense to come up with excuses.

Over the years, I have tried various methods of communicating with him. For example, playing along, where I use the "wave and smile" method, and this is a rather successful method that helps to avoid impudent interference with personal boundaries, albeit veiled, and there is no direct confrontation, but this is the balance where the sheep are safe and the wolves are full.

Of course, during personal therapy, he learned a lot about himself, I tried to speak directly how his words hurt me, explained how I hear and feel it. Wasted time. Because all he can say to me in his defense is what he means, not what he says, as if that changes everything. The end of the conversation is always the same - I misunderstand the meaning of the words. We heard about double bills, and so my dad communicates this way, the feeling is still the same.

When I talk to my dad, I’m not a psychologist, not an adult woman at the age of 27, my experience and achievements are not important, I’m just a child who wants support, I’m always just a daughter.

I can be smart as much as I like and understand what is happening, but I cry anyway, because it hurts when you devalue you, when someone close to you does it. And the question to ask yourself is how to keep yourself in this moment, do you know what question most of us ask? How not to offend our parents, they love us, they gave birth to us and raised us, we owe them everything … is not it?!

This means that you consciously or unconsciously, the difference is not big, you do not choose yourself, you choose to be a victim, because let's be honest with ourselves at least now. When you feel manipulated, when the other person is forcing you to satisfy his needs, and not yours, then this is all the violence with which you agree. And if you can't do anything about it, justifying your choice with the belief that parents love as best they can. You harm yourself, destroy your boundaries, do not satisfy your needs, feel not your desires, and in the end you do not live your life.

Building boundaries with parents is the most difficult thing that I had in therapy, the most difficult thing in my life even now.

No one in this world will try your boundaries for strength like parents. No one will break into you like your parents do

I think the hardest fight is the fight with your parents for your life. To take her away, and it is desirable to remain close people at the same time, the mission is almost impossible, but I heard that there are parents who are ready for separation.

How to stand and defend your borders?

The first is to understand that most parents are incapable of accepting themselves, their children, or other people in general. Note that I am not talking about love, because love can be neurotic.

But love is not acceptance.

Well, parents cannot accept, and it is simply stupid to demand this from them, we read psychological articles, perhaps many have undergone personal therapy, we know that there is conscious parenting, that there are functions that need to be performed in order for a child to be mentally healthy, but our parents do not know this and do not want to know. They will always be as they are, a miracle will not happen.

Therefore, you need to discover and admit that parents, one or two, manipulate, insult, hurt, in general use violence against you, psychological and sometimes physical.

It is necessary to do a difficult psychological work - to accept the fact that parents are not as good as we imagine them, to stop justifying them, but to call things by their proper names, and at the same time not to devalue their importance. (Note, not to blame for all mortal sins, but to adequately look at communication from the outside, as if this is a stranger behaving like this with you).

My father is a wonderful person, he has many wonderful qualities, and he is always the closest to me, but I know for sure that he is still that manipulator, he communicates with double messages and changes the modalities of messages. I treat him with all cordiality, but I know very well what to expect.

Second, parents do not owe us anything, just as we don’t owe our parents anything.

This is an axiom, this is a priori data, so just accept it. It's difficult, yes, our society is saturated with jobs and our whole culture is built on this, but if you want to get your life back, then you need to start from this.

Third, only we are responsible for our life, to love ourselves or not to love, to accept ourselves or not to accept, this is our choice. Nobody is obliged to love and accept us, nobody owes us anything at all.

This is tough, I know, but to build boundaries you need rigidity and resilience, you need the very constructive aggression, without which we would not have the energy to act and create our life.

If we stop floundering in the lake of hopes, demanding love from everyone, justifying other people's actions that harm us, then things will go faster.

Do you know the difference between when there are boundaries and when they are not?

Not whether your parents' words hurt you or not, whether you share something important with them or not share whether you could accept that they will remain the same or not.

I want to upset, most likely, it will always hurt you to hear words of disapproval, words of doubt, censure, but there is something important that still shows that your boundaries are strong, that you are a separate person.

This feeling that YOU ARE, that manipulations and other games that parents sometimes involve will not affect your decisions in any way, that your life is still YOURS

When I stood by the window and cried, because dad once again said not what he wanted to say, he once again confused me and changed the modality of my messages.

I was infinitely grateful to my therapist, who came a long way with me while I was building my boundaries, I am grateful to those people who now support when I take risky steps for myself, grateful to my loved one who gives me the right to make mistakes.

I will still cry, but I know for sure that my decision, his words of disapproval, will not be affected. That my life belongs to me. And yes, it hurts me from such words, it hurts me that I did not hear the words of support, but I allow him to be what he is and do not demand from him what he cannot give. And at the same time, I am important to me, I come first, my life comes first, and I am ready to defend my right to live the way I want.

I ask myself the same question, but how to save myself, how to protect my borders, what can I do for myself? And first of all I take care of myself, because I realize that my father is an adult person, and his fears, his anxiety are his responsibility, and I cannot do anything about it, this is his life. My task is to take care of myself.

Psychologist, Miroslava Miroshnik, miroslavamiroshnik.com