angst & frustration

I am so emotional right now. I am getting really annoyed by my mom.

It started when stupid me brought up that I wanted to double major in Anthro and Communications. Then she, not knowing anything about education, tries for the millionth time to try to persuade me to be a doctor. I don't understand her silly doctor fetish. I am not going to be a doctor. I have no desire, no intention to be one. Drop it. She got me so mad. She thinks that the medical field is the only safe career that makes money. That puts even more pressure on me, that I have to get rich or die trying.

First of all, no one wants to come out of school and make little money. But her unhealthy obsession with making money puts so much pressure on me. I know I will never study something I don't want to study for her, because I know that I am going to college for me. I know that I'm studying for my own career. But it hurts that she doesn't support what I want to do, even though she has no idea what I want to do. She has never asked me straightly what my aspirations are. And when she does, I never go into full detail, because she always kills my passion by trying to slip in some persuasion, trying to get me to switch my path to medicine.

I guess I understand that she worries for my future. But, I will be the first to say, that I want to live a comfortable and upper-middle class life when I get older. I am determined not to have to worry about spending when I get older. And while she thinks that, at worst, I will make 2-3K a month, my idea is that, at worst, I will be stuck in a stupid job that I have no interest in. I know I want to work in social work, most likely in Public Health, and also in magazine publishing.

My mother needs to learn to let go. She needs to learn to understand that, by this stage in her children's lives, our futures are in our own hands. Lay off. I understand why she worries about my sister, but that's not for you to know. During Chinese New Year, my cousin cried because she wasn't able to finish her homework to submit. And my mom says "If you knew it was going to be this hard, why did you choose to study this major? You should have chosen something else." When I heard her say this, I knew I had something against her, if she ever tried to get me to study something against my own conviction. So today, I got my chance to use it against her. While she was chastising me, and degrading my choice areas of study, I shot back at her. She's the one teaching my cousin the lesson, that if studying e.e. was so impossible and difficult that she should cry, then she should have chosen another study. So I contested that I was in the same situation. If I studied medicine, it would be impossible. That is completely not what I want to study. I love hard sciences, and I love learning the reasoning behind Life, but my passion is in the social sciences. If I continued on the path I was headed, hard lab sciences, I would have cried & died, I think. She was being very hypocritical in her polarized evaluations of my cousin and of me.

After that little tiff, things were a little tense and awkward. Then my sister asked if I wanted to go to the California Science Center, and I said okay, before realizing it was $20. I've been before, so I didn't need to see it again, especially for $20. So I say, never mind, I'm not going. But my sister had asked for money for me & my brother to go. So my mom asks me how much money, and I say "I'm not going, I've already been there before." And she yells at me, and says, "Why are you going again if you've already been? You think it doesn't cost money?" Geez, I don't know if she heard the first thing I said, but I got so mad. Everybody in this family thinks that I am irresponsible with money. I hate that false reputation. I only spend money on what I believe is worth my while. So I yell back to her, that "I'M NOT GOING!" But she goes out to my sister and says, "Why did you ask her to go if she's already gone?"

I swear I wanted to explode at that point. I yell back outside, saying "I said I'm not going!" She says, "Then why do you need your friend to buy tickets?" And I said, "I'm going to help her ask my friend can get her cheaper tickets!"

Then and there, I wanted to scream. I couldn't believe her.

I've always had a good relationship with my mom. I just don't understand her reasoning sometimes. I really need to discuss with her. She hardly knows anything about careers in America. She knows the electrical wholesale business. And construction, perhaps. But otherwise, she is clueless. She thinks that only doctors make money. Bugs the 1134 out of me.

PS I hate most doctors. Most of them are in it for the money, rather than to "help their patients." I also hate most cops, because they are corrupt. But I hold genuine respect for most fire fighters, because they actually go out there to risk their lives to save people.