@Anita – Thanks Anita I will look into psychotherapy, but in some ways my therapist might be best to stick with. Psychotherapy isn’t claimable in my country, whereas a psychologist is.

I felt like I probably became more the mother when I was around 18 and my he left my mother. I didn’t feel much of a mother figure to my dad growing up (perhaps slightly as I always wanting him to save his money rather than spend it so we could buy a house). But that went in one ear and out the other.

@ JayJay for your reply, but no I was a pretty switched on kid. No my father definitely didn’t want to be with my mother anymore. Plus I could hear it in the arguments what he was feeling. However, my mother not wanting me to grown up in a single parent household, so she begged him to stay. He almost had an affair and my mum convinced him to stay (I heard this in the fights and discussions themselves, so no one was telling me a different story), but once I reached around 17-18 he had enough. He kicked my mother out one night (granted he was manic but we didn’t understand at the time what was happening) and said never to return (and never apologized for his behaviour even when better).

I do understand partners when manic, can do this and don’t mean it and still love their partner, and feel so much guilt.  But I feel deep down that was my dads true intentions to end things and the manic episode just made it unfortunately a really a harsh way to end it. He never said he regretted leaving my mother or how he handled it even when he got well. I’m sure he does regret how he handled it somewhere deep down inside of him. But to really admit it, he would have to confront his ability to not take responsibility with things, and that’s just not him. You know something I found a blog post of his after all this happened (quite recently) and his perception was quite skewed as to what happened, he said that my mother had enough and wanted to leave. I think that’s what he needed to tell himself to feel okay about it all.

I have discussed with my mother not long ago about my dad (because I asked and sort of suggested that maybe he never loved her) and she’s pretty level headed about it all now and she told me her perspective. She believe he did love her in the beginning but just fell out of love with her. I think his losing interest in the religion (caring too much what his parents thought about being in such a religion, as they were devout Catholics), perhaps the undiagnosed bipolar (that went under the radar), my mother being too pushy and her own mistakes (she’s knows she could of handled things a lot better) and also the loss of my sister, just was too much for him but stayed because of religious requirements (and religious people convincing my dad to stay). Basically my mother and father had very different values after he lost interest in the religion. It just wouldn’t of worked, because it was such a strict religion and my father was now interested doing things that were completely different to my mothers values.

I don’t think my dad hated my mother, he got along with her well enough (there were certainly good times and fun times) but he just fell out of love with her. They “got along” with each other, but that was certainly not enough for my dad.

I also played up a lot because of this confusing childhood, I stole, I lied, I cut up clothing (all under age 6). My mother realises I was obviously effected much more than she realised and I was playing up to get attention and I was obviously hurting very much. She is very remorseful and feels terrible (hindsight is a funny thing). To be fair my mother lost a child at that time as well, and I think she probably was depressed.

Yep, I have a therapist and she does help a lot, but obviously there are still a lot of wounds.

Hi Anita, Thanks for writing back.

“maybe you don’t want to be like your mother, desperate for a man and you make sure that you are not, that you do not give men “too many chances”-

That is very true, I’ve actually thought this about myself as well. The first guy a talked about (the strange one). He actually was very much like my father (accept far, far worse, but very familiar) and even though I was so, full of a lust and my brain wasn’t functioning properly. I still didn’t want to come across as desperate. So even though I wanted to run to him all the time, I forced myself to hold back. I mean I did run a few times, but I tried so, so hard to control myself and not to. I didn’t want to be my mother. Of course it made no difference, he still treated me poorly. I’m pretty sure that relationship was about me seeing this guy acting like my father (except a whole lot worse) and me trying to fix the past. I swear I had the same conversations with my dad as I did with this guy. Just re-enacting the same scenes with a different man. I gave up in the end.

You wrote, in that same paragraph I quoted above: “my father was quite childish and irresponsible.. and my mother because so in love made excuses for him”- this may be why growing up you “always wanting him to save his money rather than spend it”- wanting him to be responsible and love your mother.

Yes I certainly would agree with that. I wanted him to be responsible and love my mother. I think I really felt for my mother deeply and felt she deserved to be loved, because she was a) a nice mother (despite all her issues) b)I thought she deserved to be be really loved c)I could feel her pain d)maybe knowing her story about her father, her mother, my father not loving her, I just desperately wanted her to feel happy and loved e)so I suppose yes, I was sort of transferring her desires on to me.

I wonder if you made a decision in your mind, early on, that as long as your mother is not loved (her theme was, you stated, that she is unloved, not only by your father but by others, like her own father), it is not okay for you to be loved. I wonder if this belief is underneath your great discomfort when the last man in your life put you on a pedestal…?

You could be right, I am not sure to be honest. I guess there could be something in there about me “not feeling okay to be loved as long as my mother is not loved”. I am not sure how to know this though?

The last man that put me on a pedestal was uncomfortable because it was a bit over the top and theatrical in nature.A little bit of a pedestal is fine, but too much and it’s unnerving, plus lots of other red flags. It was too much pressure on me. Especially since, I saw cracks on how he critisized others with such trivial things and I thought eventually when he gotten over the lust phase of our relationship he would start to find issues in me and I would be off that pedestal.

I think I did progress a lot from the first to the second relationship though and it help me get some clarity. The way I was treated by second guy was like “night and day”. I really did want to give it a chance, because there were some lovely aspects to him, like he was always contacting me, checking up on how I was, trying to nut certain things out, affectionate, made me laugh like no one else has been able to, appreciative of things I did etc And so when the red flags came I really was like “are they really red flags?” or is this me just trying to make excuses because I am not used to being treated like this? But no really, there were too many red flags, so despite the lovely aspects of him, it still would have not worked. But it taught me a lot about what good aspects to look for in a man.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Mia.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Mia.

Thanks Anita!

You may or may not believe, deep inside, that for as long as your mother is unloved, neither should you.

Hmmm, it’s really hard for me to know how I feel. I think she is loved now. I think she has more compassion for herself now as well. I am starting to feel the same way about myself. I know this because I am starting to myself first a bit more than I am used to. I was and am a “people pleaser” and I realise it’s because I don’t really love myself too much or really knew who I am. I don’t think I ever loved myself very much and did destructive things to hurt myself or beat myself up. I think I am starting to realise that, and I am trying very hard to be more loving to myself and realising I am not that bad of a person. Having said that, I do worry that I would screw-up any decent guy that came into my life inadvertently by not realizing all my issues and what I might project on to them without me realising it. Even just reading these forum threads have made me realise we as humans can do things on such an unconscious level that we just have no clue we are doing.

Since humans, through many years of evolution are designed to be social, to want to be in relationships, the thought that maybe you “deep down don’t want to be in a relationship” leads me to think that such a .. counter evolutionary lack-of-want, coupled with your “Forever Single (in late 30’s)” history, may be an indication of such an early decision.

Are you clarify what you mean by this? I am a bit confused about the “history, may be an indication of such an early decision”. 

Thanks for all your advice 🙂

• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Mia.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Mia.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Mia.

As to your question, I meant that human beings deep down inside need and want to be in relationships. Many are scared, many give up, but deep down inside it is natural to want to be in relationships.

I see what you mean. Yes I agree. I think I have a love/hate relationship with the idea of romantic relationships.

since you were a teenager, of dating age, how much of those twenty or so years did you spend in relationships with men, casual or serious?

None. I stopped after high-school. I wouldn’t even really call my high-school stuff dating. I had a few boyfriends, but I avoided intimacy mostly. I only started trying to date people in the last two years.

Above you wrote that you “did destructive things to hurt (yourself)”- what things, will you elaborate?

I would pick my skin, I would find fault in everything I did and sort I felt like I had some sort of disorder that I couldn’t put my finger on. Like I believed I had problems with writing, so much so that it came to fruition. I couldn’t construct sentences for a long while, because that’s the story I told myself. The skin picking is something I picked up from my mother. She did it when she was stressed and would lock herself in the bathroom. I hated it, but funnily enough in my teens I began to do the same thing, I guess it was a way to handle anxiety and pain. It’s much better now, but I still do it occasionally. I suspect I also purposely popped on weight when I hit my 20’s, so I wasn’t hassled by men anymore. It was too much for me. I hated men hitting on me.

Hi Anita,

I agree my mother was very selfish as well. She is not the innocent victim. I wish she had done the mature thing and left him earlier, but I think she had her own selfish reasons to stay, and not just because he didn’t love her. She also used the religion as an excuse to try and keep my dad.

But I would be interested to know why you think it can’t be a “good loving relationship now”?What should my mother and I do to make it more good and loving? I find our relationship pretty good these days. What could mother do differently apart from apologizing? She can’t take back the past. Wouldn’t it been worse to deny any wrongdoing?

If she is selfish then really as I am just living through her, I am selfish too.

Hi Anita,

Sorry I used the wrong wording. I do have a habit, of not always articulating things the right way. I meant more like “I am curious to what a healthy loving romantic relationship would look like”.

No, I honestly think my mother and my relationship is pretty good to be honest. I feel quite lucky to have her as a mother. I see my other friends and the relationships with their mothers and I feel for them very much.  Is she perfect, no, does she still have issues, yes. I think we all do. Does she try hard to look at herself and work on her behaviours and be honest with herself? Yes, I think for the most part she does. This is why I am able to look at myself as well, because of her looking at her own behaviors and really questioning herself. When I point out something, she doesn’t ignore it. She really takes it on board and tries to understand my perspective and vice versa and she will come back at a later date even, and want to nut it out some more. Was was really honest and sincere when she apologized and tried to stop certain behaviors she was doing around me. Yes. She’s changed a hell of a lot, over the years and grown. I think it’s loving and healthy, well healthy in the sense that we are always learning and trying to better ourselves.

My father though is quite different. He will bring up my childhood once in a blue moon (no instigation on my part), and say “oh your childhood was horrible, I’m sorry you had to go through that horrible religion and I am not a good father”. But he says that with an insincerity, he looks at me with the “I don’t want you to agree with me and instead tell me it’s all fine and that I am a good father”. He doesn’t really want to hear the truth. Over the years my father has gone on the opposite direction and become, more and more selfish. He wasn’t as bad when I was younger. I wont go into the details about how he came out recently as a alcoholic and then decided not long after that he no longer had a problem anymore (2 months later) – lol.

Anyway, I think I might take a bit of break from all this, because I got really upset questioning me and my mothers entire relationship as it is now based on this thread and that can be a bit dangerous. I’m not saying there is some food for thought in here, but I just have to be careful. It has helped me look at a few things within myself though that I need to work on and break some patterns. Thanks for all your patience and feedback Anita.

I might come back at a later date.

– Oh and JayJay, yes fear is a better word! It’s fear 🙂

• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Mia.