How do you parent with sanity after being raised by N's???

[guest2]

Thanks everyone for the responses.  As I said before, it is great to have a place to go and be listened to!

I'll try to fill in the informational holes.  My kids are 4 and 6 and very active and challenging.   We do not have any family in the area, (in my case that is a good thing), so no support.     My husband has told me many times not to tell him things, because his philosophy is to let bygones be bygones and not dwell on things.  I asked him if he would feel the same about me if I told him negative things about my past, and he said no.  After years of being told this I have given up.  We went for marriage counseling last year and he finally said in front of the therapist that he would listen and he was just trying to give me the best advice.  But I don't believe it and after all this time of clamming up it would be hard for me to suddenly begin sharing with him, anyway.   Pretty soon the counseling ended because the therapist wanted to have private sessions with one of us and he did not want to do that.

My mom is older and has health issues, but it is hard for me to know how bad things are.  She alternates between hiding things and exaggerating things.  She acts very forgetfull sometimes and is very moody.  If she calls and I am cooking dinner and the kids are yelling and hungry and my hubby is late home from work, I had better go ahead and talk to her and let my kids cry and dinner burn or else I will be making up for it for a couple of weeks.  She will get depressed and make all kinds of alarming statements and cancel any plans we might have had for her to visit the grandchildren.  

She acts really normal to eveyone, and they think she is great.  But when she is in her moods, she goes around saying that I have done and said awful things to her, and I am enbarrassed to be around our mutual friends now.

Thank goodness she has just moved near my sister.  Actually that's not a nice thing to say, is it?  But I hope she will get out of my hair to some extent.

Whew.  Glad to get that off my chest.

[dogbit]

I've been thinking about your post for several days now.  I grew up with a horribly narcissistic mother and a dad who just backed away probably for his own self-defense.  When I had my kids, I vowed always to talk to them.  And I listened to them.  I always used my words in the first tense.  Meaning:  I don't like what you are doing, or I want it done this way because I am the Mom.  And they were always free to tell me what they thought!  I spent most of my childhood being told who I was.  I figured as a parent they needed to know who I was and they could take it from there.  Meaning, if I was wrong, then I would be held accountable.  If I was right, then so be it.  I don't think this is coming across well in writing, but the bottom line with my kids was to be authentic and be willing to change course midstream if that was the healthy way to go.  I made mistakes but they were reasonable ones.  I always had the fear that I would be like my mother.  I think that fear made me a better mother since I took nothing for granted.  I double checked myself constantly.  I found friends who had young children and listened to their approaches to parenthood.  I looked at my kids and never wanted anything other than what would make them become adults with the most options open to them.  I think you are going to do just fine.  You are asking the right questions now when they are young. You know what has happened in the past and you are finding the best way to proceed.   The kids always know when you love them without an agenda.  Mine are now adults and doing fine.

[Serena]

Thanks everyone for the responses.  As I said before, it is great to have a place to go and be listened to!

I'll try to fill in the informational holes.  My kids are 4 and 6 and very active and challenging.   We do not have any family in the area, (in my case that is a good thing), so no support.     My husband has told me many times not to tell him things, because his philosophy is to let bygones be bygones and not dwell on things.  I asked him if he would feel the same about me if I told him negative things about my past, and he said no.  After years of being told this I have given up.  We went for marriage counseling last year and he finally said in front of the therapist that he would listen and he was just trying to give me the best advice.  But I don't believe it and after all this time of clamming up it would be hard for me to suddenly begin sharing with him, anyway.   Pretty soon the counseling ended because the therapist wanted to have private sessions with one of us and he did not want to do that.

My mom is older and has health issues, but it is hard for me to know how bad things are.  She alternates between hiding things and exaggerating things.  She acts very forgetfull sometimes and is very moody.  If she calls and I am cooking dinner and the kids are yelling and hungry and my hubby is late home from work, I had better go ahead and talk to her and let my kids cry and dinner burn or else I will be making up for it for a couple of weeks.  She will get depressed and make all kinds of alarming statements and cancel any plans we might have had for her to visit the grandchildren.  

She acts really normal to eveyone, and they think she is great.  But when she is in her moods, she goes around saying that I have done and said awful things to her, and I am enbarrassed to be around our mutual friends now.

Thank goodness she has just moved near my sister.  Actually that's not a nice thing to say, is it?  But I hope she will get out of my hair to some extent.

Whew.  Glad to get that off my chest.

The part of your post about her being elderly and with health issues rings so many bells...........

My N mother has 'used' her health issues relentlessly over the past few years.  Her speciality is the guilt-trip.  Luckily, I don't go there anymore.

You are brilliant with your kids..... ignore your N Mum as much as is humanly possible.

[Guest2]

Thank you Serena and dogbit for your encouraging words.  I think my mom's recent move, far away from us, has stirred up a lot of things.  So I am a bit off balance lately and not at my best as a parent, or any kind of person.   I really appreciate the existence of this message board and all the people pitching in to help each other.

I have stayed away from my mom in the past, and she from me when I was not cooperating with her agenda.  But I do realize that she had it hard as well.  Her mother divorced when she was little and did not get (or maybe even want) custody.  This was in the 30's, so that was radical.  She never forgave her for that abandonment and for her lack of support later.  Sometimes I feel like my mom does not even see me, and is mistaking me for her own mom when she lashes out.    I can see that she is not going to address any of her issues before she dies, and I feel sorry for her about that.    I can see that she has no idea how bizarre her conduct is or why my sister and I never spend the hols with her anymore.   It was jarring to realize that my mom, the person who all my life I thought was the only one on earth who loved me, doesn't even see me as I am.    I feel often that my children are my only connection to the world, and reason for living.   I do not want to burden them with any responsibility for my life, so I had better get things sorted before they get old enough to start parenting me.  

When my mother visits, I can hear her talking to my son the same way she spoke to my sister.  Like a hopeless ugly monster she had been saddled with.   So I make sure I do not go too far out of hearing, and that her visits are short so he can recover.   If she knows I am there she will change her tone.    I am again torn between responsbility to protect my child and the enormous fallout of offending my mom.

I have gotten hope from people saying that they got out of bad relationships and into good ones later in life after facing some of their issues and establishing boundaries and raising their self-esteem.  Maybe that opportunity will come to me!

Yes.  I am just babbling on and on.  But I'm glad to have place to do it!