Although forgiving your parents (or anyone who has caused you pain) might not seem like a decision that would affect the quality of your life, it certainly can. Whether it’s one instance or years of pain and abuse, refusing to forgive your parents can foster emotional wounds that never heal. They can affect your emotional well-being and relationships well into adulthood and prevent you from finding the happiness you deserve.
How Does Holding a Grudge Affect You As an Adult?
It’s easy to assume that the emotional trauma you experienced years ago gets left in the past where it belongs. Unfortunately, that’s rarely the case—the resentment you feel towards your parents can affect almost every aspect of your adult life:
You Experience a Cycle of Suffering
You might not realize it, but holding onto a grudge or any form of resentment takes a lot of emotional energy. Anytime you think of your mother or father, the hostility that you feel flares up like an injury that never heals.
For instance, let’s say that you’re angry at your father for missing your sports games as a kid. Although your anger might be valid, holding onto this grudge won’t be beneficial. Every time you attend a sports game or think about your childhood, that emotional wound re-activates, and you experience the pain all over again. You’re no longer an adult—you become the same angry kid all over again.
In the sports games scenario, attending your own child’s sports events might become difficult because the experience triggers your own painful memories.
Rather than getting to move on, you’re stuck in the same cycle of suffering. You continue to be the victim, and even if it happened years ago, you continue to get hurt by your parent’s harmful actions.
Your Trauma Can Be Reflected in Your Romantic Relationships
Although rarely anybody intends to seek out romantic relationships that reflect their emotional wounds, many people still end up in relationships with people who can hurt them the same way their parents did. According to psychologists, this is called “attractions of deprivation”, where you’re attracted to someone who embodies the worst characteristics of your parents.
This is usually a subconscious phenomenon, and most people don’t realize they’re dating someone too much like their parents until they’ve already been hurt. These relationships can trigger insecurities that you’ve tried to bury or leave in the past. Without knowing it, some people might end up getting hurt because they’ve subconsciously tried to resolve the emotional wounds they got from their parents. You’re trying to tell the same story, but with a different ending.
Unfortunately, most people don’t find the happy ending they’re looking for. While it is possible to recognize the toxic traits that draw you to a particular type of person, that still doesn’t deal with the original wound. Until you’ve forgiven your parents, getting into a healthy romantic relationship might be difficult.
Holding a Grudge Gives Them Power
Regardless of what you blame your parents for, holding a grudge can make you feel powerless—even decades later. If you’ve grown up in an abusive or neglectful home, you may want to leave those painful memories in the past and cut all contact with your abusers.
However, holding onto anger and resentment means keeping those emotional wounds alive. Even if your parents are no longer in your life, your hostility can still give them power over you. Forgiveness may seem like a passive gesture, but doing so can help you take back the power and control that’s been taken from you.
What is Forgiveness?
Although the word “forgiveness” might be thrown around a lot, you might not know what it truly means to forgive another person. Since forgiveness is more of an emotional action than a physical one, some people might struggle to understand how it works.
To forgive another person is to let go of the anger or resentment that you have for them. Once you’ve forgiven someone for the way they hurt you, you’ll no longer look back at that incident (or series of incidents) with anger. You’ll be able to move on rather than living in the past.
Keep in mind that forgiveness doesn’t always mean forgetting what happened. For example, if a romantic partner cheated on you, you might make the choice to forgive them so that you can move on. However, you might also decide to break up with them and find someone else so that you don’t get cheated on in the future.
Just because you forgive someone doesn’t necessarily mean you completely trust that they won’t hurt you again. Even when you forgive your parents, you might still have to establish boundaries or set expectations so that you don’t get hurt in the future.
Why is it So Difficult to Forgive Your Parents?
If forgiveness was easy, everyone would leave their childhood trauma behind and start fresh. However, the act of forgiveness can be more challenging for many people. Typically, the deeper your emotional wounds, the harder it is to forgive your mother or father.
Forgiveness Makes You Vulnerable
One of the reasons that forgiveness can be so difficult is because it makes you vulnerable. When one of your parents hurts you (even if it’s only a one-time incident), your anger and blame operate as a defensive shield to protect you from any future harm. Many people keep those defensive shields up for years or even decades.
To forgive your parents, you have to lower those defensive shields. As a result, you might feel vulnerability or as if you’re putting yourself in the position to get hurt again. You might have to trust that your parents won’t hurt you again—which is something you can never really be sure of.
Forgiveness is an emotional risk, and while it can make you vulnerable, it can also be worth the potential happiness and joy that you feel in the future.
You’ve Never Addressed Your Emotions
When it comes to childhood trauma, many people try to “get over” it by pretending it didn’t happen or refusing to talk about it. However, just like a physical wound, an emotional wound will only fester and continue to grow if it doesn’t get treated.
When you don’t address your own emotions or trauma, there’s no way to truly move on or forgive your parents for what happened. Addressing your emotions can mean everything from confronting your parents about the incident, talking to a therapist, or even finding a creative outlet to express those feelings.
Forgiveness Doesn’t Feel “Deserved”
Ever heard the phrase, “Forgiveness must be earned”?
For many people, forgiveness only comes after the person who hurts you apologizes or proves they won’t do it again. Sometimes, even an apology might not seem like it’s enough to cover the emotional damage they’ve caused you.
The problem with viewing forgiveness as something that must be “earned” is that there’s usually not much the other person can do to fix what they’ve done. An apology might be all that your parents can offer, but it’s usually not enough to sate anger or resentment that’s been building up for years.
If you’re upset that your father or mother missed all of your sports games as a teenager, there’s nothing your parents can do other than say they’re sorry. There’s no way for them to reverse time.
In other situations, you may not even get an apology. Even if you confront them, your parents might not see how their actions hurt you, and they may continue to defend them. It’s hard for someone to “earn” your forgiveness if they aren’t even trying. As a result, the anger and resentment will only continue to build.
Instead of looking at forgiveness as something the other person must work toward earning, try looking at how forgiveness can benefit your life. Not every parent deserves to be forgiven, but forgiving them can help you move on and have a better quality of life. Rather than making forgiveness about the other person, try to remember that it can positively affect you as well.
You May Want to Punish Your Parents
If your parents did something to hurt you, forgiveness may feel as if you’re letting them off the hook for their actions. If the wound is still fresh, it can be especially difficult to try and just move on from the incident.
Some people might hold back forgiveness because they want to punish their parents. For example, let’s say that your mother comes home from work after a long day and yells at you for no reason. She eventually cools off and moves on, but never apologizes for her hurtful words.
Holding a grudge might seem like a fitting punishment. It can also allow you to regain some control over a situation that might have made you feel powerless or hurt. However, refusing to forgive someone as a form of punishment is often ineffective—especially if they have no idea that their actions have hurt you.
You may think that your punishing your parents, but in reality, you’re only punishing yourself. Your mother will continue to move on in her life, but you’ll be left carrying the heavy burden of blame and anger.
Even if you confront your mother and she refuses to see that she did something wrong, there’s no reason why you need to continue to carry that resentment around.
Forgiveness Feels Like You’re Excusing Their Actions
For some people, forgiveness can feel like it’s excusing your parent’s harmful actions. While you are letting go of the anger you have, forgiveness doesn’t mean that what your parents did to you wasn’t wrong. The anger and resentment you felt might have been justified, but you don’t need to hold onto those emotions.
Forgiving your parents is more about improving your own quality of life rather than theirs. They might have been abusive or neglectful, and forgiving them doesn’t mean you forget that. You will always have to live with the knowledge of what your parents did to you, but you don’t have to let that trauma impact you on a regular basis.
If anyone questions you about why you’ve chosen to forgive your parents, all you need to do is remind them that you’re interested in moving on and focusing on your own life.
How Do You Forgive Your Parents?
Now that you understand how refusing to forgive your parents can affect you in adulthood and why it’s so difficult to forgive them, it’s time for the hard part—figuring out how to forgive your parents. Although every situation is different, the steps that you take to forgive your mother or father are usually the same for everyone.
Recognize Your Anger
The first step towards forgiveness is figuring out what you need to forgive. You may have plenty of anger or resentment toward your parents, but you may not necessarily know what it’s for. It’s a good idea to try and recognize what your anger stems from—it may be a specific memory or a series of memories.
Even if you already know what you’re angry about, reflecting on it months or years later can give you a new perspective. For example, you might have been angry at your parents for not buying you new toys as a kid. When you look back on this memory as an adult, you might realize that your parents refused to buy the toy because they couldn’t afford it—not because they wanted to be cruel.
Not every memory you reflect on might provide the perspective or clarity that you want, but it is a good place to start.
Redefine Your Relationship
Once you understand what you’re angry about, the next step is to consider whether or not you need to redefine the relationship. Although some grudges might be about isolated incidents that happened a long time ago, other people might have parents that continue to hurt them—even as adults.
As an example, you might have a parent who tries to control your life as an adult—whether it be financially, emotionally, or even physically. Forgiveness can be challenging if your parent doesn’t understand what they’ve done wrong, and they continue to hurt you.
Even if your parents no longer hurt you, but they used to be abusive or neglectful, seeing them on a regular basis can stir up emotional wounds.
To reach forgiveness, it might be time to redefine the relationship you have with your parents. If you feel as if they aren’t giving you enough space, you might need to take actions that create distance.
This could be anything from deciding not to contact them for a while or even moving away. Redefining your relationship is a way to create boundaries, and it can often help you maintain a much healthier relationship with your parents in the future.
Creating boundaries is also a way to help you regain the control you might have lost long ago. As a victim, you feel powerless, and like you’re at someone else’s mercy. As an adult, separating yourself and defining what you want from the relationship with your parents (and what you don’t want) can help you take that power back.
Your parents might not understand why you’re creating boundaries (even if you explain it to them), and they might even resist these changes—especially if they’ve been using their relationship with you as a way to control your life. Regardless of what your parents might say, it’s important to hold your ground.
Find an Outlet
One reason that many people find it difficult to move on from childhood trauma or emotional wounds is that they don’t have any way to express what they’re feeling. While it is a good idea to let your parents know what they’ve done wrong, it’s not the only path to forgiveness. Many people think that confronting the person who hurt you is the only way to deal with their emotions, but this isn’t necessarily true.
Talking about your pain with your parents can be beneficial, but not every confrontation gives you the answer you want or leaves you satisfied. In some cases, it might be impossible to confront your parents if they’ve passed away or you’re no longer in contact with them.
Fortunately, there are other ways that you can express your emotional wounds. Many people find that keeping a journal or writing about their trauma is a helpful outlet. Anytime you feel as if the emotional wound is “flaring up,” you can record it in your journal.
If you don’t enjoy writing, you can always express your emotions through music, art, or even by talking to someone else. The person you talk to can be anyone from a trustworthy friend that’s willing to listen to a qualified counselor or therapist. Not everyone’s outlet may be the same, but the important part is that you’re finding a way to express your emotions and let go of the anger.
Develop Realistic Expectations
In perfect circumstances, talking to your parents about how they’ve hurt you would end with plenty of heartfelt apologies and hugs. Unfortunately, not every parent is willing to listen or admit that their actions were damaging.
Many abusive or neglectful parents may try and justify the emotional or physical trauma that they caused you. In other cases, your parents might blow you off and question why you’re still upset about something that happened months or years ago.
If you expect your parents one way and they don’t, it can be difficult to forgive them afterward. Before you speak with your parents about your grudge (or even just sit down to reflect on the incident by yourself), it’s important to set realistic expectations.
Even if you forgive your parents, the relationship that you have with them in the future still might not be perfect. You may still need to create boundaries to protect yourself.
Setting realistic expectations can also help prevent future disappointment if you do confront your parents about your feelings. While it would be nice if they instantly apologized or admitted they acted wrong, their initial reaction might be to act defensively.
If you know your parents have reacted poorly to dealing with conflict in the past, it’s safe to assume they could have a poor reaction now.
Look at the Positives
When you reflect on childhood trauma, it’s easy to fall back into the role of the powerless victim. However, as an adult who’s had much more life experience, you can look at the bigger picture. The experience that you endured might have been painful and traumatic, but it could also be something you can learn from.
Childhood trauma can help you understand which parental behaviors are acceptable and which ones aren’t. Many victims choose never to let their own children endure the same childhood trauma that they went through.
If your parents never attended any of your sports games, you might make it a priority to cheer your child on at every single one of their games.
Other abuse victims might choose to find careers in a field like social work or counseling where they can help children in similar circumstances. The trauma that you endured might have caused you extreme pain and affected your life, but you can also choose to turn that experience into a motivating force rather than a secret shame.
Find True Separation
Part of the forgiveness process is finding true separation between you and your parent’s actions. Although they may have turned you into a victim years ago, you’re still responsible for your choices as an adult.
Instead of letting yourself get stuck in the past, try to remember that you are more than your parent’s actions, and they no longer have a hold over you. If you continue to blame every bad decision that you make on your parents, you’ll always feel like a victim, and you’ll struggle to forgive them.
Hold On To the Good Moments
No parent is perfect, and in some cases, one emotional wound or childhood trauma can blind you from seeing the positives in your mother or father. Your parents might have truly loved you, but their own flaws might have caused them to act poorly at times—just like your own flaws sometimes do.
This doesn’t mean excusing abusive or neglectful behavior. You’ll always have the reminders of your parents’ traumatizing actions, but that doesn’t mean you can’t also recognize their positive traits or cherish the good memories that you do have.
To forgive your parents, you need to examine your parents as an entire person. This means letting go of unrealistic expectations and seeing both their good and bad qualities. When you do this, you might find that it’s much easier to let go of the anger.
Should I Tell My Parents That I Forgive Them?
Once you have forgiven your parents, the next question to ask is whether or not you should tell them. Unfortunately, there isn’t one correct answer—it often depends on the specific circumstances.
If you’ve been withholding your emotions for several years, and you’ve never explained how you feel, sitting down and having a calm discussion with your family might be worthwhile. Once they’ve processed what you’re saying, your parents may apologize and try to act better in the future.
It’s possible they have no idea how much their actions have affected you. They may also feel much better knowing that you have the courage and the strength to move on from the trauma.
Not all parents may care that you forgive them. If they’re unable to recognize how hurtful their actions were in the first place, they might not have much to say when you tell them that you’re moving on.
Telling your parents that you forgive them can be cathartic, but it’s important to set realistic expectations. The conversation might not feel as satisfying as you want it to be.
In other cases, telling your parents that you forgive them could end in an explosive confrontation. If you believe that bringing up the subject could end in a violent argument, it might be best to stay silent.
Although forgiveness is a term that many people throw around, not everyone understands what it truly means to forgive someone else—especially when it’s your own family. It can be difficult to forgive your parents because, as a child, you trust your parents to take care of you. At some point, they broke that trust, and they might have caused you pain or trauma along the way.
Choosing to forgive your parents is a decision that will impact you more than it does them. Forgiveness doesn’t necessarily mean that your relationship with your parents will change, but it does mean that you can finally let go of the anger and resentment you feel and begin moving on. Abuse and neglect breed a cycle of suffering, but you don’t need to be a part of it.