Mommy Finger, Baby Finger

I went to the coffee shop last week to get work done and give my daughter space to process what had just surfaced in therapy. It was heavy. She had just realized, with the help of her therapist, how deeply her dad’s behavior affects her — how he makes her feel bad when she doesn’t respond the way he wants, how the conversations shift to being about him, how her feelings get swallowed up by his reactions. And then her therapist said something that stuck:

“If your dad is teaching you anything, it’s how to recognize red flags when you start dating.”

That hit me. Because no child should have to learn that kind of lesson so early — and especially not from a parent. And then my dad called.

He didn’t ask how I was doing. Didn’t ask how my daughter was. He just started yelling. About the compressor in my car. About how I’m driving around with no AC. And how I’m not handling things the way he thinks I should. I went from holding space for my daughter to fighting not to cry. This, after I asked him for help and he sent me $250 — something I never do. I asked because I needed it. Because I’m trying on my own. Instead of support, I got shamed.

He started belittling me — asking why, if I’m so “educated,” I haven’t fixed everything by now. Why I haven’t “investigated” the mechanic who scammed me. Why I haven’t used all my journalism skills and reported him. As if being a writer means I can snap my fingers and undo a mess someone else made.

I tried to hold it together. I tried to stay calm. But eventually I said, “Please don’t talk to me like that.”

And he said, “You’re being dramatic.” Like so many men do when a woman sets a boundary. “I’m not talking to you in any kind of way.” But he was.

So, I said it: “You call me just to yell. You don’t call to help. You call to criticize and it’s hurting me.” I breathed and I let the tears fall. While I was already crying, he told me: “Tienes que ser más dura.” (Be tougher) …
And then he said the thing that hit in a different way: “Tú actúas como si fueras la única batallando en la vida.” (“You act like you’re the only one battling things in life.”) As if my pain was performative. As if asking for help meant I had no empathy for anyone else.

Then, I did something I’ve never really done before. I hung up. Even though it hurt, even though part of me still wanted to be the “good daughter,” I thought: I don’t let any man talk to me like this. Not even my dad. That was my quiet click of a boundary being drawn.

This is the work. This is the breaking of generational cycles. It’s messy. It’s painful. It looks like giving your daughter language for red flags and then getting hit with your own. But it also looks like this: naming it. Calling it what it is. Choosing not to shrink. Refusing to pass it down.

If you’ve ever answered a phone call like that, cried in a parking lot like that, or questioned your worth because of a parent’s voice in your head, you’re not alone. You’re not crazy. You’re not dramatic.

What so many of us grew up with wasn’t strength. It was emotional armor, handed to us by people who never learned how to feel safe themselves. I don’t need to be más dura. I need to be human. I’ve never claimed to be the only one hurting. I’ve just learned to stop pretending that I’m not. And maybe that’s what makes people like him uncomfortable: when daughters stop shrinking and start speaking plainly. So, no — I don’t think I’m the only one battling things in life. But I do know I’m one of the few in my family brave enough say that out loud.

And I’m teaching my daughter to know she deserves respect, to claim her worth, and to know her boundaries. We don’t let any man speak to us like we’re small. Not partners. Not strangers. Not even our dads.

Here’s to the women reclaiming their voice even when it shakes.

With love,
Jeannette | @_mujerdepalabras