This is a very important conversation to have. I know someone who’s mom had them because she was lonely. To this day she relies heavily on her and her youngest daughter for emotional support because the husband is per usual emotionally absent and treats her like an appliance
My 19 year old son has been more mature than his father since middle school. He lives at home while going to college as he does not want to accrue unnecessary debt. He’s a decent roommate. My retired-early, lives-in-the-basement-spouse isn’t. I find navigating the shift challenging and am curious how folks have addressed similar situations.
Really good advice in this article. I agree that a mother who stays will be left with two terrible choices: to either dump her emotions on her children or normalize his behavior by not responding. My mother oscillated between the two for years and years.
In both cases, the kids end up becoming parentified, because they are wired to try to compensate for emotional imbalances to try to please their parents, which is extremely distressing. My mother used me as a personal therapist and cried and emotionally dumped on me for years and treated me like her confidante best friend, then when I begged her to leave my sexually abusive stepfather and tried to share my difficult emotions about his impact on me that she witnessed and allowed, she didn’t have time for me. Was too busy trying to make things better for my younger brothers.
The manbaby has got to go literally RIGHT NOW, the work that mothers have to do tiptoeing around their fragile egos is fucking exhausting and outrageous. Fuck these dudes and the futile efforts we have to go through to “make things work.”
I have had a much better marriage than any of my mother’s absurdly toxic and dangerous relationships, but even my marriage with a “nice guy” has had abusive elements, and I’m moving into a new place this week.
Leaving is one of the most effective disruptions we can make to this fucked up status quo, and I fully agree with Zawn that it’s one of the last political powers we have left.
It’s a lonely road. Often waking up to abuse from one person means waking up to abusive systems, so not only does husband gotta go, but also my mother (who obviously aligns with my husband to avoid accountability for her own damaging behavior), and all the siblings and extended family members who have benefited from not having to be the scapegoat and rally around the abusers.
Men who act like this are often groomed by and widely supported by toxic systems, so leaving him will likely mean leaving A SYSTEM with several enablers too, and it’s going to be tricky to do this in a way that doesn’t negatively affect the children, who will still want and need to be in relationship with some of these folks, including him.
But the respite provided by a mother going her own way goes a long way. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no way to completely shield our children from some level of disappointment and we can’t control others’ behaviors, but at least we can show them how to live authentically by distancing and/or removing ourselves from environments that force us to make ourselves smaller.
I appreciate the divorce statistics articles and this forum. In some senses, I feel more supported by complete strangers here than many of the people I know, thanks y’all! 🙌🏽🙏🏽
I appreciated this response, Zawn, as I have repeatedly wondered how much to share with my kids.
I highly recommend trying the strategy you mentioned of talking aloud to your kids about your thought process while parenting. I call this "breaking the fourth parenting wall" and I have also gotten feedback from my kids now that they're older that they LOVE it. They say it makes them feel included in the decision-making and that we are equals. (I have struggled some with my now-teenager who will definitely try to convince me that the thing I'm worried about is definitely NOT actually dangerous or scary though lol, so I might need to up my game 😉). It can often defuse a tense situation. I have also shared things like "I don't like feeling ignored, could you please listen for a minute," or "I feel frustrated that you guys have been fighting a lot today, what can we do" in a way that is never like "you MADE me feel this way." It is a fine line but I have found it useful for them to understand my inner world a bit in a way that is boundaried (I am never expecting them to fix my feelings).
And I have constantly struggled with how much to tell them about my spouse, who sometimes doesn't treat them or me how he should. I think your "two eventual options" are exactly right. I can tell them "an adult should never speak to you that way" or "it isn't right that daddy took his anger about X out on us", BUT for me I can feel the question in the air of "well then why are you not doing something about it, why are you in this relationship, why would you be with someone who talks to you in a way a loving person shouldn't?" I don't want to model that for them and it is the worst.
This is a very important conversation to have. I know someone who’s mom had them because she was lonely. To this day she relies heavily on her and her youngest daughter for emotional support because the husband is per usual emotionally absent and treats her like an appliance
My 19 year old son has been more mature than his father since middle school. He lives at home while going to college as he does not want to accrue unnecessary debt. He’s a decent roommate. My retired-early, lives-in-the-basement-spouse isn’t. I find navigating the shift challenging and am curious how folks have addressed similar situations.
This is such a cogent response to the question. Sending love to this momma.
Really good advice in this article. I agree that a mother who stays will be left with two terrible choices: to either dump her emotions on her children or normalize his behavior by not responding. My mother oscillated between the two for years and years.
In both cases, the kids end up becoming parentified, because they are wired to try to compensate for emotional imbalances to try to please their parents, which is extremely distressing. My mother used me as a personal therapist and cried and emotionally dumped on me for years and treated me like her confidante best friend, then when I begged her to leave my sexually abusive stepfather and tried to share my difficult emotions about his impact on me that she witnessed and allowed, she didn’t have time for me. Was too busy trying to make things better for my younger brothers.
The manbaby has got to go literally RIGHT NOW, the work that mothers have to do tiptoeing around their fragile egos is fucking exhausting and outrageous. Fuck these dudes and the futile efforts we have to go through to “make things work.”
I have had a much better marriage than any of my mother’s absurdly toxic and dangerous relationships, but even my marriage with a “nice guy” has had abusive elements, and I’m moving into a new place this week.
Leaving is one of the most effective disruptions we can make to this fucked up status quo, and I fully agree with Zawn that it’s one of the last political powers we have left.
It’s a lonely road. Often waking up to abuse from one person means waking up to abusive systems, so not only does husband gotta go, but also my mother (who obviously aligns with my husband to avoid accountability for her own damaging behavior), and all the siblings and extended family members who have benefited from not having to be the scapegoat and rally around the abusers.
Men who act like this are often groomed by and widely supported by toxic systems, so leaving him will likely mean leaving A SYSTEM with several enablers too, and it’s going to be tricky to do this in a way that doesn’t negatively affect the children, who will still want and need to be in relationship with some of these folks, including him.
But the respite provided by a mother going her own way goes a long way. As far as I’m concerned, there’s no way to completely shield our children from some level of disappointment and we can’t control others’ behaviors, but at least we can show them how to live authentically by distancing and/or removing ourselves from environments that force us to make ourselves smaller.
I appreciate the divorce statistics articles and this forum. In some senses, I feel more supported by complete strangers here than many of the people I know, thanks y’all! 🙌🏽🙏🏽
I appreciated this response, Zawn, as I have repeatedly wondered how much to share with my kids.
I highly recommend trying the strategy you mentioned of talking aloud to your kids about your thought process while parenting. I call this "breaking the fourth parenting wall" and I have also gotten feedback from my kids now that they're older that they LOVE it. They say it makes them feel included in the decision-making and that we are equals. (I have struggled some with my now-teenager who will definitely try to convince me that the thing I'm worried about is definitely NOT actually dangerous or scary though lol, so I might need to up my game 😉). It can often defuse a tense situation. I have also shared things like "I don't like feeling ignored, could you please listen for a minute," or "I feel frustrated that you guys have been fighting a lot today, what can we do" in a way that is never like "you MADE me feel this way." It is a fine line but I have found it useful for them to understand my inner world a bit in a way that is boundaried (I am never expecting them to fix my feelings).
And I have constantly struggled with how much to tell them about my spouse, who sometimes doesn't treat them or me how he should. I think your "two eventual options" are exactly right. I can tell them "an adult should never speak to you that way" or "it isn't right that daddy took his anger about X out on us", BUT for me I can feel the question in the air of "well then why are you not doing something about it, why are you in this relationship, why would you be with someone who talks to you in a way a loving person shouldn't?" I don't want to model that for them and it is the worst.