revenge

>Passive Aggression for the Obsessive Compulsive

874
15 years
by in parents, passive, passive aggressive, revenge

>When kids feel the heat of angry adults, they have many choices in how to react. Some return the anger with physically aggressive behavior. Others remain passive and walk on eggshells to placate the adult. This example, submitted by Robert on 9/27/09, shows a child with his own style of responding to an playmate’s hostile mother:

As a child I was occasionally forced to endure the overbearingly strict rules enforced by my friends’ parents. At this point it is important to note that I believe rules are essential for any child. In the case of my friend Dave Thompson however, his parents didn’t just set the ordinary rules as expected from any parent.

Upon arrival at Dave’s house, I would be given the ‘orientation’ by his mother, in which she would warn me of the repercussions for touching or moving anything besides what she had given Dave to play with for the day. Even these toys had to be returned before beginning any new activity, the punishment being ‘automatic suspension’ from Dave’s house for the foreseeable future. Every time I moved away from the toys we had been given for even a second, Dave’s mother would appear, hovering over us, watching over my every move.

Eventually I grew tired with these overbearing rules, along with Dave’s constant insecurity at upsetting his mother. I realized my own inability as a young child to face up to this fearsome woman, so devised the perfect plan to take revenge in my own subtle way. I noticed that his mother was constantly obsessing that every item in the house be situated exactly where she wished it to be. I convinced Dave to join me in my evil retaliation scheme. We moved every item in the playroom ever so slightly out of position, just enough that it wouldn’t be noticeable to any regular human being, besides to our very own Mrs. Thompson of course.

Think he was ever invited back? How long do you think it took Mrs. Thompson to rearrange her world?

What did you do when you were a kid to deal with the mean parent on the block?

>Passive Aggressive Revenge!

0
15 years
by in family members, revenge, text message

>I’ve been hearing and reading funny examples lately of people using passive aggressive means to get revenge at those who have slighted them, broken rules, or just plain pissed them off. Here’s one that was posted by Demetrius Jones Owens on 9/23/09:

In my house growing up text messages, emails, and instant messages were not considered means of communication that were consistent. In saying this, it is to be noted that my mother’s number one communication rule was to either have a face-to-face conversation with the person or call the person to explain what was needed.

So my cousins came to visit during the summer of 2000 and were a lot older than me so they were allowed more freedom and alone time than me since I was only 13. The rules were easy for them to follow and worked well at first with them calling every few hours when they would go out and so my mother became more easy going with them going out.

The problem came one night when they wanted to go to a club that was known to have underage drinking and a lot of fights, so my cousins decide that was where they wanted to go and devised a plan how to go. The night was going fine until my mother called them while they were in the club; obviously not to give away there location they decided to text her that they were out with friends and they would be home later and to please leave door open.

The night continued and they were still out when my mother got the bright idea to not leave the door open since they decided that they would disobey her rules, and subsequently they came home to find the door locked. They called the house phone and cell phones for about 20 minutes straight trying to get in the house but to no avail, and evenly received a text message that said “text messages are not reliable. I am sending this to you at 11pm letting you know we are going to my mothers and will be back in two days, be home by 3am if going”. They looked at their phones it was 5am.

Please leave your own stories of revenge–passive aggressive style.

Signe Whitson is an author and educator on bullying, crisis intervention, and child and adolescent emotional and behavioral health. In her articles, books, and training workshops, Signe provides down-to-earth, practical advice for professionals and parents on navigating the daily challenges of living and working with children, tweens and teens.

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