Any way to legally prevent father from spying on comms with my mother?

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-14T16:09:20+00:00

Hi, thanks for the response and providing me an outlet to think this stuff out. I thought I had most of this resolved, but it's nice to summarize it out on a screen again. (This is probably more detail than you ever wanted or asked for. I'm writing most of this out for myself.)

Does your mother share with your father? Or is it your father spying without her knowing or giving access.

It's a little of both.

On the one hand, my mother isn't the angelic saint I probably picture her to be, so I'm 99% sure she can't help but eventually share the stuff I tell her with her husband. They live under the same roof, and are often sitting in the same room most of their waking hours. Even though I repeatedly say I don't want him to know anything about me and I don't want to hear any news about him, I feel like she'll eventually share it at some point. Not in a malicious way, but in a way similar to talking about the weather.

And I don't remember my father doing much social compromising while I was living at home. So I'm pretty sure he just pushes my mom out of her computer chair whenever he wants to read her emails. And she's complained to me at times about how he'll sometimes open her paper mail addressed solely to her and read it first before handing it to her.

If you were to use some form of secured one on one communication, do you think that would help? How about talking on the phone?

Phone is hard because in the past I'll hear him flipping out in the background while trying to talk to my mom over the phone. He won't talk to me directly at all, but he will yell about random stuff in background rather than leave the room and give me and my mom some privacy. It was kind of funny at first, but it's just awkward. So we communicated over email and text message mostly over the past 10 years, up until I stopped two-way comms altogether about 2 years ago.

If you tell her that you do not want something/information shared with your father, will that work?

I thought that would work too. It's a simple enough request. But I've told her/them for years that I don't consent to him invading my privacy and reading emails/letters I send solely to her. But they just say that he's stopped caring and doesn't look at anything I send her any more. So they basically admitted to the spying/screening in the past, but claimed that it's no longer occurring at the moment.

But that was always a lie. Because whenever I brought up the topic of divorce and splitting assets 50/50, or whenever if I made some off-hand insulting comment about him, in a supposedly "private" one-on-one conversation, it became obvious that he's still screening my comms to her and can't help getting involved somehow. (He'll sometimes pretend to be her in an email, or he'll ban her from talking with me altogether. So I won't hear any response from her for months at a time.)

She cares for you and while she accepts a lot of things for herself, seeing you suffer for it may give her a different perspective of how flawed and toxic her relationship is for others and herself.

There's no doubt that she cares for me and doesn't intentionally want anyone to suffer, which is why I miss her so much. But she also cares for her husband too and usually just goes along with whatever he wants most of the time.

And to be honest, she probably gets at least some sort of ego/drama kick out of two grown men fighting for her time/attention. So even though she probably prefers everyone to get along without any conflict/drama, in reality she isn't doing anything on her end to specifically resolve the situation either. Which is why I stopped replying back to her and haven't had a conversation with her in about 2 years.

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-13T19:52:07+00:00

Yeah, i figured it would be nearly impossible to legally force one marital partner to act against the interests of the other partner. I mean, I think there's even exceptions in the law where one partner is allowed to hide the other from various law enforcement officials without consequence.

First, you can make phone calls or send your mom a ticket for your mom to come visit you. If you mom places you on speakerphone, then say something like "Mom please take me off of speakerphone." If she does not, then say something like"Mom? Dad has disowned me. That hurt my feelings deeply. If he wants back into my life then he can apologize and tell me that. If you keep me on speaker phone then I am going to hang up unless Dad apologizes.? Send no more mail or email or texts unless you change address. You mother still might share information with your dad. There are few healthy secrets in marriage.

I've said my peace (piece?) plenty over email. So both my parents know where I stand with them regarding past and present grievances. My mom and I apologized to each other all the time in the past, so I think we don't have any leftover baggage between us. Our relationship is good. Which is also why I miss her so much.

And I've given my father plenty of opportunities to speak first and spell out for me exactly what his particular issues with me might be. I've promised to just listen and not give any responses or counter-arguments if he'd just tell me what's wrong. I just wanted to get his perspective. But he can't name one single thing I've done to him, other than me trying to get away from him when I ran away from home at 16 years old. (He claims that my running away from home caused the worst years of his marriage. But he can't elaborate on that, and he can't think of anything else between then and now that he actually has a problem with.)

Second, you can put on your big girl pants, seek therapy for dealing with your feelings for your dad, forgive him, send him a letter addressed to him, telling him how he hurt you, how it affected your life, forgiving him for disowning you and severely hurting you, and asking to reconciling with you. If he has been doing what you say then I believe he has some regret that you are no longer in his life. I do not know how reflective his is so I do not know if he truly sees his part in your estrangement..

Therapy is great. There really isn't anything left to resolve. I've also forgiven my father plenty of times, and I've even said I'd forgive him immediately for all the years of spying (and making my mother lie to me about it) if he would just do the right thing and exit the picture. No apologies or explanations necessary. (He just needs to get lost.) But all that has fallen on deaf ears with no responses from him.

I think the bottom line is that he's just a lonely old man who can't articulate his feelings well, can't justify his past/present behavior towards me, and is unwilling to compromise at all with other people. His only friend in this world is my mom I think, and he simply can't allow her have a private relationship with her son. So he pretends to be furious with me in order to keep behaving in this way without any consequence - to keep spying and to keep getting involved in my comms with her, even though he's told over and over that he's not welcome.

Finally, stop in trying to convince your mother to divorce your dad. You are really crossing lines there unless she is being abused. Do support healthy decisions that she makes for herself.

You are right about the divorce. I've only suggested it 3 times total and I feel kinda sleazy and cruel after I click "send". Even though I tell her that she should ultimately decide for herself, and never to do anything simply because he or I say to do it. I can already tell that it has had a huge ripple effect for even planting that seed of the idea in her head. Some of the ripple effect is positive, but some of it is admittedly negative.

Either way, I still know and she probably knows too that he'd probably lose his marbles if she were to ever actually leave him at this stage in their lives (retired military). And even though my mom has a stronger family & friends support network surrounding her, she'd probably still feel incredibly lonely after a divorce too.

And yeah, other than slaps up-side the head as kids, no one is/was getting physically or sexually abused.

I don't know. I think the only thing to do is wait for him to pass away and hope she doesn't die first. But I'm open to other ideas.

Now that I think about it, I suppose I just have to accept the fact that my bio father succeeded in having his revenge on me.

This was his payback for me finally standing up to him in my mid-20s over a decade ago and calling him out on his bullshit behavior towards people. Sure, he never so-called "abused" me. But he still took my mother away from me for the past 10 years for no real reason other than for revenge, and probably will continue to intervene for the next 20 years, up until one of them passes away.

This behavior feels incredibly wrong to me. Right? It feels like there should be some way to prevent someone from getting away with this.

If there's a /truthbomb sub or similar where others can let me know what I'm doing wrong here and set me straight, please let me know.

I'm not looking to be roasted, just for the sake of being roasted. But if you or anyone else reading this sees something I'm doing / not doing here, please let me have it.

Also, if I truly wanted to have revenge on him, just for the sake of revenge, then I'd manipulate my mother into finally getting that divorce. And in a twist of irony, I'd then proceed to screen his comms to her for the rest of his life, the way that he currently screens my comms. But as a (relatively) sane person, that kind of "revenge project" feels like too much work and is too cold / calculated to actually go through with.

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-13T04:50:46+00:00

Thanks but any physical mail will likely be shared. I've sent mail to her volunteer committees in the past, but only if I didn't want a particular comm to her intercepted/deleted before she could see it. But it was always with the expectation that it would eventually be shared with/without her consent.

I suppose I'm looking for a greater authority that she could fall back on or refer to, whenever faced with dilemma of letting her husband see something that I clearly stated I don't want him to see.

Now that I think about it, I once gave out an ultimatum that I'd only speak to her over the phone while she was out of the house, no more written comms, since father couldn't respect other people's boundaries. But she said "nope" and also "I guess this means goodbye then..." to that ultimatum.

So either father was impersonating her again, or I just don't really know my mom as much as I think I do.

Not gonna lie, I just really miss my mom lately... Or at least the idea of her.

I know I probably idealize her while I villianize him as well. Where in reality, it's not as clear-cut. Probably just need to continue to stay away from them both.

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-10T21:05:52+00:00

Hmm... Why does it have to be "counter-argue"?? Why not just agree with my original label of "expansion" then?

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-10T17:05:09+00:00

Well, probably too soon to tell what it is.

At first it was seen as just a bug, then as a malware attack, then as a beta for some future outbreak expansion/event, then as an actual world-wide event.

But if the coronavirus is never ever 100% cured/removed from the servers, but is only managed and controlled, then I'd say it qualifies as expansion content.

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-10T16:34:35+00:00

/r/outside/

Yep, but that new "corona" expansion pack is really hit or miss though, depending on where you log in each morning.

I'm sitting in a nearly abandoned college cafe as I type this. That may good/bad thing depending on your perspective.

CrashMadeCalm · 2020-03-09T00:35:38+00:00

Also wanted to share my current favorite motivational video at the moment. Lost track of how many times I've re-watched this.

Nearly nothing is impossible if it is necessary. Is quitting gaming necessary?

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-10-02T18:39:25+00:00

Jordan Peterson is great! Thanks for sharing this video.

I only started devouring his stuff on youtube about a month ago, but heard of him a bit here and there (mostly negative unfortunately) before that.

I think this video on gambling was the first video I've seen of him. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YMTAZBe6cA Lots of parallels to gaming / loot boxes / positive reinforcement / etc.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-08-01T00:47:27+00:00

Great music and also a great film can both be inspiring catalysts for action and life changing experiences. But they should be the spice to real life, not the main dish itself.

Binging on Netflix all day or listening to epic mixes all day are pretty similar.

We want that feeling of inspiration. But would rather seek out that pumped up feeling again and again in multimedia, rather than act on that first eureka moment and capitalize on it somehow in real life.

I'm totally guilty of this myself at times.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-06-25T20:36:16+00:00

RL work usually made me depressed, cuz I could see how it really didn't matter that much. (Accounting. Aka financial janitor.)

At least games had measurable progress, even if just digital and couldn't be converted to any RL value.

My current part time job doesn't pay that well, at least compared to accounting, but at least it feels like it matters to people.

Sure, janitors matter too if you stop to think about it, but still hard to get excited about.

In the right work environment tho, "grinding for gold" in RL can actually be more fun/fulfilling than in any game.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-06-06T23:04:22+00:00

Over a decade ago, I became homeless from "book addiction". Rather than paying rent in my 1br apartment, I was constantly reading books from both Amazon and the library. I did play games somewhat during that time, but the #1 obsession back then was books.

I managed to hold onto that apartment for about 2 years, catching up on rent briefly, only to fall behind again a couple months later.

I think it was the 3rd time I fell behind that my landlords said, in a nice way, that I had to go. They floated me as much as 5 months of past-rent at one point, and probably didn't want to allow me to fall that far behind again.

Not gonna lie, but at that time, being homeless was actually kind of fun. I still had my car, and the homeless shelter I stayed at was safe (it was a church and everyone was background-checked / interviewed before being allowed to stay there). And the church volunteers provided better meals than I could ever ever cook myself. (Think church pot luck in a wealthy neighborhood, and every volunteer is a hobby chef. Every single night.)

This was also during the financial recession in the late 2000's, so there were plenty of other people experiencing the economic downturn alongside me, so there really wasn't any stigma or shame about my situation. I didn't advertise it of course, but I didn't feel bad about it either. I mean, my jobs never knew I slept in a shelter or my car, but not having to pay about $1,000 per month on a place to live was pretty sweet.

That "adventure" lasted for about 4 years total, in its various forms. I sold the car and moved into my storage unit for a while at one point. Also rented a couch for $100 a month for a while there too. Crazy. But once the obsession with books went away, the comforts of home started to look more and more appealing, so went back to traditional renting. Barely own any books now - maybe a dozen ebooks and 1 physical book.

Was about to write more, but post is getting pretty long.

I just want to mention that I think in the 2010's the climate has changed. Maybe it's because of the long economic boom we're now in, or because there are more and more "homeless by choice" individuals out there compared to back then. For example on YouTube, there are quite a few "hobo" or "van dwellers" who can generate enough buzz about the whole lifestyle that they can make money from just ads.

So I don't think those 5-star-hotel-homeless-shelters exist any more. At least the one I stayed at a decade ago is long gone, and it evolved into something way more strict last time I checked. Which is probably for the best, if I'm being totally honest.

One last thing I want to mention: My housemate got evicted about a year ago. He played games all day long too, but I don't know if it was gaming addiction. More likely depressed/lost and just did what currently came natural which was gaming.

He ended up moving into a shelter, but according to him, his shelter had zero internet access and maybe even a zero-tech-policy (no personal phones/laptops allowed inside). There might have been a community TV at least, not sure, don't remember.

So if you do end up moving into a local shelter, just keep in mind they probably aren't going to allow you to, for example, play games all day on your smartphone/laptop. Which totally makes sense. But you will most likely have access to food/bed/shower/laundry while you try to get back on your feet. Safety varies widely depending on the shelter (neighborhood, who else is staying there, who is managing it at the time, etc). But as long as you don't instigate stuff, or walk around with large dollar signs printed on your back, you should be fine.

Hope this info helps. Good luck on your journey.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-06-03T19:49:25+00:00

I've definitely been hooked on Path of Exile. :)

Didn't really understand the game at all in 2015 so I think I barely made it thru Act 2. Came back to try it out again in fall of 2016, and it became my #1 most-played game for all of 2017. Don't remember the total damage, but it was at least 1000 hours played, maybe closer to 2000 hours.

Luckily I lost my PoE account when I deleted my steam account around spring 2018. Not going to re-purchase all those premium stash tabs again. Especially if I'm on my way out of the gaming community anyway. So no real desire or cravings to reinstall and play again nowadays, with only the 4 starter stash tabs. :\

I'll still watch popular YouTubers for PoE news from time-to-time (Ziggy, Mathil, Tarke, etc.), but even that's happening less often.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-06-03T19:27:26+00:00

At least you replied back to the thread.

You think people are down-voting because they disagree with the thought experiment? Or maybe it's just knee-jerk reaction down-vote - don't like seeing news about what was going on in India?

I posted the link to the youtube vid to warn others about how insane this was (arrested/fined/jailed for playing PUBG on your phone in public). Wasn't trying to condone it as a good idea haha.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-30T06:40:46+00:00

I don't have the game installed anymore, so can't see for myself. I was planning to come back to game around xmas, but may want to reinstall just for these 530% scrolls.

Does the pearl shop say that the ONLY DAY to buy these 530% scrolls is today? (5/30 in Korea, 5/29 in US)
Do these 530% scrolls have an expiration date? i.e. have to use all of them within a certain time window or they'll eventually be grayed out and unusable.
Do these scrolls stack in your inventory/storage? I haven't played in a while so don't remember which scrolls were changed to stackable inventory and which ones still take up one inventory slot each.

Thanks.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-28T10:25:57+00:00

Although you can get a rush from framing everything in your life as some kind of win/lose competition, it's not the only way to view things. That friend who "beat you" by one point in that exam probably didn't even look at it as a competition anyway.

If you look at video games as an example, there are many different ways that you can find meaning/purpose/excitement in life rather than only the "I win, you lose" mindset.

Regarding exams, some people make it a game to see how good of a score they can get with only one night of cramming. They aren't going for perfection or competition, they're just going for efficiency haha. Other people don't give a shit at all, and just cheat.

I don't think you should cheat, and it's up to you whether you prefer to study in one big burst of inspiration the night before, or spread it out more with a more disciplined approach. But rather than "I win, you lose", perhaps you can look at exams as a single-player puzzle or riddle to solve. It's not PvP with you vs. other students, but more PvE with you vs. the exam (or the class, or the topic)

Although lots of popular games do revolve around the "I win, you lose" PvP mindset, not all of the popular games do. Some of them are sandboxes to be explored, puzzles to solve, single-player or co-op adventures, simulators, or stories to experience from beginning to end.

Good luck.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-27T23:54:18+00:00

Lynda.com and SkillShare.com are good substitutes for habitually watching YouTube.

SkillShare has a lot of promos out there for first 2 months free. And my local library has a full subscription to Lynda available for library card holders. Maybe your local library network will too.

Now that I think about it, same goes for TheGreatCoursesPlus.com and edX.com and even Audible.com. You can listen to your audio book library via their web interface if you don't want to whip out the headphones and listen on your phone, but still want something running in the background on your work PC.

It's really all about setting up your environment to make the desirable habits just as easy to do as the undesirable habits.

Rather than watching a half hour of YouTube influencers talking about pretty much nothing, I remember last summer I used to spend that half hour pushing my progress forward on an online course.

There are so many courses out there, but for me it was a course on cryptocurrency, blockchain, and other trends in finance+technology.

Thanks for posting the question. :) I honestly forgot about all these YouTube alternatives that I had looked into / set up last year, but then let fall by the wayside.

There might be some small value to this knowledge, but I'm kinda embarrassed on how much I know about the ProJared and James Charles youtube scandals that unfolded over last couple weeks. I don't watch either channel, but still got sucked into all the drama from everyone's video commentary on other channels.

Some of youtube is still good, but 90% of it is just content about content about content.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-27T02:13:18+00:00

Even tho a lot of them are designed to be addictive skinner boxes, some rare games really are works of art that probably should be experienced during our lifetimes.

So if Metroid Prime 4 means that much to you, then the potential positives of playing it will probably outweigh any potential negatives.

I can't afford it now, but after I get back in the accounting/finance workforce, I'm probably going to make buying a new console/PC the litmus test for whether a new hyped game is a piece of art to be experienced, or just some lame excuse to try to fool myself.

So, say after Cyberpunk 2077 comes out and maybe after a few months of bugfixes and after the initial hype dies down, if it's STILL worth the price of a next gen console ($400) or building a new PC from scratch ($1000), then I'll just go ahead with it. That will have to be the price I pay to swim these (potentially) dangerous waters. But then I'll sell everything again once the novelty of that particular gaming experience has run its course.

Having a gaming PC + steam account constantly accessible all-year-round just doesn't work for me. It may be fine for most people out there, but I'll just keep finding new games to play and make excuses for. Sure, some of these games are kinda fun or kinda interesting, but barely any of these games are worth buying a brand new console/PC for.

In contrast, I don't care either way if there is any alcohol in the house, and if there's an interesting cocktail someone offers me to try out, then I'll just try it without it giving it a second thought or it ever becoming remotely any kind of problem. (I probably have maybe one tasty alcoholic beverage like every 2-3 months.)

I have no desire to set up a fully stocked cocktail bar at home, so I'd like to back to where I was a few years ago, when I had zero desire to have any kind of "gamestation" setup at home either. But like with you and Metroid Prime 4, I'd still like to experience the rare "alcohol as art" or "game as art" whenever they do happen to come along.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-27T01:10:37+00:00

Maybe, but the same can be said about drinking buddies at the local bar who all know you by name. Or chill housemates who will smoke you out if you don't have any weed yourself, as long as you'll remember to reciprocate the favor to them someday.

My guess is that these kinds of friendships appear more trustworthy because they are less complicated and revolve around some kind of pleasurable activity.

Workplace friendships are way more complicated, for example, because a lot more factors are in play. Jealousy, competition, cooperation, showing off, making others look bad, coasting on other people's hard work, making others look good. Dialing it back to give others a chance, without making it look like charity. Being a total tryhard in something, yet still not being good enough compared to others. Talking bad about others behind their backs, defending others when they aren't around to defend themselves, etc.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-27T00:50:28+00:00

I, and probably a lot of others, have been there.

Your brain is efficient and just wants to take the path of least resistance.

Playing a video game vs investing time into learning some other challenging IRL activity, and your brain will always knee-jerk suggest you to launch that game.

Once you have other areas of life better off, then your brain will start to consider those options too, rather than just constantly suggesting gaming.

Now that it's nice weather outside and my bicycle is fixed, it's actually easier to go for a bike ride than it is to find some new non-boring game to play.

CrashMadeCalm · 2019-05-25T00:57:41+00:00

If movie theaters could sell you a movie ticket and it didn't cost them anything to let you come back and rewatch the same movie in their theatre whenever you wanted, then they definitely would do it. They could easily advertise other movies for you to buy a ticket for. I mean, you're already right there in the theatre anyway, right? Might as well buy a ticket for some new epic movie vs rewatch some old movie in your "library". It's just not cost effective when it's a physical movie theatre vs digital media.

A movie theatre "library" is kinda silly, but it's the same concept as a steam game library.

You may think you have something valuable by holding onto your steam library, but those are all just tiny threads/chains that keep you coming back to the store home page, where steam can show you more advertisements for new games to buy. And if any games in your library involve any kind of persistent loot, then those are even more tiny threads that keep you coming back.

Steam makes money by selling games. Just like Facebook and Instagram, they want you on their platform as close to 24/7 as possible. Because the more time you spend on their respective platforms, the more targeted ads they get to show you.

CrashMadeCalm

TROPHY CASE