1. xW sometimes shut down when she felt threatened, my mother never backs down. I assume xW shutting down is what made her feel "controlled."
2. As I mentioned in one of the previous posts, there are only 2 people in the world that I have these problems with. I seriously have minimal issues with conversations with others, I get along with everyone fairly well.
Otherwise, I quite admire females, more than I admire any males. The kind, gentle nature, the tendency toward empathy, the lack of aggression that the "typical" make displays. I am/try to be kind and gentle, and view women as more of a role model of my own actions than any man I have met.
As far as positive female role models... well, my mother isn't all bad, she does have some tendency toward kindness in the fairly large part of her life when she doesn't feel/pretend she is being attacked. My sister is decent, though I can identify plenty of unhealthy behaviors in her interactions also, but they don't affect me for the most part.
For both of reasons listed in the above 2 paragraphs, I have had way more female friends in my life than male friends. We get along well, we seem to think more similarly than any males. FF#1 (now GF), FF#2, FF#3, and a few others, were the best friends I ever had. I typically got along well with the mothers of the FF's (I did NOT get along with xMIL, she is an extremely judgmental, bitter, and negative person). GF and FF#2 have had plenty of kind things to say about me, to me... Many compliments for my calmness, empathy, openness, honesty, even my parenting methods.
3. There have been minimal male friends. One of my better friends since high school has some moodiness issues, and I learned to just back away until the bad mood passes, because he is great to be around when in a good mood. But I don't see him real often as he stays pretty busy. There have been a few coworkers that I got along with, but rarely very close friends, almost never did anything with them away from work. Quite a few coworkers have been helpful through this D/OFP process with similar stories of their own, "nice guys" who were dumped on when their x's left them. Back to the original question, are the interactions different? Between males and females (other than xW and my mother), the conversations are similar, but rarely as close.
4. Comfort zone and boundaries regarding who/what? I guess I haven't taken much time to "define" my boundaries. I know what I feel is an acceptable behavior and what is not, clearly, at the time of the interactions. I think I am fairly in tune with that. All of the accusations of xW, mostly what was put in the OFP, but even thinking about things xW said and did prior to the OFP, and since, compounded with the hurtful things my mother has said, has made me question my actions. I have learned many things, likely learned to "identify" better boundaries, and certainly it has helped me identify hurtful behaviors and the repercussions of them... But mostly I have learned to identify OTHER people's behavior as being unhealthy, and many of my own have been validated as "normal" by friends and family (beside my mother of course).
5. Limiting beliefs? Again somewhat answering the question with a question... Regarding who/what? I'll have to put more thought into that.
