All hail the Golden Uterus! I am YOUR MOTHER. I am THE CHILDREN’S MOTHER. This is MY DAY!
My memories of Mother’s Day are benign. I remember making cards for my mom and trying to cook breakfast when I was a child. We’d say, “Happy Mother’s Day,” hug her, give her flowers and go out for breakfast (after she pretended to enjoy the bowl of Cocoa Pebbles I served her in bed). It wasn’t a day long event during which we paid tribute to Pharaoh nor should it have been. After all, it’s a Hallmark holiday for Pete’s sake.
Over the past few decades, Mother’s Day has taken on the significance of a high holy holiday in our culture. Retail stores and advertisers begin pushing it earlier and earlier and many men experience anxiety about not providing a “perfect” Mother’s Day as if it were Valentine’s Day (another bogus non-holiday), a birthday or an anniversary.
It’s nice to have a special day for both mothers and fathers to receive appreciation for loving, being there for and taking care of their children. You know, what parents are supposed to do. However, there are some women who use Mother’s Day as a reason to torture and control their children, husbands and ex-husbands.
Mother’s Day becomes another dreaded holiday for many families. They live in fear of not meeting unrealistic expectations and disappointing mom/wife. Healthy families appreciate one another throughout the year and don’t need to go to great lengths to “honor” mom. It seems like the kind of women who make a huge deal out of Mother’s Day—demanding recognition, appreciation,
extravagant gifts, public demonstrations of affection/allegiance/gratitude—wouldn’t cut it as candidates for Mother of the Year. They want accolades and thank you’s from their kids and husbands on Facebook. Personally, I think that’s nuts.
It’s one thing for a kid or husband to spontaneously thank mom/wife on a social network profile, but I have clients whose wives demand that they and the children publicly thank mom/wife on Facebook. Methinks these women spend more time trying to look like good mothers/wives than actually working at being good mothers/wives.
They believe the very common act of giving birth (dogs do it, cats do it, even rats do it) is an act of such cataclysmic importance that all humanity should bow down at their feet, let them use handicapped parking spaces (true story) and worship and give them special privileges and reverence just because they’ve reproduced. If only the physical act of giving birth could automatically make someone a good mother and a good person. Simply put, it doesn’t. In fact, becoming a mother can make a controlling, abusive, entitled, crazy woman even worse than she was pre-baby.
Abusive women, particularly narcissistic, borderline and histrionic ones, view their children as extensions of themselves. Children are property and are treated as such when these women divorce. You see this in parental alienation cases all the time.
If Mommy hates daddy, then the children must hate daddy because they are Mommy’s children. If the children love their father and, god forbid, he begins dating or gets remarried, double god forbid that the children treat dad’s new partner with respect.
Heaven protect the children if they actually like or accept the new girlfriend/wife. That would be a betrayal of Mommy. It’s a dysfunctional and abusive parent-child relationship when the child’s job is to make mommy feel good.
Here is a real life, horrific bad mother Mother’s Day example from a second wives group I frequent. One of the women heard this exchange between her step-daughter and the biological mother on Mother’s Day:
The step-kids were supposed to go to their mother’s (BM) house “first thing in the morning” on Mother’s Day. BM never gives us a specific time, but she typically isn’t ready for the kids to come back any earlier than 3pm.
Step-daughter (SD) started calling BM at 9am to see if she was home. If BM has gone out on Saturday night, we never know where or when she’ll turn up.
SD must have called every 15 mins until she finally got a call back from her mother at 11:30 AM. SD had the phone on speaker and was in the next room. I was getting lunch started and heard the whole thing. BM started the call by screaming at her daughter. She just went on and on, rehashing the same conversation.
BM: Why weren’t you home this morning?!
SD: I was calling, you didn’t pick up. I didn’t know if you were home.
BM: Well you should have been dropped off! You promised me you’d be here!
SD: I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were home. I was calling you.
BM: Well, I was! And now you ruined Mother’s Day! MY DAY. This is MY DAY and YOU ruined it! [*She was screaming the whole time, but the words in caps were extra loud.] You just do whatever you want all the time and you don’t even care about me! All I have is this one day! Just stay the hell there with your father. I don’t even want to see you!
Then BM hung up on her daughter only to call back an hour later for round 2, screaming and crying again. I could hear the spit flying from her mouth into the telephone receiver. She launched into SD, “I need to see you before I leave for work. I have to start getting ready now, so I’ll hardly see you!” She screamed all of this while insanely crying. SD told her she’d be home and I dropped the kids off shortly thereafter.
Keep in mind that BM called around 12:30 and doesn’t have to work until 6 PM. The kids will have dinner at the bar where she works while she’s working. BM had nothing planned with the kids other than dinner on Mother’s Day. She didn’t ask for a specific drop off time and I finally stopped the driving around town game and won’t get in the car till we know she’s home.
Furthermore, if BM woke up at 9 am, why didn’t she call or answer the phone? If she was home, she was sleeping anyway, so what’s the big damn deal if they weren’t there “first thing?” This is the same woman who made an equally huge drama when SD wanted to go to a birthday pool party a few weeks ago and complained non-stop about not having one day to herself. Boo freaking hoo. Happy Mother’s Day.
What stands out to me is how the “mother” is acting like an out-of-control child and her 10-year old daughter is behaving like the responsible adult. Many children of emotionally unstable men and women become parentified—the child becomes the caretaker of the parent—and make no mistake, this is child abuse. A parent is supposed to soothe the child; not the other way around.
Last week, a Shrink4Men community member asked how he should tell his son that his mother didn’t want to see or hear from him on Mother’s Day as punishment for living with his father. Here’s Gottagetout’s comment:
Mother’s day is coming up. One of our children lives with me. My ex wants absolutely nothing to do with him, partly because she blames him for us living in seperate houses now. Part of the reason we split up is because I just could not put up with the damage I saw her doing to him any longer. It was easy for me just to stay at work for very long hours and put up with her less, but he, along with our other children, were stuck with her, which was very unfair to them. It seemed like every minute of every day he lived with her, there was another huge fight as he was her main target.
He asked me if he should get his mom anything for Mother’s Day. I asked him what he wanted to do and he said he wanted to get her something, but thought she would just throw it away. I asked my ex about it and at first she said she would not do that. I later got a message saying that she thought about it and she does not want him to get her anything at all and does not even want to see him on that day because he needs to understand and take responsibility for what he did and this is the way he wanted it. She said that he is “almost 14 and not a child anymore” (Really!) I know this is going to hurt his feelings a lot and I know there is nothing I can do about that part of it but I feel so bad for him. I have not told him about this yet. I am trying to think of a way to tell him.
How many of you have experienced something similar with your wives/ex-wives/mothers of your children? How many of you have been tortured with crazy Mother’s Day expectations and tantrums? How do you help your kids handle it? How do you handle it?
Shrink4Men Coaching and Consulting Services:
Dr Tara J. Palmatier provides confidential, fee-for-service, consultation/coaching services to help both men and women work through their relationship issues via telephone and/or Skype chat. Her practice combines practical advice, support, reality testing and goal-oriented outcomes. Please visit the Shrink4Men Services page for professional inquiries.
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Yeah – my little ones (husband’s children) go to their mom every mother’s day at 8 am – and she has them till 8 pm. They are dropped off, exhausted, talking about all the mom-worship events that they did – and the little girl has been in tears the last two years in a row after being accused of ruining mother’s day. Two years ago, she made me a card – and got in trouble for it because I am not her mom. I don’t know how her new husband handles her at all – and he has a son he has full custody of who has NO contact with his mom. Poor kid is going to have a really screwed up idea of what a woman and mother is supposed to be.
I also don’t understand women that want to ESCAPE their families for mother’s day. I mean – isn’t that what they day is about? To celebrate being a mother? You don’t celebrate it by running off to the salon for a mani-pedi, hair cut, lunch with the girls and a massage. You celebrate it by doing things with those who made you a mom to begin with. Just a bet? These same women would berate their husband’s for wanting the same and spending that much money on themselves for Father’s day. You enjoy the fact that they thought about you. You don’t force the issue if they didn’t. You know – come to think of it – these families are probably glad not to have a martyr in the house for the day.
I saw a bumper sticker for sale for mom’s day that made me want to be sick – “You don’t work full time till you are a mother.” Hmmmm….
Screaming at a child that he/she ruined mother’s day? That’s just cruel. Seems like the mom who needs a timeout. What awful, self-centered behavior.
It’s like after the wedding, THE BIG DAY, this kind of woman transfers that energy to MOTHER’S DAY. MY BIG DAY. It’s kinda pathetic. Strike that. Nothing “kinda” about it. It is pathetic.
I hope your SD is feeling better. What a mean mom.
Mothers Day..This article hits home for sure.I have first hand experience of a mom who lived her entire life through her poor son.When Mothers Day comes and he gives a card that is late,she rips it up into pieces.The poor kid…no wonder he took off at the age of 16……..she thinks that she let him have his freedom.
The Mothers Day celebration has gotten totally out of hand.
It is like Christmas with the weeks long build up that seems to end in fighting and bickering.
Yeah, ruining HER special day was something I’ve been accused of from the beginning from my stbx (10 years together, 8 years married). Whether it be her birthday, OUR anniversary, Mother’s Day, and on days ending with the letter ‘Y’! The last straw was after our daughter was born (she’s 4 yrs old now). Children, toddlers, and infants will remain children, toddlers, and infants regardless if the day is “special” or not. Stbx doesn’t understand this, and our sweet little girl gets blamed for ruining her mommy’s special day. I overheard stbx telling her this, again, this past mother’s day. It tears me up inside, because she not only tells her this, but also uses the same tone as you would an adult. Stbx would yell and scream, and tell our daughter she can’t behave a certain way or mother’s day would be ruined, and then yell, scream, and cry while telling our daughter the day was ruined. She’d say things like, “You don’t want to ruin mommy’s special day, do you?” ….and then act as though our daughter intentionally sabotaged the day! Stbx did this a couple years ago when daughter was 2 yrs old, despite being in church, a restaurant, and around her sister, and her sister’s husband and kids. A lot of what she said was only heard by our daughter and me, but when her sister and everyone else could see and hear stbx would tell them and me it was MY fault she was so upset for being so uncaring, insincere, and self absorbed!
I went thru all of that with my father instead of my mother. I’ll never forget one time when i was sitting at the table and father’s day was right around the same time as my grandfather’s (mom’s father) birthday. I was probably between 12-14 at the time, and even then my jaw dropped from the sheer absurdity of what took place. My father is screaming at the top of his lungs at my mother be she bought her father the better present. i swear i’m not making this up. she bought her dad a weed-whacker and bought my father a HUUUUGE bag of cashews – as expensive as the weed-whacker, if not more so. they were his favorite treats. you’d think he’d be happy with how thoughtful my mom was to find it and get it – – but no. in his eyes she bought a greater present for her own father, whereas he got the lesser present. i remember him screaming at her to take it all back – – all of it, including the present that wasn’t for him. and then he came by me and screamed at me “and don’t YOU even think of buying me a present”. to which, i slowly raised my head and said “hadn’t planned on it and i’m sure not gonna now”. and his reply was profanity laced tirade about what a rotten human being i was as a son… and then going and getting drunk. he’d come back from the bar and it was ON with me, and never in a good way. i could be sound asleep and he’d come in and start the beating. most times i was huddled up in my room waiting, knowing it was coming.
what fun!!!
mom lasted 39 years with him. don’t know how, and i don’t know why. but that’s an accurate example of NPD/BPD that i put up with. to this day… it has always been the thought that counts with me. my birthday is coming up and my fiance’ asked me what i want. my reply is always “nothing special because i already have all i want”. and it’s true, i do, because its the people and the love you share. but its also because i could NEVER be that type of man that my old man was, so focused on the bigger toy, the shinier prize, the latest/greatest trinket. its the thought from the person that makes it special. i am SOOOO not a materialistic person.
its awful growing up in that environment. when you know the grenade is gonna explode, its just a matter of time, but you don’t know exactly when or where or why. and i could never understand why it ever had to be some sort of competition. but he’d pull things like that all of the time.
but i can say this… i AM glad that don’t understand it, because i don’t ever want to be that person.
I’m sorry you have such bad memories of that Father’s Day. Holidays can be so hard when you live in a dysfunctional family.
My husband always says the same thing when I ask him what gifts he wants – that he has everything he wants. I can honestly say, that’s sweetest thing a person can say and it leaves an impression.
That’s very sweet.
Gosh, Freedom. I’m sorry you went through that. Abusive dads and abusive moms can do a lot of damage as do the non-abusive parents who stand by and watch it happen.
I do want to say, however, that at when I was 9 months pregnant and after my each of my sons were born, I was very thankful for those parking spots. I am 4’10 and could hardly walk. My son would constantly mash my diaphragm and I couldn’t catch my breath. I didn’t feel entitled, but was much appreciative to stores that provided them – as a trek across a Walmart parking lot takes a lot out of you. I’ve only seen a few of those and don’t resent them at all.
I have mixed feelings about stork parking. It’s a slippery slope.
I don’t have a problem with it at Babies R Us. It’s a nice idea, considering the nature of their business.
I also don’t have a problem with it. I know a few 9 months-pregnant women who were on near bed rest and needed walkers to get around (but could not wait long enough to go through the hoops for a handicapped permit). If used normally when needed (and by normal non-entitled people), it should not pose a problem, and is especially OK when it is a private business that owns the lot.
my wife has been verbally, emotionally, and physically abusive and i’ve documented it. we are currently in custody proceedings because i want to move out, but feel it would be absolutely awful, if i were to leave our daughter in custody of her mother. i promised to make dinner for mother’s day. i was at a seminar. she sms-ed me and wanted to take our daughter to a museum and she proposed a meeting time that worked. i said ok. they were over 90 minutes late (which is not uncommon), but had i just gotten up to leave, they would likely have come home much too late for the age of our child…also, well…it’s mother’s day!
so i called my mom, a real mom, and had a nice conversation with her while sitting in the sun. it was the late afternoon, the museum closed and there is an outdoor restaurant in front of it. so frankly, i intentionally had a lot of beer while waiting. took my wife out to eat, which is what she was aiming for, carried our daughter home, and well, i have discovered the fact that i can’t even get drunk enough to be a bad father. i will still carry our daughter if she is tired. i will still make her a favorite snack if she is hungry before bed time. i will still help her brush her teeth and get ready for bed. i will still help her fall asleep, and will still wake up and put a calming hand on her, if her heart starts racing in a bit of a nightmare while sleeping. all without stumbling, without missing a beat, and thankfully, without taking my wife’s bait.
i am not loud or aggressive when drunk. i am quiet and i concentrate on my coordination and speak slowly and clearly. i crossed the line for me internally…but i guess not “enough” to impede my ability to nurture our daughter…but “enough” to somehow get through the awful punishment of celebrating and sitting with a violent abusive and negligent mother.
mother’s day, honestly, with my wife, was just too much.
please social services, please courts, please police record, please my documentation, please help.
there really is not enough beer on this planet to numb how awful it feels to be bullied, abused and negated (in private), by an otherwise dynamic and charming personality. thank god for recording devices. thank god.
as much as i’m not headed down the road of alcohol abuse, i understand its appeal…and i’ve had a few creepy “connected” feelings with certain bums on the street. sometimes i want to ask them “was it a woman?” and sometimes, i really really want to go sleep under a bridge somewhere.
not because i want to sleep under a bridge, but because i want to get away from my wife’s “crazy.”
and please don’t come and say “you should have just said no.” really? do you know the consequences? temper tantrums are not the only resource used by such women. do you know what it is like when a child is used as a weapon? better keep cool now, stay alive and calm — and survive — and work towards a positive custody arrangement settled in court.
I think a great many men who are married to abusive women use alcohol, other substances, long hours at work, intense physical exercise, et., to numb out. Ultimately, escapist measures aren’t healthy and typically don’t solve the problem. Oftentimes, they create a new set of problems.
Perhaps you can tweak your perspective a bit. Staying healthy and strong is exactly what your wife doesn’t want you to do. You’re an easier target if you’re in a weakened state.
It’s crazy. These women have a script in their heads that says, “You, husband/boyfriend are the bad guy.” Then they try to force fit the man (or woman if it’s a same sex couple) into the role of loser/villain/cheater/drunk/abuser by breaking their partners down until they do and say things they’d never consider if they were in their right minds. When these women finally break their targets, they “win” and get to say, “See! I’m right! You ARE a bad guy!” Meanwhile, never taking ownership that they systematically broke their targets down with the end goal of destroying them. Why? So they can be the “victim.”
Of course, this doesn’t ultimately bring them happiness because they still seek connection. I think in some really twisted way, they really do want love, but every time they get their hands on it, they warp it because they think love is control, victimization and abuse. Then they blame the true victims; their targets. “No one has ever really loved me. All men are jerks. My relationships never work out. All men leave me.” They’re like little kids who are really hard on their toys, don’t take care of them and then get mad at their toys when they break.
Glad you’re working towards getting out of your marriage.
Dr T
I never stop being amazed when I read perfect descriptions in the abstract here of my own BPD ex’s specific/concretes, even though it happens over and over.
Righto again. For years it amazed me that she seemed disappointed that I didn’t have a drinking problem, that I really and inevitably lost interest somewhere into the third drink, if I even got to the third drink, which was rare. And I was amazed that she seemed to lose her composure over the fact that: in the midst of her fits I did not lose my composure. She’d be angry and irrational, and when I didn’t respond in kind, it’s like she’d blow a screw, completely wig out.
Then she would create craziness she’d attribute to me that didn’t exist. For example: she claimed I freaked out when the kids would get hurt. Of course it was opposite of that – it was her: the less the kids were hurt, the more she freaked out and got mad at me for not responding with enough concern, but the more they were genuinely hurt (and that she felt incompetent to deal with it) the more she’d behave as if there was no issue.
End result: one time our then 3-year-old fell face-first into mud. Mud was in his eyes, nose and mouth and he was completely freaking out because he couldn’t breath. I didn’t say a word, I just responded like it was, ahhh: urgent. Scooped him up and ran to the nearest faucet, turned him face down and washed him clean.
She calmly oversaw this whole thing, sneering and scowling the whole time, then ripped into me when it was over, over how this shows I have some anxiety problem and over-react to the smallest things.
It all bugged me, but I couldn’t put a finger on it (discovering shrink4men was years away still). In the back of my mind there was thing tick, to the affect that “it’s as if she WANTS me to flip out”. I had no idea why anyone would want that, but the sense of it grew and frew.
Then one day she was provoking me, I don’t even know what it was, just that she had dug in her feet over something that didn’t make any sense, and I had been folding laundry and a hamper was next to me and she’d been making the bed and had tossed pillows into the hamper. In anger, I picked up a pillow and threw it at a window.
Now: I have described EXACTLY what I did. Picked up pillow, threw it at window (a 90 degree angle from where she lay in front of me by the way), done in anger.
The look on her face was amazing. It was like satisfaction washed over her. Like she had just achieved some long-sought for goal.
Now – I was not “rewarded” in any sense with this, other than to have this incident replayed and exaggerated by her for years to come as proof that I “have problems that he’s not dealing with”.
For me though – I would say that that incident was the turning point. The icy satisfaction she got from getting me to lose it was too creepy. I didn’t understand it, but something was wrong with how she responded and the whole lead up to. We were probably doomed already, but that was the moment that I sensed that she was not who I’d wished and hoped and pedestalized her to be.
*Currently still involved with a (undiagnosed) BPD partner.
I have:
– Had problems with alcohol abuse/misuse.
– Been labelled a workaholic.
– Been addicted to running to relive stress.
Once again Dr T, you make me pause and say “Wow, that’s me, that’s me!”.
Thank you, for helping me get perspective.
Me too…
-Work out about 10 or more hours a week
-Spend as much time in my rented office (an apartment about 5 minutes from home that I share with a few other people in different jobs – I live abroad but work for a U.S. company, online and through a U.S. phone number), even encouraging my kids to come over and do their homework here (they often escape to my office after school).
-Try to be physically in the house only during mornings and bed time, and when my wife is sleeping, and took on a second freelance part time job, so that I can work even later.
– Keep food in my office for the kids because I know that they are always hungry.
– On weekends, try to spend as much time with my kids out of the house, i.e. at parks, and without my wife (who can stay inside the house for 72 hours at a stretch).
– Removed all alcohol from the house – so that I do not get tempted to numb out by drinking – which I very much like to do, but know that it is not a good example for my kids to see their father relieve stress by drinking (Saw enough of that growing up)
etc.
The part that gets to me is that these women have the nerve to use the word Mother or Mom when speaking about themselves.
I can’t even begin to imagine screaming at my daughter, and then taking a gift from her. What they will do for adulation is insane. If they were secure with themselves, it wouldn’t bother them.
My Mother’s Day was focused on my Mom who is dying of Stroke and Vascular Dementia and making her as comfortable as I can now. I spent my Day focused on her not on myself. That was what I wanted to do for Mother’s Day and that is what I did. I found that fulfilling.
My BPD mother seemed to believe that not only Mother’s Day was her special day, but so was Christmas, her birthday and also any family event.
Several years ago, my best friend and I had brunch with her older brother’s first fiance. She wanted my opinion on her. The family suspected she was a highly controlling, abusive and narcissistic type.
During the conversation, I asked this woman what she did for a living. She was an assistant buyer for a department store. However, she described her very entry level job this way: “The department is like a giant wheel. I’m the hub and the spokes radiate out from me.” Um, I’ll take “Things a Narcissist Might Say” for $1000, Alex.
Brunch ended abruptly (mercifully), when my friends brother (a MD) was paged to go to the hospital. His ex-fiance let out and audible groan when he took his pager out of his pocket. When he said he had to leave, the first thing she said was, “I heard your pager go off the first time 10 minutes ago. I was hoping you wouldn’t hear it.” Because her Sunday afternoon’s entertainment wasmore important than someone who needed emergency surgery. She followed that with, “What am I supposed to do all afternoon?” Pouty face whine. My friend interjected, “Narcky [not her real name], this is NYC. Surely, you can find something to do on your own for a few hours.”
What was her solution? Bed, Bath and Beyond. Fortunately, my friend’s brother didn’t marry this woman. Unfortunately, he next hooked up with a smarter, more covert narc and married her. Last time I saw him, he was more emotionally shut down than I’d ever seen him and their young children are being held hostage from his family—i.e., grandparents don’t get to visit unless they come with expensive gifts for grandchildren and DIL.
Yeah – that is such a sad, sad story 🙁 I have noticed that professional men tend to be more victimized by these women. They seem to sense them – even before they become professional. I don’t understand why. Is it the personality type of career-driven men? I’m not blaming the victim – they obviously don’t deserve their treatment, but is their something in their own make-up that makes them more drawn to damaged women or is there something that damaged women sense that the rest of the world doesn’t and so are able to latch on like leeches for the long haul.
I agree. That’s a sad story. Particularly for being so believable.
Sunshine FG
They gain self esteem vicariously through professional men. For example being a surgeon is very valued in our society so they pump themselves up to that level of self esteem because they are with them. The problem is that the Narc isn’t the surgeon. A lot of professional men go for these women when they are very attractive to complete their arm candy fantasy and because their talents lie in the bedroom. It isn’t uncommon for professional men to run on the narcissism spectrum themselves either. They didn’t start the soap opera General Hospital for no valid reason.
I agree too, SFLG, D and BE.
My observation is that a lot of professional men in medical school, science and engineering (lawyers are a different story and are more people-smart) are just too nerdy and too involved in their books and studies to think too much or be wise about ‘personality types.’ They also mistakenly believe that their book knowledge of medicine or technology will fool-proof them from being hoodwinked. Wrong! Their nerdiness (I mean that in a good way) and lack of exposure to too many women (unlike marketing or sales guys’) plus their high incomes make them prime targets for Cluster Bs who play the sex card and hook them into marital imprisonment and cushioned living off their husbands’ credit cards.
One doctor I knew who landed twice with shallow, shopoholic and narcissistic women similar to the one Dr. T describes – and I asked him why he put up with it – said he was too lazy and it took too much time to date, so he went off with these persuasive women and gave in to their chase. Now he said he was too overworked to battle her and just ‘let her do what she wants’ while he shuts off emotionally. It was very sad. The first wife was overtly crazy-bitchy. The second one probably had trained herself reading books like the ‘Rules’ so he didn’t catch it right away – she’d acted coy – and then turned out psycho on him. It’s mind-boggling how these women get what they want and lead luxurious lifestyles piggy-backing on their men while saner women slog so hard to get an education and are too busy to chase ‘eligible’ men not can apply such ploys. I sometimes feel in our world the bad ones always get pampered while the good girls get taken for granted.
“They seem to sense them – even before they become professional. I don’t understand why. Is it the personality type of career-driven men?”
Could this possibly be something to do with men tuning-out from their cluster-B partner and focusing on work more so than a man in a stable, happy relationship?
This would make an interesting study.
being a child of divorced, then remarried, parents, I broke the realistic yet unexpected news (to them) that since they remarried I now have 4 parents.
That means their standing went from 50% (or 100% if you consider that married parents are a solid, unified unit) to 25%.
Funny how this type of logic comes to bite people in the but when they fail to consider the consequences of their decisions.
If your parents’ marriage was unhappy/unhealthy, it’s probably best that they divorce rather than inflict their unhappiness on the family. Having 2 step-parents, if they’re good, decent and loving people, can add to a child’s life and become a strong familial network of support rather than become diminished parents.
Another unbelievable development in the Mother worship industry:
commercials for Jewelry for Mothers Day?!?
Yeah – and Jared’s commercials are the worst. I don’t wear jewelry anyway, but if I did, I would rather gag on peanut butter than shop at Jared.
I always think when I see those stupid commericals, “There is so much more I’d rather blow $1,000 on”
What I always thought was funny as a teenager was lingerie ads for Mother’s Day. I remember reading the Sunday papers looking for gifts for my grandmothers and thinking my father would have kicked my fanny if I’d bought my mother something from the equivalent of Victoria’s Secret.
“Happy Mother’s Day Mom! I think you’d look really good in this black 3-piece baby doll…”
Maybe Freud was on to something.
Agreed. Terry cloth robe for mom; yes. Miracle push-up bra and thong set; no.
Seems more appropriate for a Valentine’s Day gift from dad.
or deodorant. or breath gum. At least those would be funny.
Surely I can’t be the only one who loathes mandatory altruism days. It was one thing when I was a kid and we truly got nice little things for each other. But now, it’s become a charade of reciprocity.
The ultimate absurdity of this was when my brother and I exchanged gift certificates, laughed, did that a few more years for chuckles and then decided enough was enough.
So, I stopped giving gifts to my siblings and parents on these days. If I find something I know one will like, I buy it and send it. I haven’t called my mother on mother’s day or father on father’s day in well over twenty years. It helps that my parents think both days are phony, but my mom went through the charade since she likes tradition.
Back when my brother & I were in contact, we realized the same thing. We decided instead of exchanging Christmas gifts, we’d donate to a charity of the other’s choosing. It was a lot less of a hassle than trying to find that “perfect” gift and someone who really needed something got the benefit of it. Plus, we’d each pick causes which were meaningful to us, so we had the emotional satisfaction of knowing our favorite cause was getting some benefit.
That’s an awesome idea! What a great way to get to know one another and learn about what you each find important.
This article really hit home. EXGF and I broke up twice (two years in a row) on Mother’s day. She thought the world stopped for her on this day. It was the same arguement. She was not getting my complete attention the entire day. In her world I was wrong to go with my mother and watch my child play a sporting event. It has been a recent tradition with my mother. My child was from a previous relationship. She stated that I am always at my child’s events. I should devote the day to her. She is a mother also (from her previous relationship). I heard non stop how she is a mother and a father 24-7. Thankfully what was to be her engagement ring got delayed and came in a week later. I did not need it. My advice anyone getting a similiar reaction ask your self the following. Do you want to be a partner with someone or do you want to be their servant? The jumping through hoops ended for me that day.
My mother didn’t hound her ex-boyfriend (he was the one after my dad, but before my stepdad) on Mother’s Day, but there was intense drama around Christmas, her birthday & Valentine’s Day over what he was getting her. He always picked out nice gifts, but she would always pressure him about wanting a more expensive gift.
When she moved out of town, the poor guy bought lamps for her and brought them on a plane (pre-9/11 days, doubt they’d let him through airport security now with them) to give her as a housewarming gift. I don’t know if it actually caused their break-up as that was right around the first estrangement. But she made him schlep them back on the plane because she didn’t like them. I’m not saying keep them in the house if you don’t like them. But making someone fly with lamps seems a bit extreme. They finally broke up for good not long after. He was actually a pretty nice guy, I hope he found someone to treat him better than she did.
PS, I don’t know for sure if he brought them as carry on, it’s possible they could have been in the packaging boxes and checked as luggage.
There was one particularly nauseating little Facebook trend where people were exhorting everyone to post their mom’s photo as their profile photo as some sort of Mother’s Day tribute. It started on Monday or Tuesday of last week, so it was almost an entire week of reading people reposting it. I don’t mind people doing it for their own profile photos, but don’t tell anyone else what they should be doing.
I vented on my blog with my own wording. On Facebook where not everyone knows or needs to know the details of the estrangement, I didn’t post anything, but changed my profile photo to the scene in Mommie Dearest where she freaks out over the wire hangers. The people who knew about it knew why I was posting it. The rest just thought it was my odd sense of humor or irony! 🙂
Ohmygosh…I could write volumes on this topic (but will Try…really hard…not too )
“If Mommy hates daddy, then the children must hate daddy because they are Mommy’s children. If the children love their father and, god forbid, he begins dating or gets remarried, double god forbid that the children treat dad’s new partner with respect.”
The parent figures (I’ve taken to that term rather than the more endearing Mother and Father that I now believe ought to be earned) are still married, but I remember wondering why my mother was so pi**ed at me for being Daddy’s girl. He’d take me into town with him, and I’d get to eat cookies while he played cribbage. I’d hang out with him when he took his car into the shop. He even took me to the county fair to watch his nephews drive stock cars. And she HATED that. I had a gnawing sense that she expected me to love her the most, and was really offended that I seemed to prefer Dad.
The sad part of that was, it’s not like he was all that affectionate or even attentive with me. He would do his thing and I would do mine. He’d let me buy a soda at the nursing home when he visited his aging relatives, he would visit them, and I’d sit drinking my Orange Crush…but we didn’t ‘hang out.’ So, the reason I was his girl wasn’t necessarily because of what he did for me, but because of what he didn’t; he didn’t shred my soul and make me feel like a worthless nothing. He didn’t scream at me for reasons I didn’t understand. He just ‘let me’ be with him with no drama or chaos or emotional mind games.
Those are good, nostalgic, happy memories. I have zero such memories of mother figure. My memories of her include: her rejection of my mother’s day gift when I was 10. (More on that later). Having the crap kicked out of me (literally, kicked with shoes) when I was 10 screaming “You’re so stupid! I don’t know how you managed to live for so long! You’re too stupid to live!”, for letting a kitten crap on mother figure’s new furniture. I was 10. I look at my 10 year old and cannot imagine one thing she could ever do to even come close to taking me over the brink like that.
Being told to “Act like a lady” and “Show some class” when she hadn’t taught me one thing about either. Being hissed at to offer to help clear someone else’s table while we were visiting, when I’d never seen her do any such thing. She expected, nay demanded others serve her royal highness. Being told when I was 34 that she never really liked children. Hearing her say how much she hated the 70s (I was born in 1970). Never being hugged until high school, when I no longer wanted affection. Being told when I was probably 35 or so, that she didn’t let her upbringing affect the way she raised her children…she’d been ‘over it’ for almost 5 years. I’m the youngest of 4. You do the math.
“It’s a dysfunctional and abusive parent-child relationship when the child’s job is to make mommy feel good.”
That was another nagging feeling (no pun intended!) I had while growing up…that somehow, she believed that it was my / my sibling’s job / obligation to make her feel better. Like, she had to make us responsible for her problems. I guess that’s not so different from having a drunk or addict for a parent.
“Many children of emotionally unstable men and women become parentified—the child becomes the caretaker of the parent—and make no mistake, this is child abuse. A parent is supposed to soothe the child; not the other way around.”
I caught her treating my children this way once, and felt really angry that she was expecting more from a small child than she expected from herself. I don’t recall the incident just now.
I got her a card this year that read, “Everything I am is because of you.” Then inside, it says, “That’s supposed to be a compliment!” But I know what it really means.
“The look on her face was amazing. It was like satisfaction washed over her. Like she had just achieved some long-sought for goal.”
Dr. Tara talked about this some on her AVFM radio appearance tonight. The fact that abusers will antagonize and provoke, provoke provoke and like water torture, you finally just *snap* and then they not only feign victimhood, they give you that creepy smile.
This reminded me of an incident with AXH / NPD: This was after he admitted that he’d done nothing to build our relationship in all the years we’d been married, so he was really going to change. He got angry at me one night for not acknowledging how much he had changed. I asked him, “What has changed? What about you is different?” I was expecting a response akin to “I understand why you were hurting and I don’t want to hurt you anymore” or anything of that nature. He instead answered, “I’m reading books now!” I just stood there…like, are you kidding me? He never used to read, but now he’s reading to help save our marriage (those relationship self-help books that abusers use as ammo).
He later went to a convention and brought back T-shirts for me and the girls. It was cute, pink, and had a butterfly. I thought, “Wow, he did something nice for me (for the very first time).” I really thought that he was trying. I walked out into the kitchen where he was to show it off, and that ‘creepy smile’ of smug satisfaction was on his face. I couldn’t read it at first, but it looked like, “Gotcha, bitch!” I’d never seen him look like that at me before. It was only then that I realized the shirt’s quote: “If nothing ever changed, there would be no butterflies.” Normally a nice sentiment, but I figured out that he was using that as a way to passively-aggressively ‘win’ the argument with me. I never wore the shirt again.
Well, we had an interesting Mother’s Day – to say the least. I am presently living abroad (took and overseas assignment simply to get away from my wife for a while).
In any case, after my wife had received her flowers, cards and DD had cooked her breakfast, she wanted to discuss “business.” She had a doctor bill due, and wanted to know how to handle it. I told her she could pay the deductible from her bank account, send me the forms and the insurance would take care of the rest. She said she needs the money in her account, so this would not work. (Note: I take care of ALL household expenses, plus she buys whatever she wants for herself from our joint account).
She proceeds to get angry, has a melt down, brings my mother into the argument (as she always does when she is unhappy with me), spends 2 – 3 hours calling me on the phone to “talk” and then tells me I need to call DD and apologize for ruining Mother’s Day!
Go figure. . .
I lived this for years — mothers day and her birthday were the worst — one problem and the whole day is ruined — screaming at ther child and me. I can remember buy her a $500 cell phone — I got a hand made card from my son on father day. She threw it at me and it bounced off the wall an nearly hit me again from behind. Christmass was good too — nothing ever was right or good enough —
I have not yet disclosed details to even my users – but this post prompted me to reply, Dr. Tara.
This Mother’s Day was a complete disaster for the children in our household. PEW had a complete meltdown. Nevermind that the children wished her a Happy Mother’s Day and told her they loved her… she discovered that my oldest wrote a poem to their stepmother on Mother’s Day – recognizing her for all that she does and wishing her a Happy Mother’s Day.
The meltdown that ensued because “SHE’S NOT YOUR MOTHER” and “YOU DIDN’T WRITE *ME* A POEM” has resulted in me obtaining temporary, full custody of the children pending litigation.
Mother’s Day for our boys was everything detailed above and more. Making matters worse, our youngest’s birthday was that Monday.
She STILL doesn’t get that she created a lifelong, horrifying memory that will never be forgotten by these two guys, regardless of the outcome. Never. Despite her behavior (not only on Mother’s Day but for as long as they can remember) – she claims to have “no clue” why they want to live with me full time and have for some time.
The tremendous concern that my oldest expressed to me on the phone that night in combination with the uncontrollable sobbing from my youngest – I’ll not soon forget.
I’m very sorry your kids had to go through that, Mr M. What a nightmare. She ought to be ashamed of herself. Unfortunately, these types have no shame.
Hope you get full custody. My very best wishes for you and your family.
Kind Regards,
Dr Tara
‘AIN’T MOMMA HAPPY, AIN’T NOBODY HAPPY”. There is a fridge magnet on the fridge of a family I know where the mother is a Cluster B personality with THE GOLDEN UTERUS to beat all golden uteruses. The magnet was placed there by the husband who goes through just about everything men have described on this site. The husband and adult sons have been conditioned to live by this mantra. The husband is too scared to remove himself from the situation because he fears the consequences. Their sons tell him he has to “make mom happy”. I suppose they are protecting their own asses because she then turns on them too. The sons are in their late 20s. The husbanc complains that his sons, sister-in-law and mother-in-law don’t understand why he would want to leave the marriage. On the other hand the husband’s mother and 7 siblings don’t understand why he is still there. His mother has had the spare room ready for him for years…
I wonder if Dr Tara can explain the behaviour of his sons.