Originally Posted by
Behappy1 
But I am present now - being the mom I have always been along the way when alcohol wasn't present. I am trying to word this so I'm not minimizing anything, but it's as if they are maximizing everything. I sometimes feel like they act like I had them chained to a post in the basement and beat them
I hear you Behappy and again, I don't have the answer. I hope when their brains mature that this will start to fall by the wayside, but I haven't found that to be the case.
I didn't have an ideal childhood, my Father was an alcoholic. However, I don't actually blame him or my Mother for anything. They were who they were, I was very independent, by and large I had a lot of fun growing up.
I'm not sure where this blame thing comes from. The perceptions are different, that's for sure, I don't know how you change that or if you should even try. If you try then you are "defensive", or have excuses, can't make any headway there.
At some point I hope your kids will start to see you as an actual person, rather than only their Mom, I think that is key. Now that they are away at school you will probably find that you become more of who you were before you got married (at least that was the case for me and I also married very young). That didn't go over well either lol