If you come from a FUNCTIONAL family, why resent/dislike people from dysfunctional families?

[Anonymous]

And then everyone on all the other threads are like "Family is SO important!" How dare you abandon your elderly mother / not invite your cousins' kids to the wedding / never visit your in-laws... etc.

They should read this whole thread and realize the "dysfunctional people" who are trying, and have set up their boundaries, do not need this chiding or even their stupid opinions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because these family members are often draining and unpleasant. I wish I didn’t marry into a family where we spend holidays walking on egg shells so we don’t tick this person or that person off. Or we don’t talk about a million and one things because they “trigger” whoever. Or I have to carefully curate every request because someone may get offended, cancel, back out, etc.

I don’t want to deal with it and have lost patience. Empathy fatigue.

I have empathy fatigue and as a PP wrote functional and disfunctional are not binary. DH "turns off" vision and somehow magically flicks off a non existent hearing aid. Holidays/events are miserable and it's like dealing with an erratic dog that lashes out. Both sets of couple parents have $ - us earned, her inherited and major strings.

Wedding? That was 1 pile of miserable since the couple planned it, we paid, and the indvidual didn;t get what they wanted from food, to florals to guest list. Our relationship with the couple is now IMHO strictly transactional - get us for labor so don't have to outsource. Spouse and my DC's MIL do not want us to have GP relationship since their vision of that is not interracting but rather $.

[Anonymous]

OP maybe you don't understand how dysfunctional most American families actually are.

We are descendants of slaves, immigrants, slave-holders, robber-barrons, factory workers, war veterans with untreated PTSD, and the list goes on and on.

White women were expected to maintain relationships and do volunteer work for free in their communities or else they would be homeless and on the streets. They put up with a lot to manage and maintain "functional" relationships.

If you think wealthy people are not dysfunctional, think again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you don't understand how dysfunctional most American families actually are.

We are descendants of slaves, immigrants, slave-holders, robber-barrons, factory workers, war veterans with untreated PTSD, and the list goes on and on.

White women were expected to maintain relationships and do volunteer work for free in their communities or else they would be homeless and on the streets. They put up with a lot to manage and maintain "functional" relationships.

If you think wealthy people are not dysfunctional, think again.

But also you maybe don’t understand how functional many Americans are. Functional families, however, go under the radar compared to dysfunctional ones. They are not the subject of TV shows or books. They don’t get written about in newspapers or even show up much in social media.

I do see a divide where these families live their lives without worrying about the rest of the country.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you don't understand how dysfunctional most American families actually are.

We are descendants of slaves, immigrants, slave-holders, robber-barrons, factory workers, war veterans with untreated PTSD, and the list goes on and on.

White women were expected to maintain relationships and do volunteer work for free in their communities or else they would be homeless and on the streets. They put up with a lot to manage and maintain "functional" relationships.

If you think wealthy people are not dysfunctional, think again.

But also you maybe don’t understand how functional many Americans are. Functional families, however, go under the radar compared to dysfunctional ones. They are not the subject of TV shows or books. They don’t get written about in newspapers or even show up much in social media.

I do see a divide where these families live their lives without worrying about the rest of the country.

A divide based on wealth is not the same as a divide based on being mentally stable and healthy.

Too many supposed functional families later turned out to be one tragedy away from the father setting his entire family on fire and killing them or murdering and stuffing his children into crude oil tanks in the middle of nowhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you don't understand how dysfunctional most American families actually are.

We are descendants of slaves, immigrants, slave-holders, robber-barrons, factory workers, war veterans with untreated PTSD, and the list goes on and on.

White women were expected to maintain relationships and do volunteer work for free in their communities or else they would be homeless and on the streets. They put up with a lot to manage and maintain "functional" relationships.

If you think wealthy people are not dysfunctional, think again.

But also you maybe don’t understand how functional many Americans are. Functional families, however, go under the radar compared to dysfunctional ones. They are not the subject of TV shows or books. They don’t get written about in newspapers or even show up much in social media.

I do see a divide where these families live their lives without worrying about the rest of the country.

A divide based on wealth is not the same as a divide based on being mentally stable and healthy.

Too many supposed functional families later turned out to be one tragedy away from the father setting his entire family on fire and killing them or murdering and stuffing his children into crude oil tanks in the middle of nowhere.

Yes but also many real functional, mentally stable and healthy families are simply invisible in society. They don’t care to be seen or what other people think of them. They’re not over interested in the lives of other people or are over invested in society or politics. They understand what makes their lives work, and they’re happy to live them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you don't understand how dysfunctional most American families actually are.

We are descendants of slaves, immigrants, slave-holders, robber-barrons, factory workers, war veterans with untreated PTSD, and the list goes on and on.

White women were expected to maintain relationships and do volunteer work for free in their communities or else they would be homeless and on the streets. They put up with a lot to manage and maintain "functional" relationships.

If you think wealthy people are not dysfunctional, think again.

But also you maybe don’t understand how functional many Americans are. Functional families, however, go under the radar compared to dysfunctional ones. They are not the subject of TV shows or books. They don’t get written about in newspapers or even show up much in social media.

I do see a divide where these families live their lives without worrying about the rest of the country.

A divide based on wealth is not the same as a divide based on being mentally stable and healthy.

Too many supposed functional families later turned out to be one tragedy away from the father setting his entire family on fire and killing them or murdering and stuffing his children into crude oil tanks in the middle of nowhere.

Yes but also many real functional, mentally stable and healthy families are simply invisible in society. They don’t care to be seen or what other people think of them. They’re not over interested in the lives of other people or are over invested in society or politics. They understand what makes their lives work, and they’re happy to live them.

Is this the secret to a functional family? What is it that your functional family understands about how your lives work? Is it not to be over interested or over invested in the lives of people who don't live in your suburb? In your gated community? Where do you draw the line?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is the over-sharing. I don't need or want to hear about every problem you're having or ever had. Keep the drama to yourself.

I admit that this is how I feel too. I only interact with people like this at work (have no patience for them in my regular life) and this is why I am respectful but keep my distance.

Same. My work is different from my private life. In my private life, I choose to stay away from people who essentially want free therapy from me. While I am respectful of their needs, they need to respect that I get to make this choice.

OP here. I'm not talking about people who choose to limit interaction with someone who is behaving in a dysfunctional way. I do that too.

I'm talking about when people are cruel and critical of people who are struggling, whether it's complaining endlessly about their coworker who is negative and angry (the irony of this one) or using "dysfunctional" as an insult. I've just encountered a lot of people from "good" families who are mean when it comes to these issues and it surprises me.

Another thing I've observed. I have a couple friends who are from really loving families with really kind and loving parents (who I adore). When I socialize with these friends, they can be so cutting about people from dysfunctional backgrounds or people who's struggle with mental health, to the point that I've had to distance myself from them because I find their attitude offensive. But since I know their parents, I also know their parents would NEVER talk like that. It really surprises me to hear people from what I know to be really solid upbringings being very intolerant and sometimes cruel towards people who simply don't have their advantages. Is it just ignorance? Do they learn these attitudes from peers and just repeat that instead of following in their parents' tolerant, empathetic footprints? I've never understood this.

OP, I think some of these seemingly functional families have the deepest secrets. I can only speak from my own experience but my DH comes from a seemingly very functional family. It took me years to learn that they have generations of hidden family secrets, especially around infidelity. The way they deal with it is avoidance and secrecy. It is a much more insidious type of dysfunction. They are also very cutting of people who reveal weakness or mental illness.

Truly functional and emotionally healthy people would empathize with healthy boundaries of course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is the over-sharing. I don't need or want to hear about every problem you're having or ever had. Keep the drama to yourself.

+1,000,000

[Anonymous]

I come from a functional family.

My mom always kept us away from dysfunctional family members. She said she was “modeling normalcy.” I agree strongly with what she did. My kids don’t need to know about abuse, addiction, alcoholism, cheating, etc.

I had a nanny a few years ago who was great with kids but came from a very bad situation and couldn’t escape it. She gave her car to her brother, then she couldn’t make it to work on time due to bus schedules, then she started always calling in sick. There would be an excuse for everything and she always needed leniency. She told my kids inappropriate stories about how her dad would beat her as a kid. Last straw was that she stole from us to pay bail for a relative. We tried to really help her and we were good employers but we aren’t here to be taken advantage of.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Observationally, a lot of "functional" families that are drama-free, warm, welcoming, no abuse, addiction, codependency, etc. also tend to have this dynamic of exclusivity and "our home is a refuge, our family is better than everyone else". Not to say this is a bad thing, but in my experience having friends from these types of families, they breed sanctimony and judgement. Understandably so - when you come from a place of comfort and understanding you feel discomfort and even disgust when you're around dysfunction.

This hasn’t been my experience. I’d say this is pure projection.

Absolutely sounds like it.

[Anonymous]

Because it's tiring and stressful. It's always something, it's always excuses, it's always emergencies, and it's only a matter of time until you're asked for money. Give it once and everyone's got their hand out. I have sympathy, sure, but I don't want to deal with it.

If you're used to this, OP, you might not realize how weird and stressful it feels to people who aren't accustomed to it. Yes, those people are very lucky. But that's just how it is.

Or else they have such a hard time wrapping their heads around it that they just don't believe you. My mom's kind of crazy and my DH just refused to believe it for a very long time. He married me anyway, and it was only when he overheard my mom having an insane conversation with my sister that he was willing to believe me. He had to experience it for himself because it was so far outside his own experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I come from a functional family.

My mom always kept us away from dysfunctional family members. She said she was “modeling normalcy.” I agree strongly with what she did. My kids don’t need to know about abuse, addiction, alcoholism, cheating, etc.

I had a nanny a few years ago who was great with kids but came from a very bad situation and couldn’t escape it. She gave her car to her brother, then she couldn’t make it to work on time due to bus schedules, then she started always calling in sick. There would be an excuse for everything and she always needed leniency. She told my kids inappropriate stories about how her dad would beat her as a kid. Last straw was that she stole from us to pay bail for a relative. We tried to really help her and we were good employers but we aren’t here to be taken advantage of.

I really applaud your mom for doing that. I have had to do that with my family and though it pains me to explain it to me kids, I am grateful that they don’t accept their behavior as normal.

The dysfunctional nanny actually proves something that the OP was trying to articulate. Dysfunction is almost like a disease- functional people notice it faster and try to avoid it as quickly as possible. It’s like gossip. Or a bad reputation.

[Anonymous]

^^ True. I've had to avoid family members, too. I don't want my kids on social media with theirs. Since I know their backstory, I know where they went wrong. Some of us were close in age and came from the same decent household. Like the ants vs the grasshoppers.

What bothers me are these references to privilege nowadays. Like I have some privilege over them and my kids are being taught that, too, when it's really due to poor choices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you don't understand how dysfunctional most American families actually are.

We are descendants of slaves, immigrants, slave-holders, robber-barrons, factory workers, war veterans with untreated PTSD, and the list goes on and on.

White women were expected to maintain relationships and do volunteer work for free in their communities or else they would be homeless and on the streets. They put up with a lot to manage and maintain "functional" relationships.

If you think wealthy people are not dysfunctional, think again.

But also you maybe don’t understand how functional many Americans are. Functional families, however, go under the radar compared to dysfunctional ones. They are not the subject of TV shows or books. They don’t get written about in newspapers or even show up much in social media.

I do see a divide where these families live their lives without worrying about the rest of the country.

A divide based on wealth is not the same as a divide based on being mentally stable and healthy.

Too many supposed functional families later turned out to be one tragedy away from the father setting his entire family on fire and killing them or murdering and stuffing his children into crude oil tanks in the middle of nowhere.

Yes but also many real functional, mentally stable and healthy families are simply invisible in society. They don’t care to be seen or what other people think of them. They’re not over interested in the lives of other people or are over invested in society or politics. They understand what makes their lives work, and they’re happy to live them.

Is this the secret to a functional family? What is it that your functional family understands about how your lives work? Is it not to be over interested or over invested in the lives of people who don't live in your suburb? In your gated community? Where do you draw the line?

It’s simpler than that. When our kids come home, hurt because of a friend or teacher or boyfriend, we try to listen and understand their feelings. That’s it, because that works for us.

Similarly, our friends and family just want an ear and a laugh. We just want the same. Do we know what’s going on in people beyond that? Not really.