Harvard-Trained Psychiatrist Reveals The Secret To Being A Better Parent Than Your Parents Were To You
We all think we'll be better parents to our kids than our own parents were to us, but that can be easier said than done.
Drazen Zigic / Shutterstock As you were growing up, you probably made a list once or twice (or three times or more) of the many ways in which you'll be a better parent than your parents were to you. You make mental notes of the things your parents do that you swear you will never, ever, never do when you have your own children, and you feel absolutely certain you'll follow through.
Then you have your own children and lo and behold, not doing some or most of those things isn't as easy as you thought it would be. You find yourself doing them without even thinking about it, and then you beat yourself up and stew in guilt and frustration.
Are we all doomed to repeat our parents mistakes, or is there a way we can actually become the kind of parent we always hoped and expected we would be?
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On a recent episode of the Open Relationships: Transforming Together podcast, Harvard psychiatrist Dr. Frank Anderson shared with host Andrea Miller the secret to being a better parent than your parents were to you.
The secret to being a better parent than your parents were to you
Anderson shares that he himself struggled with this very issue. As a Harvard-trained psychiatrist, he felt nobody should know better than him how to avoid repeating his parents' mistakes.
"And then to come home and repeat what was done to me was mortifying," he says. "I mean, the whole reason I had kids was to give them a different experience than the one that I had growing up, right? That was the whole point. And then to find myself repeating the very thing that was done to me was just, there was nothing worse, nothing worse, you know?"
"In my experience," he states, "anybody who has been traumatized holds victim energy, but they also absorb perpetrator energy."
Therefore, Anderson explains, "If you don't acknowledge your perpetrator energy — your shadow side, whatever you want to call it — you will repeat it. That's the deal."
The only way to break the otherwise never-ending cycle of intergenerational trauma is to acknowledge and accept this truth.
Anderson understands the struggle involved with ending this kind of cycle. Even though he is a trauma expert, he says it was hard to manage on his own.
"I may have gone to Harvard," he confesses, "And I'm an expert. And I am reenacting my trauma just like everybody else was."
Truth, he says, is the antidote to trauma.
"I really felt that was important to be honest and truthful about what I've done as well as what was done to me," Anderson continues, "because we can't heal, in my opinion, until we acknowledge both sides in everyone."
Once you get this intellectually, Miller notes, you can work with it.
"To me, it's always back to 'How can I be accountable?'" Then, it's time to find that same forgiveness and compassion for yourself it is so healing to have found for our parents.
Anderson notes, "Every moment is an opportunity to repeat, repress, or repair."
Everyone has the ability to grow and make progress.
You can begin being a better parent to your child by being a better parent to yourself.
Marielisa Reyes is a writer with a bachelor's degree in psychology who covers self-help, relationships, career, and family topics.