July 19. 2023
... and just how often do difficult people change, anyway???
My mother never changed, that's for sure. If anything, she just got worse.
Once upon a time, I went on a fact-finding mission. My mother had just done something very disturbing, something that made me think she didn't have a very firm grip on reality at all. One of the things I heard was that the reason she no longer went to the church she and my stepfather dragged me to all through high school was she got in a beef on some committee and they considered her a troublemaker and asked her to leave.
I was never able to independently verify that, so I don't know if it's true. But, spying on her Facebook (before she took it down again in some sort of snit), she herself writes about being in some chat and being repeatedly placed on time out because some twenty people were complaining about how she acted. So ... there may have been some truth to the church story. Just saying.
My mother is eighty this year. She will never change.
So, what do I do? I grow up and get attached to some other person who seems to be in a great deal of pain, yet will never change. You can't be addicted to who someone could be if they could just change. You just have to accept that they will never change and decide what you want to do in relationship to that ... which appears to be what this person has done in relationship to his own difficult person, who also refuses to change.
(When you back down every single time and give that person everything they want, with no consequences for how they're treating you, ever ... Why should they change? They don't fucking have to!)
This person's decision is, "I just can't handle what I'd have to go through if I leave this person, so I guess I just have to sit here."
Sit here doing what? Well, as of eight years ago, at least, he'd sit there going, "I'm no good, I'm no good. Nobody will ever love me. I'm repulsive to women. I'm unlovable, boo-boo-boo-boo, hoo, hoo."
So somebody comes along who loves him and what does he do? Go right back to the same old shit.
This is very sad, because someone DID come along who loved this person and it didn't make one whit of difference. I loved my mother and would have done anything to meet her halfway if she'd only have had a lightbulb go off and elected to apply herself in therapy and at least TRY to get well ... but that is asking too much of someone as sick as she is. All I could really do is run for my life.
I guess that's all I can really do here, as well.
Because behind sitting alone, hanging one's head in one's room like a sad little eight-old boy whose mommy won't stop drinking, hide a lot of behaviors that are problematic in relationship.
Someone who sits there taking all the blame for everything, "I'm no good, I'm no good," isn't realizing that it isn't their fault Mommy won't stop drinking. Mommy is an alcoholic and that has nothing to do with him. Similarly, Wife was raised in childhood emotional neglect and perhaps a bit of emotional abuse thrown in and the way she is has nothing to do with him. Nonetheless, she's been given a heads-up it is miserable to live with and had eight years to look at what in her prevents her from emotionally connecting to her husband ... and decided it's too difficult to deal with.
So, like my mother, she's going to continue being difficult.
Similarly, low self-worth also creates a person who may be difficult to live with. Such a person is afraid to venture forth and say what's really on their mind. Afraid to probe and find out what's on someone else's mind. So the other person goes along thinking they're happy until suddenly--BLOOIE!! Meanwhile the person who's got their head down, putting themselves down and afraid to talk, has no idea what the other person is thinking and just has to guess why they do whatever they do that reinforces his low self-worth. Which is easy to do, because they put themselves down chronically no matter what anyway.
If by some miracle I ended up with this person, I would now be on the receiving end of this behavior, which would make a relationship difficult.
The only hope for people is deciding to change. But both these folks have had eight years, and I see no sign of that.
I’m not much for change, either. I'm not much of a social butterfly, so gadding about "meeting new people!" isn't my idea of fun. It's never been anything but a waste of time in the recent past. I don't want to do anything other than write, and that's never going to be a career, so I've had to adjust my sights waywaywaywayway down. And that's never a good feeling. Nonetheless, I just have to make myself happy with what is. I've learned that expecting anything, especially anything too dramatic, just leads to unhappiness in the end.
My problem is that I don't see much ahead, and life isn't very fulfilling for me, so I have way too much time to go on wishing things were different.
But they aren't going to be, because, as we know, difficult people never change. All this was was a dream that will never come true. I've spent my whole life dreaming pie-in-the-sky dreams that will never come true, and I need to accept life the way it is and stop.
So, oh well.
All that said, I understand why. I understand this person doesn't have a mean bone in his body and would never intentionally hurt anyone. I understand the problem is we're all hurting ourselves, every one of us. Nobody meant to hurt anyone, and everyone is only doing the best they're able to right now.
I understand that this person thinks all relationships end up the same, all women are the same, it will only go bad anyway, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Thing is, anybody who's read me this long knows me. They know how hard I work. I used to have to say this to my late husband all the time, "I'm not your first wife." But, you know, if a person can't trust and have faith and listen to their intuition, that's them and I can't do anything about that. I just have to go on alone and that’s it. And I’m sad about that, but oh, well. When it’s time to give up, it’s time to give up. I can’t do any more, here.
And I get that.
And I'll always love you.