Waterfalls wrote:
tarantella64 wrote:
Waterfalls wrote:
As you point out, Dianthus, she never expresses wanting to give to anyone. Very sad.
Why do you keep insisting on this? She's willing to stay in a situation that's horrible for her in order to protect the children. Why don't you see that as giving?
I suppose because her attitude toward her husband reminds me of my mother's attitude toward me as a child.
If an adult is holding the world responsible for his or her unhappiness, they are blaming. You make a good point, Tarantella, and maybe this person is able to give love to her kids. But at the moment she was writing, she's making it the kids' fault she feels she has to stay with her husband. Maybe it was just a moment, maybe not.
Growing up believing I was bad and creating unhappiness for my mother, and everyone, and incapable of giving to the world was extremely difficult. Extremely painful,Tarantella. So as an adult, I know my mother complained about me, my father, and others she "had" to put up with, and I'm sure she gave what she could. She just has not had much to give anyone, ever. And if pressed to say who was more noticeably ASD, that would be her, much more so than my father. Yet she was the one complaining and blaming.
So I don't see her as giving because although she writes as if that were the case in her mind, I don't see evidence in what she wrote that actual giving is occurring. And the question of whether she is giving isn't one I see as answerable based on her perspective. That question is answered not based on what she thinks or feels, but rather based on what the recipients think and feel and/or what observers think and feel. We are all capable of lying to ourselves to some degree. I'm sure she thinks she is giving, that isn't in doubt. I disagree with her rigid and limiting perspective, knowing I don't have all the facts and could be wrong.
Well...it seems to me that you're reading your story, not her story.
I see nothing in what she writes that says she blames her children. It is a fact that she's responsible for her children, and she recognizes that she's trapped, but there are absolutely no words, phrases, sentences in there saying she blames them for their existence or the position she's in. She's also explicit in not blaming her husband for his AS and the effect it has on her. She is, however, saying it's horrible and trying to warn others away from accidentally entering the same kind of life.
If she's in a marriage so bad she feels terribly trapped and joyless, but she stays anyway so that her children don't go through upheaval and poverty, then she is indeed giving. It would be a great relief to her to leave, but she gives that up for them.
She is also, if all we're going by is that post, being very careful not to complain in front of her husband -- she says she sneaks away to post. To vent on a board with people who understand what she's going through. She's also clear about why she does that. She knows it's not her husband's fault, and furthermore it wouldn't do any good; he doesn't understand what he does that causes so much pain, and doesn't understand that her pain has anything to do with him. Which she also understands is not his fault. The awareness just isn't there in him. Given that her pain is real, is she supposed just not to say anything to anyone?
ETA: She's not blaming "the world" for her unhappiness. She's pretty clear about the problem: she married a guy who treated her beautifully; then he dropped her stone cold and was/is oblivious to the emotional effects, and furthermore she can't get away from him and his continuing maltreatment of her (and obliviousness). If one person in a marriage suddenly loses interest in the other, then yes, that usually has a profound effect on the other spouse.
12 May 2014, 2:42 am
