The Hard Part of Parenting Is Seeing Yourself in the Mirror

"Somewhere in the process of parenting, you begin to see your younger self in your child-and you are forced to face the parts of yourself you have either buried or never fully understood. I started noticing this mirror effect when my daughter became a teenager. Suddenly, her behavior-makeup, boyfriend, confidence -was triggering emotions I did not expect."

"At first, I thought she was pushing boundaries. Then I realized she was pushing mine. Because, as a teenager, I was nothing like her. I was introverted. I wore simple clothes, tied my hair back, and had no interest in boys or parties. My world revolved around academics. I had tunnel vision: study, succeed, achieve."

"Maybe that drive came from my childhood. I grew up in the former Soviet Union, where schools had two languages: Russian and Kazakh. At home and with friends, we spoke Russian; with relatives, Kazakh. My conversational Kazakh was fine-but my academic Kazakh was weak. Then, at the age of six, just as I began first grade, I got into a bike accident and couldn't walk for six months."

"When I recovered, my mother enrolled me in a Kazakh-language school instead of a Russian one. I had missed the basics, and now everything-from reading to math-was in a language I didn't fully understand. I was lost. Instead of trying to keep up, I gave up. I sat at the back of the classroom, played games, hung out with my friends, and stopped doing homework altogether. My teacher used to call me "stupid." I was six, and I believed her."

Parenting can reveal unresolved childhood wounds when a parent's younger self appears reflected in a child. The mother first noticed this mirror effect when her daughter became a teenager and triggered unexpected emotions through makeup, a boyfriend, and confidence. The mother had been introverted and academically driven, possibly shaped by early experiences in a bilingual Soviet school and a childhood bike accident that interrupted learning. Placement in a Kazakh-language school led to academic struggle, withdrawal, and being labeled "stupid." Verbal abuse from a stepfather reinforced negative self-beliefs. These experiences contributed to patterns of drive, shame, and coping that can be transmitted across generations.

Read at Psychology Today