Religion as means of control

[Dinah-sore]

I am so sorry, I haven't been on here much lately. I have had so much going on (including dealing with a major personal tragedy) and I am frankly a mess, and trying to cope.

I was just laying in my bed watching TV, procrastinating the work that I need to get done, and in the show there is an 18 year old girl making plans for her future. Her parents put their foot down and forbid her to move and go to the school that she wants to. She said to them something very calm and powerful, that she wants their blessing but she is 18 and doesn't need their permission. I was shocked watching this. I know after my programming growing up, I would have just easily given in to my parents demands. I would have thought that they were "right" and I was "wrong" to think differently or want differently than them, and even further I would have felt SELFISH for wanting "too much."

What I find interesting is how around the age of 18-19 my mom decided to get "religious." She had gone to church off and on while I was growing up, but she was an alcoholic, drug user, adulterer, abuser, etc. But all of the sudden I become an adult and my mom decides she is going to become extremely religious.

The positive was that she got clean, but she stayed very abusive and controlling. Only, she started using religion to influence/control me. I never noticed the shift until right this moment. It was no longer she was the boss of me, God was the boss of me, and God wanted me to do what she wanted. And if I had an original thought or feeling it was always, "What does God think?" or "What would God want?"

Ironically, I personally believe that God is the one who finally opened my eyes to her behavior.

But I wonder if the reason she chose to get religious around that time is to have another "authority" through which to control me.

Even now, she uses religion. The other day we were having a positive conversation, although I NEVER feel safe or trusting with her, but we were talking about church stuff and I noticed how she started turning the positive things I was saying around to manipulate me. She started acting like she is so worried about me and my spirituality and how she has asked all her friends at church to pray for me.

I imagine that this can be a universal thing that PD's do to people, and it could be any religion right?

Does anyone else think the timing of her conversion to religion is suspicious? Right when I became a legal adult?

I know that it really added another layer of guilt and shame to my life -- not through the actual religion, but through the way she used religion against me.

P.S. Please feel free to move this post if it belongs on a different page.

Also, I am a parent, who is religious, but anti-shame and manipulation. My DH still seems to use a lot of shame and manipulation in his thoughts and ways of relating to people. Right now, I am hiding stuff from him. I hate that, but i posted a while back in the chosen relationships forum. My 14 year old DD had her first kiss with a boy she has liked and been in a relationship with since last May. The kiss was a peck, they are not making out. And she told me about it. I am trying to protect her first kiss memories. If my husband or the church found out, it would get blown up and there would be meetings with parents and they would get in trouble. I don't want my DD's to get in trouble for pecking a boy who she believes she loves as much as a 14 year old can, and who is the sweetest most respectful caring boy to her.

I live in an environment that says it is "loving" but it's behavior seems so critical and severe. After talking about this situation in the chosen relationships group I decided to protect my DD because I don't feel like she should get in trouble for a kiss. But I also feel like I am keeping secrets. But there is a difference between secrets and privacy right? My DD should have a right to keep some things private. And if I "tell" on her, she will just stop trusting me with her private life.

I am in a weird place right now, where I am learning what I believe, and how to live out those beliefs without shaming or manipulating people. But I don't feel like I fit into the culture that I have been surrounded with for so long, because they seem to behave that way a lot. I just think it is weird, how my mom used religion, and how I am trying to figure out religion as a mom, who is an adult child of a BPDm.

Do you have any thoughts about religion being used to control people. I am not anti-religion. I guess the word would be "spiritual abuse."

I just don't see Jesus manipulating people. He didn't even shame people. He corrected people who used religion to shame people. And he fought against people manipulating him. I just think people have the right to decide for themselves what they think of religion, and to decide for themselves how they want their beliefs to affect their lives. If they want to be extremely religious that is fine, but it isn't extreme religion to spiritually abuse others. God gave us freedom, and free will.

[need2bme]

I think our religious beliefs and relationship (you mentioned Jesus, so I would think you are Christian), is between us and Jesus.  My uNPDm has been a 'Christian' all her life.  I use the term loosely here because I don't believe Jesus would do the things she does.  I have seen in my entire life how she has used religion as a weapon.  Even just 3 years ago, I would have been 39...I was going to visit some friends out of state and she just flat out told me that I could not go.  I had waited until I was leaving to say bye to her because I knew it would be an issue.  I told her I was going and she said "The Bible says to obey your mother and father."  I stated that "The Bible also says to leave your mother and father and cleave unto your husband."  She stated that I did not have a husband.  In the Bible, it says your maker is your husband.  So I said, "He is my husband, He is my Savior, He is my Everything" and walked out the door.  It is so sad how others can use something so sacred to fuel their abuse. 

I spent my entire life running from religion.  The church I grew up in (my uNPDm's family, who all have NPD traits) actually meet the requirements to be called a cult.  Thankfully, later in life, I met some people who truly portrayed Jesus and His love.  It was 5 years ago, I gave my heart to Him.  One of my favorite sayings is "God does not have grandchildren".  We each have our own relationship with Him and our relationship does not depend on other's views, beliefs, or feelings.

Personally, I think you did the right thing with your daughter.  That was a private, not secret, moment and to have that distorted and brought before others could have done damage.  So, don't beat yourself up there. 

As far as if your m decided to get religious to control you on another level...here's what I see and am working so hard in my own life to accept.  We can not control others, we can not 'figure out' the reasons behind the madness.  The fact is, whether or not she did it for that specific purpose...it doesn't matter.  It was a tool she used to control/abuse you.  One of the steps I'm struggling to take right now is understanding that I can only function in facts and my imagination tends to run rampant.  So, it really is a difficult battle for me.  The assumption is: she found religion for the purpose to abuse you.  The fact is: she used religion to abuse you.   

I do hope you are able to find peace in your life.  I am learning this is a marathon, not a sprint.  Don't give up...there is victory ahead for us!!

[RavenLady]

Dinah-sore, I'm really glad you raised this topic because I've been wanting to but was nervous about approaching it.

I'm an out atheist and one of the patterns in my relationship with my mother is quite similar to what you describe. I hid my beliefs for years from my family because I knew she would judge and condemn me, and she did. And so, because of that, I feel pretty nervous addressing this question because I expect to be silenced for stepping out of line. Which would not be consistent with the behavior I've seen on this forum, but happens a lot in our broader culture and in my experience, so it's always a risk. (Atheists are the most despised religious minority in this country. People historically rank us below criminals in preference in many polls, though this is gradually changing.)

Anyway, I grew up under uBPDm's thumb, and in various ways and at various times her approach to religion resulted in abuse of me. This ranged from indoctrinating me with ideas about evil that paralyzed me with fear, to enforcing strict rules about dating, purity, and chastity that taught me to be ashamed of my own body. She struggled with addiction but when she was doing better with that she encouraged me to look at everything through a fixed, narrow religious lens, where mistakes were evil and submission was everything. My uNPDf, meanwhile, was an atheist and this disagreement between two disordered people meant family fights always had lots and lots of fuel. My M judged his soul. My F judged her vulnerability. I wish they had divorced.

Nevertheless, I joined a hardline religious group myself in my late teens and this was my route to escape, because it was cult-like and we all lived together = housing. I was in the ministry full-time. What I learned there was an advanced education in the kind of psychological control my M used on me. We learned how to hook people by identifying their vulnerabilities. Advancing in the faith and organization required intensive spiritual counseling, wherein unlicensed and unschooled leaders would promise to "heal" our emotional and psychological wounds with their spiritual powers. Instead, they got us hooked: only by obeying the rules of the faith just so, as they knew and taught better than others, would resolve the problems they had identified inside us. I participated in this first as a recipient and then as a practitioner. There were beautiful aspects where love and friendship were guiding us, but ultimately, I have mostly regrets. I have since tried to make amends for participating in psychological abuse, where I could. In my defense, I was very young and quite ignorant.

In any event, it turns out I really had been looking for love all along (gee I wonder why) and it turned out my cult wasn't actually a great place for it. On the way out I became aware of how easily religion is used as a means of control and, you know how it is, once you see it, you can't unsee it. Before anyone accuses me of proselytizing for atheism, please know that in many cases, I have witnessed religion bring people great hope or peace or community or stability, and thus I have no desire to tear other peoples' beliefs down. In my own life, faith did ultimately provide me an exit from my abusive FOO, and I think faith often "delivers" us in various ways, at the very least by changing our perspectives or habits. So please, readers who are people of faith, know that I respect you and your choices and wish you nothing but peace, wherever your path takes you.

The dark side is where religion is used as a means of control and subjugation. It is, in my experience, usually easiest to notice it in the practice of some other, less familiar religion. The one on the other side of the world, so to speak. But every religion has an obvious version of this (or a hundred) that is a bit shocking to outsiders. This is when the control aspects are institutionalized most, shall we say, "narcissisticly," that is, in the interest of something other than the well-being of the populace, and it is inevitably couched as being in service to the divine. The divine needs a new luxury jet, or a new degree of submission, or a focus on just this one issue to the exclusion of the rest of sacred text. The divine needs collective amnesia or to reinterpret or rewrite history. The divine in these cases sure does seem to have a lot of weird needs. And, usually, the people who are on the victim end of the divine's so-called needs are the most psychologically or sociologically or economically vulnerable, although nobody is immune from getting caught. Even extreme cults often attract the very nicest people: empaths and highly sensitive people who care oh so very much about the needs of the divine. It turns out predatory behavior has its analogues in ever strata of human experience, and the hierarchical impulses that so easily result in subjugation can be found everywhere you look.

I digress. Dinah-sore, I think your interpretation of things with your mom makes a lot of sense. Let's assume mom isn't actually happy inside. She's got a problem to solve, and her conversion gave her a new shot at that. It also happened to give her a new set of tools. If she was PD, she is going to use what is at hand to get her "needs" met. At your expense. It's like her tool was an iPhone initially, and then she switched to Android. I'm guessing the result for you was more or less the same, and that is she hurt you with her selfishness. 

I'm sorry it hurt. We probably have similar wounds. For me, the process of healing from spiritual abuse has been a gradual stretching and unfurling, figuring out where my new center of gravity is and what actually feels right to my soul. The easiest part was the moral compass: that shit is innate. It's been harder to recover a sense of connectedness, what with the abuse permeating every f*cking area of my life and destroying my trust not only in family, but community, as well. I've come a very long ways and I am eager to see where the recovery ultimately takes me, now that I've finally got this PD piece of the puzzle to work with.

Hugs and peace to you. We'll both get there. We're on our way.

[FromTheSwamp]

Dinah-sore, I think you are quite right in thinking that your mother is manipulating you using her version of religion.  She can tell you that you have to do what she wants you to do, only saying that it's what God wants rather than saying it's what she wants.  It makes it much harder for you to fight against it in your head. 

It might help to stop and think every time she brings religious talk into a conversation.  Is she trying to push you in a direction that she wants you to go?  What is her motivation?  Is it self-serving?  Keep in mind that she gets satisfaction from bringing you low, so the benefit to her might be hard to see from the point of view of a kind-hearted person, but for her it's there.  I suspect that if she sees you doing something that brings you any sort of happiness she would like to throw a wrench in there. 

[Dinah-sore]

I think our religious beliefs and relationship (you mentioned Jesus, so I would think you are Christian), is between us and Jesus.  My uNPDm has been a 'Christian' all her life.  I use the term loosely here because I don't believe Jesus would do the things she does.  I have seen in my entire life how she has used religion as a weapon.  Even just 3 years ago, I would have been 39...I was going to visit some friends out of state and she just flat out told me that I could not go.  I had waited until I was leaving to say bye to her because I knew it would be an issue.  I told her I was going and she said "The Bible says to obey your mother and father."  I stated that "The Bible also says to leave your mother and father and cleave unto your husband."  She stated that I did not have a husband.  In the Bible, it says your maker is your husband.  So I said, "He is my husband, He is my Savior, He is my Everything" and walked out the door.  It is so sad how others can use something so sacred to fuel their abuse. 

I spent my entire life running from religion.  The church I grew up in (my uNPDm's family, who all have NPD traits) actually meet the requirements to be called a cult.  Thankfully, later in life, I met some people who truly portrayed Jesus and His love.  It was 5 years ago, I gave my heart to Him.  One of my favorite sayings is "God does not have grandchildren".  We each have our own relationship with Him and our relationship does not depend on other's views, beliefs, or feelings.

Personally, I think you did the right thing with your daughter.  That was a private, not secret, moment and to have that distorted and brought before others could have done damage.  So, don't beat yourself up there. 

As far as if your m decided to get religious to control you on another level...here's what I see and am working so hard in my own life to accept.  We can not control others, we can not 'figure out' the reasons behind the madness.  The fact is, whether or not she did it for that specific purpose...it doesn't matter.  It was a tool she used to control/abuse you.  One of the steps I'm struggling to take right now is understanding that I can only function in facts and my imagination tends to run rampant.  So, it really is a difficult battle for me.  The assumption is: she found religion for the purpose to abuse you.  The fact is: she used religion to abuse you.   

I do hope you are able to find peace in your life.  I am learning this is a marathon, not a sprint.  Don't give up...there is victory ahead for us!!

Thank you so much <3 I am so sorry that you grew up in a spiritually abusive environment. I am so happy that you came to a place of peace and safety spiritually. <3 Thank you so much for you thoughts, you are right, I do not know what she was thinking, all I know is what she did.

Dinah-sore, I'm really glad you raised this topic because I've been wanting to but was nervous about approaching it.

I'm an out atheist and one of the patterns in my relationship with my mother is quite similar to what you describe. I hid my beliefs for years from my family because I knew she would judge and condemn me, and she did. And so, because of that, I feel pretty nervous addressing this question because I expect to be silenced for stepping out of line. Which would not be consistent with the behavior I've seen on this forum, but happens a lot in our broader culture and in my experience, so it's always a risk. (Atheists are the most despised religious minority in this country. People historically rank us below criminals in preference in many polls, though this is gradually changing.)

Anyway, I grew up under uBPDm's thumb, and in various ways and at various times her approach to religion resulted in abuse of me. This ranged from indoctrinating me with ideas about evil that paralyzed me with fear, to enforcing strict rules about dating, purity, and chastity that taught me to be ashamed of my own body. She struggled with addiction but when she was doing better with that she encouraged me to look at everything through a fixed, narrow religious lens, where mistakes were evil and submission was everything. My uNPDf, meanwhile, was an atheist and this disagreement between two disordered people meant family fights always had lots and lots of fuel. My M judged his soul. My F judged her vulnerability. I wish they had divorced.

Nevertheless, I joined a hardline religious group myself in my late teens and this was my route to escape, because it was cult-like and we all lived together = housing. I was in the ministry full-time. What I learned there was an advanced education in the kind of psychological control my M used on me. We learned how to hook people by identifying their vulnerabilities. Advancing in the faith and organization required intensive spiritual counseling, wherein unlicensed and unschooled leaders would promise to "heal" our emotional and psychological wounds with their spiritual powers. Instead, they got us hooked: only by obeying the rules of the faith just so, as they knew and taught better than others, would resolve the problems they had identified inside us. I participated in this first as a recipient and then as a practitioner. There were beautiful aspects where love and friendship were guiding us, but ultimately, I have mostly regrets. I have since tried to make amends for participating in psychological abuse, where I could. In my defense, I was very young and quite ignorant.

In any event, it turns out I really had been looking for love all along (gee I wonder why) and it turned out my cult wasn't actually a great place for it. On the way out I became aware of how easily religion is used as a means of control and, you know how it is, once you see it, you can't unsee it. Before anyone accuses me of proselytizing for atheism, please know that in many cases, I have witnessed religion bring people great hope or peace or community or stability, and thus I have no desire to tear other peoples' beliefs down. In my own life, faith did ultimately provide me an exit from my abusive FOO, and I think faith often "delivers" us in various ways, at the very least by changing our perspectives or habits. So please, readers who are people of faith, know that I respect you and your choices and wish you nothing but peace, wherever your path takes you.

The dark side is where religion is used as a means of control and subjugation. It is, in my experience, usually easiest to notice it in the practice of some other, less familiar religion. The one on the other side of the world, so to speak. But every religion has an obvious version of this (or a hundred) that is a bit shocking to outsiders. This is when the control aspects are institutionalized most, shall we say, "narcissisticly," that is, in the interest of something other than the well-being of the populace, and it is inevitably couched as being in service to the divine. The divine needs a new luxury jet, or a new degree of submission, or a focus on just this one issue to the exclusion of the rest of sacred text. The divine needs collective amnesia or to reinterpret or rewrite history. The divine in these cases sure does seem to have a lot of weird needs. And, usually, the people who are on the victim end of the divine's so-called needs are the most psychologically or sociologically or economically vulnerable, although nobody is immune from getting caught. Even extreme cults often attract the very nicest people: empaths and highly sensitive people who care oh so very much about the needs of the divine. It turns out predatory behavior has its analogues in ever strata of human experience, and the hierarchical impulses that so easily result in subjugation can be found everywhere you look.

I digress. Dinah-sore, I think your interpretation of things with your mom makes a lot of sense. Let's assume mom isn't actually happy inside. She's got a problem to solve, and her conversion gave her a new shot at that. It also happened to give her a new set of tools. If she was PD, she is going to use what is at hand to get her "needs" met. At your expense. It's like her tool was an iPhone initially, and then she switched to Android. I'm guessing the result for you was more or less the same, and that is she hurt you with her selfishness. 

I'm sorry it hurt. We probably have similar wounds. For me, the process of healing from spiritual abuse has been a gradual stretching and unfurling, figuring out where my new center of gravity is and what actually feels right to my soul. The easiest part was the moral compass: that shit is innate. It's been harder to recover a sense of connectedness, what with the abuse permeating every f*cking area of my life and destroying my trust not only in family, but community, as well. I've come a very long ways and I am eager to see where the recovery ultimately takes me, now that I've finally got this PD piece of the puzzle to work with.

Hugs and peace to you. We'll both get there. We're on our way.

Dear RavenLady, thank you so much for sharing your perspective. Your past experience is so enlightening. And while it is more severe than the culture I am in right now, what you said is exactly what I am seeing. I do think that many of the people in my church are kind and well meaning, but I also see that this environment can be a breeding ground for narcissists and dangerous to people who happen to be codependent (which happens to be my programming). As I break out of the codependent mindsets I am seeing the ways I allowed myself to be controlled by others, under the guise of spirituality. And I do not want my children to have to deal with spiritual abuse. They are just starting their teenage years and they are going to make a lot of mistakes. I don't want them to deal with excess shame, but healthy regret and the desire to make things right and do better next time. I don't want them to live as people pleasers or fake pretenders, just because it is hard to measure up. I don't want them to worry about losing love or being shunned when they mess up. I also, don't want them to think that they need to represent me or hold up their father's reputation in the church. You know?

I am sorry for the ways you were hurt by religion. But I love the way you worded your comment. You presented your beliefs in such a kind and healthy way. I think we should all be free to do that. Right now I am not. Right now I cannot be authentic without repercussions, just little doctrinal differences that I have, nothing divisive or what christians would call "heretical" but in our church, you have to have the "hive mind."

Dinah-sore, I think you are quite right in thinking that your mother is manipulating you using her version of religion.  She can tell you that you have to do what she wants you to do, only saying that it's what God wants rather than saying it's what she wants.  It makes it much harder for you to fight against it in your head. 

It might help to stop and think every time she brings religious talk into a conversation.  Is she trying to push you in a direction that she wants you to go?  What is her motivation?  Is it self-serving?  Keep in mind that she gets satisfaction from bringing you low, so the benefit to her might be hard to see from the point of view of a kind-hearted person, but for her it's there. I suspect that if she sees you doing something that brings you any sort of happiness she would like to throw a wrench in there. 

Thank you for your comment. <3 She does use religion to tell me what to do. And if I don't do what she says she thinks God wants me to do, then her nonverbal communication will inform me of her disappointment or "worry." For example, I stopped going to a class at the church/school that she went to because she would constantly throw me under the bus and mess with me every time I went. People here told me that I should consider dropping the class. I did. I feel less stress and anger. But she acts like I am not as committed to God. I feel like saying, I didn't drop the class because I wasn't committed to God, but because you are mean to me! LOL.

Even yesterday she told me that she had a conversation with a woman in the class who was telling my mom what a good job I do at public speaking in the class projects and discussions. My mom told me that her response to this compliment was, "You don't think Dinah is out of line?" I was shocked that she would actively speak against me, even though I got good scores in the class and the teacher and the peers seemed to respect my work. The woman was shocked that my mom would say that. And so was I. I asked my mom, "You think I am out of line?" She said, "No, YOU think you are out of line, so I was just fishing to see if this woman did too. She doesn't. She disagreed with me." I said, "But mom, you told her that YOU think I am out of line." She said, "Yes, but I couldn't tell her that you think you are. So I told her I think you are, just to see what she would say." I said, "I don't think I am out of line, what does that even mean? But you told someone you think I am." She doesn't think she did anything wrong. She thinks I should just be happy the other lady likes me, and that she was helping me see her true motives by insulting me in front of her. I think that is crazy! I guess what she meant about me being "out of line" was one time I addressed domestic violence in class. My mom said that people in church don't like to hear about that, so she worried that people would think I was out of line. I told BPDm, "Why? Domestic violence is sinful?" I am sitting here still in shock. So this conversation, all while she is still taking a class, that I am no longer in, acting like I am not committed to God, and telling others that when I speak and they like me, that she thinks I am out of line.

[WomanInterrupted]

That conversation your mom had with the other woman at church - I'd be willing to bet it never happened, and your mom made it up to undermine you and make sure the ground is still shaking beneath your feet.

Heaven forbid you actually feel like you're on stable ground, you know? 

UnBPD Didi would tell me others said this or that, her doctor said, or the all important "they" said - I don't think any of it actually happened, especially her doctor telling her to make her "no good, lazy daughter" to take her to the casino.   

Didi did say she "defended" me - but again, I don't think that conversation actually happened.  I think it was her way of trying to make me feel bad, which was a pretty regular thing for her.  If she wasn't panning the way I looked or dressed, she was hitting me with things "others" think or say. 

So just consider the source the next time she feels the need to tell you some kind of outlandish story that doesn't seem to make much sense - especially when she's telling *YOU how YOU really feel!*   

She can't know how you feel - only you know that.  But again, she's trying to play at being omnipotent -- on par with God, no less, in that she seems to know his will better than anybody else, especially when it comes to telling you how to think, act and be!   

Another thing I wanted to address was "keeping secrets" from your DH, in regard to DD.

That's not keeping secrets.  That's your daughter placing her trust in you to keep her confidence, and it's an important part of the mother-daughter bond.  That's you, the mom, putting the information in The Vault of Safe-Keeping, and your daughter knowing she can trust you to keep that information safe in The Vault. 

Normal mothers and daughters typically talk about stuff that well, maybe dad doesn't need to know, and what she told you is something dad doesn't need to know, because you're afraid he'll fly off the handle about it, or react badly - or worse, give them a brisk-talking to, which is tantamount to shaming both your DD and her boo. (As well as giving others fodder for the forbidden *gossip* - which, IME, tends to flourish in religious communities, even though it's *not supposed to.*) 

As long as your DD knows she can trust you, she'll come to you for more advice - and with more of her problems, instead of hiding them. 

If she tells you something *serious*  (potentially damaging to herself or another person, or possibly about illegal activities) - that's when you might have to tell her, "I'm going to have to let your father know about this.  Do you understand?"

That way, you're not going behind her back and the problem will be addressed, appropriately. 

But most stuff probably won't need dad's input, especially when it comes to the social hierarchy of teenage girls and trying to navigate that whole quagmire!    

See?  BIG difference between keeping secrets and not betraying a trust.   

Seeing it on the page, it seems so easy - but it's not for us, because we didn't have normal mothers! 

We had mothers that overshared *everything* and figuratively stuck their noses up our behinds, with a magnifying glass in hand - or alternately ignored us - and nothing about our childhood or teenage years was anything *remotely* close to normal!   

So this really is new and uncharted territory for you - and you're doing a wonderful job with it! 

[RavenLady]

Even yesterday she told me that she had a conversation with a woman in the class who was telling my mom what a good job I do at public speaking in the class projects and discussions. My mom told me that her response to this compliment was, "You don't think Dinah is out of line?" I was shocked that she would actively speak against me, even though I got good scores in the class and the teacher and the peers seemed to respect my work. The woman was shocked that my mom would say that. And so was I. I asked my mom, "You think I am out of line?" She said, "No, YOU think you are out of line, so I was just fishing to see if this woman did too. She doesn't. She disagreed with me." I said, "But mom, you told her that YOU think I am out of line." She said, "Yes, but I couldn't tell her that you think you are. So I told her I think you are, just to see what she would say." I said, "I don't think I am out of line, what does that even mean? But you told someone you think I am." She doesn't think she did anything wrong. She thinks I should just be happy the other lady likes me, and that she was helping me see her true motives by insulting me in front of her. I think that is crazy! I guess what she meant about me being "out of line" was one time I addressed domestic violence in class. My mom said that people in church don't like to hear about that, so she worried that people would think I was out of line. I told BPDm, "Why? Domestic violence is sinful?" I am sitting here still in shock. So this conversation, all while she is still taking a class, that I am no longer in, acting like I am not committed to God, and telling others that when I speak and they like me, that she thinks I am out of line.

Ummm...this is 1) a crazy mindf*ck of a conversation to have with your Mom, and 2) extremely disturbing that she would want to silence talk about DV. Talking about DV saves lives. If it's uncomfortable to talk about, it's probably because it is happening and nobody has the guts to face that fact. Your mother sounds like the kind of person I would go to great lengths to avoid. Sorry.

[RavenLady]

Let me clarify: I'm so sorry she is your mother. I'm sorry you are having to work through all this ick and awfulness. You sound like a kind, tender-hearted person and you deserve better than having a M who can't cherish you and celebrate you and value you.

And I also should have said...thanks for responding kindly to my previous post. I was kind of nervous about it. 

[Dinah-sore]

Let me clarify: I'm so sorry she is your mother. I'm sorry you are having to work through all this ick and awfulness. You sound like a kind, tender-hearted person and you deserve better than having a M who can't cherish you and celebrate you and value you.

And I also should have said...thanks for responding kindly to my previous post. I was kind of nervous about it. 

<3 that warmed my heart. I get what you mean about getting nervous that someone would respond harshly to sharing your honest beliefs. I feel that all the time too. But I don't want to be someone who pushes people away. Your comment was so honest and kind and you blessed me. <3

Even yesterday she told me that she had a conversation with a woman in the class who was telling my mom what a good job I do at public speaking in the class projects and discussions. My mom told me that her response to this compliment was, "You don't think Dinah is out of line?" I was shocked that she would actively speak against me, even though I got good scores in the class and the teacher and the peers seemed to respect my work. The woman was shocked that my mom would say that. And so was I. I asked my mom, "You think I am out of line?" She said, "No, YOU think you are out of line, so I was just fishing to see if this woman did too. She doesn't. She disagreed with me." I said, "But mom, you told her that YOU think I am out of line." She said, "Yes, but I couldn't tell her that you think you are. So I told her I think you are, just to see what she would say." I said, "I don't think I am out of line, what does that even mean? But you told someone you think I am." She doesn't think she did anything wrong. She thinks I should just be happy the other lady likes me, and that she was helping me see her true motives by insulting me in front of her. I think that is crazy! I guess what she meant about me being "out of line" was one time I addressed domestic violence in class. My mom said that people in church don't like to hear about that, so she worried that people would think I was out of line. I told BPDm, "Why? Domestic violence is sinful?" I am sitting here still in shock. So this conversation, all while she is still taking a class, that I am no longer in, acting like I am not committed to God, and telling others that when I speak and they like me, that she thinks I am out of line.

Ummm...this is 1) a crazy mindf*ck of a conversation to have with your Mom, and 2) extremely disturbing that she would want to silence talk about DV. Talking about DV saves lives. If it's uncomfortable to talk about, it's probably because it is happening and nobody has the guts to face that fact. Your mother sounds like the kind of person I would go to great lengths to avoid. Sorry.

LOL Thank you. I was literally sitting there with my mouth hanging open in shock. I couldn't believe she was saying that, and saying it as if she was HELPING me!!!! I seriously think my head is going to explode one day!!!! LOL

That conversation your mom had with the other woman at church - I'd be willing to bet it never happened, and your mom made it up to undermine you and make sure the ground is still shaking beneath your feet.

Heaven forbid you actually feel like you're on stable ground, you know? 

UnBPD Didi would tell me others said this or that, her doctor said, or the all important "they" said - I don't think any of it actually happened, especially her doctor telling her to make her "no good, lazy daughter" to take her to the casino.   

Didi did say she "defended" me - but again, I don't think that conversation actually happened.  I think it was her way of trying to make me feel bad, which was a pretty regular thing for her.  If she wasn't panning the way I looked or dressed, she was hitting me with things "others" think or say. 

So just consider the source the next time she feels the need to tell you some kind of outlandish story that doesn't seem to make much sense - especially when she's telling *YOU how YOU really feel!*   

She can't know how you feel - only you know that.  But again, she's trying to play at being omnipotent -- on par with God, no less, in that she seems to know his will better than anybody else, especially when it comes to telling you how to think, act and be!   

Another thing I wanted to address was "keeping secrets" from your DH, in regard to DD.

That's not keeping secrets.  That's your daughter placing her trust in you to keep her confidence, and it's an important part of the mother-daughter bond.  That's you, the mom, putting the information in The Vault of Safe-Keeping, and your daughter knowing she can trust you to keep that information safe in The Vault. 

Normal mothers and daughters typically talk about stuff that well, maybe dad doesn't need to know, and what she told you is something dad doesn't need to know, because you're afraid he'll fly off the handle about it, or react badly - or worse, give them a brisk-talking to, which is tantamount to shaming both your DD and her boo. (As well as giving others fodder for the forbidden *gossip* - which, IME, tends to flourish in religious communities, even though it's *not supposed to.*) 

As long as your DD knows she can trust you, she'll come to you for more advice - and with more of her problems, instead of hiding them. 

If she tells you something *serious*  (potentially damaging to herself or another person, or possibly about illegal activities) - that's when you might have to tell her, "I'm going to have to let your father know about this.  Do you understand?"

That way, you're not going behind her back and the problem will be addressed, appropriately. 

But most stuff probably won't need dad's input, especially when it comes to the social hierarchy of teenage girls and trying to navigate that whole quagmire!    

See?  BIG difference between keeping secrets and not betraying a trust.   

Seeing it on the page, it seems so easy - but it's not for us, because we didn't have normal mothers! 

We had mothers that overshared *everything* and figuratively stuck their noses up our behinds, with a magnifying glass in hand - or alternately ignored us - and nothing about our childhood or teenage years was anything *remotely* close to normal!   

So this really is new and uncharted territory for you - and you're doing a wonderful job with it! 

Thank you Woman Interrupted, You know you are right, if she really did have that conversation with that woman, (which she might be making it up!) she is only making herself look horrible.

And thank you so much for what you said about my DD. It helps me a lot. I want to be a good mom, a normal mom, a safe mom, and I am learning it on the fly!!! LOL Your encouragement and perspective really helped me a lot. <3