I agree with divine, no one responding to you is being narrow minded. Especially posters who are mothers themselves. And she is right, there are mothers who love their child and CARE about their child no matter how old their child is, even when their child is an adult.
However, there are mothers who never really bond with their child, mothers who are too self absorbed and quite frankly, they are not really good mother material. Instead it was just something they did next and did not really have that true longing to be a real mother. Oh, I've seen that type of parent and when that happens the child really suffers. I saw that in a traumatic way on a little culdesac I lived on with other parents around my age. This one mother had said to me how she could not wait for her two sons to get old enough to "get out" so she could have her perfect little house she had built all to herself. I remember seeing her son get off the bus and walk down to that pretty house all alone. He was unhappy and his parents clearly made him know he was a burden to them. Well, one day a while after I saw him get off the bus and walk down to that house, there were sirens suddenly coming down my little street.
As a young parent myself, I saw parents behave in a lot of ways that were upsetting. And there WERE children that I did NOT want my daughter playing with either. There were parents on that street that were very self centered, they would put their children to bed and then get together and smoke pot and get drunk and stumble around back and forth to each other's houses. So what if their children needed them? That's not something I cared to engage in, and yet they had to have THE bigger houses and better cars and designer clothes. Their boys became bullies and they picked on a little boy down the street that played with my daughter, a nice little boy. Oh I noticed them following this little boy trying to sneak up on him to pick on him and scare him. They did not see me watching and I went out and stared them right down and shamed the hell out of them. After all, it was not as though their parents were paying attention. (actually, they were too busy gossiping, even about each other and getting high and having to shop for their designer clothes and cars).
Truth is, I was very picky about the children I let my daughter play with. I tended to look for children who's parents were actually parenting responsibly and more interested in being involved parents. Truth is, I did not care about how "pretty" other mother's were either, instead it was the quality parenting that was more important to me. I have seen mothers that dressed their children up in matching outfits with themselves, it was not imeshing, it was more of connecting and it's not always BAD or WRONG. I never did that, but I might have if I had the ability to make my own clothes. Usually, those mothers make their own clothes and sew and pick matching fabrics. Eventually, a child will grow out of that and will want to pick their own clothes out.
My therapist and his wife wanted to have a child. My therapist's wife has ADHD and also struggles with depression. Even though his wife has ADHD, her IQ level is "genius". He told me that for his wife to have a child, it meant she would not be able to take antidepressants during her pregnancy. It was HELL for her and she turned to trying electro shock treatments to help her and he mentioned how it proved to be very helpful. Because it was SUCH A CHALLENGE they are only going to have that one child that a little boy. This little boy inherited the ADHD like his mother. They are VERY involved parents, and they have taken the time to LEARN about ADHD and they both take turns interacting with their young son. He explained to me how to handle the often short attention span that presents with ADHD. It was helpful in that my husband has ADHD and he has always been a challenge, and the knowledge about this challenge simply was not there when I could have used it to understand him better. Now, you may see them parent and decide it's too controlling, yet, they are parenting in a way that will HELP their young child learn how to deal with his challenge better.
For myself, I was a very hands on parent because my daughter has dyslexia and may even have some adhd like her father and grandfather. Yet, unless you knew me and what had to deal with, you may form an opinion that would have been totally OFF BASE. While my daughter had/has dyslexia, she was a wonderful engaging child and has a very high IQ. My daughter could say the entire alphabet by age 1. She was always a very busy minded child, very active and social and explorative. Oh I read to her every night, started that as soon as she could sit up on my lap. She loved sitting and having me read stories, she certainly had her favorite story we had to read every night too. She had an amazing memory and I even thought she was reading as she remembered each page word for word too. Later I would learn that reading was going to come very hard for her because of the dyslexia. HOWEVER, because she LOVED being read to and wanted to do it herself somehow, it gave her the desire to work very hard at reading.
I ended up building a business of my own so I could be THERE for her. And my business also put me around many, many children and families. I sure saw all kinds of parents and parenting styles. I remember going to a job where the individuals were extremely wealthy. And this woman walked by me with her beautiful young son and she was thin and attractive and everything designer and I bet her handbag cost a few thousand. She turned to me and said, "Sigh...my nanny could not come today, tell me WHAT TO YOU DO WITH "IT"? Oh, I will never forget the look on her face, and how she was completely detached from her child. Yes, I did see how some people had children only to hand them to someone else to raise them. Actually, I was reminded of that when I saw the movie called "The Help". There is a scene in that movie where the African American woman said, "I raised that child and gave it love, but it STILL turned out cold like the mother". Yes, I have seen that too, not in exactly the same way, but, in the type of mother that isn't REALLY a parent to her child. Hmm, what's the label that goes with that?
Well, I read what you have shared about your own parents and how your father was and how your mother struggled with depression and discontent. All I can say is I am sorry for you in that you deserved better than that for parents. I can't blame you for wanting to get distance, and it's possible you have a deep loathing for your mother too. Maybe it was your mother that imprinted you with the importance of "looks" as often when a woman is married to a narcissist that cheats it can lead to her thinking she may not be pretty enough to keep him. Oh there definitely was that going on in her generation.
I am concerned for you in that you are OK with being in a relationship with what you have shared is a sociopath and that you figured out how to handle him? Idk, in your post to me you share that like it's an accomplishment of some kind. Sorry but, god, that's just awful. Is this your own attempt to control something your mother never could? Is it supposed to be somehow "better" than her or stronger than her?
I am not really sure that what you are sharing about this other woman is wrong or if it's just very wrong to you due to how you were raised. It could be that this woman finally got to have her own child, and she wants to be very engaged with parenting her child. After listening to my therapist talk about what his wife had to go through to have their child, YES, they are very INVOLVED parents. Yet, they are also very involved because their child has some challenges and they geniunely want to help him navigate despite his challenge. I get that because it's exactly what I myself wanted and have seen other parents do for their challenged children as well.
I was so deeply disturbed by things I had seen happen with other parents that I went to see a therapist about it.
I saw things that frightened me tbh. And I sat and talked about my own history, and how my father did a terrible job raising my brother, and how he really regretted that later on when he was learning how children are supposed to be raised. I told my therapist how you never get a redo, you have one shot at developing a close relationship with your child and that's so important when they get older and NEED to talk about their challenges. You want them to be ok to come and talk to you, you NEVER want to face
because he was struggling and could not come to you.
Then one day I went in for a therapy session and the therapist's door was closed and her husband, a psychiatrist called me into his office. To my surprise her husband said, "My wife and I have been doing nothing but learning so much from you and talking about what you have shared with us". He said. "I want to thank you so much for how much you helped us because we have decided to raise our children differently because of what we learned from you. You know, I spent a lot of money for all those sessions, and I never expected that I was helping these two parents and they never helped me at all other than to thank me like that. His wife decided to change things so she could be THERE to raise their children.
These are both individuals that invested a lot of time educating themselves about so many labels and behaviors and handing medications etc, and I thought to myself "What on earth did these people actually learn?". Then this psychiatrist said, "How about I write you a prescription for Valium". Ugh, I think back on that even now and wonder, "so the help I got was to handle what I was seeing and finding so disturbing is to JUST take a valium?". When you shared that your mother is 70, well I am 63 myself, and close to her generation, so yeah, that generation was pretty messed up. It's not surprising that she is so disillusioned and depressed and I am sorry you are dealing with that. Yet, being able to control a sociopath and be ok with living with a man like that is not doing better than your mother and not gaining anything of quality for yourself.
You know, there is a great deal of gray and it's simply not black and white and a quick label when it comes to seeing behaviors that you feel is unsettling. None of the members can diagnose on what you shared, actually no one can do that not really knowing the individuals themselves. However, I too like to know the whys, I sure saw a lot of upsetting things when it comes to experiencing different parents. However, it's not black and white either. Could it be these things you got out of your thread? Maybe, and yet maybe not. Without actually knowing this woman, it's not something any of us can determine. Is it possible this woman is too emeshed with her child? It's possible, can't say it doesn't happen sometimes. Yet, without knowing her first hand, it's too hard to think about labeling and that would be true for a professional as well.