You are involved, say, with a pathologically self-centered personality, perhaps a narcissist or sociopath?
That is, he wants what he wants when he wants it, and he’ll do whatever’s necessary (his entitlement) to get it, or take it.
Key diagnostic trait: he reserves the right to punish you when you obstruct his agenda.
Now here’s the thing: in the heat of the moment, you may actually be pretty good at confronting his abuse. Maybe you stand up for yourself pretty effectively? Maybe, in the moment, you’re even pretty good at setting limits and challenging his nonsense?
So then what’s the problem?
The problem occurs when you step away from these incidents.
In stepping away from them, you potentially risk enacting your own form of compartmentalization, by which I mean that, while in the moment you may address his abuse with some backbone, yet beyond the moment you effectively “drop the ball” by failing to process, and own, the greater pattern.
It’s a case of our seeing the trees in the forest just fine, yet somehow, defensively, ensuring that we fail to see the forest through the trees.
I’m referring, of course, to a kind of defense mechanism with which some—not all—of us may be familiar?
As I suggested, strategically this defense mechanism deploys a form of compartmentalization, while tactically it assumes forms of denial, minimization and avoidance (of reality).
What precisely is the function and, more importantly, the danger of this defense mechanism?
Its function, I suspect, is to prevent us from connecting the dots; that is, our failure (defensively) to connect the dots enables our avoidance of confronting the greater pattern that underlies the series of incidents.
So long as we address the “abusive incidents” separately—as discreet events—thereby defensively ignoring their wider pattern, then we can rationalize more easily our “staying in” the relationship with a kind of pseudo-dignity and pseudo self-respect.
To be clear, we achieve this self-compromise by reframing the abuse as a series of brushfires to be troubleshot on an ongoing basis, much like a manageable chronic illness.
And especially if, as I’ve noted, we’re pretty good at this—somewhat effective, that is, at confronting these brushfires on a case by case basis—then it becomes easier to compartmentalize in the manner I’m describing.
The danger, of course, is how this defensive process—in its reframing of the exploitation as a series of disconnected, but manageable, events—supports our denial that the relationship has, in fact, been globally and fatally compromised by the exploitation.
This highlights, yet again, the basic conundrum of defense mechanisms: the protection they confer is so often exceeded, unfortunately, by their cost to our well-being and, sometimes, integrity.
(My use of “he” in this article was for strictly for convenience’s sake, not to imply that females aren’t capable of the behaviors discussed. This article is copyrighted © 2009 by Steve Becker, LCSW.)
gg: oh yeah, I know…I second guess myself too….it’s our nature to want to do our very best and their gaslighting us that causes us to fear we are not doing our very best. When I am back up…I realize that I might not always do my very best….but then I might be doing the dang very best that can be done with these difficult people!!!!! We have to know ‘when to fold ’em’ too! And for us: that’s hard! And they know it, utilize it to the max! I think it’s this way: do the best we can and let the cards fall where they may!! [AND most of the time doing our very best with these people means keeping a safe distance….kids or no kids. Apply the KISS method. 😉
Gem:
I believe this has caused you great pain…..daughter or lover….whatever the case may be….it’s not a healthy relationship for YOU.
At some point you decided you were done feeling used and abused and enabeling her. (both)
You saw her habits of only showing her lovely face when she needed something. Mostly money….or your ‘help’.
What concerns me for you is your request for ‘only an appology’…..
Here’s why.
If I was the con…..and I knew I could ‘get you back’ by an appology……and get the money I needed….guess what….I’d appologize….get on my knees, tell you how wrong I was and suck you right back in!
We don’t get closure with these situations of dealing with a toxic person…..I think this is what takes us so long to heal and process……
I can’t tell you (over 28 yrs) how many times the s ex appologized….not for everything he hurt me for….just the thinkgs he knew he needed to ‘get me back in’ for…..suck me back….
An appology from these folks is just another manipulation….
especially if that’s ‘all you ask for’.
I would re evaluate how your percieving what you want.
You KNOW your not gonna get a decent/humain/empathetic person…..apology or not……
the question is…..do you want her back in your life, and do you want to be in this painful position again (after the apology)?
This is why we feel guilt….we second guess ourselves….I’m on the flip side of you mamma gem….dealing with the emotions towards my parents.
We know we don’t want to be treated as such…..but we know we cant change the persons behaviors……the only thing we can change is our choice to be in or out of contact with them.
So…..is an appology really all your looking for or do you think if you ever received that….it’s be just a bandaid covering the underlying unhealed scab?
Feel better Gem, you have a lot to be grateful for……youv’e made a wise choice and you have felt so free due to that choice. (per you).
XXOO
EB
Dear TB,
Your story about the mother dog, and recognising her pup, but not continuing to mother it, and the mothers weaning their babies and letting them grow up and fend for themselves, etc.
Reminded me of a horse I bought once. this horse was 18 months old and still nursing. If the mother tried to wean it, as most mother horses will do by 6-9 months, the filly would kick the mare (she was as big as the mare by then) and FORCE the old mare to let her suck. this horse had never had any human handling up until that time, not even a halter, but I bought her (I was young and dumb) and haltered her, and she fought like a banshee to get loose. My grandfather helped me and we tied her to a big tree by a stout chain and let her jpull to her heart’s content for several days and she finally gav eup and said to herself, “You know, I can’t over come this so I might as well quit trying.” After that, she could be tied with a shoe string.
Well, she had never been fed any grain, and literally did not know what it was, but after she found out what it was and that she liked it—if you went into the corral with her with a bucket in your hand she would rush up and see if you had feed for her, if the bucket was empty, she would turn and kick at you or strike out to bite you. My grandfather pretty well “got her attention” on this behavior but at one time, she got him pinned up inside the barn and was coming at him and he literally had to stab her in the breast with a pitch fork to get her off of him.
We sold her, she was quite large, but quite dangerous and because she had LEARNED that she could force her mother to keep on nursing her, and that she was POWERFUL, she used this force and violence (I think she was a psychopathic horse) to get what she wanted from anyone or anything else.
The man we sold her to, worked in the log woods, dragging out logs with big horses, mostly outlaws, but he knew how to control them and make them work for him, and she probably pulled logs for the rest of her life. My grandfather had been driving by the farm where he saw her out in the pasture and got out and walked out in the pasture to see her several years later, and not even thinking about how violent she was, and she immediately attacked him and put him under the fence pretty quickly. Knowing what I know now, I would have put a bullet in her brain and fed her meat to my dogs, but at that time I was only 15-16 and didn’t have the animal boundaries I have now that dangerous or viscious animals that I own DIE and any that put me in jeapordy.
Gen, your list of what is going on is a GREAT LIST—the problems are, that though we intellectually KNOW THESE THINGS, our emotions keep getting involved because we loved these people. We may no longer LIKE THEM, but we do or did LOVE THEM.
There comes a point though, that if you are in love with, or love anyone if they abuse you long enough, how long can you “love” them? Or is that feeling we have really LOVE AT ALL? What is that yearning for a relationship with someone who abuses us. Is it love? I’m not sure it can truly be defined as “love”—-fantasy emotions maybe but not love, not forever.
I don’t feel any “love” for my P son, I don’t miss him, I don’t yearn for himm, I don’t want contact with him, I dont’ wish I could tell him one last thing or make him see how he hurt me, I just don’t want anything to do with him.
My X-friends that I lvoed like a brother and sister, and I mean I loved these folks, would have done anything for them, but when I realized how they had stolen from me, abused me, etc. I was devestated, I grieved, I tried to trivalize their behavior, to excuse their behavior to find some way to fix the relationship, but now that I have REALIZED intellectually at first, and emotionally finally, I do not miss their company, even the good times we had, and believe me there were years of great times, great laughs, great conversations, and great shared activities, but I no longer miss these people and actually haven’t seen them in over a year. Don’t want to know what they are doing, don’t care how they are, sick, well, alive or dead. They are OUT of my sphere of caring. I accept what they are, but no longer give a rat’s behind about them or their problems. So sympathy, no pity, their problems are self made, I tried to assist them (read: enabled) them as long as I could delude myself and stay in denial, but now that the rosy colored glasses are off and I see the BIG PATTERN (Oh, boy, do I LOVE THIS ARTICLE! THANKS STEVE!!!) I see that the relationship has always been with them taking and me giving and them demanding more. Nope. as Lady McBeth said “Out, damn spot!” I accept MY part in enabling them, trivalizing how they treated me, being in denial that they loved me as much as I loved them, but FINALLY facing the TRUTH.
The truth will set you free, but first it will pity you off! YEP! In spades. And it will also break your heart, but at some point if you do move on, these people cease to be IMPORTANT TO YOU. You get the bitterness about what they did to you out of your heart, you accept that you ALLOWED them to continue this by your own denial (or whatever defense mechanism you used to stay in the relationship which was painful) you admit to yourself that it was not a good thing for you to allow, and you STOP allowing it, get them out of your life physically, and eventually emotionally.
The closer the relationship was to you, and the more preciouis it was to you, the longer it lasted, and how deeply ou were in denial and how badly they abused you all play into your recovery as factors of ANGER, BETRAYAL, HOW BIG AND IMPORTANT THE LOSS WAS TO YOU, etc. But if you continue to ACCEPT the truth and not SECOND GUESS it, and make yourself intellectually accept that truth and pound down the denial when it sticks its head up, you will eventually come to accept the truth and let the being pissed off go, and you will move on and yhour yearning for them will lessen or go away.
It is a good bet to me that those of us here who have had a relationship that was with one dysfunctional person or psychopath, ALSO have had or still have relationships with others who are DYSFUNCTIONAL. Whether those relationships are with friends, other family, etc doesn’t matter, our OWN DYSFUNCTION in a relationship with a P, I think means that we OVER ALL have not got good boundaries and this ONER (or two etc) psychopaths are not tolerated IN ISOLATION, but that like Matt and I have done, we have “thinned our Rolodex of ALL the dysfunctional relationships that we can SEE are dysfunctional.
That said, what about looking at ALL of our relationships and assessing whether or not they really ARE functional and good.
In the past we sure fooled ourselves pretty good and practiced denial with at least ONE abuser, are there other abusers in our “circles of trust” that we still don’t see as what they are? I have carefully examined my relationships, close and far, and those that I could see signs of deception, abuse, greed, dishonesty, etc. I weeded out of the rolodex either by directly confronting a dishonest or abusive behavior, or in most cases just “drifting quietly away.”
Yet, here the problems I’ve had the past several days, the hurt, the head pounding, crying, screaming grief I have experienced with my beloved son C in which he LIED TO ME. Deceived me….broke my heart and destroyed my trust in him, my HOPE IN HIM, and the SECURITY I had in his trustworthyness….blew me away.
Yet, looking back over his adult life, I realize that he has done some really shitty things to me, betrayed me by not warning me when his P brother was robbing and stealing, even from us and our friends when HE KNEW WHAT WAS GOING ON. And more recently when the Trojan HOrse, my son C’s wife, and my egg donor were ACTIVELY abusing me, even the TH-P was destroying my credit using my credit card information (I finally did get that fixed by filing charges and notifying the credit card companies of this and sendin them official reports of his actions from the sheriff’s office) MY son C DID NOT WARN ME. Nope, didn’t pick up the phone and call me, all he did was to “tell them that was mean.” Did he make any action to protect me from this? Nope.
Yet, when his P-brother knew his wife was having an affair with the TTH-P and according to a letter P-son wrote to the DIL talking about this, P-son obviously APPROVED of the affair and even said, pretending to be so “open minded” that “lighting a candle from anotehr candle doesn’t diminist hte first candle.” LOLROTFLMAO i.e. her having an affair with the TH-P didn’t “diminish” her love for and relationship with her HUSBAND, who obviously didn’t feel the same way about her affair. ROTFLMAO
Yet, I know if I had lied to my son C or broken EVEN ONE PROMISE or AGREEMENT, he would have been all over me like white on rice, like stink on chit—he would have been devestated if I had known someone was abusing him and not warned him.
Does that make him a psychopath? Nah, I don’t think so, but does it make him an arse-hole, YOU BET. does it make him untustworthy as far as I am concerned? Yep, YOU BET! Does it make me partly responsible for the lie he told the other night? Yep, YOU BET AGAIN! Because he had a pattern of lying to me in the past, he had a pattern of keeping secrets from me when others were abusing me and not warning me, and I had given him my complete trust back. I had allowed him to get back inside my heart, I had trivalized or excused or out right DENIED the BIG PATTERN and lapsed into fantasy and delusional thinking about how much I loved my son C and how GOOD he was and how he had LEARNED FROM HIS UNWISE CHOICES AND DECISIONS and things were going to be rosy from here on out! YEPPERS! I was DELUSIONAL and paddling along in my canoe on the RIVER DE-NIAL when my son C took an AXE and suddenly chopped the freaking bottom out of the boat and I took a snoot full of water when my face fell into that huge hole—a thing he really had done before in “protecting” his P-brother when he KNEW his brother was stealing, in protecting his “friend” when he knew his friend was MESSING WITH ME, stalking and so on. (he didn’t know the man intended to kill me, but he knew he was doing bad things anyway.)
You know, it HURTS to realize that I HAVE BEEN SOOOO STOOOOOPID AGAIN—-that I have used my rosy colored glasses again, but I have to accept that and I HAVE TO WORK SOMEWAY THROUGH FORGIVING MYSELF.
Gem, you say you “only ask for an apology”—but if her coming there (which she will likely not) and looking you in the eye and saying, “I apologize”—would THAT WORD make any difference? HELL NO, GEM!!!! It would just be ANOTHER LIE because even if she said it, it would NOT BE TRUE, so quit expecting her to change her ways. My son C isn’t even a psychopath, he has some empathy, he has the ability to love, and he has some moral compass, but he lacks most of impulse control. He is not totally selfish or self centered, and he has some guilt about how he is behaving but he is NOT going to recognize his bad behavior even though he is most likely eaten up with guilt and will slide down life’s fire pole into the abyss of lonliness, false friends, financial irresponsibility, depression, desperation and unhappiness, giving up the only two people he has in the world who truly loved him and would put his welfare before their own and trading that for video games and friends who also value escape from Real Life, and have no sense of self worth, just existence of a sort, living in fantasy.
I am crushed that my son C is living that way, but he is an adult, and he can and should make his own choices, I’ve “let him suck from the teat” way toooo long, and as much as I am afraid i have not been able to teach him to fend for himself in this world, he is on his own. He is going out in to the real world of predators and parasites and he is ill-equipped to survive, much less prosper, but it is no longer my responsibility to carry him on my back. I can’t do it, and even if it means his death, I can no longer delude myself that I can take care of him. I have to carry myself, and sacrificing myself emotionally, physically, or financially isn’t going to help him at all, just damage me, and my own happiness and life and I can’t carry that burden any more. I have to let it fall where it will. Accept it and move on.
It is difficult for us all, but you know, I have ridden this bucking horse before and I survived and I will survive this one too, but it is time for me to get off and walk away, trying to stay atop a bucking bronco that can’t be broke isn’t fun any more.
Oxy, I read your posts, and the responses. I understand how you’re thinking, why you reacted to your son the way you did, and why you feel so upset. It all makes sense to me.
But I have a thought or two. Take them for what they’re worth.
One is that a lot of this discussion is about your son’s behavior and your concerns about his future. (I have the same issues with my son.) But in reading your posts, the thing that really strikes me is that so much of this is about you.
I don’t mean that in a negative way. I mean that you have certain standards, beliefs, history, viewpoints, and it all shapes how you want to live your life. I could rephrase this recent episode with your son in a different way, and one that is focussed entirely on you (just for the sake of seeing how it would look that way).
You found out he was living in bad circumstances, and it made you uncomfortable as a mother. You figured out that you could move him back into your home, but only under certain conditions. You gave him the conditions. They were very specific. Some of the conditions related to standards you would have with anyone else. Some of the conditions (like the requirements about what he did with money he wasn’t giving to you) related to your feelings, as a mother, in wanting him to get his life in order.
Your deal with him was contingent on his performing his side of the deal. When he failed to do that in several ways, you pulled out of the deal. Because it wasn’t the same deal anymore, and you were no longer comfortable with it.
Now, unfortunately, you’re having to suffer with the same feelings you had initially. You’re uncomfortable as a mother in seeing your son either failing now or failing in the future.
Now, that’s more or less the whole story, I think, if told as though it was only your story and no one else’s. (And I’m deliberately eliminating all the maternal stuff, because in a way, it’s more of the FOG.)
So if this is your story, it seems to me that an appropriate response would be to be seriously pissed off. You invited this person into your house to help him out of wretched circumstances, went out of your way to provide him with circumstances (inexpensive room and board, and vehicle, insurance and phone at costs totally unrelated to the real world), invested time and caring to help him get himself together, exposed yourself to dealing with his moods and the possibility of him not taking advantage of the opportunity you were offering him, and are now living with the downside of the risk you took for him. (You did all of this because you were worried about him, and now, despite all your efforts, you’re back where you started.)
In fact, I would feel really ripped off. And I don’t think I’d be prepared to do any favors at all for this person, until he recognized that he ripped you off and made some amends.
I know that you’re a very practical person. And I suspect that if you looked at things that way, you’d come up with a plan for what amends you’d consider to make things square between the two of you. But I’d suggest that you didn’t. I’d suggest that you’ve been doing way too much of this man’s thinking for him, and that he needs to figure out for himself how to fix this with you. However, if I were you, I would let him know that I’m thoroughly pissed and feel royally ripped off, as well as pretty darned stupid for being so slow to understand that he had no intention of keeping his side of the deal.
That’s what I think. Take it for what it’s worth.
But Oxy, even if it’s not worth much, I’d suggest that you have a chat with yourself about how upset you are about this. If this was anyone else’s situation, you would say that adult children are responsible for their own behavior. He is making his own choices. And you are saying that, but you’re grieving as though it was a betrayal of you or as though it were a parallel (but across generations in different directions) of things that happened to you.
It’s not. It’s a man creating a life. You may not agree with what he’s doing, and you may see all kinds of trouble ahead. But ultimately, hard as it is to accept, the only part of it that is any of your business is your feelings about it. And what you’re going to do about them.
Nothing here is very different than what you’ve been saying. Except that this is about you, not him.
With my own son, I had a lot of hope when I brought him home about how the rules I gave him were going to change his life. They didn’t because they were my rules, not his.
What did change his life was me setting boundaries for myself, and insisting on running my life as I saw fit. My son has more serious and possibly chronic psychological issues than yours, and I’ve had to deal with a lot of disordered thinking. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I had to become more open to what was going on with him, and recognize that my rules were not going anywhere. But I never stopped requiring him to deal with me, as I am, including my reactions to his behavior. The situation forced me to become more specific about my expectations of him and my disappointments. And he didn’t like it. But it caused him to come back to me with the same kind of information from his side. This has been good for both of us, and speaking for myself, I’ve gotten a lot more of what I wanted from his coming home, and I expect things to get better in the future.
I’m not suggesting that my experience has anything to do with you, except that I really do encourage you to put your anger where it belongs. And also your grief. You made an extremely generous deal with him and he didn’t keep up his side of it. You have reason to be angry. You can’t control him and you can reasonably anticipate that he’s going to get in trouble before he figures out how to survive, and that’s something to grieve. Because it’s one of those things you can’t do a damned thing about.
And if you can, stop worrying about the future. It’s in his hands and in God’s hands. Your control on this situation is over.
I hope I haven’t stepped on your toes. I wish I were there to give you a big hug, or you were here and we could take a walk in the snow and get your mind off it. Anyway, here comes a huge hug …
Kathy
Oxy: While I am not a fan of that type of horse training -I believe{ and practice} less extreme training-slower maybe but that’s ok with me. I will use a tie back and let them ‘pull back’ till they get tired of it….but I will not leave them longer than a few hours. I don’t break horses the cowboy way either….I use the training of the Spanish Riding School…slow, easy and from a very young age conditioning and building trust with the horse slowly to finally accept a saddle willingly. I never believe in a ‘breaking of wills’. I allow all my horses to come forth with some will and to submit from respect not from total force. And….here is the kicker…pun intended: yes, they must have a willing personality to begin with….and some do not..they are not worth training as a rule…..and are/remain dangerous. I agree….some things to be learned from that-people wise. An unwilling person generally remains unwilling and rebellious….and that limits our ability to have a relationship with them. I know one thing: I’d rather deal with animals than people this way. Because with animals of this nature….I do not waste my time/energy/ability/experience on a dangerous horse….that is a steadfast rule. [but, like you- did when I was younger….and time/injuries/experience has taught me otherwise]. Now to learn it human wise. *ahhhhhh-now that’s another story….
Hey TB! Have you ever heard of Epona (equine facilitated learning)? it’s emotional work for humans and horses. I have done some of it. Quite awesome.
much better than teaching myself to ride @.......8 on a snotty little chariot pony, or being the first and only one on her daughter’s back @.......12, or working with hunters and jumpers @....... 18 and flat track racers @....... 20.
I worked in the ring with a 3 year old friesen stud – with only a lunge wipe. no lunge line, no halter, nada. he taught me a WHOLE LOT about boundaries. and sense and courage.
TB Erin, Oxy, THANK you all from the bottom of my heart. I know that I know that I know that you are all right.I intend to take your great advice, and reinforce my boundaries. Oxy, darling, your last long email to me had me in floods of tears, for you for me, for all of us, but hey we are survivers, we are strong, we have survived all this and worse before, and as you said,”what doesnt kill us makes us stronger.” Erin, TB, your wise councel as well as Oxys sure jhelped me to see I am doing OK and I AM on the right track. We will NEVER get closure from these half human people, even if they are our kids, we dont have to carry them on our backs for the rest of our lives! Our ONLY hope of closure is NC, painful as it is, its a lot more painful to go on in DENIAL, go on giving to these parasites when as you say, even if they SAY “sorry” they dont mean it. Only another means of screwing us again.Oxy darling you are the queen of great metaphors!! Stay strong, we have each other for support , we are so liucky. Im so glad I found LF I have learned and continue to learn so much. TOWANDA to us all, and HI 5!guys! Much love and Thanks,{{HUGS}} Gem.XX
one step: while my daughter and I no longer train…we did/trained dressage for years….I am still active in the natural horse movement. I am not familiar with Epona-I do believe in natural horsemanship. I have trained in the Parelli method which involves speaking equine and bonding with the horse/herd to communicate. It works, it’s possible and it’s very easy and humane–once you understand how to communicate. They have their own language and they do know boundaries, respect and herd position. I believe horses are great silent healers of our spirits….my horses were my therapy for years and years. I really LOVE horses! I see many people who enjoy ‘breaking their spirits’ because it’s a battle of the wills and horses are very strong willed and spirited….but not so for me….I never wanted to ‘break the wills’ I wanted to enjoy them, communicate with them and soar with their spirits. I lost two of my beloved horses in a tragic freak accident several years ago and it broke me badly….I’ve not ridden, trained or owned horses since then. I do however, still write for equine publications and for the natural horse movement–and I do some limited equine rescue still. [my daughter [younger one] still owns horses and rides].
Friesians! now there is a horse! BEAUTIFUL!!! I had a chance to buy a wonderful stud a number of years ago before they were in America….and getting this stallion thru customs proved to be too much both for us and the stud. I gave it up…
That was wonderful for you!!…I’ve worked many, many times w/o anything between the horse and me but respect……..and I can only imagine he did teach you a whole lot…..and you will probably never be the same….talk about a soaring spirit!!!!! Thank you so much for sharing this ….it really brought a smile to my face and I can once again hear the” hoofbeats in heaven……”.
TB:
🙂 🙂
I am a tiny bit familiar with the Parelli method as one of the women i have done Epona with works with this method.
this big black boy was nicknamed ‘frat boy’ by the group i of folks i was working wiht. he had THAT energy. he would come barreling str8t at me, and i had to use my lunge whip (by literally drawing a line in the sand), and my intention to draw a boundary. I wanted to play with him SO BADLY – but he would either charge me or run off when he hit my boundary. The facilitator has tears in her eyes watching us.
i hadn’t worked with horse for over 25 years when i did this. but they are of my soul. THEY were my herd when i was young, being there for me in ways the humans of my household could not fathom. this is part of my mythoology and my truth.
Linda Kohanov of Epona has a set of ‘horse cards’ – a type of tarot. I lost the cards when i moved – hope i will find them. She’s written three books – the first, is the Tao of Equus.
I wish you horse touch soon.
nicker,
one step
Dear TB,
I agree that jgenerally “cowboy” breaking is far from ideal way to break a horse or train one, however, because for 18 months his horse had used violence to get her way with her mother, she had been “self trained” that VIOLENCE WORKS, just as a pychopath who is violent learns that people are intiminidated if they are worked over with fists in order to get what they want.
This horse, unfortunately, was one of those that should have been put down for her own sake and the sake of those that were around her, people OR other horses. I’ve only seen a couple of other horses that were as viscious as she was.
During the depression my grandfather worked “out law” stock because it was cheap to buy, and he was good enough of a “horse whisperer” that he could usually train them in such a manner that they were cooperative and not dangerous to man or beast, but he had a few that he told me about that he had to always be cautious around, mostly mules which tend not to be as docile as either of their parents, and are as smart as the donkey half, so because of their disposition which is genetic, they can be more dangerous. Imprinting of donkeys, horses and mules usually works very well, and I have used it extensively and on my cattle too. My cattle breed and herd genetics tend to be very gentle as I have strongly culled for disposition and the breed has been culled for disposition as well, but unfortunately, most equine breeds haven’t been. My renter’s horses are absolutely very genetically gentle and even the foals without much if any handling are very interested in humans and very very gentle natured. Even her stallions are rideable, and very well mannered and gentle. In fact, her stallions are all working horses as well so her foals are enough in demand that some even go to Europe every year, pretty good in an equine market where you can buy a pretty good horse for $300 and her foals at weaning go for 10-20 times that. her finished horses go in the neighborhood of $25K UP.
Gem, darling, yes, that is the thing, and believe me I had a REAL GENUINE MELT DOWN over this past week, totally out of the blue (because I wasn’t listening to me, or LOOKING AT THE BIG PICTURE) and we MUST keep the big picture in mind when we look at these things. I WANTED to believe that my son was “better” than he was, that none of this past behavior happened—and you know what I trivalized his betrayls of me in favor of his brother. C isn’t a P but he is screwed up, he has “issues” and he has “denial” and all kinds of problems but HE HAS TO RECOGNIZE THEM and FIX THEM, I can’t and I can’t endure the pain of any more betrayal. Yes, I DO love him, and I have a little hope for him (heck, look at me, i was screw up queen of the universe!) but I am not going to predicate MY happiness and MY life on HIM fixing himself.
Not any more than I am going to predicate my life, happiness, peace or joy on my egg donor (who is not I think a P) fixing herself and “seeing the light.” The woman was raised in dysfunction, abuse and enabling and she isn’t going to change now at nearly 81. But,, my happiness does not depend on having a relationship with her, or her changing or the moon or the sun or the weather (and yes, I will still gripe about the weather though!) LOL MY happiness depends on ME and how I conduct my life. sure, I may get slammed again and I may give myself a PITY PARTY and INVITE YOU ALL TO COME, and I will come to your pity parties, but in the end, we all have to get off that lousy “horse” and walk on our own two feet and make our own way in this world, just like everyone should do. We can’t let our happiness depend on what is going on outside of our control. We have to accept reality, accept ourselves, forgive ourselves and get on with doing good things for us. Enjoy those that do love us, forgive those that crap on us, but don’t trust’em again, and forgive ourselves for the mistakes and bad choices and bad jusgments we have made in the past. (((Hugs))) Love oxy ps Gem, still no contact with lily.