Post

"Won't somebody please think of the shitty parents?" Lol

wsj, apparently

Lmao yeah I don’t think anyone is surprised to see some of their rich narcissist parents rejecting accountability

she looks so much like the fuck face at school pick up who is always up in everyone's business over nothing

So basically the parents literally proved the point that they are toxic af and why their kids left them. Cool.

One of these moms joined tiktok with the username doormat mom because she viewed being expected to respect her daughter's boundaries and expecting apologies when she was hurt as terrible treatment, that she's now free from because they're estranged.

When you remember that they’re all martyrs, it makes perfect sense

No, you're reading that 100% correctly.

Exactly this. Precisely. And then tried to absolutely ruin me once that final separation was made … it’s a very predictable cycle once you recognize it and stop taking it personally. 😒

It may have been the writer but having it in quotes implies one of the parents said it. And you're right, it's a stupid use of it. I think whoever said that probably is equally bad at getting criticism.

A doormat is something you step on, not something you cut ties and no longer have a relationship with. It's a purposely dishonest metaphor. The parents in question are painting themselves as victims, as if their children owe them a relationship.

Most family strife can be mended by appealing to the readers of the Wall Street Journal.

So this Laura Wellington absolutely was a child abuser and is crying about being kicked out of her family’s life.

Please explain the metaphor of how you can be a doormat for an estranged child

This 100%

But they'll be sure to have their church group pray for you. So that's just as good, right? 🙄

THIS. I have a full-time job and kid. Dad is retired and lives alone, yet he kept bailing on scheduled calls right beforehand!

My daughter does that to me - I try to be reasonably available - she is 30- while thinking I can’t imagine my parents even picking up the phone when I was her age.

Going on 10-12 years maybe?

My stepmother used to complain that I never called her and my dad. They live on the other side of town and I haven’t spoken to them in 4 years because I blocked my stepmother’s number (for many good reasons) and apparently my own father can’t call me on his own.

Oof.

Almost the same thing over here. After years of scheduling calls only to have him bail right beforehand (and disappointing my kid!), I just stopped initiating. Haven’t heard from him in almost two years. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Almost every therapist I had as a teenager drilled into me that I must endure my parent's abuse because he only wanted to "protect me". I was badgered into telling him I loved him and his AP despite their emotional torture. Children want to love their parents. They don't go NC for fun.

They aren't treating you like a "doormat" if they're not talking to you.

how are you a doormat for someone who doesn't talk to you. what do you think a doormat is

1. Are you a doormat, or are you ignored? These are two mutually exclusive concepts. Learn to think and write. 2. Narcissists are finally giving their side? Oh wow, stop the presses.

These people are child abusers and you are enabling them.

cringe

The harmful behaviour: Unchecked addiction. Physical abuse. Emotional abuse. Theft. Love that you're acting as though the parents misspoke one time and the kids flounced.

"you can't fire me, I quit!"

This particular population doesn’t need anyone’s help climbing up on the cross, but here you are anyway

Because rich assholes have to spend the money on something.

Once I was no longer useful in being a dependent for tax purposes, or someone that would give money or have things to just take, my father stopped talking to me, and sought to be the parasite with my sister and other family. He is alone now, and honestly do not really care.

idiot

@ebernsteinwsj.bsky.social Children can't use parents as doormats without being in contact with them. Stop indulging the narcissistic victimhood fantasies of people so toxic their own children cut them off.

I've never wanted to tap the "tap to unmute" button less

This is some loser energy “your licensed mental healthcare professional is wrong. So let me publicly insult you about being a whiny lil bitch so you’re guilted into interacting with me again. And then I’ll never let you live it down”. And you said “print it”.

Fuck them

They think *they're* the doormats? And just what do their adult children think? Any adult is free to choose for themself whether to allow any other adult in their life.

“Parents publicly blast their adult children for cutting them off” sounds like a chill and not-at-all-toxic way to deal with it, can’t imagine why their kids don’t want to be around them

@wsj.com do y’all always only tell one side of the story or just when you’re interviewing parents trashing their estranged adult kids? Surely y’all could’ve tracked these adults down and interviewed them also.

Hell yeah brother this post is rude as hell 🖕😎🖕

This is the objectively best way those parents could have possibly chosen to prove that they weren't abusive.

As a person who can relate I appreciate the humor in the phrasing of it taking years for the parents to even notice their narcissistic bubbles had been dead-malled. “(5 years of silence) Hey! Nobody’s here to react to my drama!” Tumbleweeds drift past

WSJ: But what about the abusers?

Q: Why won't my kid's visit me? A: 🤷 Better start a podcast! None of these pushing-back parents are pressed as to why their kids hate them, or perhaps most precisely, none will admit to knowing. Kind of a weird gap in their origin stories!

That's the problem. Everyone is the main character now.

she didn't mean to make that face but she started picturing her kids living happy, peaceful lives in her absence and just got *so mad*

Now she uses that face on checkout clerks at Target at Safeway regularly.

Exactly this! Tell us you’re a toxic mother without using the words, “toxic mother.” I think her offspring have the right idea.

Their entire self-identity revolves around being flawless victims. Why should they make amends for their own persecution? 🙄

You’re not really a doormat if you’re not allowed at my house now are you.

this is the middle class version of "she turned the weens agenst us"

Yes

Wild. Wonder if my Mom is going to personally get my sister's husband back from Mexico and then apologize for voting for the person who if forcing her to choose between her family and living in the US... nah, probably not.

Right out the gate this woman calls her child "an ungrateful little bastard". Her daughter's estrangement is completely justified.

This headline makes no sense

Sounds like their kids were right to cut them off and will stay estranged What sad, angry, selfish people.

Sounds like you're still cut off though??

*I am the victim* Piss off

I don’t have the money for therapy. But I also don’t have the patience to put up with my abusers any longer. Many of us have cut ties with parents because they have no accountability and no interest in changing. Consequences! They’re not just for kids!

Boomers are so entitled they think you owe them your love.

She sounds *awful* and her TikToks are worse than I imagined. Absolutely no self-awareness

lol

I don't know why this needs to be explained but estranged children don't want their parents around to be anything. Another shit take from the WSJ

the wsj isn't even useful as toilet paper at this point

You put your doormat in the garage because it was cutting up your feet, and now it's come to life to complain to the WSJ about you?

great way to make the estrangement permanent and show us why it happened in the first place!

Abandoning your kid's relationship a second time will definitely work for these people

good thing their children already cut contact so they don't have to listen to them speaking about about how it's them who are actually the victim

Stay mad

this framing is fucking garbage

Maybe the parents shouldn’t suck shit in the first place

WSJ editor: I DARVOed the headline real good just like you said, boss.

Silver lining: these parents will save a ton of money on Christmas presents and travel

I cannot fathom how someone can choose to have a child and have less of a sense of obligation to an actual human person than I have to a goddamn cat. Don't get me wrong, cats are _great_.

if you didn't want to get estranged, you shouldn't have estranged 'em. reminds me of something Anne LaMott said about family and writers: "If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.”

Right? Like way to prove the point!!

How many of these parents threatened to disown the kids for one thing or another? How many people heard that threat from their parents? I’ll start: 🙋🏼‍♀️

As someone who cut her toxic parents ten years too late, I just want to say:

This has to be clickbait but no way am I clicking through to read about "World's Worst Parent doesn't understand why me being willing to give an interview about how awful I am is exactly why my child doesn't want anything to do with me".

Apparently these estranged parents have never been to therapy themselves? And are taking whatever feels they have about this situation on the road in a public "I did nothing wrong" tour? Embarrassing.

I had to come to terms with the fact that my abusers were going to badmouth me with an entirely false narrative. The people I most want in my life know the truth, and I'm well past trying to justify myself to people who prefer the lie.

"She says she broke off ties with one of her adult daughters..." This dumbfuck estranged herself and then threw herself a pity party about it online. Sounds like her kid made a wise decision.

"Murderers are speaking out about their ostracization for having a passion in life."

The whiniest, most entitled, toxic generation in history has had enough of being called out

"I'm so persecuted because you won't let me abuse you or your children."

They are clearly controlling and entitled dickheads

Parents who are estranged never stopped speaking out. It's all they do. That was the problem.

We don’t care what abusive parents think. The fact they feel entitled to access to their children is proof enough of their toxicity. Children aren’t property of their parents.

bsky.app/profile/momu...

maybe they shouldn't have been shitty parents

no

Maybe the provably bad parent should go to a therapist instead of the press. This year, due to the illness and death of the woman who raised me, I've had to have contact with my mum for the first time in 20 years. Within 2 minutes she demonstrated why I was right to cut her out of my life.