When Is Your Success Enough?

I grew up with a Korean mother and an American (Italian/Irish) father. Both came from very hard-working families. My mother is very predictably and stereotypically Korean. Korean parents will sacrifice everything and anything to help their children graduate from Harvard, medical school and eventually marry another Korean doctor so they can have more Korean baby doctors.

I ended up going to UCLA and joining the Navy. My mom seemed pretty happy about it. Then I worked in the corporate world for a bit and then I became an acupuncturist. Soon after acupuncture school (4 years), my mom asked, “Why don’t you go to medical school?” “When are you going to have children?” AHHHHHHHHHH.

What do Korean parents push Harvard-doctor-kids-who-have-children to do? What is better than that? I’m sure there is something. Basically, it’s never enough. Luckily I’ve been semi-immune/repellent to the professional pressure/guilt that comes standard as the child of a Korean person. I always liked the job that I had and was OK with not having children for a while. I think this sometimes frustrated my mother-as if it were a failure on her part that her pressure-power as my Korean mother wasn’t good enough. When I got divorced years ago-which meant possibly no grandchildren and family shame forever, it was probably what my parents’ saw as their biggest failure.

Again, I knew what was right for me. All I could say was, “You’ll understand when you see me with the right person some day.” That’s the way I handle it. I know everything they do is out of love. Isn’t that wonderful?

What do your parents pressure you to do and how do you deal with it?