Mirror Mirror On The Wall, Have I Become My Worst Parent After All?

Are we are all in danger of ending up like our worst parent?

Have you ever looked into your own inner mirror and thought: Mirror, mirror on the wall, have I become my parent after all?

Many of us experience the weird bounce-back: you know, growing up and vowing to be the opposite of your parents, but then as parents ourselves, shocked to hear ourselves saying the (scolding/guilt-inducing/manipulative/critical) words to our precious children that made us cringe as children.

When I was a mere teen, my father said to me, 'Amy, it is a cliché, obviously; but still, remember, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.' My father didn't often spout clichés, but still I rejected it. And yet, I've thought of it through the years. But my ruminations have included a revision: that the falling apple has types; not Fuji or Granny, red or green, but rather unenlightened or therapy-resistant, grown-up or stuck in childhood issues. And what I have observed is that the 'stuck in childhood' brands of apples fall close to the sour apple parent.

Now, of course, no one is perfect, and there are no perfect parents. We're all two-way street personalities, fusions of two parents. And I'm not sure if everyone has a seeming 'less than' parent. But, in my own sampling of friends, etc., it seems to be the case. Often, these are the parents who try to control, the ones we rebel against. But then, we find ourselves being sucked back in once we become parents. Why?

Maybe as the adolescent rebellion fades, the parental responsibility also rises. We are parents now; our role models were our parents. Some of what affected us most as children may not have been positive, but it stuck. And so, it feels like 'home'. We regurgitate it naturally/automatically. It is a part we have been taught in our formative years to play.

The question is: why take on the more toxic (or glass full way of saying it: 'less unconditionally loving and accepting') parent personality? Maybe because they were the ones that breached boundaries, that got into our systems more deeply. Maybe they were the ones that we didn't want to dwell on because it was risky. They ruled, and we followed. But then, decades later, a strong and seemingly different personality emerges out of nowhere--like a recurrent virus to invade your personality.

This theory of becoming like one's more invasive parent is something I came up with after observing some celebrities who suddenly shape-shifted into different personalities. I tracked these morphs back to one of their parents. But I have also seen this in boyfriends/spouses of friends, who suddenly turn into other people--but really have regressed into the less accepting parent. So---is there an emotional vaccine for this parental personality-snatcher? Can we not keep biting into and replanting the rotten part of the apple? Well, it's all a matter of degree. But maybe, we can see the chaos piece of the parenting we experienced as something we don't necessarily need to become.

It is not our destiny. We do not need to be Oedipus, running from his fate with his parents so hard he smacked into it.

We can look in our internal mirror and think: Mirror, mirror on the wall, I am becoming myself after all.

Comments

[reasonshouldrule]

A very interesting piece. For myself, I have lived my life trying to do the opposite of what my mother did. Although I have succeeded in this to a large extent, I've found that it causes its own problems.

[Polly03]

Perhaps it is the power of the abusive parent that lingers in our psyche. That power showed that that works, why else are abusive parents usually abused as children, continuing the abuse generation after generation? As someone who lived in the attic, while the rest of the family lived in the house, I knew I had that in me and never had children.

[whitemerlot]

I don't understand where all this "I'm never gonna be like my parents..." even comes from. I never once thought that my parents were doing a bad job, and I thought that many of my friends' parents were losers and was always grateful that I had mine and not their's. As it turned out (I'm almost 30 now), most of the people with loser parents either are already or are on the path to becoming losers themselves. I'm scared that I wont be like my parents when I eventually have kids, and that I might be like those loser parents I used to know and not love.

[reasonshouldrule]

You are a very lucky person to have had such loving and effective parents.

[AZBunny]

Whitemerlot: SOME of us had parents with zero parenting skills. They also had parents with no parenting skills so they thought the way to raise their children was by subjecting them to emotional and physical abuse. Also they turned to alcohol to dull the pain of their failures in life. Hence the reason we say 'I'm never gonna be like my parents." In my family the grandkids have heard "IF I EVER treat you like my parents did me you tell me!" a lot.

[movingbeyond]

Cliches aside, it's very easy for us - parents or not - to fall into old patterns. In a recent post on the Home Based Working Moms (hbwm.com) site I talk about what I call "Autopilot Parenting". Really, it boils down to when we just react without thinking - for good or naught. What can remedy this, and may help us steer away from the cliches and create a new story, or, rather, a new navigation plan, is to take time to become aware of when we're behaving in ways that are not in accord with our values. Finding ways to remind ourselves of those values can even be fun - like post it notes on our desk with questions to get us thinking - like "What do I need to be paying attention to today to be a good parent?", or whatever question or open ended statement will get you thinking out of your typical mindset. So, just because something comes out of your mouth that your parents said to you, and that you SWORE you'd never, ever, ever say to your kids, you do have hope. It's just gonna require some thought, intention and creativity. Who knows? You may end up helping your kids more than you think!

Anyway, those are my thoughts...

Marsha Finkelstein - movingbeyo­ndcoaching­.com

[AZBunny]

Movingbeyond: I was going to say the same thing but I hadn't thought of the phrase "Autopilot Parenting"