Quote:
Originally Posted by Perna
When my stepmother and I would have problems, when I was very young, six or seven, when it got too much for her she would leave in the evening and go for a walk around the neighborhood. . . rather than kill me 
Maybe when you get roped in to helping in family situations where you don't have much actual authority and it doesn't go well for you, you could deliberately get dramatic (ruins their criticisms if you do it on purpose), throw your hands up in the air and announce, "I give up!" and walk out of the house. Sometimes my husband will ask me to do something or my advice and I'll do/give it and then he'll start questioning it and I'll "give up" like that.
You are not responsible for what others do or how they perceive you; that's their problem. If you don't want to leave the house, try a bathroom and close the door in their face? Keep centered on how you feel and you can't go wrong because that is all you have to go on, whether you feel like you are helping, being heard, making a difference. If you are not feeling "loved" then don't play! It's not your battle, no matter how much you would like to help your mother.
Boundaries are individual affairs and tools rather than "set"/lines drawn in the sand or a barbed wire fence box around us. One tries to gauge the other's intents and reasonings and what can be "gained" by reminding the other person of who you feel yourself to be.
It does not sound like your uncle has ever "seen" you as a person so he's probably not going to hear you either. It sounds like he treated you as he would treat his own child, and you are a niece, a "child" in his eyes. It was great that you told him you did not appreciate his saying "shut up" to you, speaking to you in that way but you were not able to follow it through with any "action".
Boundaries are two-fold, the person states the boundary and gives a consequence if it is crossed again in the same or close/similar spot. Instead, you "shut up" like you were told to? You needed to assert your power over yourself/actions/voice by saying something like, "Do not speak to me like that again or I will leave". In this case, it doesn't sound like it would not make a very big difference, because your uncle did not want you there in the first place and the "power" was uneven because you were going up against an older generation. The only way I can see that you could probably help is if your mother were stronger asserting her rights and you were a male, lawyer nephew, instead of a niece. In this instance, you have no "authority" or anything other than an opinion to offer and your uncle doesn't care and doesn't have to care; you can't make another person care and, if you think about it from his perspective/family history, how can he suddenly listen to a niece? The family has never interacted that way to teach him how useful and right and thoughtful your opinion is and "worth" listening to?
I'm reminded of when I went camping in New Hampshire one summer and the campground we were at was having problems with a bear and they set a bear trap in the campsite across from ours. Another camper was telling us the story of his family's interactions with the bear a few nights earlier; they were sitting around the dinner table and his 4 year old son came and told him, "Daddy, there's a bear behind the car". He immediately thought, yeah, yeah, sure there is, and disregarded his son. His son told him again and he told his son to shush but his son kept insisting there was a bear so he got up and went to look and, sure enough, he turns the "corner" around the other side of the car and here's a female bear coming at him.
It was a funny story for adults to tell each other; how likely is there actually to be a bear in a public campground? How active are 4-year old imaginations and how inclined are one's young children to say funny/bizarre things? Your uncle has never "seen" you as an adult, you're a 4 year old and he's a bear; your mother has to do her own work or get a park ranger (lawyer) to do it for her? |
Thankyou very much for the detailed explanation Perna. This really clarifies a lot about how boundries work and strengthens some of my doubts. I think I've always been assertive but while growing up, I always asserted but never "exercised" my boundries as you mentioned. Or, no actually, i would exercise it as in i'd run to my room crying and when I did that, my sisters would say I was making it up, or I was too emotional, or I'm just too dramatic.
My mom also said that he sees me as a kid and I told her, well that's gonna have to change because I'm an adult now and I can't be treated like a kid all the time, I feel disrespected.
And yes, I agree that my mother needs to be the one on my side, standing up for me, because if/when she does, things will change. But, this is only a dream. That's not really gonna happen, especially with her brother.
She doesn't like confronting problems. She likes to not think about them so they'd go away (that's how she thinks is right). We can't get a lawyer for this because it was my grandmas dying wish, as in, its not in the will. Its verbal. But he still agrees to give our portion, but only after HIS stuff is transferred. I don't trust him anymore though. The way he's dealing with this property stuff is just too shady for me.
I had also mentioned to him that it was his mom's dying wish, my mother's already 60, he's been holding our property captive for 18 years now. His response was "so what, i don't have to give it its not in the will". Yes, i agree. I suppose I was looking at it from how I would operate. If its someone i care about and its their dying wish, I'd definitely honor it right away and give it away without any friction.
My mom fears that if she stands up, her relationship with him will suffer and he's the only "close" relative she has outside of immediate family. I think she knows he's not being fair but then she doesn't want to confront that and still wants to see him as "all good".