I have always felt that respect is something to be earned, not forced. My parents are overprotective and very strict. Every time one of my brothers or me make the smallest mistakes (or sometimes no mistakes at all) it turns into a reason to scream. And when my parents say something that's truly hurtful, they don't apologize at all. Their attitude towards me has had many negative effects on me and it's going to take me a long time to unlearn these things.
One incident that I want to talk about briefly perfectly describes what's wrong with our relationship. There's a local amusement park that I like to go to with my friends, and my parents usually give me a time to report back to them. (Also, this time is almost always several hours before any of my friends.) We were going to head to a baseball game afterwards, and I ended up at the car no more than five minutes after the given time. When I got off my last ride, I received a call from my dad, who was screaming. Not yelling–screaming! My brothers informed me that he was standing outside the car with the phone inches away from his face yelling into it, and it came across as thunderous on my end. Both parents made a huge deal out of my lateness and told me that it was my fault we would be late for the game.
We were over 40 minutes early.
Now, whenever I have to leave the park, I end up running and if I'm even a minute late, I begin to have a panic attack. I breathe fast and begin to sweat (which I can assure you has nothing to do with the heat) and I even begin to feel queasy. Not only should I not be experiencing these feelings, I should absolutely not be feeling them at the hands of my parents of all people. I don't think a parent has any right to abuse their power over a child the way that my parents do. And if I'm going to be panicking at the hands of my parents, it shouldn't be over something so silly.
One incident that I want to talk about briefly perfectly describes what's wrong with our relationship. There's a local amusement park that I like to go to with my friends, and my parents usually give me a time to report back to them. (Also, this time is almost always several hours before any of my friends.) We were going to head to a baseball game afterwards, and I ended up at the car no more than five minutes after the given time. When I got off my last ride, I received a call from my dad, who was screaming. Not yelling–screaming! My brothers informed me that he was standing outside the car with the phone inches away from his face yelling into it, and it came across as thunderous on my end. Both parents made a huge deal out of my lateness and told me that it was my fault we would be late for the game.
We were over 40 minutes early.
Now, whenever I have to leave the park, I end up running and if I'm even a minute late, I begin to have a panic attack. I breathe fast and begin to sweat (which I can assure you has nothing to do with the heat) and I even begin to feel queasy. Not only should I not be experiencing these feelings, I should absolutely not be feeling them at the hands of my parents of all people. I don't think a parent has any right to abuse their power over a child the way that my parents do. And if I'm going to be panicking at the hands of my parents, it shouldn't be over something so silly.
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