I had to think about this, because my first response was that there was no need to be sad, as I was talking about it like a lemons making lemonade kind of way. I have been reading "If You Had Controlling Parents", which I did;and it's been comforting to read that my responses were "normal". I just thought I was cool at the time . You know rebelling, being a slightly wild child et. It wasn't until later in my life that I realized that I was trying to escape the only way I knew how.
It took until I was 40 to finally break free!!! That is mind bogglingto me, because I am a pretty bright person.So thinking about that, I do realize that in a lot of ways, although I am also confident with high self esteem in other ways, a lot of those not so subtle messages from my parents did leak through. In fact the thing my mother hated about my husband was "he was too nuturing and loving". Like having that in a relationship was a bad thing. I am also nuturing and loving towards my husband. We are also like a partnership, and we also have seperate interests. We have been married for 20 years now. Happily, without any affairs or seperations or serious disagreements or physical fights......you know a healthy marriage. We are very lucky, and my husband is a wonderful person.
Ironically, my mother was still contacting him after we stopped speaking until I asked my husband to stop taking her calls. He always thought my family was off, but he was also the only one to make an effort to know and spend time with them for me. Then ironically my mother can't find enough faults with him (he got the flu once while we were visiting her, he's too loving, he likes sports), and my father said at breakfast one day that he shouldn't be on my life insurance because he might kill me. (I found out much later that during the divorce, he tried to take out life insurance on my mother and I!!! Wonder what kind of transferance that was YIPES). So that message is basically, you having love is bad. Or you can'tbe loved. You shouldn't want love, safety, comfort et. I can't imagine any truly loving parent giving that message to their child,or wishing them a life devoid of that.
Any way, that statement opened up all those thoughts for me:) I finally also feel like I can stand back and look at them almost like it happened to someone else, but not quite. I wonder if that girl will ever cease to be who I am now? If you know what I mean.
Oh, another thing that struck me from your post and reading the book, it's too bad as kids there was no one to discuss this with or know what was normal. You know when parents used to drag some of us to therapists during divorce and such, it was to "fix" their kids, not find out what was wrong. If I had some kind of resources and a caring professional that was aware of this and what happens, it would have made such a difference. Sadly, finding a good professional out there (especially when the parent is footing the bill, and really doesn't care about you at all) is so difficult.
Even in adulthood, during a particularly difficult time when I was involved as the sexual harrassment officer in a sexual harrassment case at work, it was my primary physician not the therapist that diagnosed me with bipolar (or cyclomania) and came up with the perscription that would help.
It took until I was 40 to finally break free!!! That is mind bogglingto me, because I am a pretty bright person.So thinking about that, I do realize that in a lot of ways, although I am also confident with high self esteem in other ways, a lot of those not so subtle messages from my parents did leak through. In fact the thing my mother hated about my husband was "he was too nuturing and loving". Like having that in a relationship was a bad thing. I am also nuturing and loving towards my husband. We are also like a partnership, and we also have seperate interests. We have been married for 20 years now. Happily, without any affairs or seperations or serious disagreements or physical fights......you know a healthy marriage. We are very lucky, and my husband is a wonderful person.
Ironically, my mother was still contacting him after we stopped speaking until I asked my husband to stop taking her calls. He always thought my family was off, but he was also the only one to make an effort to know and spend time with them for me. Then ironically my mother can't find enough faults with him (he got the flu once while we were visiting her, he's too loving, he likes sports), and my father said at breakfast one day that he shouldn't be on my life insurance because he might kill me. (I found out much later that during the divorce, he tried to take out life insurance on my mother and I!!! Wonder what kind of transferance that was YIPES). So that message is basically, you having love is bad. Or you can'tbe loved. You shouldn't want love, safety, comfort et. I can't imagine any truly loving parent giving that message to their child,or wishing them a life devoid of that.
Any way, that statement opened up all those thoughts for me:) I finally also feel like I can stand back and look at them almost like it happened to someone else, but not quite. I wonder if that girl will ever cease to be who I am now? If you know what I mean.
Oh, another thing that struck me from your post and reading the book, it's too bad as kids there was no one to discuss this with or know what was normal. You know when parents used to drag some of us to therapists during divorce and such, it was to "fix" their kids, not find out what was wrong. If I had some kind of resources and a caring professional that was aware of this and what happens, it would have made such a difference. Sadly, finding a good professional out there (especially when the parent is footing the bill, and really doesn't care about you at all) is so difficult.
Even in adulthood, during a particularly difficult time when I was involved as the sexual harrassment officer in a sexual harrassment case at work, it was my primary physician not the therapist that diagnosed me with bipolar (or cyclomania) and came up with the perscription that would help.
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