Help! I’ve Become My Parents

Episode 17 of The Work Within podcast.

John Lin: Have you ever had that distinct moment when you said or did something and suddenly realized — my gosh, I've become my parents?

Usually that's a startling feeling. Like all kids, we grow up watching our parents do the best they can, fumbling through parenthood and marriage. At some point, we're watching them interact with us and we say to ourselves, I am not going to be like that. We make that vow. But then years later, instead of being different, we find ourselves repeating the very same patterns.

Some of those patterns have serious implications. They can impact the way we connect and attach to other people. They can affect how we respond and cope with stress. They can expose or increase our vulnerabilities to things like addiction, abuse, adultery, divorce, and narcissism.

So in today's conversation, we want to talk about the patterns that get passed down from generation to generation — and ask the question: how do we break those cycles of dysfunction and trauma, with the hope that we can create something new, something better, for the generations that come after us?

I'm your host, John Lin, and today I'm joined by my friends and co-hosts, Ly Tran and Dieula Previlon. Both are licensed therapists and supervisors who have helped a lot of people break cycles of generational trauma and create something different. Ly and Dieula, I'm so glad to see you both. How are you doing?

Dieula Previlon: I'm doing well. I'm excited to be here and be part of this conversation.

Ly Tran: Good to be here as well, John. Thanks for having us.

John Lin: Before we dive in, two quick invitations. If this podcast has been helpful to you, would you show us some love by leaving a rating, a review, or subscribing? And second — if you're looking for a clinically trained, clinically excellent Christian therapist, we'd love to help. Just reach out to us. All right, let's get into it.

I thought we'd start with some lighter fare. Have either of you ever caught yourself doing or saying something and thought — that's just like my mom or my dad?

Ly Tran: You want to go first, Dieula?

Dieula Previlon: First of all, I am a perfect parent and I never repeat anything. (laughs) Okay, one simple example: it's particularly how my children dress for the weather. I can distinctly remember my mom giving us a hard time about going outside in the cold or the rain — "cover your head or you'll catch a cold." And I catch myself saying the very same things. Deep in my heart, I still believe it's true — even though it's been scientifically debunked everywhere.

Ly Tran: Mine is far more visceral. About ten or fifteen years ago, I started sneezing differently. My way of sneezing just changed — more aggressively, let's say. And I realized: this sounds exactly like how my dad sneezed. When I sneeze, it's like a whole echo — I just have to let it all out. I had this "I'm becoming my dad" moment. And it didn't stop at sneezing. It's how I walk. How I move. I started noticing I'm turning into my dad physically.

Dieula Previlon: That's hilarious.

John Lin: Wow, I was not expecting that. Here's mine — and I'll be honest, I still catch myself doing this. I'll walk into a room where my wife, Grace, and kids are talking, take a seat on the couch, and promptly lay my head back and close my eyes. I want to be present for the conversation, but obviously my body language doesn't communicate that. Several years earlier, I remembered watching my dad do the exact same thing — he'd join a conversation, sit down, and immediately lean back and close his eyes. And I thought at the time: that's not a great way to engage. Now I'm doing the very same thing. I'm working on opening my eyes when people are talking.

Ly Tran: If you do that in this conversation, we'll let you know. (laughs)

John Lin: Fair enough. And this highlights something important — some of these patterns, like how you sneeze or reminding your kids to wear a coat, aren't a big deal. But others are worth taking a second look at. And I want to be honest about something that creates tension for me. Therapist Adam Young has talked on his podcast about how it's possible to honor your parents and be honest about your experience with them. For me, that's a hard balance because I've always thought that honoring my parents means not speaking about the hard things. I've realized that getting stuck there — that fear of dishonoring them — actually kept me for years from facing things I needed to face. Do you see that struggle a lot?

Dieula Previlon: I would say 90% of people who come into counseling are dealing with that struggle. And plenty of people who don't come to counseling are dealing with it too, because family loyalty is a very big deal. That's why we often start counseling by talking about family of origin — we want to see where the bones are buried, because family loyalty will stop you from doing your work. You believe you'll dishonor your family if you share certain things, even in a counseling office, even when everything is confidential. I've experienced it myself as a client — I've seen how I hold back in sessions because I want to honor my mother and father, even behind closed doors. The way I handle it with clients is through time and trust. It takes time for people to know that we will handle their family with care — that we understand you can love someone and struggle with them at the same time. It has to be done very delicately.

Ly Tran: I'd add that this is probably a significant portion of what therapy is. A lot of time at the beginning is spent tilling the ground so we can have honest discussions. What makes it hard is that honesty and compassion can feel like they're in tension with each other. If you err on the side of honesty, it can feel critical or unforgiving. Part of the internal work is learning to hold both at the same time. And there's another layer — for many people, their family of origin is like a Jenga tower. It's already not completely stable. If you start poking at it, those might be the few stable pieces you have left. If you remove them, it can produce a lot of fear and anxiety. So a lot of what we do is helping people see they can have honest, hard discussions while at the same time re-establishing the relationship in a healthier, more secure way.

John Lin: Thank you for saying that. If you're listening and the idea of addressing some of this feels overwhelming — that's normal. But I think what we're saying is: if there's any hope of doing something different and not repeating those cycles, we have to move through that discomfort. There's a way to do it that is sensitive and gracious while also being courageous and honest.

So what are some of the patterns most worth naming — the ones that get repeated from generation to generation?

Ly Tran: The traditional lens a lot of therapists use is attachment. Attachment is how we learned to secure relationships, or how we manage insecurity in relationships. It's mostly caught, not taught — if mom handled conflict with dad a certain way, or dad handled anger a certain way, that teaches me: this is how we handle uncertainty in relationships. My own main emphasis is conflict styles. In my experience, conflict is often a determinant of how healthy our relationships are. Observing my father being highly passive and conflict-avoidant, and my mother being more volatile and aggressive in conflict — those are both patterns I know well, and I have that gear within me to do either one. When my back is against the wall, I'm either going to shut down and run, or I'm going to get very aggressive. I've had to work hard to be aware of that.

Dieula Previlon: As you were talking about conflict styles, what came to mind was shame. Shame patterns run through conflict — they can keep people from attempting any conflict at all. Shame tells people they're not enough, whether in explicit or implicit ways. And most of it is implicit. People hold shame patterns deeply and play them on repeat, often without knowing they're doing it. It feels like just how they process life. We often don't see it until we're in conflict, in counseling, or in a leadership context where it starts to show up in how we talk to others.

Ly Tran: Right. And shame often doesn't look like shame — it looks like anger, like defensiveness. I don't think my mother is even aware she's feeling shame when it comes up. What comes out is aggression. What you catch on the other end isn't the feeling — it's the coping mechanism. And that's what gets passed on.

John Lin: So someone might not be able to articulate "I never felt like I was enough" — but that was the visceral experience. And then when someone in their life makes a mistake, they respond in a way that communicates: you're not enough either. That gets perpetuated. And this connects to attachment — there's so much material out there on how we connect with others that's really worth exploring, because it cuts across every relationship we have.

You both mentioned patterns and shame. What about this: we hear a lot about how people who experience trauma or abuse often end up perpetuating the same thing. The vicious cycle continues even when we're horrified by it. Why does that happen?

Dieula Previlon: It's not as conscious as we think. We may feel the shame, we may be part of the patterns and push back on them — but we don't realize we're internalizing them. Our whole being takes them in. They become second nature because: is there another example in front of us? Think about it — you're in your family for 18, 20, 21 years. You've been studying them since you were a baby, taking in all of these instructions — implied instructions most of the time. And that's all you know. Maybe you go to a sleepover once or twice and see another family do things differently. Maybe you watch a TV show for 30 minutes a week. But you've been in your family forever, learning those patterns for years. Even if you push back, even if you felt the pain of those patterns — that's all you know. There's never been another example.

Ly Tran: When you asked that question, my first thought was: what we're really talking about is how people deal with pain. Trauma is pain that's been inflicted. We see how other people handle their pain — often by inflicting it on others. A father who, out of his own trauma, handles his pain by treating his children a certain way. That's what the child learns: this is how we deal with pain. It's not calculated. It's just that if that's all you've ever seen — this is how people handle their discomfort — then that's what you'll do. And even when you learn a different way, you're still working against muscle memory. The neural pathways are wired a certain way, and it takes real effort to rewire them.

Dieula Previlon: And we see it clearly in situations of domestic violence. Children who witness violence in the home — even though they saw how painful and harmful it was — many times will find themselves in relationships that repeat those same patterns.

John Lin: That is striking. It speaks to the impact and influence our parents are meant to have on us — and yet because of their own brokenness and wounding, it gets passed on. I've always been a little troubled by Exodus 34, where God says He will visit the sin of parents to the third and fourth generation. Exodus 34:7 says: "He maintains love to thousands and forgives wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation."

This is a text worth wrestling with. I find two things helpful when I look at it through a mental health lens. First, the accent in this passage is on the contrast — love to thousands versus consequences to the third and fourth generation. The point is to highlight the magnitude of God's love. Second, one way to understand that third and fourth generation consequence is through generational trauma itself. Those patterns get transmitted — the consequences of abuse, addiction, or violence end up being carried by the generations that follow.

And yet there's hope. The gospel always says that death, curse, and vicious cycles are not the final word. There is always an opportunity to create something new. What does hope look like when it comes to these cycles?

Ly Tran: My parents came during the Vietnam War and carried their own trauma. I can understand — even though I've been a recipient of a lot of the negativity that came from that — I can hold both compassion and honesty at the same time. I want to say to listeners who might feel terrified by the third and fourth generation language: there is so much redemption and healing in this space when we open that part of ourselves to connection, to therapy, to inviting God into those spaces. I also want to extend grace to myself as a parent. I know I'm still doing things that will impact my kids in ways I'm not aware of. My inside pro tip from being a therapist: we are aware of how imperfect we are, and there's no guarantee we're getting it right. I tell myself my kids are going to need their own therapy — and I'm at peace with that, because the only way it works is if you can issue grace, not just to others, but to yourself.

Dieula Previlon: Yes — and I love the word awareness. The hope comes in the seeing. Being aware that something isn't right, that these patterns are not life-giving, that this isn't the abundant life Christ talked about. Awareness is huge. But it doesn't solve the problem on its own. I thought I had done everything right — I'm a therapist, I'm a pastor, I've done this work. I thought my children would be the most nurtured, emotionally healthy kids around. Then one day my kids said: Mom, we experienced trauma. And I had to sit with that. Something still got transferred. The hope for us is that we can now talk about it — my kids can come to me with that pain in a way I was never able to go to my mother. And that isbreaking the cycle, even as the cycle is still being felt. They can name it. I can receive it. We can talk back to the patterns together.

John Lin: And that conversation — that meta-level awareness of what's going on — that's exactly what Grace and I have tried to build in our own marriage. What are the new patterns? Not academic or career opportunities, but new pathways of connecting and being in the world that we want to offer our children. One arena for me is repair. In recent years, I've really tried to come back after I've blown it — when I've overreacted with my kids or shown up poorly with Grace — and own it. To say: that wasn't how I wanted to show up. I know it impacted you. I'm sorry. That's not a conversation I had with my own dad growing up. If I can model that for my kids — show them what repair looks and feels like — hopefully they'll carry that into their own relationships.

(Note to listeners: Dad, if you're listening and you remember it differently, I'm willing to be corrected.)

Dieula Previlon: That's good. As a parent trying to break generational trauma, it's really hard work — especially when my kids are now 25 and 27. Because on the one hand, there need to be rules and structure in the home. On the other hand, you need grace and flexibility. And sometimes in your fear of perpetuating the cycle, you pull back from setting any limits at all. My oldest once told me my bedtime rule was "trauma." (laughs) And I had to think: okay, in my family growing up, rules were just imposed — there was no room for conversation. So anything that looks like that now triggers that same fear in me. The honest truth is: you won't always get it right. What matters is the repair when you don't — to apologize, to be willing to hold the tension, and to know that if they're hurt, there's therapy for that too.

John Lin: Yes. And what I want to leave us with is this: all of us have a past, and some of that past is really painful and difficult to face. We cannot change the past. But we do have the power to change our relationship to the past. We can begin to see it with greater understanding, awareness, honesty, and compassion. And if we can do that work, it empowers us to change our future — to break those cycles of generational trauma.

As we wrap up, Dieula: for those who want to begin this journey, what are the practical first steps?

Dieula Previlon: The first one is also the hardest one: create awareness, and sit with it. Don't rush to change everything. Create awareness, journal, pray, talk to a friend, talk to a therapist — just process what you're sensing, feeling, and wondering about. That process alone is about 75% of the counseling work. Sitting with those feelings, interrogating those patterns. And then — grieve them. Lament them. Figure out how to hold both the honor and the honesty.

Go slowly. Be gracious to yourself. And when you fail — and you will — forgive yourself and start again. It's not a straight line. You'll relapse into old patterns. That's not a sign it's not working. That's just what breaking something looks and feels like. Be patient with yourself as you do this hard, necessary, and very courageous work.

John Lin: That's a really good word. Any corrective action without sitting with it first is just a bandaid. Unless we allow it to fully settle — to actually grieve and feel those past wounds — we won't be able to truly create something new.

I hope our listeners take that to heart: be patient with yourself, be kind to yourself, as you do this work. It is hard work. But it is necessary work.

Thanks, Dieula. This has been a rich conversation — and I know many of us are still in the middle of it. Our prayer and hope, as always, is that God would bless you and strengthen you as you do the work. Thank you.

Dieula Previlon: Thank you.