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HopperUK posted:It's not information exchange. It's ritual. Yup, it's a simple interpersonal transaction where you each validate the other person's existence. There are all sorts of simple rituals you share with acquaintances, and more complex ones you share with friends, family, or lovers. You can check out this book for more detail, Games People Play: https://smile.amazon.com/Games-People-Play-Eric-Berne-ebook
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Oct 11, 2021 00:55
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Like a lot of things, abusive parents love to stunt your growth by turning basic activities like social niceties into horrific death marches without reason or sense.
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Oct 11, 2021 01:10
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Ghost Leviathan posted:Like a lot of things, abusive parents love to stunt your growth by turning basic activities like social niceties into horrific death marches without reason or sense. You speak enormous amounts of truth. The weaponization of what should be small simple easy things done out of joy and affection, (gift giving, smiling, saying thank you and/or please and many many others), and turning them into joyless rote rituals that exist now as things to punish you when you get them wrong is a horrible horrible thing. I have had "politeness" beaten into me by years of private schooling and strict appearance conscious parents. This has worked in my favour many times in formal situations, but it still makes me a little sad when I see friends and acquaintances being casually affectionate with each other, and I still have to use my best "yes sir, no sir" Sunday manners with my parents. I also revert to using these formal "courtly" manners whenever I am nervous or unsure, which is why it has worked in my favour when meeting a boss or older person or something, as it comes across to them as very respectful, when in reality it is rote learning and muscle memory.
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Oct 11, 2021 01:24
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My favorite is the Chinese equivalent of "how are you" but "have you eaten?". That's a very subtle "are you doing good" and also "maybe we can hang out" all in one.
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Oct 11, 2021 01:48
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BrigadierSensible posted:You speak enormous amounts of truth. I had to call my dad “sir” growing up from as long ago as I can remember and it definitely put a divide between us—me the progeny and he the one in charge, never to be equals. In his eyes we still aren’t
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Oct 11, 2021 01:56
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I was always interrupted to be told to say things like "thank you" before I even had a chance to open my mouth. It pissed me off so much. Just let me have the chance to prove I'm not a jerk for once instead of always painting me as one.
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Oct 11, 2021 02:26
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Picnic Princess posted:I was always interrupted to be told to say things like "thank you" before I even had a chance to open my mouth. It pissed me off so much. Just let me have the chance to prove I'm not a jerk for once instead of always painting me as one. The loving worst. I used to be on the phone with relatives after a holiday with my dad in my other ear all, "Have you thanked them yet? Be sure to thank them. I haven't heard a thank you yet." I'll work it into the loving conversation naturally, not blurt it the gently caress out in the middle of a sentence or interrupt them to do so. Chill.
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Oct 11, 2021 02:45
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It's textbook bullying like a dog worrying sheep. Never give them any time to get things right or ask what they are doing wrong, just keep barking.
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Oct 11, 2021 03:06
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I know we've moved on a bit but it's also fine to not be particularly interested in pets, but then I assume you wouldn't get one because it's the 'done thing' and then decide to put them down when you failed to bond and they bored you. The disturbing thing in that family story isn't that the mother wasn't fond of pets, but that she'd gotten at least one anyway and then treated the cat so carelessly. Even rehoming a pet with someone who loved the sort of pet they are would be much much much better, but presumably that didn't occur to her bc she didn't understand why someone would go through the trouble.
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Oct 11, 2021 03:11
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BrigadierSensible posted:I also revert to using these formal "courtly" manners whenever I am nervous or unsure, which is why it has worked in my favour when meeting a boss or older person or something, as it comes across to them as very respectful, when in reality it is rote learning and muscle memory.
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Oct 11, 2021 04:20
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Ghost Leviathan posted:It's textbook bullying like a dog worrying sheep. Never give them any time to get things right or ask what they are doing wrong, just keep barking. It goes both ways - catch a boomer/narcissist in a mistake, and they will  about anything and everything except what they did wrongRegardless of what they say, there are two things a boomer/narcissist will never do - admit fault, and give a genuine compliment. Arsenic Lupin posted:When my father was angry, he insisted on being called "sir". Not the rest of the time. My brother says it's been very handy when pulled over by police, because he reflexively shifts into "sir". Hey, you take what you can scrabble from the ashes.  My dad was in the army, and my grandfather before him, so in his rages he would expect us to stand at attention and have this entire faux-military respect thing. Its worked out well for me, like your brother - in tough situations most people assume i'm ex-military, especially copsThe drawback is that I don't actually know what I'm doing in those situations - I go into complete anxious disassociation if a cop turns on their lights behind me, let alone pulls me over.
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Oct 11, 2021 04:50
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i had to call my mom "ma'am". my younger sisters' (both in their late teens/early twenties) call her Mommy on reflex. its creepy and weirds me the gently caress out
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Oct 11, 2021 08:46
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Chairman Mao posted:That sounds insane. That sounds like the kind of ritual an insane person would have. *Incidentally I've never had trouble with this one but I've seen a lot of other autistic people annoyed by how fake it is/how it basically requires you to lie. Usually along the lines of "why are you asking how I am if you don't actually want the answer? Why am I expected to say fine when I'm not fine?" Finding out the term 'phatic expression' may help a lot in trying to explain them, thanks to Arsenic Lupin for that. PetraCore posted:I know we've moved on a bit but it's also fine to not be particularly interested in pets, but then I assume you wouldn't get one because it's the 'done thing' and then decide to put them down when you failed to bond and they bored you. The disturbing thing in that family story isn't that the mother wasn't fond of pets, but that she'd gotten at least one anyway and then treated the cat so carelessly. Even rehoming a pet with someone who loved the sort of pet they are would be much much much better, but presumably that didn't occur to her bc she didn't understand why someone would go through the trouble.
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Oct 11, 2021 22:28
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Psychologists confirming what everyone already knew - estranged parents blame manipulative spouses and mental illness rather than looking at themselves. https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2021-85856-001 does anyone has access to a journal subscription? I'd be interested in seeing if it was a basic survey report or if the researchers draw any broader conclusions.
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Oct 12, 2021 13:20
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Dongsturm posted:Psychologists confirming what everyone already knew - estranged parents blame manipulative spouses and mental illness rather than looking at themselves. If you can't get it from sci-hub or find it on ResearchGate or Google Scholar, just email the corresponding author. They can usually share their own articles and are too excited someone is actually reading it to say no.
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Oct 12, 2021 14:00
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Dongsturm posted:Psychologists confirming what everyone already knew - estranged parents blame manipulative spouses and mental illness rather than looking at themselves. From the discussion section (bolding mine): quote:One of the most popular reasons for estrangement these mothers endorsed was that family members turned the child against them, often implicating the adult child’s spouse or partner or the child’s other parent, consistent with prior research (Agllias, 2015; Carr et al., 2015). In our study, estranged women who believed family members contributed to estrangement reported lower contact frequency with children and longer time since last contact. These mothers also reported that most estrangements happened after their adult child had married or partnered and after the birth of grandchildren. Some parents have a hard time accepting their reduced feeling of importance in the life of their adult child, and may respond with negativity or anger, creating distance rather than a movement toward greater closeness (Agllias, 2018; Coleman, 2007). Generational conflict about grandparents’ advice and involvement may further strain parent–adult child relations (Mott Poll Report, 2020), which could precipitate estrangement. quote:Another commonly endorsed cause of estrangement was disagreements about values, consistent with prior research (Agllias, 2015; Gilligan et al., 2015). From the parent’s perspective, these disagreements did not center around issues such as sexuality or religion. Considering that children’s perspectives on estrangement often reveal longstanding feelings of disconnection from the parent and family, “differences in values” may have different meaning for parents and children. Moreover, even though mothers reported receiving complaints from children about physical and emotional abuse and neglect, relatively few mothers admitted abuse or neglect or implicated them as reasons for estrangement. This is striking given that adult children cite abuse (or enabling abuse) and “toxic” parental behavior as key reasons for estrangement (Agllias, 2016; Carr et al., 2015; Scharp et al., 2015). One exception was that estranged mothers with lower levels of income tended to report that the causes of estrangement included neglect of their child, in contrast with higher income women who were less likely to believe that their own issues contributed to the estrangement. Perhaps this distinction is explained by differential access to socioeconomic resources and other supports. quote:Although parents’ reluctance or inability to accept their own role in estrangement may reflect parent defensiveness, generational differences in the conceptualization of inappropriate and destructive parental behavior may play a part. Haslam (2016) notes that definitions of abuse, trauma, and neglect have expanded to incorporate more symptoms and to pathologize experiences once considered normative. Helping estranged parents adopt the adult child’s concepts and language is critical to reconciliation (Coleman, 2007). This can be achieved by acknowledging the “separate realities” of family life where a parent could reasonably believe their behavior was not problematic, while their adult child could reasonably experience it as hurtful or harmful. Helping parents express empathy, take responsibility, and avoid a “right versus wrong” perspective is essential to increased understanding and conflict resolution.
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Oct 12, 2021 14:46
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I got a copy via the author myself (PM me if you want a copy)SCHOPPE-SULLIVAN, et al posted:Data were drawn from the Understanding Interesting that this confirmed my suspicion that a significant amount of estranged parents are white, though that may be a bias of the methodology (had to speak english, survey was online, etc) For this group, this table is probably the biggest thing that would be seen as important:  Seems other spouses are a problem for estranged mothers.
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Oct 12, 2021 15:08
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I'm curious about the "other values" are that aren't sexuality or religion that these mothers think drove a wedge between them. I suspect it's the "respect and obey your parents no matter what" value.
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Oct 12, 2021 15:38
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CuwiKhons posted:I'm curious about the "other values" are that aren't sexuality or religion that these mothers think drove a wedge between them. I suspect it's the "respect and obey your parents no matter what" value. Racism
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Oct 12, 2021 16:41
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Politics
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Oct 12, 2021 18:27
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Perception of perfect obedience
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Oct 12, 2021 20:27
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Trying to convince their own kids that the grandkids should be abused into compliance.
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Oct 13, 2021 00:58
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Or believe that their grandkids exist to be their emotional bandaids
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Oct 13, 2021 01:05
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Thanks everyone. It looks like the paper roughly confirms what we saw on the estranged parents forum - parents blaming someone else for stealing their children. I was wondering if that was selection bias on the forum, but it looks like it is a general pattern.
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Oct 13, 2021 01:24
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18% of estranged mothers recognizing that their own issues are partially at fault is much higher than I expected
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Oct 13, 2021 02:02
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deep dish peat moss posted:18% of estranged mothers recognizing that their own issues are partially at fault is much higher than I expected I mean there had to be some percentage of estranged parents who aren't raging narcissists and whose estrangements really are just due to mistakes they regret or circumstances beyond their control (like poverty or their kid having issues they didn't know how to handle). Those just wouldn't be the types of people posting on forums about how their kids are ungrateful little shits who abandoned them for no reason.
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Oct 13, 2021 02:12
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Is the estranged parents forum still on full lockdown?
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Oct 13, 2021 02:15
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Rabbit Hill posted:I have access to the article through my job. The study was done through a survey with 1,630 respondents (all mothers), and here are some of the findings. That bit about mothers of lower income being more likely to recognize their neglect of their child while richer mothers do not is just heartbreaking.
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Oct 13, 2021 07:37
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deep dish peat moss posted:18% of estranged mothers recognizing that their own issues are partially at fault is much higher than I expected There were some posts where the estranged parent said sonething like "it's my fault for being too loving/indulgent/good/awesome" when they very obviously weren't. possibly these responses got counted as self awareness. Also all the ones that started with "I wasn't the perfect parent, but it's not my fault that (insane abuse story goes here)", which might count as acknowledging that there is an issue
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Oct 13, 2021 07:49
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I shared it with my high school friends group. It's funny how all the women in the group I went to high school with are now estranged from one or more parents. My mom blames my dad. She thinks he's the reason I cut off contact 2 years ago. In a weird way he sort of was. Once she ran away from home I had no reason to put up with her bullshit so I could keep a relationship with him. He was the one trying to convince me to forgive her at first. We're all on the same page now after the shenanigans she is trying to pull in their divorce. It's super angering that she doesn't think I have enough agency to make my own decisions.
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Oct 13, 2021 10:34
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Samovar posted:That bit about mothers of lower income being more likely to recognize their neglect of their child while richer mothers do not is just heartbreaking. My mom is upper middle class and frequently points to that as a reason why I couldn't have possibly experienced abuse. She gave me money! That means she can physically push me around any time, you see, because the money makes up for it. Everyone knows well-off people are incapable of abuse because that's poor people behavior (according to her) 
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Oct 13, 2021 13:34
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More estranged parents in the making. AITA for admitting I resent the forced babysitting? quote:My dad married Susan last year. She was divorced and her ex is not in the picture. Her kids are 7, 4 and 3 (she was pregnant when they met, they dated long distance for two years). My dad started dating her about three months after my mom died. I knew about it but he told me it was online so it wasn't the same as going out and dating at the time. It's been awkward as hell for me. I have been placed in the role of babysitter so they can have date nights and stuff and my dad tells me to do it out of a love and obligation for the family. Only, I love him, he's my dad and all, but his wife? Her kids? I really don't care about them. I kinda wish I didn't have to interact with them. And I hate that I'm stuck babysitting. Susan told me her kids love having a big brother who spends time with them and it kinda struck me that it's part of why they do it. They want me to spend actual quality time with her kids and be their big brother and saw babysitting as the only way to enforce it at my age (16). My dad told me they were going out Friday night and I would need to babysit again and I grumbled. He said I make it sound like a chore. I told him it's how I see it. He told me it's time with my siblings. I told him I resent it and I don't see them as siblings, they're his wife's kids, just like his wife is his wife. I told him I do it because I love him not because I love all of them but I still resent having to do it. AITA for saying no to blended family Christmas? quote:I (18f) just started college a few weeks ago and I moved out of state. I left my dad, stepmom, stepbrother, stepsister and half siblings back in my home state. They started planning a big blended family Christmas right after I left. With my dad's family and his wife's family included. I said I wouldn't be there. I want to spend Christmas with my mom's family. I didn't get to do that since I was 8. My mom died when I was 6 and they were always at Christmas when she was alive. But the year my dad remarried there was drama because they wanted a little bit of alone time with me and not to have to include my stepsiblings in that. My dad said no. That they either accept the whole family equally or they were out. I always hated that. They brought gifts for the other two and everything but they wanted 30 minutes just me and them and were told no. And after that everything was a battle and I got to see them way less. And I missed them. I always felt it was unfair. Even when I went to see them my dad or stepmom would pressure me to "just bring" the other kids along so it would be on my grandparents to say no to the kids and be the bad guys. I always wanted some time with them though. Not family time. But time with people who didn't just love me but loved my mom. And understood there was a hole that just never got filled. My dad and stepmom always assumed she filled it. That she was my new mom. Even when I never called her mom, or never introduced her as my mom, the assumption was there. And it drove a wedge because they figured she was enough to make me not miss time with my grandparents and they didn't ever really hear me when I spoke about it. YOU WILL BE A HAPPY LOVING FAMILY BECAUSE WE SAY SO... what do you mean you're going to college far from home?
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Oct 13, 2021 14:33
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"I moved on, and you're just an extension of me, so you moved on too!" is some loving nutso thinking, but is clearly what is going on here. Also, any time anyone says "<Specific type of> Family comes before anything", they're being an rear end in a top hat.
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Oct 13, 2021 14:50
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Cythereal posted:More estranged parents in the making. Goddamnit, I hate it when parents take their good-natured kids for granted.
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Oct 13, 2021 17:18
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Samovar posted:That bit about mothers of lower income being more likely to recognize their neglect of their child while richer mothers do not is just heartbreaking.
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Oct 13, 2021 17:34
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Dongsturm posted:There were some posts where the estranged parent said something like "it's my fault for being too loving/indulgent/good/awesome" when they very obviously weren't. possibly these responses got counted as self awareness. When I was a kid I was very attached to my toys and my neighborhood because I didn't have much close connection with other people, and my mom caused me a lot of stress (hitting, screaming, saying crazy things). Later on as an adult, when I was happier, I realized I didn't still feel that fierce attachment to inanimate things and places as much. But when I was a child and said to my mother that I wanted to live in a house on our street when I grew up (because I felt a lot of dread and anxiety about moving to a new place, and thought I would miss my street terribly), she said to me "Ah, maybe we've made it too comfortable for you here."
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Oct 13, 2021 19:44
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I took a personal phonecall while around my mom today which reminded me of this whole thing she does. She spends a lot of time on the phone with her siblings and they talk to each other about everything. I know what they talk about because she absolutely insists on talking to me at least once a week and walking me through every conversation she has had since she last saw me. That's everything from a little bit of small talk with a stranger at the grocery store to embarrassing or dark family secrets that her siblings shared with her. I know every single bit of drama that every single one of my aunts and uncles has ever experienced, I know their medical history and I know my cousins' medical history, I know about their struggles with mental health, I know about all of the fights they get in with their children and half the time I even know what they had for lunch and dinner every day. I have seen each of them fewer than 10 times in my entire life. I also know what comment a woman at the grocery store made about a cracker brand that I've never tried, or what someone said to her about the weather. So naturally she feels like she has an inalienable right to listen in on her kids' phone calls or private/personal conversations. If you walk away to talk in private she will find reasons to follow you and hover near you. If you close a door she will press her ear against it. In fact, if there's a part she misheard or didn't hear, she will actually ask you about it later, just this tacit outright admission that she was listening and that she feels entitled to ask for clarification about your private conversations that she was eavesdropping on. Not indulging will then often turn into her telling her siblings the entirety of your conversation that she overheard and then them all speculating together on what the part that she missed was, and her recapping that speculation for you later. Something like 15 years ago I tried several times to explain to her that this is exactly why I never open up to her or talk to her about anything but she couldn't get past denying that she does that for long enough to go "oh ok" deep dish peat moss fucked around with this message at 00:50 on Oct 14, 2021 |
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Oct 14, 2021 00:48
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Oh god Christmas chat lol I wasted years trying to convince my mom we should all do Christmas together. It seemed kind of ludicrous that we had to have alternating separate Christmases because the only family on my side that lived in the same city was my mom, so it would be one year with all of my husband's family, and then just him and me and my mom the other year. Everyone except my mom agreed it made way more sense to do it all together every year, but she always refused. It was over a decade of inviting her and her turning us down that I found out she loving HATES my MIL and has since 1999 because if a misinterpreted sentence in a letter MIL wrote my mom when I joined them for a weekend out of town at their new ranch they just bought. Which mom drove out and took me home that evening and never spoke a loving word to MIL since. They've been in the same room twice, at a yearly special event through my university, where my mom would just sit silently beside me and see about how mad she was that I seemed happier in the presence of my friends. She would wander off when we were standing and chatting in a group. The misinterpretation was "You won't need to worry, PP is safe with us", which in my mom's head didn't mean "I know we haven't met, but we're good people", it meant "PP is clearly NOT safe with you so we're kidnapping her lol sucks to suck you lovely mother". And she still believes it over 20 years later even though I've explained it, and explained it to other members of my family who my mom told, and they were subsequently baffled that it could be taken any other way than what it actually meant. All that came out in 2016 when I risked my job to travel halfway across the country to have Christmas with my mom at my sister's place, and was threatened with being disowned if I didn't go. There were a couple times she went out there in the past and I wasn't able to because Christams was the second vusiest time of year at work and we were contractually obligated to work the entire season. So I had to plead my case that I should be able to travel, and then the whole thing out there was a huge fuckign disaster and I learned the full scope of misconstrued ideas and decades of resentment held against me and my MIL. I haven't had a Christmas with my mom since, and have had every one with my MIL aside from last year due to lcokdown. But she still dropped off a gift basket full of fresh baked goodies, and now we're currently temporarily living with her while we do renovations and fixing up mold poo poo in the foundation, so we'll have Christmas with her again and it's going to be wonderful.
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Oct 14, 2021 00:55
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deep dish peat moss posted:
Same deal here. It was especially fun when I moved out of home and in with a boyfriend, and since Mum worked at the phone company and had access to every phone number we were calling and our billing activity. We forgot to pay the bill one month and the account got suspended and when I had it reconnected, the first call I got was from my mum going off her rocker at me for not paying the bill. When I told her to mind her own business she got lovely and hung up on me like I was the one in the wrong for pointing out that she shouldn't be using her job to look at our bill, which was actually in my boyfriend's name. The idea that she doesn't have an automatic right to know everything going on in my life is just completely beyond her comprehension.
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Oct 14, 2021 04:41
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bee posted:Same deal here. It was especially fun when I moved out of home and in with a boyfriend, and since Mum worked at the phone company and had access to every phone number we were calling and our billing activity. We forgot to pay the bill one month and the account got suspended and when I had it reconnected, the first call I got was from my mum going off her rocker at me for not paying the bill. When I told her to mind her own business she got lovely and hung up on me like I was the one in the wrong for pointing out that she shouldn't be using her job to look at our bill, which was actually in my boyfriend's name. isn't that the sort of thing that could have easily got your mom fired?
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Oct 14, 2021 05:51
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