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Re: Pinkeye? (very long) » Dinah

Posted by pinkeye on May 6, 2005, at 18:18:30

In reply to Re: Pinkeye? » pinkeye, posted by Dinah on May 6, 2005, at 14:49:03

That was pretty funny - about the dress :-)

Thanks for the understanding Dinah. Many times when I write about what I went through, it is because that is the only way I know how to help. I guess that is applicable for almost all of us here. And just hoping that the other person will pick up some insight from the story.

Well, I am going to do more of my rambling.. but the point is, even though it might have appeared that your mother was the one who was bad, maybe she was just reacting to your father. Maybe she just couldn't handle it herself, and was taking it out on you. Is that possible?

From here, my rambling starts. I am just venting out.. feel free to ignore from here onwards :-)


For a long time, I was actually angry at my mom. Much much more than I was angry at my dad. I wouldn't even talk to my mom many times, and till today, actually I have problem trying to connect well with her. I used to think she was very stupid - that she was always complaining of some illness or the other, and she was refusing to cooperate with my father and he is shouting at her and me, and I thought I inherited all my negativity in life from her.

But only now I realize that she had just been coping up with the hard time my dad was giving boht of us in the same way as I am - only in a different way. She also had a tendency to take it all on her body, and she would complain every day of some illness or the other. I used to hate that at that time, and my dad used to hate her for that also. He kept saying that she was being manipulative, and many times he outright refused to show any empathy for her - even when she was suffering from pain. To top it all, he was a doctor. And he was being the least empathetic towards my mom. And he somehow made me believe that he is being the victim, and my mom being the bad one in the family - for some time I believed it a lot, and wouldn't even talk to my mom.

Now I realize that my mom was just trying to get some affection and understanding from my dad - and little bit of empathy and her pain was all her psychological pleading for some help. My dad was outright severely rude to my mom. From day 1 as long as I can remember, he used to shout at her so much.. Every day, several several times, he would be angry with her and mad at her. I used to shudder with fear lot of times, and I used to actually hate to come home. I never thought of my home as my home. And several days, I used to cry in the bathroom alone, and I never understood why at that time. I used to think I was being stupid.

Anyway, my dad was not at all a responsible person. And my mom, was much more normal than what he was. According to indian standards, she was a very good wife. She was beautiful, was very affectionate, came from a rich family with lot of social status, and was very soft. My dad - made a bad person out of her. And all for nothing. He was kind of rebellious, and had several ideas which were different from what everyone else believed in. He was an atheist, and he wanted to come to the Western countries, and he wanted to bring me up in a completely different way, and had really lot more different ideas than what was normal at that time in my culture. And I think my mother just became shocked to deal with all these new things after marriage, and she didn't understand all these high fi ideas about philosophy and stuff.

He could have just let her be a simple house wife.. instead he tried to make her well read, make her a career woman, make her understand business and start some business, etc etc. He was thinking he was trying to teach her to be good, but he actually made her feel very scared, because she didn't want to be all these. She wanted to just cook and stay at home.And he kept forcing her to be more than what she was.


Anyway, she completely resisted it, and he somehow tried to convince me that she was bad. And for a long time I believed it. Even now he complains about my mom. But now, I understand what my dad did was horrible. To take a person who grew up in a different way, and try to mold the person in a complete different way.

And especially because, what my dad claimed to do, he was not doing himself. He was given lot of inheritance. He wasted it all by investing in stock market. He gave up praciticing as a medical doctor. He didn't do any work, and was sitting idle at home all the time, talking about philosophy and politics, and whiling away his time. And getting angry at my mom and shouting at her for not earning money for the family. He even used to ask her to get more money from her parents house, because her father was rich. He was given a huge inheritance himself - my paternal grandfather was extremely wealthy at that time, and he squandered away all the money, but he used to say my maternal grandfather cheated my mom.. which was not even a custom at that time.

Anyway, the only good thing he did was to give me intelligence. Somehow in all these ideas he had, he wanted to bring me up in a different way, so he made me study well. And to achieve stuff which he couldn't achieve himself. In a way it has turned out to be good for me. Even though I ended up suffering, I learnt stuff. And now I am able to understand everything. That was all thanks to my dad. And he meant well.. and didn't understand what he was putting my mom through. He simply had no clue how to bring a family, and he should have atleast understood that he doesn't have a clue and left it to my mom or listened to others. But he thought he knew everything. And made a mess out of it. He meant well, and that is the only thing that I keep giving him excuses for. And also he has tried to understand and change a lot in the past 10 years - ever since he lost his inheritance, he became more humble, and started understanding himself that maybe he was not all right. And once I got my rheumatoid arthritis, that was a blow to him. So he has mellowed down a lot more. And in the past two - three years, he understood how much psychologically I was affected. So now he has completely changed - atleast as much a 58 year old man is capable of changing. And I give him credit for that. If my dad had continued the way he was before I got my rheumatoid arthrits, I would have commited suicide long back. I am surprised my mom survived all that.


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