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Social class differences - How to break it to my parents??
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
There's something that is killing me and out of pure desperation, I'm posting on here, hoping that someone might be able to give me any sort of insight or advice. I'll start at the beginning...
My parents (who are both originally from India) came from a rather poor background as youngsters. Through sheer hard work,they built an amazing life for themselves, moved to Canada and live a happy, wealthy life. They made sure that my siblings and I went to some of the best private schools and universities, as they always wanted to ensure that we would never have to lead the kind of lives they did as kids. However, I should mention that none of us (siblings) are "spoilt, rich kids" - we don't get lavish gifts from our parents, and we've all worked our butts off in school and got respectable jobs on our own, without any "family connections" and stuff like that.
I am currently 27 years old. Two years ago, after dating and encountering all sorts of awful guys, I literally just gave up on trying to find a guy. I was just so sick of it. And as if by magic, I suddenly met the perfect guy one night out with my friends. Just like that. I wasn't even dressed up nicely, and was planning on heading home early with my friends. But there he was, and we both had an unmistakable connection. I'd never felt anything like it before, and thought that I must've been going utterly mad. It turned out that we had a large circle of mutual friends too, so he was not a complete stranger.
You would think that's wonderful, but life is never perfect. It turned out that he lived in another city, far away, about 6 hours away. We talked everyday, visited each other in turns each month, and soon we had both agreed that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. It became the kind of relationship where he would phone and I'd already picked up the phone before it ever rang. Whenever he spoke of me to someone else, 500km away, at that exact moment, I had send him a text message saying that I was thinking of him. One day at work, I had discovered that a dear friend passed away, and immediately my boyfriend had sent me a message asking if i was okay, before I had a chance to even talk to him or anyone else about it. It was uncanny, but these little occurrences happened so often. In short, it was the closest I've ever felt to anyone, but at the same time it killed me that I could only see him about once a month.
To make things worse, he confessed to me that he had never attended university or college. I nearly had a heart-attack, wondering what on earth my parents would say to that. Then he revealed that he hadn't even finished high school. His parents both lived in a very small town, and had a minimal education as well as menial jobs. They had a tumultuous relationship and split when he was very young. Throughout the whole messy divorce, they used him as a pawn between the two of them. Into his late teens, he finally got sick of it and left their little town, moving hours away into a big bustling city. He didn't continue his schooling there - instead he started working any jobs he could get to keep himself alive, in factories, warehouses and garages. Despite this, he is one of the most intelligent, street-smart, quick-witted people I have met, and I would definitely say that we can both enjoy any number of intelligent, higher level conversations or debates, without feeling that one or the other is lacking.
Once he met me and I explained how my parents would react, he enrolled himself back into high school and is currently working on getting his diploma. But now, we've been together for two years and he still has not finished his high school, and still has not met my parents. There is also the fact that he is Canadian, not Indian, and not really religious (although he was baptised and has gone though the formal Christian rites as a kid). My family is devoutly Christian. However, I know that these two factors will not be a huge issue. I have only told my mom about it, and she sort of understands. My dad is a completely different matter though. He is extremely traditional, and I fear that he will completely disown me or cut me off from the entire family. My mom also expressed similar fears and even said that telling my dad about it could cause a huge rift in the family. Furthermore, my dad has a habit of taking it out on my mom and blaming her for any faults he finds in me and my siblings. He thinks she should have been stricter with us. Despite all of this, I love my family to bits and do not want to lose them ever. But I also deeply love my boyfriend and would go to lengths to stay with him. Everything has finally reached a point now where both he and I can't take the secrets and lying anymore. It is not in my nature to keep secrets from my family. I badly want to tell them the truth, but I don't know how to without destroying my relationship, or my family.
Can anyone suggest anything at all? please? I'm at my wits end here. :crying:
My parents (who are both originally from India) came from a rather poor background as youngsters. Through sheer hard work,they built an amazing life for themselves, moved to Canada and live a happy, wealthy life. They made sure that my siblings and I went to some of the best private schools and universities, as they always wanted to ensure that we would never have to lead the kind of lives they did as kids. However, I should mention that none of us (siblings) are "spoilt, rich kids" - we don't get lavish gifts from our parents, and we've all worked our butts off in school and got respectable jobs on our own, without any "family connections" and stuff like that.
I am currently 27 years old. Two years ago, after dating and encountering all sorts of awful guys, I literally just gave up on trying to find a guy. I was just so sick of it. And as if by magic, I suddenly met the perfect guy one night out with my friends. Just like that. I wasn't even dressed up nicely, and was planning on heading home early with my friends. But there he was, and we both had an unmistakable connection. I'd never felt anything like it before, and thought that I must've been going utterly mad. It turned out that we had a large circle of mutual friends too, so he was not a complete stranger.
You would think that's wonderful, but life is never perfect. It turned out that he lived in another city, far away, about 6 hours away. We talked everyday, visited each other in turns each month, and soon we had both agreed that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. It became the kind of relationship where he would phone and I'd already picked up the phone before it ever rang. Whenever he spoke of me to someone else, 500km away, at that exact moment, I had send him a text message saying that I was thinking of him. One day at work, I had discovered that a dear friend passed away, and immediately my boyfriend had sent me a message asking if i was okay, before I had a chance to even talk to him or anyone else about it. It was uncanny, but these little occurrences happened so often. In short, it was the closest I've ever felt to anyone, but at the same time it killed me that I could only see him about once a month.
To make things worse, he confessed to me that he had never attended university or college. I nearly had a heart-attack, wondering what on earth my parents would say to that. Then he revealed that he hadn't even finished high school. His parents both lived in a very small town, and had a minimal education as well as menial jobs. They had a tumultuous relationship and split when he was very young. Throughout the whole messy divorce, they used him as a pawn between the two of them. Into his late teens, he finally got sick of it and left their little town, moving hours away into a big bustling city. He didn't continue his schooling there - instead he started working any jobs he could get to keep himself alive, in factories, warehouses and garages. Despite this, he is one of the most intelligent, street-smart, quick-witted people I have met, and I would definitely say that we can both enjoy any number of intelligent, higher level conversations or debates, without feeling that one or the other is lacking.
Once he met me and I explained how my parents would react, he enrolled himself back into high school and is currently working on getting his diploma. But now, we've been together for two years and he still has not finished his high school, and still has not met my parents. There is also the fact that he is Canadian, not Indian, and not really religious (although he was baptised and has gone though the formal Christian rites as a kid). My family is devoutly Christian. However, I know that these two factors will not be a huge issue. I have only told my mom about it, and she sort of understands. My dad is a completely different matter though. He is extremely traditional, and I fear that he will completely disown me or cut me off from the entire family. My mom also expressed similar fears and even said that telling my dad about it could cause a huge rift in the family. Furthermore, my dad has a habit of taking it out on my mom and blaming her for any faults he finds in me and my siblings. He thinks she should have been stricter with us. Despite all of this, I love my family to bits and do not want to lose them ever. But I also deeply love my boyfriend and would go to lengths to stay with him. Everything has finally reached a point now where both he and I can't take the secrets and lying anymore. It is not in my nature to keep secrets from my family. I badly want to tell them the truth, but I don't know how to without destroying my relationship, or my family.
Can anyone suggest anything at all? please? I'm at my wits end here. :crying:
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Comments
I know, I'm deeply appreciative that he did that. On my end, I'll be moving to his city next year (even though all of my close friends and family live here, and it sort of breaks my heart to leave them).
The thing is, at the root of all the craziness with my parents, deep down they're just trying to look out for me, and make sure that I don't end up living a hard, shitty life later on. I understand that. But the thing is, if they can't accept and approve of him, it's not really their loss. It's my loss. I don't want to lose my family or my boyfriend.
Are you totally sure they wont be happy for you that youve found love?
My mum is happy that I've found someone that I love so much and who loves me back the same way. My dad, however, thinks more with his brain than his heart, if you know what I mean. It's just the way he is. I mean he would think more of the reality of the situation, financial troubles that could rear up and how my future would play out with my bf, as opposed to the emotional aspect.
And yes, I'm 27, but with the kind of culture and family that I belong to, it's not really an option to say "I'm going to make my own decisions alone and I don't care what you think." I wish it was a perfect world where I could be with the man I love without having to worry about how and why to justify it to other people.
Some people do leave behind their parents for a new life. But this is something you obviously don't wish to do. So, if I was you, I'd introduce them to your boyfriend. They will hopefully see he isn't that bad. And besides, if we all only went with someone the same race, culture and intelligence as us what would the world become?
Also, this might be the only life we get- who knows. So live it how you want to live it, and not how your parents want you to. Imagen if you had a child, would you want them to have to hide their boyfriend from you because he was different?
Xxx
I think it's a case of softly softly here. Can you introduce your bf to your family first as a friend or work colleague? Emphasise how he had a poor background too and has also worked his way up (like your parents did). Drop in the fact that he's taking more qualifications to further his career etc. Hopefully it should strike a chord with your dad, and if the boy is only introduced in a friend capacity, your dad has time to get used to the idea of you having male friends from different backgrounds?
Also, since your mother is already kind of on your side already, you can ask her to soften your dad up and put in a good word for you (how well you've done to get where you are now education and career-wise, and isn't it time we let our daughter have some more independence? etc)
All the best with it x
but it looks like it's probably too late. :crying:
i talked to him again to sort this all out - but now he says he wants to break up, and that he doesn't love me as much as before. Which makes no sense to me, because 24 hours ago he was saying that he still loved me very much and still wanted to spend the rest of his life with me.
He says he needs several days to think about it and figure out whether he's making a mistake or not, and then he'll get back to me.
:crying: :crying: :crying: it's tearing me up completely, i'm hurting so bad right now. Have no idea what to do or say. I've still got my work and school to deal with, and I'm trying desperately to focus on my work but my mind keeps straying back to him.
Even worse, he did all this over the phone, so i can't even say goodbye in person.