Why are older women so strange?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the entitled young moms on this forum will make terrible old women.

Amen to that. It is like they can't hear themselves. They are writing about doing exact same things they complain about older women! All the time. How to punish my 4 year old, why my 9 year old is not listening to ME, my neighbor is not a good mom, my DH doesn't do what I want and how I want, so I became crafty and find the ways to do it all my way...I yelled at my kids for nothing, why am I so angry? We even had one who was smart enough to realize she was turning into her mom. Newsflash people, you already are strange just not as old. You think all you 40 year old brand new moms are young? Ha, not so much, you already are strange older women. Hypocrites.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the entitled young moms on this forum will make terrible old women.

Amen to that. It is like they can't hear themselves. They are writing about doing exact same things they complain about older women! All the time. How to punish my 4 year old, why my 9 year old is not listening to ME, my neighbor is not a good mom, my DH doesn't do what I want and how I want, so I became crafty and find the ways to do it all my way...I yelled at my kids for nothing, why am I so angry? We even had one who was smart enough to realize she was turning into her mom. Newsflash people, you already are strange just not as old. You think all you 40 year old brand new moms are young? Ha, not so much, you already are strange older women. Hypocrites.

I think the point is, everyone can relate to a lot of dynamics (including the hardships of motherhood that you described, or how lonely it can be for a single 20/30something as others pair off, or marriage challenges), but few people can relate to the specific dynamic the OP was talking about: people who insert themselves in to the lives of grown adults, stomp on reasonable boundaries, stick their noses in to things that are just not their business.

Unlike OP, I don't think "older women" as a universal group act like this. But like OP, I think it is very strange that some people (including some older women) do. I will say that of the nosiest and most intrusive people I actually know in real life, the majority of them are older women. So yes, I do wonder--is there something about getting to be an older woman, especially an older mother or grandmother, that lends itself to intrusiveness? (Loneliness? Fear of losing importance in family life? Fear of being forgotten?)

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Baby Boomers didn't move for jobs as much as gen x and millennials. This even though we moved far away they still expect to see us on every holiday. They want the same kinds of togetherness their families forced on them before except we all live far away.

I like my MIL but she's totally hands off and doesn't care about our family. Just wants us to visit her, never visits us or helps us. I think she's forgotten how hard babies and toddlers are and she never traveled with her so.

Maybe she remembers and is too tired to want to do you and your husband's jobs...ie raise your own kids! No one should expect or demand help. That doesn't mean "she doesn't care about your family" Doesn't she get a chance to enjoy life ?

Absolutely! And I'm sure she'll understand when her kids are too busy to help her, right?

Wait, did she or did she not take care of your spouse and any siblings when they were children? For roughly eighteen years apiece? Does that not deserve any kind of appreciation in her old age, or does she also have to take care of your children to “earn” some help when she’s older?

She needs to raise her own kids and then give lots of help in raising her grandchildren so that people won’t be too busy to help her when she gets old, is that right?

After a certain age didn't the kids help to clean the house, cook dinner, mow the lawn, run errands, etc while the parent was raising them? Maybe they got 3 bucks for picking up the dog poop in the yard or 5 bucks to organize the garage?

Do you really think a few chores around the house are the equivalent of taking care of a child’s physical and emotional needs for many years? Thankfully, most parents are not adding up and expecting their kids to do enough chores around the house to reimburse their parents for all the time and money being spent on them.

Do you not think that parents are actually responsible for raising their own children? They chose to have kids because they wanted to have children. That does not entitle them to cheap or free labor for the rest of their lives. If they want their adult children to be there for them decades after their kids left the nest, then they really do need to make it a point to be in their adult children's lives. Reciprocal relationships flourish. One sided situations dry up.

So, they were responsible for raising their own children, but you shouldn’t have to be responsible for raising yours because they should be helping. And if they don’t help you, you’ll show them and be too busy to help them when they are elderly and possibly ill. Got it.

(Did you not also choose to have your children because you wanted children? How is your choice to have children different from their choice to have children were young?)

Making yourself available to babysit every now and then or dropping off chicken noodle soup and some saltine crackers when a young family is ill or helping out with set up for a child's party, etc is not taking over childcare for your adult kids. No one has said that grandparents owe their children free daycare. I simply said that relationships are a two way street.

If all you do is sit at home insisting that your kids jump through hoops for you and give very little back in return, you can't expect your relationship with your adult children to flourish.

[Anonymous]

Why are younger women so strange?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why are younger women so strange?

Yup. Women are strange. Look at how obsessed these women are on here about their MIL. It is like some weird competition.

And we sit around wondering why women haven't moved further along in society. Hard to do that when half of them are bat sh!t crazy and can't even manage to get along with other women.

[Anonymous]

Too much Fox News!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Old men quickly realize they gotta kiss butt to get someone to take care of them. So are just silent and agreeable in their v old age. And senile.

+1

LOL you have never been to a nursing home have you? Men are in extreme high demand because there are 8 women for every one man. Carry on your sexist rant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm 62. I do not think I am weird or strange. Why are you so immature that you've decided to make such a large brush stroke encompassing everyone in a demographic? Did you put Hilary or Nancy Pelosi in that bag? Actresses like Glenn Close ? Or are they an exception. Do you generalize ideas from one or two examples? Would you like it if we generalized millennials this way(?)- becausecwe certainly could!

Yes, that's true. My MIL is the exact type of person that OP is talking about. Controlling, manipulative, unreasonable and we count the minutes until we can leave or take her to the airport. On the other hand, my Step MIL is AMAZING! So loving and supportive. Easy going. Just wants us to be happy. Lots of love and laughter around the house whenever she and FIL visit. We never want them to leave.

I have also met many other women who are in their early 60s and beyond who are wise and wonderful. They're secure in their own skin and approach life with an enlightened view, not ego based.

I don't know why I struggle so much with my MIL. It's obviously a life lesson that I have to work through. But not all women are like that. But I will never, ever understand what possesses my MIL to act the way she does!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the entitled young moms on this forum will make terrible old women.

Amen to that. It is like they can't hear themselves. They are writing about doing exact same things they complain about older women! All the time. How to punish my 4 year old, why my 9 year old is not listening to ME, my neighbor is not a good mom, my DH doesn't do what I want and how I want, so I became crafty and find the ways to do it all my way...I yelled at my kids for nothing, why am I so angry? We even had one who was smart enough to realize she was turning into her mom. Newsflash people, you already are strange just not as old. You think all you 40 year old brand new moms are young? Ha, not so much, you already are strange older women. Hypocrites.

This x 1,000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm 62. I do not think I am weird or strange. Why are you so immature that you've decided to make such a large brush stroke encompassing everyone in a demographic? Did you put Hilary or Nancy Pelosi in that bag? Actresses like Glenn Close ? Or are they an exception. Do you generalize ideas from one or two examples? Would you like it if we generalized millennials this way(?)- becausecwe certainly could!

Yes, that's true. My MIL is the exact type of person that OP is talking about. Controlling, manipulative, unreasonable and we count the minutes until we can leave or take her to the airport. On the other hand, my Step MIL is AMAZING! So loving and supportive. Easy going. Just wants us to be happy. Lots of love and laughter around the house whenever she and FIL visit. We never want them to leave.

I have also met many other women who are in their early 60s and beyond who are wise and wonderful. They're secure in their own skin and approach life with an enlightened view, not ego based.

I don't know why I struggle so much with my MIL. It's obviously a life lesson that I have to work through. But not all women are like that. But I will never, ever understand what possesses my MIL to act the way she does!

I feel the same way about my MIL. And it’s not just ME she treats this way; she treats many other people the same. I believe the life lesson she’s there to teach me is that she’s the kind of person I never want to become. Or at least I look at it that way. I see her act a certain way or say a certain thing and file it away, so thankful that I don’t act that way, vowing to never forget, and never act that way myself.

[Anonymous]

Gossipy, younger, queen bees and wanna bees turn into these strange older women who also love gossip and control over others.

Controlling younger women turn into "strange" older women.
I don't want to say "strange" younger women, because I think younger women who are considered "strange" turn out to be the laid back loving chill older women.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gossipy, younger, queen bees and wanna bees turn into these strange older women who also love gossip and control over others.

Controlling younger women turn into "strange" older women.
I don't want to say "strange" younger women, because I think younger women who are considered "strange" turn out to be the laid back loving chill older women.

+1

It is all about control, and being angry about how little control they have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm 62. I do not think I am weird or strange. Why are you so immature that you've decided to make such a large brush stroke encompassing everyone in a demographic? Did you put Hilary or Nancy Pelosi in that bag? Actresses like Glenn Close ? Or are they an exception. Do you generalize ideas from one or two examples? Would you like it if we generalized millennials this way(?)- becausecwe certainly could!

Yes, that's true. My MIL is the exact type of person that OP is talking about. Controlling, manipulative, unreasonable and we count the minutes until we can leave or take her to the airport. On the other hand, my Step MIL is AMAZING! So loving and supportive. Easy going. Just wants us to be happy. Lots of love and laughter around the house whenever she and FIL visit. We never want them to leave.

I have also met many other women who are in their early 60s and beyond who are wise and wonderful. They're secure in their own skin and approach life with an enlightened view, not ego based.

I don't know why I struggle so much with my MIL. It's obviously a life lesson that I have to work through. But not all women are like that. But I will never, ever understand what possesses my MIL to act the way she does!

I feel the same way about my MIL. And it’s not just ME she treats this way; she treats many other people the same. I believe the life lesson she’s there to teach me is that she’s the kind of person I never want to become. Or at least I look at it that way. I see her act a certain way or say a certain thing and file it away, so thankful that I don’t act that way, vowing to never forget, and never act that way myself.

+1

Amen to that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Too much Fox News!

Oh man, any chance your MIL is my MIL?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm 62. I do not think I am weird or strange. Why are you so immature that you've decided to make such a large brush stroke encompassing everyone in a demographic? Did you put Hilary or Nancy Pelosi in that bag? Actresses like Glenn Close ? Or are they an exception. Do you generalize ideas from one or two examples? Would you like it if we generalized millennials this way(?)- becausecwe certainly could!

Yes, that's true. My MIL is the exact type of person that OP is talking about. Controlling, manipulative, unreasonable and we count the minutes until we can leave or take her to the airport. On the other hand, my Step MIL is AMAZING! So loving and supportive. Easy going. Just wants us to be happy. Lots of love and laughter around the house whenever she and FIL visit. We never want them to leave.

I have also met many other women who are in their early 60s and beyond who are wise and wonderful. They're secure in their own skin and approach life with an enlightened view, not ego based.

I don't know why I struggle so much with my MIL. It's obviously a life lesson that I have to work through. But not all women are like that. But I will never, ever understand what possesses my MIL to act the way she does!

I feel the same way about my MIL. And it’s not just ME she treats this way; she treats many other people the same. I believe the life lesson she’s there to teach me is that she’s the kind of person I never want to become. Or at least I look at it that way. I see her act a certain way or say a certain thing and file it away, so thankful that I don’t act that way, vowing to never forget, and never act that way myself.

I think I learned a similar lesson from my mom. My experience was like this: When you're young, your parents are your everything and you want to please them. As you grow older, you rebel against your parents and swear you'll never be like them. Then as you grow older you start to see how much you are like your parents, especially mom, and then mom starts to be a cautionary tale that I learn from. I know now that I'm like my mom (RIP) and I work on not letting my anxiety manifest itself the same way it did for her.