Why can't parents apologize - by Chidinma Emilia

In the heart of Lagos, where the sun baked the crowded streets and the air hummed with the chaos of danfo buses and hawkers, lived Mama Chidera and her teenage daughter, Amara. Their small flat in Yaba was a modest space, filled with the scent of egusi stew and the faint buzz of a generator outside. Amara, sharp-witted and stubborn at sixteen, was the apple of her mother’s eye, but lately, their bond had frayed like an old wrapper. It started with a misunderstanding. Amara had asked to attend a friend’s birthday party in Ikeja, a rare chance to escape the monotony of school and church. Mama Chidera, a schoolteacher with a tongue as sharp as her tailoring scissors, had refused outright. “You think I don’t know what happens at these parties?” she’d snapped, her voice heavy with the weight of unspoken fears. “Boys, alcohol, nonsense. You’re not going, finish!” Amara, her pride stung, had argued back, her words spilling like palm oil on a hot pan. “You never trust me! I’m not a child!” The argument escalated, voices climbing over the hum of the neighbor’s TV. In the heat of it, Mama Chidera, her patience worn thin, slapped Amara across the cheek. The sound echoed, sharp and final, silencing them both. Amara retreated to her room, tears burning her eyes. She waited for her mother to come, to say something—anything—to mend the fracture. But Mama Chidera didn’t. Instead, she busied herself in the kitchen, pounding yam with a ferocity that spoke louder than words. The silence stretched into days, a heavy fog settling over their home. This wasn’t new. In their world, apologies from parents were as rare as a blackout-free week in Lagos. Mama Chidera, like many Nigerian parents, carried the weight of authority like a crown. To apologize was to admit fault, to weaken the pedestal on which she stood as provider, protector, and guide. She had grown up under her own mother’s iron hand, where respect was demanded, not negotiated. To say “sorry” to a child felt like unraveling the very fabric of that order. Amara, though, saw things differently. She’d grown up on Nollywood movies and WhatsApp group chats, where American teens on Netflix shows talked back to their parents and sometimes got apologies in return. She wondered why her mother couldn’t bend, why the word “sorry” seemed to choke in her throat. Was it pride? Fear? Or something deeper, woven into the culture that shaped them? One evening, as the orange glow of dusk settled over the city, Amara sat on the balcony, scrolling through her phone. She stumbled across a post on X, a thread about Nigerian parents and their refusal to apologize. “It’s not pride,” one user wrote. “It’s survival. Parents feel they can’t show weakness, or the child will lose respect. It’s how they were raised.” Another added, “In Nigeria, respect is hierarchy. Parents are above, children below. Apologizing flips that.” Amara frowned, her thumb hovering over the screen. She thought of her mother’s life—widowed young, raising three children alone on a teacher’s salary, navigating a world that demanded she be unbreakable. Maybe apologizing felt like admitting she wasn’t enough, that she’d failed in the one role that defined her. The next day, Amara tried a different approach. She cooked her mother’s favorite, jollof rice with fried plantain, and set the table quietly. When Mama Chidera came home, her face softened at the sight. They ate in silence at first, the clink of cutlery filling the space. Then, haltingly, Mama Chidera spoke. “You know I only want what’s best for you,” she said, her voice low. “This world… it’s not kind to girls like you. I can’t lose you to it.” It wasn’t an apology, not in words. But Amara heard the love in it, the fear, the weight of a mother’s heart. She nodded, her own pride softening. “I know, Mama,” she said. “I just wish you’d talk to me, not shout.” Mama Chidera’s lips twitched, not quite a smile. “You and this your sharp mouth,” she muttered, but there was warmth in her eyes. They didn’t speak of the slap again, but something shifted. The fog lifted, just a little. In Nigeria, apologies from parents were rare, not because love was absent, but because love was often shown in ways words couldn’t carry—through sacrifice, through meals cooked, through dreams poured into a child’s future. Amara learned to hear the “sorry” in her mother’s actions, even if the word never came. And in that unspoken understanding, they found their way back to each other, one quiet moment at a time.

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