Growing up with a controlling and/or domineering mother can suppress your masculinity and leave you stuck feeling and acting like a boy in a man’s body. My mother was the dominant figure in my family of origin and with a relatively passive father it was a disastrous recipe for my developing masculinity.
A controlling mother creates a relationship dynamic that will undermine your confidence in yourself as a man unless you take steps to counter its effects. So here are some steps to take to help you recover from growing up with a controlling, dominant mother:
Recognize that Your Mother is Controlling
Did you have a controlling Mother?
The first step to dealing with a problem is to recognize that it exists. It took me a long time to even see that my mother was controlling. It wasn’t until I did The Landmark Forum in my mid-30s and they started talking about how controlling most of us are that I had this insight.
When I was a child, my mother used a physical leash to control me; partly for my own safety, and partly for her convenience. As I got older, verbal stoushes with my father made it very clear that the masculine point of view wasn’t welcome in our household. My mother would fight tooth and nail every time, because to her conceding anything was a weakness. She controlled my father, and by extension the rest of the family including me. Even now during phone conversations, my mother decides when the conversation is over. My sisters and I sometimes joke about her idiosyncrasies but it’s not funny: growing up around this sort of behavior from a mother cuts deep into a man’s psyche.
Understand That Control Is About Anxiety
Controlling people act the way they do in order to manage their own inner anxiety. In fact, most dysfunctional behavior is the result of unacknowledged anxiety. Your mother may have had your safety in mind when you were a child, and felt that she needed to control your natural boyish spontaneity and exuberance in order to keep you out of danger. But her own inner anxiety about the world is likely to have magnified that danger out of proportion to reality. Children learn the most powerful lessons by making mistakes, and sometimes this involves getting hurt. Controlling and “protecting” you may have robbed you from these valuable lessons and undermined your confidence in the process.
It is natural for a mother to worry about her children, and if your mother was an anxious person to begin with, attempting to control you was probably easier than dealing with her own emotional baggage that made her anxious. Bear in mind though that if your mother controlled you, she may be so self-controlled that you’d never guess that deep down the problem for her is anxiety. If you met my mother, you wouldn’t think she had deep seated anxieties; you’d probably just wonder why she’s so aloof and critical, or you might get her when she’s in a good mood and just think she’s friendly but head-strong. Underneath it all, anxiety is the problem.
Start Expressing Your Feelings
Controlling people act the way they do because deep down they are afraid. In addition to controlling other people, they tend to have harsh judgments about themselves and to control their own behavior. This is most evident in the way they express their feelings. I have very rarely seen my mother cry, even at funerals for people she truly cared about. Our society tends to uphold such stoic behavior as a sign of great inner strength, yet it’s actually highly dysfunctional. Crying releases tension and allows us to heal our emotional wounds. Doing so publicly gives permission to other people to follow suit, which is healing and compassionate for everyone who attends. Stoic people put the brakes on this natural healing process for themselves and everyone around them. They broadcast the message “It’s not OK to be emotional”. And since we are all emotional creatures, that really means “It’s not OK to be who you are”. These people are a pain in the ass.
If your mother was emotionally contained, chances are you took this trait on too. You probably even magnified it. That’s likely to give you double trouble, because an emotionally constrained mother will have had difficulty bonding with you during your childhood, and this will leave you with a deep wound. You’re likely to be carrying a great deal of grief about this if you haven’t dealt with it yet, and the way we process grief is by expressing the emotions that underlie it… which is impossible if you’re emotionally constrained. The way out of this paradox is to start chipping away at the problem by expressing how your feel at every opportunity. See Step 12 in The Confident Man Program Guide for more on this.
Stand Up For Yourself
At some point, you need to start standing up for yourself and live life according to your rules, rather than the rules of your mother. A controlling mother doesn’t drop the rules just because you’ve reached adulthood. She changed your diapers, and annoying though this thought maybe, in her head you’re always her little boy. She’ll keep treating you that way until you start thinking and acting for yourself, and taking responsibility for your own life.
Women actually love men who stand up to them and part of her is actually waiting for you to start doing this so that she can stop worrying about you. But another part is deeply enmeshed in the idea that you need her to tell you what’s right and wrong so that she can keep you on the straight and narrow. Trouble is, her straight and narrow will wreck your life because you’re a man, and she’s a woman and we see things very differently.
If your family are like mine, your siblings may not have dealt with having had a controlling mother, and may conspire with you to play games like keeping secrets from your mother in the hope of avoiding conflict and her harsh judgments. You can’t control your siblings, but it’s time for you to take the lead and start telling the truth about what is going on. Your mother needs to start letting go and dealing with her fears by herself, and that’s not going to happen until you start being a man and standing up to her.
Take Some Time Out
If you’re a particularly sensitive guy, you may need to take some time out away from your mother’s controlling influence before you can learn to stand up to her. Travel overseas for an extended period, or even live in another country out of her reach for a while. Keep in touch, but don’t fall into a rut by establishing a structured pattern in the way you communicate. Start talking to your mother on the phone because you want to, rather than out of obligation. If you never feel like you really want to talk to her, taking a break from communication will allow these feelings to surface. She may resent you in the mean time, but that’s normal especially in a mother who lacks self-awareness as you individuate.
In my family, Christmas day was sacrosanct. Our mother would begin planning it months ahead, and be so stressed out on the day that nobody could really relax and enjoy it. One year I headed up the north coast on an open-ended motorcycle road trip and decided not to return in time for family Christmas. Mum got over it eventually, and the rest of the family actually missed me rather than taking my presence for granted. Best thing I ever did. Nowadays, Christmas day is more relaxed and much more fun for everyone.
Be Honest With Your Father
If your father has been under your mother’s thumb most of your life, he may turn out to be a worthy ally in the battle against the control of your mother; or he may be so used to submitting that he actually sides with her when confronted about the problem. My own father pandered to my mother’s whims most of his marriage, and certainly all of my life. Yet there were times when he clearly valued the opportunity to talk with me about what was really going on real without the interfering presence of my critical mother, his wife.
It’s a bit weird because he doesn’t really see just how negative an influence she is on him, and still describes her as “the best thing that ever happened to me”. Well that’s great for you Dad, but it’s not so good for me having a cold, critical, emotionally shut-down woman as a mother. That kind of thing has a damaging effect on a man. Being able to talk about these sorts of issues with my father has helped me to deal with the effect of my mother on me, and shrink her overbearing size in my subconscious. Talking it over with other men who can be more objective about it and finding other father figures to act as role models and offer the support that my own father wasn’t able to give has also been tremendously valuable.
Forgive Your Mother
Forgiveness is a highly misunderstood concept, so let me explain it in this context: Forgiving your mother means breaking the emotional attachment that you have to her and the harm her controlling behavior has on you. It doesn’t mean letting her off the hook, it means letting her do what she does without it having an emotional hold over you. This requires you to deal with the feelings you have about your interactions with her in the past, allow her to do what she likes in the present, and set a course in the future where you do what’s right for you regardless of the impact on her.
Start taking mental notes of the times when you change your mind or behavior because of the thought “what will mum think/do”, as these are clues to areas where you are still emotionally enmeshed with her. Forgiveness is about being free of this emotional dependency that allows her to control you. Once you see it this way, the notion of forgiving your mother for the things she’s done that have hurt you, becomes a lot more appealing. There’s a whole chapter in The Confident Man Program Guide about this: Step 8.
Heal Your Shame
Teaching you to be ashamed is one of the best long-term strategies a mother has to control your behavior. It’s better than reprimanding you each time you do something she doesn’t like, because once you’re taught to be ashamed, you start reprimanding yourself internally and she doesn’t even have to be around to do it. This can cover anything from having emotions and the way you feel, to your male sexuality and sexual appetite.
The problem with being shamed is that it damages your psyche deeply, and the effects go on long past the point where they may have been useful. To release yourself from the internal control of shame, you need the support of other people. You simply can’t do this alone, because shame is all about fear of other people discovering the truth about you and so they are essential to the healing process.
Find yourself a supportive group of men that you can trust, and start telling them about the things you feel ashamed of. Sex is a ripe area of shame from your mother, as is masturbation, addiction to drugs/alcohol/pornography, relationships, affairs and any kind of failure or mistake you may make in life. Join a mens group that focuses on expressing feelings. Confess the things you’re most ashamed of, and hear other men do the same, in a supportive environment where you get unconditional love instead of judgement. Sharing your story heals your shame and helps you break free, so I encourage you to talk about your experience with a compassionate, understanding professional.
See Step 13 in The Confident Man Program Guide for more on how to heal shame.
Notice When You’re Being Controlling
Finally, we can’t help but take on the behavior of our parents even if we found it abhorrent. Sometimes we promise ourselves never to be like them, without realizing that the other extreme is almost indistinguishable: A pledge to be the opposite of someone who is controlling means we’re still controlled by them and their behavior because we must always do the opposite instead of being free to choose for ourselves.
If you had a controlling mother, there will be times when you yourself are controlling; either of yourself or of others. You need to suspend your judgment about this long enough to recognize when you do it, and decide whether it reflects the kind of man you want to be. It may be a bitter pill to swallow that you engage in exactly the sort of behavior that you hate from your mother. In my case, the person I controlled was me. Somehow this seemed more noble than to afflict someone else, but it’s not; it’s still controlling. Breaking out of this has taken a long time for me, and it’s still a work-in-progress, but the sooner you start the sooner you’ll get there. Let yourself cut loose and live a little.
Repressing jealousy, envy, anger and hatred can all lead to controlling behavior on your part. The solution is to acknowledge and express these emotions directly, rather than letting them influence how you act. You may have a belief that these emotions are somehow socially unacceptable. When you start expressing so-called “negative” feelings, other people will identify with you because they have them too. Stop pretending that you’re perfect because it makes you come across as a robot that other people, women especially, will have difficulty relating to.
Question Your Religion
One of the easiest ways for powerless parents to control their children’s behavior is to send them off to church and have them indoctrinated with a set of rules and regulations, backed by a God who sees and knows all, damnation for eternity if you get it wrong, and a sense of guilt that keeps you in line. Once you internalize this, your mother doesn’t have to worry about controlling you so much any more to stop you straying, because you’ll do it yourself.
If your parents did this, it’s probably because they believed in the religion themselves and thought it was for your own good. They may even still believe in heaven, hell and eternal judgment if they’ve never questioned it nor acknowledged the damage it’s done to themselves. If your mother thinks it’s OK for God to be fiercely judgmental, then she has no reason to question her own self-righteousness. She’s just being Godly. But it’s really just another strategy to assuage her anxiety about you getting into trouble, and hurting or possibly embarrassing her.
Organized religion both attracts and produces judgmental, controlling people; that’s what keeps it organized. Everyone involved gets to avoid dealing with the underlying problem of anxiety by being controlling of self and others. Fundamentalists are the obvious tip of this iceberg.
If you still believe that good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell, it’s time for you to grow up and start questioning what you’ve been spoon-fed. Then the next step is to release yourself from the shackles of the psychological harm it’s done to you. See Step 10 in The Confident Man Program Guide for more details.
Get Professional Help and Support
Recovering from the damage done by a controlling mother is one of the most challenging tasks we can face because the emotional scars can go deep into our nervous systems. Often other members of the family have also been affected but may be too afraid to face the truth; which is why your siblings and father are more likely to side with your mother than to support your recovery, despite the negative consequences of her behavior on them too.
In some cases it may be necessary to cut contact with your mother for a period of time, which is likely to incur the wrath of siblings who are in denial of the impact their mother has had on them, and too afraid to take such action themselves. As a result, the first person in a family to stand up to a controlling mother tends to feel very isolated.
I highly recommend getting professional help and support on this journey. Since I’ve personally been there myself, I now specialize in helping people recover from the devastating emotional impact of growing up with a controlling mother. I can offer emotional healing sessions via Skype wherever you are in the world. If you’re suffering the effects of a controlling mother and want to set yourself free, [intlink id=”1511″ type=”page”]contact me about coaching[/intlink].
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107 Comments
Anonymous · July 15, 2020 at 3:17 am
Thanks for your reply.
The definition of the word theory is not definitive, and even if a theory is “proven”, it’s not a proof that there is no God, as I mentioned in my reply. A theory merely provides an explanation, which you may choose to believe. In the end, a theory is also faith-based.
If you’re interested about learning about a logical approach to the existence of God, I would recommend the books Permission to Believe by Lawrence Kelemen, and The Obvious Proof (forgot the authors’ names). If you are interested in learning further, please reach out, and I can provide further recommendations.
This is perhaps not the forum for a discussion on whether or not God exists. My point was that, although I felt your article was otherwise solid, at the end you inserted your own beliefs.
You said in your reply that I was triggered. That sounds patronizing, as if my response, by virtue of being emotional was not rational. I am actually pretty solid in my faith, and I came to it through rational understanding.
I do apologize again for veering into “psychoanalysis”. That was not my place.
Regards.
Graham Stoney · July 15, 2020 at 12:16 pm
You’re right; this isn’t the appropriate forum to discuss the existence of God. I’ve studied the topic a great deal in the past, and like you am comfortable with the conclusion I came to. As to whether our beliefs are entirely rational, I believe that humans are driven largely by emotions, not reason, and those emotions are often unconscious. We make our choices, decisions and beliefs based on how they make us feel, and then back-rationalise. For instance, “patronizing” is a rationalisation, and using rationalisations often avoids painful feelings. However, it’s by expressing these feelings authentically that we can be freed from the pain associated with them, and this is the central point of the article.
Cheers,
Graham
Anonymous · July 14, 2020 at 5:18 am
I generally liked your article, it has a lot of useful info, and I plan on reading more info on your site. I do have a problem with how you have presented religion, or, more specifically, God. The theory of evolution has not been proven; if it was, it would be called the “Proof” of Evolution. As it is, it is a *theory*. Darwin himself considered some of his own ideas implausible, and many scientists today have grave doubts about the theory of evolution; they hold on to it because the alternative is intolerable to them. Ultimately, the theory of evolution is *faith-based*. (Besides, even if the theory of evolution was proven, this does not prove that there is no God.)
I do appreciate your pointing out that a parent may have used religion as a tool of oppression and control, and that religion is an area that needs to be examined in this context. It is a very important point. Ultimately, though, a person needs to do more than cast off the shackles of his oppressor; ultimately, a person has to determine what is truth. That, perhaps, is your broader message, and I certainly agree with that.
[Comment edited after further feedback from author]
Again want to mention that I appreciate your site and your insights. All the best.
Graham Stoney · July 14, 2020 at 3:45 pm
I’m glad you liked the article, and I get that what I said about religion may have been triggering for you. I’d encourage you to read up on the scientific definition of the word “theory” because the way scientists use the word is different to the way you are interpreting it. Cheers, Graham
Anonymous · July 15, 2020 at 9:09 am
Thank you for your other response, I saw it after I submitted my post. It was candid and considerate. I appreciate it.
Anonymous · July 15, 2020 at 4:21 am
Thank you for your other response, I just saw it. It was candid and considerate. I appreciate it.
smallplanet · May 10, 2017 at 12:15 am
Hello,
I am a woman and I am wondering how does man effect from the death of their controlling mother? I challenged my ex to be just a son to her and not try to be a partner. To live his life without worrying about her because he deserves to build his own life. Now I am sorry that I intervened to their relationship because he got angry at me because of this and shut down to me completely.
Graham Stoney · May 12, 2017 at 9:42 am
It can certainly be a challenge being in a relationship with a man who is still at the mercy of his controlling mother. The fact that he got angry when you intervened doesn’t necessarily mean that you did the wrong thing. Remember you’re dealing with a wounded inner child, and he may have taken your challenge as criticism when in fact you’re challenging him to man-up. Check out my articles on How To Handle A Boyfriend Or Husband With A Controlling Mother, and point him to How To Cut The Emotional Umbilical Cord With Your Mother. If he needs support, I’m available.
Cheers, Graham
Jude Mendelsohn · December 29, 2016 at 8:28 am
Brilliant article. I speak here as a woman. Reading all this had an EXTRAORDINARY effect on me.
There was much internal silencing; which I believe to be shame based. In my family; there was no permission of emotion which I now see as the language to inner freedom from the bondage of a very very narcissistic controlling mother. She never wanted us to have any interests, hobbies or now even a new love. In her damnatory, judgemental eyes to have been married twice AND DIVORCED meant I was to be alone Forever. I fought her time and time and time again but only NOW-@ 56 (!!) do I see that she is a narcissist and Very sick and I ONLY START TO SEE THAT IT IS NOT ME…..BUT HER!
It is only from a whole year in the Narcissistic Abuse Recovery Programme by Melanie Toni Evans do I see now; she is an “ALTRUIST NARCISSIST”. I am indebted to this programme and 500 Modules in; I am creating MY OWN life- hopefully Free from her forever. Prior to this my life had ended. …such was the power over my own life. I had no “own life”… she totally enmeshed with all my life but I now see I LET HER AS I HAD NO BOUNDARIES. “NARP” teaches me all I never knew. Bless you all.
Graham Stoney · January 5, 2017 at 8:41 am
Thanks for the positive feedback Jude, and for the tip about the NARP; it looks awesome!
Roy Wells · November 10, 2016 at 10:46 am
Growing up in a dysfunctional can be tough. It is even tougher when you have two dysfunctional families with stepparents. I had an evil stepmom and a parade of clowns for stepdads. I always tried to think of ways to get rid of my stepmom but I never acted on any of my plans. I found that it was therapeutic to write stories that would lampoon them. I have a new story called My Psycho Family! It is free if you have a Kindle and Amazon Prime. I hope you enjoy it.
India Andrews · October 11, 2016 at 8:26 am
You wrote this article for men but what you say applies to women as well even the part on religion. My controlling mother loved the Baptist Church and made me go even when she didn’t feel like going herself. She would kick me out of the car and drive away. I grew up afraid of God instead of loving him. As a child, I would check to see if the world still was there in the morning because of the Bible passage about the apocalypse happening at night. I look back on these memories and think, “What kind of religion would scare a seven year old shitless like the Baptist Church scared me?” Yet, my mom to this day thinks she did a good thing by sending me there twice a week. On Thursday evening for Awana and on Sunday for services. When you get down to it, she wanted me scared by talk of hell fire and damnation because that helped her keep me in line at home. If mom didn’t get me, God would.
I could go on about so many of your other points but I don’t want to write a book. Good article.
Graham Stoney · October 11, 2016 at 5:24 pm
Thanks India. I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. Parents who use religion to assuage their own fears tend to use it to also pass those fears onto their children. It reminds me of scared people who use the phrase “God fearing” as if it were a good thing. Why would you want to teach your kids to fear the supposed source of all love in the universe?
Miss K · July 22, 2016 at 2:13 am
Wow. I feel like this post is about me. I agree with all points except the last one. I think with that it boils down to how an individual is learns to view GOD. For me, I saw (and still see) GOD as a loving father who, many times, was the only parent I could turn to.
Very eye opening though. There’s something erm.. “Therapeutic” when you realise others have gone through the same emotions and scenarios you’ve been through.
Graham Stoney · August 1, 2016 at 9:59 am
Thanks for your comment. I agree that your experience of whether God seemed to be there for you in times of suffering will make a big difference to whether you see God as part of the solution, or part of the problem. I remember struggling as a child with the image of a fatherly God, when my own passive father didn’t seem like the role model I could really respect. Yes, it’s certainly therapeutic to learn that we are not alone in our suffering. Cheers, Graham
Tara · May 20, 2016 at 8:18 am
Hi! Great article, I’m really glad I stumbled upon your site. Ever since I was a kid, I thought my 4 year older brother was more loved by my parents than I did. I know all kids think that. But he was always better in their eyes at everything. Later I found out that my mother’s parents treated her the same way. Her dad died when she was 20 and she had to take care of her mom and brother. She had the same controlling mother she is today. I am almost 30 and I realize how my relationship with her in the past influenced my relationships with other people. I have a pattern of falling into the role of the victim. Just like I did when I was a kid being yelled at. I don’t live in the same city as my parents, but we are in a frequent contact. Lately, I get so angry after every call. Sometimes I lash out then I feel sorry. But I just can help myself. I think I should make our calls less frequent, and talk less about some of my personal stuff. And remove that intimate connection you have written about. I’ll keep on reading your articles. I wanted to have an honest conversation a couple of times with my mother but she would just shut me down, not allowing me to speak, just yelling out her feelings and opinions. Funny thing actually, one time I had a huge fight with my mother, and later she was telling about it to my father, and she was telling it completely different than it actually happened. That’s when I realized that I had a completely different image of her for all my life. She is not on speaking terms with her brother. He is the bad guy, of course. But after that, I started thinking. What if she is the bad guy? What if his side of story is completely different? She is actually constantly fighting with someone. Then I realized that she is probably the problem. In the last 5-10 years, whenever I am in a conflict with a friend, it’s like I just shut down on my own. I avoid conflicts; I don’t ever say what bothers me. I just play out hundreds of scenarios in my head. And usually I shut the person out completely. I have a steady relationship which is not all that affected by my behavior, since my boyfriend is rather patient with me and doesn’t allow me to be passive aggressive toward him (which is my mother’s behavior I adapted subconsciously). How to break free?
Graham Stoney · June 27, 2016 at 12:28 pm
Hi Tara,
Sounds like your experience of your mother has been overwhelming and painful. I can see why you would want some distance from her. I have also experienced the feeling of anger after a conversation, because it didn’t feel safe to feel and express the anger at the time. I have been learning to reduce the time between when I’m treated badly, and when I feel and express the anger. It may also be worth establishing a relationship with your uncle, if you don’t already have one; as you say, there’s bound to be another side to the story and you may learn some valuable coping skills from him. Also, check out the article I just published on How To Overcome The Fear Of Conflict. I have found professional support immensely valuable in overcoming this kind of thing, so please drop me a line to talk about how I can help you to break free.
Cheers,
Graham
Isaac · April 8, 2016 at 4:40 am
Great article Graham and thanks for publishing!
I grew up in a very similar situation with a controlling and demanding mother. My father a very warmth and talented individual was completely destroyed and was basically acting as her puppet, in top of all she had her terrible habit of comparing me and my siblings to others like; Why could you not just act and be like cousin sol? like neighbor john? giving us always the feeling that we are good for nothing, and if the choice was up to her (which I wish it was…) she would rather had given birth to her sisters, uncles, neighbors, friends children since they are much more mature, smart, etc. etc. which -even though she completely broke my self esteem and self confidence- I could still state strongly that I wasn’t lacking anything from all others who she kept comparing us to.
Is this behavior related to the controlling behavior or is it an additional mental weakness?
Now as I’m almost 29 I still can’t get over all her controlling, demanding, and mainly her compressions which in effect I always intend to mirror myself in others by trying to act like them and even though it works a lot of the times, I always have this inner terrible feeling of being very unauthentic and having the pressure of pleasing all the others surrounding me.
Isaac
Graham Stoney · April 29, 2016 at 3:11 pm
Hi Isaac. I’m glad you enjoyed the article.
It sounds like your mother used unfavourable comparisons as a form of criticism. Most likely she knew that she didn’t measure up when she compared herself to other people, and so she projected this disappointment onto you. Comparisons are never helpful as we often end up comparing our weaknesses to other people’s strengths. The goal of growing up is to self-actualise; not to become a carbon copy of some imaginary hybrid of idealised features from other people’s personalities.
People with low self-esteem tend to feel bad around people with healthy self-esteem, because they are reminded of everything they are missing; so perhaps your mother unconsciously felt the need to crush your self-esteem so you wouldn’t keep reminding her how bad she felt about herself. It’s certainly a mental weakness, probably driven by the same need to avoid anxiety as the controlling behaviour. Check out my article on How To Recover From A Critical Parent for similarities.
I relate to your feelings of being inauthentic. Controlling mothers try to force us into a mould that doesn’t really fit us, which is why we often end up unhappy. But don’t underestimate the biological drive to conform to even the most distorted parental expectations: we are wired to seek our parent’s approval as a childhood survival mechanism. Many men in our society remain boys in a man’s body because they’ve never let go of this. An important part of growing up into a mature adult is unraveling the low self-esteem trigger our mothers installed in us as children, and being authentic even in the face of her criticism and attempts to control is the ultimate goal.
The key to this is learning to tolerate our mother’s distress and stop trying to rescue her from her own feelings of low self-esteem by complying with her unreasonable demands. Since this cuts to our core insecurities, it can be a tremendously challenging task, which is why I’ve found the support of other people invaluable in my recovery. But it’s also the most rewarding thing you’ll ever do, so if you’d like some 1-on-1 coaching on this, please drop me a line.
Cheers,
Graham
Meg · March 13, 2016 at 12:24 pm
I completely agree with your comment. I cannot show any emotions around my dad. Otherwise he will completely destroy me. It’s like he has no heart. And he uses our religion as a mask to show that he’s a goody two shoes and loves the lord, then once the bible is closed he is Satan. He’s completely two faced. I’m starting to realize I need therapy because I realized that I was trying to control other people. I cannot relax at home either because I always need my guard up and result of this I have horrible anxiety and feel ashamed of doing anything. And because of him destroying me my family is completely ruined, we are now divided and “he” is in control. My mother is the passive one and doesn’t do anything and lets him boss her around. Only recently she’s realizing he’s doing this to her and she standing up for herself.
I need therapy because now I’m completely isolated, lost all of my friends, having trouble with teachers unintentionally, and feel like uncontrollably spazzing out in the classroom.
Graham Stoney · March 18, 2016 at 2:18 pm
Sounds like a really frustrating situation for you Meg. No wonder you feel like “spazzing out”; you must be so angry. I assume that you’re a teenager… do you have someone you can talk to about how you feel? Cheers, Graham
readerwriter2015 · December 24, 2015 at 7:03 am
Your Experience of Controlling mother is good but I oppose one thing which is you unnecessarily pulled the heaven and hell believe in between. “According to religion good people will go to heaven and bad people to to hell” is nothing to do with controlling mother or ‘ cold, critical, emotionally shut-down woman as a mother’. Latest Scientific research proved that religion has good psychological effect on mind. sigmund freud told that religion is psychological problem but science proved him wrong. I admin mother, parent or spouse can be bad or dominating because they are human and can be wrong but do not blame and pull religion for these things. Do not to be judgmental about it. The other thing people do unnecessarily is to bring Darwin theory everywhere to prove their point as if it is a kind of maths or algebra formula. Theory of evaluation has not been proved scientifically rather science disproved it.
Graham Stoney · December 24, 2015 at 1:01 pm
Religion is supposed to be a positive force for self-actualization; but it too often gets corrupted by controlling people to feed their own ego. The Theory of Evolution has indeed been proved scientifically, but this isn’t the place to debate that: Richard Dawkins addresses this far better than I can in his book The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution.
Debris · December 23, 2015 at 2:30 pm
I agree with you that controlling mothers damage their sons, but I disagree with your take on it. First , you try to explain away their bad behaviour by saying they only have anxiety or fear issues, and that somehow causes them to need to control any males in their lives. That is wrong. The root cause is pure meanness. It is about greed for power and the love of seeing suffer anybody unlucky enough to be within their reach. If there is evil in this world, they embody it. These women are psychopaths/narcissists/sociopaths . They are incapable of thinking about the needs of anybody but themselves. They have neither a human soul nor a conscience.
Second, you advise forgiveness. The second they see you do that and drop your guard, they will rip your heart out. These mothers are soulless demons or beasts. Their inner nature makes them prey upon good and trusting people. They will never change.
My mother did everything she could to destroy me. I have not spoken to her since I was 17. My first long term relationship was with someone who turned out to be just like her. I have spent the rest of my life trying to heal my wounds. I have suffered from job loss, homelessness, and heroin addiction, all in that order. I barely make it to the next day.
If anyone has a mother like this, save yourself and run. Then get therapy and begin the healing process. And beware that you might have a subconscious tendancy to have a girlfriend like this because that is all you have ever known and it feels familiar.
I never had a chance.
Graham Stoney · December 24, 2015 at 12:52 pm
Hey Debris. Thanks for your comment. I totally get where you’re coming from, and hear that you’ve experienced a great deal of pain and anger. I agree that there are some mothers whose behavior is so destructive that we need to cut contact altogether. My take is that forgiveness is about healing our emotional wounds and there’s no point going back for more suffering once we’ve done our healing, if we’re just going to get hurt again. I get that you’ve been through hell; drop me a line if you want to talk. Cheers, Graham
Mark · December 21, 2015 at 10:36 pm
Hi Graham
Thank you so much for your blog. I myself have been in this toxic relationship with a mother who is a wounded soul and had an abusive father who made her feel helpless, so she abused myself, my father and my sister. Interestingly, she hated being helpless, yet when she burned my sisters hands on a hot stove, calling it love for us, I felt helpless, as my little sister questioned me saying, “look what she did to my hands”, hands peeling and filled with sores (thanks mom). I am now a 28 y o man filled with anger, resentment, hatred and malice. Every relationship I have with a women has failed as soon as my girlfriend starts to try to control me or express dissatisfaction with the love I provide. I have swept it under the rug for years saying these women are the problem and that they are controlling me, but rather I seek after strong and controlling women and then despise them when they behave like my mother. In fact what led me to search for your blog was an incident when I was out drinking festively with friends, and a female friend of ours was pushing every button like my mother used to. Needless to say as I was drunk and she sober, I didn’t handle her probing questions very well. I don’t believe I find this girl attractive at all, but I think that I am drawn to the fear that is put in me when I am being attacked, oppressed and control. The truth is that my mother would attack me and put fear in me to control me and called this love, so that I intimately link fear and love. I would even say I have come to know pain and suffering as close friends and this is not normal.
I would ordinarily never speak to a friend who put this emotion inside of me, as she is of no benefit to me, but I realise that I cant keep running from women who behave like my mother. I have had this situation before in a past relationship where I literally ran away from a women, never saying another word (although recently i apologised). I cant keep running from this thing and I don’t want to either. My mother is not worth it, these women are not worth it and I need to fix myself, so I am not running away this time.
My next steps are to put my foot down in no uncertain terms with my mother, my father and my family. As I go to visit them I will not ever be controlled by her again and I hope for her sake she accepts my new stance. Furthermore women will never again make me feel like that scared child who used to hide under the bed and in the closet. In no uncertain terms I am going to let them know what manner of speaking is ok with me and what is not and that I will tolerate any infringement on my boundaries. Today I take back control, not so that I can control others, but i never feel helpless again.
Thank you again for you post it has been most helpful.
Graham Stoney · December 24, 2015 at 12:46 pm
Hi Mark. I’m really glad to hear that you found the post helpful, and that you’re ready to step up and be assertive with your family. It takes tremendous courage, and I want you to know that I’m here to support you. The journey can be challenging, but it’s the most important thing a man can do to grow from powerless child into being a true adult. Women can often sense where our buttons of unresolved pain are, and will unconsciously push them to test whether we’ve grown up or not, so I congratulate you on having the awareness that the solution lies within you, rather than continuing to resent all women for what your mother and father put you through. Drop me a line any time if you want to chat. Cheers, Graham
Angie · December 29, 2015 at 7:13 pm
….but always do this with love! I had to with my own mum….but I had to make sure I made her understand she could no longer treat me in that matter with strong authority but only ever done with love.
Ed · November 5, 2015 at 9:26 pm
I am 61. I was an only child. In the past two years I have seen a male therapist and allowed myself to admit many of the items mentioned in this blog. I am married to a woman that is damaged by her father, but is even worse than my mother was. It’s too late for me in every way, my life is over. I have no family left and no support group, only my therapist. I wish I had met him when I was 10. I totally ruined my life.
Graham Stoney · November 6, 2015 at 5:09 pm
Hey Ed. I hear that you’re in a lot of pain and regret how you’ve handled your life. We can’t change the past, but we can work to overcome it’s effect on our future. I’m sensing that you have some grieving to do before you can move forward. How is it going with the therapist?
Angie · November 3, 2015 at 10:20 am
Hi there, As a woman, I grew up with a controlling mum. My dad died when I was three so she took on a mum/dad role and did her best, but for many years I was controlled….and black mailed. I went right through into my 40’s before I made the ‘choice’ to be an adult and show my mother that I WAS one, and she could no longer treat me as a child anymore but to respect that I had grown up!
I can identify with most of what your article reads except for ‘religion.’
I don’t particularly like the word ‘religion’ as my faith is in a Person and not a set of rules and regulations, and I do feel that just like we make a choice on how we live our lives in other areas, the spiritual part is also a choice.
Yes, I have seen and encountered many who have been ‘indoctrinated’ as you term it, with rules and regulations. Thing is, the real Jesus and the real Gospel of Jesus couldn’t be further from what so many people understand ‘Christianity or church’ to be. The church per se has recently had very bad press and most of it, sadly correct, so that certainly doesn’t help folk to see the truth amongst the utter rubbish and hypocrisy that hangs about like a bad smell.
It seems rather than ‘include’ all religions you pigeon-holed ‘Christianity’ which to be quite honest is not entirely fair……as many others have rules and regulations too. Yes, if there has been a strict upbringing in a spiritual capacity there will be a certain amount of indoctrination whatever that faith may be, so I think ‘across the board’ would be much better than pigeon-holing just one faith….or not bring up religion at all!
But then again, you may have had issue with Christianity yourself?
We tend to kick against certain areas we have been brought up with, but here I surmise, so please forgive me if I do not have this consideration right.
On the whole though, the rest of the article makes very good sense, and I totally ‘get it.’
Graham Stoney · November 4, 2015 at 4:25 pm
Thanks Angie; good on you for standing up to your mother. My views on religion have shifted somewhat since writing this; I’ll post an update about that one day. Cheers, Graham
Angie · November 4, 2015 at 7:56 pm
Thanks Graham. It was hard work standing up to my late mum, but the thing is I still loved her regardless. Would love to read your shift on your views on ‘religion!’ (Oh I really do not like that word very much! It is such a misnomer. ) Thanks for replying. So appreciate that.
Dali · October 29, 2015 at 11:28 pm
Great article but i think that my problem with my mother is much harder she is very controling and somtimes agressive she keeps on telling me that im not studiying properly and that im always messing around waisting my time (which is totally not true i was a grat student at highschool and i am now studiying Robotics in germany) she’s always thretening me by cutting money on me and forcing me to quite college i remember that one time we both had a huge argument and she couldn’t handle the truth that i was right and she was wrong so she started insulting me and spitted on me please help how should i deal with her
Graham Stoney · November 2, 2015 at 9:34 am
Sounds like a challenging situation there! Unfortunately she’ll always have a degree of control over you as long as you’re financially dependent on her; so I’d encourage you to do whatever you can to earn your own money and then politely tell her not to keep giving you money now that you can earn your own. Even if you have to slow down your studies a bit to do this, it would be worth it in the self-esteem that you gain. Ultimately you would benefit from setting some new ground rules with her about how you want to be treated even when she’s upset with you; this will be challenging for both of you, but it’s a part of growing from a boy into a man. Also, when you argue try to focus on expressing how you feel rather than who is right or wrong. If she continues to treat you in ways that you don’t like, the ultimate recourse is to tell her that her behavior isn’t OK, and walk away until she’s ready to change it. Cheers, Graham
Lisa · October 25, 2015 at 4:26 pm
Hi Graham,
I agree, question your religion. I am a Christian and can understand your comment about it. Being a Christian is different. While there are so many religions that take the word of God straight out of the Bible and twist them to match their sinful ways, Jesus in no way wants control. He gives us free will. He loves us so much that the last thing he would do is force us into submission. Read the Bible for yourself. It is the oldest and most historically proven document (book) in the world, above another .
Jesus loves us unconditionally and His word tells us “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” and: There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:1)
I hope this might give you a new perspective.
Thanks and God Bless you Graham 🙂
Graham Stoney · November 2, 2015 at 11:43 am
Hi Lisa. Thanks for your comment. I agree that the central teaching of Jesus is that we are free to live our lives according to our free will, like a child does. But for me there is so much culturally influenced misinterpretation of reality in the Bible that I rarely turn to it as a source of wisdom nowadays. If you interpret “eternal life” to mean a life after death, I believe that’s a mistranslation/misunderstanding. But if you take it to mean “the freedom of living in the flow/heaven of the present moment”, then I’m right with you. Cheers, Graham
Rudraaksh Bhatyal · October 15, 2015 at 9:26 pm
I realised that i had this issue just a while back when i tried to find out for myself why the girl i loved started to get distant from me. I thought that i would be able to get into a relationship with her: all the signs were there. Then i found out that she had fallen for another guy. But still she didnt tell me and we got into a fight and i realised that i was just putting too much pressure on her and i was being needy. My previous girlfriend had cheated on me. My friends have told me that i am emotionally distant and i have also been told by a teacher in the past that i needed to be more assertive.
It wasn’t until i started reading articles on thegoodmenproject.com that i realised i had these issues and your article gets it spot on.
The main problem right now i am facing after realising is that of financial freedom. I am a student in college pursuing a degree i hate and i am not good at it and i never as a child saw myself doing it. I got into this college just to get away from home; to get away from my parents. I am greatful that i found this out at the age of 21. But to tell you the truth, i am pretty scared about my future. I am scared that i will end up living with my parents again, which is pretty normal in our culture.
And i am scared that i wont be able to resolve these issues on my own soon enough. And for obvious reasons, i cannot ask my parents to provide me money to go to a psychiatrist. I know that they will go into overdrive, wont give me the money and force me out of the hostel to come live with them.
Graham Stoney · October 19, 2015 at 10:25 am
Hi Rudraaksh. Sounds like a challenging situation for you. My main question for you is: what would you love to be doing as a career? (and then, what’s the first step you can take towards making it happen?) I agree that moving back in with parents makes it more challenging to cut the emotional umbilical cord, so if you have to do things like take a job you don’t entirely love in order for a short time to retain your sanity, it’s probably worth it. I believe that being assertive is the key to getting what we want in life, including dealing with controlling parents, so it’s well worth pursuing what your teacher has suggested. It sounds to me like you don’t really need a psychiatrist, you just need some assertiveness coaching or training; which is what I do. Working out how to pay for it would be a valuable exercise in assertiveness in itself. If you’re interested in working with me, please contact me. Cheers, Graham
Starque · August 20, 2015 at 4:43 am
Hi Graham
I can relate to all the problems you stated in your article .I’m an only son and child to an extremely controlling mother and a passive father.
So today (August 19 2015) my mom took a sneak peek of stuff in my flash disk and found a certain series entailing of witch and magical stuff.She got mad at me(cos she is extremely religious) in that she shed tears saying that I get on her nerves always,on my own perspective I can’t find anything wrong with whatever I watched because it is for entertainment and I don’t copy any of the characters displayed.
She always refers to the stuff she never did to her mum(who passed away when she was 16 and she was raised singlehandedly by a father who had a not so well paying manual job,and had to stay away for weeks) and uses that as a marking scheme to my character or behavior.
Her friends advise her wrong yet they have kids of the same age as mine,do stuff as I do or probably “worse” but those friends have never sought advice from my mother about their kids or how to control their kids in a certain way.
Ever since I can recall ,my mother has always told me to go to church and never miss any session but currently it’s the last of places I wanna be cos she uses religion as a shield to her flaws and a sledgehammer to my teenage behavior
I can’t even talk on phone with my girlfriend because she’ll be over me with questions like “who’s that ,what were you speaking ,blah blah blah”.I recently had to lie to her that I’m stupidly gay so she can at least give me space to myself and my dating life.
Currently she threatens to disown me ,suspend my education and adopt another child saying that I’m spoilt (which I’m not)and ungrateful,compared to her friends’ kids.We have never had a relationship since I was 10 and I’m very distant to any relative of mine (and this gives my mum an upper hand against me) .
As for my dad he keeps off from anything Mum-related stuff unless it’s directly linked to me because she is bad bad news.
I have no friends who visit me or who I go over to because she calls the shots to whomever I befriend,and she must approve.
Well I’m right now very hopeless of anything resulting to mum free zone and I need serious help,of which therapy is not one of them.
Graham Stoney · August 20, 2015 at 11:45 am
Wow, that sounds really rough. I’m not sure how old you are, but I’d start planning to get the hell out there as soon as you’re able to stand on your own two feet financially. In the mean time, you could probably use some strategies for expressing the anger that you have cleanly, and cutting the emotional umbilical cord so that her weird behaviour doesn’t trigger you all the time. If you want to talk, contact me. Cheers, Graham
Stephen John · August 14, 2015 at 11:20 am
Won’t say much more than others…good article but again, the part about ‘religion’..and the implications that somehow religion is bad because there is no God. Call it paradox , irony..or what have you..It was in Him that is Reality…and it was by Faith that our entire family is healing by the Strength I was Given by The LORD in Spirit. He was quite aware of family issues..in their way of saying things back then He said: “Truly I tell you..you must hate your mother your father your brother or your sister, and if possible, even you own life if you want to be my disciple”..In reality, he was the best cognitive therapist that ever lived WITH a free solution. The Spirit of Truth and A Spirit that gives one the capacity to Understand thing so of the Mind of God. I know this BY EXPERIENCE and it saved me from wanting to die from only in part some of the issues you’ve addressed well in the article. No doctors could help, all medicines were mere blankets. One of the Key’s to this ‘kind of strength’ was HOPE that is REAL and not a hope that one believe’s something just because someone told you to believe it and then tries to convince you it is true. I found this site, though it mostly focuses on ‘addictions’..I have found the world is addicted..to itself. People love their own thoughts and they way they think as if that is the end all of end alls. But it’s a lie. You come off to be open minded (which again is another one of those half truth sayings)..but regardless…you might find some of what is here interesting to read about. It seems you do not understand the Truth about God nor the LORD and that He never came to make a man-made religion at all..that was man’s doing not God’s.
https://www.freedomfrommedom.com/wp3/original-cbt-manual
Graham Stoney · August 14, 2015 at 12:01 pm
Hey Stephen. Thanks for your feedback. I do find it interesting how the same religion can be healing for some, and yet harmful for others. I get that it helped you, and I’m happy for you. I agree that many people are stuck in ego gratification, but I no longer buy the Christian notion that “the world” is evil and needs saving. I encourage you to keep digging into the reality of what you call “the LORD”; I think you’ll find that the strength that you believe came from him/it actually lay within you all along. Cheers, Graham
Kira · July 25, 2015 at 1:35 pm
My mother is also very domineering. I’m an adult now, but she still cannot seem to understand boundaries. For example, she came from out of town and stayed in my new house, one that I have been re-habbing non-stop for a year. I left her alone here for a day while I worked. I came home and she had scrubbed my window sills, done my laundry, cleaned my fridge, etc. I truly believe she thought she was being helpful, but to me [a woman], it came across as a belief I lived in a dump that she had to “do something” about. It was offensive as hell, but I said nothing. She’s good at the guilt trip thing. However, I never really thought about the impact of such a woman on a son. Feel bad for you guys under circumstances like mine. In the end, just remember, she loves you but just can’t show it appropriately. Good luck, all.
Graham Stoney · July 27, 2015 at 3:09 pm
Thanks Kira. Yes it sure is frustrating when our mother’s behaviour triggers us, regardless of our gender. I think you hit the nail on the head at the end there: “she loves you but just can’t show it appropriately”. Cheers, Graham
Eenusch · July 8, 2015 at 5:06 am
One last point.
Men who have gone through this tend to associate “passion” with dark passion…their mother’s crazy moods, controlling, manipulative behavior, etc. Therefore, passion becomes an emotion they cannot trust and thus stay away from completely out of fear.
This is why men shut down. They polarize towards one of two extremes — weak and passive or strong and stoic — a spineless noodle or a cold fish.
The positive passion of a healthy sexuality and a zest for life becomes difficult to access.
Graham Stoney · July 9, 2015 at 3:11 pm
Yes I absolutely relate to this; both polar extremes of passivity or stoicism are a reaction to the experiences of being controlled. True freedom involves healing the emotional pain that drives these reactions, and accessing our true passion. Thanks for mentioning this. Cheers, Graham
PersonMan · October 28, 2015 at 8:16 am
My god this article has been eye opening. It was about 2 weeks ago I finally realized (as I approach 30yrs old) that my mother was the destructive controlling force in my familes life. It made my father become withdrawn and passive so as to “do no harm” and when he would interact, the interaction always turned to her berrating him, and then him retaliating. Violence never ensued – however I see now how damaging she is. I had to spend a stint back at home after being out for a few years and I realized then for the first time it was her behaviour that was causing outbursts among otherwise calm collected people.
We were always wrong, or failing, everything was scrutinized too deeply and nothing was ever good enough. She always blamed my father, to this day he is the “Manipulating, psycho etc”.
As I’ve gotten older I’ve realized who my mother really was, and how she behaved in comparison to other mothers her age, older and even in my generation. She displays symptoms of NPD and DPD as well as a schizotypal personality disorder, and a dopamine deficit of some sorts, which I noticed over recent years she began to self medicate with dextromethorphan, pseudoephedrine hcl, and then was prescribed buproprion which did help. Its important to note my mom was not a “drug user” by nature. This is just happening in her late 50’s.
She got her blood sugar regulated with metformin and she is healthier and happier overall now, but when we actually sit down to talk I have become aware the conversation becomes destructive to me emotionally and psychologically. Even when she is trying to help. She is at her best when she has drank a couple beers (never much of a drinker that woman.) but it really does make her more normal, less anxiety ridden, more capable of “allowing” parts of life to simply happen.
It hit me hard like I said. I was sharing something I had shared with MANY other people and while the response was similar to theirs… “I like what you have accomplished here!” It was followed up with a “But this and that and that.”
I am usually so cold towards others, or passive, that I don’t feel much either way. But I noticed that I felt something. Anger? Thought so. Nope. I correctly identified this emotion as being “hurt”. I always processed it as “frustration” or “Anger” when it came to my mother. That’s not what it was. That’s why it could cause so much chaos. My brother and I both processed that emotion out like anger.
This has been a mind blowing read.
Graham Stoney · November 2, 2015 at 11:35 am
Thanks for your comment. I’m glad you found the article helpful. It sounds like you have indeed been hurt by your mother’s past behaviour. Anger is a defence mechanism which we use to cover the hurt, so it makes sense to me that you initially processed the pain as anger, and then realized that underneath that was hurt. It suggestst that you’re well on your way to healing it. If you’d like to talk more about where to go next, please drop me a line. Cheers, Graham
Eenusch · July 7, 2015 at 10:10 am
My mother is a hysteric and stirs up endless emotional crises. This is how she controls. When she’s called out on it, she angrily plays the victim and lashes back. And, she seems almost inexhaustible in her ability to indulge this kind of behavior. Happily, my father was never passive, so things were often combustible at home, which created its own kind of stress. Those on the receiving end of this pay a heavy price.
Graham Stoney · July 7, 2015 at 1:34 pm
Hey Eenusch,
Unfortunately playing victim is a common strategy narcissistic controllers use to defend themselves when they are called on their behavior. I totally agree with your final sentence!
Cheers, Graham
Chris · June 30, 2015 at 9:56 pm
I can relate to this very much. I am a man of 35 year old, who never had a relationship with a woman. My mother, who is dead for 10 years now, used to be very controlling over me. She was sexually abused by her father (a protestant pastor), and had a multiple personality disorder. She would have extreme mood swings, going from being the nicest person in the world to an angry, mean, manipulative woman. People around her always said how nice she was, and brave with such a background, but they didn’t want to see the bad side. I always felt I had to be very careful with what I did or said, and always pretend to be a happy and loving son not to make her angry. She said to everyone that I was so smart, but the way she behaved I felt more like a big turd around her. Whenever I had an own opinion or did something she didn’t like, she would start seeking arguments with me, find things to humiliate me. Because I had a rebellious nature, I wouldn’t let myself be humiliated, and we could fight for days. Admitting to her meant being humiliated again and again, so I didn’t do it. She had never forgiven anyone ever, even for the slightest thing. She also never admitted doing anything wrong. Whenever I was ashamed of something she would laugh with it, and have fun with my discomfort. My father was passive, and always took her verbal abuse (until they divorced). My sister was there with me when my mother was (emotionally) abusive, but she doesn’t say she remembers any of it.
I find it difficult to focus on things like make my place cosy, meeting people, dating women, feeling good with who I am, rather than proving how smart I am (what my mother wanted from me). I am not especially nervous around women, I feel I usually have a good connection, but when I feel attracted to someone I shut down, and my mind become completely blank. I feel that when I don’t do what my mother expected from me that I am a bad person.
I also would like to say that I agree with you about religion. While there are some genuinly good people who are religious (I like the current pope), there are also a lot of people (like my late grandfather) who use it to control and abuse other people.
Graham Stoney · July 6, 2015 at 7:30 pm
I appreciate your comment Chris, and can relate to a lot of what you say about your mother. Unfortunately controlling mothers can leave us feeling hypervigilant, especially when it comes to women we’re attracted to. Our nervous system goes into overload, and we shut down. That would explain why your mind goes completely blank around potential sexual or romantic partners: your inner child is going “what if mommy doesn’t approve?”. She might be dead, but the impact lives on. If you want to talk about what you’re going through and what you could do about it, please drop me a line. Cheers, Graham
Msmimi · March 27, 2015 at 5:22 am
I agree that there should be some tangible steps to break free from controlling behavior. I think you outlined some important steps. I would add though that not every religious practice is centered on preventing individual freedom and as you outline this I ask that you consider being reflective of that.
Graham Stoney · March 28, 2015 at 11:45 am
Sure, religious practices that build your self-confidence, liberate you and help you self-actualize are great; those aren’t the ones I’m talking about here though.
Dragonfly · February 7, 2015 at 3:59 pm
Hi there Graham,
I can totally relate to what you are saying. My mom is a total control freak and cannot let anyone in this house do anything that is different from her own sets of rules. It was a struggle living with her for a quarter of my life but because I am very rebellious and fight hard for my freedom I consider myself lucky. I fall short from time to time, I fall hard and injure myself but I got up. Unfortunately, my siblings are more of mommy’s boy and girl and so they learn to play safe. Obeying to her every rules and needs and always staying in the comfort zone and staying by their fences, being afraid, worried and anxious. I don’t have such issues until I fall short and hard that her words starts coming into my head, her critical words like ”I told u so”, “you never listened”, “you idiot”, “you are inadequate”. That kept me stucked and ruminate about my problems and kept me in depression. Until one day, I met a man who came into my life doing the exact same thing my mom did to me, I finally came to awareness that how her behaviour could have such a huge impact in my selection of man. Indirectly, she had engrained her ideal of a person (herself) into me. After months into the relationship, my inner compass was a mess so is my brain. From there, I learn that I wasn’t happy because that man wasn’t what I wanted. The main point here is that Sometimes we arent aware of the impact of such control parents behaviour may affect us until we interact with people only then we realized. No matter what happens, may anyone fall short, got hurt really badly, forgive the person who brought you up in such a dysfunctional family (nobody can choose who their parents are), forgive yourself (learn to learn and accept your individuality) and establish healthy boundaries and healthy self confidence and self esteem. FYI, although the man that I mentioned is very controlling and critical, I know he is a loving and nice man. He just needs to know how to deal with his behaviour in such a way that he won’t hurt others and himself. I wish him well and pray he learns from his mistakes. Likewise, a controlling and critical parents are not mean people and I understand that they bring u more harm than good because of their behaviour. There is also a very useful way that you can live with them that is by practicing mental toughness. I hope anyone who faces the same situation as I am could be inspired and get some directions to the path of healing and thanks Graham for sharing such good insights. Cheers mate
Graham Stoney · February 9, 2015 at 2:01 pm
I’m totally with you! It is amazing how we unconsciously attract people who help us relive painful experiences (like a controlling parent); which either gives us more suffering, or an opportunity to heal by dealing with the issue so we can move on. You’re right that the people who wound us aren’t evil; they’re just damaged and dealing with that the best way they can. Fortunately we can choose to deal with it ourselves more productively. Cheers, Graham
Lee · January 27, 2015 at 10:31 pm
my mother never said not to date in High School but she behaved in every which way that didnt support it and hence I never dated in high school.. This carried into college and I hardly dated there. I would “get lucky” and make a girl my girlfriend immediately.
Now in my 40’s Im still struggling with how to behave with the opposite sex and really, people in general. I feel like I lost out on the opportunity to grow with my peers and hence, I feel like Ive been left behind in a lot of ways.
What can I do now to get over these internal struggles? I dont even know “how” to date in the sense of: What to do on a date. how to plan a date. what to expect on a date (currently I have no expectations and usually end up going home alone) What is a good number of dates to go on during the course of a week?
I have a good job, my own home, I live alone… I feel as is time is running out and I have no clue on how to “get into the game”
Graham Stoney · February 2, 2015 at 11:23 am
Hey Lee. Sounds like you’ve got a lot going for you, but you lack the experience of what to actually do on a date; and as a result, the confidence that you can pull it off. I recommend you get yourself some coaching. I have some time free, and can talk to you over Skype. Click here for details. Cheers, Graham
Todd Kelley · August 1, 2013 at 2:58 pm
The article was good except for the comments about religion. Many intelligent people believe in God who have also questioned their faith. The impression I got from the article is that religion is just a group of judgmental and controlling people, which, ironically, seems rather judgmental.
Graham Stoney · August 14, 2013 at 6:52 pm
Thanks for your comment Todd. I agree that many intelligent people believe in God, and that questioning what we have been taught is no guarantee that we’ll arrive at the truth that sets us free. Religious indoctrination cuts deep and often we can’t even see the full effects until we’ve recovered our sense of self. While there are also helpful teachings in every religion, the issue I’m focussed on here is the damaging way in which these teachings are often passed on to us and the healing required to recover. Cheers, Graham
Matt · May 16, 2015 at 9:51 am
I cannot think of an organized religion that is NOT based on preventing personal freedom.
GREAT comments Graham!
On this page I see a lot of people who have a problem with Graham’s comments on religion.
This is because they are compensating for the low self-esteem they have (thanks to religion/parents) by getting what Nathaniel Branden calls “pseudo self-esteem” from a religion that tells them they are chosen/loved/forgiven.
As a FORMER Bible-reading end-times Christian I can say from experience that what Nathaniel Branden describes in “Honoring the Self” and his final work “The Six Pillars Of Self Esteem” is SPOT ON.
Religion is pseudo self-esteem.
Religion is AN ESCAPE FROM REALITY (ESPECIALLY end-times obsession).
God is A FATHER FIGURE to substitute for lacking the confidence to know that “No matter what happens- I’ll handle it” (To steal a phrase from Dr. Robert Glover).
Religion IS control.
It always has been.
If people reading this who are using it as a psychological crutch (like I did) have a problem with your comments that is a personal problem for them to deal with- not your problem Graham!
Graham Stoney · May 24, 2015 at 10:14 pm
Thanks Matt, I think we’re on the same page and I understand that some people will find my views on religion confronting. I don’t really think it’s possible for a person to self-actualise without confronting the truth of our existence, and that means finding self-esteem within rather than externally. Ironically, there are many religious teachings that do point towards self-actualisation, but you need to have considerable discernment to separate the wheat from the chaff. Cheers, Graham
Jane · December 24, 2012 at 10:34 am
Both of my parents are controlling, but my Mother is beyond hope. I’ve spent over a year in therapy, in Codependents Anonymous, and yet I still feel like the crazy and fragile one whenever I’m with her. Seriously, I have no desire to be a parent because I had to take care of her for most of my life. Cutting her off was a huge shock to her system. That forced her to change, and oh she hated it. But I refused to explain myself, refused to reinforce her fishing for complaints. Refused to go along with my parents triangulating bullshit. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and it was done largely alone. At age 35 I have no desire to date, no career ambitions, but I am self-sufficient and certainly don’t need my Mother.
Graham Stoney · December 27, 2012 at 10:16 am
Hey Jane. Thanks for your comment. Recovery from a controlling parent can take time; let alone two controlling parents! Good on you for the work you’ve done so far. If you’re open to a little feedback, your lack of desire to date and lack of career ambition could be based on you rejecting your father’s energy, given how controlling he was. Seek to connect with healthy masculine energy in yourself, and in men you meet. Good luck! Graham.
Stella · April 19, 2012 at 9:40 pm
Hi,
My boyfriend’s situation is a little different, in the sense he does not see any control or abuse. He left a great job and moved across the country to be closer to his parents. They live 4 hours away and come to his place every month and stay 3 to 4 weeks. He calls them every day and talks to them in another room. When they come he’s not allowed out.. he doesnt see it that way he just says it’s not right to leave them. I see him one night a week when they are here and I can’t go to his place without an invitation from his mother. If we have vacation plans and they decide to visit he cant say no to them and we have to cancel. This past easter his mother came to stay in his/their apartment and wasnt in a good mood so I couldnt spend easter with them because he says its not right to leave them alone at easter. He’s destroyed several relationships because of this and he always says the other girls didnt understand his relationship. We spoke about moving in together and had some neighborhoods in mind. I then am told his parents chose something new for “all of them”. He says he doesnt agree with the idea that his house is not their house as well. I broke up with him because I realized that living with him would be hell and I wouldnt have any say.. for example I said that if we live together, his mother will have to smoke outside.. she’s a chain smoker.. he said no, we have to respect the way she lives. She also makes him move the tv out of the living room when she visits so I mentioned the fact that when we live together the tv will not be moved because it’s not her decision to make. he said no, we will have to live the way she wants. I find this very disturbing…
Stella · April 19, 2012 at 9:44 pm
He’s 39 years old btw…
Graham Stoney · April 21, 2012 at 10:33 am
Ouch! I get how disturbing it is living with a man who is still under his parent’s control, but won’t acknowledge it. If you’ve broken up with him, all I can say is: good call. Send him a link to this article, and move onto a guy who has grown up a little. Cheers, Graham
Andrea · April 13, 2012 at 11:46 pm
you can still enjoy her endearing traits if you learn how to manage the less desirable ones
Graham Stoney · April 16, 2012 at 9:53 am
Yes, that’s true Andrea.
Kareena Bhatt · April 9, 2012 at 5:52 am
So refreshing to read this !!
I was with a guy for 4 years, it ended about a month ago. Almost everything you have written, I have seen and experienced and recognized, but unfortunately, HE is in denial or too ashamed to accept fully. I am 31 now, and he is 33. Both his parents hold him accountable for smallest things, they call him multiple times daily, sometimes I can hear in his voice that he just wants be left alone but his mother would never stop talking. He had no qualms about telling me not to call him at work because he is too busy but he was always too affraid anywhere at anytime to not pick up her phone. I had noticed that he even turned off his phone whenever we would go out on dates(but he would make it seem like phone was out of battery) but I knew it was because he was avoiding their phone call so that he doesn’t have to answer why, when, where, what ?? !!! I’m Indian, He is African American, my culture being much more strict than his, I was stunned that he very openly asked me to move in with him, but was never able to tell his parents about it. In 4 years, his parents never tried to get to know me, talked to me or invited me over. I too call my parents daily but we talk about normal things. I couldn’t grasp the fact that someone could literally have something or someone to gossip about literally everyday for minutes and hours. In 4 years that we spent together, he never took me home, he never introduced his family to me even over the phone because it was obvious that he knew his mother wouldn’t accept me because I am not african american myself. I never voiced my opinion on this because I knew it would call for disaster but I wanted to be with a MAN OF HIS OWN OPINION. I hated that whenever we had arguments, she had to know all about it. She asked him personal intimate questions that I wonder if he realized that it isn’t appropriate. I don’t want his mother to know who says “I love you” the most and who sleeps where. Whenever we argue, he gives her the smallest details of everything. Eventhough I had NEVER talked to her, I felt like she was always in the room with us. Couple of times his mother called while we are intimate, and he even tried to pick up the phone — WTF !!!!
But sadly, he knew if he was to lie or cheat or hurt me in any way, he always had his mother’s backup. 4 weeks ago, we had a small fight about religious differences (which I knew was out of no where and there was some selfish act that he needed to accomplish by taking a freedom of few days from me)…..when he couldn’t make me angry enough, he put his parents on the phone and they all started talking about me as if I was not even in that room. His parents had no idea what our fight was about but I could hear their advice and I was just disgusted. 1 week later, he booked his ticket to go to his Frat party for 4 days, money that he said he didn’t have came up from nowhere. Bought I-phone and new cloths and shoes and flew to Texas to party because his parents said it was ok for him to do so. Mind you, this was suppose to be his tax return money that he was suppose to be buying my ring with – lol.
Glad to hear that some man recognize it, accept it and change it. But unfortunately, some of us get dragged into this mess where these men controlled by their mothers eat us up alive whenever convenient. She also has reversed her role very manipulatively. This 65+ year old woman put her husband’s business on the line and charged thousands of dollars on credit cards — if not paid her husband’s house and business could be taken anyday. So who ends up paying this mess ??? Ofcourse THE OBIDIENT SON. While he pays hundreds every month to her credit card bills, I waited for 4 years for a ring that he could never save any money for — Mind you, I had specifically told him, I am fine with a $5 ring but I think more than the money, it was the mother’s acceptance that he was waiting for and which he never got.
I wish his mother knew that because of her manipulative possession of him, her son has turned into a porn addict, hires prostitutes online and he rather live this bistandard life than stand up to her and let her know who he rather end up with. She tells him to take breaks from me, to leave me, and then directs him to who he should be with…I kept my mum for a long long time but their relationship has devastated me in every way possible. He complains about her to me but he never had any courage to stand up to her because she is the poor mother who has Arthritis, Hypertension, Big credit card debt and her husband never kept her happy….I’m sorry but are these really the reasons to control your child to where they have no thoughts and opinions of their own ???? Both my parents have several health issues but they want me to go out there and win the world so they can feel pride.
Trust means respect. If you don’t give that freedom to your children, you don’t respect them and you don’t believe in your own upbringing. You have made him promise that he must go to the church every sunday but what if he doesn’t want to ?? Your son pretends to be a Christian but yet he has his stash of porn and the bible you gifted on the same table. He is confused and lost but he keeps working hard to be accepted by his parents and feels no obligation to his future life partnar. She wants him to buy a house with a guest room separate from the house so she can stay with him forever but what if his wife is not so keen on this idea ?? Its almost like she doesn’t want him to get married, she wants him to fix what her husband supposably didn’t do for her but to me, thats just playing a part of victim to control him. They are 4 siblings, he is the only single one today since we broke up, and him being the oldest son, he is so controlled by her. She chose his career, she tells him he must work out daily, she tells him he must go to church every sunday, she tells him he must never move in with me, she tells him when he needs a break from me, she tells him where to invest his money, and I was just sick and tired of this. I had to run away. 4 years of pretending to be someone’s future wife when you know you are never going to be that person’s wife was enough !!!!! I’m drained, I’m tired and I’m sick of crying and fighting for my respect. If he hasn’t grown up at 33, there is no hope it seems. His mother is SO GOOD AT HER GAMES, no way I can compete with her and I don’t feel like wasting my time on this.
When we first met, we met overseas. He couldn’t afford to talk to her everyday, but I knew it from the beginning he was mama’s boy because after knowing him for 2 weeks, one day I decided to count how many times he says the word “MOMMY” in one day — That day it was 29 times !!!! And I even told him about it. God help me for spending 4 years with that..my ears started to bleed………last time when I heard,
“Mommy, I am so sorry I never told you how sad I have been. Mommy, I do’nt want to raise your blood pressure but I can’t be in this relationship anymore”…….I could have puked……..DRAM QUEEN……..!!!!!!!!!!!!!
He told me I was CONTROLLING and I almost wanted to laugh every time. It was almost like his frustration with his mother’s behavior was being taken out on me. Even the simplest question like “when will you be home” annoyed his so much that he literally would scream to where entire block could hear him. But he quietly yet annoyed answered questions after questions of his mother. I felt bad for him at times, but then I realized that if I pitty him, once again I don’t respect him. And its hard to respect someone when you know they have no opinion of their own. They have no judgement of their own. They have no future goals and plans and dreams of their own, and if they do, they don’t have the courage to display or to work on them. I could feel his suffocation but I couldn’t deal with the fact that he never made an attempt to break the walls and let loose even just for one day. As a woman all we want is to feel that our men can protect us, cherish us, love and respect and there is nothing wrong with loving and respecting your parents but you must give that space to the one you claim to love. If I am willing to give you that place that was held by my father for all these years, then you better make it worth it. Because unfortunately, we all know that one day our parents willl no longer be around and thats when all we have is each other. You must learn to let the woman feel like she is the part of the family….because as I told him, this emotional poison ruins everythng now and in the future. Because even when I forgive him today, I will never forget that I had no space of my own !!!!
Graham Stoney · April 9, 2012 at 9:27 am
Hey Kareena. I hear just how frustrating being in a relationship with a boy-man who is still under his mother’s control must be. No wonder you’re so angry with him. Another side I didn’t mention in the article is that the controlled man’s anger at his mother gets displaced onto someone else because being angry with mommy feel too terrifying to contemplate. Often the hapless victim is the man’s partner, who ends up getting poor treatment because all his unresolved hostility towards his mother comes out in your relationship instead. Sorry you had to go through this; I hope what you’ve learned will make it easier to avoid these guys in the future. Glad you found the article helpful. Cheers, Graham
Daphne · February 13, 2015 at 9:11 am
I am sorry, but he is not your partner. You are being pushed in the child/mother role. I hope you can break free and heal. How devastating to date a child! I have had controlling parents (and more than that) and of course that has influenced me and my choices. My father is out of the picture and my mother now understands that I am no fool, and most certainly not hers. Here are the facts, take it or leave it is my attitude to her. Now that she’s very old, she depends on me and seems to understand that a) she has nobody else and b) I don’t f her around.
April S. · March 31, 2012 at 10:47 pm
I am hoping that someone will give me some insight as to whether or not I fit in the “controlling” mom category, because I have an adult son that swears I am and whom I feel is deliberately sabatoging my relationship with his younger brother, with whom I have had an exemplary relationship with for most of his young life (he is 16 now). Unlike my relationship with my adult son which has not been so great, as when he was 25, I insisted that he either go back to school (he got kicked out of college) or move out of our home and get a job and support himself finally (he had a girlfriend that came over frequently and they would lay in bed all day and I did not want that influencing his baby brother ~ as they are 16 years apart) and he has held a grudge over that ever since then (8 years ago.) My adult son is very passive aggressive and does things just for spite quite frequently.
Over the past two years he has given his younger brother weed, multiple weed pipes, introduced him to strippers when he was 13, that gave my teen lap dances. I have witnesses that say that they saw my adult son blow weed in my younger son’s face multiple times before he ever reached his teens. I am furious that no one ever bothered to tell me until now.
My adult son was arrested twice for growing weed and I got him out the first time, but left him in jail for almost three months the second time and he has never forgiven me for that either.
So last year my adult son’s wife asked me if she could come get my teen to take him to get snow cones. He was 15 at that time and although I had pretty much always allowed him to go places with her before these incidents, after the last event which involved court, expulsion from school and the placement in an alternative school for 7 weeks, I had started becoming less lenient with both her and my adult son, so I said “No”.
Then after an hour of begging and pleading from both her and my teen, I gave in and asked my daughter in law to call me immediately when she arrived to pick him up so I would know what time he left home. That day, she drove him to a motel, gave him something called “Purple Chronic” and tried to seduce him. My teen son overdosed and ended up in the emergency room. NO ONE called me. The doctors had to wait until my son revived so they could get my number from him. As soon as I got to the emergency room, my adult son and his wife ran off without a word.
CPS got involved (she told them that I dropped my son off at that hotel with her) and a long arduous ordeal began then with me debating whether or not to file charges against her and alienate my adult son altogether, as well as have my younger son have to testify in court against her, or to try to get everyone in counseling and try to hold my family together. During this period, I was struggling to pay all our bills in this pitiful economy, dealing with health issues and handling it all alone (single mom).
In lieu of filing charges against my daughter in law, I basically blackmailed them into paying for my teen son’s counseling and a promise that she too, would seek counseling (she admitted that she was sexually abused as a girl).
Immediately after this, my teen son’s grades started dropping, he started missing and skipping classes and chronically over sleeping. And I was so overwrought with all that had happened and all that was still not resolved (my adult son is in complete denial that things happened the way my teen says they did, and the wife denied remembering what happened) that I did not notice a lot of VERY red flags. We started arguing and fighting over every thing. I started being hyper critical and complaining constantly about stupid little stuff. I had OCD as a younger woman and although I have learned how to cope with it to some degree, when I am stressed out I go into a cleaning frenzy and exhaust myself and then nit pic when things get messy again. To say that I was stressed out from everything is putting it mildly. I got my teen in counseling, but I did not have insurance for myself, so even though he was being treated, I was not. I felt like I had been in a war, suffering from PTSS with no one to turn to. And my behavior became almost manic, fearful for his safety every time he walked out the door. I began to self medicate with wine almost every night after my teen went to bed because I could not sleep without worrying that he was sneaking out a window or getting high on something that might harm him. Everything was suspect, from cleaning products in aerosol cans to anything that might remotely resemble a pipe… and I continuously checked in on him, sometimes (many times actually) without knocking on his door. Eventually, my teen just ran away. If he came back he would just take off a few days or weeks later and ALWAYS seemed to end up at his adult brother s automotive shop. But my adult son would continuously lie to me about knowing where he was, so I would stay up for days without eating and make myself sick with worry until I would just drive over there to find my teen there. Then my adult son would ALWAYS say…. “Oh, he just got here.” But many friends of my teen would tell me that he had ALWAYS been there the whole time.
Each time I begged him to come back home and agreed that I was perhaps not handling things appropriately, but each time he came home he became more and more defiant and sometimes even cussing around me and posting a lot of crap of Facebook. Some of it was true and some of it was not, but all of it was very hurtful to me. He also started sneaking out at night and leaving our home doors and windows unlocked and in some instances even slightly ajar in multiple areas while I was sleeping. He admitted that he was smoking more weed and when he was here, he refused to come out of his room much except to grab something to eat or go to the bathroom. Checking up on him (he was still only 15) I caught him sexting (about 12 times) and finally took away his IPAD ~ only to catch him with it again a few days later (he snuck in my room and got it) I got so angry at him that I told him I could not trust him anymore and I took the door off his room. I have done this before when he brought weed in our home and I found it in his room or caught him hanging out of a window smoking it and had explained to him that in order for him to have privacy, he had to earn my trust back. He says I went to far. That no mother should remove their 16 year old son’s bedroom door.
I say he broke my trust over and over and over and over again until I lost it. He says I am too controlling because I want to know where he is (he has ran away again and is living in the back of my adult son’s shop, where my adult son and his wife ~ yes the one who tried to seduce my teen and overdosed him ~ live with two other tech’s) because he can smoke weed now and hang out with motor heads and go to the drift races and car races and meet other “cool” people.
I love both my son’s, but I am only still legally responsible for the 16 year old. Yet the 32 year old son is passive agressive and ADHD and says I am too strict and controlling and that is why he ran away. Please bear in mind that every instance where my adult son gave him drugs or pipes or even the overdose incident, neither he nor his wife EVER STEPPED forward and offered to take responsibility for my teens legal fee’s, court costs, transportation back and forth to alternative school or even so much as gave him some support by showing up at court for him. I got stuck with it ALL. And now they are who he wants to live with.
I have cried myself a river of tears and I am now alone in a 4/2/2 home with two dogs, one that belongs to my teen that he maybe comes to see twice a week. He seems so different and he tells me not to worry…wow…really? We are in counseling once a week but I think it may be too little, too late.
My adult son gave him a “job” at his shop doing oil changes and grunt work for about $2 an hour / 12 hours a day. My teen has quit going to school at all now and is talking about just getting his GED, like his brother. I feel like my adult son is angry over what happened with his wife and his brother, and may be taking it out on his baby brother by passive/agressively working him so hard that he can barely keep his head up when he gets off from working there with him and he is very touchy and grumpy because he is so tired. But my youngest looks up to him and needs a strong male role model in his life now at 16 and thinks my oldest can do no wrong ~ and I believe my oldest is just taking advantage of my teen’s niavete’ as there is a lot of sibling rivalry and jealousy and my oldest son has admitted to it many times before.
I have tried using threats to inform the commercial building owner where my son’s shop is that he has 5 people living in the back which is against all city ordinances, to no avail. My adult son says he has tried to get my teen to come home (I do not believe this as he has never ever supported me as a parent to my teen and has expressed jealousy over his baby brother numerous times) but if they evict him, he will be homeless and jobless and then I will have to live with that guilt. If I don’t do something soon, my youngest son’s life may very well be on the line and I will have to deal with that guilt too.
I am so tried of walking this thin line between what is best for my teen and what is best for my adult son. I now wish that I would never have “bargained” with them as far as counseling was concerned and just filed the charges. Maybe then they would not have continuously interfered in my parenting of my younger son. I am still considering it even now as the statute of limitations has not run out and I have the police report, the toxicology report and witnesses, so my youngest might not even have to testify.
Suffice it to say that I am at my wit’s end. My youngest tells me that it is time to let him go and let him grow up. But he is truant, exhausted, failing to complete his drivers license course, failing school, failing to complete his community service and the drug awareness class all while my oldest son allows him to “work” at his auto shop all day and party every night.
So please, please read this story and someone tell me if I am too controlling or just a concerned and desperate mother. Because I am so tired of all the guilt and worry and tears. I only wanted my youngest to finish school before moving on. And before he overdosed, he was very well on track, great grades, lots of friends, a fun kid to be around and the light of my life. Now I feel like I almost do not know him anymore. And I am beyond heartbroken. He recently threatened me by saying if I did not “back off” and let him live his life that I would lose “another son”. Something that my oldest son loves to say in the singular when he wants to hurt me and something I used to allow myself to be manipulated by. But I am tired of that and this time I told them that I was not going to lose another son ~ that THEY were going to lose a mother.
So tell me…..controlling…concerned…. or just plain crazy??
Graham Stoney · April 6, 2012 at 10:46 am
Wow April, it sounds like a really difficult situation for you and I feel rather inadequate to give advice as I don’t have children of my own. Your sons sound like a real handful and I hear that you really love them and are doing the best you can with very limited support. What springs to my mind goes back to control being about anxiety, and learning to deal with your anxiety while allowing your sons to make the mistakes they need to make to learn the lessons they need to learn. I can only imagine how heartbreaking this must be for a mother to see her sons making destructive mistakes, but sometimes this seems to be the only way we really learn. It would also be great to find some positive male role models in their lives, as boys need a man to push up against so they can learn about other people’s boundaries. I get that this isn’t easy as a single mom and you might be able to find a mentor by contacting a group like The Mankind Project. Mostly though, I think you need to start looking after yourself more independent of what’s going on with your sons; I’ve found Acceptance and Commitment Therapy helpful in dealing with my own anxiety and learning to let go more. I really hope things improve for you. Cheers, Graham
April S. · April 6, 2012 at 11:59 am
Thanks for the suggestions Graham. I actually made sure that my teen had a “Big Brother” from a mentoring program here locally since he was 10 years old. But he has turned his back on him too, saying he is too “old school.”
I will look into this program you suggested. I think at this point though, that you are right. I need to start looking after myself and not allowing their issues to consume my every waking moment. I am paying attention to my reactions and responses to them so I will recognize any triggers and instead of the “knee jerk” reaction I normally have, I am taking time to breathe and collect my thoughts and observe myself so that I do not continue to perpetuate this cycle. Then I am responding firmly, but cool headed without any demands, just statements of fact. I feel I am making headway with my teen, but none with my adult son. Perhaps the issues are too deeply ingrained for him and me….I do not know. I can only work on me and make every effort to be the best person I can be personally, and pray that time will heal that relationship.
I will aslo mention the Acceptance and Committment therapy to our counselor and see what she says…
Thanks for your kind words. Much appreciated.
Cut McFeely · March 25, 2012 at 4:41 pm
Are you for real with this noise? Some of us remain “stoic” because any slight evidence of emotion invites Mummy’s invasive lunge like a lonely, perverted shark who smells blood. Lots of rape victims are stoic, too. . .you gonna paint them with that clueless brush of yours?
Graham Stoney · March 26, 2012 at 11:07 am
I’m not suggesting you should be emotionally vulnerable in the face of a mother who continues to be abusive and controlling; that’s why I recommend taking time out and cutting the emotional ties to a controlling mother. The problem is taking that stoic defense that was necessary for protection from our mother into other relationships where it compromises our ability to relate to other people. Healing the trauma allows you to drop the stoicism and be emotionally free. I’m a little uncomfortable with you comparing this to a rape victim but if the trauma of their experience remains unhealed, it’s likely to affect their ability to experience intimate relationships too. Cheers, Graham
Daphne · February 13, 2015 at 9:15 am
I understand you, weakness makes the controlling even worse. Whether for real or the “little voices” in your head. Controlling people are on the look out for prey. Having said this, if you can, find a safe place where you can relaese a bit of the anger and hurt. You’re a human not a robot.
Christina in NY · March 23, 2012 at 1:17 pm
I just found this article and I am pretty much losing patience with my controlling parents more and more these days. I am an adult woman that turned 30 this year and has been looking for a job for over 10 months. The problem with my situation is my parents think, because I am dependant on them for shelter and food (I pay my student loan bills and medical insurance payments myself), they should tell me what to do and that I should absolutely listen to them. I am engaged to a very emotionally healthy man who, like you describe in your article, has grown up and doesn’t have the same controlling situation with his parents. Whenever I bring up that I am going to visit him, my mother explodes emotionally. She tells me I’m sabotaging my job search, who will take care of them/make dinner when I’m away (I cook and clean for them while I live at home), I’m rejecting my parents, my fiance is telling me what to say to them, and, my favorite, they paid for my college education and they’re not going to let me destroy my future by joining in a relationship with “that person”.
Every time I call them while I am away from home visiting my fiance, I always get the guilt trip about how miserable my mother was running a business by herself, how she and my dad are too tired to cook at night, and that my fiance and I should live apart for a year or two while we pursue different careers (also meaning no visiting). And I’m a spoiled brat for wanting to get away and perhaps do something enjoyable with him while I’m away from home (like visit a museum or visit a new city).
I really haven’t learned how to enjoy anything, I always feel like perhaps I’m missing a call from my mother or she will berate me for wanting to experience life. Always, she will tell me that doing anything I find enjoyable, like watch movies, read books for pleasure, travel, or crafts, are wastes of time and for “stupid people who depend on others for entertainment”. I wish I was lightly paraphrasing what she actually said, but that’s exactly what she has told me in the past. My fiance can see how tense I get when we go out on a little excursion, like I want to go home early or I’m jumpy. I honestly don’t feel like I can enjoy life because she’s constantly trying to drag me down emotionally into the dumps she inhabits. She’s dissatisfied with the way my father just quit his job after a nervous breakdown and has refused to work even 10 years later. She thinks that all men are like this and she constantly tries to tell me that she sees some of these negative qualities in my future husband. In our early days, she did everything to make me dump him and she even threatened to kick me out of the house during my senior year of college and not help me pay for tuition. She never made good on those threats, but I feel that she has damaged my perceptions of my relationship, though, not enough to make me call anything off. I just feel that she’s tainted it. I don’t want to feel guilty for being happy.
I have never been to counseling for this problem, part of it being she has always instilled in me that counselors and therapists make you hate your mother. After reading your article, I think I may have to figure out a way to get counseling for my situation.
Graham Stoney · March 23, 2012 at 1:48 pm
Hey Christina, thanks for sharing your story. With all these controlling mother stories, I’m starting to think that maybe my mother isn’t so bad after all! But like yours, my mother has disdain for counseling and I think fears my judgement of her just as much as she judges me. The underlying problem is that counseling and therapy expose the intense emotional pain that the controlling person is trying to avoid: that’s probably the real reason she doesn’t want you to go. Facing your pain may cause her to feel hers. Pretty selfish really. But you deserve to be free, and to be happy. I think your line “I don’t want to feel guilty for being happy” pretty much sums it up. When you become free and happy, it’s going to trigger your mother’s pain so unfortunately you can’t always expect her to support what is best for you. It’s all part of the growing-up process for both you and your mother. Good luck! Graham
Daphne · February 13, 2015 at 9:21 am
Is your name Christina or Housekeeper? Sure you need to help out, but being jerked around is something different. You have no income or not enough, so now you’re game and hunting season is open. They shoud be interested in whether your fiancee is caring and loving, without sticking their noses where it doesn’t belong. They sound to me as if they see you as a liability instead of an asset.
I guess that your childhood must have been rough. So you’re already “prepped” to feel anxious and to obey. I hope you will find your own place soon and that a caring therapist will guid you to become an adult, something that your parents don’t seem to want you to be.
IamDetermined · March 17, 2012 at 12:48 pm
Graham, great article. I just exited a relationship with a 32 year old guy cannot really call him a man. We were together for 7 months, 6 months happy or so I thought. I am 45 and divorced. His parents didn’t approve of my age and marital status. We moved in together into his place (I’ve never lived with anyone outside of marriage)around the 5th month and were planning to marry. His mother did everything in her power to divide us and she succeeded by rallying the entire family against me and our relationship. We were planning our wedding. Little did I know they were planning a coo and they ambushed him – broke him – he has never gone against his parents wishes and he said he he wasn’t sure if he was ready to marry and needed time to think about things – I thought it best that I move out – to give him time to think and now he has turned his back on me, and now refuses to speak to me. I discovered this week that he has an active profile on match.com active for over 3 weeks. Something inside me prompted me to check. I was sick to my stomach and decided to just walk away permanently. Placed my stuff into storage and I have no apt yet – sleeping on a friends couch. At 32 he still allows his mother to navigate his life and now relationships. I was angry but now I just feel sorry for him. Until he realizes it’s his life and not hers – he will never be happy in any relationship that she choses for him.
Graham Stoney · March 18, 2012 at 8:06 am
Sounds like bad news for him, but a close save for you. If a man hasn’t grown up enough to detach from his mother, I can’t see this changing magically just because he marries. Whenever mum still has emotional control over him, she’ll be the one pulling the strings; and I can only imagine how crazy this would have sent you. Well done for trusting your intuition. Your last sentence pretty much sums it up. Cheers, Graham
Graham Stoney · March 13, 2012 at 11:43 am
I have no doubt that my parents do love each other to the best of their abilities; they just don’t communicate their feelings very well. I did try “gaming” my parents one night by teasing and neg’ing them and was amazed how well it worked. Felt pretty weird to me, but they really dropped their guards and were actually fun to hang out with for a change. After initially looking to my father for advice, I’ve now been slowly educating him on being a man. I am lucky he’s still around. Cheers, Graham
Matt · March 11, 2012 at 11:12 am
I wouldn’t say my mother was controlling to the point that some mother’s obviously are but the part you wrote about controlling through anxiety certainly makes a LOT of sense when it’s layed out in front of me like that.
There are now a handful of childhood moments where I now reflect on and think ‘ahhh – that makes sense’ when I consider that her actions and words were coming from a place of anxiety verses anger.
Nick of time · March 2, 2012 at 2:23 pm
This really is a big eye opener. Again, my mother dominant, father passive aggressive, I have lived with an underlying pain I was reluctant to process. I decided, about 2 months ago, to see a therapist to confront some anger, anxiety issues I have been having. I was not aware of the direction of my anger. I assumed, maybe myself, for making mistakes, not following through on promises to self, failure to mature as much as I and others would of liked, even though I am happily married, have a good job and a majority of the trimmings that go with it.
The therapist focused in on my childhood and parental relations right from the get go and a few home truths came upto the surface. It is amazing how much stuff I have been bottling up for this long. I feel on one hand; relieved to say the least, like a weight has been lifted off, like I no longer have to validate them to recieve love in return (more specifically i have no desire to). I feel on the other hand, ungrateful. Afterall no one’s perfect, they have raised me up to be a decent human being, fed, clothed, helped me achieve my career goals through financial support.
They are not bad people but I will not defend or absorb their immaturity’s any more.
I am dissapointed, angry, upset and in a land of ambiguity half the time. That being said, I feel proud of myself for doing something good for me.
To cut a long story short, I have alot of thoughts going through my head right now, but ultimately I’m glad I read your posts on here. You have the clarity and leadership I dream of myself one day, and good for you. I will stay tuned. Any useful tips for a guy just starting down this path would be truly appreciated.
Graham Stoney · March 4, 2012 at 11:33 am
Hey Nick. Sounds like you’re on the right track; my only tip would be to keep doing what you’re doing and allow the feelings to come up without getting stuck on those thoughts that make our head spin. My experience of emotional healing is that it takes time. Initially a lot of feelings come up in one hit and then over time you get to go deeper into more subtle areas. It’s amazing how much our unacknowledged feelings drive our behavior. The work you’re doing will profoundly benefit your wife and any children you have now or in the future. Always be true to yourself and your emotions. Great work! Cheers, Graham
YouGotToBeKidding · February 28, 2012 at 4:50 pm
Graham,
I just finished reading through a few of the articles and “Graham’s Story” and felt very connected to the experiences you describe.
However there are major differences (such as your financial and academic success) and, as the old saying goes, the devil is in the details. If there is one thing I have come to believe is that the mental jiu-jitsu our divergent (the self-confident man and the scared man-child) selves are always finding a very reasonable explanation to justify our beliefs, either positive or negative.
Like others here I have a controlling, emotionally abusive mother that, if pressed for time, I would simply describe as sociopathic.
However, unlike many of the other posters here, I have, during my late teen years and early adulthood-hood, distanced myself both physically and (I thought) emotionally. But that separation came at a cost of a lack of continuity in my life; both from personal and professional perspectives. From my state of mind I interpret my 20s and early/mid 30s as a constant distraction and misdirection from what I believe to be a pathological fear of ANY kind of commitment -professional, emotional, etc. I am in a state of permanent impermanence and, 10 years ago, re-entered my mother’s life in the belief that the financial help (rent free in exchange for work around the house and rental properties and sharing the house with roommates that would cover the mortgage and utilities) would help me catch up in my educational and professional development. I was 33.
Now I am turning 45 and consider myself underemployed and over-educated (I have 2 BS degrees and am under way on a Masters Degree, and make enough to have a new $20K car, a $5K motorcycle, a few toys, travel yearly and not have any debts -but I do not feel fulfilled at all and have no social life outside of my travels to see friends I made in my teens and 20s). I live with my mother and rationalize the fact in very cogent ways. However, what I don’t express to others (but I do to my mother, go figure…) is that this is due to this pathological fear of being responsible for my life and this extremely profound and all-encompassing lass of self-worth. Read the entry for “Avoidant Personality Disorder” on Wikipedia, it explains it to a “T”.
Guilt, shame, insecurity are all part of the equation and I am utterly unable to differentiate what is part of me and what is part of my mother in me.
To add to my fears (I believe I will end up in a homeless shelter or committed to a mental institution eventually), when I try to talk to her about inheritance there is a cloud hanging over the conversation – you see, all my childhood I heard “I pay for your food, clothing and school, you owe me respect” and “Paying for things is the only way I know how to show love”-. Yet, now, when I try to speak about it I am constantly denied information, unless there is a fight about how much I contribute financially to the house (I pay commercial rent rates, more than my “split” on utilities and do a lot of work around the properties) and hear threats of “forget about any inheritance” and “you are so selfish. I had to raise you and pay for everything myself “.
I guess that this is also where I let people know that my father left her when I was 1 month old, my first stepfather left her and her current husband also left her, all with the same complaint about her being “full of anger”.
Well, after this expansive setup, my questions really boils down to these points:
– How can one change basic beliefs about themselves and the universe if the “belief mechanism” is failed? To me it seems that it’s like trying to operate on your own damaged brain.
– How to free yourself from the influence when that influence extends to things you have no control and which seem paramount to your future well-being? I dream of winning the lottery and being able to never have to speak to her again. Yet I do not believe that I have, on my own, the capacity to be self-sufficient without severely committing (to a home, location, job, etc.) or diminishing my quality of life (and all the end-of-the-world scenarios those thought bring about). How does one become free of an abusive relationship when you are (for real or not) dependent on that relationship?
– No person is an island unto themselves. I believe we define ourselves largely by others reactions to us (or our interpretation of others reactions). How does one free oneself from the “mother filter” we have developed?
-If it wasn’t clear, this is a rant, but I do appreciate any responses I get to it!
Graham Stoney · March 4, 2012 at 11:20 am
Thanks for the question; I can see how painful this situation is for you. I think it’s time for you to cut the apron strings with your mother. As you point out, merely being physically separated doesn’t break the emotional attachment; but I think it can help. The first step is to become financially independent of her. If you have no track record of successful commitment, it’s no wonder you’re fearful of it. You’re just following in the footsteps modeled by your father & step-fathers. You need some separation from this situation so you can learn to be a man, and part of that is being self-sufficient. Wishing for a lottery win or inheritance is boy thinking. As a man, you don’t need them.
You’re right that this process is like doing brain surgery on yourself, and the key ingredient is to take action to work towards having a life that you love, one small step at a time. Start small by finding a job you think you’ll enjoy doing. Get your own place. Get a partner who meets the intimacy needs you’re currently seeking from your mother. Get some therapy. Get some supportive male friends who will listen to how you feel, but not to your bullshit. Get a life of your own that you love living and your mother issues will slowly fade into obscurity. Get some guidance. Get my book. Learn to express how you really feel. Take action every day towards this new dream, and watch your confidence and happiness grow.
Start making small commitments. Start by committing to yourself. You’re only afraid of committing because people have pushed you to commit to things you didn’t want. Start doing the things you want to do, and forget about what your mother thinks. You’ll learn to love it over time. Good luck!
YouGotToBeKidding · March 6, 2012 at 3:38 pm
Graham,
I just “re-found” my bookmark of your site and was pleasantly surprised to see you reply.
Paraphrasing Tony Robbins: “We all know what to do. Humans can do a lot, but what we will do is completely different”. Quoting Morpheus: “I can only show you the door, but you are the one that has to walk through it”
One only has to watch an episode of “Hoarders”, “Addiction” or “Celebrity Rehab” to see how damaging one can be against oneself. Those people -and myself, of course- are like bad characters in a horror movie, constantly running into the forest or the abandoned house to investigate what the blood-curling noise is. And we are also our own audience,screaming at ourselves “why the F are you going there without the guns/cross/backup?!”
It is hard to know what action to take. I know I am not the man I would like to be when my choices are based on “what would be less dangerous/risky/damaging?”.
When I feel good about myself I always make choices based on “would this be a good thing, a story to pass on? Would I be proud if someone close to me did this?”
But it is hard to trust your own thinking; that old “self-administered brain surgery” dilemma and all… I believe the totality of the human experience can be summarized into 3 facets, in order of one’s ability to control or influence them:
1 – Actions
2 – Thoughts
3 – Emotions
Anyone can see the inter-connectivity of this tripod and how it relates to you [very good] advice.
I need more audience to my own horror story. Either that or start living a better script.
Again, I apologize for using your site as a journal. I hope that my own experience can add some value to the wonderful content you have created.
Graham Stoney · March 6, 2012 at 10:53 pm
I believe Tony is referring to a 4th facet: our intuition; which is buried underneath our emotions. I sense that like many of us, you’re over-analysing and that’s a way of keeping us stuck in our head and away from our painful feelings. If you could think your way out of this, you’d have done it by now. The important thing is to allow yourself to feel: both your joy and your pain. This is the key not only to healing the past, but also to accessing your intuition about the future. I’m happy to discuss more; this would make a great topic on the forums. Cheers, Graham
Daphne · February 13, 2015 at 9:32 am
Leave! Run for the hills! She paid for your clothes and food? WOW! Noble prize runner up! I figured, now I am 43, that I only need one good friend: myself. I have the brains and the determination.
You sound like you have a good head on your shoulders; use it to heal yourself with the help of a therapist who cares. If you need psychiatric help, take it. There is no shame in needing pills. I know 🙂 You can only take as much and then…snap. Take action before you would end up in a looney bin.
So can’t you really afford a place of your own? Maybe with trustworthy roommates?
Steve R · February 1, 2012 at 5:13 pm
John, I just got off the phone with my mother who was berating me because I had not responded in a timely fashion to an email, which made her ashamed and disappointed. I went to my computer and looked up “how to deal with a controlling mother”. Your article looked interesting so I began to read it, and as I did my eyes opened up as if you were speaking directly to me! I would love to speak with her about these things, and also with my father, but her defense is locked down tight: she is a psychologist of many years, and would just discredit anything I had to say. She also insists that my father would not want to talk to me about anything on an emotional level (he really doesn’t like to be dragged in between us), and therefore I shouldn’t bother. I also run the risk of making her angry, which is VERY easy to do, and then I worry that I’m hurting her. Just writing this really exposes to myself the psychological mire I exist in… Advice?
Graham Stoney · February 4, 2012 at 11:07 am
Hi Steve. Awesome question; I had a similar thing happen to me recently. Our relationships with our mothers can have a huge influence over us. My reply was too long for a comment, so I wrote this article for you on How to Handle an Argument with Your Mother. Let me know what you think. Cheers, Graham
Daphne · February 13, 2015 at 9:40 am
For all I care she is the Queen of Sheba 🙂 Was the email important? How long did it take you to answer? Was it so important that she needed to tell you through the phone what a jerk you were for not answering in time.
Do you still have a curvy?
My mother, years ago when I was about 30, thought that when she called me in the evening I needed to answer. That I had worked and was hungry was not important. Now I am talking about unimportant calls, just her wanting attention. When I told her that first I wanted to eat and thenw e could talk, she blew a fuse. She thought I was her lady in waiting.
Now I am 43 and I don’t take this kind of crap anymore. The fact that she depends on me must be the reason she’s not so apeshit crazy anymore. She also has a therpaist which I forced on her for many years now, maybe that does some good. Even though that woman called me when I had no contact with my mother. I could have gotten her license removed as this is a sin. A therapist is NOT allowed to call people whose therapist he/she isn’t. She wanted me to understand that my mother really loved me. When I proceeded to tell her a few things that she had done to me, she become quite silent. This person is an enabler and my suffering didn’t mean much to her. Then again I wasn’t paying her “therapay” bills…
Dennis Teel · September 26, 2011 at 12:27 pm
interesting article.the section regarding religion however seems like it was a personal attack . i became a christian..bible believing,yes in heaven and hell and so on..had nothing to do with my parents however/.i firmly believe in heaven and hell and yeah,in jesus,etc..i was sold pretty much by what the article says but the personal attack on religion made me wonder if you’re one of these people that believes kids in church =brainwashing parents.that’s an extreme accusation if that’s the case.
Graham Stoney · September 26, 2011 at 1:19 pm
Thanks for the comment, I appreciate your feedback. If my opinion felt like a personal attack, then it sounds like there’s an insecurity there for you to explore. Which is a good thing, because identifying our insecurities allows us to deal with them. Insecurity and fear dramatically undermine self-confidence. One of the problems with the Christian beliefs in heaven and hell is that they’re a way of avoiding the primal fear of death and it’s absolute finality. Of course Christianity isn’t alone in this; almost all major religions have this shortcoming. Avoiding our deepest fears is ultimately counterproductive because we never really get to deal with them and the subconscious impact they have on our self-confidence. We are all brainwashed as children by parents, society, religions, etc; just as our parents were. The journey of building confidence is about getting back to our true core selves and living with greater authenticity. Great to hear from you!
Nicki · August 6, 2011 at 3:54 am
Hi John, I’m a married adult woman in her early 30s with a super controlling family (mom, elder sister and dad (although now to a lesser degree). As the middle child, I’ve grown up trying to be perfect and keep everyone’s feelings intact and please everyone, while they have shredded my heart to bits. I’m quite confident in my non-familiar life (work, lots of friends, activities, travel etc.) but when it comes to my own family, I feel trapped. Through my husband’s support, I’ve been speaking out a lot more and trying not to bottle my feelings, even though the guilt factor – the wanting to be better, to take the high road (sans high horse), the setting myself up to higher standards is killing me. Just wanted to say I learnt a lot from your post, so thank you for writing it. I’m going to be reading the bits I’ve highlighted freq
Graham Stoney · August 6, 2011 at 7:47 pm
Thanks Nicki, glad you found it helpful. I can certainly relate to feeling trapped in my family. You might also relate to the post Forget About What Your Family Thinks Of You.
Nicki · August 7, 2011 at 3:22 am
Hi Graham,
Thanks for the post. I found it really helpful, specially “My family don’t really seem interested in getting to know me at a deeper level. When they ask me what I’ve been up to, their inquiry never seems to go very deep; it’s always kept quite superficial.” That is so true of my parents, particularly my mother! Whereas, to keep them entertained, informed and “off my back” over the years I had involved them in my life, introduced them to my friends and their parents (where feasible), I realized they really didn’t care very much. My father is far more interested than my mother, but even then more in the non-emotional stuff. I studied economics and so we talk about politics, economics, religion etc. more than about emotional stuff, although over the years we’ve started to talk about feelings. But he’s an old fashioned “life is tough, get over it” kind of man.
I have done things differently over the years to create distance because I realize as much as I love them, my family is toxic for me. But it’s still hard to let go of the guilt I feel (and am also made to feel sometimes) regarding how much more I could do for them. I’ve stopped getting dragged into their fights but my two sisters (older/ younger) are at different points in their journey, so some entanglement is inevitable, considering I’m the only child in the same country (and within 10 minutes drive too).
Anyway, long story short, you’re absolutely right. I have to stop seeking validation from them, and also start to have realistic – not sky high – expectations of myself. I’m only human and I can’t be perfect all the time. This need to be perfect all the time, at the expenses of my own feelings and taking all their crap, comes from the family’s attitude “there is no room for failure”. While I have been able to understand the damage that philosophy does, it’s tough when it’s been ingrained in you since infancy.
Graham Stoney · August 7, 2011 at 10:26 am
I’m totally with you Nikki; we’re on a similar journey. The guilt and perfectionism stem from the childhood feeling that if we can just be good enough, our parents will love us. The truth is that our parents loved us regardless, but they just weren’t able to communicate that in a way that we could feel as a kid because they were unable to express emotion and love is an emotion. No amount of being good was ever going to change that. You might also find this article on overcoming perfectionism helpful. You’re on the right track!
doctor steve · June 11, 2011 at 11:26 am
this is one of the most accurate descriptions I have ever read. I am not a real doctor, its just a nickname, but I have suffered all my life from a dominant mother passive father family. I substituted my name and life into most of these categories and it fit. not quite all of them to a ” T ” but close enough to be scarily right. amazing stuff.
John · March 22, 2011 at 4:58 am
I am an adult male in his mid 30’s who is dealing with a very controlling and critical mother. I have been completely financially independent of my parents since my early 20’s, and do not have any children. I have one sister who has two children. My mother is critical of my weight, anything I purchase, clothing, house, anything!! I have tried to take over some of the family holidays to make things easier on my mother, but the tension when she comes over to my house is unbearable at times. My mother is also very critical of my sister and her family.
The most recent event occurred at my fathers birthday party several weeks ago. To celebrate paying off a large amount of student loan debt in full, I purchased something special for myself. I didn’t even mention the purchase to my mother, but she noticed it that evening (an expensive ring) She started critiquing it immediately!! She was even muttering under her breath, as she ran into her bedroom at one point!!
My mom sent me an apology email the next morning, but I sent a response saying that I was tired of the nonsense, and that we needed to talk about her put downs and controlling behavior. She has not responded as of yet, nor will my father get involved. My sister said my Mom came down on her about something this past weekend, but did not mention anything about me.
I don’t understand why I constantly need or want her approval at this point in my life. In the last year or so, I have put some distance between myself and my parents, but it really hurts that I can’t have a good relationship with them at this point in my life. My Mom controls many of the family gatherings, so when I am at odds with her, I don’t see the rest of the family.
Any input?
Graham Stoney · March 22, 2011 at 12:24 pm
Hey John,
I feel your pain! There’s something uniquely strong about the mother/son relationship which becomes really painful when mother won’t let go. Your mother is probably playing out some old emotional wound of her own which makes it difficult for her to detach from you. Her criticism is just another way to control you so you won’t abandon her. It’s self-defeating and infantile on her part, and it has a huge effect on you. Those emotional ties can be damn hard to sever when your mother is unwilling to transition from an adult/child relationship to an adult/adult one. Most likely you’ve been wounded in the past by her criticism too, leaving a part of you feeling that you need to please her at all costs; hence your emotional response. However, I get the sense that you’re actually on the right track here.
The way out is to keep attacking the problem on all levels: do whatever you can to heal the emotional wounds that keep you stuck trying to please her, learn to detach from her emotional drama so that you aren’t triggered by it as easily, develop your communication and relationship skills with other women so you can transition to healthier relationships with feminine energy, and allow yourself to feel and express the anger you feel towards her for the way she has treated you. In short: learn to stand up to her. I deal with these in more detail in the Confident Man e-book Steps 12, 8, 16, and Skill 2 respectively.
Women of all ages put men to the test all the time. In a sense, your mother is just testing you, waiting until you can learn to pass the test. The secret to passing the test is to stop being fazed by it. Laugh off her next criticism, or throw it back at her playfully. I recently realised that the things my mother criticises my father (and myself) for are the very things that make a man masculine, powerful and attractive. Nowadays when she criticises something I do or something I wear, I know I’m actually on the right track. The irony is that once you learn to pass the test, women stop throwing them at you so much: If you learn to stand up to her criticism and not get upset by it, she may stop sending it your way. Another book I highly recommend that talks about this dynamic between men and women is The Way of The Superior Man by David Deida. It’s a definite must-read for all 21st century men!
You’re on the right track… Don’t give up!
Daphne · February 13, 2015 at 9:45 am
My input: give her something to complain about 🙂 Tell her about your new ventures as a crack dealer and that you will move to Colombia with 3 whores. Maybe she would approve of that?
Abnaxus · June 17, 2015 at 2:57 am
These mothers wreck daughters too. I totally relate to the childish behavior. My dad offered to get me much needed furnishings for my first dwelling. Including a large bed. My mom had a fit because she wanted me to get a smaller bed, claiming ‘what if the rooms are too small for a full size bed’. So here I was 8 months pregnant, and she thought a twin bed is what I deserved. She had a fit, probably tears, and pouted that SHE wanted to be the one to help me. When she finally left, my dad said, ‘it’s really because she doesn’t want room for anyone else to fit in my bed’ lol. But yeah, it wasn’t freakin funny then.
Even though this site is for men, I’ll look for help anywhere! I also want to avoid becoming that to my son. I went the opposite way. I let my son follow his passions and get to know himself. Now that he’s a teen, he does have trouble with hearing NO or not getting his way when he’s manipulative (there is likely NPD on both sides of the family and I worry big time for my son). I really pushed him about a sport he wanted to play. I made him go to the summer clinic. It turned out he is lashing out because of shyness, anxiety over crowds and social situations. Once he saw kids that he knew, he was ok. After the first 2 days, he is excited and thinking about adding another sport! I think the hardest thing for me up til now is knowing when to enforce or push when you know it will help your kid. His shyness held him back from trying out his freshmen year…but now he seems so happy after only 2 days of practice!
I don’t know why I need to feel approval….even though I gave that up. I’m into drawing/music/animals. I got mocked and derided for ‘choosing’ creativity over ‘real’ career interests. I never got support or guidance. I was just told to go to college and make money. I tried but all things led back to music and drawing. I’m also solitary, where mom is a shopper and church goer. I was forced to go. I don’t have any beliefs, but this church is an oppressive, legalistic, non-tolerant type. So of course, I wouldn’t have anything to talk about with her, like sexuality and religion or politics. I tell her I KNOW how you feel about that ALREADY! But she’ll still have fits. She loved Robin Roberts on ABC until she came out. Lots of the people she liked on tv came out, lol. I won’t even go there about what I think about THAT pattern!
I’ve had to tell myself to let go of this idea of making a certain amount of money before my mom dies…..so she can see what I can accomplish. Now I tell myself, she’d never be truly happy anyway. I’m still not straight enough, not religious, and still into that ‘weird’ music. I have my own purpose and passion in life. So do you. That deserves more of your attention. Moms that do this are hurting us, but don’t see or care enough to stop. Distance helped me, but I think I will end up moving a little further next time. Like to a rural area or Canada.
I feel the same. I feel it hurts that I can’t just be who I am and relate to my mom. We only relate to parenting kids, but I even do that differently and have had to protect mine from intrusion and dominance. I’ve had lots of angry dreams, esp when I would feel suffocated and manipulated by the overbearing behavior.
The longer people engage in a behavior, the harder it is to change. My mom still tells me what to say when I’m calling a company! Like I’m 11 years old! I called her on it, and she still does it! I always felt living in the same city was NOT an escape at all. Setting boundaries helped me a lot. (Leave anti-gay crap outside because I won’t have you upsetting me in my home!). But I feel I will have to move again. I need hours of solitude and concentration (hence the sign on my door for appointments/deliveries ONLY – which my mom occasionally ignores). I’m thinking rural next time . Or maybe even another state.
A lot of these moms have NPD. Some are just insecure and doing what their insecure parent did. It all has the same bad effects. These people are physically, mentally, and emotionally draining! I always felt years fell off my life because of the unnecessary drama. I felt like I lost out on so many opportunities because of the interference of these personality types (because I was controlled, my only relationships were controlling people hurting me – I’m liking the single life because there’s no controllers).
Now I see my second chance in life because of technology! The more you become ONE with your passion/purpose (I feel the 2 are linked), the stronger you get. The stronger you get, the more happy you will feel. The more happy you feel, the less others can affect you. You will eventually be able to say, This is YOUR problem, mom…please get help for it or we can just have less contact.
The one thing you really have going for you is that you’ve been financially independent since your 20s. That’s great! In the late 80s to 90s, I was stuck with ‘women wages’ and always had to have roommates to make ends meet. That really sucks when you long to live alone!
Good luck John! I’m still in the process of dealing (since I’m stuck in the same sub for a bit). The one thing that helped me was knowing what I wanted to do with my life. I just didn’t have the tools and resources. I don’t know where I’d be with out the internet. When you have a disabled child, your employment is very limited (depending on the severity). Now I can be my own boss!! I think working for myself is helping me figure a lot of my problems out! I hope you find your way. Good luck, all!