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cameroncowan comments on Where is the line between being a good child and taking care of oneself? - Less Wrong Discussion

11 Post author: jkadlubo 04 December 2014 07:26AM

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Comment author: cameroncowan 07 December 2014 08:57:22AM *  -1 points [-]

This is a very typical experience of too many people including my own self. However, the only person you can fix or control is you. The only person you can work on is yourself. My recommendation is to sit with yourself and decide what is their draconian expectations and what is truly your problem. Leave everything that is theirs behind and only worry about what is yours. It won't seem like you're a "good son" but too often being a good son means co-dependency and excess control. Don't hand your very real power away to someone else. You will always be in the wrong, you will never do it right for them and you will never get what you are looking for. I do not say this to hurt you but to help you to an important realization. You are you and they are sick and trying to infect you with their disease. It's time to walk away.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 07 December 2014 03:42:46PM *  1 point [-]

Adulthood isn't an award they'll give you for being a good child. You can waste... years, trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just... take it. Give it to yourself, I suppose. Say, I'm sorry you feel like that and walk away. But that's hard.

Lois McMaster Bujold