Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
In an effort to encourage understanding of overdrinking and the effects it has on family members I'd like to repeat what I often say.
Current pop psychology borrowed from media dictates that we are awash in Narcissists. Everywhere you read in chat rooms someone is being tortured by one. People are diagnosing like crazy.
It's been my observation that those who habitually drink too much alcohol exhibit all the traits of Narcissism. We see the behavior but not the cause behind it.
The clinical truth is that no one who abuses alcohol can be professionally diagnosed until a lengthy period of abstention. But it is a guarantee if one member of a family is having a substance abuse problem, everyone in the family is confronted with that problem.
Some ignore, some blame, some try to fix, some abandon, some pick up a bottle and join in and the most unfortunate go mad.. Most all of those responses will have no positive effect.
A family, in psychology, is a unit, the patient. We see everyone being part of the problem but ourselves.
I knew you would be here to voice this opinion given how you refuse to give your own mother a hug when it was requested. I have no idea how you do not see how hurtful this is to the people who love you more than anyone in the world.
That's a lie and seems real personal for you.
I hug my mother sometimes, just not every single time we see each other, which is often.
This will be the last time I tell you.
I feel sorry for people who have family members who don't respect boundaries, Dave.
Adults don't tell other adults who to hug and who not to hug, period. They certainly do not chastise another over it, we need to be minding our own p's and q's. This animosity is not necessary. If you are not a likeable person that others often shun affection, you may want to look inward. Commenting on other posters here who hug or don't hug their moms is getting too personal.
Op is a grown 34 year old man, who’s grandma was around him in childhood doting on him and she’s one of those clingy sentimental clannish women who clung to her son and her sons kids.
I certainly don’t know what it’s like to dote on your son’s babies from infant onward and watch them grow through stages of life, but I imagine their feelings will be stronger than your feelings, and you won’t understand those feelings until your kids ( if you have them) have babies, and you're a part of their lives for decades, as you yourself get closer to death. I mean this grandma is what, 80s ?
The kids in return want nothing to do with her. Could be she’s a little much, could be the typical kids who have way more important things than thinking about grandparents- better seen than heard, and not interacted with. I’m sure I didn’t see grands at op’s age, wasn’t that close.
Though I did have a grandma who I had a few sketchy interactions(corporal punishment) as a kid and she didn’t speak well of my mom and tended to push people away, yet needed a lot of attention.
It was sad. I saw her once years after she moved away and she was lonely. I didn’t blame her for her isolation as some sibs did, as being deserved. Deserved or not, isolation in elder years is very cruel. I can see it, feel it. Even though I didn’t feel close to her I felt sad for her. She was so hungry for attention like a caged animal. In my typical callousness of young adulthood, I felt uncomfortable and didn’t understand hey I’ll be old like that one day- never thought that would be me.
But it is, op, one effing day you could be grandpa/ old senior guy all alone, your years ebbing away. Maybe you won’t ask for hugs or attention. Doesn’t mean you won’t necessarily need a sign of caring from somewhere, maybe even your kids and grandkids you doted upon and shared memories you cherish.
For whatever reason, Op doesn’t really seem to care for grandma. She adores him based on history that it’s her grandchild, they shared memories that mattered to her and maybe she’s holding onto those as she gets older and older.
I think it’s best to just give the lady a hug and try to be compassionate, because she’s freaking old, like 80 probably and near dementia, if not already there. There may be a time she doesn’t even know who the eff you are. That’s pretty sad, unless you’re a stone.
I’d think you’d feel more regret standing there arms crossed to maintain boundaries, than one day realizing this woman tried to make special times and memories for you, and maybe one day you’d be a grandpa and do the same. Then you might realize that’s a special comforting love you have for grandkids carrying on the family line, a legacy one is a part of . Maybe it’s comforting to think of your grandkids living on after you’re gone. And them having kids and happy lives.
I think you're justifying by talking of Disney world views cuz you want no granny hugs. Geez Disney memories are cheerful compared to how complicated a hug is from someone who hasn’t done you any real harm. I’ve hugged people I barely know out of politeness and while I didn’t particularly feel anything I carried on.
I think granny earned a hug here and there even if unexpected. Jmo fwiw. You don’t need to ever hug her if you’re so sure of your correctness.
Yes it's certainly unusual which is a HUGE tip off. Clearly, not wanting a hug is perfectly okay. We all know this.
Rebuking someone for not showing "fake love" and not being "deceitful" is repulsive. It's abuse. I certainly wouldn't want a hug under those condiitons. I'm sorry you went thru that but you do not need to be an abusive person just because that is what you endured. A hug is intimate, it needs to be done with a genuine heart and when so, it doesn't feel like zapping energy. The compulsive nature of the peanut gallery to weigh in is where the abuse is.
He needs to just stay away from this grandmother and these hateful people for a while. There is no need for him to be treated badly each time he sees her because he's genuine and they are not. It shines a light on their darkness when he won't play along with a rooze. See Grandma in private, no peanut gallery around trying to cause strife between them. How dare they? We try to foster genuine love and caring between relatives, not this.
Also others who insert themselves to Lord over another to decide they need to hug this or that person need to be rebuked. And of course the obvious, don't hug those people. They are sick. Distance yourself until they can act appropriately. Not perfectly, just appropriately. If they continue, then they are showing you thru their actions, you are not welcome. Spend time with people who do welcome you instead.
Seems like you, the OP, are being advised to estrange yourself from your those within your family who cannot act "appropriately" making them "hateful." Perhaps skip all gatherings where your grandmother and dad are present. The hug from the little old lady who brought an end to family gatherings. I suspect, OP, you have more common sense than this. A suggestion: maintain your 'boundaries' with kindness instead of outrage. Your grandmother arrives mid-meal for a hug, meet her halfway, escort her back to her seat, all the while promising her the best hug ever after the meal.
Perhaps at your age you don't fully realize how the elderly crave touch, how it is an expression of their humanness, of the love still embedded within them. Spouses may now be dead, little children and grandchildren now grown. The suggestions to put your elders on a behavior modification plan - "distance yourself until they can act appropriately" - that is so sad.
Your Dad being older no doubt gets it. For you a not terribly touchy-feely young man it's harder, and that's perfectly understandable. Still the appropriate psychological framework here is not 'boundaries,' your selfhood inviolate, the jargon of the current generation. If the old childish love for your grandmother is a phenomenon of memories past, and her current eccentricities now more present and irritating, well that's also understandable. Sometimes the elderly are a pain in the butt.
For generations functional familial groups have found concepts like respect and care for elders useful. Not to cater to them, but to help foster the concepts of basic trust and care that are found in the best but of course not all family structures. It's an ideal to strive for, and growth comes from at times putting others before yourself. Perhaps that's the lesson your Dad is trying to pass on. Not only to please his mom but see his son continue to grow into an admirable man.
We are never too old to learn lessons, and, of course, that applies to your grandmother: hence my suggestion for kind and gentle redirection as necessary.
Nope. Not at all. But when you teach children that adults get to touch you whether you like it or not then you are setting them up to be taken advantage of.
OP did not introduce the theme of sexual abuse into this thread; indeed nothing in his description of the time he spent with his grandparents when younger suggests this.
To my recall he describes *himself* as not being particularly touchy-feely and it's not terribly unusual for a young man to no longer want to be so smothered by his grandmother. Still life is not always exactly what we want at any one moment in time -certainly not at the expense of a woman who appears to have been nothing but kind to him. Now sure, the grandmother may well be a bit persistent and not a good cue-reader - hence others sometimes find her a bit much. '
The OP may well have to develop an approach or technique to better deal with this grandmother without saddening and possibly embarrassing her and upsetting his father. Presumably at age 34, he has already learned how to avoid child predators.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
