Forgiving Your Parents

I read somewhere that the first thing you must do in order to grow up is to forgive your parents. I've been thinking a lot about that over the last couple of years. Every time I look at reels on Facebook or Tiktok, I'm seeing posts from parents of adult children who have made a "no further contact" decision. It breaks my heart. Not simply because I am not as close as I would like to be to my own children, but because I wonder how close I came to that decision from time to time over the years. I guess in a way, I can see both sides. What I also see is the need for forgiveness.

The Bible tells us clearly that there is no magic number for the amount of times we should forgive someone who wrongs us. It also tells us if we don't forgive, we won't be forgiven.

With that knowledge in mind, how do we forgive when we believe we have been hurt so bad and we won't ever be able to get past that hurt.

Then comes the next question. Are we doomed to parent the way we were parented? The times when we promised ourselves that we would never do to our future children what was being done to us. There were things I said that about, and I don't feel it necessary to go into the specifics here, but I kept that promise I made to myself.

Was it right or wrong? At my advanced age, I should know, shouldn't I? I don't. My children are no more loving than I was growing up. The people who raised me were not terribly affectionate after I was five or six years old. Who pulled back? Me or them?

I found out after I married and moved away that I was a hugger. I didn't know that before because my immediate family were not huggers.

What causes us to distance ourselves from the people who raised us? What causes us to refuse contact or limit contact?

I can say at age 65 that I miss hearing from my children and grandchildren. I know they have busy lives and I suppose I don't cross their minds very often anymore. I hope they know I think of them everyday. I pray for them and hope that someday, they will forgive me. So they can grow up and be forgiven.