Sigh... got into argument/ fight cos I accidentally said my thoughts out loud to someone I dislike

[Ecdysis]

Ahhh grrrrrr goddamnit...!

I got into a fight with someone who I've been trying hard to be totally "neutral" with for ages...

It's someone I dislike and normally would avoid for sure.

I don't want to talk about the actual details of the situation, but let's just say it's comparable to this: Say I have a kid in elementary school and in class they sit next to their best mate in the class and I'm happy they're friends cos both of them are nice kids and you can tell their friendship is valuable to them... But the other kids mother.... Well, she grates on my nerves something terrible and she annoys me and just everything she says and does would normally make me steer clear of her for miles... But cos her kid is my kid's friend, I tryyyyyyyyy to be polite and friendly and helpful... and I reeeeeally try to not let on how much I dislike her, so that it doesn't affect the kids' friendship.

So, this situation has been going on for about 2 years and everytime I'm around her I bite my tongue soooo much and always make sure to take deeeep breaths and my mantra is just "be polite be polite be polite be polite"... and keep smiiiiiiiiiiiiling

Sigh....

So recently we got entangled in a discussion about an important issue that affects our kids... There have been like a million other conversations where she's said things that I think are totally preposterous, nuts, offensive, ignorant, selfish and a whole host of similar adjectives that I'm just going to spare listing here...

Yesterday our discussion got a bit... I dunno... energised? frustrating? circular? And this afternoon the issue got out of hand and I burst out saying how ridiculous and stupid I found what she was saying.

Sigh.... Double sigh... Tripple sigh...

She was really surprised because usually I'm just like "Uh huh, sure, that sounds interesting" or just try to change the subject when she says something particularly dumb. So she really didn't see it coming that I was reaching the end of my tether and was just ranted at her: "Oh my God for f*ck's sake can you stop repeating this bullshit this crap is just f*cking unbelievable and I'm sick of it!"

Grrrrr.... I'm so in two minds about this... If it were just us adults, I'd have said this to her ages ago and just been like "Stop wasting my time and grating on my nerves, I've no patience for this" and been done with it. (PTSD makes some of us very good at just plain cutting off negative acquaintances, friendships and relationships and just plain moving on).

But... I feel like I can't afford for this situation to turn shitty cos of the kids... That feels like such a crap outcome.

So, obviously I can just go back to pretending that things are fiiiiiine and just faking a smile whenever I'm at a loss of words for how to respond to some mindf*cked crap she's babbling.

But... it's always been a pretty tough act to pull off convincingly and I think from now on she's going to be weighing my words to see whether I'm being nice or whether I'm pissed off and getting a headache from being around her. I feel like my acting skills are not THAT good.

Ugh.... ugh... ughhhhhh....

I've been really hard on myself the last couple of hours along the lines of WHY WHY WHY COULDN'T I JUST KEEP MY DUMB MOUTH SHUT?!?!?

But honestly, I've been doing that flawlessly for 2 years and have listened to so, so, so much garbage and have just been thinking "do it for the kids, do it for the kids..." and honestly, I'm surprised I've managed to do this for a whole 2 years... I remember thinking initially that I wouldn't even be able to be pretend-friendly for a month, let alone a year, let alone 2 years...

So I guess I need to go easier on myself... ugh... But I still feel like "I ruined this for my kid by being too dumb to shut my stupid mouth"

I don't know how to go forward with this... Our kids have a play date scheduled for tomorrow afternoon and seeing her is gonna be so freaking awkward.

Sigh...

I think part of the problem is that she's pretty lonely cos she has no friends (and my personal opion is that well that's no f*cking wonder cos she's unbearable) and so she's always like "Awwww our kids are best friends, so we are basically best friends too, right...?!"

My brain is like "Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!" when she says that but my mouth is like "Uh, yah, isn't it great how our kids are such good friends, that's so nice for us" and hoping that qualifies as a randomly "nice" reply...

Right now my brain is like OMG can she just go away and can my kid puh-leeeeeze find another friend instead?!?!

I feel like I have to make this dumb situation "work out" somehow tho for the sake of my kid.

I think I need to start coming up with some fake apologies for stuff I don't feel sorry for at all.

Like "Sorry I was so short-tempered yesterday - I didn't get much sleep cos I was stressed cos my father in law got hospitalised last night and I was frazzled from trying to organise all that stuff and I just lost my patience. I'm really sorry, if I was rude..."

Which is actually true... except the whole truth would be "I was short-tempered yesterday because of some stressors I had going on and so I forgot to pretend to be polite and forgot to bite my toungue and I accidently said my thoughts out loud and uhhhhhhhh can we pretend that was just like a freak accident and you know, let's just not talk about things that make my brain explode in future, ha ha ha..."

And then hope that'll be enough to awkwardly smooth things over and hope our kids don't notice that things are weird...?

 

[No More]

I was totally going to come in here and cheer you on from the title, like yeah girl, you tell ‘em!

And then I was like ah, I see why the situation complicates things.

No advice, other than if she pretends it never happened - run with it And some swift and blunt changes of subject required in the future when she starts on the itchy topics.

 

[Ecdysis]

Talked to some friends about this and I feel a bit calmer about it now... and also thoroughly exhausted... and super annoyed that I let myself get tangled up in this and have wasted energy on it.

I think part of the problem is that I feel sorry for her. I don't like her, but I feel sorry for her. So because I feel zero affection towards her, I try to over-compensate by being kind in other ways, to make up for the unkindess of disliking her so much.

It's my brain's crappy go-to solution, to try and fix a situation that's basically f*cked up.

If there were no kids involved, it'd be a no brainer as to how to make this dysfunctional situation stop being such a mess. Just cut interactions down to a bare minimum and invest zero time and energy into this stupid dynamic.

As things are with kids involved, I'm going to have to find some other work-around.

But I can't dislike her and then help her with things because I feel pity for her. Pity is a really invalidating sentiment. It's deeply disrespectful. And I'm in no way "helping" her by doing things out of pity, even if it seems that way in the moment.... If I say "yes" to something she's asking, when I actually want to say a resounding no... It seems like I'm saying yes to be kind, but saying yes out of pity is a shitty role both for me and for her.

I also feel really, really sorry for her kid. Ugh... I just think what a nightmare it must be for him to have a mother like that...

Coming from a background of childhood trauma and dysfunctional families and emotional abuse and neglect... I can so easily imagine what it must be like for him to have that kind of home and family situation.

Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh....!

I also hate that my kid is subjected to her behaviour, even if it's only relatively minor exposure to it.

I think I have to "zoom out" and instead of focussing on the details of what happened and what was said and what annoys me... And instead think about what roles I want us to have. What do I want my role to be? What role do I want her to be in? And then basically "delete" the muddled crap that's happened over the last 2 years and start with a clean slate and then be clear about sticking to my role and refusing to deviate from that.

 

[Ecdysis]

I was totally going to come in here and cheer you on from the title, like yeah girl, you tell ‘em!

And then I was like ah, I see why the situation complicates things.

No advice, other than if she pretends it never happened - run with it And some swift and blunt changes of subject required in the future when she starts on the itchy topics.

Heh

Well, you made me laugh about it for the first time, so that's pretty cool - thank you for that. Laughter and humour is so valuable especially in challenging situations.

I'm making some progress on how to think in a more solution-oriented way, instead of catastrophising my faux-pas.

I guess what happened today was a "Freudian slip" - I said something honest, without meaning to.

Often those situations are intensely uncomfortable and embarrassing, but kind of healthy too because a truth that's been left unspoken for too long "accidentally" is put into the light of day for everyone to see and to cringe about.

She left a semi-apologetic WhatsApp message earlier that I'm choosing not to reply to tonight... I'm gonna leave it til the morning and then try to genuinely say something akin to "Look, sorry, that was stupid, we both said things we didn't mean that way - let's focus on what's important and that's our kids - and let's just steer clear of difficult subjects in future"

Or something like that...

Annnnnnnd a penny has just dropped... Kaching...!

I was a "parentified" child... So in the role of being a "parent" to my inept, dysfunctional (childish) parents...

This has (always) led to a tendency for me to see other people that are similarly inept, stupid and dysfunctional as "needing help" and "unable to cope", just like my parents.

Which then sets off my skillset of helping/ supporting (ie. enabling) such people.

Which is me repeating the parentified trauma patterns of my childhood.

Problem identified

Now to find a solution to stop this dynamic. Which is gonna be harder cos unfortunately it's the habit of a life time and repeating trauma is a difficult compulsion to stop.

 

[caroline_13]

Ahhh grrrrrr goddamnit...!

I got into a fight with someone who I've been trying hard to be totally "neutral" with for ages...

It's someone I dislike and normally would avoid for sure.

I don't want to talk about the actual details of the situation, but let's just say it's comparable to this: Say I have a kid in elementary school and in class they sit next to their best mate in the class and I'm happy they're friends cos both of them are nice kids and you can tell their friendship is valuable to them... But the other kids mother.... Well, she grates on my nerves something terrible and she annoys me and just everything she says and does would normally make me steer clear of her for miles... But cos her kid is my kid's friend, I tryyyyyyyyy to be polite and friendly and helpful... and I reeeeeally try to not let on how much I dislike her, so that it doesn't affect the kids' friendship.

So, this situation has been going on for about 2 years and everytime I'm around her I bite my tongue soooo much and always make sure to take deeeep breaths and my mantra is just "be polite be polite be polite be polite"... and keep smiiiiiiiiiiiiling

Sigh....

So recently we got entangled in a discussion about an important issue that affects our kids... There have been like a million other conversations where she's said things that I think are totally preposterous, nuts, offensive, ignorant, selfish and a whole host of similar adjectives that I'm just going to spare listing here...

Yesterday our discussion got a bit... I dunno... energised? frustrating? circular? And this afternoon the issue got out of hand and I burst out saying how ridiculous and stupid I found what she was saying.

Sigh.... Double sigh... Tripple sigh...

She was really surprised because usually I'm just like "Uh huh, sure, that sounds interesting" or just try to change the subject when she says something particularly dumb. So she really didn't see it coming that I was reaching the end of my tether and was just ranted at her: "Oh my God for f*ck's sake can you stop repeating this bullshit this crap is just f*cking unbelievable and I'm sick of it!"

Grrrrr.... I'm so in two minds about this... If it were just us adults, I'd have said this to her ages ago and just been like "Stop wasting my time and grating on my nerves, I've no patience for this" and been done with it. (PTSD makes some of us very good at just plain cutting off negative acquaintances, friendships and relationships and just plain moving on).

But... I feel like I can't afford for this situation to turn shitty cos of the kids... That feels like such a crap outcome.

So, obviously I can just go back to pretending that things are fiiiiiine and just faking a smile whenever I'm at a loss of words for how to respond to some mindf*cked crap she's babbling.

But... it's always been a pretty tough act to pull off convincingly and I think from now on she's going to be weighing my words to see whether I'm being nice or whether I'm pissed off and getting a headache from being around her. I feel like my acting skills are not THAT good.

Ugh.... ugh... ughhhhhh....

I've been really hard on myself the last couple of hours along the lines of WHY WHY WHY COULDN'T I JUST KEEP MY DUMB MOUTH SHUT?!?!?

But honestly, I've been doing that flawlessly for 2 years and have listened to so, so, so much garbage and have just been thinking "do it for the kids, do it for the kids..." and honestly, I'm surprised I've managed to do this for a whole 2 years... I remember thinking initially that I wouldn't even be able to be pretend-friendly for a month, let alone a year, let alone 2 years...

So I guess I need to go easier on myself... ugh... But I still feel like "I ruined this for my kid by being too dumb to shut my stupid mouth"

I don't know how to go forward with this... Our kids have a play date scheduled for tomorrow afternoon and seeing her is gonna be so freaking awkward.

Sigh...

I think part of the problem is that she's pretty lonely cos she has no friends (and my personal opion is that well that's no f*cking wonder cos she's unbearable) and so she's always like "Awwww our kids are best friends, so we are basically best friends too, right...?!"

My brain is like "Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!" when she says that but my mouth is like "Uh, yah, isn't it great how our kids are such good friends, that's so nice for us" and hoping that qualifies as a randomly "nice" reply...

Right now my brain is like OMG can she just go away and can my kid puh-leeeeeze find another friend instead?!?!

I feel like I have to make this dumb situation "work out" somehow tho for the sake of my kid.

I think I need to start coming up with some fake apologies for stuff I don't feel sorry for at all.

Like "Sorry I was so short-tempered yesterday - I didn't get much sleep cos I was stressed cos my father in law got hospitalised last night and I was frazzled from trying to organise all that stuff and I just lost my patience. I'm really sorry, if I was rude..."

Which is actually true... except the whole truth would be "I was short-tempered yesterday because of some stressors I had going on and so I forgot to pretend to be polite and forgot to bite my toungue and I accidently said my thoughts out loud and uhhhhhhhh can we pretend that was just like a freak accident and you know, let's just not talk about things that make my brain explode in future, ha ha ha..."

And then hope that'll be enough to awkwardly smooth things over and hope our kids don't notice that things are weird...?

She sounds a tiny bit un-self-aware. I wouldn't beat yourself up. It will work itself out organically.

 

[Ecdysis]

Right... We're leaving for the kids' play date in 20 minutes...

I didn't respond via WhatsApp initially today... I was just feeling too over it... Refusing to spend anymore time and headspace on it for the next few days and decided I'd deal with it next week once I'd gotten a ton of more important tasks done.

But B's mother wrote again earlier asking whether the play date was still on and she was quite neutral/ friendly/ polite, so I figured okay, yup, it's probably a good idea.

I replied saying "Yup, sounds good, but no talking about difficult topics today please! I've got so much work on my plate at the moment and I need my head clear for that. We can discuss stuff at a later date if needed but I need peace and quiet today, please!"

She responded agreeing, saying that was a good idea.

So, I'm glad we're both putting the kids first and are behaving like adults and behaving neutrally/ politely.

I mean, at least that's the theory so far.

Now I (and she!) are just going to have to put it into practice

I have nooooo idea what small-talk topics to choose today... sigh... I'd better come up with a few quickly... Maybe I should google some suggestions...

She sounds a tiny bit un-self-aware. I wouldn't beat yourself up. It will work itself out organically.

Tiny bit is an understatement

So, we're back from the play date. Kids played on the playground for an hour, we sat on a bench at the side and talked.

I had four small-talk topics lined up that the AI tool here helped me come up with and it went well. I launched right in with the 3rd smalltalk item I'd planned, which lead neatly to the 2nd item which then led to the 1st item and then we finished with the fourth topic. Honestly, I spoke for about 75% of the time and didn't do so much listening this time. Usually I listen a lot more. But I was so concerned about the conversation becoming awkward or crap because of the fight we had yesterday, that my priority was keeping the conversation on these neutral topics, so I think it's okay that I talked alot and didn't listen as much as I normally would, because it accomplished my aim.

I should also give her some credit:

- She managed to stay polite and neutral and wasn't as annoying as she usually is. (I didn't give her much of a chance because I led most of the conversation, but even the chances she did have, she didn't get annoying. So, yeah, some credit where credit is due.

- Also, I probably would have left things until the middle of next week... I probably would have preferred a few more days to let the dust settle and to process it and to shake off the negativity. But waiting can also have the opposite effect of leaving an issue to fester, so her approach of basically "ripping the bandaid off" and diving straight back in is also good, so credit there too, where it's due.

I'm relieved to have things be neutral again and in fact, it may even lead to an improvement, with me a) protecting my boundaries better and b) her being more aware and respectful of my boundaries. So I may have less headaches from these encounters in future.

Above all else, I'm just very relieved and grateful that there's a good solution for the kids and they're not going to suffer from any weirdness or tension around their friendship.

 

[Friday]

When my son was a toddler we went to a company Christmas party in a culture where everyone was married with kids, and exactly this topic came up.

One of the Murphy’s Laws about parenting?

If you like the parents? Your kids HATE each other.
If the kids are friends? The parents HATE each other.

It’s. So. Durn. True.

At the time? We were actually best friends with the parents of my kid’s best friends. So it was a little… the f*ck are all y’all talking about?!? I’m sitting here seeing how arranged marriages used to be the norm, we’re like one big extended family.

Until we weren’t.

And, oh yeah.

If you like the parents? Your kids will hate each other.
If your kids are friends? You’ll hate the parents.
999 : 1,000