Today, I listened to a podcast that talked about coercive control. It sounds remarkably like how my mother behaves and how we all lined up for her. While she wasn’t and isn’t violent (that I know of), she certainly engages in many of the tactics that this uses from the silent treatment, to withdrawal of care, to reducing another’s self-confidence. It plays out with my sister and anyone who is in her orbit more than not and how they view her and the relationship with her and those relationships she complains about. (I’m also aware that I probably got a double dose of this bullshit from my father, too, because he was no walk in the park either and displayed several of the same behaviors.)
I think the one thing that perplexes me is the thought that they are aware of their behavior, that they are actively aware what they are doing is wrong but doing it anyways, and that these behaviors are preconceived and preplanned to make sure they get the reaction. Behavior they want. It’s hard to wrap my brain around that idea because I want to believe my mom isn’t aware she is a shitty person via her behavior. I want to believe it is due to the shitty behavior of her mother and what she viewed as “normal”. I don’t want to think my mom is a monster. But…everything I see says that she is aware, she does know, and that yes, she is a monster.
This whole thing makes me sad and disheartened. It leaves me at a place where I’m aware she isn’t going to change. I can recover from the damage she and my father caused me throughout my life. I can reduce the CPTSD traumas. I can learn the triggers and know the best practices to avoid or reduce the impacts. I can fix myself for the most part. But from what I’ve read, she has zero chance of redemption. She has no way of ever being anything better than who she is now. She can’t change because this is a core part of her personality. It’s a sad realization because it says I will never have a healthy relationship with my mom. I have to come to terms with the finality that my mom is who she is and she won’t ever be better.
Over the years, I have learned to address the things I have felt shame or regret over. To process those things so that I can learn, change, and recognize that mistakes can be made, but it is how we handle them afterward that matters more. I don’t want to live with shame or regret. I don’t want to have that hanging over me to my dying days. I don’t want to have any secrets that I take to my grave. It has been something that has been vital to my happiness and quality of life over the last 15 years. I have shed so many instances of shame, guilt, and regret. Oddly enough, those things of shame are exactly the things that manipulators, coercive controllers, and narcissists use to control people. That isn’t why I started processing all this, but it seems to be a beneficial thing to have done. Now, as feelings of shame, guilt or regret come up, I deal with them immediately, apologize to those who I can, make the changes to make sure that doesn’t happen again, and forgive myself for the situation that caused those feelings.
I’m not saying that makes me bulletproof, but it does give me one less thing to worry about being used against me.
I also noticed that as I went through these things of shame, guilt, and regret, I also created boundaries of things that I would not allow in my life. They weren’t conscious boundaries, but it was very apparent they were in place when my mom came to live with me and in current potential partner picking. I see them very clearly, though, when they are trespassed on, and I do take actions when I see them being disregarded.
This post is just really an expression of feelings, so there isn’t really a plot here, other than, I feel sad with the realizations that my mom is exactly who she has shown she is, that is her personality at her core, she won’t change because she can’t change and the worst part, she is aware, cognizant and actively behaving in these ways to get what she wants. That hurts because it means I have no parents anymore. I am emotionally an orphan. My mom is not a mom and never will be, and my dad was not a dad when he was alive and is not a dad now that he’s dead.
On the positive side, I guess, if there is one, the rejection she has given for the last 7 years isn’t really a rejection, There was never any loving emotions to feel rejected from. Her understanding of love isn’t love, never has been, and never will. Her idea of what giving love looks like isn’t actually love, it’s manipulation and control. So, I was never rejected because I was never actually loved by her. It’s weird and probably doesn’t make sense, but it does make me feel like I haven’t lost anything because nothing was actually ever there. If that works, I’m going to take it. A parent being willfully unloving hurts more than knowing they have just never been capable of it to begin with. Perhaps that is the path to reconnecting if I ever feel like I want to take a walk into the lion’s den again. She was never actually a mom, so I don’t have to feel like I have a real connection with her. The connection was one way and was not in my benefit, so I can approach her knowing there will never be a connection that is mutual and that I can make it on my own terms without feeling like I’m not being a “good daughter”. I was never a daughter. I was a tool and an object to use for personal benefit. I can let her go in peace and hope she finds whatever happiness she can and be at peace myself with that separation.
There will be some mourning, but now, it will be mourning what I thought was and what I thought may be in the future that will never happen, and that’s okay. I think a part of me always knew these things to be true. It’s probably best to come to terms with the now rather than hanging onto a hope that could potentially be used against me in the future.
I’ll be okay. As one famous orphan sang, “The sun’ll come out, tomorrow.”
Goddess of Foxes 