Dear joanna:

Regarding you being messy: it may be true, but not because you were born-to-be messy, not because you have a Mess Genetics or that you were born faulty that way, but because your mother severely discouraged you from being neat. She complained but discouraged you from doing anything about what she was complaining. When you had your stuff in the kitchen, she complained about the kitchen being messy but vehemently refused that you fix the mess by removing your things from the kitchen.

And so, other people see the mess and confirm, indeed you are messy. And they are correct, you are messy… because you were directed to be messy by the most powerful person in your life, your mother.

If your mother encouraged you to be neat, you would have been neat and people would say: how neat you are, joanna!

Regarding your second question in your post above: basically, your mother’s parents’ critical voice was directed at your mother when she was a child. As an adult, your mother is redirecting that voice toward you. This is the nature of abuse, every generation redirects that voice so to hit the next generation.

Your last two lines: “my mother perceives it as ‘other people criticize you too, they see how bad you are so I must be right about you being this and that”- how vicious your mother is, to drill her message into you repeatedly and relentlessly, employing the help of others in her drilling.

anita