Relationships In Middle Adulthood
Relationships in Middle Adulthood
Relationships with immediate family members go through many changes as one grows up. The intense neediness of the young child/parent relationship changes as the child goes through adolescence and then matures into early and middle adulthood. The relationship I will describe is the one with my mother.
My Mother and I When describing behavior it is important to distinguish between reasons and excuses. Sometimes the understanding of why someone behaves in a certain way is the only way to understand the relationship dynamic. It has taken me many years to fully understand my mother’s behavior and it is by understanding the reasons why she interacted with me in the ways that she did that my relationship with her changed.
Background/family history My mother was number eleven of twelve children born to Armenian refugee/immigrants. My grandparents came to this country after fleeing the Armenian Genocide in the early 1900’s. In order to escape my grandmother agreed to marry a man who was a virtual stranger. She was only 15 when she left her father and her one surviving brother (her mother died …show more content…
I never knew my great grandmother, but from anecdotal accounts of my aunts, uncles and cousins it is very clear that she suffered for some kind of psychosis. Whether it was something organic, severe PTSD or a combination cannot be known, as she never saw a physician. My great grandmother would chase my grandmother with a butcher knife and threaten to kill her for various perceived slights, she also threatened to harm and generally terrorized all the children. My mother remembers having to stay awake on nights my grandfather worked late at the mill so my great grandmother wouldn’t take money or other things to incite my grandfather into a rage against my
Relationships with immediate family members go through many changes as one grows up. The intense neediness of the young child/parent relationship changes as the child goes through adolescence and then matures into early and middle adulthood. The relationship I will describe is the one with my mother.
My Mother and I When describing behavior it is important to distinguish between reasons and excuses. Sometimes the understanding of why someone behaves in a certain way is the only way to understand the relationship dynamic. It has taken me many years to fully understand my mother’s behavior and it is by understanding the reasons why she interacted with me in the ways that she did that my relationship with her changed.
Background/family history My mother was number eleven of twelve children born to Armenian refugee/immigrants. My grandparents came to this country after fleeing the Armenian Genocide in the early 1900’s. In order to escape my grandmother agreed to marry a man who was a virtual stranger. She was only 15 when she left her father and her one surviving brother (her mother died …show more content…
I never knew my great grandmother, but from anecdotal accounts of my aunts, uncles and cousins it is very clear that she suffered for some kind of psychosis. Whether it was something organic, severe PTSD or a combination cannot be known, as she never saw a physician. My great grandmother would chase my grandmother with a butcher knife and threaten to kill her for various perceived slights, she also threatened to harm and generally terrorized all the children. My mother remembers having to stay awake on nights my grandfather worked late at the mill so my great grandmother wouldn’t take money or other things to incite my grandfather into a rage against my