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Post by tapati on Jun 2, 2010 18:26:08 GMT -5
Then there's the strained relationship between Peter Bishop and his father, Walter, which turns out to be even more complex than he realized. (I won't spoil it in case someone wants to rent and catch up on the series.) Oooh, Fringe is so so good. I can really relate to all the father stuff too. My dad bailed on the family in selfish ways for many years... Recently, he made a big show of trying to make up for that... Opened up his basement apartment to me while I looked for a job. And then did nothing when his wife beat me and broke my thumb one night. (For those that don't know, I have a physical disability that makes me quite a bit weaker than most 30 year olds. I wasn't sufficiently able to defend myself.) I ended up having to file a police report--and leaving in the middle of the night with a police escort. I've since told him that I don't blame his wife for our estrangement. I blame him and his cowardice and laziness and inability to stand up for anything. For those of you who didn't know... There are reasons why passive men (and people in general) freak me the hell out. I now know that Brad in the other thread didn't deserve to be yelled at as if he was my father. But, yeah... Wow, major fail on his part. What a horrible thing to go through! The most basic part of a parent's job is to protect you. I can see why passive folks are a trigger for you. I've had to learn to assert myself over the years and it took a lot of conscious work. I had learned that if I tried to (in my family) I often got either ignored, steamrolled over, or incited violent rages. It was never productive so as a child I didn't often try it. I wasn't always passive but the few times I did stand up for myself it didn't seem to matter much. I am a conflict-avoider by nature but I have learned how to deal with it when it is important enough to me. It was a steep learning curve though. Now if I choose to avoid conflict it is a conscious choice and I take responsibility to not be annoyed by behaviors I haven't bothered to object to.
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Post by anatheist on Jun 2, 2010 18:31:11 GMT -5
Thanks Tapati!
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Post by usotsuki on Jun 2, 2010 18:31:40 GMT -5
I'm known to be laid-back enough that when I *do* take decisive action in a situation people look at me like I have two heads. :/
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Post by Ex-Adriel on Jun 2, 2010 18:39:56 GMT -5
No worries - it is a perfect song, and really illustrates the point. It's a good choice of multimedia.
I think I'm a little shocked by all the father issues that are emerging here. It's strange, almost, that in a forum about the abuses of patriarchy, one of the main themes here is abandonment and neglect, rather than more direct physical/emotional abuse. (I'm not implying that neglect and abandonment are NOT abuse, just that they're abuse in a fundamentally different way.)
I wonder if that has anything to do with them trying to avoid the whole patriarch thing altogether - trying to avoid responsibility or connection? A sort of anti-patriarch.
Regardless, I think that's the worst a parent can inflict on their kids - it's in your power as a parent to make them think of the world as a safe place where they are loved, or a dangerous place where people can leave at any time. If you can't behave in such a way that they can grow up feeling secure, you damn well shouldn't have kids to begin with.
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Post by nikita on Jun 2, 2010 19:21:22 GMT -5
Sometimes families just suck beyond the telling of it. I too have father issues but they come from a really different place. I understand more fully now what the dynamics of my family was/is, why my mom and sisters were/are the way they are. It doesn't make it hurt or piss me off any less, but at least I get why they wound up the sick people they turned out to be. And although I understand the why of it, I cannot excuse them for it. We are all dealt a hand to play. It’s what we do with it that determines the kind of people we ultimately are.
I come from a family of extremely toxic women and my dad was the only sane and safe and loving person I had to turn to as a child. Unfortunately he died when I was fourteen. So I have abandonment issues without the other dad-baggage that goes with it. It was always the women in my family who, through indifference or outright hatred, did a number on me. My mom and sisters mocked me for mourning his death and as soon as we got home from his funeral they made a point of killing my dog, a beloved pet of mine since I was two years old. Their jealousy and hatred knew no bounds and I remember how astonished I was by them. I always knew they didn't like me, but at fourteen I was unprepared for the level of hatred they let loose upon me. These were all grown married women with families of their own and I was still very much a child. It wasn’t until I was older that I realized that it wasn’t just directed at me, they were all linked in a dance of jealousy, lying, and hatred from earliest childhood. I was just the latest member of the club, so to speak.
Their behavior when my dad died was a blessing in a way though, because it shocked me into the realization that I was not part of them at all, it let me separate psychologically from them to a greater degree, enough that I avoided a lot of their insanity for myself. I stepped outside the dance they were in and went my own way. Of course part of that was joining a cult at fifteen, but given a choice between them and the cult to this day I’d choose cult. I have my own issues, obviously, but at least I stepped away from their craziness. My mom redeemed herself with me when I was an adult, but my sisters are all still locked into a maelstrom of hatred and petty jealousies that never fails to shock the outside observer. I could tell you tales about stupidity that would make your jaw drop. Dealing with them is like walking through a minefield. No matter how insignificant the subject at hand, how completely mundane the topic, the position all my sisters take is that the other one has to be lying. And sadly, it’s usually true. All these many years gone by, and they are still in full swing. Just trying to figure out who is telling the truth about anything at all is exhausting work. And of course there are the loyalty tests. I cannot believe I am related to these people.
So yeah. Family. It spins us in many directions, some good, some bad, some just a relief.
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Post by km on Jun 2, 2010 19:30:19 GMT -5
nikita: Wow... That is horrific. I was targeted as a child in my family as well, but nothing that ever approached that level of cruelty. The way in which I was targeted was more of an afterthought, more something that my parents did because they didn't know how to deal with the problems in their marriage. Even so, to this day, I become outraged if someone tries to blame me for something that isn't my fault.
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Post by km on Jun 2, 2010 19:37:19 GMT -5
I wonder if that has anything to do with them trying to avoid the whole patriarch thing altogether - trying to avoid responsibility or connection? A sort of anti-patriarch. In my own family, I have seen it more as a habit of avoiding responsibility altogether. I would expect an anti-patriarch to instill his daughters with self-confidence and strength. But more specifically, my father is no anti-patriarch because he has always hated women. Most of the women in his life are--and always have been--far stronger than him, and he resents that. He would always go on and on about how oppressive it was for him to live with "three women" (my mom, my sister, and me). He would act as if this were a joke, but it was just one more passive-aggressive way of expressing his resentment. He was also a pastor, and he always hated the women in the church who stood up to him beyond all reason, but he afforded a degree of respect to the men. I see it as just one more fucked up, entitled response to patriarchy, but not necessarily less patriarchal than the control freaks we've talked about here.
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Post by nikita on Jun 2, 2010 19:59:38 GMT -5
Hey, the left over mashed potato controversy of 2002 went on for months. Sending home a half cup of left over mashed potatoes with my mom after Thanksgiving dinner became me ‘ stealing all the mashed potatoes’ and was the topic of outraged conversation and accusations past Easter. The real irony of the thing was that they were my mashed potatoes in the first place. I bought ‘em, I cooked ‘em, I mashed em’, and I did all the clean up. But we were at my sister’s house, so somehow that half cup of potatoes became hers. Half. A. Cup. Of. Mashed. Potatoes. Seriously, I can’t believe I’m related to these people.
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Post by km on Jun 2, 2010 22:30:53 GMT -5
Hey, the left over mashed potato controversy of 2002 went on for months. Sending home a half cup of left over mashed potatoes with my mom after Thanksgiving dinner became me ‘ stealing all the mashed potatoes’ and was the topic of outraged conversation and accusations past Easter. The real irony of the thing was that they were my mashed potatoes in the first place. I bought ‘em, I cooked ‘em, I mashed em’, and I did all the clean up. But we were at my sister’s house, so somehow that half cup of potatoes became hers. Half. A. Cup. Of. Mashed. Potatoes. Seriously, I can’t believe I’m related to these people. Oh, wow... At least my people are generous with their food. That is completely ridiculous. It must be...difficult to maintain contact with them.
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Post by anatheist on Jun 2, 2010 22:53:51 GMT -5
Oh nikita, I am so sorry that you had to be exposed to such cruelty
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Post by tapati on Jun 3, 2010 7:30:05 GMT -5
Hey, the left over mashed potato controversy of 2002 went on for months. Sending home a half cup of left over mashed potatoes with my mom after Thanksgiving dinner became me ‘ stealing all the mashed potatoes’ and was the topic of outraged conversation and accusations past Easter. The real irony of the thing was that they were my mashed potatoes in the first place. I bought ‘em, I cooked ‘em, I mashed em’, and I did all the clean up. But we were at my sister’s house, so somehow that half cup of potatoes became hers. Half. A. Cup. Of. Mashed. Potatoes. Seriously, I can’t believe I’m related to these people. Oh my... But somehow it sounds familiar. I've never found the thought that our families will greet us on the other side when we pass away as a comforting one. So one Halloween I had a talk with my relatives who passed on (since I believe that is a time of year when that is more possible). I basically told them that if they were still fighting and into drama please don't bother me when I cross over, but if they had learned some lessons and changed their behavior I'd be happy to give them another chance. I apologized for any of the things I felt I had done to contribute to family conflicts myself. I felt like the air had been cleared--even if there is no "other side" and I was just doing a fancy version of the empty chair technique. I like Clarissa Pinkola Estes' mistaken zygote theory, myself. Somehow I got dropped into the wrong womb...
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Post by tapati on Jun 3, 2010 7:30:56 GMT -5
PS I'd be awfully tempted to buy them each a big bag of potatoes and drop it on their doorsteps...
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Post by tapati on Jun 3, 2010 7:36:38 GMT -5
Why
I know I haven’t been a good father You said, expecting what? I wonder I couldn’t get the word out Through my contracted throat Why I wanted to ask Why echoes down throughout my life Accompanied by How and What Who could only be you It was your choice—your absence Making my heart not fonder but more lonely Confused, afraid to take chances The unasked question directed at all Who dare enter here …Haven’t been a good father You haven’t been.
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Post by krwordgazer on Jun 6, 2010 1:03:41 GMT -5
That is a beautiful poem, Tapati. Raw and honest and real.
Your segment was very good-- painful to read. "Cat's in the Cradle" resonates with me, too-- though my father was present in our lives when he was sober, when he was drinking his body was in the room but he was not. He had turned into someone else. The broken promises were hardest to bear-- made when he was sober, only to be forgotten.
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Post by cereselle on Jun 6, 2010 12:53:04 GMT -5
[quote author=tapati board=cradle thread=1126 post=15407 time=1275484110I'm sorry to remind you of it, though it was the perfect song to use for this. It started out as a poem by Sandy Chapin that Harry turned into a song with her permission. [/quote] Oh goodness, Tapati, don't take that as a condemnation of your post! I am fascinated, as always, by your story. I am just sensitive, and was even worse as a child. I've built up some defenses since then.
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Post by tapati on Jun 9, 2010 17:42:22 GMT -5
That is a beautiful poem, Tapati. Raw and honest and real. Your segment was very good-- painful to read. "Cat's in the Cradle" resonates with me, too-- though my father was present in our lives when he was sober, when he was drinking his body was in the room but he was not. He had turned into someone else. The broken promises were hardest to bear-- made when he was sober, only to be forgotten. I've heard that from a lot of people and I can imagine it must be so painful to have the illusion of father but not the reality. Knowing him when sober must increase the feeling of loss. I shouldn't have been surprised that this post hit a nerve and I hope it also allowed members here to know they aren't alone with their loss.
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Post by tapati on Jun 9, 2010 17:44:26 GMT -5
I'm sorry to remind you of it, though it was the perfect song to use for this. It started out as a poem by Sandy Chapin that Harry turned into a song with her permission. Oh goodness, Tapati, don't take that as a condemnation of your post! I am fascinated, as always, by your story. I am just sensitive, and was even worse as a child. I've built up some defenses since then. Oh I didn't, I'm just sorry it brought up so many sad feelings for so many members...and sad that those feelings are there in the first place. I don't know how to reach all of the fathers who are currently neglecting their children but I wish there were a way.
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Post by rosa on Jun 9, 2010 23:27:15 GMT -5
Tapati, can you imagine being Mormon and hearing over and over that you are going to be in the exact same family relationship with your family of origin or your husband for EVER.
Just the little pamphlets give me the heebie-jeebies.
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Post by tapati on Jun 17, 2010 22:04:39 GMT -5
Oh Goddess, no, I wouldn't want to be stuck with my ex for eternity! Though if I were I'd make sure he felt that he had fallen into hell!
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Post by tapati on Jun 17, 2010 22:07:08 GMT -5
Those who've followed my story might be interested in this compelling memoir by a man who spend most of his childhood (against his will, really) in the Hare Krishna movement in Europe and India. chakra.org/announcements2/DevadsJun15_10.htmlSmall world--the Kirtiraja he mentions in his book is the very same devotee who first wrote to me when I ordered Krishna Book in 1974. He was later sent to start a farm temple in Sweden.
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Post by tapati on Jul 24, 2010 11:53:39 GMT -5
Ha, ran into an instructional video that Mahasraya posted from when he was in Brasil.
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Post by tapati on Aug 4, 2010 2:08:30 GMT -5
Earlier today I posted something on my blog related to the whole project of my memoir and how it affects others, and also told an important story. tapati.livejournal.com/550153.html
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Post by Vyckie D. Garrison on Aug 4, 2010 10:18:48 GMT -5
Earlier today I posted something on my blog related to the whole project of my memoir and how it affects others, and also told an important story.
[a href="http://tapati.livejournal.com/550153.html"]http://tapati.livejournal.com/550153.html [/size][/a][/quote] Tapati ~ thank you for sharing this here. You have inspired me to write a new FAQ for No Longer Quivering: Why Do You Dwell in the Past ~ Why Don't You Just Forgive and Move On?
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Post by dangermom on Aug 4, 2010 11:18:53 GMT -5
Tapati, can you imagine being Mormon and hearing over and over that you are going to be in the exact same family relationship with your family of origin or your husband for EVER. Just the little pamphlets give me the heebie-jeebies. I just saw this comment, and it's not quite reflective of LDS doctrine. Yes, we believe that family relationships can endure forever, but that doesn't mean that they have to. Abusers do not get that privilege. Nor is anyone forced to be with someone they don't want to be with. Family relationships are 'sealed' in the temple; that's one of the main functions of temples. A person who breaks the covenants made in the temple is no longer sealed to his or her family. This is often simply assumed rather than formalized, but the idea is once you've broken your end of the deal--say, by abusing your family-- then that covenant is gone and you will not find yourself with your family in the eternities. (The same is true of the priesthood; using it wrongly makes it go away.) In the case of a divorce and remarriage, this can be formalized with a cancellation of sealing. Otherwise, it's just understood that human relationships are kind of messy and can't always be charted out. These things will all be straightened out in due time, and no one will be forced into anything. In LDS thought, choice is always paramount--God honors our agency above all else and we have to choose for ourselves. (Which incidentally partially explains why Mormons are invariably appalled by Calvinism. Predestination, irresistible grace, and the like are directly opposed to the Mormon insistence on agency.) I can understand your feelings; I just want you to know that the pamphlets assume that you are actually fond of your family. AFAIK, Calvinist thought is that if God is omnipotent and sovereign, then he controls everything and dictates if you are to be saved--so perhaps you look at "families can be together forever" and see "God will make you be with your family forever whether you like it or not"? Whereas Mormons believe that God deliberately does not do that, not because he can't, but because it would be wrong. To Mormons, if you can't say yes or no to God, then all other free will is pretty meaningless. I hope that helps clarify things a little?
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Post by dangermom on Aug 4, 2010 11:24:41 GMT -5
An to get back to this thread, I just read your blog post Tapati and I'm so sorry your daughter was put through that. I'm glad your sticking to it and writing about it.
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