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clevermanka) wrote2021-04-02 09:10 am
clevermanka) wrote2021-04-02 09:10 am
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Yesterday I mentioned a conversation with my mom and how it made me realize some stuff about myself. Also about my parents and how they (surprise!) heavily shaped my expectations of relationships and emotional connection.
My parents didn't plan to have me. I was the reason they got married at 23, and my mom told me when we argued once about abortion that she would have gotten one if they'd been legal. That said, let me be clear: I have never felt my parents didn't love me. They've always been affectionate and my dad sends me a couple hundred much-appreciated dollars every month. I can rely on them for many things, but emotional support isn't necessarily one of them. Recently I've begun to understand theirs is an abstract sort of love. They love me because I'm their daughter. I think if they knew more about who I am, instead of the edited version I give them, they probably wouldn't even like me very much (this doesn't make me feel bad I promise, so consolations aren't necessary). They respect me, and at this point in my life that's fine and sufficient.
Daddy was/is a workaholic. Now that he's retired he's always doing stuff that takes him out of the house for their church, where he's a lay pastor. Even when I visit them he'll be gone for hours at a time, doing his ministry work--visiting people in hospitals, buying groceries for shut-ins, etc. He was a school superintendent until I was in college, and then he started his own business as a motivational speaker. He's incredibly charismatic--much loved by children and dogs--but I have very rarely seen him vulnerable. I remember rolling my eyes as a teen at his seriousness and my mother once remarking to me in private "Your father likes to play the heavy." He gets emotional at inspirational movies (the right kinds, anyway, usually ones where a white person saves the day) but I don't remember the last time I saw him moved by a real-life event. Maybe his mom's death in 1986. He is very much in control of his emotions at all times.
My mother is not in control of her emotions at all. Not only do they control her, she seems to be surprised by them. She's still not over the death of my dad's best friend and starts to cry when she talks about him. It's been twenty years. She's the one who said no to my childhood requests for dance lessons. I doubt she even brought the request up with my father. Instead she enrolled us both in piano because she was our church's choir director and wanted to take them herself. She finally let me quit after six years, but it was a fight. She was bitter about it for years.
With those stellar examples of emotional regulation, adolescent me cobbled together a process of dealing with my own feelings. I recognized my strong emotions, but I reigned them in like whoa at all times. It wasn't conscious. I just knew what I didn't want (my mother's tantrums) and what I couldn't achieve (my father's placidity). I subconsciously created a workable template for managing my feelings (acknowledge but don't act) and ran with it. I maintain my opinion that mine isn't the worst way to deal with emotions, but it probably would've been helpful to be more aware of what I was doing and craft it into something that allowed more recognition for the influences that shaped me so I could avoid their pitfalls. But hey, where's the fun in that?
My father is not a great conversationalist, which seems strange because he's the one who inspired me to learn small talk. He's always friendly to service people and I saw how that resulted in good service. Being an observant, logical person, I adopted those habits which have served me well. But unless he has information or an anecdote to share, he doesn't really have much to say. Even when he asks questions, they're usually pointed toward achieving A Result, not an indulgence in casual chit-chat.
I talk with my mom, though, when I have the energy for it. It's usually pretty easy because Mommy can talk about herself or her friends for ages. And that's fine. There's very little about my life I care to share with her (did that, learned better). It gives her a sense of connection with me so she doesn't get despondent. She was incredibly close with her mother who lived with them for longer than I did (thirty years!) and I'm sure she would love that sort of relationship with me, but our personalities and values are much too different to allow that.
Which brings me to our conversation on Monday night. I was talking more than usual (loopy from fatigue, probably) and she wasn't interrupting as she often does. I gave her a lot more detail about my post-McKitterick emotional state than I might have otherwise, and mentioned I was going to need therapy as soon as I could afford it.
"I don't trust anyone anymore," I said.
There was a pause and she responded in a very small voice, "You mean anyone new, right?"
And it was like a curtain opened, allowing me to really see my mother for the first time. Because her gut reaction (she has no other kind) wasn't "Oh honey that sounds lonely!" or "That's so sad!" No, it was a need for confirmation that surely I still trusted her, right? She was different. She hadn't done anything wrong and shouldn't be lumped in with the rest of humanity. Right? Right?
After I unloaded my trauma to her, she's the one who needed comfort.
I don't know if my mother is actually a narcissist. But she's an undeniably selfish person (which I think, honestly, she would agree with). It never registered exactly how deep her self-centeredness went, though. I realize now what a huge effect it had on the way I form emotional attachments, as well as with whom.
Which brings us to now, and my examination of myself and my relationship with McKitterick. Like my father, McKitterick doesn't do casual conversation. Every exchange needs to have A Point, and it's best if it's a point he's using to illustrate or educate. He can relate nearly any topic to an anecdote of his (mostly traumatic) childhood. And like my mother, it's imperative that McKitterick feels good about himself, even if that comes at the expense of what someone else might actually want or need.
Hilariously, I don't have a history of dating people who fit this profile. It's only been my last two long-term relationships that did so. Before that I was much less willing to compromise my needs and desires. I simply left relationships when the spark died and I wasn't interested in doing the work to reignite it. I left two sweet, charming guys who are both happily married to their (first, and only) wives. I felt especially bad about the second one, and made the effort to stay friends with him post-breakup (and succeeded! I was a bridesmaid at his wedding!). I knew that wasn't a recipe for long-term happiness, though, so in my late 20s I decided to make the effort to work at relationships and here I am, half a lifetime later, suffering the fallout from two relationships that didn't deserve my efforts.
This sorta-essay has a pretty abrupt ending because I have no idea where to go from here, but at least I have the information, now.
My parents didn't plan to have me. I was the reason they got married at 23, and my mom told me when we argued once about abortion that she would have gotten one if they'd been legal. That said, let me be clear: I have never felt my parents didn't love me. They've always been affectionate and my dad sends me a couple hundred much-appreciated dollars every month. I can rely on them for many things, but emotional support isn't necessarily one of them. Recently I've begun to understand theirs is an abstract sort of love. They love me because I'm their daughter. I think if they knew more about who I am, instead of the edited version I give them, they probably wouldn't even like me very much (this doesn't make me feel bad I promise, so consolations aren't necessary). They respect me, and at this point in my life that's fine and sufficient.
Daddy was/is a workaholic. Now that he's retired he's always doing stuff that takes him out of the house for their church, where he's a lay pastor. Even when I visit them he'll be gone for hours at a time, doing his ministry work--visiting people in hospitals, buying groceries for shut-ins, etc. He was a school superintendent until I was in college, and then he started his own business as a motivational speaker. He's incredibly charismatic--much loved by children and dogs--but I have very rarely seen him vulnerable. I remember rolling my eyes as a teen at his seriousness and my mother once remarking to me in private "Your father likes to play the heavy." He gets emotional at inspirational movies (the right kinds, anyway, usually ones where a white person saves the day) but I don't remember the last time I saw him moved by a real-life event. Maybe his mom's death in 1986. He is very much in control of his emotions at all times.
My mother is not in control of her emotions at all. Not only do they control her, she seems to be surprised by them. She's still not over the death of my dad's best friend and starts to cry when she talks about him. It's been twenty years. She's the one who said no to my childhood requests for dance lessons. I doubt she even brought the request up with my father. Instead she enrolled us both in piano because she was our church's choir director and wanted to take them herself. She finally let me quit after six years, but it was a fight. She was bitter about it for years.
With those stellar examples of emotional regulation, adolescent me cobbled together a process of dealing with my own feelings. I recognized my strong emotions, but I reigned them in like whoa at all times. It wasn't conscious. I just knew what I didn't want (my mother's tantrums) and what I couldn't achieve (my father's placidity). I subconsciously created a workable template for managing my feelings (acknowledge but don't act) and ran with it. I maintain my opinion that mine isn't the worst way to deal with emotions, but it probably would've been helpful to be more aware of what I was doing and craft it into something that allowed more recognition for the influences that shaped me so I could avoid their pitfalls. But hey, where's the fun in that?
My father is not a great conversationalist, which seems strange because he's the one who inspired me to learn small talk. He's always friendly to service people and I saw how that resulted in good service. Being an observant, logical person, I adopted those habits which have served me well. But unless he has information or an anecdote to share, he doesn't really have much to say. Even when he asks questions, they're usually pointed toward achieving A Result, not an indulgence in casual chit-chat.
I talk with my mom, though, when I have the energy for it. It's usually pretty easy because Mommy can talk about herself or her friends for ages. And that's fine. There's very little about my life I care to share with her (did that, learned better). It gives her a sense of connection with me so she doesn't get despondent. She was incredibly close with her mother who lived with them for longer than I did (thirty years!) and I'm sure she would love that sort of relationship with me, but our personalities and values are much too different to allow that.
Which brings me to our conversation on Monday night. I was talking more than usual (loopy from fatigue, probably) and she wasn't interrupting as she often does. I gave her a lot more detail about my post-McKitterick emotional state than I might have otherwise, and mentioned I was going to need therapy as soon as I could afford it.
"I don't trust anyone anymore," I said.
There was a pause and she responded in a very small voice, "You mean anyone new, right?"
And it was like a curtain opened, allowing me to really see my mother for the first time. Because her gut reaction (she has no other kind) wasn't "Oh honey that sounds lonely!" or "That's so sad!" No, it was a need for confirmation that surely I still trusted her, right? She was different. She hadn't done anything wrong and shouldn't be lumped in with the rest of humanity. Right? Right?
After I unloaded my trauma to her, she's the one who needed comfort.
I don't know if my mother is actually a narcissist. But she's an undeniably selfish person (which I think, honestly, she would agree with). It never registered exactly how deep her self-centeredness went, though. I realize now what a huge effect it had on the way I form emotional attachments, as well as with whom.
Which brings us to now, and my examination of myself and my relationship with McKitterick. Like my father, McKitterick doesn't do casual conversation. Every exchange needs to have A Point, and it's best if it's a point he's using to illustrate or educate. He can relate nearly any topic to an anecdote of his (mostly traumatic) childhood. And like my mother, it's imperative that McKitterick feels good about himself, even if that comes at the expense of what someone else might actually want or need.
Hilariously, I don't have a history of dating people who fit this profile. It's only been my last two long-term relationships that did so. Before that I was much less willing to compromise my needs and desires. I simply left relationships when the spark died and I wasn't interested in doing the work to reignite it. I left two sweet, charming guys who are both happily married to their (first, and only) wives. I felt especially bad about the second one, and made the effort to stay friends with him post-breakup (and succeeded! I was a bridesmaid at his wedding!). I knew that wasn't a recipe for long-term happiness, though, so in my late 20s I decided to make the effort to work at relationships and here I am, half a lifetime later, suffering the fallout from two relationships that didn't deserve my efforts.
This sorta-essay has a pretty abrupt ending because I have no idea where to go from here, but at least I have the information, now.
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(If there's one thing I know it's that I'm going to do my everything to avoid my kid ever feeling this way.)
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Kid me was precocious and I wonder how much of my disinterest in having kids (which I announced at age eight) was colored by my dislike of other kids and how much of it was rooted in some abstract, not-fully-understood notion that if my own parents couldn't supply what I needed emotionally, how would I do that for mine?
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Wish I'd figured this stuff out before I spent nearly 25 years in two bad romantic relationships but better late than never!
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Nice work!
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She's not worth my time, frankly. I love her in a sort of vague "she's my mom" way, but my childhood trauma of trying to evade her rages (yelling so hard at me that I freeze---my husband has witnessed it and it freaked him the hell out) has marked me for life. She can tell herself she did a good job raising me and my sister all alone after she divorced my dad (and she should have, let's be clear), and that seems to be important to her, but from my POV, it was all me doing the hard work of figuring everything out alone, because she is not capable of guiding me or of, well, loving me except in a sort of vague "she's my daughter" way.
I didn't have children because I was in charge when my parents checked out, and I had to take care of my little sister while they were drinking themselves into unconsciousness. I was 8 or 9, so I did a shitty job of being in charge. But I was SO DONE taking care of people that to this day, I don't want to do it.
So you be you, and good for you for recognizing when a relationship no longer deserve your effort.
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Mine didn't yell at me often, but it happened occasionally and she slapped me once for refusing to practice piano. I remember feeling more insulted and embarrassed than anything else about it. I was eleven years old! Why would you slap an eleven year old for not wanting to practice piano? On the plus side, it was only a couple months later that she finally let me quit, so...
One thing for sure, all this has taught me to compromise in a relationship, not about it.
eta: I remember I used to keep count of how many phone conversations in a row I had with my mother before she'd ask me a question other than "how are you?" before launching into her own monologue. Her record: Six. Six phone calls, and it's not like we even talked once a week.
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But I don't feel too sad about it because she once talked at me for forty-eight minutes without ever asking me a question. 😂
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It's so unfair. Disappointing.
Sadly typical.
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I should say then, "she expected you to.."
I guess we have more Mommy stuff in common than I realized.
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When can we next chat?
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And honestly I'm not sure. I have a tarot class on Sunday that I'm woefully unprepared for, and I need to use my high-energy days for working on the Fu Meng Po portrait. How about I ping you when I'm done with it?
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I'm fascinated by people who have close and emotionally rich relationships with their parents/family. I'm a wanted loved kid of parents who have never talked about emotions. My parents are happy to talk about things/people but without any sort of depth. I don't know if it's personality, upbringing, what was usual for the times, probably a combo of all of these things? I think they've been surface happy, but there's probably a lot more going on underneath.
I have such a hard time opening up even as I'm feeling a lot of things, out of some deep desire to not be hurt or humiliated (this is a thing that I've added to the maybe ADHD side of the scale because emotional disregulation and rejection sensitivity). One of the fic tropes I love is the fear of being seen and the overwhelming nature of finding the person who manages to do so.
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Right? Although tbh I'm not certain I know anyone like that--not in person anyway. Do I? Makes me want to ask people, now!
eta: Yes! I do! I just now thought of someone I know who has a very good relationship with his mom. He's promised to introduce me to her at some point because he thinks we'd get along.
One of the fic tropes I love is the fear of being seen and the overwhelming nature of finding the person who manages to do so.
*looks at my entire Guardian oeuvre* Welp. 😂
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This is the tell about attachment styles and what we imprint upon.
You damn well deserve a hell of a lot better than that. I'm rooting for you and your ability to learn from your experiences into a direction your best self wants to go towards.
Where to go from there? Wherever you want to; that's kind of the point. If that's fuzzy, define it as a place that exists with qualities you want and not the places that you want to avoid. Just some friendly advice from a long-time traveller on this road.
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For the where to go, I meant more "where to go with this essay." 😄
I'm having a great time fantasizing about where I want to go with a future romantic relationship because I'm 100% not giving up on that possibility.
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Also, from experience, we end up re-iterating our personal narrative to include new information and new insights. A lot.
Because it's hard to define water when you're a fish.
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Someone we were friends with many years ago--not someone I was super close to, but in our local friends group--once mentioned on retreat that her parents (or possibly just her mom) had sometimes described her as a "self-raising child", and how she was proud of that when she was a teenager but increasingly realizing how fucking unfair and damaging it was.
It's such a thing to look back and have these revelations about how we were parented.
*hugs*
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That. 100% yes, same exact same for me.
It's such a thing to look back and have these revelations about how we were parented.
Oh, you know, not parented as the case may be! 😄
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I'm sad that society/people made you feel like you needed long term relationship to feel whole, but it's true that is the message we are all given from childhood on. You definitely deserved better than what those partners gave you!
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One of the best things about conversations like this where there's actual shared experience and not just a "oh that reminds me of the time..." is that someone else's story can help us see our own stories in a different light that can lead to better insight. So please feel free to talk about stuff here if you'd rather than email or whatever. 🧡
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But that aside, I'm like...amazed and awed that you were able to recognize her trying to shift the conversation to her emotional reaction and her importance and say NO. I recognize it in my mother, but I don't have the wherewithal you displayed, so...that's fucking really cool and I'm pretty much awed by you.
It's weirdly good to get to a place where you can look at those relationships and finally understand some of the lasting impacts. Therapy helped me with that, too. I hope you find a truly excellent person/situation when and if you start again! <3333
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amazed and awed that you were able to recognize her trying to shift the conversation to her emotional reaction and her importance and say NO
Well, I've got a few years on you 😅 and a lot of practice navigating around her communication style. It helps that I haven't lived anywhere near her for more than thirty years. I'm also not conflict-averse (something else I can thank my father for), with decades of calling her out on more egregious stuff.
I hope you find a truly excellent person/situation when and if you start again!
Thank you, bb. We'll see if it ever happens--not necessarily from my lack of interest, but that bar is rrrrrreal fuckin' high now!
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I dont think anyone (well, maybe very very few people with unusually good parents) has the luxury of knowing how their emotional self-management works. It takes years and years of experience to figure that out. so i guess we all have to go through that.
There's very little about my life I care to share with her (did that, learned better).
Ugh, yep. Been there, done that.
I'm glad you figured out another facet, and that it'll help you going forward. <3
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MMmmm, boy, and I sure do love emotional growth. 😆
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It sucks, truly sucks, when you spill your guts to someone, your pain, fears, anxiety, all of it, only for that person to find some way to make it all about THEM. Suddenly, you're consoling someone else, telling them how wonderful THEY are and it's like a magic trick. How?? How did this happen?? I don't know. I've never known. I guess that's because I'm not a hardcore narcissist.
In a sense, though, I feel like it's always kind of uplifting to see a mom acting selfish? Proof that when women become mothers, they don't necessarily morph into caretaker automatons with no inner lives. Take that, society! (Or is this me being, just, waaayy too Pollyanna-ish? Yes. It definitely is. I've spent so much of my life looking on the bright side, I think my vision's finally starting to go spotty. Also, I want to clarify that this train of thought does NOT APPLY TO MOMS WHO MURDER THEIR KIDS.)
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LOL IT'S TRUE! (and I'm eternally grateful, for so many reasons) I look forward to you being able to teach me the handshake (again, for so many reasons).
It's fascinating to observe my parents in the context of my experience with McKitterick, who displayed both the above-mentioned tendencies of my parents, just to a more excessive degree. My mom patiently, lovingly, and enthusiastically cared for her mother during her slow decline (she needed 24/7 care the last two years of her life) but now I wonder how much of that was motivated from it feeding something in my mother as well.
And obviously we all get something out of helping other people, but for some it's coming from a very different place, you know?
I feel like it's always kind of uplifting to see a mom acting selfish?
Ha! I definitely know what you mean. And I agree, it's healthy for people (moms, especially) to be selfish once in a while. I just wish it wasn't a personality trait for some of them.
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Glad you're out of McK's clutches and don't have to do all of that emotional babysitting anymore. Neither his diagnoses nor his background are any excuse for his behaviors, and you deserve more out of life. You deserve an evenhanded relationship, a true dialogue.
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