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Muse Lynne Coon counsels boomers dealing with aging parent issues
Specialty:   Counselor (Helping adults with aging parents cope with the emotional and practical aspects of caring for their parents)
Lynne Coon
Bio: Lynne Coon grew up next door to her paternal grandparents and great grandfather. She helped care for them when they got older. Her maternal grandparents were also in her life growing up and as an adult. She saw the issues that came up as her grandparents aged and how her parents helped them. After completing her master's program she looked for a job specifically focused on older adults. She is now a counselor specializing in families with aging parents.
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Lynne is a Muse who has an affinity for working with older adults.

Forgiving Parents Who Hurt You

Studies have shown that people who are able to forgive are happier and healthier than those who can't. It actually takes more effort to hold onto resentments than it does to let them go. The idea seems simple enough, but forgiving someone is not a simple act for those who've been hurt, especially by their parents.

The idea of forgiveness is important in many religions, and each has a different philosophy about it. My approach is from a psychological perspective, which sees forgiveness as a process. I've broken it into steps for ease of explaining it, but it's not exactly a step-by-step process.

It's important to remember that forgiving someone doesn't mean that you approve of what the person did. It is not condoning the behavior.

1. Admit that you've been hurt. People often try to deny to themselves they were hurt. Once you're able to be honest with yourself that you were hurt, you can begin to move forward, in spite of the hurt. Denying it keeps you stuck.

2. Recognize that the offense changed you. If you had an abusive, or neglectful parent, it had an impact on your life and shaped who you are. The ways you were affected aren't necessarily all negative. Seeing that you changed in positive ways can be helpful. For instance, you may have more compassion toward others because of what you went through.

3. Try to view the situation in a new way. It may make you more able to consider forgiving the other person and more willing to do so. Maybe your father was neglectful because he had you at a young age and wasn't ready to be a parent. Is it possible that even though he neglected you, he was doing the best he could?

4. Find empathy and compassion for the offender. This is a big step but without it I'm not sure forgiving someone is possible. This doesn't mean you're excusing what your parent did but that you understand why it might have happened. Going back to the example in #3, you might be able to empathize with what it might be like to be a young parent. Or, if your mother stayed in an abusive relationship, was it because she didn't have family support and she felt lost; to cope she sought a relationship thinking that she needed the help of someone else to raise you, no matter how bad the relationship was.

5. Other things that can help you move toward forgiveness:

  • recognize that others have been hurt by someone and they were able to overcome it.
  • remember a time you asked for forgiveness and what it felt like to be forgiven.

Notice I didn't suggest you go to the person and forgive them. Forgiveness doesn't require the actual act of telling others they're forgiven. They may not think they need to be forgiven for anything. This is about you forgiving them, because it's best for you. John W. James and Russell Friedman, in their book, The Grief Recovery Handbook, suggested the following phrase to a woman who resisted the word forgiveness: "I acknowledge the things that you did or did not do that hurt me and I am not going to let them hurt me anymore." Forgiving someone is about letting go of what is still giving them power over you.

The benefit in forgiveness is a release from old ways of thinking and feeling. Forgiving makes it possible to move forward and make different choices, find new joy in the world and those around you and be in the moment instead of stuck in the past.

See also Muse Lynne's Article, "Telling Elderly Parents What To Do"

Additional Articles by Muse Lynne:

Building Resiliency to Combat Aging

Contact Information:

Lynne Coon, MS, Counselor
Helping adults with aging parents cope with the emotional and practical aspects of caring for their parents
Lynne Coon Counseling




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Bonus Article

Telling Elderly Parents What to Do

One of the biggest obstacles my clients struggle with is that it may be time to tell their parents what to do. They'll tell me they've asked their parent to do this or suggested they try that and their mother or father hasn't followed through. They wonder how they should approach it with them now. When I suggest that it may be time to be more direct with their parents, their response is usually, "I can do that?"

There does come a time when you can no longer wait for your parents to act. If their safety or wellbeing is at risk then it's in their best interest that you try a different approach to prevent a crisis. For example, when there is a risk they will hurt themselves by falling or driving; be taken advantage of because they're no longer making good decisions; or their health is suffering because they're caring for their spouse or can't fully take care of themselves any longer.

There are several things to keep in mind when you have to "tell" them what to do:

It should be done with respect. I don't want to give you the impression it's okay to boss them around. That probably didn't work for you when you were a teenager, and it will have the same effect on your mother and father now.

It's in their best interests. If your parents aren't able to be rational about their situation and the need for it to change, then you need to do what's best to insure they stay as safe and independent as possible.

Your motive should be their health and wellbeing. Emphasizing this as much as possible is important. You both want the same thing: their independence. Unfortunately, that doesn't always mean living on their own or continuing to drive. It does mean maintaining or improving their physical health so they can be as independent as possible given their limitations. Your goal is to prevent them from becoming incapacitated to the point they need a high level of care, which means a low level of independence.

Telling them what to do still means choices. The approach that works best, in my experience, is to give options. For example, "You can't live at home any longer unless you have a caregiver. If you don't want to do that, then you'll have to move to assisted living."

Show understanding but stay firm. In the ideal world they would instantly agree. In the real world they're likely to get mad, defensive, cry... You can, and should, let them know you understand why they feel the way they do AND they still have to do it.

Set a date for a decision and for action. If you don't do this it can continue to be a L-O-N-G and repetitious conversation with no end. If it has to happen, it has to happen. The situation you're dealing with determines the deadline. If they're unsafe now, then a decision needs to happen in days, not weeks and months.

This may not be an easy conversation for you or your mother and father. It's a sign they're getting older. To them it means letting go of more independence. To you it can mean that you have to accept they're getting older and your roles are changing. You're beginning the journey of letting go of the parent you've known all your life.