How To Know If You Are Living With A Control Freak?

Living with a parent or grandparent who is a control freak isn't easy. The worst thing is they are not even aware that they are control freak. If they are not aware, they won't realise they have a problem. Without realising that they have a problem, they will not take steps to change their behaviour and thinking.

After a meet-up with a friends lately, talking to him about my problem with my grandfather, he pointed out that grandfather was a control freak. Indeed.

I didn't know how my mother managed to live with him for over twenty years without going crazy but in these 1 year and 8 months that I have lived with him, I have suffered a few mental breakdown. Not only that, some people criticised me as being too emotionally immature or too quick tempered. These people should live with my grandfather for one year before they think they know everything.

So, going back to the main question. How do you know if you are living with a control freak?

1. He wants you to be back home by a certain time every day. 

My grandfather used to call me at 10pm every day, asking me the same five questions every time: where are you now? what are you doing now? who are you with? what time will you be back? are you coming back soon?

Years ago, when I was living with my parents, he used to wait at the bus stop every day where my mother would alight after work. He would walk behind my mother until they reach my parents' apartment. Then he would leave.

My mother told me he's crazy. But actually, he's not crazy. He has a very serious need for control. It wasn't that he really cared about my mother much as he needed to see that my mother was back home at a certain every day.

2. He guilt-trips you by giving you pretty reasons for the things he does.

I asked my grandfather why he called me the same time every night and he said it was for my safety. It was a good reason but I was 29 years old, and going to be 30 years old. Surely he knows that I'm able to take care of myself? But, the reason would make you feel guilty about not being back home early because you are making him worry, But don't be fooled. He wasn't worried. He just wanted to make sure you were back by a certain time. It's a kind of control!

Because I tutored almost every single night, so when I reached home, it would be almost 11pm. And he would always tell me he hadn't eaten. He was waiting for me to eat. I would always tell him to eat earlier when he's hungry. There's no need to wait for me. And he would always tell me he wasn't hungry. And if I told him I don't want to eat, he would be unhappy and say, "I waited for you for so long to eat yet you don't want to eat."

3. He doesn't allow you to do anything at home.

I like to water the potted plants outside my grandfather's apartment. But he would always stop me. He said he had already watered the plants and I didn't need to do it again. Or he would tell he he would water it later and there's no need to trouble me.

When I wanted to wash the dishes after a meal, he would also  tell me that he would do it later.

When I wanted to wash my clothes, he would also tell me that I didn't need to do it.

On the surface, he seemed like a good grandfather. But he's just a control freak. He's telling me not to do it not because he loved me but as a control freak, he couldn't stand anyone doing things their own way.

Are you living with a control freak?

Good Parenting Brings Good Karma

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Good parenting brings good karma. If you sow good seeds today, you not only benefit your children. You also benefit your grandchildren and their children and so on.

My mother warned me before I moved in to live with my grandfather, her father, about one year and eight months ago.

Initially I thought my mother was wrong. I thought she was simply prejudiced due to her experience with her father.

But she was right.

About six months after I lived with with, he started to call me every night at 10pm asking where I was, who I was with, what was I doing, and what time would I reach  home. This lasted for about a year and finally came to a stop after I had a breakdown in my neighbourhood park and complained to my father that I couldn't take it anymore. It was a torture. At the worse, he called 15 times within an hour because I didn't pick up his call.

He even had a good reason for it. He was worried about my safety, he said. On the surface it seemed a good reason, but I was 29 years old, going towards 30 years old, and being treated like a child. No wonder my mother felt suffocated.

But the worse thing that he could ever do to a child was to lie and lie again, and refusing to admit he was telling lies. I told him not to bring my clothes out to dry by direct sunlight. I told you to just leave my clothes indoor. He refused. Every day, he would promise that he heard me but every day, he would bring out the clothes as if he had never understood what he promised. For one year, I kept telling him nicely not to hang the clothes out. Eventually, several of my clothes faded because of the strong sunlight and some were lost as they were dropped onto the ground floor (we lived on the 8th storey) without his knowing.

And still, he insisted that he didn't bring the clothes out to dry. He even said that he didn't touch my clothes and he didn't know how my clothes were lost. What a blatant lie! I threw a very bad temper that day, and thereafter, he stopped doing it completely.

Recently I was trying to see if I can successfully grow garlic from a bunch of garlic cloves that I had. I put these garlic cloves in a small bowl and added quite a substantial amount of water to the bowl, but for two days, the bowl was surprising totally dried up after I came home at the end of each day. I knew my grandpa had drained the water. I confronted him about it and he said he didn't know. So for the third day, I continued my routine and added the same amount of water before I left home for work but this time, the water that remained in the bowl at the end of day was substantial. It meant that my grandpa had actually been draining the water. It wasn't that I didn't place enough water in the bowl.

After so many such episodes for the past one year and eight months, I couldn't bring myself to trust him again.

Only then I realised why my mother didn't trust anyone, including me. I wondered how she live twenty over years of her life with my grandpa. This lack of trust has seriously undermined my relationship with my mother. I often wondered and was angry with her for not believing in me.

I told my grandpa that was exactly the reason why his daughter and son didn't want him anymore. He simply shut me up, and told me if I was so unhappy with him, he would call the police and ask me to talk to the police. Instead of reflecting on himself, he simply insisted that the problem was me, not him.

Calling the police was his habit. In the one year and eight months I lived with him, I had seen more policeman coming to his house than for the past 29 year I lived with my parents. In face, I have never seen any policeman before at my house. He called those policemen because I threw my anger at him over his behaviour.

If the only thing that he could do was to call the police when his children or grandchildren made him very unhappy, what good could he do?

And I also had reason to believe his bad karma affected the career of his children.

No wonder his children, my mother and my uncle, forsook him. And now, I am ready to do the same as well.

He had to reason to blame anyone for not caring about him. This is karma.