post #61 of 61
7/12/05 at 12:46pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by DaisyRose
I find it sad that some posters think that it isn't possible to have influence over adult children without that influence being abusive, or that a desire to remain an influential part of your child's life is automatically pathological.
For some mothers, it's NOT possible, and it IS automatically pathological. You might be lucky, but not everyone is. I don't see that fact as any more sad than saying outright that you would never want to have a son because of what you perceive your rights/expectations to/of him might be when and if he gets married (because you presume that you will have a distant relationship with your DIL, or wouldn't want to include her like you do your "own" daughters, I don't know which?).

What you seem to be leaving out (why, I'm not sure, just look at the mother/son MIL/DIL stories even in this thread, as well as others) is that a mother is just as likely to influence the family of her DIL as she is a biological daughter. Granted, we mostly hear complaints about it here (but people tend to vent on bulletin boards, we don't hear as often people spontaneously saying wow, my MIL is great!). But it sounds to me as if a goodly number of motheringdotcom spouses are still their mother's sons. And plenty of motheringdotcom mamas still struggle with their mothers.

The parent of an adult can exert a lot of influence--whether by being hellish and nasty and tearing down their child's family (at their own peril), or being there as a soft place to fall and resource for BOTH of "your" children in that family.

I think it's kind of sad that SILs are preferred over DILs. Women can appreciate an elder who cares for and accepts them and includes them just as much as men can--perhaps even more. Again, I guess *I'm* the lucky one in that regard, and I'm grateful for it. I feel very grieved for people (and I'm sure there's many of them) that have controlling/abusive/shaming/manipulative/rejecting people on BOTH sides.