Since my teen years, my mom would dump her frustrations, griefs and tears at me. It started when we moved back to America from South Korea as education refugees. I was in 7th grade. My sister wasn’t capable of the educational rigors and her teachers told my parents that she won’t pass the exam to get into high school and advised them to go back to America.

My mom being the youngest daughter had a wonderful, kindhearted older sister and praying mom who loved and listened to her. I think my mom developed a bad habit of dumping her complaints and grievances at family members which lightened her load. Once her avenue was closed off, I became her dumpster. Usually her biggest complaint was about my dad.

My daughter’s situation with her mental health has been very difficult and stressful. I am very concerned about sending her off to college in a month. Yet whenever I pray and also having surrounded the decision with friends’ prayers; I get peace from the Lord about sending her to college faraway to Indiana.

This week she told me that therapy is not helping her at all and she wants to stop. Now that she’s 18 years old, we cannot force her. As I was dealing with this situation, and managing my escalating concerns, fears and doubts; I called my mom to check in and hear how her weekend went. She went on and on about something that happened with my nephew. As I was taking in her garbage like a dumpster, something just snapped in me. I just couldn’t listen anymore. I told her to stop talking. And then I started crying and wailing really loudly. Wow I have never done that before. I shocked her and myself!

Although she knew about my situation at home, I don’t think she knew how much it was affecting me. My loud wailing and crying shocked her. I asked her to please not share anymore drama in her life with me because I cannot take it right now. I told her unless it is an emergency, please deal with the situation on her own.

Since day one, I have been telling her that she needs a Christian fellowship and that she cannot rely only on family members. It appears that the Lord is cutting off her relief line (me) so that she can start relying only on God, and also seek out a local church for likeminded Christian friends. I pray that she will knock, seek, and find this small group of believer community easily and quickly.

As I was reflecting back on what happened on Monday morning, I am realizing that I am no longer a dumpster. 😃

As for my daughter, Alex please pray for her and me too. My daughter has a lot of anger and resentment mainly towards her dad, and there is bitterness and unforgiveness. Probably it was always there, but the pandemic isolation, the stress of college applications and pressures from her dad tipped her over the edge and now her mental state is fragile.

Her coldness is really breaking my husband’s heart too. She barely talks to him and stays in her room when she’s home. She doesn’t talk to me much too but we are in a better place, and so I am the one who talks to her about getting ready for college.

I remember once when I was praying and seeking the Lord if she can handle going off to college, the Holy Spirit gave me this friendship song by Michael W Smith. The chorus portion where he sings about letting his friend go into the Father’s hands, ministers to me. I’ll listen to this song whenever I am worried about her and turn it to the Lord in prayer. https://youtu.be/lOnSToVsBz4

I pray that one day very soon, Alex will receive Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior and start her process towards forgiving her dad. I know that this was something I had to do nearly eleven years ago when I was came back to God. It was very hard to let go of unforgiveness but it set me free. As parents, it is very important that we don’t speak ill about our spouse or anyone else to our children. When we do, then we plant seeds of bitterness and unforgiveness into our children and put them in bondage. Instead, we should pour out our hearts to God. Only God can handle our frustrations, grievances and He even bottles our tears according to scripture.

As for my mom, I pray that she will grow in the Lord as I cannot help her much at this time. I have no choice but to also release her into God’s mighty and loving hands.

Psalm 56:8 – You have taken note of my journey through life, caught each of my tears in Your bottle. But God, are they not also blots on Your book? (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+56&version=VOICE)

A very concerning report by CDC shows that the pandemic has impacted Gen Z mental state more in girls than boys. This is my family’s case. 😢 – https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7024e1.htm?s_cid=mm7024e1_w