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May 22, 2007 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
50:58
766 Maternal Suffocation

A listener's tale of violence and manipulation

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Good afternoon, everybody. Good evening, I guess.
Hope you're doing well. It's Steph out for walkies, and I have brought my good mic because there have been some complaints over rumbly, wheezy Steph and bad things going all around, so I thought that I would bring a decent mic and see how I feel about doing the hunchback of neutropodcasting with the mic on the walk.
So, here is a...
Scenario or a story from a listener.
And his mother's response.
Ah, the mother's.
Is there anything too much that we can say about them?
I'm not necessarily sure, but if there is, let's give it a shot, shall we?
So this is what, let's call him Robert.
He says...
It's not a dramatic story and it's not an essay, it's just what happened, what I wrote up in the last few minutes.
It seems appropriate to share and therapeutic for me for the time being.
I don't have anyone personally to talk to, no friends available.
I'll try to focus on today with as little backstory as is necessary, as there is far too much backstory to begin to mention here.
My mother and father are divorced.
First today my father came up here to visit.
He comes up every other week and takes us out to breakfast in a movie.
I've expressed anarchist and atheist views to my father before.
He's essentially agreed with me, though.
He's kind of a, quote, working man.
He doesn't devote a great deal of his time to thought, but he's a fairly bright man nonetheless, though he doesn't act on it.
I have mixed feelings on this.
While obviously I would prefer it if he would be a virtuous and ethical person, from what I can gather from his past, he used to be, until my mother was pregnant and suddenly he had to give his attention to caring for and raising children.
I don't want to mindlessly back up my father.
He's certainly not perfect, but he's a good friend.
So my stepmother, who is apparently somewhat religious and has always shown some pretty negative views towards many things outside the quote mainstream, found my MySpace.
There, my views on atheism, anarchism, and my sexuality, gay slash bi, were printed for anyone to see, as I do regard the truth as important.
My stepmother flipped out and showed my father, who didn't care.
He had a gay brother and has agreed with me on the issues of politics and religion for the most part.
My father had suspected I was gay before when in high school my mother found a note to a boy I liked.
Naturally, my mother went insane.
She began running around the house uncontrollably and yelling the world, evil, over and over.
She even broke some glasses against her ceilings in her fit of rage.
My father brought it up, and while I was ashamed in front of him, he made it perfectly clear that he fully supported my decision, whatever it was, that he understood if I was questioning or that I was gay.
He had questioned as a rational young man with a gay brother.
My mother and father even met in a gay bar where they were both working.
This behavior was regular in my teenage years.
My mother was definitely the type that had children for love without all of the trouble of being a good person.
And when her children began to think, she tried to mentally bash them into loving her.
From buying a limp biscuit album, biscuit, how square we are, to wearing black clothing, from not wanting to go to church, to wanting to be a vegetarian, my mother found cause for ridicule and insane freakouts in everything contrary to what she wished she was.
I can literally think of nothing I wanted to do in my teenage years that wasn't mocked, even the things I wanted to do just for her approval.
The television show The Simpsons was not even allowed in her house until I was 15 or so.
Of course, I watched it anyway when caught.
I was punished accordingly.
This abuse was helped along by Will, my mother's boyfriend.
He is an admitted racist, a homophobe, a bigot in the worst ways possible.
He literally admits this and has even agreed on numerous occasions that he is irrational, but this is his choice, he thinks.
Will drinks heavily at night and gets even more unstable and insane than he is in the day.
He yells out of nowhere, gets angry at nothing, and all around provokes conflict through the house, even on stable nights.
where...
My mother is feeling fine and being kind.
When they are both unstable, they just feed off each other's rage.
Bill has physically hit me many times.
While I can't recall a time it left a mark, of course, that doesn't matter.
I finally got out of high school.
I moved to the city with some friends and didn't really do anything.
I moved to get away, not to do something else.
My relationship with my mother was a bit better then, as I mainly received happy phone calls of her missing me and food she cooked.
That was the extent of the relationship.
Eventually, I ran out of money and moved home where I worked for six months.
Now, I've been living here for over a year.
I'm going to community college and currently not working.
Our relationship has been fairly stable.
We had one big argument a few months after I moved back where she tried to bring up a lot of the things she did to me as a kid.
As is somewhat expectable from her, she acted...
Sorry, let me start that again.
We had one big argument a few months after I moved back where I tried to bring up a lot of the things that she did to me as a kid.
As is somewhat expectable from her, she acted as if none of it happened.
In fact, I'm sure she has actually convinced herself that it did not happen, that none of it happened.
But tonight we had a big clash.
She was angry for whatever reason at everything already.
She asked me if I wanted mashed potatoes, if they should make more.
I said, yes, I might eat them later.
Later she came to my room and said they were done.
I told her I didn't think I wanted any right now, but I'd have some later.
She was visibly angry about it.
I said, give me a break, and she flipped.
She started yelling about anything she could think of.
Bill recently bought a new dog, which Mom has hated since day one.
She claims the dog has a vendetta against her, and often calls the dog a selfish bitch, which we also call projection.
That's my comment. Earlier, she said that the dog had insecurities about herself.
And that's why she didn't share toys with the other dog.
I told her that it's just not scientifically true that dogs simply don't have the same complex psychological functions as humans.
She later mocked this by saying in a childlike voice, Me, me, me, me, science!
I started to walk away laughing at this point.
Bill started yelling that I don't deserve respect because him and Mom are adults while I'm, quote, a little kid.
I told him to fuck off.
He got in my face and stuck his chest out like he always does, stuck it into my chest and started yelling with his alcoholic breath about how he's stronger than me.
How big do you think you are?
Etc.
I went back in my room and locked my door.
Bill and my mother took turns walking up to my locked door, shaking it like animals and yelling various cruel things and that I had to be out of the house by tomorrow at five.
I turned up my music.
Eventually, my mother sounded calm and asked me to open the door.
So I did.
She started yelling.
That's when I went off.
I yelled the truth, that she was the worst mother to me, that she abused me so much as a child.
I continually tried to explain it when Bill got in front of me with his chest again.
My mother started to freak out more and more.
Eventually, she slapped me across the face for the, you were an awful mother, comment.
I ran back to my room, out of breath, and called the police.
I hung up and decided to let it pass, but they called back.
Bill answered and we all eventually got on the phone.
Bill was condescending on the phone and they sent out an officer, told me to stay in my room.
The officer arrived.
When I went out to talk to him, it was obvious.
My mother had put on her crazy act and Bill had tried to comfort her.
She was crying and said, I just can't look at him, then walked away in shambles.
The officer condescendingly asked me if I was proud of what I did.
Did you hit your mother? Is this your house?
What kind of man are you?
I told the officer very calmly that I didn't think he understood the whole story.
We went back into my room and I tried to explain the night.
He went back out and discussed it with my mother and Bill.
They had further lied. It was clear, as when the officer returned, he told me I should try to be the bigger man and shake Bill's hand, then hug my mother and try and talk to them about moving out.
He was still here when I went outside and asked me to shake Bill's hand.
I did, regretfully. Bill is in higher spirits now, or was in front of the cop, hasn't seen him since.
I haven't yet encountered my mother, but I don't think a hug is in order unless she begins to recognize everything she's done.
Edit. It's funny that the only function of the police I might appreciate they don't actually follow through with.
Not ironic or unexpected, mind you.
Just funny. I feel good in a way.
It's been a long time coming. I do feel sorry for my mother.
Not because of anything I have done, but because she is what this broken world has produced.
She's a sad woman. She almost died two years ago due to heart disease.
She uses this as sympathy often.
Of course, she very well might not have much time left.
It's all a depressing situation, honestly, externally, just knowing that this kind of life exists for people.
It does fill me with a great deal of sadness, but also a great deal of motivation to make sure less people have to go through this, what I have gone through and what my mother has gone through.
Well, I know this scene all too well.
I didn't have...
I mean, I had the insane mom with whom there was simply no ceiling to the histrionics, to the emotional and verbal abuse, to the violence.
I mean, there's simply no cap on these people's screechy, tyrannical...
Tantrum-y kind of rage, so I know that side of things.
I didn't have an alcoholic, brutal guy sticking his chest out and threatening to punch me, and then punching me and so on.
So, I don't get the sense that you're too old, and I have a very, very strong sense that you are trying to put on a maturity that is not healthy.
You are trying to put on a kind of rising above it, That is desperately, desperately unhealthy, and I'm going to have to be rather frank with you, and I do apologize for bluntness here, but, I mean, this is a really dangerous situation.
This is a very dangerous situation.
This is the kind of situation that you're in that could completely and totally screw up your life.
Right? So, I don't want you to rise above it.
I mean, if you'll take advice from some guy you don't even know, I very emphatically don't want you to rise above this.
You are in a situation of extreme physical, emotional, and mental torture.
You are in a situation of extreme pathological destructive danger and you've got to get out.
You've got to get out.
This is not a maybe. This is not a maybe later.
This is not a soon. This is not when I've saved up enough money.
This is like, don't let the sun go down before getting out.
And don't look back with the pseudo-maturity of, quote, believing that your mother is a, what did you put it, a product of the world, or this is what the broken world has produced?
No. No, no, no.
No. No.
That is desperately unhealthy.
I totally understand why you're doing it.
It's a way of keeping the pain at bay, but this is not a pain that should be kept at bay.
If you keep this pain at bay, my brother, you're going to keep wallowing this shit for the rest of your life.
Your mother is not what the broken world has produced.
Your mother is what produces a broken world.
Do you see? Your mother is not what the broken world has produced.
Your mother is what produces a broken world.
Now, you may have listened to So You Think Your Family Is Nice, the series 1 to 5, which I did about a year ago.
If not, please, please do me a favor and have a listen.
This is the key. This is the key.
If you say that your mother is broken, then clearly she is not capable of controlling her behavior.
Right? Clearly, if your mother were truly broken, schizophrenic, completely mentally insane or whatever, then she would simply not be able to control her behavior.
Ah, but, magically, the police come in and she's sweet as sugar.
I just can't look at him.
Right? And cops, of course, are raised by these kinds of women, so of course the cop can't see a goddamn thing.
So she's able to be sweet and reasonable and not a bully when the cop comes around.
So this is not a woman who is broken.
This is a woman who is breaking.
This is not a woman who is broken.
This is a woman who is breaking.
And she's breaking you, my friend.
And what the hell are you doing in there?
I mean, this is like we work in a nuclear power plant and you're in the core without any radiation protection.
What are you doing here?
Get out!
Get out! This volatility that occurs is very much known to anybody who's been in these kinds of familiar situations where literally a chance comment about mashed potatoes can spiral into this kind of viciousness and this kind of ugliness.
And it is really something that you need to work to understand that naturally And, of course, it doesn't have anything to do with mashed potatoes.
This is your mother filled with rank sentimentality about motherhood and cooking and food.
And when she says that, I want to give you something, and you say, maybe later, you are ambivalent about it.
You don't say no and you don't say yes, right?
I mean, this is how you can understand how these things work, how these things come about.
You don't say no to her, and you don't say yes to her mashed potatoes.
Which for her, of course, she's got the whole mythology, as women do, or a lot of women do, about food, and food is love, and so on.
So she's got this whole mythology cooking around, around food and love.
And so she's offering, this is what goes on in her unconscious, in her tortured hellish mess of a brain.
She wants to offer you love, right?
She wants to offer you a mother's love.
And you're ambivalent about it.
Maybe later, I don't know.
So when you reject her mashed potatoes, you are rejecting her as a mother.
You are rejecting her love.
You are calling her a bad person.
This is what instantly flashes into the myth-making machine of these crazy people.
We all have the myth-making machine.
But these people, the myth is them, right?
They are a myth-making machine.
They don't have a myth-making machine.
The myth-making machine has them, which is true for most human beings in this world.
This soap opera we call society.
Actually, this soap opera, which most people call reality.
So, not now, maybe later, is, I don't know if I love you, and I'm rejecting your love in order to control you, and I'm rejecting your love in order to punish you.
So, she experiences this as an act of aggression.
This is how bizarre, volatile, and corrupt, and evil these people become, these people who abuse children.
And by the very act of moving back in, and living there, By the very fact that moving back in and living there, you are in an ambiguous situation with your mother.
I'll take your money, I'll take the roof over your head, but I don't like you as a human being.
Right? So, she knows that you're ambivalent about her.
She knows that you're there, but not there.
She knows that you're there for convenience.
And I don't mean to use the word convenience lightly.
But... It is more convenient to live at home with these sick people than it is to do the necessary thing for your soul and to get the hell out.
So, your ambivalence with regards to your mom's mashed potatoes is the ambivalence that she feels, the tortured nature of your relationship that is within her and that she has provoked through constant abuse over the years.
And this is a very dangerous situation.
Again, I don't generally get overdramatic, and I'm certainly not trying to hear, but I know this kind of rage.
I know this kind of rage.
This is the situation that you're in, my friend.
One day, Bill is going to stick his chest in your face once too often, and he's going to be near the top of the stairs, and you're not going to think about it like I'm going to kill him, but you're going to push him back angrily.
And because he's drunk, he's going to stumble and pitch.
And then your mom will send you to jail for 20 years.
Or Bill's going to take a swing at you, and you're going to take a swing at him back.
And then it's two people's version of the events who are parents against yours.
And then you have a criminal charge, and you're in jail for six months.
What's that going to do to your job prospects?
What's that going to do to your mental health?
To get anally buggered for six months?
See, this is the kind of danger that you're in.
I know this kind of rage.
This kind of rage is murderous, and you can easily get infected by it, and you can easily allow it to take you over when you're in this constant state of eternal provocation, and you can do something violent from which there is no recovery.
And don't imagine for a moment that these sick, evil, sadistic bastards and bitches will not take extraordinary pleasure in sending you to prison.
So, you've already had the cops called on you once, right?
They've already noted that your mother can't handle you, that you're violent.
They've already had two reasonable, sweet-natured adults sitting down and telling them exactly what you're all about.
This has all been written up. This is all part of it.
Right? Don't get sucked in.
Don't get played in this hellish kind of way.
Get out. You're in the fucking mafia, my friend.
Get out. You're in the mafia.
And you're gonna get busted.
One of these days, something bad's gonna happen.
And that's how the infection of evil will spread in this case.
There's lots of different ways it can spread.
This is how it's gonna spread, I do think, in this case.
Look, you're dead.
Now, I'm never very good.
Sorry about the airplane.
I'm never very good at figuring out what all this family stuff is.
Like, I've always sucked at second or third cousins twice removed and this and that.
But as far as I understand it...
Your stepmom is running around shrieking, and this is the woman your dad married, is running around shrieking that you're evil when she used to work in a gay bar.
So I can only assume that she's become a born-again Christian, or a sort of mystic of some kind.
Christian, I would imagine.
So, I mean, dude, there are no good people in these layers of hell.
There are no good people in these depths of hell.
They don't exist. There's not decent people who've accidentally bungeed down into these layers of Gehenna.
In these layers of hell, there are no good people in these layers of hell.
And my God, if I could just get people to understand that, oh, I would die content, though not soon.
There are no good people In these layers of hell, right?
You right down near the bottom, right?
Down below you is like pimps and drug dealers and murderers and so on, right?
And I say drug dealers not because drug dealing is innately wrong.
It's just that this is sort of where it is because it's criminalized, right?
You're passing along stuff. You don't know if it's good or bad.
You don't test it all. And a lot of people, of course, because it's illegal and the drug dealers are getting younger people hooked and so on.
Just so I don't get flamed by every drug user on the planet.
Drug series is to come, I promise you.
Right, below where you are, there's like another layer of pedophilia.
But there's not much below that.
Wait, president. Oh, wait, soldier.
Oh, and the guy in blue who came to your house.
But, outside of that...
So you're really near the bottom here, my friend.
And this is not a sad situation.
This is a sick and evil situation.
These are not broken people.
These are breaking people.
And they're really working to break you, my friend.
And you're just standing there, right?
You've got six million lasers on your forehead, all with bullets ready to go.
And you're just standing there.
Singing and passive-aggressive and listening to music, right?
And everyone with any eyes to see is like, run!
Run! Run!
So run. His mother's letter.
His mother's letter.
So... This is the, I think it was an email he got the next day, or letter he got the next day from his mom.
Hello. I am so depressed about all of this.
So deeply saddened.
And even more so when I see you just wander around, singing songs as if nothing had happened.
I keep trying to search back into my own youth.
Days when I was your age, when I was fighting my mother, capitalized, I tried to understand, to see how I felt, and how it would be easy for me to totally blow off and dismiss fights such as these.
Are you putting on a show?
Or are you really so cold?
I fail to understand.
Maybe it's a girl thing, I don't know.
It baffles me to no end. Your casual, aloof actions make it hurt even more.
Dad called last week complaining about his girlfriend.
She broke up with him and he told me how sad he was.
He said that she thought they spent too much time with our family and she felt she was losing contact with her own kids.
Dad said it was BS and argued it vehemently.
I said, Dad, stop.
I said, Your pride is getting in the way here.
Just call her up and say, Honey, you are right and I'm sorry.
If you really care and really miss her, give her that.
Women need to be right.
Sometimes. And it doesn't sound like this is worth the battle you are making.
Besides, these are her feelings.
You can't argue with a person's feelings.
People own their own feelings.
He was stunned, speechless for a bit.
He called back later and said, It worked!
Now when he calls me, he laughs and repeats, Honey, you are right.
Those are golden words.
Life is so short.
If only more people could just get past things and say those words.
Is being right so critically important, or does it just end up making one right and alone?
Is it worth it to be alone?
Our foolish pride.
I betcha that hermits are the most darned right people in the world.
You are the most amazing, interesting, kind, sensitive, intelligent, curious, artistic, musical, talented person, and I really admire you.
I look at you so often and feel such pride, pride in my work in raising you.
Your brother, too, both of you.
I realize that to you I must seem critical of you, and I know I don't say nice things often enough.
Instead, I tell others, I'm sorry.
I should tell you more often personally.
We all should. I sure could use some of those kind words, too.
Do me a favor. Think for a minute of someone you really admire, someone you really look up to.
Got him or her pictured in your mind?
Now imagine that person scowling at you and saying to you that you are a miserable human being and the worst at being a friend, mentor, relative, whatever they are to you.
Oh, that doesn't feel good at all.
It hurts to the core how awful not to be liked by someone you think is so awesome.
You knew that, too. You dug down into your bag of hurtful tricks, found the sharpest dart you could find, and threw it at me.
Well, you hit the bullseye.
I remember the last time you did the same.
You're a pretty good shot.
Maybe you were unaware of your power in hurting me, but I cried.
Immediately, instinctively, I felt that awful hurt.
The hurt that only a mother can feel.
Worse than a dissection, those awful tears.
You had the nerve on top of that to say that my tears were fake, and maybe they, quote, work on some people, but they wouldn't work on you.
Oh, my God.
Gosh! Have you no clue?
You wrote those words in indelible ink upon my soul.
Have you no understanding of the power you hold over me, over how much that hurt me?
Those tears were real, just as real as they were the other night, just as real as the slap that came out of my hand for hurting me.
Was attempting to slap you immature?
You bet. Was it my only defense?
You bet. Did you revert me back to a small child being hurt by a fellow classmate?
You bet.
I created you.
I raised you.
I'm proud of my work.
You are an awesome person.
I must not be too terrible.
I must have done something right, or is it all in the genes?" They say that a mother is the barometer of the home.
If the mother isn't happy, then no one in the family is happy.
Contrary to that, they say that a mother is only as happy as her saddest child.
Interesting, isn't it? Interesting, isn't it?
Which is it? The chicken before the egg?
Or the egg before the chicken?
Or both? I was in a psych class in college where the prof said, Okay, everyone stand up.
I want you to repeat after me.
My parents screwed up.
We all did, and laughed.
Now, he continued, I don't want to hear that ever again.
Get over it. Get on with it.
Everyone's parents did the best they could with what they had, and even if they didn't, drop it.
You are in charge from here on in.
You need to deal with your life.
I learned my lesson then and there.
My mom and dad really screwed up, but I'm on my own now, and blaming gets me nowhere.
Sorry, but you either.
You have to move on.
Son, I may not have always made the best decisions, but I have done the best that I could for you.
And frankly, when I look at you and your brother, I can't help but think that the guy and I haven't done that badly.
You guys are both the most awesome people, and I'm so proud of you.
Still, it hurts to the core to think that you think I failed you so totally.
I have bent over backwards to live my life with your goodwill in mind.
Every decision I made was made for you and because of you.
I told Bill when I moved that you kids are my priority.
You and your brother are the most important things in my life, and I'll always love you more than anyone.
Bill didn't like that at all, but it's the truth, and he knows it.
I really thought I was doing the best for you two when I moved here.
I thought of moving, but your brother never wanted to.
I thought we had moved or changed enough.
I was afraid of again changing schools, etc.
I wondered what yet another change would do to you.
I'm deathly sorry and feel guilty that I've put you through the nights of awful, nasty fighting while you turn your music up and try to block it out.
I'm so sorry.
Those are all nightmare memories for me.
I've spent nights crying about not what Bill says to me or how he hurts me, but how I'm hurting you, too.
That's all I can say.
I'm terribly sorry for that.
I've dreamt night after night of just sitting at a table, eating a grilled cheese and being quiet, alone with you boys.
I dream of being poor again.
Poor, but happy.
Unfortunately, I never had the money to move.
Once I lost my piano students and the first, last deposit in the Astoria home, I couldn't get ahead enough to move on.
I still try and fail.
Disability has a cap on my potential income.
I'm trapped. Maybe someday, but that day is too late for your childhood.
Again, I'm sorry. I wish you understood my position.
It's not easy being a single parent, let alone a single disabled parent.
All excuses aside, though, I am sorry.
The only good thing about staying here was that Bill said he'd help with your college.
But over and over you say you effing hate him.
Now that him helping you is no longer an option, and now that you say Bill hit you unprovoked, which I didn't see, so I have no clue what happened, I don't feel I can stay here either.
I'm horrified that you say Bill hit you and it wasn't in self-defense.
Regardless, no one should hit you.
He's an adult. I don't understand why...
Sorry, it's too funny.
I don't understand why a grown-up would hit.
It's pitiful. Bill still argues that you pushed him first.
I just don't know, nor does it matter.
I cannot live with a man who has hit my child.
Then again, we all hit.
We are all guilty of losing our tempers, and we are all grown-ups.
How embarrassing for all of us.
It's as bad that I tried to slap you as it is that you slugged me.
I don't know how on earth I'm going to move, but I'm on the lookout, and I'm saving any money I can in order to do so.
Great timing. I guess it never is, but with my health and with you two leaving, it's going to be very difficult on me.
I guess we're all back at square one.
I love my river.
I'm going to miss it terribly. I wish there were a way back.
Grandpa knows about my diagnosis and he will leave my money to you and your brother so that you are taken care of.
It's not a lot, but it will help you.
Like me or not, relationship or not, you are my children and I do care and love you and I want to leave this earth knowing that I did my very best for you.
It's the least I can do.
That's a responsibility thing that I will never let go of.
I still can't imagine facing you.
Your words hurt far worse than your slug.
You have said what you said the other night to me before.
You apologized back then, and we talked it through.
I thought it was over, that you really didn't mean it at the time, but now that you've said it again, after you know how much it hurt my soul, I can think nothing but that you truly feel that way.
I'm embarrassed, ashamed, and hurt to think that 19 years of my life I honestly tried my very best.
I gave my all to you, and yet I failed.
It makes me want to scream in pain.
It was the most important job in the world to me, and I failed so miserably that you hate me enough to hurt me that deeply.
wow blows me away let's see do we have much more oh my god it's just wretched let me just see here so I go on I've learned that you just have to pick yourself up and keep on going Life doesn't quit when we feel this way.
Jobs still need to be finished.
Work needs to be done. Dinner needs to be cooked.
I cannot believe that even after you knew that Mother's Day meant so much to me that you totally ignored it.
I was wished a happy Mother's Day as uneventfully as if it were just a Monday.
That should have been my first clue of how you felt about your mother.
I remained blissfully ignorant, though, and blamed it on the fact that you were just busy.
I want to end this note by saying, honey, you are right, and I'm sorry.
But despite those golden words, I remain alone.
Where did I go wrong?
I wish I could blame my parents, anyone, but I am solely to blame.
I'll eat that. If I can help you move, let me know.
I am always your mother and always here for you.
That's hard to say, as I still can't think of facing you, but I will try.
The hurt will lessen, I'm sure, but it will never be gone.
My pride isn't worth arguing with how you feel, and after all, you own your own feelings.
I just wish you would have just gone on and not shared those feelings with me.
I could have well done without knowing how you truly feel.
What a gift that would have been.
What a wonderful fantasy.
Dream on. I have some horrible memories of my childhood, and they haunt me still.
I'm so sorry that it sounds like you have the same.
That was not my intention.
I tried so hard to make things better, different for you.
How on earth did I fail so terribly?
I guess five trips to Disneyland wasn't the key.
I just don't understand how I have good memories, and yours are so bad.
I spent all morning writing this, and still it doesn't say what I want it to.
Good luck to you, son.
You are a fine young man, and you will go far.
No one will ever love you as much, nor be more proud of you than I am.
Please remember, that's a rare and very nice quality in a person.
It's called unconditional love.
I will always feel that for you, and likewise, if you ever have children of your own, you will understand.
Love, your one and only mama.
Oh my god, that's just...
Oh my god.
Oh my god.
Where... Oh where... I mean, what do I need to say?
What do I need to say?
Not much at all.
I will just skim over a few things, but this is...
Really sick. I mean, this is just beyond sick.
This is one of the worst letters I think that I've ever seen.
And my God, I've seen a few and received a few in the course of doing this.
This is one of the worst and most horrifying letters that I have ever, ever read in my life.
And thank you so much for sharing it with us.
And I hope you don't mind me podcasting on it.
The foggy web of contradictions and rage and fear and self-pity and narcissism and thwarted anger and sentimental attachment, followed by accusation, followed by...
I mean, this is just a brain that is in full free-fall, short-circuit, self-justification, self-pity, rage mode.
This is up is down, black is white, reality is inside out, your father is a hamster and your mother danced with elderberries.
This is just, this is the sheer ravings of a lunatic.
But a very cunning lunatic, a non-accidental lunatic, right?
Which is where my sympathy, of course, tends to diminish just a little bit.
This is a firm and beautiful and detailed and wonderful example of mythology in action.
Right. This is a self-portrait in all of the rainbows of self-pity and sentimentality that you could conceivably imagine.
This is a woman working herself into a weeping frenzy about how beautiful her soul is and how hard done by she is.
And this is a woman so wildly fragmented in her personality because, I mean, she's just shattered herself.
Obviously, she was fairly busted up by her parents, but then what she has done and is doing to you is just beyond, I mean, it's unspeakable.
It is unspeakable what is being done in this letter.
So we'll just touch on a few of these, and I don't think that I need to say.
I think we've got the hang of this by now.
We don't need to keep going through this kind of stuff.
So, here's some of the problems, right?
The logical problems that the letter has in it, right?
Naturally, she wants to attack you.
Right? Naturally, she wants to attack you.
A terrible thing has occurred, which she started.
I believe you in that.
I really do. I'm sure that you're not always a saint in these interactions, but you're the kid.
So, your only responsibility is to get the hell out.
So, she wants to attack you.
See, she's enraged. A bad thing happened, and her conscience is plaguing her.
But she's got too many bodies, too many destroyed days and nights behind her.
She's dragging too many corpses around to be able to make any kind of rational, and have any kind of rational understanding of what's really going on.
So a terrible thing happened, and now she's caught in a trap, which she's desperate for you not to see.
But I'm sure you see it, but let me point it out for those who may be newer to the conversation.
This is the trap. First of all, whenever your parent attacks you, it's completely irrational.
It's completely and totally and absolutely and finally and madly and totally and completely and absolutely irrational.
A parent cannot attack a child any more than a sculptor can attack a sculpture for not being a good sculpture.
I mean, yeah, yeah, we got free will, blah, blah, blah, but the harm that is inflicted on us by our parents...
is something that they cannot attack us for.
They just can't. They just can't.
They chose to have children.
They were given a child which is naturally rational, naturally positive, naturally happy, naturally benevolent, naturally angry and defensive, sorry, angry and healthy way in terms of establishing boundaries.
They were given a pure and beautiful and wonderful child.
And that was what nature provides to every parent.
And if they fucked it up, they fucked it up, right?
So yes, I totally get that you are cold and angry at your mom.
I totally get that you sing songs and pretend that nothing happened because you know that sticks the knife in deeper.
And that's why you've got to get out.
Because that is a habit you've got to drop.
That is a habit that you've got to drop.
The desire for a cold, knife-twisting vengeance against those who have abused us is a perfectly healthy and natural response, and you have got to stop that.
That is absolutely going to rob you of happiness in your life, because that is going to tempt you with sadism whenever you are hurt.
And that is something that you cannot have in your life.
You've got to make that commitment that when you're hurt, you talk about it, and you make sure that you're with people that you can talk about it productively with, and that means getting the hell out of this situation.
So, of course, she wants to attack you, but at the same time, she wants to praise you.
Because if she attacks you as a cold, mean, vicious, hurtful, spiteful, bag of tricks, evil, dart-throwing, saint, satanic little kid, then, of course, you're right.
She was a shitty mother. Right?
So, her sentimentality and her desire to paint you as a wonderful kid so that she can imagine that she's a wonderful mother is warring with her spiteful and venomous rage against you for hurting her.
Right? You don't even show up in the world for this woman.
You're not even like, you have no, this is narcissism at the core.
This is narcissism at the core.
You don't even show up as a distant shadow on a distant mountain for this woman.
You as an individual, you with a personality, you don't show up even as a tiny fragment of mote of dust in the middle of a huge ballroom.
It's all about her.
And that's why you've got to get out.
I mean, this woman is whittling you down and evaporating you and turning you into an empty wandering ghost every time you interact with her.
So she absolutely is enraged at you.
Because you hurt her, I understand that.
But she can't say that you're a sadist.
She wants to imply that you're a sadist.
But she can't say that you're a sadist.
Because if you're a sadist, where did you get it from?
I'm not saying you are. I'm just saying, if you were a sadist, where did you get it from?
Well, you had to come from your mother. So if you say to your mom, you're a terrible mom.
Then she's enraged at you because you won't say that to somebody unless they were a terrible mom.
So she's enraged at you, but she can't call you a bad kid because then of course she was a terrible mom, raised a bad kid.
So we've got these two poles working in this letter constantly.
You can see this surging back and forth.
Mad, crazy. Like a killer whale in a swimming pool.
Just thrashing and surging back and forth.
You are a wonderful kid means I... Was a wonderful mother.
Right? She doesn't know you.
She's just making up shit.
You know, just making up gold and casting it in a mold.
It's got nothing to do with you.
You're not even in the room, right?
Because she wants to look at it in herself, right?
She wants to look at herself as a good mother.
So, yeah, she's going to praise you as being a great kid because that makes her a great mom.
But then she's also enraged at you and calls you cold and mean and vicious and underhanded and violent and blah blah blah, right?
Right? So, I mean, which is it, right?
If you're a great kid and she was a great mom, then there's nothing to be heard about because you didn't do anything wrong, right?
If you hurt her, then you're a bad kid, but then she's a bad mom.
You see how this goes back and forth all the time.
And then there's a story about the dad.
Oh, my God. So, you know, she says that your dad called about his girlfriend and she said, Honey, you're right and I'm sorry.
Those are the magic words, right?
Anybody who doesn't apologize to a woman is proud and cruel and senseless and will be abandoned, right?
A hermit must be the rightest people in the whole wide world.
Right? I mean, this again is pure narcissism.
And she says it openly.
It's amazing. It's amazing how clear people are with us all the time.
They tell us everything about themselves.
She said, how wonderful it would have been if you had never told me your real feelings.
How much I would have preferred if you had never become real to me.
If you had never told me your real feelings, I would totally and completely have preferred that.
How angry I am that you spoke the truth.
How angry I am that you made yourself real to me.
How angry I am how enraged I am that you had the temerity to tell me something I didn't want to hear that was inconvenient to my preferences.
I mean, that's all you need to know.
That's all you need to know.
So... And then she apologizes for things that you haven't complained about.
This is a standard practice of abusive parents.
They will apologize for completely inconsequential things that you have not complained about, that are not part of the issue at all.
And they're very conscious and aware of doing that.
That's not accidental. And so she says, I'm sorry that you moved.
Like, that's not the issue.
And this, again, is always the trick, the manipulative tricks of these kinds of vicious bastards and bitches, these scumbags.
It's what they always do.
They say that they're sorry for things that don't bother you.
And then when you say, but this is what bothers me, they say, well, I've already apologized.
And you say, but not for what bothers me.
And they say, oh, okay, fine, what bothers you, right?
It's constantly, you're fighting a fog here.
This woman does not even exist.
She's nothing but mythology and evil, pouncing, vampiric hallmark cards out to suck your life dry.
Right, so...
So, yeah, she says that...
And then when you nailed her, right?
So she's crying, right?
Because, oh, it's the worst pain only a mother can feel.
Oh, they're crying, they're crying, right?
And you say, well, they may work on other people, but these manipulations don't work on me.
You wrote these words in indelible income.
I sold you. See the intelligence, though?
Like, the intelligence and the language skills of your mom are pretty amazing.
Pretty amazing. Like, let's give credit where credit is due.
The language skills that your mom has here?
Oh, fantastic. Just amazing.
I mean, this is evil genius.
It really is. This is like a woman who could have gone far if she'd only used these powers for good, right?
Rather than this kind of stuff, right?
Oh, and you've got to love this kind of stuff.
This is the Donald Rumsfeld stuff.
Donald Rumsfeld is like, gee willikers, and gosh darny, things like that, right?
This is a guy who has ordered the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of people, and he can't even use the mildest cuss word.
And this is your mom, right?
Your mom is manipulating cops, and the cops could have dragged you off of jail for assault?
Absolutely, you hit your mom, right?
And she wouldn't have said no to that.
She abused a child.
She knows that her husband physically intimidates you.
She's seen it.
I bet you a million to one she used the most unholy words during this exchange.
But then when she's writing a letter, that doesn't fit with the narcissism.
This is a completely fragmented and empty personality structure.
There's nothing here. There's nothing here.
And, I mean, this is a zoo without anything in the cages, right?
Except you, my brother, except you.
So, she then can't say the word F, and she uses gosh, and gosh darn it, and darny darnyville, and gee willikers, and all this kind of stuff, right?
This is a satanic witch.
And, of course, when she writes it down, though, it doesn't fit with the hallmark image of the mother and blah blah blah.
And, oh, I don't know how I'm going to move and blah, blah, blah.
I'm going to move because I can't imagine that my husband hit you and this and that, although I don't know because this and that, right?
So the guy's an alcoholic, drinks all the time, is nuts and screaming and raging and this and that, but you can't imagine, can't imagine that he would have hit you, right?
So, this kind of stuff is just...
It's got nothing to do with you.
She might as well not have bothered sending it to you.
It's entirely for her to pour her own portrait up against the wall, right?
I mean, this is the prison that people end up in when they believe that they can will reality.
Where they can just change reality because they want it to, right?
When your mother has these dreams of being peaceful and nice and just eating a grilled cheese sandwich and blah blah blah blah, well, you know, who is it who disrupted, right?
Who married the alcoholic guy?
Who married your father who ended up marrying this other crazy woman, right?
So, dude, I mean, let's not even get into your father.
You know the stuff about this that we talk about here, bud.
Your dad is... Is core to the issues here.
Your dad is core to the issues here.
Your dad does not get away scot-free as being a decent, hard-working guy.
He's married two women who've abused you.
And he's stayed married to them.
Right? Your dad is no saint, and your dad is exactly the same as your mom.
He's just more passive. He's just an enabler.
Right? There's the abuser, and there's the enabler, and he's the enabler, and who's worse?
Who's worse? So, anyway, I mean, we don't have to go on about this.
I do totally understand.
The last thing I'll say, the five trips to Disney wasn't the key.
I mean, this is just astounding, right?
The idea that a happy childhood is somehow involved with five trips to Disney.
And then she says, after telling you that you have to apologize to women because that's what they want, right?
Apologize to me because that's what I want.
Not because you're right.
You say, I'm sorry, you're right.
Women need to hear that.
No, narcissists need to hear that.
and she's insulting women by saying that this is true for women, not just narcissists.
So, after telling you that apologies are the way to solve these kinds of problems...
Hi.
Hello. She ends up saying that I can't apologize.
I can't apologize.
I can't apologize.
Oh, and the Mother's Day thing too.
Don't even get me started on Mother's Day.
Where's the children's day? Don't even get me started on Mother's Day.
What a hypocritical load of crap that is.
It's like saying, I have a wife's day.
No, every day you love and treasure your wife or your husband.
Every day you love and treasure those who are close to you.
And you don't need a day where you have to be pretending that all of this kind of stuff is flowing out of your soul like an effluvia from Mount Vesuvius.
It's a hypocrite's day, right?
I mean, if you love your mom, which I think is wonderful, not you, and you can't love a witch like this, but if you love your mom, then fantastic, wonderful, beautiful.
Then treller and venerate her, and you don't need a Mother's Day.
You don't. Mother's Day is just the guillotine, it's the noose that bad mothers use to punish their children, and it's got nothing to do with love.
So, anyway, I hope that this helps.
You just, you've got, I mean, this is like not even a maybe.
This is not a gray area.
You have got to get out tomorrow, tonight.
I don't care where you go.
Go live in a hostel. Go live at the Y. Hell, I'd almost say go live on the streets.
But you have got to get out.
I know this is going to toast your plans, but it's going to toast your plans a hell of a lot less than possibly ending up in some sort of criminal problem or totally short-circuiting your capacity to love because your mom is going to provoke all the sadistic withdrawal in you that you're capable of, and that is how she's really going to rule the rest of your life.
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