Quote:
Originally Posted by Asiablue
Peaches... obviously this touched a nerve for you. I wasn't being judgemental. I don't see calling someone's behaviour manipulative or passive aggressive as a judgement, just a fact. There are some behaviours that ARE passive aggressive and there are some behaviours that are either consciously manipulative ie a person knows they are doing something to illicit a response in another or unconsciously manipulative ie they are unaware that the way they are acting is forcing another person to act in a certain way.
I know there is reasons behind why people do it, i also said that those people need help with it and deserve help with it. But just as those people need support and understanding, i think it's fair to say that it's ok for others to admit to hating feeling manipulated, and put in a role they never asked for. I personally hate it because i have a parent who does these things and it has caused me much anguish and it has given me my own mental health issues because of it, i am in therapy because of some of that type behaviour, so it triggers me and i now refuse to be part of it for anyone else. That behaviour kind of triggers a reaction in me which is why online i stay away from it because i have nothing constructive to say.
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Asiablue,
Thanks for explaining where you're coming from. It helps me understand where your strong feelings originate. This thread triggers my own "parent issues," but in a different way. I certainly can understand how it evoked some powerful emotions for both of us.
I agree with you that sometimes a person with a desire to be loved or special to their t could be capable of trying to manipulate their t in some way to attain that feeling of specialness.
The thing that I objected to the most was how you seemed to be categorizing all people with a desire/need to feel special into that selfish, manipulative category. Not all of us act manipulatively. Not all of us feel entitled. Many of us feel undeserving of care and hate to even ask for help. And if we do ask, and find out what we want is "too much," we back off in shame.
Our crime isn't that we purposely maneuver situations and people into meeting our needs because we are selfish, manipulative people. Our crime (if it can be called such) is that we were never taught how to ask for, or receive help, in a balanced way. Either we kept our mouth shut and tried to forge through all our problems alone, or else we ended up cracking open and spilling our needs onto others in a way that was "too much" for them to handle. Once we realize our needs have worn somebody else down, we feel shame and go back to trying to be an island again, coping with our pain alone.
Often, our parents were not there for us when we desperately needed them, so we could not depend on them for support. So now, we don't know what IS or IS NOT acceptable when it comes to depending on others. We don't know what's normal, what's balanced.
People who don't struggle with these issues expect us to have these relational skills and are quick to label us as manipulative when, in actuality, we're just trying to figure out how relationships work. We don't know how to depend on others in a balanced way until we learn it, usually through painful trial and error.