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when relatives don't want your kids near their kids...
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<blockquote data-quote="recovering doormat" data-source="post: 205106" data-attributes="member: 5941"><p>Ladies, thank you so much for your support. I woke up earlier than usual this morning feeling miserable, but after reading your posts and thinking about it, I realized that I am continuing to act like a doormat for taking my relatives into my confidence about the kids, then feeling hurt when they are judgemental. Andmy mother and brother are very judgemental (interestingly, so is my ex...maybe we do marry our mothers!) and less than compassionate. My brother is the type who, when traveling in NYC during the late 1980's, would lecture a homeless person begging for change to get a job. Some years ago, his wife forbid their 9 year old daughter (the confirmation girl) from seeing a friend who was going through a hard time with her stepmother -- I'm not sure what got my sister in law so worried, the mere fact that this little girl came from a fractured family, or if she was concerned that my niece would be somehow tainted by associating with a kid with family problems. When my sister in law told me the story, she mentioned that another mother called to reproach her for being judgemental and said that she hoped if her daughter were in the same position, that other families would be compassionate and include her to make up for the lack of warmth at home.</p><p> </p><p>The geographical area that my brother and sister in law live in, Northern Virginia, although filled with us transplanted Yankee trash, is still far enough below the Mason-Dixon line to have a much more conservative, family-values oriented culture than the urban/suburban Gold Coast of Connecticut, where we live (town is 50/50 white/non-white, lots of divorce, single parents, etc, extremes of rich and poor). My sister in law was raised very conservative Roman Catholic and the kids reflect this -- they flinch when they hear my kids utter a swear word. Which is great, because there is no better way to teach adolescents how to behave publicly than beiing with well-behaved kids. </p><p> </p><p>I agree that my brother's current recreational drug use is not for discussion, I wouldn't out him. I suppose I wish for a little honesty from him -- I wonder what he would tell his kids if they found his stash of weed or coke. Out of his presence, his 16 year old son makes fun of his dad's heavy beer consumption during parties. Our dad was a functioning alcoholic but no one in the immediate family would ever countenance that fact -- alcoholics are fall-down, throw up drunks who can't hold jobs, my dad just liked to enjoy himself. I tried to have that discussion once with-my brother, that my kids' anxiety and depression has its roots in the previous generations who drowned their sorrows with liquor (we are Irish/German, after all, it kind of goes with the territory), and he was having none of it.</p><p> </p><p>LIke they say, denial isn't just a river in Egypt. </p><p> </p><p>I'm feeling better today and on my way to see my shrink and ask her for help in removing this load of guilt from me and placing it squarely on the backs of my difficult child's and easy child.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="recovering doormat, post: 205106, member: 5941"] Ladies, thank you so much for your support. I woke up earlier than usual this morning feeling miserable, but after reading your posts and thinking about it, I realized that I am continuing to act like a doormat for taking my relatives into my confidence about the kids, then feeling hurt when they are judgemental. Andmy mother and brother are very judgemental (interestingly, so is my ex...maybe we do marry our mothers!) and less than compassionate. My brother is the type who, when traveling in NYC during the late 1980's, would lecture a homeless person begging for change to get a job. Some years ago, his wife forbid their 9 year old daughter (the confirmation girl) from seeing a friend who was going through a hard time with her stepmother -- I'm not sure what got my sister in law so worried, the mere fact that this little girl came from a fractured family, or if she was concerned that my niece would be somehow tainted by associating with a kid with family problems. When my sister in law told me the story, she mentioned that another mother called to reproach her for being judgemental and said that she hoped if her daughter were in the same position, that other families would be compassionate and include her to make up for the lack of warmth at home. The geographical area that my brother and sister in law live in, Northern Virginia, although filled with us transplanted Yankee trash, is still far enough below the Mason-Dixon line to have a much more conservative, family-values oriented culture than the urban/suburban Gold Coast of Connecticut, where we live (town is 50/50 white/non-white, lots of divorce, single parents, etc, extremes of rich and poor). My sister in law was raised very conservative Roman Catholic and the kids reflect this -- they flinch when they hear my kids utter a swear word. Which is great, because there is no better way to teach adolescents how to behave publicly than beiing with well-behaved kids. I agree that my brother's current recreational drug use is not for discussion, I wouldn't out him. I suppose I wish for a little honesty from him -- I wonder what he would tell his kids if they found his stash of weed or coke. Out of his presence, his 16 year old son makes fun of his dad's heavy beer consumption during parties. Our dad was a functioning alcoholic but no one in the immediate family would ever countenance that fact -- alcoholics are fall-down, throw up drunks who can't hold jobs, my dad just liked to enjoy himself. I tried to have that discussion once with-my brother, that my kids' anxiety and depression has its roots in the previous generations who drowned their sorrows with liquor (we are Irish/German, after all, it kind of goes with the territory), and he was having none of it. LIke they say, denial isn't just a river in Egypt. I'm feeling better today and on my way to see my shrink and ask her for help in removing this load of guilt from me and placing it squarely on the backs of my difficult child's and easy child. [/QUOTE]
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