So your parents don't believe in therapy...

“I think my mother has undiagnosed depression. I’m overwhelmed by her emotions”

“My father is an angry old man. We have to walk on eggshells around him and never know when he’s going to blow up”

“I wish my parent would go to therapy, but they don’t believe in it. They would never do it.”

When I hear some version of these statements from my clients, I sense the feeling of helplessness and despair from wanting a parent to heal from trauma, understand themselves better, be able to take difficult feedback, or at the very least learn to just listen.

If you are similar to my clients, you might start therapy not for yourself, but for someone else. By being in therapy, you can say to one or both of your parents, “Look, you’re the reason I am going to therapy…if I’m doing the work, why can’t you?”

Starting therapy this way would be a mistake. I see how frustrated you are, how your parents mental health impacts you, how desperate you are for them to change, so you can be released from the psychic burden of managing their destructive behavior and feelings. Sometimes, clients are seeking a therapist’s “expert” opinion on their parents condition, diagnoses, etc.

In my opinion, your parents are allowed to live their life however they see fit.

Culturally, your parents have probably thought therapy was only for people who were extremely ill, or that talking about your problems is shameful, useless, and a waste of time and money.  They’d prefer to brush things under the rug as they always have, one sacrifice among many they’ve had to make. They would never, ever, go to therapy. That very well may be the case.

Meanwhile, if you have grown up in the US, you have likely been learning that it’s good to express your feelings, to not bottle things in. You have learned about intergenerational trauma, attachment theory, internalized oppression, and the body-mind connection. You’re proud, rather than ashamed, to be in therapy.

Neither of you are right. It’s a difference, informed by your life experiences, upbringing, and surrounding influences. The fact that your parents don’t believe in therapy will not diminish your investment in it. This difference does not have to divide you, either.

So, instead of hoping that you can heal your parents, go to therapy to find out what’s there that can be just for you.