Young Woman Confronts Her Parents For Not 'Loving Her' Like Her Sister — And They Admit 'It's True'
She expected a fight, but was met with a shocking revelation.
Peopleimages.com / CanvaPro Our relationships with our parents are foundational to who we grow into as adults. Their care and love (or lack thereof) inherently change our perception of the world.
One young woman turned to Reddit to share how her family dynamic irreversibly changed the way she views love. Sadly, this realization came to a head when she confronted her parents for making her feel unwanted and unlovable.
This young woman confronted her parents for ‘not loving her’ like her sister — and they admitted it was ‘the truth.’
After turning 18, the young woman said she was finally ready to confront her parents after years of feeling overlooked in the face of her younger sister.
“I never felt they loved me, no affection, no cuddles, no bedtime stories or even a loving pat on my head,” she wrote. “I saw my mom [doting] on my sister and my dad spoiling her with random gifts.”
She heartbreakingly admitted she just wanted her parents to think about her fondly, even if it meant something as small as “having a snack” for her when she came home from school.
Unfortunately, that never happened. Instead, she described her mom's parenting as “indifferent and only did what was necessary.”
She never felt like her parents ‘liked or loved’ her, which led to a confrontation after she turned 18.
After reaching adulthood, she realized she couldn’t move forward in life without truly understanding why they “didn’t love her.” Was it something she did? Was there something she didn’t know?
The burden of carrying that uncertainty was weighing on her. So, she mustered the courage and finally asked her parents why they didn't love her and if it was because she was "difficult as a child."
Photo: JackF / Canva Pro
After years of emotional neglect, parental trauma and fighting for attention, she now stood face-to-face with her parents.
Instead of fighting back, reassuring her that “of course” they love her, they looked back in shock. “My mom said it was true.”
After her parents almost got a divorce over their daughter’s ‘overwhelming’ crying when she was just a baby, her mom admitted she never shook her resentment of her daughter.
“[My mother] tried not to cry, but said she blamed herself for not being able to bond with me,” she wrote. “She said that giving me up wasn’t the right thing to do … but she can’t force herself to love me.”
They agreed they did their best to “meet her needs and take care of her” throughout her childhood, but they “weren’t capable” of giving her the same love as her sister.
As she stared back at them, she couldn’t help but feel the guilt they were unconsciously passing over to her. As if giving her “the bare minimum” to survive, with no love, was an acceptable way to deal with a fussy newborn for her entire life.
Psychotherapist Helen Villiers took to TikTok to share her opinion about these parents and the blame they placed on their daughter. “That is just a parenting responsibility,” she said about providing the “bare minimum.”
She adamantly stated, "A child should not have to be grateful… or suppress their own needs to accept your behavior, just because you are cooking and cleaning for them.”
After their confession, the young woman knew her mother was holding something back. She wrote, “Mom admitted that she felt that something broke in her and she just couldn’t shake that resentment she developed, because apparently my dad almost left his family with my sister and dated another woman."
“Me crying overwhelmed them both too much… that resentment against me never went away.”
The young woman should seek therapy to heal from her childhood trauma.
Many commenters pointed to “generational trauma” as a possible explanation for this couple’s treatment of her daughter, or at the very least, some kind of trauma that explains their toxic attachment style.
“Go to therapy,” one person urged. “This is text-book level attachment issues that have now gone into the level of generational trauma. Your parent’s trauma has made them traumatize you. This is something you need to work through.”
Dr. T, a therapist on TikTok, simplified just how generational trauma impacts families and how trauma can be easily passed between parents and their children if active healing isn’t prioritized.
While it’s not explicitly called out in this young woman’s post, Dr. T’s explanation begs the question, what happened to these parents in their own childhood, that made it so difficult for them to love their own daughter?
Regardless, this young woman has finally come to terms with the reality of her childhood, and armed with the answers she’s always wanted, she can start to heal in a way that works for her.
Zayda Slabbekoorn is a news and entertainment writer at YourTango focusing on pop culture analysis and human interest stories.