I asked the question, "Is it emotional abuse?" because I thought it would help give me some answers about my childhood. But I'm not sure I'd have any reaction if it was in fact emotional abuse. This is because I would find some way to disbelieve it.

It would be relieving to define my childhood. It would offer me something to point at and say, "This had an impact on me, and therefore I've planned to move forward in X way." I think it would be more relieving than simply saying that my childhood has had a profound impact on my emotional responses to certain situations.

But if it did indeed cement some kind of understanding, I am not sure that it would do me any good. The idea of defining the parents' actions in a certain way is disturbing to me because it falls in line with the way I have harshly thought of them in the past. I am sure that they raised me to the best of their abilities. (No, I'm not.) However, my opinions of them were colored through a "westernized" viewpoint and my own self consciousness, which was rooted in perceived differences between I and my American classmates. I came to think that we were somehow barbaric, a notion gently fed to me by insensitive classmates, teachers, and homework assignments. To use a western definition (I am only aware of it existing in western societies), to call it abuse, worries me as I feel that it might be more complicated than that.

To be sure, there was some pain and unhappiness, but my parents provided enough for me so that I never felt the need to help ease their unique pain as immigrants. I was privileged enough to disdain them and therefore contribute to their pain. I was privileged enough to think of their struggles and their attitudes towards me as cruelty, and I was privileged enough to be lazy enough to hate them. I really have no idea what to think. To forgive them makes me feel as though I am erasing a lot of pain that has unfortunately formed my identity. To describe their actions towards me as "emotional abuse" also feels wrong.

In other words, I have no idea. I think the real problem is that I am kind of isolated from common sense. My reality is self made, and I don't believe it.

Today my therapist asked me a question (I can't remember what it was), and I had this nonsensical essay on the tip of my tongue. I didn't say it. I was sure, somehow, that this would be a performance for her. It is now, too.