TwitterJan 02 2010
Part 2, Let's Start with Monday. . . my mother the bully . . .
CONTINUED:
Honestly I don’t think my step-father processed that by him asking me to call my mother…he was asking me to “fix something that I had done wrong”. But that’s what was happening. And that’s exactly the power play I think she had been trying to create. I’m positive that after I called/!BLAM!med there was hell to pay coming from her. She has NEVER admitted that she ever did a thing to feel sorry for. I know for a fact that she had pressed, pushed, insulted, and degraded him all the years they have been married, making him wrong for all the problems. She was doing it when I was living at home, I’ve seen it since.
I’m not making my step-father innocent mind you, by no means he played his part. He was awful. But he has asked for forgiveness and admitted his wrong and by now time and again. AND he has CHANGED. For the most part he’s doing things completely differently. No one that has been that broken and is changing deserves to be beaten on. No one deserves to be harangued and demoralized when you’re the other person that played as equal a role in the mess. But this is what she has done to him in a very demoralizing manner all these years. Let me give a couple recent examples:
Example 1: Remember when I had gone home a few years back, to try to achieve some form of establishing a basis for us to move forward from, in a healthy manner rather than just enduring the periodic forced phone calls she had pushed on me for the few years prior? (click here for post) Well, during this very meeting she said, “I regret ever marrying him. He ruined my life and my children’s. He was the reason for all the problems…” Then, through tears, she went on to ask, “How could you just forgive him after he destroyed our family and lives.” I was so so shocked I said, “I can’t believe you. He’s sitting right here. How can you do that? Not to mention this is the man you have been married to for over 40 years. You played your role or have you forgotten? My God you’re awful.” Her response was tearless with a small care-less shrug she said, “Yeah, well.”
Example 2: She had told my brother the week before that I had “called” (the !BLAM!) and, “Theresa was extremely rude and mean to me. Here your father had caused all the problems and ruined everything and she treated him like royalty and me like shit.”
So, it’s pretty simple to put two and two together even if you don’t know a lot of history. She’s been bullying him to carry all the blame for years…and it’s obviously worked. Look at his reaction to me.
Well, anyways, there was no way I was getting cornered like this. I had compassion for him but I’m sorry this wasn’t happening. My mother needed to stand on her own two feet. Be an adult. Own her stuff. I wasn’t getting bullied anymore. That call/!BLAM! I had made was serious to me. To my life. To my growth. To my experiencing real healing. And no one was going to take this from me. I had already been through the issue of her backing me into a corner a few days earlier (click here to read that post), I wasn’t going back. No sir. And frankly all I could think was, what on earth has that woman done to you??? I felt his pain. I felt the shame she had foisted on him. I felt more love and compassion. AND I KNEW how he felt. My mother had done the very same thing to me for my entire life.
This call gave me exactly what I had cried out for for the days I was stuck in that corner…
Strength to stand up for myself and never go into my corner again.
Giving me even more resolved to not back down.
To stop the sadistic cycle my mother had created:
The fear,
the control,
the intimidation,
the psychological torquing she had done to my brain,
to stop concerning myself with what she might do to me or herself if she were pushed in any way. (since I was young she’s threatened, “I wish I were dead.”)
Monday morning I began to be equipped to take my life back in a new way.
To beat that iron mask of worthlessness into a new shape…
Night, love ya,
Theresa Jane
-more tomorrow
