Thanksgiving aftermath - family feud

Parent Cafe
41

@garland I am stunned, hurt, upset or any other words you want to use if you read my post and think for one second that I would “be patient and accept abuse” tell my children or anyone on this board to “be patient and accept abuse.” I hope you think twice before putting words in someone else’s mouth again. That is a blatantly false statement.

It is important to note that my comment is on page one. It sounded to me like a dispute with annoying, loud parents where the dad thinks he is always right… to me at that point it read more “annoying and difficult old people” than smacking of a long term abusive relationship. Going back and reading the first post over now I did look past some red flags for which I apologize – but for me the abuse part of the relationship came more apparent when the OP came back later (which I just read now) to add to the post citing a “lifetime of repressed anger and resentment” and yet another post even later calling her father a “narcissistic bully and my mother his chief enabler” – neither of those comments were on the board when I replied.

Let me make this perfectly clear – while I’m all for patience with the elderly, nobody should “be patient and accept abuse.”

42

@happy1, there is no reason for you to be stunned, hurt or upset over someone’s interpretation of your post. That seems unnecessary, just explain what you meant. I can understand why garland read your post differently than you intended, when you wrote:

It also struck me as a bit odd, and I’m
generally a “do whatever it takes, life is short”, sort of person. But it wasn’t till later posts that I realized the parents are downright abusive, and likely you hadn’t come to that conclusion so early in the thread.

43

@busdriver11 If you are not stunned, hurt by a person suggesting that you would accept abuse and recommend to your own children or others that they accept abuse, then I guess we have different criteria. Sorry, but having my name associated with accepting or telling people (especially my own children) to accept any form of abuse is both offensive and shocking. Nobody has the right to attribute that sentiment to me.

There is a difference between being patient with elderly parents (which I try to do) and accepting abuse (which is unacceptable). And for the record, while my mom can be difficult she absolutely isn’t abusive. There is a difference.

Apologies to the OP for going off topic but I just could not let that comment stand.

44

Congrats to rockvillemom for standing up for herself !
It is totally liberating to say what you actually think. It takes quite a bit of practice. Years in fact. Better late than never.
It is probably a real surprise to your parents but you are not responsible for your parents reactions. It doesn’t mean you need to disengage from your parents–it means you can interact with them and protect yourself. No need for apologies.

I don’t give a pass for bad behavior just because someone is elderly unless I know they have mental decline or illness of some sort. Age alone doesn’t allow you to treat others badly. Good young people grow into good old people.
Your son sounds like a gem.

45

No, I’m not stunned and hurt by someone I don’t know misinterpreting what I wrote in a forum. People read things differently all the time. Sometimes it is just their interpretation, sometimes it wasn’t clear what I wrote. All you have to do is explain what you meant, not get upset by it. I agree it is a poor idea to put words into someone else’s mouth, it is better to ask questions about what they meant.

46

RVM, my dad is like that too, very controlling. He does have over the top reactions and anger, but not in public. (He will freak out if something doesn’t go according to plan. He doesn’t hit or name call, but he will try to reclaim control in ways that don’t make sense.) The key difference in my family has been we acknowledge it, including my mom. Because of that, we kids became financially independent pretty quickly so any threat to be cut off was meaningless. I can remember my dad’s face when he realized he had no control over me, that he could offer an opinion and I was free to accept it or not. I was in my early twenties.

The emotional part persists, of course. I wish he would be more supportive and encouraging even now in my fifties. And my sibs have adapted differently to the situation. One brother is still resentful and it affects his life. I wish I could make him understand that it doesn’t matter whether or not our dad agrees with what he does. The rest of us support him. This includes financially. My dad will still threaten to leave someone out of the will. My folks have decent assets, but aren’t rich. If they live long enough they could consume them. My sibs and I have agreed that if anyone gets cut out, we will just redivide the assets the way they should have been divided. Yes, the emotional sting will be there, but any cut off sib will know the rest of the family has his back.

Interestingly enough, my kids handle my dad well. They just see him for short periods of time and can weather his outbursts. Sometimes they give in, sometimes they gently nudge him to a better path.( I warn them that grandpa can be controlling and freak out. Mostly it has been in small ways, like he won’t let them order for themselves off a menu. He chooses what they eat. But they saw him lose it in bigger ways when the folks were moving to an apartment and my dad did a full scale tilt. Things were moving too fast for him and he froze us all while he angrily sought to impose an order he understood on the process.)

Take this break. You deserve it, especially if you are the one who has to deal with him all the time. Your son sounds wonderful.

47

Just a general comment that I don’t think we ever “earn” or “deserve” an inheritance. The money is our parents to do with as they please. Period. We don’t stay in a relationship for that reason. We do it because that is the right thing to do and because we wish to honor our parents. I do not mean that we accept abuse or disrespect. I love all the suggestions about removing ourselves from unpleasant situations and taking a break can be very healthy for all parties, I think. I think there is a lot of wisdom and experience in this thread from some really loving adult children who are trying so hard to do their best.

48

@rockvillemom I’m sorry for you having to go through this. At 89, you’re probably at your sunset of your relationship with him. You’ll probably have a different relationship with just your mom. On a glass half full note, your son sounds wonderful.

49

@happy1 --you are correct that I interpreted “I’m not saying you need to apologize but I would try to give them a break” as “be patient and accept abuse” and that was not your words. You started by saying that you saw it differently from other posters, which may be why I misinterpreted–which i agree is not an excuse.

50

Here’s another book on this topic that I found useful: https://www.amazon.com/Coping-Your-Difficult-Older-Parent/dp/038079750X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1511800648&sr=8-1&keywords=difficult+parents

51

@rockvillemom , I’m sorry that you’ve had to go through this and I hope you can find some peace during your break whether it’s short term or permanent.

IME, you can probably expect some push back from siblings if you suggest they need to become more involved with their parents and they may even claim that you’re exaggerating any bad behaviors. At least that’s what happened to me, and it continued after my mother died. One brother, who was favored by our mother both emotionally and financially, tried repeatedly to rewrite history and claim that none of her abusive behavior ever happened while at the same time trying to shame me for refusing to deny my own experiences with her.

Clearly, you’re a far better parent than they were to you and that’s something in which you can take both pride and comfort. I hope you can focus on your own family and allow yourself to disengage from your parents.

52

It’s been my experience that to expect that your siblings won’t pick up any slack. It’s been my experience that they will whine that they are too busy, that they will call you to complain about your parents and generally not be helpful.

I pray that your siblings will be better than mine.

53

@rockvillemom Let me give you some encouragement from the other side. We too had a scene in a restaurant that was the final straw in a lifelong difficult parental relationship. In my case it was my MIL at the DD’s high school graduation dinner. It was bad.

Long story but DH made the decision to extremely limit contact with his mom until and unless she apologizes. Given her proven inability to ever accept blame or responsibility for her own actions this is very unlikely to occur. We have not spoken since (1 1/2 years). We mutually exchange Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas type texts and include each other on rare email updates sent to extended family. Every couple of months she sends another scathing email or letter to DH demanding that he reconcile with her and accusing him of every evil under the sun. He calmly re-sends his original email asking for an apology to our daughter for the way she acted at her graduation celebration and offering to talk to her on the phone about it if she calls. She has never called.

But I did promise encouragement. Life has been much better without her in it. We are sad for her. She is missing out on being a part of our lives. When someone has been impossible to please the sense of relief when you finally stop trying is immense. My biggest regret is not taking the step sooner. We have been taking various steps to limit her ability to control and hurt us since early in our marriage but even with all those barriers in place this final-ish break has been much needed.

Hang in there. It is tough. Everyone deserves love and acceptance from their parents and it hurts not to receive that no matter what your age.

54

OP:
How stressful for you & your DS! On what should have been a fun & enjoyable holiday. When I first read your post, I thought, “Regardless of what total buttheads the grandparents are being, this parent did a great job…look at how compassionate the DS was.”

So bravo, OP. Total parenting win there. Seriously.

Some thoughts about your toxic parents -

  1. You teach others how to treat you. Just because they are your parents doesn't mean that you should allow yourself, in your 50s, to put up with verbal & emotional abuse.
  2. Sometimes with people like your mom & dad, the best way to deal with them is to just not say a word, get up, and leave. It's the only thing that will get their attention.
  3. Whenever my extremely difficult mother-in-law is stepping over the line, my DH basically puts his mom on a time out. So yes, we are using preschool behavior modification tactics on my MIL. But it works.
  4. Re: the inheritance threat - it's just money. Don't spend the rest of your parents' lives (and what is now your entire adult life so far, perhaps) putting up with horrible treatment just because of the money. I'm serious about this. Is it REALLY all that worth it? My parents thought so. They put up with all kinds of horrible stuff from my paternal grandparents for years. And once both of my GPs died, you know what happened? My GPs had basically cut their kids out of the will almost entirely. So all of those years of that were for nothing.

Would an inheritance be nice to have? You bet it would. Should your parents leave the money to you and your siblings with no strings attached? Of course they should. But clearly, that is not the sort of people who your parents are. Don’t allow yourself to become a slave to it.

  1. Only YOU can decide what YOUR personal boundaries are. Decide what those boundaries are. And then be prepared to enforce them.
  2. When you enforce those boundaries, be prepared for your parents to get really ticked off. Furious. Get ready for Flying Monkeys to show up or call. What's a Flying Monkey? It's from the Wizard of Oz...a Flying Monkey is somebody (a family member or a family friend) who knowingly or unknowingly contacts you and tries to overtly or passive-aggressively manipulate you into going back to the old way of doing things.
55

Another way to look at the Flying Monkey concept is to consider this analogy…

DON’T ROCK THE BOAT!

At some point in your youth, your parents (or whoever the dysfunctional family member is) gave the boat a little nudge. Look how everyone jumped to steady the boat! So your parents do it again. And again. Pretty soon, the family is in the habit of swaying to counteract the crazy behavior. Mom & Dad move left, everybody else moves right and balance is restored (even if temporarily). Life goes on. Some people move on to boats of their own.

The boat-rocker can’t survive in a boat by him/herself. He/she has never had to face the consequences of his/her rocking. He/she will tip over. So he/she finds an enabler: someone so proud of his/her boat-steadying skills that he/she secretly (or not so secretly) lives for the rocking.

Boat-rocker escalates. The boat-steadier cannot manage alone, but can’t let the boat tip over. After all, he/she is THE best boat-steadier ever, and that can’t be true if his/her boat tips over, so, therefore, the boat cannot capsize. How to fix this situation?

Ballasts.

And the next generation of boat-steadiers is born. A person born into boat-steadying doesn’t know what solid ground feels like. He/she is so used to the constant swaying that anything else feels wrong and he/she will fall over. There’s a good chance that Boat Rocker never taught Boat Steadier how to swim either. Boat Steadier will jump at the slightest twitch like his life depends on it.

Now you’re in the boat, too. And since you’re in the boat with them, you’re expected to help steady it. When you say no, the other boat-steadiers get resentful. Look at you, just sitting there while they do all the work! They don’t see that you aren’t the one making the boat rock. They might not even see the life rafts available for them to get out. All they know is that the boat can’t be allowed to tip and you’re not helping.

Now you and/or your significant other get a boat of your own. With you or your significant other not there, the balance of the boat changes. The remaining boat-steadiers have to work even harder. While a rocking boat is most concerning to those inside, it does cause ripples. The nearby boats start to worry. They’re getting splashed! Somebody do something!

So Flying Monkeys are dispatched. Can’t you see how much better it is for everyone (else) if you just get back in the boat and keep it steady? It would make their lives so much easier.

You know what would be easier? If everybody just got out of the boat, stopped playing the game, and left the toxic person(s) to have to steady the boat on their own.

You will probably be accused of horrible things by your parents. Here are some choices phrases that people like this use in order to get you back in line. Don’t fall for the guilt trips.

  • “After all we’ve done for you!”
  • “You are no son/daughter of mine!”
  • “There goes your inheritance!”
  • “I can’t believe you’re speaking to me this way!”
  • “How DARE you disrespect me/your father/your mother like this!”
56

^^wow interesting @tucsonmom!

I read somewhere that - in toxic families especially - people are not allowed to leave their lifelong “role”.

57

For those who suggest talking to them rationally about this, I would say that they are probably master gaslighters. They will appear completely puzzled (as if you are speaking in tongues or something) and then brush off whatever you said. The language of empathy and being kind to everyone, or taking someone else’s feelings into account, probably isn’t a language they even speak.

58

I always take my own car to any any family function and I do not drink so that I can drive away whenever I want to (whenever I need to). And I do leave, from houses, from restaurants. I just leave.

Since I’ve adopted this policy, things are calmer. They didn’t want me to leave because I’d take my children and they like my children.

59

It’s never easy.
Some of our parents are wonderful in public, people rave how nice. It’s in private that we get both barrels loaded.

They can set targets because that person always “took it,” one way or another. When we’re young, intimidation and punishment work. So when we try to call a halt or in any way dispute them, (“This table’s fine,”) they rage. It’s a power struggle. It escalates…because that’s the pattern that, through time, worked. And the chance to rage is fulfilling. Because it gets what they want.

So you can’t argue, that’s defiance. Walk away from that moment.

60

I’ve done the whole “get up & walk away” thing myself with my own parents. It was ages ago now earlier in our marraige and at the time, DH & I lived about 20 min from my parents. We had arranged to meet at a favorite restaurant for dinner.

My parents had this unreasonable expectation that you would somehow just “know” what their various rules were for various things. Case in point: a man must shave every day.

I don’t have any brothers. My parents never said a word about this until one day out of the blue, they blew up at me about how “disrespectful” my DH was being by not having shaved that day before being in their presence.

DH & I met outside the restaurant - he having just come from work (after working a horribly long shift) and me having just come from work. My parents were already inside. DH hadn’t shaved yet that day and we realized it when we were about to walk inside. So out of respect for my parents’ stupid rule, DH drove home to our apartment and shaved and then came back.

In the meantime, I went inside by myself and World War III unleashed. It was a very crowded restaurant that evening and my mom started in on how horrible & disrespectful we were since DH didn’t shave. It wasn’t enough that he was respecting their dumb rule by going home first to shave, since seeing 5:00 shadow on his face was apparently so awful.

After several minutes of being verbally berated, my DH arrived and by that time, I’d had enough. I said to DH, “Let’s go. We’re going home.” I got up and put enough cash on the table to cover our portion of the meal. My mom got upset and said, “Sit down, this is embarrassing! You’re making a scene. Be quiet. People will hear you.” I’d been talking in a normal volume up until that point.

That’s when a switch went off in my head. It all just clicked. I said to them in a loud voice, “It’s never enough for the 2 of you, is it? It’s not enough that we are respecting your stupid rule…the stupid rule that you never actually TOLD me about until we’d been married for over 7 years. So for 7 years, you were mad and said nothing. You want to talk about disrespectful? How about being mad at somebody for 7 years and not giving them the respect to actually TELL them what they did to make you mad! No, I’m done. And I don’t care what all these people think about us. I don’t know them and I’m never going to see them again. YOU are the ones who CHOSE to pick a fight in a public place YET AGAIN because you KNOW that we ALWAYS follow the rule of “nice people don’t raise their voices.” Well, forget that. WE came here to have a nice dinner with the 2 of you, but you know what? Now you’ve gone and ruined it. We’re leaving.”

My parents pulled that nonsense repeatedly for years after that. So I can’t tell you that by doing the “walk away” method that they will get the message right away. But if you’re consistent with it for long enough, eventually they will give up. My parents finally did.

The “walk away” method can also be used when your parents are berating you in private. Always make sure that you have your own transportation. A get away car. Of if you don’t have that, Uber or Lyft on your phone so you can call for a ride.

The “walk away” method also is easier to implement if you are not meeting with them in your home. Go to their home or a neutral 3rd party location. Even better if it does not require you to pick them up and drive them to the 3rd party location.

BUT…let’s just say that your cranky elderly parents DO depend on you to drive them places because they no longer have driver’s licenses. And let’s say that you DO pick them up again and take them to a restaurant. Let’s say that your dad DOES act like a donkey’s butt in the restaurant. Here’s what you can do:

  1. Get up, go speak to the server and/or manager. Apologize to the restaurant staff for your parents' donkey's butt behavior. Pay the bill in full.
  2. Go back to the table.
  3. Say to Donkey's Butt Dad and Mom (who won't say a thing for fear of upsetting Mr Donkey's Butt), "Perhaps now is not a good time. I'm sorry that you're upset, but it appears that nothing can be done about this. Here, I'll take you home where you'll be more comfortable."
  4. Then get up and help Donkey's Butt Mom and Dad out of their seats and to the car.
  5. When Butt Head Dad and Mom make even more of a scene, that's when you get even more calm & patient. Just repeat things out loud to them like, "Oh I'm sorry to hear that you're upset." Or "That's too bad." Or "I'm sorry you feel that way." You aren't agreeing with them. Nor are you arguing with them. You're just acknowledging that you've heard what they're barking about.
  6. If they become especially argumentative, stubborn, and flat out refuse to leave, then you say, "I'm sorry you're so upset. But we're leaving now. This is clearly way too upsetting of an activity for you right now. I'm leaving. I'll be out in the car waiting for you. However, I will totally understand and I won't take it personally if you do not want me to drive you home. I'm sure that the receptionist can call a cab for you. I'll be outside if you change your mind. You have 10 minutes to decide before I leave." Then you walk out to your car and wait.
  7. 10 minutes later, if they're still in the restaurant stewing and making a scene, then you drive away. This is calling their bluff.

In the aftermath of it, they will be furious with you for a long time. But you know what? It doesn’t matter. Why? Because nothing you ever do is good enough. Because regardless of what you do, they’ve decided that you are an embarrassment, bring shame to their family, make them mad, etc., etc.

But you know what they will think twice about doing again?
Throwing a temper tantrum in a restaurant.