Epiphany: I’ve Been Too Hard on My Parents. Immigrating Can Be Traumatic.

Apr 23

I grew up under classic Tiger Parents.

“You don’t have to be number one. You can be Number Two or Three.”

“We’ll pay for you to attend Harvard or MIT. Or else, you can go to the state school.” (Although I had no idea what the state school was like, it was made out to be infinitely worse than Harvard/MIT.)

“Be a teacher, accountant, or doctor.”

I was so stressed out when my parents told me stories of their friends who left their children kneeling out in the snow because of their grades, and I hated when the local Chinese parents would get together and talk about whose kids went to Harvard and who was the genius.

But recently I interviewed therapist Jeanie Y. Chang for my episode about healing and resilience from racism.

We talked about intergenerational trauma, and Jeanie noted that immigrating itself can be traumatic.

In the case of my parents, they had to learn a new language, study, and find work in America with no financial net. They experienced racism (repeatedly passed over for promotions at work) and faced racial violence (my dad was literally dragged into an apartment and beaten when he told our neighbors to be quiet. The beating was so loud my mom heard it from our apartment and went over to break up the fight. The police didn’t do anything.)

All of that is stressful, and traumatic.

I never really thought about it, because my parents never complained. Even when I recently talked to my mom about the beating, she said they had a better situation than others in this country.

Jeanie also mentioned that immigrants can face trauma in their home country experiences.

For my parents, that was living through World War II, extreme poverty, death of a parent at a young age, and separation from parents and siblings.

I knew my parents went through all of these things and didn’t have access to the financial / social / mental health resources that I do, but still I resented the Tiger Parent culture.

For the longest time, until literally a few weeks ago when I interviewed Jeanie, I thought my parents were Tiger to get bragging rights within the Chinese community.

Chinese people like to compare their “success” based on how their children perform, right?

But what if it’s not just that? What if they’re Tiger because that’s what they had to do to survive in America, and they wanted us to survive as well? What if things were so difficult and competitive in their home countries, everyone had to be Tiger to survive? (You know the stories of the high school and college entrance exams in Taiwan and China, right?)

I never thought about these points because I watched my non-Asian peers have so much more freedom; I just automatically assumed it was a problem with Asian culture.

I recently read the book Untigering: Adventures of a Deconstructing Tiger Mother, and the author Iris Chen notes that the traits we find so troubling in our parents are defense mechanisms which enabled them to survive.

Although I don’t plan to parent in the same way because we are now native speakers of English and have access to so many more resources, from our parents’ sacrifices, I now understand why they did what they did.

—-

Now my parents are in their 80s.

When I see them, everything they pushed us towards when we were younger — academic success, work accolades — doesn’t seem to matter.

They don’t ask about it.

My dad doesn’t even remember where we went to college or what professions we are in.

The rat race seems so meaningless.

It’s sad to witness their frailty and ponder their mortality — and my own.

When I spend time with them, all of my small daily worries — is my kid falling behind in extracurriculars because she does absolutely nothing? How do I grow the podcast? Where should we invest our time and money ? — disappear.

Because in the big scheme of things, it doesn’t matter.

It’s the small enjoyments that matter and sustain us in our day-to-day lives.

Watching a tomato seedling grow. Sharing a snuggle with my kids. Spending time with God in prayer, Bible and nature.

That’s it.

That’s life.

Mom and Dad, I’m sorry I’ve been so critical and hard on you for the Tiger Parenting. You did the best you could, with the resources you had, to prepare me for life. Thank you.

What’s your perspective on Tiger Parenting? Do you agree it was a survival mechanism, do you think it’s an unhealthy part of Asian culture, or both/and?