Dear Neverdyed:

I re-read all your posts so to learn more about you. Not a lot to read because you wrote so little so far. This will be a longer post. My following understanding will not be perfectly accurate, of course. It will be an approximation, a list of possibilities for you to evaluate and let me know what is accurate and what is not. When discussing your childhood, I will be focusing on your mother for the reason I will explain at the end of the post (first *), and keep in mind that I am lacking  important information about your childhood, a few things of what I don’t know are mentioned following the second * at the end of the post.

Here is what you wrote about your childhood: “Even being little, I was able to observe the unpleasant atmosphere between my parents, the process until the divorce was frightening… I’ve tried to not be my mother… Just can’t stand her aggressive attitude during a fight, and I’ve adopted my father’s silent but passive aggressive way.”

Reads to me that as a child you were very aware of your mother’s angry, aggressive, offensive (hurtful to your father) behavior and you decided early on that you did not want to be like her: to not being aggressive and offensive, to not hurt another person’s feelings no matter what (even if that person doesn’t care about you), to always be nice.

You expressed regarding this man, that even though it’s probably the right things for you to do, you don’t want to cut him off, block him, leave him on read, not be nice to him, and ignore him: “it’s the right thing to cut him off, but I don’t want to block or leave him on read as I don’t like to be treated like that… Would you agree that even though he said we were friends, I don’t have to be nice to him based on that?… If he ever reaches out again, to protect myself, I may simply ignore him, which is cold and probably selfish in my opinion, and that’s something I dislike to be treated and have tried to not do that to him”.

Your mother, when she fought with your father, she communicated with him and opened up to him in a very angry, aggressive and offensive way. Having decided to not be like her, you went to the extreme (as children do) of .. not communicating and not opening up at all, instead,  keeping your deep thoughts (“guarded with my deep thoughts”), and your dissatisfaction, your anger- all to yourself. When you opened up with this man, it was an exception to your decision to not be like your mother: “I’ve tried to open up and communicate which I rarely did… with this person, I’ve become my mother by opening up and trying to communicate (calmly)”.

You communicated and opened up to him calmly, unlike your mother angry way of opening up. You took the middle way in this case, not the extreme. But his response was discouraging: he was passive, or passive aggressive: “with this person, I’ve become my mother.. while he’s like my father”. (If only his response was encouraging, if he encouraged your calm opening up to him by expressing love for you in return, that would have been a very good happening in your life!)

When your mother fought with your father, when she was aggressive and offensive, she was self centered, selfish, totally cold, putting herself first, before anyone else, and you don’t want to be these things, criticizing yourself any time you think you may be any of these things: “what if I’m too self-centered?… One thing I’m afraid of is that I’d be selfish or totally cold when putting myself before him “.

Because of your desire to not be like your mother, you are a very kind person, very considerate and appreciative of others (“Looking forward to hearing from you, but take your time (thanks a lot..”, etc.), but you are also conflicted (“Conflicting myself much” is the title of your thread): on one hand you want what you want which requires you to put yourself first, but on the other hand, you are scared to put yourself first (“it’s intimidating to be myself again and put myself before him, but I hope to succeed at last”).

You will not be like your mother if you put yourself first. It’s a matter of extremes. You want to avoid both extremes: one which is putting yourself first at the expense of another and the other is not putting yourself first at all. The middle way would be putting yourself first while being considerate and respectful of the other person.

* I don’t know what you meant by your father being passive aggressive. Maybe during the fights, or otherwise at home before the divorce,  he was quiet and passive, and years later you retroactively figured that he was passive-aggressive. Maybe during the fights or otherwise at home, he did things like slamming doors, visibly and audibly expressing his anger (?)

* I don’t know if and how your mother was aggressive toward you directly, and if and how your father was passive aggressive toward you directly. I also wonder what attitude your mother was referring to when she told you that you “need to change your attitude towards people” (?)

anita

• This reply was modified 4 years, 6 months ago by .