A Bad Case of Fleas- Fleas on our children

If you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas, or in Latin, qui cum canibus concumbunt cum pulicibus surgent. "He that lieth down with dogs shall rise up with fleas" has been attributed to Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac. The Latin has been unreliably attributed to Seneca, but not linked to any specific work.

The quote has a large almost universally agreed meaning of "You should be cautious of the company you keep. Associating with those of low reputation may not only lower your own but also lead you astray by the faulty assumptions, premises and data of the unscrupulous.”

Recently, an article was published based upon the quote above. I immediately saw the truth in this but until I thought about it more deeply I did not relate it to my life. I was thankful for this article because I now realize that I have been INFESTED with fleas. The good news is, I am dipping myself daily to rid myself of them. The other thing that made me thankful is that this has eased my mind on a certain fear that I have been mulling over lately.

One of my 14 year old son’s displays many traits of Narcissism. I began to panic due to thoughts of “Incurable!” “Too Late!” “My fault” “Maybe if I had been strong enough to leave before and not wait to be discarded!”

I now, thanks in large part to this article, have looked at my son with new eyes. Does he have empathy? “yes”… Does he care about others? “yes”…. Do I feel his love the way I feel it from my other children? “yes”. Does he lie? “YES!” but is he good at it? “no!” So at this point, I have come to believe that he has simply been infected with an abundance of fleas. Although I have had little success in “dipping” him at this point…I will have to trust that the lack of the constant presence of the infected source will diminish the load of fleas on my son.

He has many traits that scare me…including the tendency to have the “Blank Stare” and “go AWAY” when confronted with his behavior. He is difficult to get along with at school, and has trouble relating to his peers, due to his inability to deal with not being the best, intolerance for losing at anything and know-it-all attitude. His peers, however, are providing the unfavorable feedback that has the greatest chance of altering that behavior…and I am providing constant reassurance of unconditional love. I DO seeing changes happening in him. It is going to be a long process and I know that. He has lived with this modeled behavior his entire 14 years.

He has also lived with the influence of my loving Mother, our giving family and his protective (albeit aloof at times) mother. That’s me! I say aloof because, for many years, I gave up the training of our son’s to their Father. Did I agree with what he taught them…No, not really. But although I KNEW something was wrong with their Father, YEARS ago….I still had the UNWAVERING belief that although he might abuse MY sons, abuse his family, abuse my family and abuse the public at large…he would NOT abuse OUR children in any way!

You see, I was still under the mistaken belief that he CHOSE to be abusive, that he was able to feel love, that his children (being related to him by blood) would be protected by the same “self-serving” behavior in him. I was, of course, wrong. He was a very involved father, WHEN the twins were very young and drew much attention…when he could carry them around in twin car seats and people would approach and want to look at them…providing him with vicarious supply. Even as they grew he remained involved in the public eye. He was the one who took care of the school activities…took the kids to the Doctor and the Dentist…etc. He spent much time trying to get them involved in his obsessions which caused him disappointment over and over. Our children, being normal children, simply could not maintain the same obsessive interest in things that he did. This was especially difficult because in each case, it was HIS obsession, his interest, that he pursued…and not any organic interests of the children so, naturally, they would lose interest.

I wonder, now, if the people on the periphery, thought that he purchased the toy rockets, the fossils, the model trains….due to some expressed interest OF OUR CHILDREN? That would be an assumption that a normal person would make! It was not the case. Those things were HIS obsessions, his desires, and he INVOLVED the children and attempted to mold their interests to reflect his…but this was unsuccessful.

At 14, they have very little in common with him. They love him. He is their Father. But I cannot think of a single common interest that they share with him. While his current obsession has him outside all the time, horseback riding, camping, etc….nothing could be further from a “fun time” in the hearts of our children. Our children are “indoor” kids. Interested in computers, video games, etc. I realize that this may be a generational thing as this interests are common in today’s children.  

I have always classified people as being PRIMARILY “mental” or “physical” in nature. The well rounded person has both aspects but few possess both to the same extent. I have never pretended to be “well rounded” and I am very strongly based in the “mental” realm. ( haha! He would agree but would attribute an entirely different meaning to this statement!) He is strongly based in the “physical realm” and, in that realm, must always be doing something, planning something to do, constantly on the go…perhaps because the deep thought and rich self-reflection that are required to be satisfied in the “mental” realm are just not present in him.

Looking at all 4 of my son’s it is very evident that each of them shares this strong tendency to be based in the “mental” realm. Despite his best efforts he has not been able to alter that. When OUR children were younger he would try to involve them, pull them, guilt them…DRAG them into his “physical” world but it was HIS choice, not theirs. To the outside world it appeared that he was a very involved Father and he got much supply from having twin “sidekicks” with whom he spent so much time.

As they have gotten older the time ACTUALLY spent with them has decreased considerably. He would still appear in public with them on occasion to maintain the illusion for his fans and supporters…but it began to become very evident that this was being FORCED and the children simply were not ENJOYING it. They began to complain and fight being dragged along to be used as attention seeking devices.

Near the end of the relationship, he had, not only lost the supply being generated by me but also that being generated by the children. They have become teenagers and are not very keen on giving up what interests them in order to put on a dog and pony show for his fans and supporters. This was NOT something, I did…it is simply a natural course of events. Being this, it was not in his power to change that…but he TRIED and continues to try!

That being said, other than attempting to MOLD them into carbon copies of him and using whatever tactics of guilt, control and fear he needed to use to make them maintain his illusions, he had not been overtly abusive to them when they were younger. As anyone who is dealing with this knows, much damage was done during this process even WITHOUT overt abuse. They had always, as toddlers and young children, been controlled by the “Because I said so” tactic and the fear of consequences of disobeying him.

Over the past 2 years or say, it has been necessary to “amp up” the tactics in order to maintain control of them and, of course, that control was an illusion. Always before, there was the automatic assumption that, not only must they do what he said, but that what he said was CORRECT. As they have grown up and started to have their OWN experiences they have, naturally, started to see that what he says and what he does, do not match up to what he is telling them to do. This is not reserved for him but also applies to me, as their mother. They ALSO question me...and I often must admit a failure to live up to my expectations of them. I am working on it!

So, they are still PARTIALLY physical controlled by their fear of “retaliation” (which is funny because that word got changed from consequences to retaliation BY THEM) but the control of their THOUGHTS and EXPERIENCES is LOST to him. He finds this unacceptable. He REQUIRES them to spend a certain amount of time with him and they are too fearful to refuse to do so, for the MOST part….BUT he CANNOT make them ENJOY it and that is driving him to distraction. They now see through his lies and see that he is BLATANT in lying which has caused them ANGER. “How STUPID does he think we ARE!?!” Because of this NATURAL development, they are now being subjected to the true emotionally/mentally abusive tactics…you know…gas-lighting, threats of love being taken away, threats of loss of possessions, intense GUILT provocation, threats of monitoring location through GPS, insinuation of his ability to innately read their minds and seek out and destroy their souls.

One of them recognizes this for what it is but still suffers the intense, instilled and EXPECTED guilt. The other one, the one with the more severe case of fleas, the GOLDEN child…does not express his awareness. Does he have any awareness? I do not know. I suspect that he does as he is very intelligent and has deep thought processes that their Father fails to understand. For now I must bide my time and try to support them as they are now. To do anything else might jeopardize their time with me as it could be seen as attempting to alienate them from him.

I made one attempt (pure folly I know) to explain to him that he is ruining his relationship with our kids by not recognizing that they are human beings and NOT possessions. That resulted only in renewed, intense guilt provocation for them and an attempt to drive a wedge BETWEEN them. (to remove the problem child and keep him from infecting the Golden child with thoughts of autonomy) His treatment of the two is now disparate enough to be recognizable to even a total outsider. I have had to do much talking in an attempt to remove this wedge as it was driven deep very quickly and I found myself with twins who nearly HATED each other at one point….but that is calming down now. Another unsuccessful tactic.

I have no NEED to alienate my children from him because he is doing such a good job of taking care of that himself. He does not believe this, of course, and states that I am trying to turn the kids against him. I am not. I would not hurt them that way. I only encourage them to keep their eyes open and to try to protect themselves from any crazy making behavior.

They spend the time required with him…and my adult son and I pick up the crumbled pieces of their self-worth each time they come home. They hold the keys to this mental jail cell. One day they will find those keys and free themselves.