Denial - Page 3

quote: With the understanding that I have gained over these past years, I certainly appreciate that my parents kept me physically well and alive, and have voiced this appreciation to them. But the fact of the matter is that parents have a responsibility to us, to make us feel loved and understand when we are young, that we have worth, as individual beings in our own right, which is just as important as keeping a child physically well. Children should be given emotional nourishment also.
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It seems your only grateful for your physical survival, they have actually taught you more than you know. Namely how to not live life in a narrow corridor of thought, like them. I think its good that you at least keep a superficial relationship for now, but having to many superficial relationships can be unbearable. As for dwelling on the past, the longer you stare into the abyss the longer the abyss stares into you. Its ok to learn from it but to dwell just makes things worse and wears you down.

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The thing that will make them respect you is if you go out there and succed in life, for there are losers and winners, them being the pessimists will tell you how you can lose, but if you ignore them or use there help to win then they will respect you.
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It sounds like you're assuming that what they think makes me successful and what I think makes me successful, is completely the same. And since this couldn't be further from the truth, I'm going to say that gaining my parents respect in this manner is certainly nowhere near the top of my agenda. It's not even on the list.
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I meant to say USE your parents resources ($$) if you can for college or any other venture, if you can. Whatever it is that you think makes you succesful I know not. For me it would be stablity in my financial life and happiness and love in everythingthing else, said in the broadest terms I can express.

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It seems your only grateful for your physical survival, they have actually taught you more than you know. Namely how to not live life in a narrow corridor of thought, like them.

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Let me respond to this with something taken from one of my earlier posts.

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these lessons that they teach us without even realizing, depends on our own perceptiveness and ability to learn from them. It is with no thanks to them, that we are able to pick up and understand the mistakes that they have made, especially when they themselves do not acknowledge it.

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They didn't directly teach me what I know now, and I think it is false to say that someone has taught you something through their own negative actions, so you should be thankful to them for that. Of course we learn things from all negative experiences because we actually have to. Our lives and the quality of those lives, actually depend on our ability to do so.
I for one, started contemplating suicide when I was 12, and I don't think it is appropriate for someone to make any individual feel that way. It just illustrates the precariousness of the whole situation. You either learn from it or you don't. If you learn from the negative actions of someone else, it is only yourself you have to thank.

So, while it's true that circumstances with my parents have made me who I am today, I don't think I should appreciate my parents for taking abusive actions. The fact is, the abuse did more damage to me as a child, than good, even now I am still learning how to love and accept myself. My parents did only give me physical nourishment. Emotionally they'd do innapproriate things, like weigh me down with their personal dreams and berate me when I failed to meet their expectations. They never taught me how to accept myself, or that I was even worthy of acceptance.

I think it is fair & logical for me to not want to have to feel gratitude toward my parents for their negative actions, because rejecting such actions is part of how I am overcoming them. If someone punches you in the face without good reason, you're not going to turn around and thank them.
All of this doesn't mean that I don't love them because I do, and I feel appreciation toward them them for whatever I can. It simply means that I am asserting that they did me an injustice. And quite simply, they did. I think if someone important in your life, doesn't acknowledge that they mistreated you, you have to be able to assert it yourself so that you can move past it. And so I am here, figuring out how to get myself past all of this, without the dwelling. This, I think I'm achieving to some degree.