My parents are not very vocal about their emotions, and I have definitely “inherited” that trait. Both my mom and dad come from very traditional backgrounds, so it would make sense why they struggle to express and cope with their feelings. Usually, it results in explosive bursts of anger, either because of a miscommunication or because I did or said something that ticked them off. My father, most of the time, apologises after, but my mom takes the “if we pretend nothing happened, then nothing happened” approach.
I have tried to talk to them about how I feel, but they never work out well. I remember this one instance very clearly, during primary school, I was telling my dad how I was feeling stressed about my upcoming exams. He responded by essentially telling me that I shouldn’t feel stressed because I was too young and HIS work was soo much more stressful than my exam. I remember feeling so angry by the way he responded and confused at how this was supposed to make me feel better. There are many more events like this I want to talk to him about, but my mom and dad got into a big fight because she tried to confront him on something hurtful he said to her in the past. He responded to that very angrily, saying something like how it was so long ago and it shouldn’t even matter because he’s changed since then. I guess after all of these I just stopped trying to talk to them - or anyone- about my life and my feelings
I understand that my parents both work very hard and that they love me and each other, and I’m so grateful for everything they’ve done for me. I want to confront them about this but I’m also struggling to even bring this up because we are all scared of being vulnerable and communicating properly, and I want to avoid starting another scene like the fight I mentioned above. Sometimes, I feel a bit of resentment as well. Like, why is it my responsibility to fix the communication skills of fully grown adults? But I know that not even adults are perfect and I just want my family to be happy, but I’m so scared of even thinking about trying to bring this up to them. argh im so tired