If you had a depressed parent

[Anonymous]

How did it affect your life?

[Anonymous]

Made me very anxious and also depressed. For many years I had a very negative outlook on life and my DH often joked that was a total pessimist. I’ve had therapy which really opened my eyes and I have been able to come out of that negativity. Now when I hear my mom saying her usual negative things they really stand out to me and I can see how harmful they were to us. Unfortunately she will not get help.

[Anonymous]

My mom’s depression and anxiety - really, unresolved/unaddressed childhood trauma - manifested as violent abuse. I had zero self-esteem or self-worth. I had issues with other women (I am a woman), was in two physically abusive relationships before age 25, attempted suicide, was hospitalized for mental illness a handful of times as a teenager, and experimented very unsafely with drugs and alcohol and questionable characters. I was desperate for love and acceptance.

Parents, please be your child’s safe place.

[Anonymous]

It’s very hard for me to know what was caused by my mom’s depression, my parents’s collective emotional immaturity (caused by their own childhood trauma), dad’s narcissism, or my dad’s serious health issues and hospitalizations.

I have dealt with depression and anxiety throughout my life, struggled to maintain friendships, deal with extremely low self esteem, and have over time become so introverted that I no longer feel capable of working in an office.

But I also have multiple traumas from adulthood, including a sexual assault by a friend when I was 25, and a sexual assault at work when I was 32. My experience growing up has impacted my ability to heal from those events.

I’m mid-40s now and surprisingly functional and happy given all this.

[Anonymous]

Only when I was an adult, and after my mom's death, did I fully realize my mom likely was depressive, at times perhaps extremely so, but she was incredibly good at functioning through it.

Nothing at all like some PPs above describe, though, which might illustrate the very wide range of what depression is and how it manifests differently in different people. I don't think her depressive tendencies were rooted in any early trauma that I ever knew of, and I think I knew a lot about her upbringing. I do believe now that her depressive tendencies were greatly exacerbated by physical issues she just tried to push through all her life (miscarriages, a lot of gynecological difficulties, what I only now realize was a horrible menopause, and what today would surely be diagnosed as fibromyalgia). She was negative and "down" in many ways yet managed to be supportive of me, and was very intentional about telling me she loved me, and neither permissive nor at all strict. Not perfect but a good mom possibly because she was hard on herself about just keeping going, however she felt physically or mentally.

As for how it affected me, I did grow up being very aware that women were often dismissed if they tried to get medical help for anything that wasn't clear-cut and extremely obvious to a (usually male) doctor. That was my mom's experience. Better doctors would have spotted many of her physical issues and diagnosed them better (rather than blaming EVERYTHING on "the change") and maybe connected them with depression and helped her not have to just push through everything on her own.

For context, I'm probably older than many on this board, and was raised in an area where there was plenty of medical care but also a lot of misogyny ingrained in everything. And my dad died suddenly when I was in middle school and my sibling was in high school, so my mom had that to deal with (situational depression, I think that's called) and college money to worry about. I truly respect and appreciate her more, the older I get. I just wish I could have known more at that time about depression as part of overall medical issues. But I was a kid and teen. I've raised my own DD to be very proactive about both physical and mental health.

[Anonymous]

She yelled a lot. I yelled at my kids for years. I think I'm doing better now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s very hard for me to know what was caused by my mom’s depression, my parents’s collective emotional immaturity (caused by their own childhood trauma), dad’s narcissism, or my dad’s serious health issues and hospitalizations.

I have dealt with depression and anxiety throughout my life, struggled to maintain friendships, deal with extremely low self esteem, and have over time become so introverted that I no longer feel capable of working in an office.

But I also have multiple traumas from adulthood, including a sexual assault by a friend when I was 25, and a sexual assault at work when I was 32. My experience growing up has impacted my ability to heal from those events.

I’m mid-40s now and surprisingly functional and happy given all this.

PP, you don't mention it, but I sincerely hope you've been in, or are still in, therapy for the trauma? Especially with a therapist who specializes in working with sexual assault victims? I'm so sorry for your experiences, but also glad to hear that today you're so functional and happy.

[Anonymous]

My mom has struggled with depression for years; when I was growing up, it was exacerbated by my dad’s narcissism. Not a great combo.

Anyway, I internalized a lot of her relentless negativity. She still struggles with self-worth and I took a lot of that on as a kid. Now, as a well-therapized adult, I can see clearly how extreme it is - but when I was a kid, it seemed normal to think I was a loser. I went through a period of depression, too, but meds and really good therapy helped. Knock wood, no recurrence, but it’s something I keep an eye out for because I don’t want my kids to be impacted.

[Anonymous]

My mom struggled with anxiety and depression, but was an externalizer so it manifested in rage,
scapegoating, venting all her issues to me from a young age, hurling insults at me when she felt I was not doing enough for her, making me responsible for her happiness, etc. I went into therapy on and off as different issues came up like being in an abusive relationship with a guy in college, being in an abusive work situation and then eldercare issues. It wasn't until eldercare issues I stopped worshipping and trying to please mom and shared what was really going on. The therapists eyes bugged out of her head as I shared stories from now and growing up. She wondered about personality disorders like BPD and NPD and even bipolar, but over time I think we figured out it was more the less preferable manifestation of anxiety and depression along with maybe some traits of personality disorders. She definitely was NOT an internalizer.

I do think it's not just genetics that made anxious and prone to depression, but modeling what I saw even though I internalized unlike her. That said, by nature I am an optimist, and I reclaimed that and was able to manage my won anxiety when I learned more about it and stopped seeing mom as a model. Now when she tries to emotion dump on me I detach and suggest therapy. I don't let myself catch her moods. I also stopped having so much empathy for her because it turned into me constantly forgiving abusive behavior.

[Anonymous]

Sorry by less preferable I mean she externalized her depression and anxiety with rage and abuse rather than internalizing. I think she does have unstable sense of self, but mostly she blames everyone else when she feels down or anxious.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Only when I was an adult, and after my mom's death, did I fully realize my mom likely was depressive, at times perhaps extremely so, but she was incredibly good at functioning through it.

Yup.

I think the way it's affected me most is to change the pattern of not acknowleding anxiety/depression (my childhood family) to recognizing it, talking about it and treating it in my family now.

Some of our kids have anxiety and related conditions and we got them help and discussed it from an early age.

I'm sad that my mom didn't get more help. She did later in life and I'm proud that she had the courage to finally access help when some around her would rather she pretend it wasn't real.

[Anonymous]

After a serious work related accident that left my dad unable to work, both of my parents fell into a deep depression. I remember calling some depression hotline that was on tv at the time (early 90s) and ordering them information. Even though they knew it was me, I denied it. I coped with their depression by digging into school and eventually work. While I was already type A and driven, it made me very ambitious. As though I was making up for their lack of inaction in life.

Guess what, I'm still in that cycle. Only now I have a depressed spouse, ironically, also do a work injury, and two depressed young adult kids (19-21). I'm not talking seasonal depression. Two are clinically depressed, one is bipolar. What am I doing? What I always do. The worse they become the better I do at work. I manage everything. It's exhausting and I'm finally feeling burn out. But I'm not sure what else to do. It's like dragging your entire family uphill through waist deep mud. Just waiting for them to feel a bit better so they can carry some weight again.

[Anonymous]

Oh my God, I feel like I have found my tribe. You all sound so much like me. I have often wondered if my mother had something like chronic low-grade depression her entire life. She is basically a weak and passive woman with no interests of her own and she has let my father treat her like a slave for over fifty years. He was a mean drunk who screamed all the time and threatened us, and she would say things like "He's going to kill me some day" but never actually stood up to him, including defending us. It was like living in a madhouse!

To this day, I feel like I have to earn my place in the world, winning awards and never resting, since I don't view myself as objectively having a right to exist. I don't know how to relax. I have no internal self-esteem. I feel guilty if I am happy. I am also working through my trauma with a therapist and trying to reprogram all of my negative self-talk. Realized lately that I spent my life trying to meet my parents impossible standards,but I never set any standards or expectations for anyone else. My kids are grown but I basically let them and my husband walk all over me because I didn't htink I had any right to demand anything of anyone. weird to be realizing this now, so late in life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Made me very anxious and also depressed. For many years I had a very negative outlook on life and my DH often joked that was a total pessimist. I’ve had therapy which really opened my eyes and I have been able to come out of that negativity. Now when I hear my mom saying her usual negative things they really stand out to me and I can see how harmful they were to us. Unfortunately she will not get help.

+1

Parents died young but I see this in MIL and SIL - high anxiety and depression, and everything is "too stressful" - like, anything at all. DH's family not one to talk about anything, least of all, their emotions, but there was a lot of anger and hostility in the household. MIL walked on eggshells, jumped for FIL, and was never good enough or worth anything, but too depressed and anxious to contribute more than for show. FIL was never home, and the family never enjoyed anything, as their togetherness was forced, and they really didn't like each other very much - except for MIL and doppelganger SILs, who enabled each other, and still do. Older SIL was forced to grow up and adult at a young age because MIL could not step up. Only agreement was expected, no one, especially MIL, was allowed an opinion. Meals and vacations were their absolute low points, and DH has issues with those to this day. I do hope one or more of them have sought professional help, knowing now what I did not know at the beginning, but is now so glaringly obvious. If only they were honest about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s very hard for me to know what was caused by my mom’s depression, my parents’s collective emotional immaturity (caused by their own childhood trauma), dad’s narcissism, or my dad’s serious health issues and hospitalizations.

I have dealt with depression and anxiety throughout my life, struggled to maintain friendships, deal with extremely low self esteem, and have over time become so introverted that I no longer feel capable of working in an office.

But I also have multiple traumas from adulthood, including a sexual assault by a friend when I was 25, and a sexual assault at work when I was 32. My experience growing up has impacted my ability to heal from those events.

I’m mid-40s now and surprisingly functional and happy given all this.

PP, you don't mention it, but I sincerely hope you've been in, or are still in, therapy for the trauma? Especially with a therapist who specializes in working with sexual assault victims? I'm so sorry for your experiences, but also glad to hear that today you're so functional and happy.

Thank you, yes— I have been in therapy. Sadly it is hard to find a therapist generally and even harder to find one doing a specific kind of therapy (such as trauma informed, though I wish all therapists were trauma informed). So some of my therapists have been not the best fit.

Interestingly, I only learned about trauma informed therapy when I volunteered with an organization that helps sexual violence survivors. That’s also when I started to realize how much my sexual assault traumas were still impacting me. I saw a therapist for a bit who was not a good fit, but even that helped some. I have gotten a lot out of reading books and studies about trauma and recovery. Learning about ACES was really enlightening. But yeah, it’s a piecemeal patchwork of mental health support over here. I have a supportive DH and I’m hella determined though!