Welcome back, my beautiful friend.

One of the biggest shifts in my own healing came when I stopped asking only what happened to me and started becoming curious about what happened to the people who raised me.

Not because my pain didn't matter.

It absolutely did.

But because I realised something I'd never truly considered before...

Before they became my parents, they were children.

Children with hopes.

Children with fears.

Children who carried wounds of their own.

And those childhood experiences didn't disappear simply because they became adults.

My mum was only five years old when both of her parents passed away.

Five.

Just pause for a moment and imagine yourself at that age.

Think about how much you relied on the people who loved and protected you.

Now imagine being told they were both gone.

In a single moment, her entire world changed.

She and her older sister moved in with an aunt who was already raising several children in very difficult circumstances.

There wasn't much money, and there was little emotional support to give.

Life became about survival.

Can you imagine how frightening that must have been for a little girl?

No child should have to carry that kind of grief.

My dad's childhood looked different, but it carried its own pain.

He grew up on a farm where life was incredibly hard.

From a young age, children were expected to work.

Mistakes weren't met with gentle guidance—they were often met with harsh punishment.

The belief at the time was that severe discipline would teach lasting lessons.

Looking back now, it's heartbreaking to think of how normal that was considered to be.

Children weren't encouraged to express their emotions.

They were expected to endure.

To survive.

To keep going.

As children, we naturally believe our parents know everything.

But the truth is...

Most parents are simply doing the best they can with the understanding they have at the time.

The way they were comforted.

The way they were spoken to.

The way conflict was handled in their home.

The way love was expressed—or withheld.

These experiences quietly become the blueprint they carry into adulthood.

Without awareness, many people repeat what was modelled for them.

Not because they want to cause pain.

Because it's all they've ever known.

Learning about my parents' childhoods didn't erase my own experiences.

It didn't suddenly make everything okay.

But it gave me something I had never had before...

Perspective.

Instead of seeing only the choices they made as adults, I began to see the children who had been shaped by loss, fear and survival.

That changed the way I held my own story.

Not because my experiences became smaller.

But because my understanding became bigger.

Sometimes people worry that compassion means pretending nothing happened.

It doesn't.

Compassion allows two truths to exist simultaneously.

You can acknowledge that someone hurt you.

And you can recognise that they were deeply hurt too.

Both can be true.

Understanding another person's story doesn't take away your own.

It simply frees your heart from carrying resentment forever.

Every parent was once a child.

Every adult carries stories most people never see.

When we begin to understand that, something beautiful starts to happen.

The walls around our hearts begin to soften.

Not because we excuse the past.

But because we realise that pain often travels through generations until someone chooses to heal it.

Maybe...

That someone is you.

• What do I know about my parents' childhoods?

• How might their early experiences have shaped the way they parented?

• Can I hold compassion for their story without dismissing my own?

• What cycle do I want to end with my generation?