BLAMING YOUR PARENTS

Emotional health is not achieved by blaming your parents for your own problems. It is also not achieved by blaming yourself for the way you were raised. There is harm done with both unhealthy approaches. As a psychologist, if I were to have to choose the lesser of the two evils, I believe there is more harm done from self-blame than the immaturity of waiting for someone else to fix their problems in order for you to fix yours.

Emotional health is promoted by taking responsibility to manage your own emotions and behavior. Unfortunately, this is not as easy as it sounds. In fact, it is very confusing. Emotions come from two sources. One set comes from the Natural Self, where the primary emotions, joy, sadness, and anger are located. When a parent validates a child's natural reactions, the way you are raised is consistent with your own Natural Self. When the child sees the parent's emotional reactions, and is met with denial by the parent, the child becomes confused. They are now required to bury the belief in what they see and replace it with doubt and fear in order to be accepted and valued. This is the origin of the Family Self, where fear, guilt and shame lie.

An easy way to consider the difference between the Natural and Family Self is that the emotions from the Natural Self come from the inside, while the emotions of the Family Self come from the outside. They come about as a result of interactions with your parents, and are internalized in order to survive the relationship to them. Confusion arises because all our emotions are experienced as internal reactions, and feel like they all belong to the Natural Self. I often hear patients tell me, "That is not me. I could never do that..." and feel they are reflecting what is in their Natural Self. In fact, the phrase most likely reflects the fear of an experience that results in guilt and shame from breaking the family rules of behavior learned from interactions in the family. We have an imprint of the family experiences within us, and confuse those reactions with the truth we know within us. I firmly believe that the truth lies within all of us, and if we take the time to discern our emotions, we can tell the difference between real truth and the truth according to our family.

The truth is that our Family Self reflects negative part of the way we were raised. The positive experiences are integrated into our Natural Self because they feel real and do not raise doubt and fear. Parental denial of weaknesses and fears cause natural anger in the child. If the parent silences the child through guilt and shame ("You are an ungrateful child.....How could you do something like that.....You are a bad kid, etc"), the child gives up their anger and replaces it with guilt and shame. Anxiety or fear is the signal that anger is present. When the adult child experiences natural anger, anxiety is often the felt reaction, rather than the anger. Fear, guilt and shame replace the natural reaction. The Natural Self becomes fused with the Family Self.

In sum, listening to the emotions of your Natural Self promotes emotional health and self-worth. This is especially necessary in your primary relations as the connections are the strongest and the battle between the Natural and Family selves is the most confusing. Challenging family members who deny the truth about the family problems is necessary to honor your Natural Self. There is a difference between asking your parents to assume responsibility to drop their denial and blaming them for your problems. The difference is that the accountability you bring to your relationship to your parents enables you to be more honest and learn to work with their good and bad sides. They are not expected to be perfect, only human. However it is equally important to hold them responsible to manage the power of the parent and the potential for harm if you deny yourself. When parents be open to learn about their own emotions from the reactions of their children, and children, especially adult children, can voice their reactions honestly, problems can be solved and the emotional health of all family members can be promoted.