Parent vs. Child

A twisted person looking in a funhouse mirror sees a straight line. Millions of them saw a straight-up man in crooked Trump. And a skewed husband and wife have given their 17-year-old daughter a lifelong depression. She is the America-born child of “old school” Indian parents, if you can allow one’s early forties to be “old school.” Their yelling is daily, triggered by their inner selves, of course, then by their daughter’s every behavior – even the “perfect” behaviors, which they require. She has one B among A’s. It is terrible for them and therefore for her.

Do some therapists confront, others pussyfoot around, parents like these? I suspect mother and father will be rigid, for they will attribute their neurosis to their millennia-old culture and to their own parents. Can they be trained? Given insight? Given regret or guilt?

So far, one session with child solo. I say that all the yelling is wrong, all the criticism is harmful, the requirement of best grades painful, unnecessary. She’s a little disturbed, more gratified, her eyes deepen, she thanks me for being “honest.” I’m not here to just listen. Empathy first, truth next. She is being mis-parented.

I talk to her about confidentiality, the non-judgmental nature of therapy, some ideas about what helps a person. It is good: She is already feeling this is rewarding, though there is obviously the undercurrent – hopefully not undertow – of now being confirmed that her life is somewhat wrong. The session ends, we retrieve her parents to schedule for next time. And I make a mistake.

Possibly.

“Thank you for bringing your daughter to therapy” (though it was entirely the girl’s idea). “This can be an excellent place for children to express their feelings and concerns and be listened to. They can get their pain out. It’s been proven by research and many decades that when a child is listened to without judgment, when she is accepted with compassion for who she is, then she can feel heard, can feel good enough to look at herself and maybe change things, grow. It’s an actual paradox.* Parents think that if we accept a child as she is, she’ll just stay that way. But in fact, it’s when we don’t make them feel accepted that they have to defend themselves, defend who they are. They will not change, then.”

What do you think will happen? In a few sentences, I named their daughter’s pain, and connected it to them. I rejected, by implication, not just their parenting method, but their entire lives, because their treatment of her must have happened to them in their youth, depressing them, causing a stripping of themselves, requiring a sea change giving up, growing an underground flame of anger. And I said it in the nicest and most giving way, joining them in adult camaraderie.

Did I teach them? The idea! Did I manipulate them into keeping her in therapy? In our dreams, let’s hope so.

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* I didn't say this as well as Dr. Thomas Gordon wrote it, but the face-to-face delivery may have given it some voodoo vitality.

“When a person is able to feel and communicate genuine acceptance of another, he possesses a capacity for being a powerful helping agent. His acceptance of the other, as he is, is an important factor in fostering a relationship in which the other person can grow, develop, make constructive changes, learn to solve problems, move in the direction of psychological health, become more productive and creative, and actualize his fullest potential. It is one of those simple but beautiful paradoxes of life: When a person feels that he is truly accepted by another, as he is, then he is freed to move from there and to begin to think about how he wants to change, how he wants to grow, how he can become different, how he might become more of what he is capable of being.

“Acceptance is like the fertile soil that permits a tiny seed to develop into the lovely flower it is capable of becoming. The soil only enables the seed to become the flower. It releases the capacity of the seed to grow, but the capacity is entirely within the seed. As with the seed, a child contains entirely within his organism the capacity to develop. Acceptance is like the soil – it merely enables the child to actualize his potential.

“Why is parental acceptance such a significant positive influence on the child? This is not generally understood by parents. Most people have been brought up to believe that if you accept a child he will remain just the way he is; that the best way to help a child become something better in the future is to tell him what you don’t accept about him now.

“Therefore, most parents rely heavily on the language of unacceptance in rearing children, believing this is the best way to help them. The soil that most parents provide for their children's growth is heavy with evaluation, judgment, criticism, preaching, moralizing, admonishing, and commanding – messages that convey unacceptance of the child as he is.”

“Adapted with permission from ‘A Catalog of Effects of The Typical Ways Parents Respond to Children’ and ‘Effective Ways of Confronting Children’ in Parent Effectiveness Training by Dr. Thomas Gordon.”