Compassion or forgiveness for abusive parents, here's one person's take.

[raccoon]

"I'd like to say a word, here, if I may about the subject of "compassion"....

While I truly DO feel sympathy for my mother (and the horrific psychological abuse she suffered herself as a child), I do NOT feel empathy toward her....

In my view, it is FAR too lenient to say, "well, she simply couldn't help herself," because she COULD.

My mother could turn her rages and sadistic behavior on & off like a light switch.... She would INSTANTLY become "normal" the moment ANOTHER PERSON entered the room.... (....another person, other than my dad, that is....)"

http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A3UG6R29SFGKP5/ref=cm_cr_dp_pdp


For myself, as I grow older, I can better appreciate the difficulties and lack of support my mother had to deal with. (My father, that's another story.) But in a situation such as the writer above describes, the woman obviously COULD treat people better than she treated her family. Seems to me the vast majority of abusers are like that.

[Warpy]

1. They are.

My mother was one of those exploders when I was a kid. She'd grown up with an alcoholic father with whom she'd broken contact by the time she was 20. I never met him; he drank himself to death when I was 3.

Black and blue "flu" was a frequent illness. To her credit, she managed to stop. What finally did it was a beating during which I told her that no matter how long she kept hitting me, she'd never make me cry. She heard herself as a child and she never hit me again. I was eight. When I look back on my teenage years, I see her as an absolute miracle of restraint because there were times I richly deserved an Irish backhand I never got. I think she knew if she started, she'd never stop.

She could change in an instant from a woman who'd lost it completely into a sweet suburban housewife. All it took was a knock on the door.

I've known other abusers who were exactly the same. People who are violent toward the people they love will never sock a cop or a boss.

[Old Codger]

2. somewhat

I agree to a small extent. My wife and I work with abused children on a daily basis and I do not have a lot of sympathy for "adults" who abuse children. If a child is abused they do not really know any better than to possibly copy the behavior they have seen, they think this is "normal" as they get older and see what the real world is like they have the opportunity to make a judgment on what is "right" and what is "wrong" as they become adults they have no excuse for perpetuating the abusive behavior, yet society seems bent on condoning this behavior by accepting the "excuse" that these supposed "adults" cannot help themselves since they were abused as children completely ignoring the fact that they are now adults and in many cases have been exposed to normal acceptable behavior for a much longer period of time than they were abused... I do not accept these lame excuses nor am I willing to go along with the precept that "adults" cannot help themselves (barring a diagnosis of mental illness). The systems seems to condone it and in so doing perpetuates the problem.


Ramble a little sometimes, I apologize for that ..... A very sore subject for me

[AlCzervik]

3. my Mom died when i was 17 but up until about a year before life for both of us was terrible

and the last year she was alive and very ill i started to understand she did the best with what she had, she was brought up with an alcoholic father and a mother who was never there. My Mom wasn't as bad as her own father but she made some really bad choices that affected me in the most terrible way, at 41 i've dealt with it and i like to think i am a different parent than my mother and father were.

suffice to say do to my own childhood i have never laid a hand on my own daughter and i also rarely drink and if i do it's not in front of my girl.

[lapislzi]

5. You could be me!

Our stories are eerily similar except that I lost my mom when I was 25--and I'm a few years older than you. I have never struck my daughter (except in mock combat) and she seems to be turning out OK.

There is something to be said for doing an about face on your parents' methods.

Peace to you.

[AlCzervik]

7. Peace to you as well my sister from another mother.

:hug:

[Nay]

8. I also have managed to raise my child decently despite being raised

myself by an alcoholic father and a depressed mother. My brother and I were not physically abused, but we basically raised ourselves. Dad was drinking or off with a girlfriend, and mom slept nearly 24 hours a day and had agoraphobia so badly that she couldn't even walk to the mailbox. Certainly as adults we understood more of what went on in our childhood, but that really didn't make up for having a childhood that wasn't really a childhood.

I ended up having very little to do with Dad after they divorced when I was 17. I did keep in touch with Mom, but not like you would with a Mom who'd actually been an effective Mom. I was always pleasant to her, but visiting was tough because she would refuse to leave the house -- even though she had long ago gotten over the agoraphobia and learned to drive, etc. She always acted very passive-aggressive, as if I, my hubby, and little son were out to "get her" somehow. Needless to say, we didn't visit much.

[AlCzervik]

9. sorry Nay, my Dad is still alive but i live 3,000 miles away from him if that tells you anything.

He was just not there, you know?

[Nay]

10. Yeah, I know. He would occasionally call up and whine about how

I didn't visit or write, but...he never did those things, either! And he had the money to visit -- I didn't. God knows I was having a hard enough time working two jobs and putting myself through college. It still brings on bitter memories, as you can probably tell. I still wish things had been different, esp with my mother. She was, down deep, a very nice woman who had been so damaged by her marriage (and certain crap that her religion required) that it mentally wrecked her. My brother and I did the best we could, but we both felt like we had essentially been abandoned emotionally because our parents had no time left to love us after hating each other all day. A sad thing! If I had been less shy and more outgoing, I would have done better -- I at least would have had a better chance of more quickly ameliorating the damage by reaching out to others more. But I have a nice life now, so I am thankful and content.

[Lorien]

4. I haden't feard of BDP before. I might have to pick that one up

Both of my parents were abused as children. My mother sexually, my father physically and emotionally. They divorced early on and neither hit either of us much, but they are/ were very prone to rages. My mother would say things like "you are the living embodiment of all of my worst mistakes in life", and "You'll never have friends and no one will ever love you because you weren't meant to be part od this world" (I was the reason they had to get married in the first place. This was pre-Roe v. Wade). She was a completely different person outside of the house, and sometimes she did seem like an ideal mother at home, too-but often something would set her off and her demeanor would change in an instant. since it was a single parent household I spent many hours every day looking after my younger sister, cooking, cleaning, doing yard work, grocery shopping...I really didn't mind having to "raise myself" that much, the only part I regret now is that I never learned how to relax or have fun, and I certainly never was able to fully trust anyone . To this day I'm in still in survival mode, so maybe this book would help. Thanks for posting, raccoon!

[seabeyond]

6. INSTANTLY become "normal" the moment ANOTHER PERSON entered

when this sunk in for me, .... is when understanding came. i agree

[BlueIris]

11. Compassion for abusers...not feeling it.

I...don't begrudge others their desire to forgive their abusers (personal choice, I guess). But...not seeing the value in doing that. Sometimes, it looks like another form of denial to me, and I still see some who have chosen to "forgive" their abusive parents pointlessly hoping those people will start showing them the love they never showed at any point in the victims' lives. In my own life, I strive for acceptance and self-forgiveness and that's about it. Even that is more than abusers deserve.