When K was here, we were talking about family. We are both middle-aged, which means our parents are definitely old. I was talking about how my mother would react any time anything didn’t go her way. For example, for her and my father’s 50th anniversary, she wanted us all (including my brother’s family) to go on a cruise. She had made it known for up to a year ahead of time that this was her dearest wish.
Now. Let me be clear. This is my idea of hell. I do not like crowds, being ‘locked’ in, doing activities I have no interest in (such as wall-climbing and nerf gun battles), and I have many food intolerances. My brother said that the cruise had a ton of different food choices, but, and I put this as kindly as I can, I don’t necessarily believe him. Not that he would lie intentionally, but people who don’t have food intolerances/allergies, truly don’t understand that certain things are everywhere. I don’t blame them! Why should they know when they don’t have to think about it? I have an intolerance to gluten and dairy, and I have to be very careful with cauliflower, onions, and garlic. I’m NOT vegetarian/vegan, though, which is oftentimes confused with dairy-free.
I also get motion sickness and the idea of spending ten days on a cruise with 4,000 people almost made me break out in hives. In short, it is everything I hate, turnt up to a hundo. As the kids say. I made it quite clear that I would not be going.
You would think my mother would accept this and come up with an alternate plan, yes? Or just go without me and call it a day. Hahahhahahaha. You underestimate the tenacity of my mother! She whined and moaned about it, not letting it go. She had tears in her eyes and a tremble in her voice when she said that it was her dearest wish.
I had had enough. I said to her, “You want me to go, knowing I’ll be miserable and hating it, wishing I were anywhere but there? Is that really what you want me to do?” She had no response to that, but I’m sure that she wanted me to go no matter what.
Why do I say that? Because she has pushed me over and over again to do what she wanted, regardless if I wanted it or not. A big example was when she wanted my brother and I to go back to Taiwan (with my niece). This was a decade ago, and I remember it as starkly as if it were yesterday. I didn’t want to go. I can deal with my mother when it’s on my terms (more or less), which means me in Minnesota and her in Taiwan. But when it’s in here territory? No.
During that request, she cried because of course she did. K mentioned that my mother used crying to get her way, and she (K) is completely right. My mother has weaponized tears to a high degree. That plus relentless pushing means she’ll get her way more often than not because it’s easier to say yes to shut her up than to keep pushing back.
Here’s the thing. I’m sure it really does hurt her when things don’t go her way. I’m not being snarky. I think she does get emotional over these things, but it’s because she has an image of what a perfect family should be like. She had never been on a cruise, but she thought she’d like one. That’s fine. That’s normal. But in her mind, she had this idyllic family scene in which we all did activities together and ate dinner tother, etc. You know what happened when they came back from the cruise? She complained for a half hour about how my nephews misbehaved. I’m not exaggerating. It was the first thing she mentioned and she went on and on about it.
She did the same when my brother took his family back to Taiwan. I did not go (this was five years after the first disastrous trip). Hm. I think we went fifteen years ago or so and then five years later, my brother and his family went. During the first trip, I was ignored when I mentioned what I wanted to do. I only insisted on one thing–seeing the National Palace Museum. I love museums. Everyone else complained loudly the whole hour we were there (I knew better than to push my luck), but my brother wanted to go to four different things? Of course we had to do that!
It was the same when my parents and I went to New York. I had to beg to be able to see the Met, and beg again to go for one hour to two. I’m the only person in my family who likes museums. I could not go on my own, of course, because faaaaaaamily. It was better that we go and be miserable together than I go on my own and actually enjoy the museum.
I learned that what I wanted didn’t matter. I had my own room, but for whatever reason, it was where everyone gathered. I wasn’t allowed any alone time. It was bad. Really bad. This was in Taiwan. There was a point where we were near the ocean and I thought, “I could walk in and never come out.” Yes, I wanted to kill myself because being with my family was so horrid. It took every ounce of self-control I had not to do it.
When I got home, my parents emailed me to tell me how disappointed they were in me. My mother had to talk about how grotesquely fat I was and my father had to blare how they spent ______ dollars on the trip and I didn’t enjoy it. Seriously. This was the email I got. You can guess how much that made me want to spend more time with them (that would be fucking not at all). I emailed my mother telling her she was not allowed to mention my weight at all. Yes, she couched it in terms of being concerned about my health, but it was clear that wasn’t what she meant. I know that because she didn’t say a peep when I was anorexic to the point of blacking out. She didn’t care about my health then. The only thing she said was that my waist was smaller than hers, and it was in a tone of jealousy. So, yeah, miss me with that “I’m concerned about your health” bullshit. I know it’s a lie because she has been policing my weight since i was seven and it’s allll about how gross I look (and what a bad reflection I am on her).
As for my father, of course he complained about the money. Mind, he was rarely there when we actually went out and did things. When he was, he wasn’t having fun, either. He’d be there, his face stony, him not saying a word. So it’s pretty rich for him to comment on my attitude. More to the point, I didn’t ask to go. I did not want to go. I felt coerced into going. So it was a double slap in the face when he mentioned the amount they had paid for the trip. I. NEVER. ASKED.
When I was regaling K about all the times my mother pulled this bullshit on me, she commented that it seemed to be my mother’s MO to cry to get what she wanted. I hadn’t really put it together, but it’s true. Whenever she wanted something from me, she would cry.
Let me say, I have no doubt that she was feeling some kind of way with all these incidents. I don’t think she was conjuring up fake emotions. So on that level, it was her being honest. And, yeah, sometimes people cry when they’re emotional. I get that. But in this case, she absolutely weaponized her tears to get what she wanted. If she weren’t, she’d say something like, “Don’t mind my tears. Let’s just keep talking.”
But, no. It became all about her pain and how bad I was making her feel. She wouldn’t say that out loud, but it was the undercurrent, the subtext of what she was saying. Any time a conversation got hard, she would cry. She would also try to throw psychology jargon at me (like projection) when I said something she didn’t like. Unfortunately for her, I am well versed in psychobabble as well, so we’d just throw it at each other.
She can’t stand the fact that I am not her or a clone of her. She’ll push and push and then act like the injured party when I snap. One time, she kept saying, “Oh, you must be cold” when she knows fully well that I don’t get cold. Day after day, she’d say it to me. When I finally told her, “I’m not cold and I don’t get cold. You know that!” She sighed and said in a hurt tone, “I just don’t know how to talk to you any more.”
First of all, you never did. Secondly, yes, you do! You just let your slavish desire to cater to my father’s ego override your good sense. He’s the one who has a problem with me not being cold and probably nagged her about it, thus she pushed me on it.
That’s her MO, and it’s really hard to break free of it. She’ll keep pushing until I snap (or my brother), and then I’m the brute for being so mean to her. I know she’s doing it, but I have yet to figure out how to extract myself from the situation with minimal hurt feelings (on my side). I accept that I’m going to hurt her no matter what when one of these situations come up. I just want to be able to not have it press down on me for days afterwards.
I have more to say, but this is running long. I’ll pick it up again tomorrow.