I wish I could say I have never abused my children, but I'm ashamed that I can't say that and be honest. I didn't know better. Thank God I did get help.

When I was a young mother, the slightest sign of non-compliance sent me into a fury. "How DARE you disobey me? I'm the parent. You WILL do what I tell you!" I soon caught on that I was repeating my father's tone from long ago. And a bit of insight occurred to me.

I had been conditioned into total submission,and being the one to give the orders didn't quite feel right to me. I was yelling so loudly in asserting my authority because I was trying to convince *myself* I had the right. A person who truly knows he or she is in charge, doesn't need to do that. Anyone who is secure in their authority would automatically expect obedience, and usually get it, without the dramatics. I wasn't one of those. Neither was my father, thanks to the conditioning by his father before him. He, too, threw his weight around because he had to remind *himself* that he was the one in charge.

It's still that way for me, sometimes. Not the throwing the weight around, but the feeling funny about being in charge. Tuffy (in my avatar pic) and Tiger were my husband's cats before we got married, and now I even feel funny sometimes telling them not to scratch on the furniture. Who am *I* to give orders? When I was in college, in the early days of "information processing," when computers were booted by a removable disk and run by DOS, I even felt odd giving the *computer* a command. As if an inanimate object is going to rebel and say, "don't you tell me what to do."

I hope this bit of insight will show part of what makes an abuser tick. Not that anything ever excuses it, but maybe this helps explain it.

[WePow]

Thank you for posting this. The difference is that you are sorry for the things you did that you know now were not right. Not all people who cause abuse are like this. Sadly, some of them never say they are sorry because they are not. They continue to make an excuse for their actions. My father is a pedophile and even after serving jail time and being exposed, he still blames my ex-husband for giving him some medication he claims "made" him do it. Of course that doesn't hold water because he was abusing children before I even met my ex! The point is though that many sociopaths are just not capable of feeling any remorse for harming others. You are not like that from what you said :-)

My daughter told me recently that the reason she agrees to have a relationship me is because I own up to what I did. If I denied it, as my mother denies that her actions were abuse, my daughter tells me she would want nothing to do with me, but that's not the case. Thank God, daughter and I are close, and I can enjoy being grandma to her 14-month-old son and to her upcoming child. Daughter and I agree, this generation will be the one in which the abuse cycle is ended. May my grandchildren never have reason to say, "I was an abused child."

One thing I say often is, "All parents make mistakes. The good ones admit it."

I think my father honestly didn't know better; he had been abused as well and also had a mental illness. He had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, but this was during a time when anything stronger than depression was mislabeled as that. My father never heard voices or suffered delusions, but he did have extreme mood swings. I'd bet any amount of money he was actually bipolar. A correct diagnosis and proper treatment might have saved him, and protected us.

I can be forgiving toward him today ONLY because there was one brief instance when he had a moment of clarity. In the middle of a tirade, he suddenly stopped short, pulled me onto his lap, tenderly hugged me, and told me he was sorry for being that way. If he'd never done that, I don't know if I could forgive him.

Regardless of the abuser's mental condition, whether it is pure evil, mental illness, or simple ignorance, it was still abuse and still did damage, just as I did damage to my children even though I'm not a monster either.

Your father is a different story. From what you describe he is certainly a sociopath, and I wonder about my husband's father. I've never met the man, and I don't care to, after the things my husband has told me. Hubby has had virtually no contact with him since turning 18 and leaving home, and his relatives inform him that his father still hasn't changed. Another sociopath, I would guess.

[Typo]

(((((((((Lovebirdsflying))))))))))

Thank you so much for this post, it does offer a lot of clarity...

[AtreyuFreak]

Thanks for this. It seems very true, that those who abuse are either ignorant or mentally ill. Both of my parents have emotional issues, and neither of them recieved a good example of how parents should behave. Unfortunately, the ignorance of parents goes back a long, long time, and was (for quite a while) considered the "right way" to raise a child: with a heavy hand and an open fist (or closed, or a stick, or a belt...)

Thank you all for sharing.