I'm betting that theres another side to this story, that looks more like this:
And he married my mother partly because of her elevated academic pedigree. Not only did she graduate EARLY from Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn (a big deal), she had her undergraduate degree from Barnard College and her master's degree from Wellesley by 1950. That made her a desirable mate for a future physician society-wise.
A big deal to whom? Desirable to whom? I think that the above is a perception not necessarily shared by reality.
But unexpected consequences: she could not only match wits with my father, but my mother often could win arguments with him. That's not what makes a narcissist happy. So, there were consistent powerplays in my household.
Am I the only one that suspects that these 'power plays' went the other direction, or at the very least went both ways...and that the father putting his foot down makes him, in the eyes of this DUer, 'a narcissist'?
I believe the straw that broke the camel's back for my mother was my father interfered with her few but close friendships she had with other disaffected and educated women. He used a bad business deal with his close friend to sever ties with him. Unfortunately, that friend was married to my mother's close friend. And the women were forbidden to socialize with each other. Sort of like Fred Flintstone telling his wife, Wilma, that she could no longer be friends with Betty Rubble. That kind of stupid. Another instance decades later: my mother was friends with a divorced woman who was a close golf buddy. The friend was outspoken, bawdy, and loved a good strong drink. My father couldn't stand her. And again, the friend was banished from my mother's life, leaving her lonely and frustrated.
It sounds to me like this father couldn't abide others interfering within his marriage. It also sounds to me, like substituting the word 'feminist' for the word 'educated' would clarify things.
My point of this essay was the authoritarian control my father yielded over my mother. And no wonder my father went after me when I exercised even a modicum of independence, even as a child. He couldn't let me get away with something he denied to my mother.
Why do I get the feeling that this DUmmy post a lot in the feminist forum on DU?
Back to my mother's friends. My father couldn't abide with women who were encouraging my mother to get out under my father's thumb. They had to go.
Shame on him for not wanting bitter divorcee feminist types mucking with his wife and marriage.
And in my case, I couldn't turn to my mother when my father turned his ire on me.
It sounds like he thought you were going down the same path as the bitter divorcee friend and didn't much like it.
Postscript: the first friend of my mother cared a lot about me. She could see my father's excessive interest in controlling me. I was 12 when I no longer was associated with her. In 2001, she passed away. I went alone to her church service. (My mother didn't even go.) Afterwards, her neighbor took me aside and confided that my would-be mentor spent years after the break, inquiring about me and my siblings to see if we "were alright". Because of my father. This still brings tears to my eyes. I'm certain my mother suffered more than I did.
This reads like a feminists 'dear abby' letter.
Some (not all) men dedicate their marriages to destroying the women they married.
Some (not all) women, dedicate their marriages to trying to have the security and resources that a man provides, along with the freedom of being single. Some (not all) women, are very much mistaken about how much a womans education level matters to a man. Some (not all) women, end up as bitter divorcees who are poisonous influences on the healthy marriages of others, and most men know this even if they don't know that they know this. Some (not all) women, have no other recourse but to call a man a narcissist when they object to a man putting his foot down to keep such toxic influences clear of his marriage.
Feminism is cancer to all that is good and right.
