Hey everyone, I am new here but I’ve been following you guys for quite some time already. While I know there are those among the older generation who will do anything and everything to help out their kids, I want to remind you that many of those among the older generations simply don’t care about the genuine happiness and welfare of their kids.
I am in Bangkok, Thailand and one of my buddies here, his dad was director of WebMD (surname starts with an A) for over a decade. He’s a leading expert in cancer research in San Diego as well as being proficient in multiple other types of medicine, but my friend’s found a much happier path for himself halfway across the world and his dad simply doesn’t get it.
His dad keeps pressuring him, both directly and more subtly, to go back to the US, further his education and join the grind in a “respectable” career path. What also doesn’t help is his brother followed in his dad’s footsteps, is miserable AF but is in it for the prestige, and has a wife that constantly complains about them never having enough “stuff”.
His dad’s insistence has often made him depressed, and compounding things is the fact that the dad has BPD on top of his demanding and unsympathetic tendencies. He clearly has the financial means to help out my friend in whatever way makes him happy (and my friend is one of the most compassionate people I know), but in the name of “you gotta grind and suffer like I did or else you won’t deserve anything”, refuses to support my friend and give him his blessing.
It would be outright impossible for my friend to have a decent shot at a good life back in the States, nor is it what he wants. He told me a decent apartment in downtown San Diego would cost well over 2000 bucks a month, and the complex might still be old.
It’s hard for his dad to understand that he’s chosen to live in a way that makes him feel a lot more at peace, and his dad is salty about that.
What a dick. My friend was also horribly mistreated by his stepmother while growing up (whom his dad eventually divorced) and his dad kissed her ass while enabling that bitch of a woman to mistreat his very own son.