Don’t trust anyone over 60?

Started by Call Me Cordelia, March 29, 2021, 08:40:44 PM

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Call Me Cordelia

I noticed that I am much more cautious and guarded around anyone of my parents' generation vs. people of any other age group. I don't trust my friends' relationships with their own parents and I guess project my own experiences on to them. Like your mom is babysitting? Watch out... I don't say those things of course, but I also don't say, "That's great!" I mostly just medium chill it and feel vaguely uncomfortable. Anybody else?

bloomie

#1
Call Me Cordelia - I can't say it is a particular generation or age group for me. It is when I observe or experience certain red flag behaviors or phrases that could reveal certain entitlements or attitudes from someone or between people in a family or close intimate relationship.

I feel an almost immediate huge slow down inside of myself and my senses go on hyper alert and I am very cautious going forward.

I am not sure it is always fair and I am not saying I am 'right' or labeling someone... but, I spent so many years not trusting my gut to my own harm that finding a good balance is an ongoing work.

I also do think that certain 'societal' practices that become 'norms' in some family dynamics and in familial hierarchy and structure - certain entitlements and expectations - are sometimes attributable to specific eras in which generations were formulating their paradigms that are incredibly hard to challenge and change within that generation.

This does not excuse in any way harm done to us. And it has helped me to be more understanding of my own elders when I consider that the world they grew up in and were formed in was so different than my own. Harder in some very important ways and so much simpler in others.

It sheds some light anyway and for me, that has been helpful.
The most powerful people are peaceful people.

The truth will set you free if you believe it.

Hopeful Spine

While I have my issues with my own parents (and in-laws) I happen to have a lot of friends from all age ranges, including women of my parents generation. 

When a friend and I talk about our parents she will usually say something like, "you know how our mothers generation was raised - to stay in the kitchen and serve man."  I always disagree with her. 

I've had enough experience with mature women to know that assured, confident FUN, strong, relaxed and interesting people have come from that generation. 

That is not the case with my mother.  Or my friends mother.  Which is probably why we get so frustrated with our mothers.

Call Me Cordelia

Thank you, Bloomie. After I thought about it a bit I realized it wasn't just the age thing, although I do think I have my guard up a bit around ANYONE'S parents. Be they older than mine or not. If I'm relating to someone as an individual outside of a family context, the same hypervigilance isn't there.

The same things that my kids, particularly my daughter, envy about their friends I simply do not see as all that great. I mean, maybe they are for them, but yes I think you struck a bit of a chord with something that could "reveal certain entitlements or attitudes." Like Sunday dinner at grandma's house every week that they almost never miss, for one example. Maybe it's a burdensome expectation. I tend to suspect it is, even though I'm aware it's not really my business.

I have had people suggest to me that maybe I can find surrogate grandparents for my kids and that feels like a big fat trap. I think we need to be okay with our family as it is. That's almost like telling someone just divorced she needs to get out and date because her kids need a dad.  :sadno:

It's also very possible that what I'm feeling is just plain old grief. Or maybe partly my training to never ask my parents for anything. I feel uncomfortable when parents support adult children. Like their car broke down so they borrowed their dad's car for the day while it got fixed. Stuff that's pretty normal and probably not a huge deal to the people involved. I just can't relate to that and it kind of blows my mind that parents can treat their children the way I would treat a good friend.

Boat Babe

CallmeCordelia. Your last paragraph sprang off the page to me. There's a lot of pain there and I think you've tapped into some grief that you didn't know you had. Which means you've been carrying it for a long time.  Time to put it down my dear. Sending hugs.
It gets better. It has to.

Call Me Cordelia

Or even more than a good friend. Being a MOM or a DAD or a GRANDPARENT. I just can't imagine it. To treat each other like family and actually being a family. With support being given and received in a healthy and balanced manner among all the members. For there to be a standing arrangement for childcare or shopping or visits that is really a manifestation of love and not a source of stomach-churning anxiety.

I'm having a lot on my plate right now, a particular need where it would be normal for family members to offer us support. We've built up a good FOC and community around ourselves, but it's just not the same. People have been generous and caring to us and I'm grateful, but it's not the same. It's not the same as having a regular family around, as people who have loved you your whole life and have your back no matter what. No idea what that's like, but I know what I have is nowhere near that ideal. I am chugging along doing what needs to be done same as ever, since you gotta do what you gotta do, but yeah. I have grief and anger coming up again and I didn't really recognize it when I first posted.

I'm still angry that my FOO and my in-laws resented everything I ever asked them to do. I'm angry I even had to ask. They expected me to take care of their needs when I had obvious and really severe stuff to take care of in my own FOC. I'm angry they shamed me for ever needing anything ever. I'm angry that they don't know or care. I'm angry to be on the outside looking in, but not looking in too much because it hurts. It's easier to just cast doubt on the good things in other people's lives and indulge the outer critic. I'm angry that I didn't even know I was hurting.

bloomie

Call Me Cordelia... you can't imagine it, but you can envision it and build strong, healthy, loving, reciprocal bonds within your own FOC. I know, because despite having been so very much on our own raising our own children in the darkest of nights our with parents on either side having shown a profound lack of genuine interest, generosity of spirit, and compassion toward us all, we have found a different way of life with our own adult children and you will, too!

QuoteI'm having a lot on my plate right now, a particular need where it would be normal for family members to offer us support. We've built up a good FOC and community around ourselves, but it's just not the same. People have been generous and caring to us and I'm grateful, but it's not the same. It's not the same as having a regular family around, as people who have loved you your whole life and have your back no matter what. No idea what that's like, but I know what I have is nowhere near that ideal. I am chugging along doing what needs to be done same as ever, since you gotta do what you gotta do, but yeah. I have grief and anger coming up again and I didn't really recognize it when I first posted.

I'm still angry that my FOO and my in-laws resented everything I ever asked them to do. I'm angry I even had to ask. They expected me to take care of their needs when I had obvious and really severe stuff to take care of in my own FOC. I'm angry they shamed me for ever needing anything ever. I'm angry that they don't know or care. I'm angry to be on the outside looking in, but not looking in too much because it hurts. It's easier to just cast doubt on the good things in other people's lives and indulge the outer critic. I'm angry that I didn't even know I was hurting.

My heart is with you.  :'( It is in these challenges that we feel the absence of free flowing familial love that is safe and sacrificial that keeps no record and is not part of a quid pro quo system.

Despite the very good and helpful efforts of those that do love and support us and our deep gratitude for those dear ones, it still hurts a lot and is a significant absence of an entire generation of sustaining and enduring love for us and our precious children. Very hard. I'm so sorry! :hug:
The most powerful people are peaceful people.

The truth will set you free if you believe it.

Amadahy

This thread is helpful to me. Thank you.  :bighug:
Ring the bells that still can ring;
Forget your perfect offering.
There's a crack in everything ~~
That's how the Light gets in!

~~ Leonard Cohen


Jolie40

Quote from: Call Me Cordelia on March 29, 2021, 08:40:44 PM
I noticed that I am much more cautious and guarded around anyone of my parents' generation vs. people of any other age group.

for me, it's the opposite

In high school, became good friends with mother of my best friend
she took me under her wing & when at the end of my rope with living at home, they let me move in with them for a while!
to this day, still friends with the "mom" who became a substitute parent for me & last time we spoke she said "I love you" to me!

was friends with a much older neighbor, too
unfortunately, she died a few yrs ago in her 70s

I felt "looked after" by these older women & they gave me what I craved from PD parent but never got

be good to yourself

Cat of the Canals

Right around the time I was realizing how dysfunctional my own family was, one of my oldest and closest friends was having a fairly catastrophic falling out with her FOO. I knew her parents very well growing up, and in many ways they seemed the opposite of mine. So I'd always envied her family quite a bit and was pretty shocked at the things she was telling me. The closeness I'd observed and envied was apparently something much more like enmeshment.

Once I started thinking about that, I realized I couldn't think of a single friend who didn't have at least one dysfunctional parent or family situation. I still can't. I have to remind myself (FREQUENTLY) that healthy parent/child relationships exist somewhere out there, even if I've never seen one in the flesh.  :P

MamaDryad

I've been thinking about this a lot myself. An old friend of my mother's (who sees her clearly and has excellent boundaries) has stepped into a sort of godmotherish role with me, and I keep expecting her to turn on a dime, even though that's not at all who she is.

I think for me, a lot of it is guilt. I know rationally that going no contact with my mother was crucial for my mental health and ability to raise my son. But there is a part of me that feels like by so doing, I've forfeited the right to have anyone care about me in a maternal way at all.

Call Me Cordelia

Wow, MamaDryad. I hadn't thought of that but it rings true. I have often heard from my parents some version of, "Well that was your choice." Like I broke up with a boyfriend and now don't have a date to the prom, sucks for you. I chose to have a baby, and now I want help??? You made your bed, now lie in it. That sort of thinking. I think I may have been applying that mindset to NC somewhat. I cut them off, so now I'll have to muscle through on my own. I'll have to take a good look at those beliefs. Obviously I have other support, but something like a mother figure does scare me.

Call Me Cordelia

Cat, that also seems true to me. I can't think of one adult parent/child relationship in real life that I would look at as a model. Sometimes I wonder if truly healthy people have one interaction with me and run. That's depressing, sorry.

SparkStillLit

MamaDryad and Cordelia, very thought provoking.
"That's YOUR choice" is one of updh's signature phrases, and Cordelia, you are right in that it it feels like a blanket statement voiding all future rights to support in whatever area it was about.
Plus, and worse, and backing up that feeling, if it's involving the YA, he will say more vicious things like "YA better not ask for another dime/support/anything ever remotely relating to situation/ ever again for the rest of YA's life, I'll never do this again" [other vicious crap along those lines].
This reinforces how I feel about things like that.

Breakthrough

So I guess my experience was very different.  Though my parents have their issues, they also were and are extremely supportive of their children.  I don't ask them for much because they are older and I don't want them watching my kids to be a burden.  They also aren't here very often for me to do that, in general, we have no family around and we just manage on our own.  My MIL and FIL are pretty supportive to my husband as well.  We are pretty fortunate that way, though the boundaries have been an issue with my parents and inlaws at times. 

I hear a lot of trauma in your words.  Honestly, my mom could be tough and unsympathetic at times, but I also knew she would give me the shirt off her back if it would do me any good, she loves us fiercely.  It sounds like your parents and inlaws were/are pretty selfish. 

I think what you are being triggered by is not the age, but the familial relationship.  Because is sounds like anything your parent figures did for you came with strings. I can understand that to a certain degree, as my parents were a bit like that too growing up, and I put a lot of pressure on myself to be independent as a result (I chose a quick career path so I could work and pay for any other education, which I then did, so I didn't burden my parents further, they had already committed to remortgaging their house to help pay for my eldest sister's education).  I think it did create some distance between my parents and myself, so I didn't feel dependent on them, partly because of the strings, and mostly because I didn't want to burden them.  My parents paid for a big chunk or all of my other siblings education, I paid my own way through entirely.  I see my siblings want to get them this or that and expect me to pitch in, but I don't feel the same obligation to do so since I don't "owe" them as much (though I often end up contributing anyway, I put my foot down when 2 of them expected me to contribute to a luxury vehicle, I didn't have the money, and I also don't "owe" them as much in my mind monetarily, though my parents were still very supportive to me, not so much with money as with my siblings, those 2 siblings still asked 6 or 7 times).

It sounds like you basically could never depend on them for anything, and that is rough.  I would say, work on that trigger.  It helps me to work through my mind that different relationships are different.  My relationship with my MIL is not as triggering partly because I know and work through the fact that many other ppl have much different, and better relationships with their MILs (and not all MILs are PD), but I think it's also easier because that's a less long lasting, and non formative relationship.  I think the parental relationship is a bigger trauma to work through because it was during your formative years and you should have been able to depend on them, I mean that is a parent's JOB.  It will probably be triggering for quite some time, but I do think it's helpful to distance yourself a bit from other people's relationships with their parents.  Their parents, are not your parents, relationship are complex and their traditions with their family might be enjoyable, wither way, it doesn't need to take up space in your mind and disturb your peace.  It's setting a boundary in your mind with that.