Any others who were "overprogrammed" "trophy" children?

[andromeda]

By overprogrammed, I mean, signed up for so many activities you didn't have time to breathe, think, or be who you were.

By 10 years of age, I had....been competing on the YMCA swim team from age 8 (year-round, 5 days a week practice), competed on the: T-Ball, Soccer teams at school for first grade (age 6) on up, had been taking ballet classes, and of course, mom started me on violin lessons at age 4, which meant practicing at least 30 minutes a day.

Summers were soccer camp, tennis camp, violin camp. I was on the junior high orchestra when I was in 4th grade, in the high school orchestra when in 8th grade. High school meant fall, winter and spring varsity sports plus varsity debate & forensics (I travelled all over the country) a touring orchestra...I graduated early with a 3.4 (mostly AP classes) because I'd overloaded every year and finished almost all but 2 credits of requirements by the end of my junior year.

Not to mention 10 years of piano lessons...

I started working part time my junior year as well.

I felt like a trophy for my mom. Mom signed me up for all of these things. I still have a hard time quitting activities that are inappropriate for me because I remember the pressure Mom put on me not to be a quitter.

I feel exhausted just writing this!   

My parents didn't have alot of one-on-one conversation with me, not alot of emotional connection. Very much more along the lines of 'managing andromeda'...I was so overinvolved with these things that I had little time for emotional relationships with other kids my age.

Curious if anyone else had this experience...

Andromeda...the former trophy childe

[write]

my parents were very uninterested and uninvolved. I used my talents to 'attention-seek' from other adults...

However I see plenty of parents now whose involvement ( overinvolvement ) in their children's lives is incredible, and I'm sure they'd be shocked to be told it's abusive, interfering and for their self-gratification not the benefit of the child.

Plus the kids are expected to be 'good all-rounders' ie. good at EVERYTHING!
Good at sports, play an instrument, look good, be outgoing and confident, get good grades...talk about pressure.

I guess these are the families when the kids can't handle it and rebel say 'we gave them everything...' and other people say 'they were model parents...'etc.

[Hopalong]

Andromeda,

You've earned lolling in a hammock watching the leaves stir for a decade or so, imho.

Whew. That does sound like frenzy confused with family.

I'm sorry you didn't get the loving attention you needed, glad you're hunting it now.

Hopalong

[andromeda]

Thanks guys...

I'll take that time in the hammock...but working on something all the time is such a habit now, I'd have to bring four things to do with me!    Old habits die hard.

I know now, alot of it comes from mom being smart and not having opportunities -- her favorite quote was, "You should be grateful you have all these things to do. My high school was so limited I had to take typing twice." She still wants me to go to law school, even though I have the highest degree in my field (studio art) and am making a concerted effort to build my career in that field...

The thing that was really damaging was the overruling of my ability to say 'no' to things. Why do I have problems with boundaries? Was I ever taught to have them? Allowed to set them?

However I see plenty of parents now whose involvement ( overinvolvement ) in their children's lives is incredible, and I'm sure they'd be shocked to be told it's abusive, interfering and for their self-gratification not the benefit of the child.

Stage mothers, I think, are Ns who live through their childrens achievement...There's a difference between showing up at your child's recital and hugging them afterwards and telling them how proud you are of them (my mostly-absent Dad) and picking apart your performance and making you cry, even though everyone clapped and your teacher told you it was your best performance ever (that would be Mom). 

The thing that sucks about this set of experiences is that they are culturally rewarded.

This is a long slow waking-up process. Since none of it is 'overt abuse' like the completely horrifying stuff some of the other people on this board have suffered through...Didn't Tolstoy open Anna Karenina with the line, Happy families are all the same. Unhappy families are each tortured in their own way. --?

Thanks for your encouragement...I'm hesitant to call my mom N and would like feedback on it. She was hypercritical, witholding, controlling, with me (not my brother), simply did not listen to my perspective or experience of things, my input would be politely ignored. Nothing I ever did was good enough for her...A funny telling moment was when I was in therapy at 19, I made a 'feelings drawing' as part of an exercize...the first time I'd been asked really to express my feelings.  Three weeks later I went looking for it at home and she had thrown it away. 

My house was emotionally very cold, my dad worked 60+ hours a week as a doctor, was on call most of the time, didn't get alot of sleep and was VERY short-tempered as a result. Didn't have alot of time to himself and aggressively took it (leave me alone I'm stressed out). All of my sense of emotional affirmation came from my dad, however - he was the source of emotional warmth for me, read me bedtime stories etc.

Mom was just the iron hand under the velvet glove.  I think I was more afraid of her than of my dad's outbursts, because at least he'd get it out in the open and he'd genuinely apologize later...Mom was sneaky and manipulative, and mean when nobody else was around, so nobody would believe me.

Good grief. Its Christmas Eve...I had to work today and the day after Christmas, so I'm not with the family this year (I live 1,000 miles away). Maybe thats why all the family stuff is on my mind. Its much less stressful dealing with christmas when you don't have to do Christmas...

Merry Christmas! A time of rebirth for all of us. Happy Happy!

Andromeda

[write]

none of it is 'overt abuse'

no indeed, most children are supposed to be incredibly grateful for their 'opportunities'...
which is great, so long as the child ghets the opportunity to be themself and work out for themself their own path.

But like me learning tons of skills to try and impress my family one day...there's an upside to everything and all these skills you have- now you can use them for yourself and others in your own way.

Nothing's ever wasted really...

xoxox

[Plucky]

Hi Andromeda,
I know what you mean.   I see this a lot.  There is a lot of pressure for mothers to sign up for everything other children are doing, so your child will be 1. Like everyone else, and 2. not disadvantaged.
But I think the whole thing comes about because people do not want to spend time with their children.  I don't understand this.  They are in school all day, and in activities all evening, when do you form family bonds?

I think a lot of people have children who basically have no business doing so, because they don't really want to be with that person and raise them themselves.     

On the other hand, I know it is tiring and stressful and prevents you from experiencing a certain slice of life.  But just think if you were stuck in the house full time with a raving N.  No outlet.  Who thought that activities were bad and people should stay home all the time.   Who still didn't spend that quality time with you.  Whose bad side you had a view of all the time.

At least you got to have that music teacher who praised you.

Plucky

[andromeda]

At least you got to have that music teacher who praised you.

Plucky

Actually, she was a nitpicky beast most of the time!  And that praise was at my next lesson, distant from the actual tears-inducing event.

My mom literally and figuratively drove me...I had a sense of being ridden, like a horse of some sort. As an adult, its EXTREMELY difficult for me to do something I'm not interested in doing...Its like I've been going to work since I was four, so thirty years later I'm burnt out.

<a href="http://www.angriesout.com/grown20.htm">The Drama Triangle Page</a> (which I found on the resources board, THANK YOU SO MUCH!!) describes "the resilient child" and I relate to that...

I wrote about my divorce on the forgiveness thread, and the process of leaving the alcoholic Nhusband has transformed my life for the better. I decided when I left him I would be gentle and protective of my own instincts, and listen to myself and what my guts were telling me and always respond to that...This exploration of my childhood has come from my commitment to healing...

I feel myself slowly shifting from being a shell or nonbeing to filling up from the inside, as I learn more about myself, and commit more to being myself.

I've had a pretty crazy life, but I'm in a good place now...

Andromeda

[Plucky]

Hi Andromeda,
You must feel kind of psychically exhausted.  I feel similar, although not for the same reason.     My mother thought that activities should be severly controlled.  I would have loved to participate in more things, especially to get out of the house and in contact with normal people, but she thought it was bad.  Instead, we worked like slaves every spare moment.  I spent every last
Saturday in the house doing housework from when I could remember until I moved out.  Does silver really need to be polished every single week, even if it hasn't been used?  I was not allowed to sign up for anything that would inconvenience Madam.   I could see my friends outside playing, but if I was caught looking, it was a problem.  It was so awkward saying no to everything and after a while, I was thought very wierd.  I had to get up at 7 every Saturday, even as a teen when I had a lot of trouble sleeping.

Nowadays, I still have a hard time relaxing.  I cannot just sit around, even on vacation.  I am so tired.  But I do make sure my kids have a lot of play time.   Maybe this madness can end with me.

I'm glad you've gotten past it.  Most people don't even think it is an issue to have a hard time forcing themselvesto do something they don't like!
Plucky

[andromeda]

Thanks P...

The discipline of 'keeping busy' keeps me a very productive artist, but I have to be careful to keep balance in my life with work and play...

The biggest thing I've gotten from the N-discussion on these boards is how the N refuses to listen to the voice of their children, instead treats them as an object to live through...I think Mom was N-ish in a 'professional/work/career' way, in a, "You don't know what you want, you're just a child. What you really want is this..." and overriding whatever choice I had made inside myself...

Which has led to some strange consequential behavior as an adult...

Andromeda

[solayads]

Hello Everyone:

Interestingly, my former "N" pastor and his "N" wife have four (4) trophy children.  I say this because they want so badly for the children to be preachers like they are.  The problem is:  the children are so angry because the parents are always flying or driving off to some preaching engagement and leaving their kids in someone else's care.  Those children just want to be children.....

Prior to my parting company with these two notorious characters, they had the oldest child (6 years old)  up in front of the church "preaching" or prophesying.  What it really amounted to was the child CRYING for help and PLEADING for the parents to not go away so much.  He seemed to be blaming himself under the guise of preaching.  It was quite sad to me; meanwhile some onlookers thought that child was demonstrating some kind of prophetic gift!  What I really heard was this 6-year old's pain!!!!

He already is having problems in school which the "N" mother had to address.  She would not share this fact with anyone because she "did not want her son to be treated any differently by the members".  The thing is, everyone at some time or another was having some issues with their kids.  They were not trying to "fake" it or hide it.  People just knew about it and knew that the parents were working to resolve the issues.

What makes her so different?  Because she and her husband are "N's".  They cannot tolerate anything that tarnishes their image of their trophy family, marriage, children, or life.  They would rather sweep it all under a rug and put on false pretenses ---even if it causes the kids to have psychological problems.

[Hopalong]

Solyads,
That is HORRIBLE, forcing their child to "channel" their twisted idea of "testimony".

God.
Or rather, not-God...

 
I weep for that kid.

Hopalong

[ratso]

 Let's hear it for those who didn't measure up to their mothers' expectations of being a trophy child and were dropped into an as-if existence.  Leo sun sign parent can tend to be narcissistic and use children talents as trophies…..thank god most of my talents are so hidden that as yet to this day most people don't begin to suspect that I am….oops better not let the cat out of the bag….