What if your parent is lousy? What if they’re non-existent? What if they’re sick, addicted, mentally ill or in prison? What if your parents are dead?
If your parents are marginalized for some reason, you’ve got a tough road to hoe. I want to say something about this, some may feel is radical. If there is any way that you can keep your lousy parent in your life, I’d do it.
The reason is because it’s so hard to navigate life with no father or mother that you can at least point to from time to time. I’ll give you a concrete example of this.
When I was a teenager, I met the man I am now married to. He wanted to marry me then, and I wanted to marry him as well. The problem was, he was from a good family and I was not. He wanted to get married in a Catholic church, get the families together…everything all traditional.
The problem was that I did not have parents that I could trot out to participate in such a ritual. Not by any stretch of the imagination. Because of this, and because of youth, ignorance and fear and a variety of things of that nature, I could not get married. There was simply no one to fill the slots where the parents go, for reasons I could not explain.
Recently, I advised someone to keep their father in their life. Like this…
“Let’s just say that your father is a screaming alcoholic. You may not want to hang around him, but you’re still going to be better off if he can show up for you on occasion. There will be times like this in your life and you’ll want to be able to say, hey Dad! Clean yourself up and come to my wedding! And maybe he’ll be able to do this for you. It may not be great, but it’s a lot better than having no one at all to stand in that place, ever, throughout your entire life. I’m telling you this from experience…”
If you’re a parent who is marginalized, you might think about the position this puts your children in, because it’s severe. If you can manage to go work each day, and be reasonably moral and sober, this is probably enough for a child who is motivated. If you can’t manage this stuff, you should probably keep your pants on.
Do you have a parent who is marginalized in some way? How do deal with it? How has this impacted your life?
As I have said before, I cut my Mom out of my life about 2 years ago. I did work up the forgiveness to take her out to lunch a week after Mother’s Day. She apparently told my Aunts about this and spoke as if I was the greatest child on Earth because of it. Weird. During lunch she had told me about some hassles her neighbors are giving her, my Mom is 74 and really shouldn’t be living alone. Mentally you would think she is 84 not 74. So last week I called her and told her if she needed any assistance in dealing with these neighbors/lawyer/whatever…to call me. I feel like I can’t just leave her alone to fend for herself. I don’t care what she did to me in the past I only care that she doesn’t treat me that way now. So far, so good…no raging attacks yet! Meanwhile~ my sister, the golden child, lives 1,000 miles away happily removed from having to do any of the ‘real life’ stuff with our mother. Whatever, I’m used to it. I just can’t in good conscience leave my Mom to go to battle on her own. I DO love her and she IS my Mom, even if she wasn’t always right towards me that should not keep me from doing what’s right for her.
Its funny you wrote this because I realized last night how much I need my parents in my life! And how much they have helped me and how little I have appreciated them 🙁 I feel guilty and I should.
I have a number of clients who parents have both passed. Every holiday or important occasion, these people have to punt.
Myself…I have been pretty much on my own since I was 7 years old – totally on my own since I was 15. I don’t know any different, but when I look back on my life, there is a huge gap there. I think people have been kind to me over the years in regards to this. I am in a very bad situation, because I really can’t explain.
In reality, people who truly care about you are not going to judge you by your parents…at least not the kind of people I would run with. It’s the total void that’s very hard to deal with, because this is another unfortunate fact – when people know nothing, they tend to make a bad story rather than a good one.
Anyway, a marginalized parent will cost you in a lot of ways. There is no getting around this. But I do think having someone in the slot is better then having the total void.
I talked with a coworker last week who was doing a survey for her college classes. Her question was about the importance (or not) of having a male figure in the household. I told her I thought it was very important and she seemed surprised – so surprised that she challenged it repeatedly. I laid out concrete answers for my beliefs while she looked at me like it was stuff she’d never heard before. It was shocking to me that younger adults would have this attitude and I could tell it was equally shocking to her to hear my views. So what if they never have a parent to trot out there in the first place? Some people don’t seem to see it as a problem. Weird, huh?
I agree with you. I moved far from home and welcomed the detachment from my parents because I didn’t feel appreciated or wanted by them. It was not until I realized how permanent my move would be, its effect on my adult life and parenting my son, that I really felt a sense of loss.
@GTO I don’t think it’s weird. People only know what they know and if it’s all you know, then that’s the end of line.
Also, if you never venture outside your circle…you’ll probably never know anything more or anything different.
My sister used to call me “Mowgli”, and she was quite serious. Mowgli was raised by animals…and then he gets to town and WOAH.
My experience is/was very similar. You just don’t know wtf…though you are a human and react like Mowgli did.
In my case, I got town and met my husband…like Mowgli spies the girl. But if he hangs out with her and meets her parents…he’s going to eventually realized, Baloo can’t really stand in as dad!
Now, if I never got to town…I would still know nothing more than I did when I was 10.
You can pretty much compare me to one of those girls they found recently – they were kidnapped when they were young and held for years.
Now lets say one of them sneaked out and tried to blend in. Maybe she would be successful. But when it was time to come up with a dad for some reason…not going to happen. What does she do? Call her kidnapper?
I actually did that, if you can believe that. Called my kidnapper and tried to negotiate so I could marry my husband (when I was 17).
This may sound crazy from the outside, but if you were me, you’d see the logic. I was in love…I wanted to marry, I needed someone to stand in.
Unfortunately, the answer was, “Eat shit and die”, so I had to let my husband go, for this precise reason.
@Elsa. I need to get out more. The world I grew up in doesn’t seem to exist anymore. My parents have always been there and I was glad to have them, problems and all.
@GTO this blog is a good start.
People who stick around, expand. It’s just impossible not to.
Darned if I can’t relate. And yet still, I dunno, I guess I still somehow look at it differently.
I had to be so self-reliant in the parenting area, even when I was still living with them. I mean, holding steady on my own course in frequently stark, sometimes violent contrast to their own influence.
Now I continue with that. They are simply too disruptive. I’ve come to terms with “well with or without, here I am”.
I haven’t had bad parents, so I don’t know from this from experience. But considering the damage that bad parents do, I think NO parents is probably less damaging. Yes, I see how awkward it is to not have any parents to cite and bring to a big Catholic wedding, but I think bringing abusive parents who don’t want to be there and have no control and may just try to punch you or your husband at the wedding or do something else awful would be far worse! If your family is that bad, they probably aren’t capable of fronting enough to pretend to be a “normal family” for so much as an hour-long dinner with the new in-laws.
And I have seen many, many, many advice letters about how someone’s parent is a raging abusive alcoholic–is there any way to get them to sober up for the wedding? And the answer that all the experienced people give is “no, there is not.” You can’t make someone shape up if they don’t wanna and the alcohol is more important than their kid.
So….I see Elsa’s point about how hard it is to have no parents, but I’d still rather tell in-laws that my parents aren’t in my life because they’re abusive than try to get abusive parents to pretend to shape up and pass for normal for a few hours and keep faking it my whole life. Good enough people will understand.
Mowgli, ha ha. I always wanted to be like Baloo but my inner Bagheera prevented it.
This post hit me hard.
I am so tired of having a black hole inside me where my parents’ love fell short. It has dominated my entire life. I need a shift and SOON.
((((Namaste))))
Thank you, Elsa.
I am at a loss of how to detach/transcend/grow self esteem, beyond what I’m already doing. Feeling very adrift/ungrounded/erratic. I see how this hole affects all my relationships. I try hard, too hard, looking for the love that I never had. People are drawn in because they are intrigued/repulsed by my intensity.
The energy around you is palpable to me…your pain. I’m sorry. 🙁
This is an interesting post! For me, I would say I had one of each, one to cut all ties with, and one to maintain. Both parents, were far far outside the norm, but one was toxic, and one not so pathologically much. Oddly it’s the more “normal” of the two who is poison. I have no contact, and for that I’m grateful. Even when I wish I had someone, that someone is not worth having. In the other case, I would have certainly kept on with the relationship, but he died. Parents count, and they are a good thing to have, but you have to weigh the damages/how well you can protect yourself. Just my 2cents. Good topic for Cancer!
Sigh:.
Family, they hurt you, they love you, they’re there for you. Ugh.
‘In reality, people who truly care about you are not going to judge you by your parents’
I know this is true…I still postponed the wedding. lol. To think I was going to get married with t.Pluto exactly on my Moon?? No thanks, I’ll wait for next year.
To answer your question–yes. To speak of how I dealt with it will simply take too long. But I did.
I am 36. My dad will be 87 this year. God knows how old he will live to be but he’s too old to focus on his shortcomings as a father. Maybe he will walk me down the aisle. Maybe not.
As for my mother, I have come to terms with her mental illness and try to focus on what I am grateful for. I am grateful she TRIES. A lot of parents don’t. I know she has been driven to despair over her lack of feeling for her kids. She lives in guilt. I don’t want that for her. It seems so pointless.
I also don’t entertain her drama anymore. On mother’s day I went to visit her, brought her flowers, made her lunch, and her response was to ask ‘did I terrorize you as a child?’ and then get upset when I refused to go there: ‘you’d think on Mother’s Day I get to talk about what I want…’
I just said–nope, not talking about my childhood today. Focus on those flowers we brought and this nice seafood lunch instead.’
A year ago, I would have gone there, and just completely fucked my own head up in the process.
It gets better, it really does. Just not in the way you may think/hope.
I don’t have any parents left. My mom died 6 years ago and my dad left when me and my sister were 16.
We kept in touch for a few years but he has some PTSD issues (stemming from his years in Vietnam) and had major alcohol issues which found him homeless in a state hallway across the country from me. He stopped taking my phone calls one day and I haven’t heard from him in over 7 years.
Everyone around me has a big family, and thankfully my in-laws are so supportive but most days I feel like the orphaned lone wolf with no pack.
Still, my twin and I are so close and we are lucky to have been ‘adopted’ by really good people around but I pretty much feel like an alien compared to most of the human race. I am very guarded.
My guy never knew his father and his mother was a man-chasing drug addict.. he grew up having to steal the neighbor’s water at night and sleeping in garbage, finally leaving home in his teens.
Having known this, I never trusted him, thinking he was damaged & would therefore hurt me like the men before him. But he’s the most mature and tolerant person I know, and works his ass off in all areas of life.
Did his beginnings strengthen his character? Perhaps… this is the higher octave of abuse. Inspiring to those (like me) who struggle and scream, “Woe is me”
I cannot agree with this where there is extreme pathological behaviour: some parents eat their children, even quite literally. I knew someone who was rescued from the roasting pan. Then their was the orphan who was adopted as a pet/plaything for the child of a wealthy couple. Sometimes we must choose to be a motherless child to survive.
Yes, father was a heroine addict and my mother lives on public aid. Both of my parents are/were marginalized figures. It has impacted me to a great extent. I realized I did not want my Life to end before its beginning.
Aeterna, that’s rough. 🙁 I’m very sorry.
@Omie, Luna and Aeterna, I agree with you all that extremely abusive parents can end your life early, even if you manage to be still breathing…
@Elsa, this is a really touchy subject for those of us who have spent a lifetime trying to deal with PTSD from abusive, narcissistic parents. My response to your post about wishing you had a parent to give you away in church is that I wish you guys had eloped when you first met; that you could have convinced your husband that this was the best option.
@Elsa, it seems you may have tried to cope with your situation by normalizing, minimizing or dissociating and thinking that a stand in parent would have been Ok where a parent was needed in a church ritual so that things would look Ok.
My belief is that we are all children of God and that Mother Mary would stand by all of us in love and that any of the saints or avatars that have suffered abuse would be happy and willing to stand by us in church or in any spiritual setting where we need to unite with another in love.
I am not talking about extreme abuse here, or suggesting people who suffer it hang on to their parents.
@Stella56, I don’t feel you understand my situation at all, and there is no reason you should. I do feel I have to state this though. I have a lot of trouble with people misunderstanding me. I am sorry I did not better express myself.
@Elsa,
I probably don’t understand your life story because I don’t know you as a person. I am responding to the written words on your post and I honestly hesitated before writing my comments because I didn’t want to minimize your thoughts and feelings on this issue. However, I wanted to make sure that people who have been abused by parents did not feel doubly hurt. You do have authority here on these boards and in the way you so elequently express yourself and topics like this can be very very touchy for people who have suffered greatly in life. I want to say that I continue to admire your courage to discuss controversial issues in spite of the fact that people may misunderstand you at times.
Thanks, Stella56. I don’t don’t always hit the mark I am aiming for.
My intention here was to offer encouragement to young people who may have ambition beyond their parents limitations.
My second intention was to give a nod to people who live with a total void in this area(often because their parent(s) is dead).
I did not mean to address abuse at all.
My third thrust here, was not really an intention, but something I could not help myself from doing. That was, making a rude comment about people not becoming parents if they were going to put themselves ahead of their kids.
I could have left that out. I debated it. But then I indulged myself.
So this is my actual way of thinking behind what I wrote. I wanted to address an important and generally neglected, niche.
I recently went to a wedding, and I thought, “My parents aren’t going to be at my wedding. :(”
My parents would be missing at my wedding because I decided to amputate them. Imagine how that wedding would be. I cried a little.
I have forgiven them a little (for a different reason), but I’m aware I cannot stand them. Limited contact is the only way to go. They’re not on full amputated status anymore. They got upgraded to limited contact.
This is a nice post. My father died when I was twelve and simultaneously so did my relationship with my mother. It was, for me, a terrible living situation. She finally moved 14 hours away with her new husband who…Da Da Da, I don’t get along with. I go through phases where I don’t care if she is present in my life and then sometimes I just want to talk because I feel like that’s what a “normal” family should do. It’s always shallow talk, nothing in-depth, just skims the surface, but that’s just it. That’s just all its ever going to be.
Thank you, shanna.
See, the person I was talking to…I was offering my opinion. And my opinion was that even if their parent is limited (ultimately, we’re all limited), the total void is very difficult to deal with.
People want people to be perfect and guess what? They’re not!
Really, everyone’s parent lets them down in some way, if only by aging…and then dying.
I don’t really agree that people don’t judge you by the lack of family in your life. It may be true on a superficial level, but when you are going to marry someone…that kind of thing, it does matter. The void is very noticeable when there is no one on your side of the church. To everyone.
I am talking about reality here, not theory and not dream world.
I wrote a post long ago about a mean Pisces. She had this boyfriend, he was great. She was great too, but not to him!
She had Pluto opposing her Sun by the way and lots of friends. Tons of friends and family.
This guy treated her really well. He was always good to her and he had a lot of patience. She told me once, what a fuckin; moron he was…she sent him to the store for toilet paper and he came back with one ply or two ply not three ply, She read him the riot act.
I was always sort of appalled at the stories she would tell me…they were like that one. I asked her why she was so compassionate with everyone but him.
She thought it was a good question. She was a double Pisces actually, and she said she could easily forgive a child rapist and murderer, who was in prison…but not her boyfriend who came home with the wrong toilet paper.
Then Christmas came. She told me that she had all these presents under the tree…tons of them, she said. From her family and from all her friends.
She said her boyfriend only had presents from her – the twerp. He didn’t have a family….
I didn’t see her after that. I really could not bear her cruelty…even if she would be upset and feel bad when it was pointed out to her, which I did.
She was berating him for this. “You don’t have presents like I do, you must suck…”
She may be an extreme, overt example but many of you know exactly what I mean.
You are so insightful, Elsa. I haven’t been around here for a while, but you helped me a LOT when I was going through an extremely painful time with my dad, who has a mental illness and can be violent. I ended up moving halfway across the country for a job and detached myself from him and my family as much as I could. At one point, I made up my mind to never see him again. There’s been a lot of internal work since then (2 years!) and I’m at the point where we speak sometimes and I see him on my terms with the rest of my family. I can tell you from experience that for me, it’s better not to completely amputate, which leaves a huge void. Its hard to explain , but somehow that void took over much more of my self than the opposite road of coming to terms, not blaming myself or him, and just leaving it be.
I also seemed to run into the stigma you’re talking about from people I’m close to, which surprised the hell out of me.
Good to see you, Belle. 🙂
I grew up with a mother who told me I was unwanted. There was not much love available for me, at least not as much as I would have needed or wanted. Many years, I pitied myself over all that lack and hurt until I realized that what was in the past does not have to influence me in the now because I can give myself what I need and can stop blaming my parents. They tried their best, even if that was not great in my eyes, and I try to do my best now.
It was not easy to get to that point, but behind my mother’s emotional distance, I am able to see her own suffering, even if I don’t understand it, or don’t understand how it translates into her behavior. But seeing it makes me look at her with compassion I never thought would be able to have, and I am actually able to listen to her lamenting, etc, without regressing (most of the time :-)).
That doesn’t mean I don’t continue to have emotional reactions and pretend stuff didn’t happen, it’s just that I want to say there is a real possibility for a relationship beyond the pain of the past, and totally independent of the judgement of everybody else. It asks me to be aware of my boundaries, yes. But it’s also clear that my story is my story, and to pretend that it’s all fairy tale in order to fit in is probably more damaging than to just be who I am. What good does it do to cut out already marginalized parents? They are hurting. By being in touch with my mother, I actually continue to learn things about my self and see behavioral patterns in a new light. Not always nice, but revealing, and at least, now I can address it …
More and more I think it makes sense the possibility that we pick our parents before coming to this earth. So, if we’ve picked them out before even being born – we Knew what type of life we were choosing to have.
I have a friend. Her mother used to beat her up all the time. What did she learned from this mother? She learned how Not To Be a mother – now she is very careful about the way she treats her children. Even raising her voice to the kids, in my friend’s mind, is something bad and to be controlled and avoided.
What if, I wonder sometimes, she picked this totally awful mom so she could learn how to Excel in mothering when it came her turn to have kids?
You know, there’s so many layers to this type of stuff (kids, parents, family) – one never knows why things are the way they are.
I struggled between limited and void with my parents. Like belle, I put some boundaries in place and grew up enough to understand their lives and challenges and vulnerabilities. And found that I could pull off limited with my parents. But I was fortunate enough that they weren’t so abusive that limited couldn’t be an option.
Elsa, thank you for bringing up this topic.
I have not spoken with my father in almost 2 years now. This is not the 1st time in my life that we have had no contact. He has popped in & out of my life now since i have been around 15 years old.
I have been told by my father many times that i was never wanted, never planned, & he only wanted my sister.
He & my mother divorced because of his abuse.
Also because he unfortunately creeps woman * young girls out..(if ya get what i mean)..
Each time he has a nervous break down (usually after a night of lots of alcohol) he abruptly tells me, out of nowhere.. that he wants me out of his life, never wants to see me again & wants to ‘divorce’ me as his daughter. So acting on his wishes, i leave & have no contact till he is sober & able to talk to me again with rationality, usually a couple of months after. But i am never quick to forgive & forget.
My whole family know that he has a personality disorder, they all talk behind his back about it, but no one has had the back bone to tell him to get some help.
The last time i seen him..i finally told him he needs help. But this just made things worse.
He was violent with me the last time i lived with him back in 2011 when me & my partner decided to split up for a bit & i desperately needed a place to stay. Although i am used to his attacks, it just hurts because he never treats my sister like this, its only ever directed towards me & my mother, & his own mother..my grandma. I feel so lonely every time he turns abusive. I have hardly left my house in the past 2 years except for work..i have no motivation..no confidence in myself.
Its finally taking its toll.
When i was 15, i ended up in hospital for a suicide attempt (took 30 pain killers) after my father told me to get out of his life. He was violent. & very nasty, to say the least….
I try with him all the time. But he needs help…& now unfortunately…so do i.
As for having him apart of my life for the sake of having a father there to fill the role of family when i get married..im unsure. No one likes being around him..especially my fiance’s family, they cant stand him. They are very polite about it to me, but they think he is a nut bag..& no one would dis agree with them. I certainly dont.
what to do…what to do.. 🙁
I walked myself down the aisle. I am a grown woman, giving myself to a marriage, not some child that needs a group of immature repulsive deviant fuckw*ts to boost my self esteem as acceptable and deserving. Noone is perfect true, but highly abusive immature parents should be kept at a distance at minimum, completely castrated asap if possible. The damage is too great. Keep them away from you, your marriage, your extended family and your children. As for them growing up and changing..bullshit! They finally decide to love you and treat you decently because they NEED you. It’s still all about them. Selfish, destructive, cruel and dangerous. I would never advise anyone to tolerate overtly abusive parents. Why? Because they gave birth to you? A bitch dog can do that. You need a male in your life to teach you?..Well every 2nd person is one, so what’s the problem, pick someone of quality. Geeze.. next we’ll be advising people to hang onto abusive husbands and wives. Hogwash! Throw them to the gutter and go make a new family elsewhere. As for people judging..well perhaps they’ll judge your smart to have left them. Since when does a mature experienced adult judge a person on such issues? Nonsense.
As to what varying degree one decides enough is enough, well that is a personal evaluation and descision. Therefore don’t bitch at the dissapointing outcome, it was you’re choice. Dumping abusive people from my life, be it family or friend, has been the smartest choice i’ve ever made for myself and those i care for.
God my comment sounded harsh. The written word cannot convey the tone. Strong yes, harsh no. I have compassion, i have forgiveness. But i’m just not damn stupid. If you want to be a shell of a person, if you desire to slowly and painfully destroy your spirit and all those around you, if you wish to put unpalpable pressure for no good reason on you’re beloved, if you wish to always feel like some misguided, unwanted, used and abused and useless undeserving nobody misfit..you go right ahead and hang in there for that loser who doesn’t give a damn about anyone but themselves, who has the intregrity of a rat. Go right ahead if you suffer from self esteem issues you wish to endure by feeding the saintly self sacrificing too nice syndrome of loving and tolerating you’re abuser. Pity the bastards from a distance. Send a christmas card to make yourself feel better (with no return address). Give to the poor. But god damn it..Don’t you reward a selfish cruel asshole with you’re love and loyalty for no good reason other than guilt and self esteem issues that THEY gave you! Even the dumbest moron can be a loving caring person to their child. If you were the mother of yourself, what would you counsel you’re child? Would you advise you’re child to love and pay sacrifice for their rapist? violent abuser? psychological vampire?
…Get you’re head straight and leave you’re damaged emotions where they belong. In the bullshit ‘must delete’ garbage can.
Having sex and giving birth does not make you a parent! Having a litter of siblings does not make you a family! Having a cheating, deceitful husband or wife does not make you a committed partnership! Good zueks people. Get it straight.
Ah i see the cross reference here between abusive parents and parents who are deemed just not good enough. A quick comment. If you are loved, nothing else matters. Not their education, their job, their ineptness. All a child wants is love. If they cannot give that. I deem them an asshole. Simple. Or you’re being an ungrateful brat, it’s one of you. Figure it out. I have trouble understanding truely. When i love people i cannot bare their tears, or i try desperately to ease their pain. It’s pretty easy to tell who cares for you and who doesn’t. I would think if you have issues with parents and you’re over 40. You’re either a selfish idiot or you’re parents are. Easy enough to tell.
I’ve got the example of what i was trying so ineptly to convey. The movie “I am Sam”. The dysfunctional disabled dad who loved his child.
Fushion, you need to stop. Ironically, you’re comments are abusive.
Yes, someone seems angry 🙂
But I see some of my sibling’s attitude in these postings as they severed contact to my mother. I agree that there are times when we have to retreat and cut our ties to heal, but there is also a time to forgive and make a step forward again.
I also agree on the point of selfishness; see it in my mother every time I talk to her, and I know better than to trust her blindly. But that’s the difference to when I was a child – I can at least try to deal with it like a grown up who does not want to be determined in my emotional reactions by what happened in the past because my emotional and intellectual maturity is on an entirely different level.
Hope that makes sense. … or expressed differently, I would not want to be angry anymore!
@Fushion i think your just being honest..not abusive. The net is where we come to be, so that we may state our views without bias or sugar on top coated opinions.
In fact..im going to have to whole hardheartedly agree with most of your statements..even if you came across angrily.
I get it. I just do.
”Ah i see the cross reference here between abusive parents and parents who are deemed just not good enough.”
Yes, that’s probably more to the point here on this topic i would guess. But i can see your point of view also.
”Go right ahead if you suffer from self esteem issues you wish to endure by feeding the saintly self sacrificing too nice syndrome of loving and tolerating you’re abuser”
Yes, harsh. But dammit.. you hit the nail on the donkey as far as my personal story/situation with my father is concerned.You were just being honest. Wish i had someone in my family that spoke up for me with the view & honesty that you stated here on this topic.
Its a lonely feeling when your abuser gets away with the abuse, because everyone else is to busy trying to play ‘the Jones’ family, sweeping the abuse under the door mat, so that you have to ‘play nice’ at family events just to please the ‘status qua’ within you family ties.
I plan to have a registry wedding, just me & my man with two witnesses (friends) even if i end up talking to my father again this year. I would LOVE a big family wedding, so would my fiance, but the reality is..its just never going to be a reality for me. My partner is very accepting.
@Fushion..i just had to read your posts again, made me feel better. Wish i had someone with your points of view in my family, or at least close to me.
Great question and insight!
My father was an alcoholic and died when I was eight years old. Even though I loved him very much, I foolishly assummed or fanticized my world would mend.
It didn’t. At 34 years of age my mother finally had her freedom which meant men, men and more men with little to no interest in me. Years later I learned through therapy she was an aggressive narcissist.
Once I knew what she was I read as many books as I could get my hands on to learn more. Bottom line: They can’t change so I did. I stopped enabling her by returning her verbal insults, kept my thoughts to myself and created a see-through shield between us.
She died almost five years ago. At 53 I was finally free and knew in my heart I did everything I could for her.
Last year I met a wonderful man who is good, kind and uncomplicated. We deeply love each and plan to marry next year. Because she is dead I can finally have a real man in my life and a future to look forward to.
My mother made me a better more loving person by giving me on a daily basis lessons on what not to do. While I wouldn’t want to repeat those years, I know they made me a stronger more whole person.
I wish you all the peace I feel and revel in now.
Thanks.
I believe it is important to have good relationships with parents, even if they are not perfect. Otherwise, the risk of having an afflicted Sun and Moon is high. Of course, having a 4th house Chiron in Cancer reinforces this…
I grew up with dysfunctional parents who around in name only. They were kind enough to feed and clothe me until the I turned 16 years of age but they were absent in every other way. They are still absent today and couldn’t be bothered with my life, only talk about themselves and just have no interest in anything other then their own lives.
My dad has been absent from my life for the last ten years. My mother will occasionally email me about her life with her boyfriends (she’s in her 60’s) and doesn’t want to hear about what is going on in my life and can’t be bothered to return emails and telephone calls etc
They didn’t conduct themselves like parents while I was growing up, I had the television to raise me along with a few kind neighbors. I still feel somewhat socially awkward due to the lack interaction growing up, I was never hugged, kissed or told that I was loved. I could never talk to them about problems or issues. They were disinterested in my school life and would even actively discourage good grades & school performance.
At the age of fourteen my mother just took off and left, she never came back. I was left with my father who was a raging alcoholic, his drinking increased to the point he didn’t even purchase food or come home anymore, it was during that time I decided to live with a friend. I’ve been on my own since the age of sixteen, no one ever paid child support for me and there was no social services involved in my situation, however, I survived just the same.
It was dark road struggling to survive alone with no help in my teens and early adulthood. I think some people who have parents that love and care for them really take it for granted. It is something I missed out on in my life. I can only hope that in my next life I will have parents and family who will love me and care for me like others people do.
P-
I had someone once ask me if I still saw my dad. Ya of course I do. She looked very surprised. She knew what kind of person he was. I don’t talk to him very much. About 3 times a year, and he lives halfway across the county. That’s enough for me. I think it would hurt more to have that door closed forever.
I’m not sure how I got a black box as an avatar but its kinda cool.
I am currently embroiled in a hot debate on this topic.
I still feel the same way, though I’d have said it differently.
Now we’ve got the so-called “cancel culture”. Ditching your family is recommended… but not by me!
Everyone to their own… Me: I had 3 sets of parents (either abandoned me/sent me back/dead/alive)
If you have ‘No Choice’ about ‘No Parents’..then you understand what ‘Void’ actually is! I did my Initiations early & know that my inner-world is where its at. Ultimately it is all I have…everything else is attachment in whatever form that comes…Hey but I am trained to NOT ATTACH yearning comes though Thats the hard bit.. TO YEARN
“You can’t get Milk from the Mouses’ House” Clarissa Pinka Estes