Triggered

I was at my Mom's house over the weekend in preparation for a camping trip that my kids wanted to take me on.  I was prepared to do what needed to be done in order to get everyone's needs met around it, so I rolled up my emotional sleeves and "asked questions" from everyone so I could get all the information needed to make the correct decisions.  I took the info from one side and did what needed to be done on the other side, then brought the results back to the other, etc.  Unfortunately, my Mom interpreted my actions as malevolent, and then attacked me.  She thought I was only telling her what she wanted to hear and placating her.

Both my Mother and Daughter have similar issues around giving straight answers to these kinds of questions.  I know what's behind my Daughter's stuff, but not my Mom.  I would guess that they are probably the same or similar.  Asking them would be yet another exercise in futility, so I won't.  They will each simply use that opportunity to abuse me.  Another method of dealing with them is necessary. 

That night that I wrote that one blog about feeling overwhelmed, I got a really great insight into myself.  I saw that I had these impulses that could never emerge where I grew up, and only began to come out when I was living at the Homeless Shelter.  These were not impulses for evil or naughtiness, but impulses to love, be honest and be good.  I deeply, secretly wanted to be good, but my Mother would not believe me.  She would squash those impulses by humiliating me whenever they came up.  Somehow they threatened her.  The same with the others.  I could not love in my family.  It made me cry when I realized how gutted my life had been by her when I was small. 

When I laid on my bed awake thinking about all this, I got up and went to the bathroom, and one of my Client/Friends was in there.  I told her everything.  Telling her that I wanted to be good created this sensation of threat for me between us.  So I told her about that too.  I'm not sure she understood what I was saying.  She was very kind and supportive, but I think she thought that I doubted my goodness.  And that's not what I was experiencing.  It was the exact opposite.  It felt as if someone was going to come along and squash me, shame me or embarrass me because I said I wanted to be good.

So, I've spent most of my life placating my Mom by repressing my impulses to be loving, truthful and good.  It's kindof ironic how she thought I was being condescending towards her and placating her when I was actually expressing my goodness, love and truthfulness, but failed to detect that all my years of being totally blank when she asserted her assumptions and interpretations all over me were when I was actually placating her. 

I'm really glad that I awakened to that last week because that prepared me for this confrontation with my Mom.  When she attacked me by basically calling me a liar, I didn't take it.  I stood up to her and rebuffed her insult.  She tried to intimidate me, but I threw it right back at her and didn't bat an eyelash.  I knew who I was.  She said some stupid, childish things and left.  My Son got up from the living-room floor where he had been sleeping before the fight, and went into my Daughter's room.  The two of them were scared.  I was pissed.  I told them to just pack up everything they were gonna need for the camping trip and get ready to go, then had my Daughter call her friend to come and pick us up.  The van arrived within minutes and we piled our stuff in it and left.  My kids never want to go back there. 

Mom doesn't really want them there, but she tells us all that it's okay for them to come over.  She crosses her own boundaries that way.  Then when she gets pissed because they're there and doing things in her house and with her car, she attacks us.  So, we're all doing our best to give her what she really wants, not what she says she wants.  We've all had it with her dishonesty and meanness. 

I feel sad right now because I'm remembering some of my attempts to express those impulses throughout my life, and having them squashed or dismissed again and again.  My husband did it.  My Daughter did it.  My boyfriend does it.  My boss does it.  All of my bosses did it.  It's a deep trigger for me.