3 tips on how to cope with being invalidated by Asian parents
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It hurts to not get validation and acknowledgement from your parents when they are the people you want it from the most. But sometimes we have to understand and accept that it may not be something they can provide and that’s okay. Allow yourself to grieve what you wish you could have had.
It was difficult for me to accept because not receiving emotional validation and acknowledgement of my emotional struggles made me question my own self worth. It wasn’t until I thought long and hard about why I never had the courage to speak up in difficult situations or have uncomfortable conversations with people, that I realized I had internalized the fact that maybe I was being ‘too much’ or ‘needy’ for wanting it from my parents. This manifested into my other relationships, such as overcompensating for others, overly checking in and helping others when I needed support but struggled to ask for it and feeling uncared for because I didn’t get it. But the issue is, I didn’t have the courage to ask for it… As hard as it was, having an argument with my mum was the turning point that made me realize that there are things I need to change moving forward.
Coming home after years of being away from my family due to COVID made me realize patterns of communication that I haven’t before. I started to understand what triggered me and why. Being back with my family has made me default back to my old ways at times, for example, when I become reactive to something rather than thinking intentionally before I process and respond. It was difficult for me to grapple with because I have grown tremendously outside of home and defaulting back to my old self made me feel like I’ve lost all my progress of personal growth.
I’ve slowly come to understand and realize that what I want…perhaps isn’t something that my parents could give me due to their upbringing, their conditioning from their parents and their belief system and that’s okay. As much as it hurts to say…. I have started to come to terms with not getting validation from my parents despite still feeling sad and hurt by how it has affected how I see myself and how that manifested into patterns of me going along with other people’s wishes and needs because I thought my own needs and wants didn’t matter and shouldn’t matter.
My therapist told me that how others treat us is NOT a reflection of our self worth and we can make a choice of not letting it stick to us internally. It has been a painful process but I’m learning to validate myself and to define my self worth through what I can and have already done for myself, such as starting this online business - Your millennial therapist. I just need to keep reminding myself why I started and to keep improving myself and leveling up my business moving forward.
Here are 3 tips on how to cope with not receiving validation or acknowledgment from your parents:
1. Reframe and interpret their responses and concerns as a sign of their love for you
When they respond with a negative tone or they express concerns to what you said, breathe and remind yourself that that is their default way of caring about you. They show it through worrying about what you did, worrying about how your actions will affect others’ perception of you, etc. Remind yourself that they don't intend to hurt your feelings or make you doubt yourself. When you reframe and not see it as a personal attack, you will start to see just how much they care even if they show it in a hurtful way.
2. Let go of your expectations of how you want them to respond to you because it's just not realistic and you may not get that because they may not have the emotional capacity to do so
As much as I would like them to say things like, ‘Yeah that must be really difficult’ or ‘I can see where you are coming from even though I don’t necessarily agree with your viewpoint’. It just may not be possible, because they may see my emotional reaction or struggle as a problem that needs to be ‘solved’ or to get rid of. Imposing my values and beliefs on them may not be fair for me to expect from them because they probably don’t know why it would matter so much to get it. Perhaps they have retained their scarce and survival mentality - if it doesn’t help, then push it aside and move on. It has served them well up to this point so they may expect that this way of coping would work for me as well.
3. If you have tried to communicate how you want them to respond > their default way and they are not open to it, learn to accept that’s how it will be while also acknowledging your own feelings of potential sadness and disappointment without suppressing it
Remind yourself that your parents are from a different generation with different sets of expectations from their parents. They did not have the luxury to question the way things are and did not have the resources like we do to expand our knowledge of world events, culture and mental health. The way they operate is vastly different to how we operate in our current generation. With this gap, try to understand that because they had different concerns when they were young, they could not make room for emotional experiences or learn to understand why they react and behave in certain ways. They may express their emotions in other ways but they probably did not have the luxury to learn better ways to cope and articulate what they are feeling.
So, thank you mum and dad for doing what you think is best for me even if I don’t necessarily agree with you :)
When you’re ready, here is how I can help you :)
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