It’s crazy how many people become therapists but end up doing the exact opposite of their job. I sometimes wonder how they even got there in the first place.
Well if your parents were paying for the sessions then really the parents were the clients the therapist was serving, they were trying to use their understanding of psychology to manipulate you on your parents behalf. Common problem with child psychology, in order to keep clients, therapists need to say what the client wants to hear, and if the client is the parent instead of the child they are therapizing, they will tell the child what the parents wants them to in order to not lose the customer.
I think it's because abusive parents hire family practice ones (usually also ones that don't really care so much about health but rather "fixing" the family) happened to me too
That sounds a lot like my youth pastor telling me that my depression was doing a disservice to God. I was so deep in the indoctrination of the Catholic Church at that point that I thought it was a comforting thing to hear, like it made me believe this meant it could be overcome, because Jesus died for our sins, therefore anything like sin could be overcome (with prayer and contrition and blah blah blah). Looking back as an atheist adult, I realize how horrible that “advice” was.
I’m sorry she said that to you. Guilt is the last thing anyone needs when they’re going through something like that.
I was scared of my child therapist, she was dressed like a witch - or so it seemed to me as a child. I told my mother that I was scared of that woman, but she didn't care, of course she didn't.
She said more inappropriate things to me, like "You know that (my OCD) will never go away, do you?" and later in my teenage years "I had thought that you'll develop an eating disorder as well, you seemed like the type for it."
I was gobsmacked.
When I was 17 she sent me to a clinic to get in-patient therapy on a ward for teenagers with eating disorders. Why if she thought I was in danger of developing an eating disorder did she sent me to a ward like that?
As someone who knows therapists outside of work. They are terrible, both at their job and as people. They don't want you to get better, they want easy to manipulate victims they can make emotionally dependent on them so you continue providing their paychecks.
Of course there are bad therapist, but there are also good therapist, like it is in every profession.
In my country the mandatory health insurance covers therapy costs and it is not easy to find a therapist with vacancies, so they are definitely not dependant on the money they make by treating me.
During Covid I did online therapy I paid out of pocket for and my therapist was amazing. She was really good at her job, supportive, compassionate and understanding. She could have made more money, if she had followed her practice's policy - cancellations had to happen at least 24 hours before a booked session was about to start in order to get a refund-, but the times I had to cancel on short notice she told me that I only pay for the sessions I actually get. If she had only been doing her job for the money, she'd stuck by the policy.
Not to defend them because what they said to you was terrible and disgusting, but they might have reported the abuse. I didn't think mine did until years later, when a phone call about my file revealed the enormity of the reports that had been made to children's services about my family. Nobody ever contacted us or interviewed me. Only 1 person ever admitted to making a report, and I believed for a long time that that was it
Yes. I was told by my abusive parents that if they got reported to CPS, I would be removed and placed with abusive foster parents who would molest me.
The one time a professional admitted to reporting the situation, I nearly passed out when I got home that day, expecting authorities to show up at any moment.
My other concern as a child was that if they showed up and DIDN'T remove me to place me with evil foster people, I would be retaliated against at home by parents - potentially never being allowed out of the house unaccompanied again. A scary prospect for a teen who was already socially isolated. Feared it would turn into a captivity situation.
My enabler mom would say that about my narcissistic overall sociopathic aunt to me FREQUENTLY "Mom she called me a bitch because I was having a panic attack over the internet being out" (when it was my only gateway into the world as a kid, because thanks to said aunt and being horrifically bullied in highschool, I'd severely hermited (hikkikomori is a common word for it) myself, and my mother would pretty much verbally wave it off and say "be the bigger person, she's been through stuff too" It's such bullshit. The woman's 32 years older than I am, why did I, a child at that point, have to be the bigger person?
Yeah. They are the parent, their responsibility is to take care of you until you turn 18 and depending on where you're at, take care of you more if truly needed. Being their "first time living" stops being an excuse after they turn 30 at the latest. Being abusive has no excuse at all no matter the age.
They had their life to live, now that they chose to raise you, they are required to be responsible for your mental, emotional, and physical well being throughout your childhood. If they negatively impacted that in anyway or caused any kind of trauma, then that's on them.
I imagine this quote is targeted to an audience where the parents aren't abusive, but rather trying their best, but not perfect. I had good parents growing up. I wasn't abused or neglected, and they loved me. still do, which is great. but eventually I realized my parents weren't perfect, and that I had grown as a person to the point where I was the one seeing that they needed guidance in some way. in that case, "be kind to your parents" would be about having the same patience and kindness they showed me when I was young and didn't know better.
obviously, any quote that's phrased as a blanket statement is not a good quote, and this one is situational at best. if your parents are abusive, you have no obligation to be okay with that, to tolerate it, or to show extra kindness to them in return. if they're failing to be good parents for you, it would be akin to sainthood to show them kindness for it. humans aren't like that. maybe a couple are, but overall, no.
I'm guessing this quote/jpg came from an online Christian facebook group or something similar. of course there's a possibility that it really is just abusive parents trying to justify their actions, and if that's the case, then roast them alive for it. I guess I just assumed when reading it that whoever made it had good intentions
And on the other hand, it's odd in a different angle to see it at a later stage of processing childhood parental abuse. What she did was never right, and she can never justify or excuse it- I'm not sure she'll ever be able to properly apologize for that matter either- but it's... really something to humanize her. No abuser thinks they're abusive. She came from a place of fear, fragile self esteem, and her own cache of trauma, and she didn't know how to deal with it either. That again, never will make it okay, but for my personal healing, from her abuse and my own potential to continue the cycle, I need to remember everyone is scared, everyone can misuse that fear, and everyone can be better.
This. I think it's really helpful when all you're still struggling with is being able to understand a why. And that is why. Because we're all very inexperienced constantly and some people handle it absolutely terribly. My mother was basically a big baby playing adult pretend because she can't get over her dad's death when she was 10. That's not my fault and she should not have hurt me and allowed me to be hurt by others in exchange for approval. But it is sad and I do hope that the bridges she builds from here are strong and she never sets another ablaze. But people treat it as a reason that I should build a bridge back to her from scratch. Abso fucking lutely not.
Works very well for good parents and you just feel stressed because they don't understand you properly
now, there's mfs that'll look at your parents straight up doing terrible things to you, literally breaking your mind apart, growing you into an insecure person and say exactly this to you!
like, waow, did they really need to be a narcissistic asshole? What a pity of them
Yeah thats fair. I think it would be better if it was accompanied by "be nice to your child, its their first time living" because a vast amount of parents do not seem to understand this. Or just "be kind to everyone, its their first time living too". But i think the fact this is directing children to be considerate towards their parents sort of rubs people the wrong way. Because most people ARE considerate of their parents. It takes a lot of shit to break that parent-child bond, and some of the stuff people put up with are things they would not tolerate in any other relationship dynamic. Meanwhile the parents knowingly had a child and committed to care for them their whole life. Not that theres no situation where the child is wrong and parent is right, but i think parents being toxic is a lot more common because they have the power in the relationship a lot of the time.
Yeah this kind of misses the point that the child comes first in the relationship between a parent and a child. Any parent that doesn't see that is bound to be a bad parent until they do.
Yeah, like, this is appropriate when talking about a decent parent accidentally saying something awkward or being kind of oblivious despite good intentions. But, like, you don't just accidentally scream at a 7-year-old for three hours because they lied about seeing a movie when they'd really just seen clips and wanted to talk about said clip with another kid. Abuse is generally not accidental, and it is okay to avoid someone even if it is because you deserve to be treated with basic decency.
omg i hate it too. like yes, but your parents birthed you, they're older, and if they decided to have a kid, they should be somewhat prepared and understanding
That's the thing, they never are because it is and always was about them. You are just an NPC in the player's game so it's impossible for them to view you as a real human being with thoughts and feelings that actually does matter, where the things done to you matter and actually affect somebody. A real person. Narcissism and main character syndrome at it's finest.
You can't blame a person living in a place without proper sex-ed, lack of access to effective birth control, and illegal abortions for not being a good parent.
as an adult myself I have even less understanding for my parent's actions then I had as a kid. Now that I'm aware of the kind of advantage a fully developed brain with decades of experience can give you in life
Ive seen this thrown around SO MUCH as some great advice, but to me its basically "Nobody has lived before → therefore we should excuse the people with the most responsibility."
it puts the responsibility on the child, but children shouldn’t have to “parent” their parents emotionally,
It sounds good, until youre one of the unfortunats bunch with a abusive, neglectful, manipulative, or unwilling to improve kind of parent.
This shit doesn't fly bc "living" isn't something you do one time and move on. It's an endless series of tiny actions you constantly get a feedback on. If you ignore that feedback (like your child being in distress and you're making it worse) time and time again, yeah, it's not the first time. It's a consistent choice.
So just forgive everyone and assume they mean the best because they weren't previously alive before they were alive? Anyway, I wish people would realize that all these meaningless quotes that look like they're printed on bible paper are AI generated, lol
"It's their first time but I'm just starting and they're two decades ahead. If I get a job and the manager is just as shit as I am I'm fucking panicking!"
Reminds me of how it was somehow my job to connect with my dad after my parents divorce even though he was never a part of my life despite living in the same house as me. Everyone but my mom wanted to infantilize him while also expecting me to be the bigger person despite me being like 18.
Having your own problems isn’t an excuse for shitty parenting. I don’t know why so many people think it does
I am living this exact situation word for word except my mom also wants me to put effort into maintaining an amicable relationship with my dad, a man with the emotional intelligence of a shoe who couldn't engage in self-reflection even if he lived in a house of mirrors. She will talk smack about him and then immediately suggest I go visit him as if we both didn't experience his abuse.
Yeah but in my case they had 30-40 years before I was born to become better people and then another 5-10 after I was born to improve yet all I seem to hear is "I did the best i could with the knowledge I had at the time"
Yes, it is, but they decided to have children and they should have asked themselves, if they are up for the job.
I asked myself, if I'm mentally, emotionally, physically and financially able to give a child what it needs to have a happy childhood and to become a stable and healthy adult. As I was unable to answer every question with a yes, I decided against becoming a mother.
If one of my parents had answered the above questions honestly, they had answered two with no.
Intention don't excuse impact. I can drive a friend's car with the intent to get somewhere safely, make a mistake, and wreck the car in an accident. My original intent won't save me from any charges, magically fix the car, or make my friend forgive me on the spot.
“it’s their first time living too” is such a terrible argument because it applies to literally everyone — yes, that would include your domestic abusers, rapists, murderers, and so on.
This is extremely dependent on what sort of stuff your parent did. It’s advice aimed at people whose parents made a lot of mistakes but were ultimately well meaning and trying their best, but it doesn’t specify that and when you direct advice like this to people whose parents were genuinely abusive it sends a harmful message.
Unfortunately people will say stuff like this when you’re no contact with your family without knowing the context of why you’re no contact, and they end up pushing in on issues that are better left alone.
The amount of times I have seen this be used to excuse actually abhorrent behavior from parents needs to be studied. It’s especially strange to see when it comes from a stranger and they’re saying it to someone who either mentions going no contact with their parents or talk about the abuse they went through.
they said they tried their best, and if that's truly the case, then their best wasnt good enough. and im sure as shit not giving them a goddamn participation trophy either...
As a general sentiment? yeah, be kind to people. Even your parents are doing things for the first time and might fail.
As a more specific sentiment? If your parents were abusive or failed you utterly then you have no responsibility toward them.
I think the quote refers more specifically to this feeling a lot of teens get that their parents were supposed to be flawless, but they're suddenly finding out their parents are flawed and it makes them angry.
it could be argued that people make mistake because of ignorance but :
-We live in the age of information and misinformation, if you wanna yolo a baby or listen to stupid advice, fuck you
-Previously we had larger familial/cultural groups to help eachother; they just refused to learn something else than tradition.
I'm struggling with constant suicidal ideation and my dad thinks "JUST. USE. YOUR. BRAIN. 🤷♂️" is a supportive text. Like, bro my brain wants me dead.
Honestly given my abusive father was 54 when he had me and had 3 other children who were already no contact with him I feel like I don’t need to give him much grace in that category, sure it was his first time being alive but he had a 54 year head start on me and he’d already had 3 tries to learn from when it came to parenting and he still managed to fuck it up big time.
Like I know for a fact that man doesn’t forgive anything I did because it happened to be my first time on earth and I was a child, he acts like me being autistic was an attack on him specifically to this day. I just think there’s some people who do things badly enough that it goes way beyond just inexperience.
Sure you should have some grace for your parents, as you would anyone. However, expecting the child to be the bigger person and more accommodating is ass backwards. If the parent doesn't like it when their child matches their tone and level of respect, then it's their fault for setting that level, not the kids.
Fuck them parents. It is our first time ever living and learning. They’ve lived their years ahead of us and need to fucking learn a thing or two for god’s sake.
For alleged people that are living for the first time, they sure act like demons that survived through the centuries. They really give their all at being mundanely cruel and mean-spirited at their root.
Same, I despise it. It enrages me. They had 25+ years more than me to figure out life and their unhealed mental health issues before I was born. Them having me before healing is something I can't forgive, at least for now.
Right, I should forgive narcissist who care about their immediate well being over lifetime of depression, suffering and trauma they have caused me, that nearly ended up killing me. Truly inspiring.
Nothing makes you realise how shitty they were like becoming a parent and discovering some of the worst of it was how they CHOSE to be. I can't even fathom saying or doing any of that shit to my children.
“It’s their first time living!” Well if they’re still so inexperienced, immature and lack parenting skills then they shouldn’t have kids maybe? What kinda shitty advice is it?
There’s a difference between parents who did the wrong thing but ultimately thought they were doing the right thing and parents who just hate their children.
Yeah, no. I'm a mother and I say screw this quote! Like, obviously don't be a jerk to your parents, but stuff like this is used WAY too often to invalidate and gaslight abused children. To any parent who resonates with this quote: practice what you freaking preach! You've been on this Earth longer than your children, and being a parent is a RESPONSIBILITY, not a privilege! If your child grew up to resent you, that is YOUR screw-up as a parent! Do better! BE better! It's only too late too mend things once you're dead. You can always choose to do better while you're still alive. "I'm sorry" is a good start.
Def not something to say to a victim of parental abuse. That would be fucked up.
On the other hand if your parent just isn't doing a great job and screws up every now and then, the quote sounds about right imho. Mistakes are a human thing and being 30, 40 or 50 doesn't change that.
When you deal with the shit they caused you, you learn throughout the years there never was any excuse...especially when you've changed for the better multiple times yet they stay the same after years.
I can understand what they mean if it's like sure your parents may not be the best but they are genuinely trying however I can definitely see how even for me that statement can be a little bit off for people who have parents who are not...very there.
What I mean is for example my mom and stepdad were physically and verbally abusive and my mom mostly blamed her past Behavior on her being in her 20s and obviously she even said that I was born by complete accident wich i understand but still.
I think its intended to help young adults start seeing their parents as 'people' rather than just provider/caretakers. Its probably designed for a different type of healing.
Something i dont like about vague phrases like this is that they dont really come equipped with guidelines for context, so they can be easily weaponized to enable abusive or toxic behavior.
Sure, theres a deep emotional bond between a parent and child, but that also makes abuse of that bond even more egregeious, one cannot reasonably be expected to honor that bond when it stands in direct obstruction to ones wellbeing.
Im sure the origional author had good intentions but in your case, i think its more than fair to disregard this advice.
This is accurate because a lot of people don't get trained into how to be a good parent but at the same time this shouldn't explain away child abuse or anything like that.
In response to the quote itself, not OP: Sure it's their first time living, yes, but it's not their first time making a decision on how to treat somebody, especially a child. Nor is it their first time taking care of something, like if they've at least had a plant or a pet or something. This isn't as complicated as people try to make it out to be. All you have to do is love them and take care of them and express some understanding when it comes to the emotions of a child. That's it. The rest might be a lot more difficult, sure, but seriously.
Sure. Why not. Just make sure they realize that after the kids leave home, all the parents will be left with is the relationship they cultivated with their children.
My dad was mentally and emotionally abusive as hell. Always screaming and yelling, always pointing out my flaws, mistakes and shortcomings, always threatening me with something. Always putting me down, always.
And those are things that I'll never forgive him. He's caused so much horrendous shit in my life, I'll never just forgive.
But at the same time my heart bleeds for him.
My grandmother was an abusive, neglectful alcoholic who beat and starved her kids. My grandfather was physically abusive all through their childhood, until he abandoned them.
When I think of my dad growing up like that, my heart honestly breaks for him. I can't bear the thought of anyone, even him, growing up like that. And I do try to give him grace
But I can't forgive the damage he's done to me.
And all my life, and for the rest of his, I'll keep my distance to him
This reminds me of that quote that starts with "I am not your friend, I am your parent..."
While I can hear what they were going for in that quote and this one, they both make me wince. To me, they both sound like a cop out for being a bad parent.
So once again, the hardships of being a parent are taken out on the child.
These kind of sayings are a nightmare, my mother loves to use phrases that imply this message, my father does not. They were both alcoholics and growing up with them being drunk and fighting constantly was hard but the financial strain of addiction was also heavily felt.
Dad lost nearly everything in the divorce, mum went from relationship to relationship and threw her whole family aside. Dad said “when you hit rock bottom, the only way you can go is up.” And he meant that. Got sober about 18 years ago, and did the emotional work, yes he had mental health problems and an alcohol addiction, but it was no excuse for being a poor father and he learned from that. My mother refused to sit with her feelings or get help, believing everyone else to always be the problem; so now she’s 2 years sober but she is still exactly the same self absorbed person causing all the same harms just without alcohol. So if you dare point that out, she whips out one of these kinds of phrases and says “but I’m sober now, I’m better now, I was so much worse when I was drinking.” If she says it during a tantrum it’s usually followed by a threat that she will go buy a bottle of vodka as well.
Some people can learn and be better… but many do not. My mother is terminally ill now, she will be this way till the end.
How is that their first time living? That quote makes no sense because unless your the result of teen pregnancy they’ve had like three decades of living to figure shit out. Humans don’t get two lives EVERYBODY is first time living that logic just makes no sense. First time living too? So kids are first time living but so are parents when it’s night and day in terms of life knowledge. Can anybody actually explains what first time living even means? A kid could say that because all their life experiences will be dictated by humans. They experience a world the parent could never experience so how are they BOTH first time living?
Harboring resentment will ruin your life. Forgiveness is about you, not them. You only need to make sure you're side of the street is clean. If this quote ticks you off, you are certainly harboring resentment.
My dad threatened me. When I told my mom and my sister that I would press charges if he did anything, they both pounced and went “he doesn’t deserve that!!” I asked them “so I deserve to be hurt?” They both hesitated with a “…well…” I lost all faith in my entire family that day.
All three of them accuse me of being the one that ruined my relationships with them. My dad fully ignores me and then just shrugs and goes “she isn’t making any effort to fix anything” when my mom cries about our family. My mom cries at me about how I don’t spend time with them as if they don’t make my life miserable. My sister says that my dad can do whatever he wants because it’s his house, and has fully used the “it’s their first time living/being parents”.
Everyone knows what it’s like to be a kid. It shouldn’t be hard to empathize and not treat people like garbage. One of my friends has two children, and I can’t even fathom speaking to them the way my family speaks to me.
This and the one about "if i could choose i would choose my mother doing x instead of having me" or smth like that pisses me off so much. I was not put on this earth to dread my existence, I'm worthy of love and joy just bc my mother voluntarily or not didn't got to experience said things. Too many people are afraid to admit that their parents are not good people and they had chances to have a redemption or change but didn't choose to do so.
I mean it'd be a bit difficult to make a quote that covers every single situation and I don't doubt that this quote can be used to invalidate abuse, but some people also just have generally peaceful childhoods where they may have some mild interpersonal conflicts with their parents. I'd say this quote did help me navigate my parental relationships.
Yes! Also "Forgive your parents because they will be here shorter than you" or smth like that. Why would I care how long they will be alive? They ruined my life, took from me normal childhood and teen years. If they don't planning to leave me inheritance, I don't care about they sooner or later death.
It's not universally good, I think it's just genera;;y advice to see other people as human and accept that just like you have flaws, they have flaws. But obviously not all flaws are created equal and being abusive is not a totally understandable mistake anyone could make.
Definitely not a universally helpful quote. Feels really invalidating if you are still processing your own childhood stuff.
Ah yes, be the “bigger person” even though they’re the parent and never gave you such consideration. That’s just a way to normalize child abuse.
Yeah, it reminds me of when I was about 11 and a therapist told me that I couldn't control what my Dad did, but I could control how I reacted to it.
I was like,"how else would someone react to (insert act of abuse)?" I mean, what a really to deaf thing for them to say.
My child therapist told a lot of things that made me feel worse not better as well.
One thing she said was: "You are terrorizing your family with your illness (OCD)" As if I had chosen to be mentally ill in order to hurt my parents. 🤬
It’s crazy how many people become therapists but end up doing the exact opposite of their job. I sometimes wonder how they even got there in the first place.
I have met quite a few unhelpful therapist and they should have never been given a license.
Well if your parents were paying for the sessions then really the parents were the clients the therapist was serving, they were trying to use their understanding of psychology to manipulate you on your parents behalf. Common problem with child psychology, in order to keep clients, therapists need to say what the client wants to hear, and if the client is the parent instead of the child they are therapizing, they will tell the child what the parents wants them to in order to not lose the customer.
I think it's because abusive parents hire family practice ones (usually also ones that don't really care so much about health but rather "fixing" the family) happened to me too
Jesus! I'm sorry. That's really fucked up.
That sounds a lot like my youth pastor telling me that my depression was doing a disservice to God. I was so deep in the indoctrination of the Catholic Church at that point that I thought it was a comforting thing to hear, like it made me believe this meant it could be overcome, because Jesus died for our sins, therefore anything like sin could be overcome (with prayer and contrition and blah blah blah). Looking back as an atheist adult, I realize how horrible that “advice” was.
I’m sorry she said that to you. Guilt is the last thing anyone needs when they’re going through something like that.
I'm sorry that you got indoctrinated and blamed for being ill.
It's sick to say something like that to an ill person in general, but to a child it's even worse.
I think I was 20 at the time, but yeah I was still that type of vulnerable. Nobody deserves that.
My therapist said the same thing to me as a suicidal 13 year old. “You’re traumatizing your family with this behavior.”
I was scared of my child therapist, she was dressed like a witch - or so it seemed to me as a child. I told my mother that I was scared of that woman, but she didn't care, of course she didn't.
I hope they had their license pulled. I’m so sorry.
They didn't.
She said more inappropriate things to me, like "You know that (my OCD) will never go away, do you?" and later in my teenage years "I had thought that you'll develop an eating disorder as well, you seemed like the type for it."
I was gobsmacked.
When I was 17 she sent me to a clinic to get in-patient therapy on a ward for teenagers with eating disorders. Why if she thought I was in danger of developing an eating disorder did she sent me to a ward like that?
I’m so sorry
As someone who knows therapists outside of work. They are terrible, both at their job and as people. They don't want you to get better, they want easy to manipulate victims they can make emotionally dependent on them so you continue providing their paychecks.
Generalizing is a bad idea and never fair.
Of course there are bad therapist, but there are also good therapist, like it is in every profession.
In my country the mandatory health insurance covers therapy costs and it is not easy to find a therapist with vacancies, so they are definitely not dependant on the money they make by treating me.
During Covid I did online therapy I paid out of pocket for and my therapist was amazing. She was really good at her job, supportive, compassionate and understanding. She could have made more money, if she had followed her practice's policy - cancellations had to happen at least 24 hours before a booked session was about to start in order to get a refund-, but the times I had to cancel on short notice she told me that I only pay for the sessions I actually get. If she had only been doing her job for the money, she'd stuck by the policy.
Some professions should be gatekept better
What a horrible therapist. I hope that they lost their license to practice since then 😡.
I honestly just wish they'd reported the abuse. I thought they were supposed to do that.
Not to defend them because what they said to you was terrible and disgusting, but they might have reported the abuse. I didn't think mine did until years later, when a phone call about my file revealed the enormity of the reports that had been made to children's services about my family. Nobody ever contacted us or interviewed me. Only 1 person ever admitted to making a report, and I believed for a long time that that was it
Wow. That's really awful. I'm sorry.
You really should have been notified, though
I was a minor. I swore I wouldn't speak to any professional if they were going to report abuse, so they apparently did but hid it
I don’t understand. So you didn’t want them to report it?
Yes. I was told by my abusive parents that if they got reported to CPS, I would be removed and placed with abusive foster parents who would molest me.
The one time a professional admitted to reporting the situation, I nearly passed out when I got home that day, expecting authorities to show up at any moment.
My other concern as a child was that if they showed up and DIDN'T remove me to place me with evil foster people, I would be retaliated against at home by parents - potentially never being allowed out of the house unaccompanied again. A scary prospect for a teen who was already socially isolated. Feared it would turn into a captivity situation.
Precisely this. The posts’ message is essentially asking us to give our shitty parents participation trophies 🏆.
Holy shit I want to frame your comment.
🫶🏻
My enabler mom would say that about my narcissistic overall sociopathic aunt to me FREQUENTLY "Mom she called me a bitch because I was having a panic attack over the internet being out" (when it was my only gateway into the world as a kid, because thanks to said aunt and being horrifically bullied in highschool, I'd severely hermited (hikkikomori is a common word for it) myself, and my mother would pretty much verbally wave it off and say "be the bigger person, she's been through stuff too" It's such bullshit. The woman's 32 years older than I am, why did I, a child at that point, have to be the bigger person?
And since when has being the bigger person entailed going back for more abuse?!?
Yeah. They are the parent, their responsibility is to take care of you until you turn 18 and depending on where you're at, take care of you more if truly needed. Being their "first time living" stops being an excuse after they turn 30 at the latest. Being abusive has no excuse at all no matter the age.
They had their life to live, now that they chose to raise you, they are required to be responsible for your mental, emotional, and physical well being throughout your childhood. If they negatively impacted that in anyway or caused any kind of trauma, then that's on them.
I imagine this quote is targeted to an audience where the parents aren't abusive, but rather trying their best, but not perfect. I had good parents growing up. I wasn't abused or neglected, and they loved me. still do, which is great. but eventually I realized my parents weren't perfect, and that I had grown as a person to the point where I was the one seeing that they needed guidance in some way. in that case, "be kind to your parents" would be about having the same patience and kindness they showed me when I was young and didn't know better.
obviously, any quote that's phrased as a blanket statement is not a good quote, and this one is situational at best. if your parents are abusive, you have no obligation to be okay with that, to tolerate it, or to show extra kindness to them in return. if they're failing to be good parents for you, it would be akin to sainthood to show them kindness for it. humans aren't like that. maybe a couple are, but overall, no.
I'm guessing this quote/jpg came from an online Christian facebook group or something similar. of course there's a possibility that it really is just abusive parents trying to justify their actions, and if that's the case, then roast them alive for it. I guess I just assumed when reading it that whoever made it had good intentions
Yes,and if the stuff is literally just abuse this quotes not fixing that💀
As someone just realizing the abusive things my mom did, yeah.
And on the other hand, it's odd in a different angle to see it at a later stage of processing childhood parental abuse. What she did was never right, and she can never justify or excuse it- I'm not sure she'll ever be able to properly apologize for that matter either- but it's... really something to humanize her. No abuser thinks they're abusive. She came from a place of fear, fragile self esteem, and her own cache of trauma, and she didn't know how to deal with it either. That again, never will make it okay, but for my personal healing, from her abuse and my own potential to continue the cycle, I need to remember everyone is scared, everyone can misuse that fear, and everyone can be better.
This. I think it's really helpful when all you're still struggling with is being able to understand a why. And that is why. Because we're all very inexperienced constantly and some people handle it absolutely terribly. My mother was basically a big baby playing adult pretend because she can't get over her dad's death when she was 10. That's not my fault and she should not have hurt me and allowed me to be hurt by others in exchange for approval. But it is sad and I do hope that the bridges she builds from here are strong and she never sets another ablaze. But people treat it as a reason that I should build a bridge back to her from scratch. Abso fucking lutely not.
Which I don't think the quote was meant to address.
Works very well for good parents and you just feel stressed because they don't understand you properly
now, there's mfs that'll look at your parents straight up doing terrible things to you, literally breaking your mind apart, growing you into an insecure person and say exactly this to you!
like, waow, did they really need to be a narcissistic asshole? What a pity of them
Yeah thats fair. I think it would be better if it was accompanied by "be nice to your child, its their first time living" because a vast amount of parents do not seem to understand this. Or just "be kind to everyone, its their first time living too". But i think the fact this is directing children to be considerate towards their parents sort of rubs people the wrong way. Because most people ARE considerate of their parents. It takes a lot of shit to break that parent-child bond, and some of the stuff people put up with are things they would not tolerate in any other relationship dynamic. Meanwhile the parents knowingly had a child and committed to care for them their whole life. Not that theres no situation where the child is wrong and parent is right, but i think parents being toxic is a lot more common because they have the power in the relationship a lot of the time.
Yeah this kind of misses the point that the child comes first in the relationship between a parent and a child. Any parent that doesn't see that is bound to be a bad parent until they do.
Well, and worse, it normalizes those dynamics, so you *do* put up with it in other relationships when you shouldn't.
You win 🏆. This is exactly it!!
Yeah, like, this is appropriate when talking about a decent parent accidentally saying something awkward or being kind of oblivious despite good intentions. But, like, you don't just accidentally scream at a 7-year-old for three hours because they lied about seeing a movie when they'd really just seen clips and wanted to talk about said clip with another kid. Abuse is generally not accidental, and it is okay to avoid someone even if it is because you deserve to be treated with basic decency.
I know they are being horrible to you but be nice them to them okay
/s
omg i hate it too. like yes, but your parents birthed you, they're older, and if they decided to have a kid, they should be somewhat prepared and understanding
That's the thing, they never are because it is and always was about them. You are just an NPC in the player's game so it's impossible for them to view you as a real human being with thoughts and feelings that actually does matter, where the things done to you matter and actually affect somebody. A real person. Narcissism and main character syndrome at it's finest.
yup
"#" Not all parents decided to have kids.
You can't blame a person living in a place without proper sex-ed, lack of access to effective birth control, and illegal abortions for not being a good parent.
Some parents do unforgivable things. Sometimes being kind to them isn't an option
https://preview.redd.it/6kli22y0fa4g1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=994afb86881f39827a8b68e5fb28d6d991a763de
This is what gets me. Like my parents have thirty years more experience than me but I'm the one who's supposed to be endlessly understanding?
It seems like a lot of the common sentiments about relationships just aim at getting people to shut up and stop making other people uncomfortable.
as an adult myself I have even less understanding for my parent's actions then I had as a kid. Now that I'm aware of the kind of advantage a fully developed brain with decades of experience can give you in life
Ah now I’m emotional
Who wrote this? Might add this to my poetry collection
my own father actually said that I wasn't abused because I never got bruises or black eyes like he had as a kid.
Like...you shouldn't have gone through that either?? It still doesn't make what he did right.
Ive seen this thrown around SO MUCH as some great advice, but to me its basically "Nobody has lived before → therefore we should excuse the people with the most responsibility."
it puts the responsibility on the child, but children shouldn’t have to “parent” their parents emotionally,
It sounds good, until youre one of the unfortunats bunch with a abusive, neglectful, manipulative, or unwilling to improve kind of parent.
People think you're not allowed to poke holes in "advice" that starts with "be kind" or something of the like. Surely, it must be wholesome
I always want to respond with "be kind, it was Jeffery Dahmer's first time being alive 🕊️ 🙏🏻"
Be kind to abusers, it’s their first time abusing.
Fresh graduates out of Abuser School. 😂😨
The quote doesn't even mention the responsibility parents have. Everyone lives once. Children only have one life, so parents should be kind to them.
Why do the majority of people in this sub all these generic, bland quotes are directed at them?
Because many have had these dumb generic quotes directed at them either out of malice or due to not knowing the circumstances.
However, that doesn't make their feelings about the intention of these types of statements what they actually mean.
This shit doesn't fly bc "living" isn't something you do one time and move on. It's an endless series of tiny actions you constantly get a feedback on. If you ignore that feedback (like your child being in distress and you're making it worse) time and time again, yeah, it's not the first time. It's a consistent choice.
To be fair, same goes with criminals. It's their first time living too 🤡
So just forgive everyone and assume they mean the best because they weren't previously alive before they were alive? Anyway, I wish people would realize that all these meaningless quotes that look like they're printed on bible paper are AI generated, lol
"It's their first time but I'm just starting and they're two decades ahead. If I get a job and the manager is just as shit as I am I'm fucking panicking!"
It’s my first time living too. I didn’t become a narcissist and an abuser.
Apparently it’s a parent’s right to be one so maybe if you get a kid you’ll unlock that upgrade
I was a child.
No.
Reminds me of how it was somehow my job to connect with my dad after my parents divorce even though he was never a part of my life despite living in the same house as me. Everyone but my mom wanted to infantilize him while also expecting me to be the bigger person despite me being like 18.
Having your own problems isn’t an excuse for shitty parenting. I don’t know why so many people think it does
I am living this exact situation word for word except my mom also wants me to put effort into maintaining an amicable relationship with my dad, a man with the emotional intelligence of a shoe who couldn't engage in self-reflection even if he lived in a house of mirrors. She will talk smack about him and then immediately suggest I go visit him as if we both didn't experience his abuse.
Yeah but in my case they had 30-40 years before I was born to become better people and then another 5-10 after I was born to improve yet all I seem to hear is "I did the best i could with the knowledge I had at the time"
Yes, it is, but they decided to have children and they should have asked themselves, if they are up for the job.
I asked myself, if I'm mentally, emotionally, physically and financially able to give a child what it needs to have a happy childhood and to become a stable and healthy adult. As I was unable to answer every question with a yes, I decided against becoming a mother.
If one of my parents had answered the above questions honestly, they had answered two with no.
Only if they’re kind to me. Respect is a two way street after all.
Not according to my parents.
I mean I feel like there’s this caveat where it means just making small mistakes, not like, abusing you.
Right? I feel like this is asking to give grace, not ignore egregious issues.
So much stuff that gets posted here is just... taken out of the intended context and looked at as if it was meant to solve every problem.
i murdered a family of five but your honor it’s my first time living
-it was their first time living too -well maybe next time they'll avoid being murdered better, your honor
Intention don't excuse impact. I can drive a friend's car with the intent to get somewhere safely, make a mistake, and wreck the car in an accident. My original intent won't save me from any charges, magically fix the car, or make my friend forgive me on the spot.
I only live once. That's why I am not a psychopathic pedo.
Fuck 'em. They were not nice to me, why should I be nice to them
“it’s their first time living too” is such a terrible argument because it applies to literally everyone — yes, that would include your domestic abusers, rapists, murderers, and so on.
and,
respectfully,fuck that.By that logic, should the world pardon EVERY crime then?
Exactly where my mind went. Yikes!!
It's true, though. Once you've finished understanding your childhood and forgiving your parents, this will help.
This is extremely dependent on what sort of stuff your parent did. It’s advice aimed at people whose parents made a lot of mistakes but were ultimately well meaning and trying their best, but it doesn’t specify that and when you direct advice like this to people whose parents were genuinely abusive it sends a harmful message.
Unfortunately people will say stuff like this when you’re no contact with your family without knowing the context of why you’re no contact, and they end up pushing in on issues that are better left alone.
Life experience is not at all binary, its cumulative, if someone has lived 73 years they should know more than someone who has lived 3 years, yes?
Why should I be kind to the people who still invite my rapist over despite knowing
My parents have 28+ years on me to have figured their shit our
Well they fuckin suck at it
The amount of times I have seen this be used to excuse actually abhorrent behavior from parents needs to be studied. It’s especially strange to see when it comes from a stranger and they’re saying it to someone who either mentions going no contact with their parents or talk about the abuse they went through.
Be kind to serial killers guys it’s their first time living too 🥺🥺🥺
If it's their first time they deserve getting treated the same as we did when it was our first time living
I was kind to them. I was met with more abuse.
Hahahahahahahahahaha They’re monsters. Die.
they said they tried their best, and if that's truly the case, then their best wasnt good enough. and im sure as shit not giving them a goddamn participation trophy either...
As a general sentiment? yeah, be kind to people. Even your parents are doing things for the first time and might fail.
As a more specific sentiment? If your parents were abusive or failed you utterly then you have no responsibility toward them.
I think the quote refers more specifically to this feeling a lot of teens get that their parents were supposed to be flawless, but they're suddenly finding out their parents are flawed and it makes them angry.
it could be argued that people make mistake because of ignorance but :
-We live in the age of information and misinformation, if you wanna yolo a baby or listen to stupid advice, fuck you
-Previously we had larger familial/cultural groups to help eachother; they just refused to learn something else than tradition.
DISGUSTING!!!!!!
Yeah like I’m sorry that my parents traumatized me and are generally pretty narcissistic.
Yeah? Well, i wished they'd had the decency to abort.
Bish, my mother literally wants to strangle me because I cried too much as a toddler.
My grandma had to put a stop to it.
I'm struggling with constant suicidal ideation and my dad thinks "JUST. USE. YOUR. BRAIN. 🤷♂️" is a supportive text. Like, bro my brain wants me dead.
Honestly given my abusive father was 54 when he had me and had 3 other children who were already no contact with him I feel like I don’t need to give him much grace in that category, sure it was his first time being alive but he had a 54 year head start on me and he’d already had 3 tries to learn from when it came to parenting and he still managed to fuck it up big time.
Like I know for a fact that man doesn’t forgive anything I did because it happened to be my first time on earth and I was a child, he acts like me being autistic was an attack on him specifically to this day. I just think there’s some people who do things badly enough that it goes way beyond just inexperience.
Sure you should have some grace for your parents, as you would anyone. However, expecting the child to be the bigger person and more accommodating is ass backwards. If the parent doesn't like it when their child matches their tone and level of respect, then it's their fault for setting that level, not the kids.
see i can understand that about them AND still feel how i feel
Fuck them parents. It is our first time ever living and learning. They’ve lived their years ahead of us and need to fucking learn a thing or two for god’s sake.
As someone who believes in reincarnation theory a bit, I genuinely don't believe this lol.
I don't like that this feeds into my guilt of not forgiving the horrible things they did to me and out me through :(
Yeah, but there’s things where it’s my first time living too but despite being younger I still know better than to do/say certain things to a child.
If they wanted me to be kind to them, they should've been kind to me. Now they both get to die alone, like they deserve
Are they kind to you? Then be kind to them. Hey, even be a bit forgiving and allow for a few fresh starts and mishaps.
Are they abusive? Fuck 'em
For alleged people that are living for the first time, they sure act like demons that survived through the centuries. They really give their all at being mundanely cruel and mean-spirited at their root.
The person who came up with this quote can shove ny generational trauma up their ass.
They had their time to work on their childhood before having me. Why should I be nice to someone who beats me?
They also have more life on their shoulders. So there.
Stupid low expectstions of parents given too much grace
And not us too ????
As someone with an absent father, i hate this quote even more than you do
I fucking love that quote
As a general rule, people should show more gratitude and grace with their parents
But they had a longer time to adjust then me
Same, I despise it. It enrages me. They had 25+ years more than me to figure out life and their unhealed mental health issues before I was born. Them having me before healing is something I can't forgive, at least for now.
Yep everyone should just do whatever the fk and leave the consequences to their children.
Thanks. Now I can be an absolute piece of shit to my kids
Right, I should forgive narcissist who care about their immediate well being over lifetime of depression, suffering and trauma they have caused me, that nearly ended up killing me. Truly inspiring.
Nothing makes you realise how shitty they were like becoming a parent and discovering some of the worst of it was how they CHOSE to be. I can't even fathom saying or doing any of that shit to my children.
“It’s their first time living!” Well if they’re still so inexperienced, immature and lack parenting skills then they shouldn’t have kids maybe? What kinda shitty advice is it?
Yeah but they had a multi decade head start and learned how to pretend being malicious was ignorance
There’s a difference between parents who did the wrong thing but ultimately thought they were doing the right thing and parents who just hate their children.
Generally good advice, but you just know someone would say this to a person with terrible parents.
Yeah, no. I'm a mother and I say screw this quote! Like, obviously don't be a jerk to your parents, but stuff like this is used WAY too often to invalidate and gaslight abused children. To any parent who resonates with this quote: practice what you freaking preach! You've been on this Earth longer than your children, and being a parent is a RESPONSIBILITY, not a privilege! If your child grew up to resent you, that is YOUR screw-up as a parent! Do better! BE better! It's only too late too mend things once you're dead. You can always choose to do better while you're still alive. "I'm sorry" is a good start.
Sorry, for the rant, sore subject... 💜🙏(genuine)
Def not something to say to a victim of parental abuse. That would be fucked up.
On the other hand if your parent just isn't doing a great job and screws up every now and then, the quote sounds about right imho. Mistakes are a human thing and being 30, 40 or 50 doesn't change that.
Yeah this is my first time living and somehow I’ve never abused anyone
My parents should've been kind to me, it was my first and only time being a child.
When you deal with the shit they caused you, you learn throughout the years there never was any excuse...especially when you've changed for the better multiple times yet they stay the same after years.
I can understand what they mean if it's like sure your parents may not be the best but they are genuinely trying however I can definitely see how even for me that statement can be a little bit off for people who have parents who are not...very there.
What I mean is for example my mom and stepdad were physically and verbally abusive and my mom mostly blamed her past Behavior on her being in her 20s and obviously she even said that I was born by complete accident wich i understand but still.
I think its intended to help young adults start seeing their parents as 'people' rather than just provider/caretakers. Its probably designed for a different type of healing.
Something i dont like about vague phrases like this is that they dont really come equipped with guidelines for context, so they can be easily weaponized to enable abusive or toxic behavior.
Sure, theres a deep emotional bond between a parent and child, but that also makes abuse of that bond even more egregeious, one cannot reasonably be expected to honor that bond when it stands in direct obstruction to ones wellbeing.
Im sure the origional author had good intentions but in your case, i think its more than fair to disregard this advice.
Did you mean to extend the A sound in “hate,” or did you intentionally add an E sound to the end?
They're alive?
So are we going to start being more relaxed with violent criminals? It's their first time living too
Why specifically parents? By their logic, this applies to everyone.
I do generally try to be kind to people though.
Lmao I thought this quote is a joke
It's my first time living too and I would never do to a child half of what they've done to me
Tough luck. Theres a reason i didnt produce any brats...
This is accurate because a lot of people don't get trained into how to be a good parent but at the same time this shouldn't explain away child abuse or anything like that.
yeah but the difference is one has 50 years of life experience while i dont even have two decades yet
In response to the quote itself, not OP: Sure it's their first time living, yes, but it's not their first time making a decision on how to treat somebody, especially a child. Nor is it their first time taking care of something, like if they've at least had a plant or a pet or something. This isn't as complicated as people try to make it out to be. All you have to do is love them and take care of them and express some understanding when it comes to the emotions of a child. That's it. The rest might be a lot more difficult, sure, but seriously.
Sure. Why not. Just make sure they realize that after the kids leave home, all the parents will be left with is the relationship they cultivated with their children.
It's honestly a tricky thing
My dad was mentally and emotionally abusive as hell. Always screaming and yelling, always pointing out my flaws, mistakes and shortcomings, always threatening me with something. Always putting me down, always.
And those are things that I'll never forgive him. He's caused so much horrendous shit in my life, I'll never just forgive.
But at the same time my heart bleeds for him.
My grandmother was an abusive, neglectful alcoholic who beat and starved her kids. My grandfather was physically abusive all through their childhood, until he abandoned them.
When I think of my dad growing up like that, my heart honestly breaks for him. I can't bear the thought of anyone, even him, growing up like that. And I do try to give him grace
But I can't forgive the damage he's done to me.
And all my life, and for the rest of his, I'll keep my distance to him
This reminds me of that quote that starts with "I am not your friend, I am your parent..."
While I can hear what they were going for in that quote and this one, they both make me wince. To me, they both sound like a cop out for being a bad parent.
So once again, the hardships of being a parent are taken out on the child.
I hate quotes like these. Damn them.
This feels like it was written by Facebook Stacy after her kids went NC with her and she can't fathom why
These kind of sayings are a nightmare, my mother loves to use phrases that imply this message, my father does not. They were both alcoholics and growing up with them being drunk and fighting constantly was hard but the financial strain of addiction was also heavily felt.
Dad lost nearly everything in the divorce, mum went from relationship to relationship and threw her whole family aside. Dad said “when you hit rock bottom, the only way you can go is up.” And he meant that. Got sober about 18 years ago, and did the emotional work, yes he had mental health problems and an alcohol addiction, but it was no excuse for being a poor father and he learned from that. My mother refused to sit with her feelings or get help, believing everyone else to always be the problem; so now she’s 2 years sober but she is still exactly the same self absorbed person causing all the same harms just without alcohol. So if you dare point that out, she whips out one of these kinds of phrases and says “but I’m sober now, I’m better now, I was so much worse when I was drinking.” If she says it during a tantrum it’s usually followed by a threat that she will go buy a bottle of vodka as well.
Some people can learn and be better… but many do not. My mother is terminally ill now, she will be this way till the end.
It's easy to be kind when every time you see them you don't get teleported behind a locked door crying and avoiding to get yelled or violenced at
How is that their first time living? That quote makes no sense because unless your the result of teen pregnancy they’ve had like three decades of living to figure shit out. Humans don’t get two lives EVERYBODY is first time living that logic just makes no sense. First time living too? So kids are first time living but so are parents when it’s night and day in terms of life knowledge. Can anybody actually explains what first time living even means? A kid could say that because all their life experiences will be dictated by humans. They experience a world the parent could never experience so how are they BOTH first time living?
its complicated
yes, but it’s their second child, i’d say they should have some experience by now, no?
parents: spank children
society: „it’s their first time owning a human they’re legally allowed to assault, have some empathy“
Harboring resentment will ruin your life. Forgiveness is about you, not them. You only need to make sure you're side of the street is clean. If this quote ticks you off, you are certainly harboring resentment.
Ygbfkm. No: it's their job to grow up, too. There, I fixed it.
My dad threatened me. When I told my mom and my sister that I would press charges if he did anything, they both pounced and went “he doesn’t deserve that!!” I asked them “so I deserve to be hurt?” They both hesitated with a “…well…” I lost all faith in my entire family that day.
All three of them accuse me of being the one that ruined my relationships with them. My dad fully ignores me and then just shrugs and goes “she isn’t making any effort to fix anything” when my mom cries about our family. My mom cries at me about how I don’t spend time with them as if they don’t make my life miserable. My sister says that my dad can do whatever he wants because it’s his house, and has fully used the “it’s their first time living/being parents”.
Everyone knows what it’s like to be a kid. It shouldn’t be hard to empathize and not treat people like garbage. One of my friends has two children, and I can’t even fathom speaking to them the way my family speaks to me.
This subreddit is a literal cancer. Y'all choose to be miserable. 😂
Yeah no, im not even their first child, and they still treat me as sub-human. It's not hard to treat people with basic human decency.
I HATEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE unnecessary Es.
It feels like something my mom would send me to gaslight me into feeling bad for her after she hurt me
This is a weird quote. I have never seen this before I wonder what brought that about
Ah yes. But you see I was the child with no experience and they had a couple of decades to learn something.
They've been alive for longer than me so they should know how to be better
Yet when I make a mistake suddenly I'm "too old" to be making these mistakes..🤔
Never forgive your parents
If they've done something unforgivable
This and the one about "if i could choose i would choose my mother doing x instead of having me" or smth like that pisses me off so much. I was not put on this earth to dread my existence, I'm worthy of love and joy just bc my mother voluntarily or not didn't got to experience said things. Too many people are afraid to admit that their parents are not good people and they had chances to have a redemption or change but didn't choose to do so.
Healthy family have-er
Tell that to a Buddhist.
Samsara erasure smh
“Honor thy father and thy mother, that your days may be long in the land”. Is a bit better. The OPs quote infantilizes the parents.
Yeah but they've been doing it way longer than I have...
-laughs in Buddhist-
I mean yes the quote is right but while it should be used to explain mistakes it shouldnt be used to just ignore the issue
Yes, sure, not every bad action calls for punishment, we all try our best and sometimes it just isnt the best
But that doesn’t mean it would be a good idea to just ignore the problem and say „mistakes happen“
I mean it'd be a bit difficult to make a quote that covers every single situation and I don't doubt that this quote can be used to invalidate abuse, but some people also just have generally peaceful childhoods where they may have some mild interpersonal conflicts with their parents. I'd say this quote did help me navigate my parental relationships.
You don’t have to if you dont want to. But if this advice makes you uneasy it might be worth thinking more about it
I was literally just saying I'm tired of seeing that quote
My parents were horrible parents, not on accident but by choice, there’s no way they could have been that abusive and that cruel on accident.
Unless you’re a regressor in an isekai or reincarnation manhwa it’s everyone’s first time living??
My parents know what's up. Writer of this quote needs to mind their fucking business.
Be kind to your children, you chose to have them.
i didnt ask to be born and frankly with how much i had to realize i never fucking had... i should probably stop talking
Yes! Also "Forgive your parents because they will be here shorter than you" or smth like that. Why would I care how long they will be alive? They ruined my life, took from me normal childhood and teen years. If they don't planning to leave me inheritance, I don't care about they sooner or later death.
Extremely based quote
Funny how the people who taught me how to apologise never learned to do it themselves.
Sometimes you just need to realize a quote wasn’t specifically for you
It's not universally good, I think it's just genera;;y advice to see other people as human and accept that just like you have flaws, they have flaws. But obviously not all flaws are created equal and being abusive is not a totally understandable mistake anyone could make.
They realized pain is inevitable but it is amusing to share it with the next generation. Thanks Mom and Dad