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This one is for Maria M. - Sometimes, what we don’t know about them explains everything we’re trying to figure out about ourselves.

They gave us our name, our nose, maybe our sense of humor—and a few things we didn’t realize we were carrying until someone else pointed it out. We talk endlessly about romantic relationships, situationships, friendships and heartbreaks, but the longest, most complicated love story of our lives often gets left in the shadows: the one we have with our parents..

The Ghosts in the Wallpaper

When I was little, I thought my parents knew everything. How to fix a broken toy, how to pay rent, how to make dinner and make decisions. But as I got older, I started seeing the cracks between their answers. The tired sighs. The unsaid things at dinner. And I began to understand something deeply unnerving: my parents were still figuring things out too. They were building a life for me while trying to recover from lives they hadn’t fully healed from.

Most of us never get the full picture of who our parents were before us. What dreams they gave up, what pain they never processed, what love they lost, or worse—what love they never received. And without knowing it, their emotional ghosts end up moving into our bedrooms.

The Things They Never Said—but Showed

Some of us had distant mothers who always looked busy. Some had fathers who only showed affection through practical acts—driving us to school, fixing the Wi-Fi, buying us our favorite snacks without saying a word. And for years, we wonder why words of affirmation never really landed for us—but an act of service? That’s how we feel love.

They teach us without teaching. They model patterns of conflict, avoidance, silence, or sacrifice—and we soak them up like language. So when we start dating or living with people, we sometimes play out those scripts without realizing we didn’t write them ourselves.

I once dated a guy who couldn’t handle emotion. He shut down every time I opened up. And I found myself shrinking in response, softening my feelings like they were too much. And then it hit me: I had done the same thing with my dad. Not because he didn’t love me, but because he was never taught how to hold emotion either. I was loving a man the way I had learned to love my father—quietly, cautiously, carefully.

The Love That Shaped—and Misshaped—Us

Even the best parents, the ones who tried their absolute hardest, left fingerprints on our lives. Sometimes they’re warm and reassuring. Other times, they push too hard or protect too much. They tell us to be strong but never teach us how to be soft. They want us to succeed but forget to show us that rest is allowed. And we grow up mistaking pressure for love. Or boundaries for betrayal. Or caretaking for self-worth.

The truth is, a lot of what we struggle with—overthinking, attachment, anxiety, people-pleasing, perfectionism—didn’t start with us. It started in a house where someone was always a little too quiet or a little too controlling or a little too absent. And healing means learning to separate who we are from what we inherited.

Forgiveness Isn’t Forgetting—It’s Rewriting

I used to think healing the relationship with your parents meant confronting them or getting closure. But sometimes, healing means understanding that your parents might never become the people you needed them to be. And loving them anyway—while giving yourself permission to become the person they couldn’t.

It’s okay to set boundaries with the people who raised you. It’s okay to outgrow their beliefs. It’s okay to be grateful and hurt at the same time. It’s okay to look at your childhood honestly without being disloyal. And it’s okay to give yourself the things you were never given.

I’ve learned to thank them for what they gave me—and mourn what they couldn’t. Because maybe the truest kind of growing up isn’t leaving home—it’s coming back with your eyes open.

So here’s to the relationships we don’t always talk about. The ones that shaped our fears and our habits and our hearts. The ones that left silent scars and invisible blessings. The first people we ever loved. The first people who ever let us down.

And maybe, the ones who taught us—without meaning to—how to love ourselves better.

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