When People Accuse You of What You're Not Guilty Of
by Lisa A. Romano
Have you ever been accused of something you're not guilty of?
Have you ever had someone project their assumptions, perceptions, and opinions onto you and then found yourself defending yourself, only to end up feeling dirty, like you did something wrong when you know you didn't?
I grew up this way with a mom who made up all sorts of stories in her head about what kind of child I was to justify her feelings toward me, which were filtered through her motherwounds; the ones that left her feeling resentful toward the innocent needs of her children, the ones she didn't even know she had.
My mom was accusatory, judgmental, critical, passive-aggressive, cynical, angry, condescending, cold, emotionally unavailable, and believed every fantasy her mind conjured up about me, which meant, she never really saw me at all.
I lived in fear of upsetting my mother and knew that needing her would set her off, so I learned to isolate and become super responsible to weirdly please her.
Growing up, I felt like I lived under a microscope and as if it was my job to convince her I was not this evil, calculating person she thought I was. And then, one day, during my separation, and after she made a snarky comment about me for all to hear, I just gave up trying to please her.
An Angry Mom
This week, an angry mom took to one of my social media pages to throw shade my way and accused me of turning adult children against their parents.
Umm...no, that's not what I do; however, I could imagine being a mom whose daughter no longer wanted to speak to her and how deeply that might have hurt.
I could empathize with her pain despite knowing her anger was misplaced.
After a few back-and-forth comments between her and I, and regardless of how many times I reinforced the idea that I empathized with her, I did my best to explain that I am not in the business of turning any child against their parent and told her I had hoped that she and her daughter could find their way back to one another in the future.
I explained how I reached a point of spiritual objectivity and was fortunate enough to understand my mother and father from a higher state of consciousness and how that allowed me to release the pain of the past.
I explained how most adult children are so emotionally abused they've been programmed right out of recognizing they were abused at all and that I aim to help wounded adult children access the emotions and the experiences of childhood that prevent them from experiencing the breakthroughs they need to live authentic lives...because all children are in a hypnotic brainwave state up until the age of 7 and as adults, don't even know they are living out their negative childhood programming.
She couldn't hear me...and then she made a few comments that had me understanding the dynamic between her and her daughter more clearly...
One of those comments was...
"My daughter doesn't know what bad is... and so if she wants to hate me because I lived with a____then, so be it."
It reminded me of how my mom and dad would marginalize my siblings and me and fail to empathize with what we were experiencing. It was always about them, what they felt, what they were going through, what they thought, what they believed, and what their opinions were.
We had to understand them, and they did not have to understand us, which is super weird when you consider I was only seven the first time I heard my dad justify my mother's cruelty toward me by telling me how rough her childhood was.
😕
Despite the ironed school uniforms and peanut butter jelly sandwiches in our plastic Snooply lunchboxes, we were invisible to my parents. And as children, we were forced to deny our inner reality for the sake of white picket fences and neatly trimmed hedges.
Emotional Unavailability
I get it. When a parent's world is stressful and frustrating, especially when they are in abusive relationships and carry unhealed wounds of the past, sometimes all a parent can do is make sure their kids are fed, bathed, and get to sleep on time. And while that is valid, it is also crucial that we, as the children of such adults, recognize how our parents' stressful lives have impacted us...not so we can blast them on Facebook or riddle them with guilt...
Instead, we learn to appreciate how our brains interpret the lack of connection to our parents.
We look within and over our shoulders and into our pasts to help us make sense of our self-sabotaging behaviors, negative self-perception, lack of boundaries, and low self-worth.
And by the way...I was that mom...and I know I didn't always have the bandwidth to meet my children's emotional needs. Still, I also take accountability for the pain I have caused them, and I have committed my life to help parents and children heal their childhood programming.
I Didn't Flinch
In the past, an angry mom accusing me of things I am not guilty of might have triggered me. However, this time around, I didn't flinch.
And that's because I know who I am, and others can only see me through THEIR perceptual lens.
That one key idea has changed my life and has allowed me to not react to other people's criticism, projections, or opinions.
Dear One, today, think back to when someone you loved vomited their faulty perception (projection) on you...and then think about how that made you feel...
Did you defend yourself?
Did you fawn after them and try to convince them their perception was wrong?
Did you isolate, hide and try to make yourself small?
Did you apologize for their perception of you?
If so...please know...how other people see you is always projected through their inner lens, and that is not something you can control.
