BP 231
My name is Isabella. I am twenty-five. I am a Christian. And I recently realized that I am very angry with God.
Why am I angry with God? I don’t know for sure—at least it’s not very clear to me. However, I think it’s because I’m angry with my parents; and that’s not a good thing. I can’t be angry at my parents.
Why not, you ask? Because my father (“the sinner” of my two parents) has taught me that I can’t show any anger toward him because he will make me feel bad if I make him feel bad; and my mother (“the saint” of my parents) is so sweet that if I ever hurt her, I feel so guilty. How can I ever be angry with such a nice person especially when she is powerlessly trapped in a marriage with my self-centered father?
To sum it up, I can’t get angry at either my father or my mother because I’ll end up feeling bad or guilty. Neither of those experiences are desirable to me in the least.
How I feel about my father has always seemed clear and justifiable. He is emotionally young. He is narcissistic. It’s about him. He gets angry any time you offend him. Sometimes his anger is hot—yelling and shaming. Other times his anger is cold—rejecting me by walking away and shaking his head.
He needs me to make him feel good and look good, especially in public. If I smile and achieve and am nice to others, everyone will look at him and think what a great father he is. That’s my role—to be a mirror that reflects him well.
I can’t be me. I get so anxious walking on eggshells around him. What will I do or not do that will set him off?
Appearances matter deeply to him. I don’t think he cares about being good on the inside. He only needs to look good on the outside.
At home, my father needs me to be grateful to a fault. I must thank him for everything he does as if he is some amazing super dad or as if he is more special than other dads who provide for their children because that is their role, because that is the usual and customary things fathers do without demanding a pat on the back or a medal for heroic behavior.
If I don’t thank him for everything—for putting a roof over my head, giving me food to eat, paying for my grad school tuition, worshipping him for being head and shoulders better than every other dad on the planet–then I am an ungrateful wretch of a daughter who is hurting her poor loving father. He used to yell at me when I hurt him. Now he just turns his back in stony silence.
Don’t get me wrong. I am thankful for everything he gives me. But when his emotional equilibrium is dependent on me building up his fragile ego, I get so frustrated and don’t want to be around him. I am tired of emotionally taking care of him. He’s the parent, not me. No child ever wants to be the crutch the parent needs in order to walk.
And then there’s how he treats my mother. He has hurt her so many times with his anger that my mother now avoids him all the time. She can’t even sleep in the same room as him. Poor mom. She is the true victim in this dysfunctional marriage. Once again, she is the saint, and my father is the sinner. How can I not defend my mother and avoid my father? My mother genuinely loves God in the privacy of her closet while my father only loves God in the public eye so others will praise him for his amazing godliness and inflate his ego.
If the people at church only knew what went on at home . . .
Shockingly, a recent development has begun to capsize my reality. My mother is beginning to fall off her pedestal of saintliness. How did something so unexpected and terrible happen? I have increasingly noticed that when I disagree with any of my mother’s decisions, she is quick to reference God. She will tell me that during her devotions just that morning, God revealed to her what to do in any given situation. She is right and I am wrong. She has a special connection with God that I do not have.
I am just beginning to see that she has always justified her actions by claiming to have heard God’s voice. I am noticing that she does that whenever she feels threatened. She can never be wrong because God is the One who told her what to do. She is right and everyone else is wrong. She can never be questioned.
Yes, I am now aware that my mother is not only threatened by my father whom she avoids; she is also threatened by me whenever I disagree with her opinion, whenever I try to share my frustration with her, or whenever I question what she is doing. She cannot receive anything corrective from me–her loving daughter who has always taken care of her emotionally–but chooses to defend herself by inserting God between her and me. She will protect herself instead of listening even to me!
In short, I now recognize that my mother, just like my father, is emotionally fragile. I must take care of her just as I take care of my father. I must change what I think or feel before I approach her if I think it might upset her or make her feel bad. And the worst of it is that she invokes God as her defender and the One who justifies her every decision with His blessing. She is so one with God that if I disagree with her—God’s prophetess–I am disagreeing with God Himself! What a bind for me or anyone else who might question her or be angry with her self-protective and justifying behaviors.
So, now I know an unhappy truth: My mother is emotionally young. She is immature, just like my father. Maybe they were attracted to each other in marriage because they were roughly the same age psychologically. Both my father and mother insist indirectly that I take care of them.
My father needs me to inflate his fragile ego with constant gratitude and my mother protects her fragile self with “a word from the Lord” if I challenge her. If I don’t inflate my father, he will dismiss me with anger. If I threaten my mother, she will protect herself at my expense. God will be for her but then not for me.
Now I am feeling anger not only towards my father that I can’t express because if I do, he will hurt me as I have hurt him. (Oh, and he will also accuse me of not obeying my father a la Ephesians 6:1.) I am also feeling anger towards my saintly mother that I can’t express, or she will insinuate that I am sinning against not only her but against God Himself. I hate feeling bad or guilty, so I swallow all my negative emotions only to have them leak out in depression, anxiety, and obsessive thinking.
As if this is not enough, I am also angry with God because my mother is using Him to convince me that she is always right, and I cannot disagree with her or be angry with her. God is her protector and defender, not mine. I must take care of my mother, the one who hears from God, and be alone with my needs and perceptions. I feel like no one is parenting me—not my father, not my mother, not even God. I am alone to take care of myself.
What is a believer in Jesus supposed to do in this situation? Fear leads me to avoid my father. Guilt leads me to avoid being honest with my mother. Anger leads me to avoid my God.
I’m so confused, Jesus. Who will understand this bind I’m in? If I conceal my anger inside my heart, I will become bitter and so alone—maybe for the rest of my life. But if I express my anger to those you placed in my life to parent me, I will be directly told by my father that I am disrespectful and nicely and indirectly told by my mother that I am guilty of questioning her and God.
What am I to do? Jesus, please help me. I know I shouldn’t be angry with you. I know I shouldn’t blame my parents. Please help me sort out this confusing mess!
I am so alone, and I feel so unloved. I am deeply sorry for being so ungrateful and for being so selfish.
Forgive me for being angry with you, O Lord!
I don’t know what to do!
“Hear, O Lord, when I cry aloud;
be gracious to me and answer me!
8 You have said, ‘Seek my face.’
My heart says to you,
‘Your face, Lord, do I seek.’
9 Hide not your face from me.
Turn not your servant away in anger,
O you who have been my help.
Cast me not off; forsake me not,
O God of my salvation!
10 For my father and my mother have forsaken me,
but the Lord will take me in” ~ Psalm 27:7-10
“But Zion said, ‘The Lord has forsaken me;
my Lord has forgotten me.’
Can a woman forget her nursing child,
that she should have no compassion on the son [daughter] of her womb?
Even these may forget,
yet I will not forget you.
16 Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;
your walls are continually before me” ~ Isaiah 49:14-16