I just read today, a story about a young woman named Rochelle, who with her brother, grew up with a single mom who was mentally and emotionally abusive to both of them. Her mother told her she was stupid; she told her never to have children because Rochelle and her brother were the reason for ruining her life, etc.
How endearing.
Conventional masochistic Christian teachings will tell you and encourage you to forgive someone else for what they did to you. But I say, you should forgive yourself first and start loving yourself, before you try to forgive someone else. In this case, there is an abusive parent. The children were born to this adult.
Forgiveness is hard. And frankly, I don’t think it’s necessary. I don’t think you have to forgive anyone because what’s done, is done, and you can’t undo it. So you might as well focus on healing yourself instead. You’ll gain much more doing that than trying to do the hard thing, which is forgiving.
The other person doesn’t need to be forgiven anyways. They chose.
In this story, it’s her friends who are TELLING her to reach out. I mean, what, do they really think that dredging up the past, is a good thing for their friend. I don’t. I’d tell her to leave the past behind and go forward instead. As a child, little Rochelle didn’t make the mistakes. Her brother didn’t make a mistake either. Her mother, as an adult, made the mistakes, but instead of being accountable, she chose to blame her children.
In the story, Rochelle does indeed approach her mother. But she suffers each time she visits with the woman. She hasn’t changed. It’s not doing Rochelle any good to be around her mother. She finally stops visiting.
Well meaning friends, right? Well, your opinion is all about you. Her friends’ opinions are all about them. What did they possibly think would come out of it? Real life isn’t about Hollywood endings and even in Hollywood these days, I’ve noticed a lot of movies ending, well, open-ended. There’s a question mark.
Do what’s right for you. If you feel pressure, ask your friends why they want you to do certain things. What’s in it for them? Is it because they somehow feel guilty due to something that’s bothering them!?
I know you want everyone to be happy, but happiness is also a very subjective thing. Understanding one’s background should be enough to let some sleeping dogs lie and stay there!
Guilt is a useless emotion. Remember that. Don’t listen to foolish therapists, like the ones in the article! Surely they do more harm than good.
Cheers. Dr. Joanny
Dr. Joanny Liu, TCMD, RAc, P.Eng. Dr Joanny Liu “Best Selling Author and founder of Extraordinary Sports Medicine, where we help athletes reverse injury, get back in the game they love and improve their quality of life.” Best selling book at: Heal Your Concussion: How to Quickly and Effectively Get Back in the Game Remember, we’ve got two books about healing concussions in Amazon: Knock OUT Concussions, Heal Your Concussion: 21 Days to Brain Health, and Dr. Joanny’s new book, Heal Your Concussion: How to Quickly and Effectively Get Back in the Game is NOW live on Amazon!
