Another thing that seems to be taking a really long time to sort out is: How could my parents be both largely uninvolved in my upbringing in any engaged, emotional sense and yet have such a profoundly negative impact on my sense of self?
I think the answers are all there, already, meaning that I've thought them and/or written them down, possibly repeatedly, but haven't yet been able to assemble the pieces into a coherent picture. The puzzle analogy, again.
And also that first sentence contains what I believe is a well-known, long-understood, very common pattern recognized by various study-ers (?) of human nature: The disengaged parent. I'm not sure I've seen that particular term used, exactly, but that seems to be getting close(r) to the right word to capture my sense of the parental units' behavior toward me.
***
My parents were not 'permissive'; they were, instead, insanely stingy, unbelievably un-generous, not only with money, but with their time and emotional energy as well. They made every smallest request or need on my part seem like some absolutely unreasonable demand, with which I was going to turn their lives into a living hell. Forget about asking for a bicycle or a puppy or anything beyond the barest, most basic survival needs; I wonder if my early fondness for old, worn-out clothing came from the fact that most of my stuff came from the Goodwill, and I would never dare asking for anything new for fear of being criticized in some way? (As an adult, I loathe spending money on nearly everything, though there are a few things I spend money fairly freely on, such as food - to my mind, food, being the basic building block of the body, is a really stupid place to pinch pennies. A classic penny wise, pound foolish move [not the word I want].)
The other thing that keeps coming to mind is my mother's apparently absolute inability to see me as anything other than an extension of her own needs. That is, anything that I said or did that was congruent with her wants and needs at that moment were seen as Good; anything I said or did that went against her wants and needs of the moment were seen is inherently bad.
(Pulling out eyebrow hairs at the moment, from what I think of as my 'anger venting' mole, in the middle of the left eyebrow - whenever I get to this mixed0-up tangle of emotions - shame that I'm 'bad', anger that *I* can never get *my* needs met, even now, so many years later; fear that I'll be 'caught' saying 'bad things' about my parents, and then cycling back around to anger because, don't MY feelings count, too?)
Putting the above 'aside' at the center: How do I break the cycle of guilt/shame/rage that I encounter whenever I think about my parents, especially my mother?
I had a self-talking-to time a bit ago (a few hours ago?) where I was having an imaginary 'conversation' with my father, setting 'boundaries' with him that I was never able to set a s a child: Saying no, telling him to go away, telling him to 'stop it', whatever 'it' might have been at the time.
My mother is harder - both she and my father saw me as inordinately responsible for her emotional health and well-being from at least as early as the age of six, if not before. They put me in charge of 'taking care' of her - I was her 'minder', as the Brits say.
And this is not a woman who was mentally or emotionally incompetent in any - usual? - sense of the word.
I'm not really sure what happened there. She (according to dad, and to *her*?) was vulnerable, and fragile, and in need of protection. And so, said 'protecting' fell to me, as soon as I was old enough to be 'shamed' into it, which I think was around age 7 or so. But my experience of my mother? was that she was mean, and spiteful, and made vicious, snippy remarks.
It's only occurred to me recently that maybe the reason nobody else seems to 'know' about any of this is that she only did/does it when no one else is around?
So I've come up with the idea that I must only be around my mother in the presence of 'witnesses', which, at the moment, I think, means my nieces. They may as well be exposed to the inner working of the family early on, eh? Disassembling the Wizard right before their very eyes, so they can see how his 'smoke-and-mirrors' machines work. Give them the tools to take the sonofabitch apart themselves, later on. Which they will surely have to, given that their upbringing seems to be echoing much of the same shit I grew up with. Sigh.
It's
Showing posts with label piecing it together. Show all posts
Showing posts with label piecing it together. Show all posts
Thursday, September 9, 2010
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Everything you *think* you know is wrong
Here's a posit: People become introverts because they experience their early (formative) relationships as draining rather than as supportive and nurturing. That is, the cost/benefit ratio of interacting with others often leaves the 'introvert' drained rather than charged up.
I would define myself as introverted by the standard definition, and I would say that *my* introversion stems largely from feeling that I am often more attuned to other people than they are to me. Interactions with others cost me more than they give me in return. Hence my current focus on 'two-way street' asa prime the main criterion for anything resembling a 'close' relationship: I'm trying to break the old pattern. (Insert here: "There's A Hole in the Sidewalk".)
The first, and worst, offender with respect to 'lack of attunement' was my mother; the second (mostly out of sheer absence, unavailability and lack of interest rather than that he couldn't figure it out) was my father; and the third was my middle brother, who was *quite* capable of compassion, but who chose to use his ability to 'read me like a book' to torment me rather than support and/or encourage me.
I guess that's supposed to be 'normal' behavior for siblings, par for the course, but in my case not only did my mom not even seem to notice what was going on (dissociation from things that perfectly echoed her own childhood, the pain from which was still sharp enough that she couldn't deal with my pain, the pain her own daughter was experiencing... compoundment. A new coinage, yes, I just made that up.)
Not only did my mom never notice that my brother was torturing me, but when I complained about it to dad (it seemed pointless to bring it up with mom, because she'd [mentally and emotionally] run off and hide in La-La Land whenever it happened), but dad would actively say "Just don't let it bother you," and would never, EVER call my brother out for being an asshole.
I still don't understand that behavior, to this day. The thing where an adult sides with the abusive child, rather than the one who's being stomped on. What IS that? Why do (some) parents do this? Are they STUPID? Fucked up in the head? What? I no understand.
***
This kind of introversion (need a name for it, even if only for myself?) is when you understand 'them' better than they understand themselves. And your - sympathy? Empathy? Compassion? Is used against you as a weapon. It's seen as a weakness to be taken advantage of. Reminds me of that scene in The Incredibles where Mr. Incredible is being held prisoner and he grabs Mirage when she gets too close, threatening to kill her. The bad guy says, "Go ahead,"but Mr. Incredible doesn't do it, because - well, he's just not that kind of guy. The bad guy, of course, perceives this as a 'weakness' on Mr. Incredible's part; but Mirage points out that showing compassion for another human is NOT weakness: It's a great strength. So, in summary: I'm Incredible! Yay, me! :-)
***
Back to the original subject:
The title of this moment of writing is more aimed at a culture that is constantly trying to label and pigeonhole everything - people and their behaviors, especially.
I was just reading a blog about introversion (in my ongoing pursuit of an 'answer' as to whether introversion in inborn or an acquired trait - I'm going for a mix of nature and nurture, at this point.)
The woman writing the blog made an aside (why is it that the 'throwaway' comments are often the ones with the most 'juice'?) about how her son is a daydreamer, the same as she was when she was a kid. Her 'aside' was that if she was a kid these days, she'd probably be diagnosed as ADD. And then the gem:
The real PROBLEM is not kids who are 'ADD'; the REAL problem is adults who fail to properly ENGAGE the minds of the children for whose 'education' they're responsible.
But we can't say that, because we might hurt the poor teachers' feelings. Or something.
Why is it that kids are continually having to be 'dumbed down' in order to not offend some less competent, less intelligent adult? Why are power structures almost always skewed in favor of the ineptitudinosities®* from the shallow end of the gene pool? Don't answer that, I don't think I really want to know.
*I may just use the ® as a way to communicate "here is a coinage I just made up," in case it's unclear. Of course people are coining 'new' words left, right and center. I just want credit, when I'm actually due some. Thanks. :-)
***
Also this, from a commenter at another blog (http://pastaqueen.com/blog/2009/02/in-defense-of-quiet-people/, anji • February 26, 2009 at 6:11 pm):
What I'm wondering is, was this teacher silenced as a little girl in such as way that she was too frightened to speak for fear of "talking too much"?
Because it sure sounds like it to me, reading that fragment of her story and knowing how often little girls are discourage from 'talking too much' because it draws attention to them (attention which, at least through my feminist lens, is expected by the culture to be reserved for males).
So she maybe isn't really a natural introvert at all, but was rather, scared into it by some adult or adults in her life.
***
I also think that while a tendency toward reflectiveness may be inborn (the penchant for mulling things over in one's head before speaking), that introversion is more a reaction to the social brew in which one was soaked as a child. It's more about the 'mismatch' thing where a parent and child are so dissimilar in temperament that the child (because of the parent/child power imbalance) becomes the 'ugly duckling'.
Whereas reflective kid born to reflective parents will see herself in them and vice versa (no pun intended about the 'mirroring' aspect :-). And so will tend to remain quiet until she's sure she has something relevant to say, but will not be 'shy', per se, so much as just reticent until she's got a good read of the lay of the land, so to speak. And when she's around people she trusts and/or knows well and is comfortable with, she'll be more comfortable with speaking her mind.
But even that, what I just wrote, seems to me to be about me, since *I'm* writing it - I think the reason I don't just blurt out whatever I'm thinking is because I was so often pounced on by the people around me. Never mind that they were often wrong in their 'mis-corrections' of me; the effect was the same: To SILENCE me. To make me doubt myself; to make me unsure.
I still struggle with this to this day - I can't tell you how many people have told me I 'should' be more sure of myself, because I'm often RIGHT.
But for each one of those people, I've had plenty of others question me on something I was absolutely sure about (and which, in retrospect, on verification from a source I trusted, turned out to be right), who managed to undermine me to the point where I didn't speak at all.
Of course, over the years I learned to - what - uncover? or, reveal? can't find the word. These people who spoke with such great authority on subjects about which they knew absolutely nothing, or only enough to be dangerous (such as my mother, who learned it from her father, and also I can think of at least one boss who was notorious, at least with me, for doing this - it's not universally a male trait, but men do it pretty dang often. I've taken to calling men of all stripes out on this, no matter their age, 'status' or whatever. "Taking them down a peg [or a 'notch']," I believe is what it's called.)
'Expose', that's the word I was looking for. And that word, which brings, once again, the image of the 'man behind the curtain' (a la the Wizard of Oz) being exposed to the bright lights of day, truth, and reality, reveals what I (think I'm) looking for: Fear. Fear of being exposed as a fraud, a shyster, a cheat, a know-nothing. Fear of being exposed as the charlatan and poser one really is. Seeking power at the expense of others' - credulity? Is that the word I want?
***
On reflection, after writing all this, I don't think I really care how other people define introversion. I'm just trying to find a way to deal with my particular 'form' of it. And it helps, sometimes, to walk through 'how you got here', to help you figure out how to go somewhere else. Or something like that. I'm sure there are a million 'sayings' that sum up that sentiment more eloquently, I may even *know* some of them already, but just can't think of them right now.
But for now, those words will just have to do. And they do just fine!
***
Some "Murphy's Law" -like sayings, from "Says You" (as heard on KUOW, 4 Sept 2010) :
[these are paraphrased - I tried to write them down as fast as I could, but missed some bits. Note to self: See link at bottom for possible 'confirmation'.]
First law of theater attendance: The last people to arrive in the audience will be the ones seated in the middle of the row.
Mechanic's law of physical irritation: As soon as your hands are completely covered in grease, that's the moment at which your nose will begin to itch.
The isolation conundrum: The more you want to be alone, the more likely that you'll run into someone you know.
The immersion [principle?]: The moment you are completely immersed in the tub is the moment the phone will ring.
The queue ______: Whichever line you're in will be the one that moves the slowest. Corollary: If you *change* lines, the line you *move* to will slow down.
The toolbox truism: The only tool you need will be the only one missing.
***
Word for today (so far :-) :
Fremescence: A dull and incipient roaring.
Ah, here's a possible reference/source: http://www.joe-ks.com/murphy/Murphys_Laws.htm
***
A Terry Pratchett quote:
"People wanted the world to be a story, because stories had to sound right and they had to make sense. People wanted the world to make sense."
I would define myself as introverted by the standard definition, and I would say that *my* introversion stems largely from feeling that I am often more attuned to other people than they are to me. Interactions with others cost me more than they give me in return. Hence my current focus on 'two-way street' as
The first, and worst, offender with respect to 'lack of attunement' was my mother; the second (mostly out of sheer absence, unavailability and lack of interest rather than that he couldn't figure it out) was my father; and the third was my middle brother, who was *quite* capable of compassion, but who chose to use his ability to 'read me like a book' to torment me rather than support and/or encourage me.
I guess that's supposed to be 'normal' behavior for siblings, par for the course, but in my case not only did my mom not even seem to notice what was going on (dissociation from things that perfectly echoed her own childhood, the pain from which was still sharp enough that she couldn't deal with my pain, the pain her own daughter was experiencing... compoundment. A new coinage, yes, I just made that up.)
Not only did my mom never notice that my brother was torturing me, but when I complained about it to dad (it seemed pointless to bring it up with mom, because she'd [mentally and emotionally] run off and hide in La-La Land whenever it happened), but dad would actively say "Just don't let it bother you," and would never, EVER call my brother out for being an asshole.
I still don't understand that behavior, to this day. The thing where an adult sides with the abusive child, rather than the one who's being stomped on. What IS that? Why do (some) parents do this? Are they STUPID? Fucked up in the head? What? I no understand.
***
This kind of introversion (need a name for it, even if only for myself?) is when you understand 'them' better than they understand themselves. And your - sympathy? Empathy? Compassion? Is used against you as a weapon. It's seen as a weakness to be taken advantage of. Reminds me of that scene in The Incredibles where Mr. Incredible is being held prisoner and he grabs Mirage when she gets too close, threatening to kill her. The bad guy says, "Go ahead,"but Mr. Incredible doesn't do it, because - well, he's just not that kind of guy. The bad guy, of course, perceives this as a 'weakness' on Mr. Incredible's part; but Mirage points out that showing compassion for another human is NOT weakness: It's a great strength. So, in summary: I'm Incredible! Yay, me! :-)
***
Back to the original subject:
The title of this moment of writing is more aimed at a culture that is constantly trying to label and pigeonhole everything - people and their behaviors, especially.
I was just reading a blog about introversion (in my ongoing pursuit of an 'answer' as to whether introversion in inborn or an acquired trait - I'm going for a mix of nature and nurture, at this point.)
The woman writing the blog made an aside (why is it that the 'throwaway' comments are often the ones with the most 'juice'?) about how her son is a daydreamer, the same as she was when she was a kid. Her 'aside' was that if she was a kid these days, she'd probably be diagnosed as ADD. And then the gem:
"It’s not that I had any problem paying attention, I simply chose not to. Whatever was going on inside my head at any given moment was usually a lot more interesting than what the teacher had to say."So *there's* the real truth: She daydreams because she's bored. Because what's inside her head is more interesting to her.
The real PROBLEM is not kids who are 'ADD'; the REAL problem is adults who fail to properly ENGAGE the minds of the children for whose 'education' they're responsible.
But we can't say that, because we might hurt the poor teachers' feelings. Or something.
Why is it that kids are continually having to be 'dumbed down' in order to not offend some less competent, less intelligent adult? Why are power structures almost always skewed in favor of the ineptitudinosities®* from the shallow end of the gene pool? Don't answer that, I don't think I really want to know.
*I may just use the ® as a way to communicate "here is a coinage I just made up," in case it's unclear. Of course people are coining 'new' words left, right and center. I just want credit, when I'm actually due some. Thanks. :-)
***
Also this, from a commenter at another blog (http://pastaqueen.com/blog/2009/02/in-defense-of-quiet-people/, anji • February 26, 2009 at 6:11 pm):
The bolded statement is the one that interests me - I wish I could ask the commenter about this, but the comment was written over a year and a half ago, so I'll just have to guess.Amen sistah! I didn’t talk for the first two years of school… and, when I did? All the kids cried because they thought I couldn’t speak and I scared the shit out of them.
I hated school, I hated being the center of any attention, I hated making small talk….
But now? I’m now the freakin’ teacher and have to talk and explain my thoughts as part of my job… granted, I’m not a chatterbox but I no longer get bowled over or let my shyness take over…. I still love having quiet moments at home, I enjoy my peace that I can find at any time… I love being able to entertain myself and I also loved never getting into trouble because I was talking too much in class or anything.
What I'm wondering is, was this teacher silenced as a little girl in such as way that she was too frightened to speak for fear of "talking too much"?
Because it sure sounds like it to me, reading that fragment of her story and knowing how often little girls are discourage from 'talking too much' because it draws attention to them (attention which, at least through my feminist lens, is expected by the culture to be reserved for males).
So she maybe isn't really a natural introvert at all, but was rather, scared into it by some adult or adults in her life.
***
I also think that while a tendency toward reflectiveness may be inborn (the penchant for mulling things over in one's head before speaking), that introversion is more a reaction to the social brew in which one was soaked as a child. It's more about the 'mismatch' thing where a parent and child are so dissimilar in temperament that the child (because of the parent/child power imbalance) becomes the 'ugly duckling'.
Whereas reflective kid born to reflective parents will see herself in them and vice versa (no pun intended about the 'mirroring' aspect :-). And so will tend to remain quiet until she's sure she has something relevant to say, but will not be 'shy', per se, so much as just reticent until she's got a good read of the lay of the land, so to speak. And when she's around people she trusts and/or knows well and is comfortable with, she'll be more comfortable with speaking her mind.
But even that, what I just wrote, seems to me to be about me, since *I'm* writing it - I think the reason I don't just blurt out whatever I'm thinking is because I was so often pounced on by the people around me. Never mind that they were often wrong in their 'mis-corrections' of me; the effect was the same: To SILENCE me. To make me doubt myself; to make me unsure.
I still struggle with this to this day - I can't tell you how many people have told me I 'should' be more sure of myself, because I'm often RIGHT.
But for each one of those people, I've had plenty of others question me on something I was absolutely sure about (and which, in retrospect, on verification from a source I trusted, turned out to be right), who managed to undermine me to the point where I didn't speak at all.
Of course, over the years I learned to - what - uncover? or, reveal? can't find the word. These people who spoke with such great authority on subjects about which they knew absolutely nothing, or only enough to be dangerous (such as my mother, who learned it from her father, and also I can think of at least one boss who was notorious, at least with me, for doing this - it's not universally a male trait, but men do it pretty dang often. I've taken to calling men of all stripes out on this, no matter their age, 'status' or whatever. "Taking them down a peg [or a 'notch']," I believe is what it's called.)
'Expose', that's the word I was looking for. And that word, which brings, once again, the image of the 'man behind the curtain' (a la the Wizard of Oz) being exposed to the bright lights of day, truth, and reality, reveals what I (think I'm) looking for: Fear. Fear of being exposed as a fraud, a shyster, a cheat, a know-nothing. Fear of being exposed as the charlatan and poser one really is. Seeking power at the expense of others' - credulity? Is that the word I want?
***
On reflection, after writing all this, I don't think I really care how other people define introversion. I'm just trying to find a way to deal with my particular 'form' of it. And it helps, sometimes, to walk through 'how you got here', to help you figure out how to go somewhere else. Or something like that. I'm sure there are a million 'sayings' that sum up that sentiment more eloquently, I may even *know* some of them already, but just can't think of them right now.
But for now, those words will just have to do. And they do just fine!
***
Some "Murphy's Law" -like sayings, from "Says You" (as heard on KUOW, 4 Sept 2010) :
[these are paraphrased - I tried to write them down as fast as I could, but missed some bits. Note to self: See link at bottom for possible 'confirmation'.]
First law of theater attendance: The last people to arrive in the audience will be the ones seated in the middle of the row.
Mechanic's law of physical irritation: As soon as your hands are completely covered in grease, that's the moment at which your nose will begin to itch.
The isolation conundrum: The more you want to be alone, the more likely that you'll run into someone you know.
The immersion [principle?]: The moment you are completely immersed in the tub is the moment the phone will ring.
The queue ______: Whichever line you're in will be the one that moves the slowest. Corollary: If you *change* lines, the line you *move* to will slow down.
The toolbox truism: The only tool you need will be the only one missing.
***
Word for today (so far :-) :
Fremescence: A dull and incipient roaring.
Ah, here's a possible reference/source: http://www.joe-ks.com/murphy/Murphys_Laws.htm
***
A Terry Pratchett quote:
"People wanted the world to be a story, because stories had to sound right and they had to make sense. People wanted the world to make sense."
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