Is people pleasing manipulative?

[Lookatthesun83]

I’m just wondering. I have a family member who literally lives by trying to please everyone. Going out of their way to appear perfect and nice and overly accommodating.

@Lookatthesun83 ahhh. You've just highlighted alot of what this is about.

I too have a child who is ADHD and Autistic. Unfortunately, you will face so much judgement and you know that. Another reason to keep you and your child away from these blimmin people.
Alot of this is because you're feeling judged and blamed. They probably bitch behind your back saying the kid probably hasn't got ADHD and it's you.

Not only did I grow up in a narc family cult I also have had to deal with this crap. My own sibling would say I was to blame when my child is now diagnosed Autistic/ ADHD. Guess what, I've cut contact with brother.

Why are you doing this to yourself!? You will only feel at home and accepted with your child around other parents of ND kids. Or very tolerate people. It's not fair, it's life. Your poor kid doesn't need to be around these dicks.

For the love of god speak to your husband and stop trying to get in with these people. They are not your tribe!!

Yes I know they say it’s me and I know they don’t want my kid to mix. They don’t want their kids tainted by anyone’s kids. They have openly blamed my parenting because the other SIL is so calm and perfect blah blah. The whole thing just feels like shit tbh. No they aren’t my tribe at all, I’m most definitely not perfect enough

I think people pleasing is the wrong word for what she is doing.

It does sound hugely fucked up.

It is pretty rare nowadays for someone to get pregnant at 17, still be in the same relationship years later and have totally entwined herself with her MIL.

I would be concerned that there was something about her own parents she was running from. She then landed with a MIL who doted on her and they are now in some kind of codependent relationship. Her own marriage sounds a bit shit. She can't hold down a job. And she's not doing a great job of parenting either.

Something has gone very wrong in your SIL's life. You also sound like you have accidentally married the scapegoat of a toxic family.

Best thing you can do is mute them all on social media, see them once a year for Christmas and remind yourself that MIL is not a prize worth winning.

It is their fault that they misunderstand. Their fault and their ignorance. It is a horrible feeling to be misunderstood and human nature to keep attempting to be understood and to be accepted and loved.

But nothing will change them. They really are missing out. Just be yourselves, I suspect in the long run that your family will end up happier and healthier.

@AnnaMagnani yes, this I agree with entirely. My most recent thought was that OPs husband is the scapegoat and by extension so is OP. Add the child with ADHD and you are the perfect scapegoat family.

Great advice to OP 👏

You can't change other people, only yourself. Whatever the reasons are, your MIL and SIL sound very dysfunctional. I expect your SIL is very insecure. But you mentioned that you feel left out by them and simultaneously don't like them. Why are you concerned about what they feel about you? Could you accept them as they are and take a step back?

Oh lovely. Well isn’t much I can do about any of it, my daughter is struggling big time, we all
are as it’s so difficult to manage. I do get worried what his mum says to him behind my back. I’m sure I do a good job at fitting into the role she has assigned me.

I’d like them if they didn’t leave us all out but that’s not going to happen so what’s to be liked. It’s not simultaneously as I’d like to be included, I don’t outright dislike because I’m being an arse.

Yes me too. That's why I was saying with no reason. The people I have exploded at and I can only think of a few examples are the narcissistic family members who have abused and baited their entire life. It's reactive abuse I think it's called. And then you are the ' unhinged ' one if you ever do that.

For the most part, people like you and I are decent and empathetic at our core. 🙏

Sorry wasn't clear. I think what I was trying to say is that they aren't very nice and it's completely understandable that you don't like this. But they're not going to change. So you can only work with what you have. At the moment you seem to be bothered about what they think of you. You care about what horrible people think of you, why is that? Waffling now!

I have to agree with the commenter saying she doesn’t sound like a classic people pleaser.

I’m a people pleaser! It’s one of the co-morbidities of ADHD. I have something called RSD - rejection sensitivity dysphoria. When someone doesn’t like me, it physically hurts. It feels dangerous to not be liked.

I’m not being intentionally manipulative but you could argue there is manipulation going on in people pleasing: they change themselves to make you like them.

Having said all that, I think if your instincts are telling you that you should stay away, trust them.

How sad that she has no friends, but that’s surely telling. Being a people pleaser doesn’t make you friendless - for me it’s the opposite. I have a lot of friends because people are so important to me! I just keep the peace incredibly well. We almost never fight and I carefully choose people who my values align with so I don’t have to pretend.

I saw a TikTok that made me laugh so much once, as a people pleaser. It was “Oh you like my personality? Thank you so much. It’s actually not mine though. I designed this one specifically for you based on previous interactions, what you like, what you respond to, I have one for every person I know. And this one’s yours! Glad you like it!”

What was your brother like before he met her?

Did you say your brother is quite a bit older than her? And she was pregnant as a teenager? Did he groom her?

no, it's not her brother's wife.
it's her husband's brother's wife.
wish we had different terms for this in english.
also if you say to someone, we are going out now; we could either include the person addressed, or not, which can cause upset. it's not clear.

you can confirm who's who by the fact they have a joint MIL.

If someone doesn’t like you though despite trying what do you do, how do you respond with them?

’Their son was older and got her pregnant and she has been raised with their views.’

Think that line explains everything, OP. I also wonder if MIL initially worried what people might think so overcompensated by nurturing this mini-me perfect Stepford Wife DIL

Your SIL doesnt sound like a people pleaser, more of a classic covert public/private persona. Nice up front, bitchy behind closed doors.

People pleasing seems more like a benign form of ..something...manipulation seems a strong word. Its not done with the bad intentions, and generally to avoid conflict and feel ok about themselves and others. But, I find overt people pleasers problematic. What actually do you like/want to do/prefer/think? It feels like you never get a real answer.

Maybe but that doesn’t explain why MiL can’t expand the love onto me and kids and us a family. She isn’t 17 anymore. Perhaps she was worried that her son made a young girl pregnant and they all trying to prove everyone wrong because that didn’t look too good. The son certainly seems to have something to prove, everything has to be the best. The SIL needs everything to be perfect. I feel like I am the comparison. See look how imperfect they are compared to the teenage mum.

Other people looking bad make others look better. I think they all think they are better than us and it makes them feel justified in ignoring us. When in actual fact we all have issues and difficulties and we are all pretty much the same. I’m not sure if that’s a narcissist type of view. All the crap and dysfunction gets put onto us.

I do actually think it’s a form of manipulative behaviour - my MIL is an intense people pleaser, and if you try and impose any kind of boundaries when her behaviour becomes intrusive; she gets very upset and says she just ‘wants to help everyone’. I find the constant ‘helping’ is actually not helping and is just a continual overstepping of boundaries anyone puts in place. To me it’s almost like a mask to actually do exactly what she wants - the opposite of people pleasing. It’s not genuine behaviour in my opinion which is why I definitely think it’s a form of manipulation. It’s a form of soft power and often manipulates people into going along with the people pleasers’ behaviour because they feel guilty turning down someone’s ‘help’ or ‘kindness’ despite it being driven by complete selfishness.

It sounds very much to me like she was groomed and manipulated by an older man and his family, and that she fears losing them as she wouldn’t know how to manage outside of the family as it’s all she’s known since a teenager. So she does all she can to keep in MILs favour. I will reiterate, through fear. She sounds like a deeply insecure and anxious person.

You on the other hand sound jealous and bitter. Just leave them to it - you don’t have a good word to say about any of them anyway.

How would you like me to talk about people that ignore my family. Ignore my kids birthdays, leave us out of family holidays, don’t visit, make comments about my parenting and my children. I’d love a nice family. I sound annoyed and sad and bemused and confused, I’m not bitter.

Mirroring a couple of your examples @Lookatthesun83 op my MIL has also had a lot of falling out with people - always their fault for being so unreasonable - when all she does is try and be a good friend/help etc etc. It’s the same every time. I think in reality friendships start off great for her but over time people get worn down and she doesn’t see any signs and carries on and it’s just too much for people. Ironically I think if she let go of trying to control everyone’s opinion of her by ‘helping’ , her relationships would actually be much much better!!! As she’s gotten older and the circle has gotten smaller, I can see she is often ‘operating’ in a vacuum because the other parties have removed themselves from the situation; this has made her worse because it’s only her opinion as others remove contact. For example she has a long running feud/very negative opinion of another family member (who she has ‘only tried to help’ and ignored their boundaries) and everyone around that situation has stopped talking to her about it because she’s so negative and won’t let it go and everyone else (on the side of the other relative) is tired of hearing about it so now it’s just her own opinion with no other opinions being heard which makes her worse!!

You are laying all this at your SILs door, who sounds sadly like a victim.

Why are you so desperate to be liked by people you clearly can’t stand?