yours and your mother's concerns

[Blaze]

When my mom was pregnant with me she was very lonely & depressed. She was originally from England & had just moved to America & obviously hadn't gotten to know anyone yet & the culture was different for her. Apparently this caused her to grow very attached to me. She wished for a loving, deep, artistic child who liked dragons. Interestingly enough, I have always fit that criteria. It's kind of weird because I was obsessed with dragons as a kid.

this is very interesting, exactly how i was thinking this topic could be talked about when i posted the thread.

i was born in 1964, before feminism really took hold. my mother was a high school foreign language teacher. when she began to to "show" her pregnancy, she was fired. i guess pregnancy was obscene for high school students to see back then.

ok so on to her "concerns". she was only 22 years old when she gave birth to me and had only just gotten married. she wasn't ready for a child, but my father had convinced her that unprotected sex was the most natural thing for them to do. well, naturally, she became preganant. she has shared with me over the years that she didn't want to have kids so soon, and also that she deeply resented having gotten fired from work due to her pregnancy, which ended up being the beginning of a long trend of not reaching her career goals. so her concerns, in a nutshell, were her relationship with my father and work. she is my benefactor.

i have always felt that i have had to fulfill a mission from her to succeed at work and to rise in the hierarchy. that the purpose of my life is to live this out, in part for her. we even connect best on work related issues. she is very interested in all the politics and strategizing, etc that comes with the kind of work that i do, and unlike the vast majority of nearly everyone on the rest of the planet, can talk about it for quite some time.

when i compare this to how i feel about my own kids i can see a pattern. with my first, i wanted to love my child. what better type for an ILE than an ESE, if this is the desired outcome? indeed, ESE is well loved by nearly all people. with my second, i wanted most to be able to help her. what better type for an ILE to help than another ILE?

i kind of think that there is something to the idea that mothers imbue their children with purposes and missions. and that mothers do that more than fathers. being a mom myself, and looking at my own mom, i can see there's something there, but trying to figure out what, is where i thought the group consensus might be helpful.

[DirectorAbbie]

I talked to an older woman at the facility where I'm doing my childcare practicum. She fully believed the mother's concerns during pregnency have a direct effect on the child's personality. I interviewed my mother (SLI) and got these results.

First Child: She was hoping she could find a good doctor to deliver the baby. She was concerned that there was no place to put the baby and not enough money for baby things. She was also concerned that she didn't know anybody and therefore couldn't expect a baby shower to get baby things.
Result: An LII who needs very little room, is frugal, and isn't very social.

Second Child: She was hoping for a healthier baby who was livelier than the first.
Result: A healthy LSE who sometimes took her clothes off and made her mom chase her around the house.

Third Child: She was worried about the age gap and wanted a child who would get along well with the other. She was also concerned because she had to find a new hospital and wanted the most natural birth possible.
Result: An easygoing SEI.

Fourth Child: She wanted a child with more spunk and would like someone to help with physical work.
Result: An athletic SLE.

[pianosinger]

I talked to an older woman at the facility where I'm doing my childcare practicum. She fully believed the mother's concerns during pregnency have a direct effect on the child's personality. I interviewed my mother (SLI) and got these results.

It has been proven (I believe) that stress and anxiety in a pregnant woman does affect her unborn child. To take it so far as to say a child's Socionics type (particularly the Vulnerable function as the OP asserted) is determined by the mother's concerns is much more questionable. Especially as it has been pointed out that even twins pretty much always have different personalities.

First Child: She was hoping she could find a good doctor to deliver the baby. She was concerned that there was no place to put the baby and not enough money for baby things. She was also concerned that she didn't know anybody and therefore couldn't expect a baby shower to get baby things.
Result: An LII who needs very little room, is frugal, and isn't very social.

Second Child: She was hoping for a healthier baby who was livelier than the first.
Result: A healthy LSE who sometimes took her clothes off and made her mom chase her around the house.

Third Child: She was worried about the age gap and wanted a child who would get along well with the other. She was also concerned because she had to find a new hospital and wanted the most natural birth possible.
Result: An easygoing SEI.

Fourth Child: She wanted a child with more spunk and would like someone to help with physical work.
Result: An athletic SLE.

Highly coincidental, IMO. Besides, even these examples do not support the original theory, that the mother's concerns determine the PoLR. At least, not the way I am understanding the theory's assertions.

[pianosinger]

But, I will reveal my own concerns from when I was expecting each of my boys. Just for the sake of argument, or whatever.

Child One: DH and I had to move in with his parents for a while, so it wasn't always easy for me psychologically, living in someone else's home. However, I was not very stressed about this initially (it took about a year for the stress to really hit, and by then my son was already born). I actually was kind of glad for the fact that I wouldn't be in a house alone with a new baby while my husband went off to work (he also worked out of his parents' home as he was helping with the family business). My biggest concern actually was that I might have a premature delivery like my mom did with all of her babies (or would have except she went on bedrest with the last three to prevent premature birth). So I was actually rather relaxed and inactive during much of my pregnancy, and ended up actually going past my due date. At that point, I finally was a little stressed, because I was worried that the baby might not arrive before my mom flew up to see him.

Child Two: I was dealing with a very active, stubborn 2-year-old. I stressed myself out trying to get him potty trained before his baby brother arrived, and it was all in vain and resulting in a lot of willfulness on his side and on mine (think epic Se struggle, or at least that's what it felt like). I was quite active with this pregnancy, unlike my first. I was determined not to go past my due date again, and I was doing everything in my power to help things along. I wanted a natural labor, so I did my research and prepared for that. Aside from the potty training struggle, though, I did not feel very stressed and was truly looking forward to having this baby. It wasn't until after the birth that the anxiety triggered.

[Creepy-]

I interviewed my mother (SLI) and got these results.

First Child: She was hoping she could find a good doctor to deliver the baby. She was concerned that there was no place to put the baby and not enough money for baby things. She was also concerned that she didn't know anybody and therefore couldn't expect a baby shower to get baby things.
Result: An LII who needs very little room, is frugal, and isn't very social.

Second Child: She was hoping for a healthier baby who was livelier than the first.
Result: A healthy LSE who sometimes took her clothes off and made her mom chase her around the house.

Third Child: She was worried about the age gap and wanted a child who would get along well with the other. She was also concerned because she had to find a new hospital and wanted the most natural birth possible.
Result: An easygoing SEI.

Fourth Child: She wanted a child with more spunk and would like someone to help with physical work.
Result: An athletic SLE.

Correlation does not equate causation (necessarily).

I have no reason to doubt you're lying, but if the test supposedly conducted was actually conducted, and it got those results, I would say that it pretty much destroys this theory. If all these premises hold true then, I would consider your mother's case(s) pure coincidences.

[The Ineffable]

Fourth Child: She wanted a child with more spunk and would like someone to help with physical work.
Result: An athletic SLE.

And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, and it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
And the Devil said, This is Director bullshit: and he was sent to hell.
And the Devil said, Conquerors are strong but lazy bastards, Thy mother shall get no help.
And God said, No, begone beast.
And the Devil lit a cigar and said, Wanna bet?
And God said, No: and there was no more evil in Heaven.

[The Ineffable]

Third Child: She was worried about the age gap and wanted a child who would get along well with the other. She was also concerned because she had to find a new hospital and wanted the most natural birth possible.
Result: An easygoing SEI.

I would like to mention that "repressed" does not mean "easygoing", if the case. He's not a pet and I'm in doubt whether you pay much attention to tell the difference, though I like to think that you do. Having that you're Te-Base and he's Te-PoLR, still you state that he's "easygoing" sounds terrifying to me.

(This haunted me since I read that post, yes. I have seen how damaging is for an SEI to grow in the shadow of a LSE and I can easily connect the lack of freedom with eating too much, too.)

[DirectorAbbie]

I would like to mention that "repressed" does not mean "easygoing", if the case. He's not a pet and I'm in doubt whether you pay much attention to tell the difference, though I like to think that you do. Having that you're Te-Base and he's Te-PoLR, still you state that he's "easygoing" sounds terrifying to me.

(This haunted me since I read that post, yes. I have seen how damaging is for an SEI to grow in the shadow of a LSE and I can easily connect the lack of freedom with eating too much, too.)

I asked him whether I was bossy and he said that I'm not bossy, I'm demanding, and it's easy to ignore demands. I've found it's easier to get him to do things for a stupid reason than for a good reason. My IEE dad gets along worse with him because he expects him to be like an IEE or an SLI and thus doesn't understand him at all.

[The Ineffable]

I asked him whether I was bossy and he said that I'm not bossy, I'm demanding, and it's easy to ignore demands. I've found it's easier to get him to do things for a stupid reason than for a good reason. My IEE dad gets along worse with him because he expects him to be like an IEE or an SLI and thus doesn't understand him at all.

I understand. Note that I'm not referring to bossiness, but rather limiting his horizons. I now recall that I was living with a LSE cousin - she was quite some years older than me and my brother - she couldn't order me what to do, still I felt her mental pressure. From what I can recall, once outraged me by breaking my magpie eggs (IN MY ABSENCE, the bitch), other time she pressed me to break-open the turtle ones for the reason their time was up for long. Yes, she was right, the time was up, but I had to discover that, I need to see all the "whys" and "hows" and it's for no use to me to be told that things are a certain way if I don't understand/experience them. In fact, as I don't know for sure what happened to those magpie eggs because I didn't see them myself - words are just words - nor I was compared the incubation time vs the time they were left there, I still don't believe her today; to me, she remained - based on that case and similar ones - a totally unreliable and often dishonest person, so I tend to oppose and distrust her in any situation that I can't verify - basically doing the opposite of what she says, when I'm unsure, because what she says now sounds like bullshit.
(btw, one turtle egg contained a black mummified little turtle, like a gem, which my mother - another Ej type - considered garbage and threw away without admitting it)

So this is the problem, Alpha Irrational children need to discover everything by themselves, without being told what's true or false, good or bad, right or wrong - apart for general lines, lawfulness - otherwise they may become confused rebels without a cause: a really embarrassing personality trait, being irrationally undisciplined without an intellectual support for it (intellectual base that again, Alpha Irrationals IMO can get solely by having this freedom to discover and decide).
The same thing I observe in my gf, she's the same "rebel" with her LSE mother and often other people, rarely on actual reasonable grounds. And guess what, I recently heard her mother blaming herself for letting her daughter making her studies in a remote city (my city, actually), she still believes that "too much freedom" made her so obstinate, while in fact it's the opposite!

So yeah, when I was saying "pet" I was rather thinking of keeping it in a leash/yard (limited world of ideas and facts), rather than daily commanding/enforcing. Btw, I observed that pets used with the outside tend to come back, the others tend to get lost .

[DirectorAbbie]

So yeah, when I was saying "pet" I was rather thinking of keeping it in a leash/yard (limited world of ideas and facts), rather than daily commanding/enforcing. Btw, I observed that pets used with the outside tend to come back, the others tend to get lost .

I don't supervise him into holding back. The challenge is getting Squishy to move. With the pet analogy, I need a carrot on a string, not a leash.

[The Ineffable]

The challenge is getting Squishy to move. With the pet analogy, I need a carrot on a string, not a leash.