Tammy’s (fictitious name) oldest daughter began openly treating Tammy with contempt and disrespect when the girl was about thirteen. Tammy faced temper tantrums, unrelenting criticism, anger, bullying and abuse from that daughter for the next twenty-five years. Tammy’s other two adult children never behaved like that. They were always reasonable, accommodating, kindly and caring of Tammy’s feelings.
After each episode, Tammy’s extended family and friends said she should “forgive and forget.”
Tammy’s daughter often subjected Tammy to a loud and long silent treatment. After Tammy reached out repeatedly, her daughter would finally relent and say that she was willing to forgive Tammy and they could move forward with a clean slate. The extended family agreed with Tammy that her daughter was obviously a narcissist and had to have her way about everything by controlling Tammy. But they allowed her daughter to be angry, while telling Tammy to deliver everything her daughter wanted, accept all the abuse and never disagree. Her daughter was the most stubborn person and Tammy had to give in to her for the sake of the family. It was just the way that daughter was, and Tammy had to be the bigger person. She should forgive and forget, and try again and again, forever, with that daughter.
Tammy realized, “forgive-and-forget “never worked.
Tammy was finally clear. What her daughter really meant by forgive-and-forget was that Tammy had to pretend the previous thousand beatings didn’t matter, and Tammy had to be willing to subject herself to the next beating whenever her daughter decided to deliver it.
Tammy decided to put the ball in her daughter’s court.
When Tammy got over her self-blame and guilt, she told her daughter she was not going to put up with her behavior anymore. The problem was one hundred percent her daughter’s fault. What her daughter had to do to get back in Tammy’s world was:
Say she’d been behaving despicably. Confess that she was sorry.
Confess that she was sorry.
Say she loved Tammy.
Describe specific ways she would act differently so they could move forward together in a new way.
Prove to Tammy that she could act differently over time.
And Tammy gave her a list of new behaviors when the next situations happened. If her daughter did what Tammy wanted, Tammy also pledged not to beat her daughter up with every past incident and hurt feeling.
Tammy sent to everyone in the extended family a copy of what she’d told and written to her daughter. She told the family that moving forward, she was going to be the most stubborn person.
Tammy’s daughter threw a huge fit and complained to the whole family.
Of course, she threatened that she’d never allow Tammy to see her beloved grandchildren.
This was about what standards of behavior they would allow in their lives.
Tammy had prepared the family with the choice they had. This was not about which person they favored. Tammy was insisting that good behavior was more important than allowing someone in the family to abuse someone else they loved. She would no longer pretend to accept her daughter’s beatings, as if that behavior was okay. Pretend family was less important than real behavior.
Of course, many people in the family were horrified at Tammy’s choice and tried to plead or argue with her. They said, “Life is too short to upset the family unit.” Tammy replied that her life was too short to accept any more beatings. As they realized Tammy was, indeed, the most stubborn person, almost all told her daughter she had to change to maintain the family. Her daughter was faced with the choice of being blamed and excluded or changing her behavior.
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