To this day, the Parental Units don't seem to grasp why I don't speak to them anymore.
Ah, well. As I've said before, at least I have my inlaws, hubby and MIL's extended family. They've all been totally supportive, loving and nonjudgmental, things I never got the benefit of growing up.
My mom also played games with my career/college plans.
If we won money sufficient for the purpose, I would be returning to college. I *like* math and science. I was damn good at both.
But those careers aren't "ladylike" and not appropriate for a woman of my background.
Blarg.
The best I could do was get a PhD in English and teach college: at my PhD graduation, for my graduation gift, she bought me a whole bunch of third grade grammar books to use with my students. She honestly thought she was being helpful. (If only she could have seen the value of that as a joke gift, but really, she just mentally ignored that I would be teaching college in the fall.)
This sounds very familiar to me. I think our mothers may have a lot in common. I also learned the hard way growing up that my mother could not be trusted with my inner thoughts and aspirations. She would only spit on all of that and tell me what I *should* do.
In her efforts to control me once I reached adulthood, she did something that essentially changed the course of my education. The only way I could go to university was to take out scads of student loans, and as long as I was living at home and under a certain age my student loan applications required Mom's signature and income information. My application was all filled out and ready to go for my second year when Mom found out that I had started visiting my estranged father on the sly. I got home that day to find that she had taken scissors to my application, cutting out her signature and every reference to her information.
The Maternal Unit knew I wanted to attend a particular private university in Waco (we live in Houston), because they had an undergraduate program I wanted to pursue, as well as a reputation for having an excellent law school, which I also wanted to attend after finishing my undergrad degree
( ... )
Oh yeah. And the reason I no longer speak to the Paternal Unit either is that he recently admitted to me that, since he's been married to her for 40 years, he's always going to take her side over mine, no matter what. I always knew he felt that way, but having him actually say the words out loud was a real kick in the gut, yanno?
I get it! And once I was finally out of 'the nest' I got "Why aren't you applying for jobs? Why aren't you working?" when I'd been just about scared into total frozen stillness about the whole process, thanks to her. After spending my whole life with them being told (and even now if I were to listen) all the stuff I 'couldn't handle' or 'couldn't do' it's amazing I ever did anything at all.
I honestly didn't really blossom and grow as a confident, self-assured person until I met hubby. He (and his family) taught me what "unconditional love" really means. I look back at the person I was then--as you say, "scared into total frozen stiffness"--and reflect on the person I am now, and I'm so thankful to have made it far enough that I did ultimately find light at the end of my long, dark, lonely tunnel.
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Ah, well. As I've said before, at least I have my inlaws, hubby and MIL's extended family. They've all been totally supportive, loving and nonjudgmental, things I never got the benefit of growing up.
Reply
If we won money sufficient for the purpose, I would be returning to college. I *like* math and science. I was damn good at both.
But those careers aren't "ladylike" and not appropriate for a woman of my background.
Blarg.
The best I could do was get a PhD in English and teach college: at my PhD graduation, for my graduation gift, she bought me a whole bunch of third grade grammar books to use with my students. She honestly thought she was being helpful. (If only she could have seen the value of that as a joke gift, but really, she just mentally ignored that I would be teaching college in the fall.)
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In her efforts to control me once I reached adulthood, she did something that essentially changed the course of my education. The only way I could go to university was to take out scads of student loans, and as long as I was living at home and under a certain age my student loan applications required Mom's signature and income information. My application was all filled out and ready to go for my second year when Mom found out that I had started visiting my estranged father on the sly. I got home that day to find that she had taken scissors to my application, cutting out her signature and every reference to her information.
I didn't go to school that fall.
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