Yes, Amber. Some grow out of childhood conditioning.....the one's capable of self reflection, me'thinks.
In my OP, I was thinking of co-dependence...... poor coping strategies......resulting in dysfunctional relationships and FOO systems as human conditions, mostly installed during early childhood.
I was thinking about how our culture tends to view these complicated systems and unconscious beliefs as shameful/personal failure and choices, as though one selects these system errors and mindfully builds a framework on them.
It seems unfathomable, from here, right now.
It's unhelpful , particularly as those suffering abuse are more likely to seek/accept mental healthcare, than those inflicting it, IME.....more likely to be the "identified patient."
And we're all capable of doing harm.....I suspect every human does, bc we can't do better, till we know better.
Many people don't want to know. I'm thinking of parents who sabotage T for their children. Most don't have the ability to turn and face themselves, bc it's human nature to flit from one distraction to another, avoiding pain and suffering. Just human. Not judging, but feeling the sometimes terrifying weight of trying, and sometimes, succeeding.
And when one's avoidance harms other people..... it's........what IS that?
I'm trying to see it with some distance, here.
I've done it. I've watched FOO do it. Experienced it. Held it against my parents and their FOOs and extended family members. Watched my children hold it against me.
We experience trauma.
We do trauma.
We examine both, just the trauma done to us, just the trauma we do/are accused of, or maybe we examine nothing at all.
Some point fingers OR remain confused, while repeating patterns without understanding or care t understand, change, suffer less. It's resilience in a child, fate, luck or what? To question, or not question.
I want to examine motives, at this point, but, as you said ( I think) everyone is doing their best. Right? Seriously.....they are, despite how dreadful/harmful/toxic some human's manage as best....
right?
This morning DD22 said......
"Have you ever noticed how you bend over backwards, concerned with hurting men's feelings, while they stomp all over yours with impunity, Mom?"
She went on.....
"That's misogyny."
I write this, as I digest breakfast, in a chair facing a window, looking on to the street, where the cowboys live, where the police were called, again, last night. DD22 saw the blue lights, this time. We were both out front when a cab arrived this morning, either dropping off or picking up the cowboy.
I'm writing this, bc I feel I'm unable to stop looking over my shoulder, in their direction. Some of it's old trauma..... not knowing what an enraged, entitled man, with many guns, is DOING......but constantly reminded he's making threats and moving through the world in anger.....with entitled purpose....DOING things, saying things, threatening things in anger.
The 3 elderly lady wives pow wowed in the retired nurse's drive yesterday. I didn't join, mostly, bc I already assume nothing can or will be done, but.....I might should have joined. If cowboy wants cowgirl dead.... she'll likely be dead. The same thing my second civil attorney told me in my situation. It's accepted and how things are.
That's a reality, two doors away.....it feels like a dark dangerous energy, pressing in.
Obviously, this is me, struggling with acceptance.
A personal failure..... all my own. Of my own making. Right?
Noting familiar preoccupation with justice/lack of justice. Another personal failure, right?
There should be something, beyond yellow crime scene tape, IME.
A societal, systemic failure, but I'm "co-dependent.". I admit it.... even though I know safety and justice are only imagined constructs, I think I need, at least the illusion, they're real.
Does it, become personal, the moment "good" men, women, citizens do nothing to counter........
what should we lable interpersonal terrorism? I know, I know. It's just "normal" stuff people do, kids suffer, cops allow and Judges ignore.
I know better than to count on the police/ safety nets and the courts.....but that doesn't sit right.
There's discomfort.
And there's complicated lives with complicated stories/med histories/FOO trauma/misogyny and addiction involved. Condemnation of the gay son....
No safety nets for that. Maybe the imagined safety nets/ignorance around the laws/justice system will soon drop, like a curtain.
Willful ignorance won't be so easily sustained.
Lighter
