i just started The Woman Destroyed, and i’m reading about the narrator’s conflict with her son’s wife, Irene. she says that she feels Irene will “wipe out” whatever life she built for her son, and that she has no part or say in her son’s life anymore. she’s bitter toward Irene because she thinks she’s not passionate about anything, but is that really the only reason why? is the fault with the narrator or Irene, or both?
also, this is sticking with me because i don’t want my relationship with my boyfriend’s mom to be like this. we’re still fairly young, in our teens, and i want to do anything to make sure i keep a good relationship with his mom. i don’t want her to feel like she doesn’t have a part in her son’s life anymore, or that i stole him away, but at the same time this book made me realize i feel a sort of jealously toward her as well. she’s the only other female except for his sister that he spends so much time with. should the mother of your partner be more important to them, all in all?
by throwrastrawbery
5 Comments
As a teenager? Yes, your mother should absolutely be more important to you than your partner. He sounds really lucky to have a great relationship with her. Unless your parent is abusive or absent, your teenage relationship shouldn’t take priority over the relationship you have with your parents.
I haven’t read the book, so I can’t speak to that, but while it’s just as important for parents to allow kids to grow up and make their own choices, it’s also just as important to try to maintain a relationship with your parents as you grow into a young adult.
I wouldn’t take to heart the musings of a pedophile. You can have a great relationship with your mother in law.
I’d recommend reading about who the author is before taking advice from her.
” French author Bianca Lamblin (originally Bianca Bienenfeld) wrote in her book Mémoires d’une jeune fille dérangée (published in English under the title A Disgraceful Affair) that, while a student at Lycée Molière, she was sexually exploited by her teacher Beauvoir, who was in her 30s.[41] Sartre and Beauvoir both groomed and sexually abused Lamblin.[42] In 1943, Beauvoir was suspended from her teaching position when she was accused of seducing her 17-year-old lycée pupil Natalie Sorokine in 1939.[43] Sorokine’s parents laid formal charges against Beauvoir for debauching a minor (the age of consent in France at the time was 15[citation needed]), and Beauvoir’s licence to teach in France was revoked, although it was subsequently reinstated.[44]
In 1977, Beauvoir signed a petition seeking to completely remove the age of consent in France, a move which would ultimately lead to the loss of her teaching license.[45] She, along with other French intellectuals, supported the freeing of three arrested paedophiles.[46][11] The petition also explicitly addresses the ‘Affaire de Versailles’, where three adult men, Dejager (age 45), Gallien (age 43), and Burckhardt (age 39) raped minors from both genders aged 12–13.[47][48]”
You’re a teenager, so please do not internalise anything Simone has written,,,, because she was not a good woman.
Simone de Beauvoir must have been the mother-in-law from hell. It’s at least a little funny how in her head her son has almost no agency. I wonder if she really thinks it’s her DIL who’s preventing her from having a relationship with him, or is it too painful or ego-bruising even for a tough cookie like her to admit that her grown son prefers as little contact with her as posible.