On childhood, growing up, and family

We all have baggage from our childhood. I’m no exception.

I used to think that I was entirely a product of my own decisions, but looking back on my adolescence now, I see that I’m largely a product of my environment and upbringing.

My growing-up story is pretty typical of a first-generation immigrant family. When I was 6 years old, my parents immigrated to the United States without knowing a single soul outside of China. Their dream was to raise me in a better place and give me more opportunities in life than they had. They both worked tirelessly to make that a reality.

My parents’ educational qualifications from the motherland didn’t amount to much in America, so my family ended up living a scrappy, militant lifestyle, moving every year or so to follow work opportunities wherever they presented themselves.

As a result, I had a very uprooted childhood, and never knew the comforts of permanence and routine. I was constantly “the new girl in school” because we moved around so much, and I found it hard to make friends. It didn’t help that I lived in parts of America that had very few people that looked like me (Asian). It also didn’t help that kids that age were just learning how to be cruel, and the ones I grew up with were completely unabashed about it.

From what I remember, everything in my life — my school, my home, my friends — seemed transient, and I grew to become a very socially aloof child, quickly learning that getting attached would only lead to pain. It was lonely living.

On top of that, my home life wasn’t very comforting. My father was pretty much MIA for most of my childhood, as he was always working overtime whenever he could find the extra hours. My mom, on the other hand, was a force to be reckoned with. She worked long hours too, but when she was home, she ruled the household with an Iron Fist. She was a classic Tiger Mom: authoritarian, unyielding, and harsh.

She expected me to excel at everything I did (which, at my age, mostly meant school) and she didn’t accept excuses for anything. But because we often moved mid-school year, my education always felt disconnected. Every time we moved, I would miss big chunks of core classes like Math, Science, and English, and would have to scramble to catch up in my new school. Often, I taught myself. It’s not like I was doing anything else social after school or anything. If nothing else, I learned how to be resourceful, disciplined, and take initiative for my own success.

Still, it didn’t stop me from looking back on my younger childhood and resenting my parents for giving me that life. I hated that they threw me into a life of loneliness and insecurity, when all I wanted at that age was belonging; I hated that they imposed such strict standards for me, without giving me the support system to succeed; and I hated that they constantly reminded me that everything they had given up was for ME, and I still ended up miserable.

The way I was raised broadly skewed the way I grew to view the world, but it wasn’t all tragic. In a lot of ways, I think it gave me strength. I grew up independent and self-sufficient, and well… pretty accustomed to and content with life alone.

On the other hand, I was ill-equipped to build and sustain long-term, close relationships in my adult life. I was still emotionally detached, and never developed a natural tendency to depend on others. I had trouble accepting help in any form, from anyone, because I was entirely uncomfortable with placing my well-being in anyone else’s hands. I saw it as weakness, and I wanted to be impenetrable.

In a lot of ways, I know that my parents didn’t intended to raise me this way; it’s just how I ended up internalizing the circumstances of my childhood.

In hindsight, I think I resented my parents for a long time, even after I left the nest to build my own life. I didn’t involve them in my private affairs and life decisions, because I felt like they didn’t deserve to have any part in it. I shielded them from anything and everything for which I didn’t want their judgment or disapproval (which was a lot of things), because it was just easier that way. As a result, they weren’t privy to a lot of my most formative experiences growing up, and I didn’t give them the opportunity to support me and guide me through them.

It must’ve been heartbreaking. I was their only child and the most important thing in their lives for the past two decades. Even though they weren’t by my side for a lot of it, they were always working for and thinking about me.

I have many regrets about this — I wish I had the maturity to understand what my parents went through and why they did what they did, and I wish I had the kindness to let them in when they initially came knocking. But I didn’t — not for a long time.

It took me many years to appreciate my parents for everything they did to raise me. It took me many more years to understand that I really am my parents’ daughter — that the person I grew up to be is largely a product of my upbringing, even if it didn’t all go according to my parents’ plan.

Now, well into my 20s, I’ve come to attribute a lot of my personality and character—both strengths and flaws — to my upbringing. We’re all scarred by the baggage from our childhood, and I’m no exception. I’m thankful though, that hindsight is 20/20 and that I can see things for what they are.

I try to use a certain degree of self-awareness granted by that hindsight to build a better version of myself each day; a version of myself that is more thoughtful and considerate of others; a version of myself that accepts the support and love of others and sees vulnerability as a positive thing; a version of myself that finds joy in serving others with the same selflessness that my parents had in raising me.

I’m happy to say that I now have a close and healthy relationship with my parents. I share every aspect of my life with them, I choose to stay in Toronto to be close to them, and I try to visit them often.

You can’t choose your family, and they can’t choose you. But I think it’s because of that, that their love and acceptance is even more sacred. My parents have been by my side at my worst, bore my resentment for years, and have seen me as the shittiest version of myself that I’ll ever be, but they never gave up on me or stopped loving me for a second.

That, I think, is the most beautiful and poetic thing I could find in life, and I mean to keep it close to me.