I managed an event without being dragged down to her level and flooding

[Guest guest]

She had the nerve to announce to a room of mostly strangers and one cousin that

I had only ever been spanked once (apparently if she did it with a yardstick,

one hit per year I was old on a bare butt they didn't count)...and then she

actually said I was spanked because I had knocked over a candle when I was 3. It

AMAZED me that she happened to bring up this particular incident because it is

one of my earliest, clearest, childhood memories and it happens to also be my

earliest memory of her telling me that reality was not reality that only her

perception of reality is real...she left me in the dining room next to the table

which was covered with a blue and white checkered table cloth. She lit a candle

and told me not to touch it or go near it. I watched the candle, fearfully, as

it simply tipped over in the candle holder and called out to her and my dad.

She went bonkers on me for tipping over the candle but no matter how I tried to

tell her what happened she refused to listen let alone hear or believe what had

actually happened. This was when I was 3 years old. I am 44 now. She brought

this up in a room full of people all waiting with my great aunt who was

literally about to die any moment. I'm not sure how the spare the rod topic

came up but I happened to say that spanking doesn't work for my 6 year old so we

have come up with a system that does, that works, that doesn't require hitting

him...that's when she said to this group that I had " really only been spanked

once. " I looked over at her and said, " I didn't knock over the candle, it just

tipped over when you left the room " . She started to seethe, " You did knock it

over, you were in your high chair. " Um, no, I wasn't in my high chair and she

wasn't in the room and so she didn't see anything actually happen, she just

decided what the reality would be for all of us. I didn't say that though...for

the first time in my life, I did not try to explain, try to get her to

understand, try to defend myself with factual information, instead, I said, " I

didn't knock that candle over and I'll go to my grave knowing it. " She tried 2-3

more times to insist that I had and I just smiled and said back, " goin to my

grave knowing it " , " goin with me to the grave " , " grave " .... Did my handling of

the situation give me pleasure, pride, relief, and peace = yes... I would have

loved to tell her what really happened, discuss her point of view and the

fallacies she's created to support it, but none of that works SO IT'S NEVER

GONNA HAPPEN. I'd have like to say, " ONCE! So every time you whipped my ass

with a yardstick didn't count? " , or " who the hell is stupid enough to leave a

three year old unattended in a room with a lit candle? " , or " you weren't in the

room so you have NO ACTUAL WAY OF BEING ABLE TO 'KNOW' THAT I KNOCKED IT OVER "

but the reality is that none of those things would have gone anywhere except

into a deathgrip battle over what was real and she will never see anything but

what she wants to, I can't make her do any better, and in the meantime I didn't

let her drag me down into despair and self-hating depression...