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Family of Origin
When parents still abuse their adult children:
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<blockquote data-quote="Scent of Cedar *" data-source="post: 675060" data-attributes="member: 17461"><p>This piece made such an impression on me that D H and I discussed parents abusing adult children at some length last night. It is interesting to note that D H told me he has been saying exactly this about my mother for years and that my sister is no better <em>but that I refused to see it.</em> </p><p></p><p>Attaching the name "abuse" to my mothers behaviors has had the strangest effect on me. Of course this is true. The conversation D H and I had last night revolved around denial, and how strange a thing it is. I can be consciously in denial. I can know the feeling of pushing against an invisible barrier that denial is. On one level I do know my mother is someone who abused over time, that she could be a person who is a narcissist or something far worse. On another level, a brighter, more active one filled with something that feels like hope I suppose, is that family dinner I thought I'd grown beyond.</p><p></p><p>But there that imagery still is.</p><p></p><p>There are even candles. I can see the happy glow and feel it, in the room. The linen is white and clean. We are outside, beneath the stars and I wonder whether that is a closer interpretation of what is real than the ugliness and deceit of this time.</p><p></p><p>WTF</p><p></p><p>Denial is so desperately strange and painful a thing.</p><p></p><p>***</p><p></p><p>D H and I concluded that my denial, and the pain I am still in over my family of origin and their pointless wickedness this has to do with moral, or with ethical, choices. </p><p></p><p>Mine.</p><p></p><p>My morals; my ethics.</p><p></p><p>Something like two years ago, maybe three, I began (finally) taking an ethical stand, first around issues of exclusion having to do with the behaviors and consequences my mother and sister were levying against my brother and then, implacably, at my sister's response to daughter's beating. <em>My problem is that I am refusing to stand up to the consequences of the stand I take. At some level, and who even knows why anymore, I continue to believe in that family dinner.</em> D H says that as long as that is true, I will be vulnerable. He also said that while he is sorry my family is as it is, that the person who needs to begin making ethical choices and meaning it (in other words, and not punishing myself for the choices I make with guilt or self-recrimination when the truth is I would do it again in the same way) is not them, but me.</p><p></p><p>I made a choice, a series of choices. Now, I am (whining was D H word: roar I hate D H sometimes) trying to evade or cover or pretty the consequences of the choices I did actually choose to make because I don't want to acknowledge myself as that person who does not have something she never had to begin with. </p><p></p><p>That is the key to denial.</p><p></p><p>Identifying myself as that little girl, walking home through the dark and through the cold and to the house where my mother was.</p><p></p><p>And where things were not good. Because Mother....</p><p></p><p>Denial; that feeling of invisible barrier.</p><p></p><p>We are done with Mother, here on FOO Chronicles, for now. There is still pain there behind that invisible barrier, but for now, I do not need to explore it. Suffice it to say that Mother has not changed.</p><p></p><p>A feeling of dissonance, like the world goes watery and snaps back with crystalline clarity.</p><p></p><p>She is the same, my mother, then and now. The expression, the watchfulness. </p><p></p><p>The same.</p><p></p><p>***</p><p></p><p>That is the memory, the place where I feel so alone and ashamed, and part of that is that I am old enough to know, now, that things are not right with my mother.</p><p></p><p>I was eight.</p><p></p><p>The problem gets stickier. I wanted a mom like my best friend's mom. I wanted to be loved like that, though I did not have the words to say so. I wanted that security and love that I saw in the homes of my friends. I wanted it so much that in my adulthood I based my own home on those visits to that home, and on that wonderful mother, of this girlhood friend.</p><p></p><p>I wonder whether that mother is still alive, and whether she ever knew the difference she made in my life.</p><p></p><p>So, there is a lesson for us all: We do make a difference, whether we know or not.</p><p></p><p>That is why we need to do our best and stand by our choices and stop hurting ourselves needlessly with guilty recrimination. If these things are true about our situations, if we can get it on an intuitive level that our abusers abuse because they are evil, then we can understand that we can change things for someone else through simple decency to one another, and through standing up.</p><p></p><p>We cannot stand up when we weaken ourselves with guilty self-recrimination to protect the abuser ~ or to protect ourselves from fully understanding what we know already about our abusers.</p><p></p><p>We need to stop being surprised by what we know.</p><p></p><p>Our stories have been ugly, painful stories in so many ways...but there is triumph in them too: Copa's Sleeping Beauty Kiss.</p><p></p><p>Thank you Serenity. This was an excellent subject for me.</p><p></p><p>I am so glad you are back.</p><p></p><p>:O)</p><p></p><p>We missed you very much.</p><p></p><p>Cedar</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Scent of Cedar *, post: 675060, member: 17461"] This piece made such an impression on me that D H and I discussed parents abusing adult children at some length last night. It is interesting to note that D H told me he has been saying exactly this about my mother for years and that my sister is no better [I]but that I refused to see it.[/I] Attaching the name "abuse" to my mothers behaviors has had the strangest effect on me. Of course this is true. The conversation D H and I had last night revolved around denial, and how strange a thing it is. I can be consciously in denial. I can know the feeling of pushing against an invisible barrier that denial is. On one level I do know my mother is someone who abused over time, that she could be a person who is a narcissist or something far worse. On another level, a brighter, more active one filled with something that feels like hope I suppose, is that family dinner I thought I'd grown beyond. But there that imagery still is. There are even candles. I can see the happy glow and feel it, in the room. The linen is white and clean. We are outside, beneath the stars and I wonder whether that is a closer interpretation of what is real than the ugliness and deceit of this time. WTF Denial is so desperately strange and painful a thing. *** D H and I concluded that my denial, and the pain I am still in over my family of origin and their pointless wickedness this has to do with moral, or with ethical, choices. Mine. My morals; my ethics. Something like two years ago, maybe three, I began (finally) taking an ethical stand, first around issues of exclusion having to do with the behaviors and consequences my mother and sister were levying against my brother and then, implacably, at my sister's response to daughter's beating. [I]My problem is that I am refusing to stand up to the consequences of the stand I take. At some level, and who even knows why anymore, I continue to believe in that family dinner.[/I] D H says that as long as that is true, I will be vulnerable. He also said that while he is sorry my family is as it is, that the person who needs to begin making ethical choices and meaning it (in other words, and not punishing myself for the choices I make with guilt or self-recrimination when the truth is I would do it again in the same way) is not them, but me. I made a choice, a series of choices. Now, I am (whining was D H word: roar I hate D H sometimes) trying to evade or cover or pretty the consequences of the choices I did actually choose to make because I don't want to acknowledge myself as that person who does not have something she never had to begin with. That is the key to denial. Identifying myself as that little girl, walking home through the dark and through the cold and to the house where my mother was. And where things were not good. Because Mother.... Denial; that feeling of invisible barrier. We are done with Mother, here on FOO Chronicles, for now. There is still pain there behind that invisible barrier, but for now, I do not need to explore it. Suffice it to say that Mother has not changed. A feeling of dissonance, like the world goes watery and snaps back with crystalline clarity. She is the same, my mother, then and now. The expression, the watchfulness. The same. *** That is the memory, the place where I feel so alone and ashamed, and part of that is that I am old enough to know, now, that things are not right with my mother. I was eight. The problem gets stickier. I wanted a mom like my best friend's mom. I wanted to be loved like that, though I did not have the words to say so. I wanted that security and love that I saw in the homes of my friends. I wanted it so much that in my adulthood I based my own home on those visits to that home, and on that wonderful mother, of this girlhood friend. I wonder whether that mother is still alive, and whether she ever knew the difference she made in my life. So, there is a lesson for us all: We do make a difference, whether we know or not. That is why we need to do our best and stand by our choices and stop hurting ourselves needlessly with guilty recrimination. If these things are true about our situations, if we can get it on an intuitive level that our abusers abuse because they are evil, then we can understand that we can change things for someone else through simple decency to one another, and through standing up. We cannot stand up when we weaken ourselves with guilty self-recrimination to protect the abuser ~ or to protect ourselves from fully understanding what we know already about our abusers. We need to stop being surprised by what we know. Our stories have been ugly, painful stories in so many ways...but there is triumph in them too: Copa's Sleeping Beauty Kiss. Thank you Serenity. This was an excellent subject for me. I am so glad you are back. :O) We missed you very much. Cedar [/QUOTE]
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