Displaced Anger and Frustration: Boyfriend Trashing My Kids
Reader’s Question
I have been in a long distance relationship with a man for almost two years; we live several hours away from each other. Most of the time we get along well, but lately I am increasingly bothered by one thing in particular. This man has an adult daughter who has caused a lot of problems over the years — drug addiction, pregnancy without knowing who the father is, attempted suicide, and the list goes on. She ignores her father for weeks and during this time, he will protest that he can do without her in his life. Also, during these times he will have nothing but nice things to say about my adult children. Then, suddenly his daughter will call him or visit him again and the next thing you know, we are having problems. These problems always seem to center around my adult children and where they are going with their lives. All three have finished high school, while one has finished university and lives in another part of the province. None of them are into drugs or get into trouble. I live in a high unemployment area and there are times when one of them might be temporarily out of work. But yet I find that the conversation always comes back to how they need to move on with their lives. Maybe it’s my imagination, but it seems these issues always come up whenever he spends time with his daughter. He’ll start going on about how well she is doing for herself (even though she’s only worked a total of two months in 22 years) and say that my children should be able to find jobs immediately after being laid off.
At this point, I’m wondering if I’m with a certain person who thinks they are right all of the time or is just insecure. An outside view would be appreciated.
Our Clinical Psychologist’s Reply
From what you’ve said, it certainly appears that this man has a lot of reasons to be in some significant emotional pain. Despite his protests to the contrary, he has strong feelings regarding the situation with his daughter. Some of his feelings — especially feelings of anger, frustration, and possibly even an urge to sever ties — are likely to be not only intense but also ultimately unbearable. When people deal with such feelings, they often “displace” them to safer outlets or “project” them onto others and other situations. Directing anger and other conflicted feelings toward “safer” targets is one way of venting while simultaneously forestalling the dreaded estrangement from the person for whom the feelings are rightfully meant. Seeing the relative success of your children most likely only adds to the pain this man probably feels regarding his daughter. So, as sad as it is, he might gain a bit of relief about his own situation by cutting them down a notch.
The fact that your boyfriend may be displacing and projecting helps explain his behavior but certainly doesn’t excuse it. In the old days, there were “whipping boys” to take the punishment for royal sons and daughters who were thought too precious to harm. We’ve come a long way since then. You and your children must not be whipping boys for the anger that might be meant for this man’s problem child. You will probably need to address this issue with some empathy but also with directness. You might even encourage him to enter counseling or to participate in counseling with him, using the safer venue of a therapist’s office to work the issues through.
