There are many adult children of bad mothers. A bad mother can be defined as an emotional, blackmail, black-belt con artist…one who blame-fully poisons the well of the positive mind and is communicationally abusive.
On Mother’s Day, many good men and women feel guilt-tripped by all the Hallmark card mixed messages that try to define the perfect mother as, well..perfectly normal. BUT what if y/our mother is bad to the bone? What then? Do you act nice and dress up that ugly reality all pretty-like? No, of course you don’t. It’s not wise to ignore a painful reality.
Tell me…Why Is A Bad Mom Such Bad News?
So let’s be fair, here. Many of us look as if we hail from the perfect family when in reality we are living in a cauldron of family stew, where tense emotions…NOT talking…and disappointed expectations, are the norm. Here’s why a “bad mom” can be such bad news:
- Guilts: Gives you the “guilt look” and drops the “guilt bomb” on ya
- Gossips: Talks behind backs and plays kids/grandkids (siblings) off against each other manipulatively
- Fakes: Doesn’t respect personal boundaries, healthy discourse and truth-telling
- Blames: “It’s NOT my fault because I”m NEVER wrong!”
- Abuses: Emotionally (physically) abusive…controlling…fault-finding
- Psychodramatic: Melodramatically and breathlessly invites you to come into “The Blame and Shame Show,” which isn’t the greatest show on earth.
- Is a Taker: A people user…uses other people as objects…expects sympathy
- Shames: Makes you feel bad about the best parts of who you really are
- Puts Down: Undermines your healthy self-regard by saying: “You’re just being selfish!”
- Angers: Paints others red with her anger whenever anyone has the nerve to effectively disagree
- Abandons: Uses threats of abandonment and punishments such as social ostracism or exclusion, to get her way
- Blackmails: Is an emotional blackmail artist, own a black built in guilt but can cry like a baby, when it’s to her advantage
Don’t get me wrong. There are “bad” fathers, bosses, grandmothers/fathers, coworkers, etc., and the list of terrible traits above would fit them all, too. That’s the point!
Bad communicators use the same bad talk tools, and that’s why we call them “bad communicators” when what we actually mean to describe them as something more spiffy, such as as “ineffectual communicators who turn positive talk off cold.”
Focus today on the people who really “want you” and care for you as you are. Trying too hard to please others who are too hard to please will put your happiness in a coffin. (Read the timeless fable of “The Scorpion and The White Horse” on this site to find out why we are slow to learn who are true friends are.)
In the meantime, go on easy and let go of the guilt, especially if you know a “bad mother” (or bad boss, father, grandparent, brother/sister etc.) who uses the cloak of motherhood to do some pretty dark and dastardly deeds this Mother’s Day.
Dr. Dennis O’Grady is the father of three daughters, and enjoys a two-way communication street with his elder mother, Betty Merrill O’Grady. Dennis works with many cases of controlling parental emotional abuse…which he conjectures and believes to be one of the root causes of relationship fear, mistrust and distress.
