Is discipline in strict immigrant households love or abuse? (TW: abuse, suicidal thoughts)

My mother and father immigrated to the States with only $80 in their pockets a few years before I (25f) was born. Both are extremely intelligent and hardworking and created a beautiful childhood for me. Because it was just the three of us, they showered me with generosity - summer camps, dance classes, sports clubs, travel abroad.

The price for my comfort was strict parenting. I know all my immigrant kids out there know this story already. Strict rules about boys, strict curfew, expectations of academic excellence, no sleep overs, etc. etc. Religion was important in our house and God speaks through your parents. To disobey your parents is to disobey God.

And the rules were enforced mostly by my mother’s lectures and wooden spoons. I was getting spanked since the beginning of time, and the lectures turned to screaming matches every time. I became an absolute wild child which compounded every argument. I screamed back, I got suspended, I partied, I crashed my car, I snuck out. I deserved my mother’s discipline.

Every day was a fight exacerbated by our cultural differences. My father beat me with a belt when he found I lost my virginity at 15. My mother accidentally gave me a black eye when I came home blacked out after a party at 19. I never NEVER hit back. It’s disrespectful.

But it’s the screaming everyday that broke me. I started my first bout of depression in first year of university after I moved out of the home. I am just coming out of my worst episode yet. It lasted a year and was the first time I fantasized about suicide. I read that children who suffered trauma are more likely to develop depression. What else can I call my childhood other than small, daily traumas? I’m functional and socially successful - I have a good career and friends, a wonderful partner but my depression is a plague.

Now that I am a successful adult, my mother no longer yells. I can tell she feels guilty and wants to be friends to make up for lost time. But I feel like fucking Pavlov’s dog. I see her calling and immediately become irritated and defensive, though I wish I didn’t. I am big believer in therapy and am on the long road learning to forgive myself and my parents. But there's questions I have no answers for.

All I want is to ask my mother is if she realizes my depression is because of our fighting. Does she realize I would have been less rebellious if she at least sometimes was my friend, not my parent? Does she know I feel broken? I wonder if she sees the guilt I carry for torturing her. I wonder if she knows the reason I won’t kill myself is because I know they can’t live without me - and I can’t live without them.

I’ll never ask her. It’s hard to call their discipline abuse because I know they did it out of love. I’ve moved countries 3 times to be away from them. We love each other better from afar. I think about them constantly. Everything I do is for them. I love them so much it hurts.

I wish I was the only one with a story like this, but it seems to be pervasive in immigrant communities. Just another story from just another kid...

Edit: Thank you for your stories, support and kind words. Is seems the answer to my question is the same for many of life’s other questions: it’s complicated. I am currently in therapy, have been in the past, and will continue to lean on it as resource in the future. There’s been a clear change in our family dynamics over the past year and it’s for the better. There’s a long road of recovery and discovery of self worth ahead.

I’ve been blessed and lucky in practically all other aspects of my life. This is simply my demon to battle. I know that for every demon there is an angel. Thanks, again.