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My ex was raised by very controlling parents, and he ended up being an adult who really still cannot make decisions. He would always defer to me, and even get angry with me when I wanted HIM to decide something.
He went through a phase in his 20s when he was completely irresponsible, I think, because he had been under their control so much, and with his first experience with freedom, he had no experience of problem-solving, taking responsibility, or decision-making. Even after he settled down with me about age 30, he just could not handle decisions and was quite happy to let me decide everything and handle all the household responsibilities. For example, he would forget to pay a bill, and when I told him it was late, his response was "well, you didn't tell me to pay it" (!)
I HAVE A TWIN!!!! The first time in freedom is why I failed out of college. I attempted to go back but it just wasn't for me. I had poor study habits and just made it hard to decide priorities.
Raised by controlling parents (mother was worse), I always had a strong independent streak, perhaps as a counter-reaction, or perhaps that is just my nature regardless of upbringing. Anyway, I was fortunate enough to go off to college several hundred miles from my parents at age 18. That was really a great thing, and I never looked back. I don't mean I severed ties with my family, but that I never returned to live at home, although I did occasionally spend several days up to two weeks on visits.
My parents separated and divorced when I was in graduate school. From that point forward, I always lived about 2,000 miles away from my mother, and that was about the perfect distance. I would visit her every other year, usually staying about two weeks. Those visits had a good amount of conflict, as my mother was unable to put aside her controlling nature and my own independent nature caused me to resist and reject the efforts to control.
Sometimes the only solution may be to create enough distance, geographically and otherwise, to get some breathing room.
A good friend of mine has some of the most controlling parents I've ever encountered. They were the type that our friends would meet them for the first time and literally say "wow his mom is so controlling" on the drive home.
Eventually my friend got into drugs, and while I tried to reach out and help him (he was a really close friend), he never really wanted to confront the issue. After not seeing this guy in about 4 months, he shows up at my house that two of our mutual friends and I shared. He said he'd had a huge fight with his parents.
Next morning--He is sleeping on the couch as a friend and I are playing XBOX. We hear this loud pounding on the door (like a cop that REALLY wanted in). We were scared and didn't answer for about 45 minutes, and it's my friend's controlling dad. After trying to wake the guy up for 20 minutes he got up and left with his dad.
So, like a year later me and druggy friend start to talk more and reconnect a little bit, as he had apparently gone to rehab, got a good girlfriend (who I knew) and pieced his life back together. He invited me and some other friends to the lake where his parents live for Independence Day. He told me beforehand that his mom wouldn't be there, which I thought was strange. His mom and I got along OK for years...
So we're all out on the lake in a boat and as we're returning to the dock I see his mom walking towards us, and as I go to give her a hug she just kind of took it without hugging back and said "why are you here?"
Whaaaaat?
So she drags me inside and chews me out... It's all my fault. I got her little baby into all these drugs and I'm a loser blah blah blah... (FYI I smoked some green in college and tried shrooms/coke/acid 2 or less times each, but always had a job and good grades)... and she kept going on about how it was my group of close friends that got him on the wrong path. Everyone that knew this guy knew that his parents were the cause with their constant controlling behavior.
So, after trying to defend myself for 10 minutes or so, I said it: "Everyone knows his issues stem from you and [his dad]. You two are such controlling--" and that was when she cut me off as her face tensed up like she was going to cry and she just pointed to the door and her voice crackled "get the **** out of here" and that was when I noticed that she KNEW it was her fault and had been over it before, at least in her own head. She couldn't handle what she knew was the truth. No one had ever challenged her because of her attitude and personality.
So as I was going to leave, I walked up to my "friend" and told him what had just happened, and he was like "sorry man, I didn't think she would be here..." So as I talked to him about it I told him that he had to come clean that it wasn't my group of friends, but rather his co workers from the restaurant he worked at when his issues were magnified.
He wasn't really engaging in the conversation, and I realized he was too scared to right the ship and tell his mom what had really happened because of her preconceived notion that it was me. He was a 25 year old man and couldn't even tell his mom a harmless truth. Made me really thankful for my parents.
From the problems my old buddy experienced, controlling parents seemed to give him a sense that he had to totally let loose and go against his own best judgement whenever they weren't around. Almost like he would rebel and do things they wouldn't want him to do.
Crazy thing is they weren't even his real parents, but rather his aunt and uncle. His real mom was like 15 when she had him and had issues with drugs herself... and they would ALWAYS hold it over his head if he was screwing up (a bad grade or behavior in HS) with "you're going to be just like your loser mom!" and stuff like that. Just unbelievable.
so, as I'm close to approaching my 30th birthday, I've slowly been coming to the realization that my upbringing was toxic (at least I think it was). It's so hard to express what I've experienced or feel without feeling as if I'm "betraying" my immediate family by discussing certain issues/behaviors with others. I especially cannot say how I feel/voice my opinion in regards to my mother without her claiming "disrespect" because I don't agree with her ideas and defend her in every instance, even when she is flat out wrong. Eevn though there have been words exchanged(some of them misunderstood and others just downright emotionally damaging), I still try to be the "respectful" adult child of my mother's, but I don't know for how long I can do this anymore. The thing is, I actually want to have a decent relationship with my family, especially my mother, without having to feel guilty for living my life the way I choose to or having to wonder if my going out with friends or a significant other is bad because I'm not rushing to every crisis that occurs within my family.
As an African American/Black female born on the West Coast; raised in the Southeast, the rules/guidelines for bringing up a child came straight from the Bible (or, from one's family's interpretation of Biblical principles). In my family, growing up, I was more afraid of my mother than God because she instilled that fear into myself and my siblings (as an adult, I still struggle with this to this very day). To use the Bible as a means of raising one's children is one thing, but to use the Biblical principles in the way that doesn't uplift an individual, but rather, that has an individual fearful of anything that hasn't come straight from the mouth of the parent is damaging (even as I'm typing this, I have a gut feeling that God will be disappointed for me voicing my opinion about my upbringing, this being a direct result of the toxic nature of my upbringing). There are so many examples I could list in this forum about this, but as of this moment, I'm not sure of if I'm delusional, if my family and upbringing were toxic, or if I'm just a stubborn adult child who refuses to submit to my mother's wishes and ideals.
A part of me wants what I'm thinking/feeling to be an instance I've created in my mind as a means to have an excuse to distance myself from my family, but the other part of me already knows that I can no longer continue on this way because it's messing with my mental and emotional state.
I don't know if anyone out there has experienced a similar situation, but I just don't know where else to turn besides meeting with a psychologist about this (I'm even scared to talk to a psychologist because I'm fearful that they will side with my mother and tell me that I'm wrong for feeling the way that I feel). So, if anyone has any advice, I'm all ears...
The only thing I can say to advise you is that no reputable and good therapist will say that someone is wrong for having the feelings they do -- no matter how "bad" those feelings are. Feelings are one thing, acting on them in a negative way is something else.
In my experience, the only thing they will do will be to help you to examine the reasons for your feelings and help you to explore ways of coping with them. Also, if your feelings are not justified, the therapist will probably not tell you so flat out, but would just lead you to discover that fact for yourself.
So, if you think therapy might help you, go for it!
(And, btw, just based on what you wrote, I think that you are VERY justified for feeling the way you do!)
Last edited by katharsis; 11-18-2016 at 02:59 PM..
thanks for your reply. I honestly didn't think anyone would reply so soon. I only hope that I find/meet a good therapist who would understand my feelings and help me to process them in a healthy way. I just hate having the feelings that I do because I feel guilty for having them, but if I didn't have them, I'd be way more miserable than I already am.
Posting to subscribe. I can relate to the OP and others in this thread, since my family was extremely overprotective in my formative years. Not just my parents, but all adults in my life. This had far-reaching effects on my romantic relationships, past and future.
I may add a more detailed response later, if I feel comfortable enough talking about it.
I was just contemplating the reality that I'm surrounded by controlling people, there are so many controlling people and I was just wondering what the characteristics are of adults who grew up in households where one or both parents were extremely controlling? If you grew up in such households, how would you describe yourself in regards to this experience and how it affects your life and relationships today?
Me, I had a controlling mother, and I feel that it has made me extremely afraid of intimacy. I'm always afraid people are out to control me or get something from me at my expense. Usually I'm right by the way. It'd be nice to share my life and/or time with somebody but there are so many people in my life demanding my time and going on stupid power trips and even more ridiculous things that I really can't handle one more person doing these things.
I had a controlling mother.
I suspect you are using your experience as a sort of excuse for not pursuing meaningful relationships. If you know you had a controlling mother, then you should be adept at seeing when someone wants to control you.
There isn't any reason to be afraid of this. You don't have to fall for it; you've been through it and you should know the signs.
We come into contact with all sorts of people in our lives. We have to figure out how to deal with them.
In my case, I have posted here that I used passive aggression in my relationships because of how powerless I had felt in my relationship with her. In other words, it was learned behavior. When I heard a description of passive aggression, I realized I was that way and was horrified. I tried to change. I think I felt that I changed more radically than I did. Lately I have been wondering if I am still not passive aggressive. I recognize now that I have to be on guard against those tendencies.
But I am in a long standing loving marriage with a grown family I am proud of. So, even though I am far from perfect and am sometimes not easy to get along with, I have had a good life. I think you can do the same. Your upbringing does not have to define your destiny.
I was just contemplating the reality that I'm surrounded by controlling people, there are so many controlling people and I was just wondering what the characteristics are of adults who grew up in households where one or both parents were extremely controlling? If you grew up in such households, how would you describe yourself in regards to this experience and how it affects your life and relationships today?
Me, I had a controlling mother, and I feel that it has made me extremely afraid of intimacy. I'm always afraid people are out to control me or get something from me at my expense. Usually I'm right by the way. It'd be nice to share my life and/or time with somebody but there are so many people in my life demanding my time and going on stupid power trips and even more ridiculous things that I really can't handle one more person doing these things.
My parents were about as controlling as they come. When I was 18 my parents wouldn't allow me some freedoms that most 12 year olds have. After I moved out at 22, my parents spent the next several years trying to control my life from afar.
I find in my adult life, I am overly worried about how I am perceived by the people around me and find it way too difficult to say no. For instance people, even friends, who come into my life can control me at lot easier than they should be able to. I have a difficult time establishing boundaries. Slowly but surely I am learning, but it's still not easy.
I am also very afraid of intimacy. It doesn't help that I am gay in an extremely conservative town with ultra-fundamentalist parents, but I am afraid to cross the "point of no return" when it comes to doing something my parents would disagree with. Of course, my sister is heterosexual and she suffers from the same thing. My parents hated every friend both me and my sister had growing up, and we were never allowed to date (actually I was allowed to go one one date, with a girl my parents set me up with). They also did what they could to sabotage the friendships we had. That has made relationships quite difficult.
I am 31 now and sometimes feel like life is getting away from me and I never had the opportunity to really live it because of my parents.
I was just contemplating the reality that I'm surrounded by controlling people, there are so many controlling people and I was just wondering what the characteristics are of adults who grew up in households where one or both parents were extremely controlling? If you grew up in such households, how would you describe yourself in regards to this experience and how it affects your life and relationships today?
Me, I had a controlling mother, and I feel that it has made me extremely afraid of intimacy. I'm always afraid people are out to control me or get something from me at my expense. Usually I'm right by the way. It'd be nice to share my life and/or time with somebody but there are so many people in my life demanding my time and going on stupid power trips and even more ridiculous things that I really can't handle one more person doing these things.
People generally do two types of things. They gravitate towards people and situations that were traumatic when they were growing or they completely stay away from those people and situations. It sounds like you do the former, which is why you end up with controlling people in your life.
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