quote:

RobinW782461 Jul 12, 2019
JUDITH NEWMAN - IF YOU ARE OUT THERE, PLEASE CONTACT ME, I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW WHY YOU WROTE THIS HORRIBLE ARTICLE TO MAKE PARENTS FEEL WORSE...

RoboRodent posted:

I have an ongoing goal that once I'm more settled in my life (as opposed to living in a bachelor suite while I go to school in my thirties, lol) to look into becoming a foster parent. This is something I feel pretty strongly about. I want to do this. I'm not ever going to have kids of my own, between a deformed uterus and being pretty gay and also pretty chronically single, but i could be a good home for kids who need it for a while.

Stories like this just discourage me so much, and I don't know why. I think it's a sense of "and what makes you think you'd be any better, you big loser, you're not morally superior to anyone." Maybe it's just really obvious how much these people don't see people around them as human beings with feelings and agency. Maybe it's that I start doubting whether I don't have my own self-aggrandizing illusions about what foster care would be like.

quote:

My daughter in WI is married but they do not want kids. My other daughter received her doctorate in TN and lives there with her husband and our only two grandsons. My friend always told me; You love your children but its nothing to compared to the love of a grandchild'. My friend was right as our grandsons both stole our hearts which breaks each time we say goodbye after a visit.



We recently retired, and I told my daughter in TN that we were thinking of moving to TN, and her response was 'our lives are very busy" which to me meant they wouldn't have time for us in their lives. I remember the good times we had while they were growing up, and it's painful to accept the fact that they don't need us anymore. Both of our kids are concerned that we don't have much retirement saved, and every time we make a large purchase they question our decision. I know it is because they care about our wellbeing. I am a caregiver for my 98-year-old mother, and my children are beginning to see themselves as our caregivers! At what point does the child become the parent?

quote:

@k304574p Truly enjoy your retirement. It is the two of you now. Do whatever you need to do to make yourselves happy.

RoboRodent posted:

I have an ongoing goal that once I'm more settled in my life (as opposed to living in a bachelor suite while I go to school in my thirties, lol) to look into becoming a foster parent. This is something I feel pretty strongly about. I want to do this. I'm not ever going to have kids of my own, between a deformed uterus and being pretty gay and also pretty chronically single, but i could be a good home for kids who need it for a while.

Stories like this just discourage me so much, and I don't know why. I think it's a sense of "and what makes you think you'd be any better, you big loser, you're not morally superior to anyone." Maybe it's just really obvious how much these people don't see people around them as human beings with feelings and agency. Maybe it's that I start doubting whether I don't have my own self-aggrandizing illusions about what foster care would be like.

MasBrillante posted:

quote:

Hello to all. I guess there is no point in dragging out the details of my own personal betrayal by my youngest son.

In short, the child with which I felt the deepest bond and reciprocal affection met a woman, fell in love, married her and became increasing critical of me. Over eight years we tread that familiar thin ice in order to keep things right for her and right for this new him.

A very unbalanced, polite, controlled and measured relationship was what evolved. We gave, they took and we were always on guard against doing, saying the wrong thing. Over the years it was mostly me in the “hot seat” and under a magnifying glass. In the end it was my husband that said something that was “wrong” and apparently unforgivably insulting to her. My son backed her up as was the pattern and I found myself unable to triangulate against my dear husband who had apologized and was way within his rights to say what he did. The light hearted son I knew had become humorless and defensive and completely unreasonable and actually abusive with his words and behavior.

Limping along to salvage contact with them became impossible anymore. Sadly, there are two precious granddaughters in the mix and one on the way.

After hitting my head against every possible wall to make this not be my family’s truth, it may finally be sinking in that there is nothing more that I can try. My husband and I have exhausted every strategy and are out of “angles” to fix this. I may finally be ready to help someone else.

Sheri! thank you for writing this intelligent book, Done With the Crying, which I am just now able to work through. It is smart, comforting and incredibly helpful.

LoudPipesSaveLives posted:

Now that I have kids I am doing my best to be a good dad, to be even handed with my kids and really enjoy raising them but holy hell is it hard. Their personalities are so strong from the time they're born and as they develop and become bigger kids they define themselves further and sometimes when we clash I really have no idea what to do to defuse things.

Ebola Roulette posted:

Arsenic Lupin posted:

I think a really important part of good parenting is to apologize to the kid when you're wrong. This sets an example for the kid, that adults can be wrong just like children, and that when you're wrong you say you're sorry. Basically, don't claim infallibility ever. The other side of this is to acknowledge feelings on both sides. "I know you're really mad at me right now. You still have to pick up the Legos." Model that it's okay for them to be angry at you, that that is normal. But you still have to pick up the Legos.

Broshevik posted:

The way she throws "humorless" in there when describing her son I assume it was something insanely racist.

Ebola Roulette posted:

quote:

It has been ten months since my son has estranged himself from me. One by one, his two siblings have been blocked from his life and his father.

All I have are questions and no answers and, so, have not been of much help as a participant here.

My husband and I have tried every intelligent angle that we could come up with to get a softening from him. And we have gotten pretty creative, I must say. My most recent attempt was to email him about a dream I had that he and his wife now had three babies (instead of the 2 that I knew), but in the dream all I could see was their backs, they faced away.

We have run every scenario down as a possibility from a cult to drugs to mental illness and none gave us the answer that we are desperate for. We were actually disappointed that we couldn’t put a label to it. It was as if discovering a brainwashing or addiction would make it easier to accept….
No approach has gotten him to show a glimpse of the person that (I thought) he was – my youngest, closest, and most affectionate child of three. How this warm and loving person could flip on us in such a cold and mean way is something I wrestle with far too often. I keep puzzling for ways to make this make sense. I haven’t yet been able to accept their may be none. This is what is tiring.

The details don’t matter, I suppose. All of our stories are just as hideous as the next. Thanks for being here.

Shifty Pony posted:

Let's not jump to conclusions here.



It could have been something insanely sexist too.

pentyne posted:

Its becoming more and more visible that many older people like boomers and die hard free speech advocates who get super upset over the idea that somone is hurt by their words and language and will never accept that words can be hurtful.

Arsenic Lupin posted:

(I'm a boomer)

quote:

know perfectly well that the words are hurtful, which is why they enjoy using them.

quote:

This is seriously ridiculous so bare with me.

My parents and I have a very strained relationship. The reason being that they had an ugly divorce 12 years ago due to my father's infidelity. My mother tried to alienate me and my brother from our father out of "fear we would like his wife more than her". She is also very controlling. She could be straight out of the insane parents sub. Recently I found out that she had a GPS tracker on my car. So not great.

My father is a whole other story that is not important today.

So onto the real story. I met "Clarissa" 6 months ago and we started dating 4 months ago. She is a fascinating girl with a lot of self exprecion. She is very non traditional, imagine like a Bratz doll but real life lol. She wears a lot of highlighter colors, short skirts high heels and her make up is seriously very good. So obviously my mom doesn't like that. She thinks a "godly woman" has to be conservative and never show too much.

When Introduced Clarissa to my mother she was very snappy and rude. We left and I told her she could get back to me once she learned to have some manners.

2 days later she was crying at my place because she had to tell me the truth. She then made up this fake story about dad having an affair with Clarissas mother and that Clarissa is somehow my half sibling. Even tho she gave me the real names of her parents, I knew it was bs.

Now let me tell you why this is imposible. Clarissa moved to this country one year ago. Her parents and her had been living all her life in Russia never even stepped foot in here. And my father has a chronic fear of planes. It is virtually possible for him to be her dad.

I kicked her out and am dealing with the whole after math. Clarissa is very scared because she doesn't want to break my family apart and she feels disrespected, my mother is calling me an ungretefull brat and telling me that I have no common sense. What the gently caress am I supposed to do?

Ebola Roulette posted:

I really really want to know what this woman's husband said to the daughter-in-law. I'm also 100% sure that the strategies and "angles" they tried didn't include a genuine apology and an effort to change.

SweetWillyRollbar posted:

I mean the mom is obviously nuts and should be cut off but who the gently caress favorably compares their girlfriend to a Bratz doll???

LadyPictureShow posted:

Bratz dolls might've been her only solace while being raised by her insane mother.

I think someone that's 24 now is the right age to have grown up when they were the cool new doll.

Ghost Leviathan posted:

Probably best just call it a nostalgia filter, Bratz dolls have been off the market for years. (Forcibly so, Mattel sued for obscure legal reasons)

SweetWillyRollbar posted:

I mean the mom is obviously nuts and should be cut off but who the gently caress favorably compares their girlfriend to a Bratz doll???

quote:

Bucket, I’m just sorry that you’ve had this experience, you write well, I don’t always check my spelling either. My granddaughter was given one of those digital devices (Iphone or whatever you call those things) at the age of eleven. My son did not want his daughter to have one at her age but has shared custody of his daughter so there was little he could do about it. When she visited last week, I took her to lunch, she walked with her head down looking at this device. I finally told her I couldn’t handle her doing this and to please put it away while she was walking outside at least. Kids are different today and it’s not all positive.

It is true, I think, the less we know as grandparents, the less stressed we are because what we know, we can’t fix or change without interfering and that’s not the way to go.

quote:

GetPastIt, you’ve put into words what I’ve wondered myself, why do we remember the awful things people have said to us, and yet, for a daughter to have said what yours has said to you, I wouldn’t forget either. Words and actions are remembered when they are unkind towards us. I’ve not had that experience with estrangement, but it went on behind my back by the reaction of others towards me. A month into caring for a former stepdaughter and a neighbourhood mom came to me and asked bluntly if I was abusing this girl. That was so ludicrous because those two kids I raised that were not my own were constant challenges ringing in my ears, demanding my attention.

I don’t have anything to offer because I wonder how anyone who has experienced a loving relationship with a parent could do this. I just don’t understand what’s gotten into these grown kids these days. It’s no wonder that so many rejected parents mental health is affected by the rejection of their child or children.

quote:

J. should I say fortunately or unfortunately I can totally relate to your honesty. I was an only child, like first borne children, we’re often placed in a position of feeling overly responsible for ourselves in how we behave and overly responsible for others. I agree, most men don’t bother getting themselves worked up over things we may perceive as being important, it’s not to them as a rule. It’s why a male and female balance in raising children can be very effective.

I’ve never spoken, and certainly not on a public forum which others are able to read, of my experience adopting a child. However, in doing so, I’ve come away with a greater openness to understanding that some of the behaviour I’ve experienced from this child could be attributed to something I’ve yet to understand in her genetic make-up. During the years she grew up in my household environment, she was a sweet and passive child who lived in her own world but in that world she perceived things in people that the other children did not. I looked upon her as a wise old owl. Yet, once she grew into her genetic balance, when she was twelve or thirteen, she changed considerably and not in any way that I understood her. When I first laid eyes on her in the CAS office, this beautiful baby dressed in a lovely yellow dress and bonnet, something came over me, a feeling that something was, how can I describe it without being pejorative, a feeling of doom, that there was something there that momentarily made me fearful for her, not of her. There was no engagement between this baby and those around her. And here, with others having input, I can ‘see’ more clearly that my expectations of this child, whose IQ would have allowed her educationally the opportunities others would not have with a lesser IQ may not have been possible at all for her. That she is doing as well as she is, is a credit to her inner strength. However, it doesn’t change the way I’ve been treated.

I have values too, that disallow certain behaviours from being ‘accepted’ into my life. How we treat other human beings is a standard we all set for ourselves. It may not appear that way to others who have their own set of standards but I don’t ascribe to verbally or physically abusing people. I don’t ascribe to putting people down, to speaking about them pejoratively to others. That means that I don’t accept others treating me this way. I’ve been through a very painful time emotionally with my daughter and with my stepdaughter. This I do not forget. What happens when a child estranges from a parent, when they are so openly critical of them, when they character assassinate that parent to others, it can destroy any sort of relationship going forward, it forever alters any relationship. if there is to be one.

Thank you to others here, those particularly who’ve been involved in childcare professions, for adding your input here. It has enlightened me, it has opened my mind.

Xik posted:

Couldn't decide on which thread to put this in, feels more topical here.

My mom(50s) claims the reason she hates my girlfriend(21f) is because she is my(24m) secret half sibling

5er posted:

Bitter, manipulative, solipsistic baby-boomer who is perpetually mad about the natural process of children growing up to be their own adults, enters a forum filled with other bitter, manipulative, solipsistic baby-boomers who have driven off their own children. Proceeds to hear their own myopic, self-serving, circular-reasoned opinions out of the mouths of others.

"Wow, thanks for everyone's input! It has enlightened me, it has opened my mind."

MasBrillante posted:

No wonder she hates you, you hag.

MasBrillante posted:

Christ, the unmitigated drama.


I don’t know what this sentence means but I do find it fascinating that even her neighbors think she’s abusive.


No wonder she hates you, you hag.

MasBrillante posted:

No wonder she hates you, you hag.

BrigadierSensible posted:

Am I over-reading into this, or is there some racism involved here? As in this is from a crazy white lady who adopted a black, or hispanic baby, (to give it a better life and opportunities that it wouldn't have had in "those" communities)? All the stuff about her "genetic pre-disposition" and the way she damns with faint praise how well the girl is doing at school due to her IQ, (which others like her don't have) makes me think that here is a racist undercurrent to this story. Which may be why the mother and daughter haven't bonded sufficiently for the crazy lady's taste.

BrigadierSensible posted:

Am I over-reading into this, or is there some racism involved here? As in this is from a crazy white lady who adopted a black, or hispanic baby, (to give it a better life and opportunities that it wouldn't have had in "those" communities)? All the stuff about her "genetic pre-disposition" and the way she damns with faint praise how well the girl is doing at school due to her IQ, (which others like her don't have) makes me think that here is a racist undercurrent to this story. Which may be why the mother and daughter haven't bonded sufficiently for the crazy lady's taste.

same mom posted:

Thank you all for your input here. I think that I am in a comfortable place in regard to my daughter’s defection in my life and then something like this comes up here on the forum and I am close to tears again. Lundy, the AL-ANON saying is a mantra I need to hold in my life in all things. It is truly the only way to be and yet, my ego interferes and I try to micro-manage my mind and thoughts. Letting go is the only way to peace of mind. And so I might suggest that given the historical genes your elder daughter has inherited might this not be a factor in her behaviour towards you now? When my late husband and I adopted our daughter at the age of three months, the social worker gave us the information that her birth mother did not get along with her mother. I felt it was an odd remark to make and yet, it is one that keeps coming back to me time and again. At the time I felt confident in telling myself, I am a different person that her birth mother’s mother; we are different people, she will be living in different circumstances. And for the first twelve or thirteen years of her life, she was a sweet, thoughtful, fey child, unusual but I loved her unusualness. And then one day she lost her temper with me because I’d asked her to put on a pair of snowpants when she was going skating and she blew. Her face contorted, she screamed at me, it was so out of proportion to the situation; she was someone whom I did not know. It was a demarcation point for me. Gradually her own personality began to take over until she became who she was, her mix of genes, her personality formed, nature over nurture, took over. I think you’ve answered your own question in that your former husband sounds like a narcissist with his assumption that you were the problem and based elective therapy on that. And yes, CeCe, therapy with the right person more than helps. We’re so mired down in our own desperation when our children reject and abandon us, unheard of in my time, that we can’t see the forest for the trees (I think I’ve got that right…I always turn things around…the trees for the forest, no that doesn’t sound right)

same mom posted:

MLou, what can I say…my heart goes out to you and would agree, your wife is realistic. I’ve said the same thing about my ED. I love my daughter but she is not the child I raised now. She was a sweet child, an intriguing child, I used to look at her and think, you’re a wise old owl in a child’s mind. Yet, she did continual ‘walkabouts’ and yes, she is half Australian, half English. Her birth mother is Australian. We were told at the time of her adoption that her mother did not get along with her mother. Whatever ‘it’ is, I believe is partly the result of genetics. I am an Aussiemom to two furry dogs…Australian Shepherds, a breed which has not come from Australia but western Europe it is believed. I came to this board because I wanted to hear how other people in a similar position to mine, dealt with it, never thinking that in the process of doing so, as I’d thought I coped reasonably well now, that I needed to heal more myself. What I read here has stripped several layers from my consciousness, like peeling an onion, what I thought I’d coped with and put to bed, is still there. This is helping me work through ‘stuff’ I thought I’d worked through and hadn’t. It’s also reinforced me too in becoming stronger, not accepting responsibility for being a shameful mother. I am not. Never was. But what I was buying into, I needn’t have bought into. I was being brainwashed by a damaged individual. I am far stronger for having been part of this forum.

same mom posted:

Tired Mom, I was also accused of ‘not being there’ by my daughter when she was in her very early twenties. This was in relation to her sexual abuse. This is the guilt projected onto me, as a mother who should have known and protected her and didn’t because I did not know. There were several times during my daughter’s childhood when I mentioned her behaviour with this perpetrator but much is lost in time but otherwise, I never suspected what was going on. When my daughter made this comment, I knew she was ready to try and deal with this very painful issue. I had spoken to therapists with the women’s shelter in town and they informed me that she had two options: one, a civil suit, the other criminal charges. I paid for her lawyer, she chose a civil suit. No need to go further with this other than to say, I wouldn’t take on someone else’s projections. I found dealing with both girls I raised, that projecting onto me was like a game of tag to them. Not long ago, as I’ve mentioned here my ED wrote a letter to an editor of her local paper in response to an article on “we’re only as good as we treat our mom” and in this, she mentioned that parents need to put a little elbow grease into the raising of their children. This comment only pointed out to me that she appears to have blocked out the considerable energy I put into raising her. I just don’t think you can take on entirely the accusations these people level at you…listen to them, assess whether you feel there is merit in them or not, take ownership of what you feel is right to you and then remember, projecting is a way of protecting them from dealing with reality. Blame mom is the game. Don’t buy into it all.

And how I cope is in how I protect myself. I would not consider going onto a social media page, I do not ask questions if an opportunity arises, I have gone on the internet and Googled her name which is how I found the letter which pointed out to me that disrespect was prevalent still in her thoughts towards me. I try to protect myself as much as possible, cocoon myself with a life that doesn’t focus on her, yes, I feel the loss deeply, but I need to look after me and continually beating myself up around the head for her issues that she has projected on me isn’t going to help me. Don’t know if any of this is useful for you, Tired Mom, others here on the board will share with you as well.

same mom posted:

Lucy 2, don’t put yourself down as a mom. The trite comment that you’ did the best you could at the time’ is so much hot air to me. If we become parents, most people do try their best, that goes without saying. We’re not perfect human beings, nor are our children perfect beings, though some never give a thought to that and blame us imperfect parents not looking at the fact that they are imperfect as well. You may have missed many things in raising your children, so did I. One very serious one of sexual abuse which was going on under my nose and on my watch as a parent, still I didn’t ‘see’ it though at times I felt uncomfortable because of it not knowing what ‘it’ was. We beat ourselves up too quickly when things go wrong like this thing with estrangement or as has been noted, adult children divorcing their parents. Who would have thought of that term when we were growing up. As much as I dislike ‘buzz words’…this pretty much describes what we’ve been through. And is it our fault…? Why is everyone looking for fault or blame? Why does that have to happen to label something just to justify their actions? I try to look at raising my children as a career, it was that part of my life, I was there to help those kids along the pathway of life, to hopefully imprint some of my values given to me by my parents. Hopefully in the sum total of their lives they might have an inkling that I gave them a blueprint for their lives…but I somehow doubt it…..and being a parent can be a thankless job at times. There are no guarantees in life. And I can say that because I had a nice massage yesterday and while my world is often topsy-turvy, this morning it happens not to be, until something comes along to turn it upside down again.