Isn't the point of the argument, though, to also have humanity and sympathy for yourself?

If altruism is the only argument in favor of seeing your family, doesn't that actually prove the opposite?

Incidentally, hello!

Also, test.

Those html tags wont work, you gotta use the forum tags [ and ] instead of < and >. Just FYI.

And, welcome!

Dyl;

Weird. Works for me; test test. Same!

Zebra;

On the other hand, this period ended. xina no longer screams at the doorbell. And, surprising to me, it does appear that nearly everyone who asks firmly to be let alone is let alone.

I do not understand the 'in her head' distinction. Kindly explain further.

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burns so many bridges;

This is something that really gets me. Why is it that "I'd like to be left alone for a while" is greeted with such hostility? Why aren't I free to be alone if I want or feel I need to?

Basically, if my family invites me over, why can't I say 'no' just because I'm not in the mood?

I say explicitly to all my friends that if I propose something, and they don't want to, they should tell me no straight up. No justification needed, because I can safely assume they will want to, just not right now.

Incidentally, somewhere between my family and school, my emotions have become all but dead. I'm fairly sure I am one of those exceptions, which colours my perception. On the other hand, sharing my emotion's deadness are both my parents. And no, I don't miss them.

[quote: "Alan"] On the other hand, this period ended. xina no longer screams at the doorbell. And, surprising to me, it does appear that nearly everyone who asks firmly to be let alone is let alone. [/quote]

Oh--I missed this---and therefore I may have completely misunderstood what you were saying above.

"Xina no longer screams at the doorbell" OK-- but it was really not too long ago that she and Stef "had to" *hide* in their house...

But in any case I'd say that she has successfully completed the process of installing Stef in her mind as a part-self . (And I would think Stef required this kind of total monogamy and attachment ( thou shalt have no other gods..) to the exclusion of all others..friends, family, pets?

Doesn't it seem strange that a self-described "family therapist" is the sycophant of someone who believes that all families are corrupt, evil, and that all children should leave their families (or words to that effect)

Thanks for your replies, everyone. I'll try to get to them in the next few posts.

defoodDad wrote:

Now, since you knew what you were planning, is there anything they could have said that would have satisfied you to not de-foo?

I might not have been clear, but I wasn't planning to end the relationship the night we had our final discussion. It had degraded pretty significantly over the previous few months, but I didn't think that night was going to be the end.

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Do you quit a job that easily? How about your friends?

I have many ex-friends. I've never quit a job because I thought I was being mistreated, but I have quit sports teams and other social organizations because I felt mistreated.

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I just truly can not understand how a person can be so intolerant of diversity.

I'm not sure where you get this. The people in my life come from a wide variety of backgrounds and vary in terms of personality, politics, religion, etc. I just don't like to spend time with people who I don't like.

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I get a feeling the word "abuse" is a way overused word, like "hero" in the news these days. Were you abused or a child that did not get everything you wanted? I mean that not as a direct question to you, just want to understand de-foo.

I agree, and I never used the word "abuse" in terms of how I was treated, though I did use it to refer to how my sister was sometimes treated. I certainly didn't get everything I wanted, but that's an unreal standard to hold my parents to. I think I explained the general reasons I had in the OP.

RE your later post: I understand that you can't imagine yourself not being in relationship with your parents or your children, but I think you're conflating your feelings with universals. I also think there's a difference between saving someone's life and having dinner once a month with them. The demands and strains of being in a relationship with people you don't like are infinitely higher than those of dragging someone out of a burning car.

QuestEon, thanks for sharing that story. I'm glad your parents were able to patch things back up, and that it resulted in real change for them. I certainly understand why you have the view you do, and it's generally good advice. One thing Molyneux does is underplay the potential value of the healthy adult child-parent relationship.

QuestEon wrote:

The first question I wanted to ask you (DP) as I read this is very basic--is there any part of you that still loves your parents? Then I thought, no, here's a better way of asking: Is there any part of you that still wants to love your parents? If that desire is there, but the relationship is sick (by that I mean in the sense of "ill,") do either you or your parents have the tools to help it get well on your own? Would it be worth the effort to acquire them?

Part of me really wants to have parents to love, but I really don't want to be in a relationship with mine, if that makes sense. I think if they did what I suggested in the OP, maybe with a therapist to help them, I would be willing to try it again. But from the reports I'm getting from my siblings, that's not happening, and it's not because they don't have the resources for therapy or contemplation. I should add that I spent several months seeing a therapist since the defoo as well.