Posted on 10/27/2024 2:12:23 PM PDT by Az Joe
Is this Millennial generation out of their minds or what?!
I have tried hard to do my best, I've been generous. My son married a paranoid narcissist woman who suffered from pretty bad childhood abuse. Father ran out on her, stepfathers/mother's boyfriends abused her. She left home at 16 to escape it. I have offered to pay for her to get therapy.
Please be gentle, I'm doing all I can to help my grandchildren, and I worry about their mental health
Buy and quickly read the 2010 Third Edition of life coach Patricia Evans’ “The Verbally Abusive Relationship”.
In her Introduction she says that, yes, for Abuser and Victim she uses He and She, redpectively, but by that she is not saying that women do not abuse men. They certainly so, Evans says.
She also says this in her Introduction: Never in her clinical experience has she observe a single instance of an adult female abuser reform herself.
Abusive men do sometimes reform themselves, she says in her Introduction, but abusive women apparently never do.
Sad, isn’t it?
In any event, This Guy guarantees: It will help you greatly to read Evans’ book.
Unfortunately, you may not succeed in persuading your abused son to read the book. At least not until he hits rock bottom. But you should at least hand him a copy.
By the way, according to Evans, in situations like the one you’re describing, the roles of Abuser and Victim do not switch back and forth. So don’t fall for the gaslighting sure to flow like a holy flood from an abusive wife claiming she, and not her husband, is the abuser.
Many of those who have not yet read this book will tell you: All of the above is nonsense.
Once you yourself read it, though, you’ll conclude that, sadly, such people are all speaking out of ignorance. They actually might be gaslighting abusers themselves.
Final facts: Not once in her book does Evans use any form of the word “gaslight”. She also apparently deliberately avoids using any form of the terms “narcissism.”
This last was a smart move, really.
Perhaps:
Kiddies: Grandpa and Grandma are so much nicer than you are.
Mommy: I know how to stop those comparisons from being made.
Perhaps Grandpa and Grandma needed to compliment Mommy more frequently.
Note: There are other possibilities, such as if a divorce is upcoming and a judge is not to be given options of custody (by grandchildren) other than that of Mommy.
Thanks. I will look at it.
Those are not small things, especially if "church habits" means a grown child rejects Christ because he or she married a non-believer who raises the kids to think Christianity should be beneath their yuppie lifestyle.
That all sounds familiar, but it’s boys. I am hearing and observing that the youth are REALLY going nuts this generation. The TV shows, movies and music are telling them to disrespect their parents and authority. My moniker means something VERY important, but they won’t get it until they are about to get their heads cut off.
If you would say something that crude to a perfect stranger about something he or she posted to someone else, I think we may have located the problem.
I have similar feeling about what you say, too.
What I’d say is just tell the DIL that you’re there when she/they needs you, even to watch the kids, etc. AND THEN let them alone and wait. Eventually, a situation will crop up where they do need help. Let that happen.
Assuming that this part of the story is true, then staying away from someone who is trying to undermine your marriage would be a christian duty.
Amen and amen! Thank you for posting. Some young people think they have all the time in the world to get around to it... here we just lived through a pandemic and there are rumblings on the horizon. Not only does no one know the day or the hour when they may be taken out, but those who reject Christ have no idea how much deeper and richer their lives as a family could be if they let Him in. He knocks; but each individual needs to be the one to answer.
Sorry for the typos and grammatical mistakes.
An ausive wife, if she is at all on her game, will surely falsely claim ***victim*** status. It should be easy to see that she is lying if you take into account the overall situation. Which may well include the victim husband engaging in his own kind of self-destructive behavior by desperately trying to cover up or deny his wife’s years of abuse of him.
In raising children most people will never have such an opportunity for impact of the future, to influence and mold an entire life and that of others to follow. Do it well and the legacy of your success lives on. Do it poorly and that legacy lives on too and screws up lives you will never know, even like the tentacles of a cancer.
You will never know how well you did until the deed is done, good or bad, and until it is too late to change it by much, if at all.
I will never have grandchildren so will never be tempted to correct my mistakes there.
Too bad the only instructions we really have in raising children is seated in the recollections of how we were raised; sometimes that can be good. Once upon a time we had close knit and close by families. That usually worked out well and most people thought it was a good thing. That has changed a lot now. Of course, there is the Bible which is a good set of instructions for setting a good example of life and living but a person has to start listening to what it has to say early and earnestly. That usually happens only by guidance from someone.
It is the children that count. Not long after I had retired and moved back to the farm I was at the corner store getting gas. A truck pulled up adjacent, a grandmother and bright eyed happy little girl got out. The girl had a skateboard but I gathered no concrete at home and so she was delighted to use the concrete at the station. "Look what I can do grandmother!" Only to be met with grandmother snapping her head off. Dejected she got back in the truck. Treatment like that will crush a child's spirit and ruin lives and the cycle just keeps repeating. There are better ways to grow up.
Growing up I thought everyone had parents like mine. I grew up to find out that hardly anyone was as lucky my siblings and I were.
The average Redditor is a young single male who’s been educated in the government propaganda farms called public schools....
Thanks for the rant. Your kids will finally get around to communicating with you when they need something. I know how that works.
Wow...that sounds like a miracle!
Please read This Guy’s #61 and #70, for which your DIL (who reformed herself) is the exception to the rule. The exception the noted author says she herself has never personally seen.
But, if you live only 20 minutes away, and you're only seeing them, say, once every two months for a couple of hours, then your request to see them more often sounds more than reasonable to me.
My kids' grandparents lived an hour away, and we visited once a month on average, sometimes less often, sometimes more often. But, every visit lasted all day, late into the night. It was never enough time for the grandparents, though. (lol)
But, you live so close to your grandchildren that you could see them more often. Are the kids in sports or extracurricular activities? Watching them play sports, for example, is spending time with them. I don't know what your financial situation is, but could you afford to treat the family now and then? Your son and DIL wouldn't turn down free food, would they? Have you invited them all to your place? Maybe order takeout for everyone? If you like to grill, maybe a barbecue? Or, how about meeting for ice cream somewhere? Notice all my suggestions have to do with food. I don't have grandkids, yet, but I do trick bribe oops, I mean, "encourage" my adult kids to visit by making them a nice meal and dessert.
We do feel that we were granted a miracle. She still has her moments but by and large, she has been a pleasure. She had just delivered her second child weeks before she mentioned the D word, which she had talked about in the latter part of her pregnancy. We think there is definitely a hormonal component.
I also think there is some bit of mental illness hovering in the background. It runs in her family on her dad’s side. Her mom does too. I’m so glad we get along with our kids’ in laws.
For the time being, we are counting our blessings, and try to model every day what a loving marriage is like. Mr FF and I still act like the teenagers we were when we met. Very much in love with each other. Empty nesting has been very good to us. 45 years together, and married for 40 of those next March.
Prayers continue for healthy, loving marriages for our kids. And for those here on FR.
Praying for you AZ!
Oh nice, insinuating she’s crazy and needs therapy. Mind your own business. Never offer help unless asked.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.