OK - I am getting behind the posts again...
Ami - You mentioned that you lost it when your father stated she was fine.
It is really odd - before I read your post, I had a thought earlier today that I see a lot of posts about your incubator (aka mother – I hope this doesn’t offend – sometimes I hide behind dark humour) – but not your father. I was thinking about this, and it reminded me of something my T said when I was in therapy. He said, “I keep writing MOM with capitals. I never write in capitals. I think my subconscious is telling me that there is something going on there – you hardly ever talk about her. Do you think we should talk about your Mom?” I thought about it for a minute and replied, “No, she isn’t physically abusive that often, she is just kind of there, a presence in the background, but that is about it.”
He was so right. Neglect and abuse can be overt and it can be passive. My mother never lifted a finger to protect me. One time I asked her if her parents ever hit her. I figured that if she had been hit, then maybe this would explain why she let it continue. I will never forget it, she got this look of total shock on her face and said, “Ohh Noooo, I was a good girl, my parents would never have hit me.” I was devastated by this – the obvious implication was that I was a bad girl and deserved what I got. I am sorry, but I don’t understand how a 2 year old deserves to be slapped in the face for not going to sleep – nonetheless, in her mind, I deserved it.
From what you said, it seems to me that maybe your father falls into the same category. I may be projecting here, you haven’t written a lot about him so I am not sure that it is the same. In my case, I feel that my mother sold me out to save herself. Sounds to me like your father did the same thing when he denied that there was anything wrong with your mother – when, IMO, her actions clearly define her as an emotional infant.
If it is true, this adds a whole new layer to the betrayal.
You also mentioned that they are destroyers of innocence (Tayana you said the same thing). When I had kids, it was a real eye-opener to me. My daughter is currently the age that I was when I was supposed to do an art project for an inter-school district competition. It was not required. I was young, but had a bad habit of forgetting things. The night before the project was due, my mother started in on me for forgetting. It was really nasty – that cold, voice, “What is wrong with you that you can’t remember anything… You will never make it anywhere if you can’t start to remember. I can’t be responsible for remembering everything for you – what will you do when you are an adult if you can’t remember anything” And on and on. It wasn’t screamed at me, it was said in that nasty, cold voice - as a statement of fact.
That night I did the project. About a week later, I came home from school and my mom was sitting in the kitchen. She was clutching something to her chest – she said to me, "You won first place in the art competition. You got a trophy. I don’t know whether I should give this to you or not. You don’t deserve it. You didn’t do that poster until the night before it was due." Out of hundreds of kids, I won first place. Did she say congratulations? No, just put me down some more. For about 2 months after that, my mom suddenly developed an interest in drawing. I never saw her draw before in my life. She drew all of these pictures, signed and framed a couple of them, and hung them on the wall; my artwork – trashcan.
You know the funny thing, I completely forgot this incident until a couple of months ago. This was the kind of thing that just happened on a day-to-day basis when I was growing up. It was normal. As an adult, I now realize that she was insanely jealous that I won something, and had to take the success of that away from me. The way she was clutching it to her chest, they way she started drawing and framing her own pictures. I had no idea that this was what was motivating her when I was a kid – when I was a kid, all I took away from that incident was that I didn’t deserve to win because I had trouble remembering and that I would never amount to anything.
I look into my daughter’s eyes and see that innocence. It is totally age-appropriate for my daughter to forget things. Instead of criticizing her for it, I find a way to help her remember – notebooks, bulletin boards, etc. And if something gets forgotten, and she gets upset – I ask her, in 20 years, is it really going to matter if you forgot this? If she won first place out of hundreds of kids – even if she did the project last minute – I would throw a huge party for her to congratulate her.
In a lot of ways, the only person we had to rely on growing up was ourselves. I see the innocence, happiness, and light in my daughter’s eyes, and I figure that I am doing pretty good considering that I didn’t really have parents. Look at the wonderful relationship you have with your children – IMO, this is a really strong statement of who you are and the strength you have to break the cycle of abuse. Not an easy thing to do.
Janet – you summed it up in one sentence:
Just goes to show how screwed up they are, I suppose.
Yes – and I think it is testament to how strong we were to have survived and to recognize and break the pattern – I think it is remarkable that we were able to do this despite having emotional infants as parents.
Sorry for the long ramble - got on a bit of a rant there!!!
