In a large part, your upbringing can affect the way you behave in adulthood.

This doesn’t mean that you always end up acting like your parents, it’s not an excuse – in fact, sometimes our upbringing shapes us into behaving quite differently, because we don’t want to be like them.

The beauty of being an adult is that you get the opportunity to choose, to advocate for yourself and build up your own boundaries.

The trouble is, for the woman in this story, that her parents refuse to respect them.

Read on to find out why.

AITA for telling my dad he hurt my arm when he hugged me?

I am a 30-year-old woman, and I am visiting my parents (in their sixties) from a different country where I’ve been living for several years.

They now live in an area where I don’t know anyone else so it’s a bit isolating for me, especially because I can’t drive right now (no active driver’s insurance) and it’s not a walkable area at all.

For context, my dad was always strict with me when I was growing up. Nothing was supposed to hurt, and crying wasn’t allowed unless bones were poking out (his favorite phrase was “Suck it up and get over it”).

My mom generally didn’t argue with that sentiment even though she wasn’t actively saying it either.

Yikes! Let’s see what happened to cause drama when she visited her parents.

This morning, my mom and I were sitting in the living room of their house when my dad came up behind the chair I was sitting in and leaned over to hug me.

I braced myself in the chair because it rocks and I have a fear of it tipping over backwards (they both know this), and when he hugged me, his fingers dug into my arm and hurt.

I said, “Ow,” and as he sat down, he used a childish voice to mock me, repeating my “Ow” like a mean sibling would.

This is not the first time he’s done this, and I’ve told him several times in the past that I don’t appreciate it when he responds to me this way.

Read on to find out how she responded.

In response, I said, “Hey, that actually hurt.” I definitely had a frustrated look on my face, and he shot back, “Oh please, that didn’t hurt you. Stop overreacting and acting like a baby.”

He’s said this I don’t know how many times to me, both growing up and as an adult, and usually I just let it go and ignore him. But something in me today told me I couldn’t do that.

I replied (much more irritated this time), “Hey, I’m allowed to have feelings. I’m not overreacting; that hurt.”

I don’t know why but that apparently triggered a huge drama that I wasn’t expecting.

The way her parents reacted was totally immature.

He walked out of the room to go for a walk (clearly angry), and my mom left the room too and didn’t speak to me.

I went to the guest room where all of my things are because I assumed my dad just needed to calm down before we talked about it. Unfortunately I was very wrong.

I overheard them talking when he got back (I couldn’t make out anything until he loudly whispered, “I’m done”). He didn’t speak to me as he packed a bag and left to drive to another town.

Instead, my mom confronted me while I was making something to eat and berated me, saying I was acting like a teenager and pushing them away and that I had hurt my dad’s feelings because “he was just trying to give you a hug.”

Uh-oh. Read on to find out how she felt about her mom’s guilt-tripping.

I avoided arguing with her because it generally just escalates, because she doesn’t listen to me when I try to explain my side of things.

Neither of them have spoken to me since he left an hour and a half ago, and now I’m considering moving my flight up and asking a family friend to drive the two hours to get me out of this house.

Do I need to apologize, like my mom seems to think?

AITA?

The fact that even as an adult her parents are minimizing her emotions is incredibly problematic.

Not being allowed to express hurt as a kid, and being belittled and scolded for doing so?

That kind of emotional trauma can do a kid some real damage.

Let’s see what the Reddit community made of this.

This person called out her dad’s abusive behavior.

While others encouraged her to leave – potentially for good.

Meanwhile, this Redditor explained exactly how her parents’ behavior is wrong.

Her father is being emotionally abusive while her mother is enabling his behavior – and that is never okay.

It’s unfair that she has never been allowed to express her feelings, and that she is being lambasted for setting boundaries now – but her body and her feelings are her own to make choices with.

Good on her for advocating for herself as an adult – now that it’s clear she doesn’t respect her boundaries, she needs to leave.

If you liked that story, read this one about grandparents who set up a college fund for their grandkid because his parents won’t, but then his parents want to use the money to cover sibling’s medical expenses.