Often when communicating with our parents we experience mixed feelings - on the one hand, these are the people we love, on the other hand, sometimes if a stranger spoke to us like that, we would simply send him and no longer communicated with him.

When my mother calls and in an ultimatum form states what I, a 40-year-old man, should do. Or when the father manipulates, putting pressure on feelings of guilt.

This is called aggression, we really want to justify our loved ones, but over time it turns out worse and worse.

You can, of course, formally agree, hiding your dissatisfaction, but then sabotage the actions expected of us, avoiding open conflict. In the short term this works, but in the long term this strategy is of little use, since such situations appear again and again in various variations.

Talking directly to them about what is not pleasant also does not give much effect, since accusations begin that I am twisting everything and misunderstanding, and have no right at all talk like that.

In short, how to build your relationship with your parents so as not to feed your passive aggressive feelings. How to love your parents and at the same time be honest with yourself?

Where are the boundaries with parents? They go where your interests and your needs begin.

It is a rather difficult choice - to be a victim of aggression from loved ones or to choose your own interests. It is known that only very close people can do the most harm, and it is they who, as a rule, actively strive to destroy your boundaries and climb with their feet where a stranger is afraid to tread.

In essence, by satisfying the desires of other people that go against your interests, you agree to violence against yourself, destroy your personal boundaries, neglect your needs and ultimately live someone else's life .

To correctly build boundaries with loved ones, you need to agree with several theses:

1. Unfortunately, not all people are able to accept others as they are.

2. A person can love, but at the same time have bad character traits

3. You can love your parents without making excuses for their bad behavior

4. We don't owe our parents anything, and they don't owe us anything

5. We cannot control the feelings and attitudes of other people towards us

These theses may seem harsh to you, but you can accept responsibility for your attitude - to love or not love yourself. We cannot control the attitude of other people towards us, and no one owes us anything, we manage our own lives, regardless of what other people, even those closest to us, think about this.

When you accept these theses for yourself, it will, of course, be unpleasant for you to listen to manipulations and valuable instructions from your parents, but at the same time you will feel that this is your life.

Then it will be much easier for you to say, “I love you, but if you talk to me in this tone, we will not communicate.” After all, this is what parents usually do with their children - they show love to them, without ignoring bad behavior.

You allow them to make their own choice - to communicate with you on your terms. Conditions for respecting your personality and boundaries or not communicating at all.

It will take time for your parents to learn to understand the difference, it will be unpleasant, but then you will have greater internal freedom and a sense of your own integrity, and they will learn to communicate the way you want it if you are truly valuable.

What will happen if they don’t learn, get offended and stop communicating? Then you will be hurt, but you will be able to accept their choice, treating them with love, but understanding that you cannot influence their life and their decisions. Their life, fears, anxieties and complexes are their responsibility. They need to take care of themselves, and I need to take care of myself - and this is my responsibility to myself and my personality.

If it’s difficult for you to walk this path on your own and you need support on this path to asserting your boundaries in relationships with loved ones - for this there is online psychotherapy, where together we can walk this path to maintaining its integrity. The initial conversation is always free - you can sign up right now by clicking the button below.

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