Daughter needs vacation from controlling mother
Dear Carolyn: I have no bond with my mother and never have, including as an infant. She is self-centered, probably has a narcissistic personality disorder and makes herself look good by spinning partial truths to make other people look bad. Through the years, I have been her target.
I belong to an organization that has an event on Fourth of July weekend in a different city every year. This is the first year I’m able to go because it’s in my area of the country. I’ve had these plans for a year and have been getting more and more excited to combine my first vacation ever with the event.
My brother has informed me that my mother’s 70th birthday celebration is all figured out — July 5 for 25 people at $40 a person — and that because he understands my financial difficulties, he and our other brother are prepared to cover the cost.
I’m insulted that I wasn’t consulted regarding an event they are suggesting I might “cohost,” but I’m trying to let that go.
My real issue: Am I now obliged to cancel my only vacation, ever, to attend? If I go, I will be resentful (obviously). If I don’t go, it is fodder for family gossip about what a terrible daughter I am. It looks to me like a lose-lose situation.
Dear M: I can see how you would think that, after a lifetime as the preferred target of a dysfunctional family.
But please trust this: People accustomed to being treated with respect would respond immediately with “Jeez — wish you’d run the date by me first! I’ll be on a vacation that weekend that I planned a year ago. If you change the date, I’m in.”
The only “lose” in that scenario would be the disappointment of having to miss a celebration you care about — not the terror of poking wasp nests with a stick.
I suggest that you respond to your brother with those words anyway, as if you are a valued equal in a healthy family. Why? Because your mother’s problems confer no obligation on you to make them your problems, too. You get to live as any other independent adult does.
If that whips Mama into a frenzy, then figure out the radius of her reach and step calmly, decisively outside it.
You might still see this as a notch in the loss column. As long as you’re prepared to withstand the fallout, though, I actually see it as a win, because it says to your mother and anyone who is still in her sway, “Breaking news: I’m beyond the reach of your powers.”
That fallout won’t be fun; on the contrary. The first time a controlling person notices that she is losing control, the punishment is usually swift and merciless.
It only works, though, if you keep caring what she says about you. I know; I know: It is very hard work to get there. But you know that she is a bad egg. It is within your power to upgrade that from intellectual awareness to a core, life-guiding conviction.
Finally, maybe your mother can’t be kind to you, but you can.
Write to Carolyn Hax — whose column appears on Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays — at tellme@washpost. com.