Ask Amy: Mom’s martyrdom creates a man-boy monster
I have pulled away and stopped “spoiling” him like I used too.
Please, how do we fix this? How do I tell him, “You’re self-absorbed and impatient. You never think of anyone but yourself. You don’t do anything for anyone.”
— Feeling Different
Dear Different: Talk is cheap, and impossible if the person you are trying to reason with is drunk and belligerent.
What you see as your own nurturing behavior, I see as enabling.
There is a distinction between “taking care of my boys” and actually promoting your alcoholic partner’s selfish behavior. You are doing the latter.
You have helped to create a monster and now you want the monster to stop being a monster, even though he is simply behaving according to what he has been taught.
I think it might clarify your next move if you examined, recognized, and held yourself accountable for your role in this household dynamic.
Kids look to the members of their own household for models of how to be. What man does your son have as a role model? That drunken guy on the couch.
If things don’t change radically, your teenage son might be on his way to becoming the same type of hard-drinking man-boy that your partner is.
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