HealthyLimits

I keep trying to make a post but it's sooooo long, I'm trying to include so much information but really struggling with brevity as these family dynamic situations are often so complicatedly simple.

In short I would describe myself as a functional healthy adult who had a good childhood and good relationship with my parents. I have a healthy communication style, zero substance abuse issues, a good relationship with my now adult children and my partner, I'm self aware, and emotionally available. I'm good with setting boundaries and limits, seeking interdependence, maintaining healthy friendships, I hold myself accountable for my choices, know that I can't make anybody else do anything, know that their choices and actions are not a reflection of me nor my responsibility. I'm well versed in human behavior and psychology, I rarely take things personally, I'm engaging and growth driven, and so on. Overall I would call myself healthy and well balanced.

That all having been said, I have a co-dependent passive aggressive mother and alcoholic avoidant father (he was a dry drunk for the past 6 years and recently started drinking again) and my biggest issues at the moment is my opinion of them. It's really, really bothering me (and impacting my relationship with them) that I view them both as insecure, co-dependant, cowards who can't even handle having a conversation with me about some of the things I would like to better understand. They're in their mid-60s so I do feel some pressure to have some tough conversations so I don't view them the ways I do when there is no resolution possible.

As I got older though he wanted to make me more of a buddy and they both sought me as a confidant and shoulder. I addressed this 11 years ago and posted in the forum then (as did my mom coincidentally) as I needed to take a year or so away from them to isolate myself from the situation and redefine boundaries.

Of course I likely understand their choices, in part I've explained the whys in this very post but I'm still very bothered by many of the things I know and would like to sit down with them to talk it through. They would rather not speak to me then face that conversation and while I don't take that personally, while I feel empathy for what that must be like for them I simply can't understand it and don't seem to be able to let that go and interact with them on what to me would be a superficial level.

Making things so much harder is that I always felt loved, supported, accepted by them, as a kid my dad was really good to me, they both were and he was for a kid more of a fun drunk so his drinking impacted my mother (and their relationship) more then me (or ours).
At 40 I did get 30 therapy sessions just in case some underlying issues were still lurking around from me turning 40, a divorce in my 30s, having some health issues and my relationship with my parents.

So, the confusing part is that I feel so processed and at terms with things, I feel like I had really good parents as a child who like all of us were struggling with their own growth and issues. Yet I don't think super highly of them simply because I know so many things a son shouldn't know about their parents.
I did jump around a fair amount while writing this on the fly so you're going to have to forgive the syntax ( :

SmallButMighty

Hi HealthyLimits. Glad you came back to write out all the codependent family "stuff" that is still swirling around in your brain. Boy-oh-boy do I get it!

Sounds like you really have yourself together and in a good place mentally and emotionally. I like to think I'm in the same boat. Yet, I still get really frustrated and sometimes upset about the whole dysfunctional dynamic that my parents roll modeled. My alcoholic father passed almost four years ago but my codependent mother is still alive and thriving in her codependent ways at 73.

My situation was a lot like yours. I had a happy, adventurous childhood. I always felt loved and protected. While I was disciplined from time to time (when I most assuredly deserved it) I was never abused. I never lived in the fear or turmoil that some children with alcoholic parents do. My dad rarely drank to obvious drunkenness but when he did he was fun. He'd get his guitar down from the wall and we kids loved it when he'd belt out the Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings tunes.... we'd mostly ignore Mum glowering from the other side of the room, not understanding why she was grumpy. I always thought it was because she thought we were being too loud. I now understand it was much deeper than that.

Honestly, since I came to terms with my own codependence and worked hard at changing my ways, I've been far more at odds with my mother than with my dad who was the drinker. (I became just like her when I myself married an alcoholic) Lately my thoughts on that have been shifting a bit and I've grown a bit more angry, or maybe it's disappointed(?) with my dead dad, like that's going to do me any good? *sigh*

Sorry for the ramble, but your story this morning struck a chord with me, and even though I don't have any words of wisdom, I did want you to know that I completely understand what you are feeling... I don't know what the exact name of that feeling is... but I have it too.

A codependent upbringing really is the gift that keeps on giving isn't it? I have a lot of guilt that I did this to my kids too.... but hopefully we have now broken that pattern.

Last year I was having a bit of a melt down about my mother and started a thread about it. It turned out to be a pretty interesting conversation. If you care to read it, here it is: https://www.soberrecovery.com/forums...nt-mother.html (Struggling with My Codependent Mother)

SparkleKitty

I have had to learn to accept a lot of things I don't understand if I want to be at peace.

HealthyLimits

I can certainly relate to pretty much everything you said. My drunk dad meant something fun as a rule and me often feeling like my mother was being the heavy instead of just enjoying the fun.

Also like you, I have grown more upset with my mother with time. That she didn't have the self respect to address issues or that she brought me into things and situations I shouldn't have been. But this is all stuff after childhood really and I was a super independent kid so I only dealt with what I had time for.

I don't think I fit into the codependent category. Enabling maybe but even that really only if I'm enjoying it or getting something from it. I'm going to have to really think about this more though in terms of my behaviors because I felt an obligation versus getting enjoyment from the results.

I've never been codependent in relationships, I've had relationship struggles but not those that stem from the model I grew up with. I do think they taught me a higher level of devotion which has caused me to stay in relationships past their expiration date. I also think I'm willing to "suffer" more when I'm not happy in a relationship but I'm not sure if that's nature or nurture. I don't think any human relationship is easy and I don't think marriages are easy but they should certainly be loving, accepting, supportive, and healthy while also being realistic. I'm also a problem solver by nature in all walks of life so part of it for me has sometimes been trying to solve the puzzle that were our problems.

SmallButMighty

I'm glad you don't identify as codependent! You are lucky if you grew up in that dynamic and didn't end up like me. I've had to dig deep and make a lot of changes to break those (generations worth of) ingrained behaviors. I certainly didn't mean to infer that you were codependent. I just meant to point out how affected we are by that environment in which we were raised. I was 40 years old going through the break down of my own alky/codie marriage before I realized how screwed up my parents were.... and honestly, the older I get, and the farther away I get from it all... the more I view it as pathologically unwell. I guess we can be glad that we are more enlightened than our parents! The next generation will be far better off because we can have these kind of discussions. So much for those "good old days" when people just swept all this crap under the rug, left to fester on down through the ages.

trailmix

Dysfunctional households produce "independent" kids (broad generalization but it's my experience). What choice do you have except to be independent in a household where fires are constantly being battled?

Obligation vs wanting to participate, high tolerance for unhappy situations, problem solving. All of these can be strong attributes of an adult child of an alcoholic (ACOA). But that's a whole different kettle of fish.

Can you give an example?

hopeful4

Well, it seems to me you have two choices.

One is to try to make them face conversations whey don't want to face. They are in their 60's, so it's not like they are going to actually change anything about themselves. They have made it clear they don't want to do this. Making them do so will likely cause angst in your relationship.

Or, you can accept the past as the past. I don't mean your issues are not legitimate, I just don't see how keeping the focus on these things is healthy for you or them.

I know it's different as it's my X husband, but I had to come to a place that I can coparent with this man for the rest of my life. I had to stop the focus on his past and the things I know about him that are not morally acceptable to me, and just let them go. They are his to own, not mine. I now have a surface relationship with him that is cordial and we can talk about our kids.

I realize it's totally different with your parents, but it's all about relationships and pasts. I have come to a place in my own life that I have to let everyone deal with their own past issues and just focus on my future.

I feel for you, and I hope you can get past these things and have a healthy adult relationship with your parents. If not, I hope you have the strength within you to draw boundaries that you deserve to draw and keep the focus on your own strength and happiness.

Sending you a big hug!

LifeChangeNYC

thousandwords53

Healthy limits, I understand as well and this is why I have been lurking here lately, not sure what to post exactly, but know you are not alone and this thread is extremely helpful (and well timed, for me personally. )
My current situation has me living in the middle when I would rather make distance. Back at it again here on the forums for me. Struggling with my own recovery as I see every day why I am the way I am.

it's hard sometimes being healthy(ier)- you can see the dysfunction so clear.

HealthyLimits

It would be fine if you had and a fair assumption given my upbringing. Do you happen to know what MBTI or Enneagram are? They're a really good learning and perspective tools for better understanding ourselves and others. I'm an ENTP and an Enneagram 7W8 neither of which are overly prone to being codependent in my experience. Had I been an ISFJ or ESFJ though or a 1W2 I'm completely certain that I would have followed that pattern. If you don't know what those are this won't make as much sense but as I said they're yet another good tool in helping unravel the complicated web of being human.

My unresolved issues: This is a lot of stuff that happened later in life or dawned on me later in life. As I reached late teens I realized my parents had a pattern of my dad drinking a lot, pushing my mothers limits, her disconnecting some and him toning it all down just long enough to repeat the cycle. In these ebbs and flows I would become a greater or lesser focus to them. Basically when he was at his worst they wanted to both buddy buddy with me, when he was trying to make it all better they were more focused on each other and I took the back seat.

Additionally as I got older (18+) my dad started treating me much more like a buddy. I'm not the guy to engage in this type of talk but I think my dad wanted to feel more like he fit in. While drunk he told me many thing that still bother me and keep in mind I'm a very very thick skinned person. Not because I'm emotionally disconnect but because I understand people well enough to know why they're doing and saying the things they're doing and saying. He said things like "you're mother is like a dead fish in bed" to justify infidelity to telling me that my mother had to have a hysterectomy because he had unprotected sex with a working girl while drunk and brought home some "gifts" for her though he didn't word things as pleasantly. It all really just leaves me feeling a complete lack of respect for him and like he's a total POS. I have some fairly strong ideas of what I think a "man" is and other than his work ethic he doesn't embody any of them. Those were his burdens to carry there was no need to straddle me with them and leave no way to reconcile them with him.

This isn't all of it of course, he always talked like a goofus, a leaker, elementary, whatever word you want to use. My mom would employ me to monitor his internet activity once he found out how to get in trouble with that. Porn was a serious addiction for him and I often felt like a babysitter to one or both of them and stuck in the middle. His jokes were always toilet humor, he was almost always embarrassing to be around others with. He's also ALWAYS in the past, repeating the same stories over and over and over about things he could have done in the past with women or the time he fixed something by trouble shooting and using limited tools or a time he stuck up for me as a child in some way he sees as very manly.

In their dynamic my mother is always and always has been the go between, it's something she's so used to at this point I don't even think she understands the depths of why she does it. If you read her post on here from 2008 (will link below) you would very much see the typical behaviors and mentality of a woman in her situation.

This all reached a boiling point for me again about 6 weeks ago due to my father emotional decision making and the tenuous situations it often puts me in with my mother. Since then I have been pressing the topic and trying to address this and this was my mothers response a couple days ago where I was trying to talk about some of it via text:

"You certainly do not need to be concerned about how he treated me. I don't need nor want to hear expletives he has said. What he said to you or anyone else, to be honest, I simply don't care about. Men talk stupid with other men. Women say things to other women. I have been with your dad for 50 years. There is no one who understands him more than me. I am not going to talk about it anymore, you can talk to a therapist like the rest of the world. I am not going to apologize for dad, and don't care what he has said. I don't want to know any things you said to him....some times you don't get to have the closure you want with the person. Dad always did the best he could do. If you can't accept that he loved you and did everything he could to be the best dad to you, or husband, or friend, or son that is going to have to be for you to figure out. It's not a perfect world. You can be as stubborn as you want. I do not want anymore stress over this, I don't want dad to have more concern over this. Things are not always how you may want them to be, figure it out. The rest of us all had to."

"I have a boundary I have set with you, I am not talking about your dad anymore. I don't want to hear about it anymore. Just the fact that you will not respect that concerns me. You have a tendency to push and push people until you get the response you want-either because they agree, or because you wore them down and they just want to get away from you. Is that the kind of conversation you want. Your a grown man. Start to act like a grown up. Your showing no respect for me, if you don't want to talk to us then don't. I guess your assertive/aggressive approach has worked. Conversation over."

In truth, I strongly dislike my interactions with my dad 90% of the time but have made the effort to have a relationship with him. I dislike my interactions with my mother only as it relates to my father but overall her and I do fine. I'm pressing this topic now fairly heavily because for how little I enjoy interacting with my father I feel there is only room to go up. Guilt isn't a tool that works on me, I'm not in charge of how this makes them feel so that isn't a concern. The concern I do have is regret, that constant though of "if I never get a chance to speak to them again will I regret how I'm handling this" tempered with the thought of "if I don't ever address this can I live with it and find resolution within".

To make matters worse, my mothers mom passed away about 4 hours after that text exchange. Talk about bad timing for a conversation but it's not like anybody could have known that.


My moms post from 2008:

https://www.soberrecovery.com/forums...-feedback.html (Major confusion-Need feedback)

trailmix

I went back and read most of the previous thread, your Mom's and your response.

Truthfully? What I see is someone trying to manage an unmanageable situation. Someone who wants to fix this and who is doing everything in his power to bring about the changes he wants.

You mention issues that have come up in your life now, how your upbringing and the dynamic of your parents and your Father's less than stellar behaviour (putting it mildly) have accounted for some or many of your troubles in life.

I also had an alcoholic Father, but the dynamic was quite different and my Mother was no push over and we were not dragged in to it etc etc, still very dysfunctional, but not on that level.

I take it you are an only child.

What I also see is that this will most likely never be resolved to your satisfaction. It's incredibly unlikely your Father will ever quit drinking at this point, it is incredibly unlikely your Mother is going to leave him, it's incredibly unlikely (and she has said as much) that she is going to stop supporting him.

So, while you may not like their relationship and you most certainly don't like your Father's behaviour, it's the way it is, with almost zero possibility of change - I don't know what your Father has said but your Mom is pretty clear on this point.

So that's it really. Now what you choose to do about it, for yourself, is up to you. That is really the most important thing - you are the only person you control. You might decide to cease interaction with your Father and only see your Mother, maybe that is a better way for you, however, you really don't have the right to choose how they live their lives.

You see their behaviour as punishing you, of disrespecting you and that they should really apologize for who they are (imo, correct me if I'm wrong).

Have you ever asked yourself - why should they? They were who they are, for better or worse, before you arrived and they are still who they are, for better or worse. We don't get to choose our parents. They, usually, have some great attributes and some perhaps not so great but they, generally, don't mean us harm. They do, by and large, the best they can.

Now it is absolutely ok for you not to like that and it is absolutely ok for you to distance yourself from it. It's kind of not ok to badger them about it maybe?

We kind of have to accept people as they are, where they are (or not).

HealthyLimits

Thank you for a long response and for taking the time you have to write it. I wish I resonated more with what you're saying, maybe you've missed some of what I've said? I'm certainly not trying to manage two other adults, I myself am an adult with a life, children, a relationship, friends and those are my obligations. Attempting to manage my parents or anybody else isn't of any interest to me.

I'm also in no way attempting to bring about any changes. If my parents want to beat each other every night, get drunk, watch porn, make meth or whatever they choose not my circus, not my monkeys. Am I attempting to have a 60 minute conversation with them so I can find some additional empathy in understanding? Absolutely.

But to be clear, you mentioned "troubles in my life" and these are not my words. I am the architect of my life and nobody else. I'm very happy with my life, I would NEVER speak in terms like that. I'm happy with my childhood, I'm struggling and posting about how I view my parents as human beings for the choices they have made and their unwillingness to even speak about it.

It seems childish, avoidant, immature, irresponsible, unhealthy and so on. This mostly matches my expectations though so my posts are made in an attempt to reconcile these internal struggles.

Thanks again for posting and hopefully this is much more clear. I'm a very very direct communicator so there's never anything between any lines with me.

trailmix

Sorry if I misunderstood, I took that meaning from this part of your other post:

Granted that was 11 years ago and you may have already sorted through everything, but I thought that was part of the issue.

That aside, perhaps your expectations are realistic. I think your Mom was pretty clear about not wanting to have to justify their life choices to you. Now, I get that you may not be coming from a place of confrontation, but that is obviously not their perception, for whatever reason.

Is there anything and I mean anything either of them could say that would increase your empathy?

HealthyLimits

Yes, that was a long, long time ago and even then I was sorting out the nurture/nature component to get a better idea of what was what and why. At the time I felt some of my relationship proclivities if you will were related to my upbringing but with time it's become clear they're squarely me and not unhealthy provided there is a a proper exchange of needs.

Well, I'm posting a little confused about what I even want. My father is just a coward, I'm not sure he even remembers many of the stupid things he's said to me. I guess I just need to have a conversation about it. Like something to humanize the motives without me having to guess at them so I could be more understanding and see them in a different light.

I likely wouldn't be friends with either of my parents were they not my parents but that's family summed up in simple terms for most of us. I also feel like when it comes to growth, self awareness, acceptance of self and such I'm gigantic leaps and bounds ahead of my parents. So it sucks being the person your parents should be.

I would just move on if not for how much I dislike how stupid my father talks and his emotional decision making and my mom foolishly just following the bad decision train.

With my own kids, there is NOTHING off limits, any issue they have, any talk they want to have, anything they need resolved from their childhood I'm fully engaged and willing. I simply can't fathom being any other way.

And, thank you all for listing, even talking about it this much helps me process a lot.

FionnaPerSe

HealthyLimits

Your response along with my own confusion relating to how I best resolve this was some of my reluctance in posting. I tend to speak very intentionally and this seems to ironically also cause confusion which I understand the reasons for as the vast majority of people aren't very direct.

I'm not in any way, shape or form "judging" them. If I'm parsing words, we all make judgements daily, "she's pretty", "they're in good shape", "he seems happy". So if you're referring to my calling them "cowards" for example, I'm stating an observation best defined by the word "coward" which is "a person that lacks the courage to do or endure unpleasant things". I often struggle with the word "judging" or "judgemental" though as having good judgement is such an essential part of living a healthy life. When people use it in the context you did I take it to mean drawing conclusions about the value or worth of a person based on observations which is something I never do. Is that how you meant it?

I also don't feel they're "less than", my parents are amazing people, salt of the earth and certainly not "less than". You may be referring to me saying "I also feel like when it comes to growth, self awareness, acceptance of self and such I'm gigantic leaps and bounds ahead of my parents. So it sucks being the person your parents should be."?

Again, this is an observation of skill proficiency in those specific areas not a blanket statement about the entirety of the person. I don't know what led you to think I was feeling like they're "less than" so please feel free to clarify but my parents were in so many ways better parents than I've been able to be, they both have a better work ethic, they outshine me in more areas than I can count but self awareness and a willingness to confront tough things aren't on that list.

I really do value all of your insights and maybe the issue is just my posting without any clear resolve in mind. I attempted to address this 11 years ago without success and don't want these things to go unaddressed forever.

FionnaPerSe

pdm22

Myers Briggs & Enneagram are systems that I find interesting too, and are great tools to use in helping to understand ourselves and other people better. I don’t find myself trying to type people too much in real life (occasionally I do, especially if I’m really struggling to understand someone, or sometimes a type is just obvious), but I do keep in mind that most people are 6s (followed by 3s & 9s), and those strong codependent tendencies and “helping” type behaviors are found in the Myers Briggs types you mentioned, and in type 2. Although it is my understand that growing up in a dysfunctional home environment in and of itself is on some of the codependent trait checklists (depends on what definition you are going by, no doubt), and in can manifest in various ways, in different types.. My best friend in college and partner in crime was an ENTP (possibly an enneagram 7), she had a great sense of humor, was super adventurous, and we had a lot of fun travels together.

As far as you parents, whoa, that’s a lot of personal sexual information to put on you. I’m reminded of a Patrick Carney’s book I read years ago. Not sure why a friend recommended it to me because I didn’t have the emotional incest type stuff (neither parent was an alcoholic, but abusive and dysfunctional, very little sex talk, but my father was a psycho when I went through puberty / teenage years, around boys). But that strikes me as information that would be super invasive, even as an adult. With my own parents, there’s a lot of dysfunction in their marriage too, and I find that I’m happiest and do best when I don’t get involved at all, and mostly try to focus on my own “issues stuff” from my upbringing (the gift that keeps on giving).

trailmix

I can be really direct so here goes.

You are in fact judging them and very harshly. You can say you aren't but that's not actually true. You have been very specifically judgmental in the way you describe both of them. Perhaps you are denying this to yourself to temper it because standing on the podium of judgement is, obviously, against what you are, theoretically, trying to accomplish and your standards for yourself.

"she's pretty", "they're in good shape", "he seems happy" - are also judgments.

You must know that in order for your parents to attend your 60 minutes of "talk" you are asking them to explain themselves, individually to you and themselves as a couple.

Truly, it isn't any of your business.

Their behaviour, your "coward" of a Father and your - weak co-dependant Mother do not want to explain themselves to you.

I'm going to guess that you have probably attempted this talk before and have gone round and round with it to no avail? You will never get the answers you want. They are who they are and to ask someone to explain their innermost workings to you is a pretty tall order.

I also get that in your family if one of your children wanted to have this type of conversation with you that you would come to the table ready to talk. That does not mean that they would be accepting of what you had to say.

Your parents are who they are. I think it's pretty clear why they are the way they are. You have known them for 40 years, their motives and personalities are probably well known to you as you have been thinking about this for a while.

If nothing else, having them leave your property all those years ago was a clear sign of rejection of them and their lifestyle, it doesn't get much clearer than that.

You don't like them much and respect for them is non-existent at this point - and that's ok, that is your choice, however, you have said that by and large you had a really good childhood. So kudos to them for supporting you in your growing up years and allowing you to have great memories.

My suggestion to you (for what it's worth) is that, if you wish to pursue this you take a long, hard look at what you are really looking for and asking for and what you hope to accomplish with it.

Hawkeye13

Agree with above.

I never got apologies or acknowledgement from my alcoholic mother for many things that have followed me into middle age and beyond.

I never got that conversation or closure I thought I needed and deserved before she died.

Turns out I could do the work myself and build my own closure.
You mom made it crystal clear the conversation isn’t going to happen.

Maybe making peace with that and letting it go will let you find closure on your own and heal.

The pain is so hard to carry for a lifetime.