Ending Intergenerational Trauma With Me

The biggest parenting mistake I ever made happened when Little J was four years old.

After the terrible twos and the horrible threes, he entered the "freaking fours," determined to test every limit Dr. J and I had, daily. After one meltdown, he protested, "Why do I have to go to my room and calm down? Did Grandma tell you to go to your room and calm down when you were little?"

Exhausted and angry, I shouted, "Grandma wouldn't have sent me to my room--she'd have beaten me with a cane or a clothes hanger until I was bruised and bleeding!"

I regretted it instantly. Little J looked terrified. He ran to his room, slamming the door behind him. I turned around with tears in my eyes, and Dr. J gave me a look of understanding. I broke down, sobbing.

When I was a little, going to my room to calm down wasn't an option, even if I'd wanted. One time, I locked myself in my room to escape my mom's cane. She called my dad, and together they pried open the door, found me hiding under the quilt, and beat me until I was covered with wounds. Even years later, the memory still makes me shudder. After becoming a mother, I realized that parents can act out of anger when in conflicts with their children, but it can be avoided if we just take a moment to calm down. The time it took to pry open a door should have been enough for my parents to calm down. But they didn't. Amid shouts of "You dirty bitch" and "Go to hell," they broke a tennis racket beating me. To this day, I still believe my mom intended to beat me to death.

The road out of that childhood trauma was long and painful. When dating Dr. J, I told him, "We can't have kids--I will probably beat them." Research shows that abused children often grow up to be abusive parents. In Harry Harlow's classic rhesus monkeys study, baby monkeys separated from their birth mothers were given a soft cloth "mother" and a cold, barbed-wire "mother" with a bottle. The babies clung to the soft mother, only going to the barbed-wire one to eat, then returning to the cloth mother immediately. Later, when these monkeys grew up, the researcher found that they could not mate normally. After they had babies through artificial insemination, they abused their offspring--biting, tearing, and pushing them off the cage.

I totally believed that would be me. I had horrible relationships with my two biological sisters. Our fights always turned physical--we bit and hit each other. The scariest part was that I didn't even realize how wrong it was until I left home and got help. I'd learned from my mom that when something goes wrong, you get angry, and when you're angry, you hit people. My parents beat me, insulted me, and threaten to kill me--so why wouldn't I do the same to my sisters?

When finally realized how messed up that was, I freaked out. I was terrified that I'd be an abusive mother, and the fear affected my relationships with all my ex-boyfriends. Then I met Dr. J, and he supported me completely. For years, his family urged us to have kids, but I hid behind him, let him deflect all the demands. Eventually we had Little J, but only when I felt fully prepared. By then, we'd been together for five years.

Little J turned four years old in what felt like a blink of an eye. I was determined to break the cycle from my family. I worked to stay calm and gentle, never laying a hand on him or raising my voice, even in moments of intense anger. I tried to reconcile with my parents, not because I agreed with them, but because I didn't want to trapped in a cycle of hate. I sent them money regularly, called every week so Little J could know his grandparents, like a normal kid. I tried so hard, but all those efforts fell apart so easily.

I knew one day I'd have to explain the scars and bite marks on my body to little J, but that was supposed to happen much later, when he was old enough to understand. Threatening him with stories of the abuse his grandma inflicted--that was totally wrong.

Little J stayed in his room for a long time that day. Dr. J suggested I talk to him. "Just tell him that some parents hit their kids, and that's wrong," he said. "Explain we won't hit him, but that doesn't mean he dan do whatever he wants."

"I'm so worried about Little J," I admitted

"I'm not worried about him. I'm worried about you. You've tried so hard. Don't let one mistake make you give up."

I hesitated for days until Little J finally asked, "Mama, did Grandma hit you a lot when you were a kid?"

I thought about it and decided to tell the truth. "Yes," I said.

"Ms. Parvaneh says we shouldn't hit people."

"Your teacher is right," I said. Then I explained that hitting is wrong, and Grandma made a mistake, but it didn't change the fact that she still loved him. I also make it clear that in our house, no one is allowed to hit, and no one will be hit. We solve problems with words.

We hugged this out.

Of course, this conversation didn't end on that day. Little J is eleven now, and recently I finally had "the talk" with him about child abuse, how it happens, and the impact of my childhood. I told him how I moved past the pain, forgave my parents, and freed myself. Looking back, I appreciate what happened when he was four--it gave me the chance to think about how to have that important conversation with him.

As a mother, I can let the trauma stop with me.

**This post was originally published on Commonwealth Parenting Magazine on February 6, 2019. This is an English translation, revised on October 16, 2025.