It makes you wonder what made their mother to be so fearful in the first place. I know why mom turned into a Helicopter parent, it was the result of things that happened to her.
There IS usually trauma behind narcism.
It’s just that an explanation is not a justfication.
Maybe it’s not Amarillys fault that she becams the way she is now. But it is her responsibility, that she stayed that way.
Mental illnesses are just that unfair.
We have plenty of evidence to suggest that Amarillys is a Narcissistic mother. I’m sure that she saw Evette as her Golden Child whose sole purpose is to make Amarillys look good. Her getting second place or seeing her friends cuts into Ama’s self-image to the core. An imperfect Golden Child does nothing for her ego.
Oof. What saddens me the most here, I think, is the constant overbearing presence of Amaryllis in Evette’s life. Every diary entry she’s made has her mention her mom’s controlling tendencies. It’s a reminder that golden children also suffer in dysfunctional families.
Also, “mom found out somehow”; I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if Amaryllis actually violated Evette’s privacy and watched her diary regularly.
I hope this gives Abeille confirmation that she made a good decision to stay on Monotropa; girl, this would be your life if you returned to Pasque, but multiply it by six, because the scapegoat always has it worse.
“violated Evette’s privacy and watched her diary regularly”. Oh, it’s not violating privacy, it is protecting her daughter. All for her best. Without her mother, she would not even have a privacy worth protecting. And her mother will use that information only for her best. And by that, I mean Evette’s best. Probably.
Amaryllis didn’t necessarily have to had violated Evette’s privacy to find out.
I had a friend who had parents more overbearing than my mother (And my mother was already pretty far into narcissism territory). He and a couple of friends from his university dragon boat club had made plans to rent a car and transport some equipment to UBC for their race – about a 12 hour drive through the mountains (including stops). His parents generally didn’t let him go further away from them than the university campus, so he was worried they wouldn’t let him go.
I had managed to get away from my mom by this point, and I advised him as he was 20, and legally an adult, to just do what I did and not tell them until after he was on the road so they couldn’t try and talk him out of it. One of his friends left a message on the house answering machine to confirm meeting times (this was before cell phones were a common thing), and his mom found out and crap hit the fan. My friend had gone to rent the car which was why he missed the call. His dad actually drove him back to the rental agency, made him return the car and then called his friends to let them know he wasn’t going.
With my mom back in the day, she didn’t necessarily need to read my diary. All it might take was one careless phrase in a casual conversation she overheard (“I won’t make it to regular thing that weekend, I have plans” Mom swooping in: “OH??!? What plans do you have I don’t recall you talking about plans?!?!”)
Ah, shit. Sorry for both you and your friend. My mom has a teeny-tiny fraction of Amaryllis’ overbearingness, can’t imagine having to deal with the whole package.
She can go to a doctor on Monotropa and use that diary as actual evidence of emotional abuse to both herself and her sister. I also think that her sister locked herself out in the cold on purpose to finally escape her mother’s reach. I can only hope that there’s a message for Abeille in that diary.
I have no guess about what is going to happen with Amaryllis. Restraining order sounds like a good idea and this also sounds like a good idea, to me. If those will be needed.
Catastrophizing now is probably not good and would be a hard sell to people that would have the power to help her with an imagined future threat.
Abeille seems to me like an eyes open person. She is driven to be true to herself and others. The time she was reactionary, that I saw, was in the cafeteria dumping food on mr. troll dude.
Her “friends” from the cafeteria cheered her on. I got a little thrill out of that scene too. But, that’s the heat of the moment. Ultimately it hurt her to associate all of what she endured, with this one incident; to catastrophize, making a drama out of the very real and clear harm that her mother is responsible for.
I think it shows Abeille is not likely to harbor grudges. She is so strong that she can be real. What she does turns out for the best, ultimately, so far. With Miel and his family having her back, she is in a very good place.
I know the mother type all so well.
I finally closed the door behind me and cut off all contact with my own mother.
I was way in to my 40’s and I was living on my own for years, but she still wanted to control MY life.
Now she is all alone for none of her children want to have any contact with her.
The only thing Abeille can do is turn in to a rage against Amaryllis when there are a lot of strangers around her, and in the end turn her back to her mother with the final words: “I don’t want to have anything to do with you any more. Till never!”
I try to imagine what it must feel like for Abeille to watch Evette in these clips. The entire story relates to Evette and Abeille is on Monotropa to honor her sister.
Contrasting with Abeille’s memory where Evette says she’ll talk to their mom about Abeille’s ringette practice getting stomped on https://lovenotfound.com/comic/ch21-p17/ it’s difficult for me to work out what the dynamic was between the 3, except for obviously Amaryllis is toxic.
It reminds me of how my sisters, all older than me, would act as stand-in parent, in absence of our mother. When Evette reassures Abeille that there’s nothing wrong with her playing ringette and she’ll talk to Amaryllis, it’s supportive. I don’t think it’s dismissing Abeille. She’s protecting and encouraging Abeille.
That could also be part of why Mallow says Amaryllis means well. It seems like Mallow is struggling with new realizations. Imagine your father saying, yeah your mom is horrible. Then your pals?
Mallow is being parental, trying to be hands off and also protective, and doing an admirable job right now.
If this is the first time Abeille is seeing that Evette had trouble with Amaryllis too, that’s probably helpful. It seemed to me that Abeille has already decided she will have her independence and is well past needing help deciding that.
It’s a good example for her that it never really mattered if she lived up to expectations or not. Her mom would have moved the goalposts to jerk her around no matter what she achieved.
Mom is starting to run out of excuses by us, the readers and simply being a crap parent.
I understand that people don’t simply become what Amaryllis is from nothing, but this behavior isn’t new. She’s had PLENTY of time reevaluate and notice her actions. If anything, Abeille running away should’ve set off some alarm that her attitude needs adjusting. It’s honestly coming off as her simply being a crap parent that needs to be cut off.
Yes but notice the difference in *how* amaryllis ruined their plans. For example, Abeille was being punished for being too “immature” and “lacking drive”. Abeille is “too unreliable” to deserve the things that she wants, such as being on the ringette team. While Evette is “needed” and Amaryllis simply cant spare her. Evette is “too good” for the things she wants, such as going on a hike with friends.
It seems like a good thing that she had this last interaction with Mallow and that she gets to see this diary, whatever the contents might be. I’m happy she didn’t blot them out of her life, back when all we saw from Mallow was him enabling Amaryllis.
Her last visit to Amaryllis seemed very healthy to me. I took it as her asserting that she is going to be independent. I think she is in a very stable place now. But, we’ll see.
Interesting. She thought mom was only hard on her, but will see she was on her sister too (and probably can then realize on her dad too) because she just is a control freak with everyone.
A little bit of triggering going on…yes, there are parents out there who act just like Amaraylis. Yeah, I’m 72. BTDT & WTTS (Been there, done that, and worn the Tshirt) Healing ONLY takes place when the toxicity is gone and the victimized child can reach out to find healthy ways of relating to others. I feel THIS is why Abeille is reaching out to “touch”- it’s the primary need of an infant in order to feel secure and safe. Abeille has never had that. Mallow hadn’t done much to stand between Abeille and Amarylis” toxicity- up until coming to say Goodbye to her as she left. Back to Amarylis- what a monster to destroy both her own child and Miel’s careers! This is a part of toxicity. And IRL there are toxics who perjure themselves to take grandchildren away from their parents to punish their adult children further…I’ll save all my comments on biology (especially flowers) being all about “sex”until I stop shaking with remembered humilitation sorrow and anger.
Back to Amarylis- what a monster to destroy both her own child and Miel’s careers!
Miel deserved it, and clearly Eyebright was not a suitable environment for Abeille, given that they employ child molesters. The world is a better place now; mommy knows best.
Well, the first line was enclosed in a “quote” tag (referencing Mitzi Agnew Giles) which happens to not result in a visible change. Oops. And the rest was enclosed in a virtual quote tag (referencing you-know-who) which also happens to not result in a visible change.
I really appreciate Gina’s use of symbolism in Love Not Found even if it isn’t intentional (doubtful). It’s a whole other level of beauty that I rarely find in web comics; especially at the kind of scale I find here.
The amaryllis plant is the symbol of pride, determination and radiant beauty derived from the Greek words for ‘to sparkle’ and ‘bitter’ because the flower’s bulb has a bitter taste. How appropriate that Amaryllis is a bitter pill to swallow (so to speak) because of her dramatic tendencies, egotistical nature, and unrelenting overbearingness.
Mallow is also appropriately small (in terms of room presence or vocal opinion), meek, and pale like the mallow flower, which is named after the Greek word ‘to heal’ as it’s often used in poultices and teas to soothe and coat irritated spots.
Evette doesn’t seem like a ‘planty’ name, but it’s a French name associated with the yew tree, which symbolizes death and resurrection. She was literally choked out of growth and happiness by Amaryllis.
So, how wonderful to have Abeille (French for bee) be the one who isn’t rooted to Pasque, be the pollinator/enabler of Evette’s dream by creating a fruitful, successful/happy/stable life away from the iron thumb of Amaryllis with Miel (her honey) and a garden of their own. And how appropriate that Mallow would deliver the diary to Abeille in an attempt to soothe the irritation Amaryllis riled up.
I love it too. There is this on an unofficial wiki https://lovenotfound-fans.fandom.com/wiki/Amaryllis and there’s a flora page. You and everyone can edit that wiki. I think it certainly needs those meanings added. I didn’t see right away where the bitter meaning comes from.
That was fun finding citations for the “bitter” and “to heal” correspondences. I hope I didn’t butcher your comments.
It’s funny that I thought Mallow corresponded to the Mallow plant (as opposed to Marshmallow), which grows in the worst of conditions: vacant lots and cracks in pavement. Mallow has endured much and he is meek and pale and soothing. Marshmallow is a hair detangler. That was a very useful comment. Thanks.
Every entry mentions their mom….she’s sorta…sheesh. Poor kids.
Notice how all of these have Amaryllis causing and scene or hindering Evette.
It makes you wonder what made their mother to be so fearful in the first place. I know why mom turned into a Helicopter parent, it was the result of things that happened to her.
Or she’s just narcissistic. There isn’t always a trauma story behind this kind of behavior.
There IS usually trauma behind narcism.
It’s just that an explanation is not a justfication.
Maybe it’s not Amarillys fault that she becams the way she is now. But it is her responsibility, that she stayed that way.
Mental illnesses are just that unfair.
We have plenty of evidence to suggest that Amarillys is a Narcissistic mother. I’m sure that she saw Evette as her Golden Child whose sole purpose is to make Amarillys look good. Her getting second place or seeing her friends cuts into Ama’s self-image to the core. An imperfect Golden Child does nothing for her ego.
Nah I highly doubt that. Notice how Evette’s plans were ruined just like Abeille’s?
Oof. What saddens me the most here, I think, is the constant overbearing presence of Amaryllis in Evette’s life. Every diary entry she’s made has her mention her mom’s controlling tendencies. It’s a reminder that golden children also suffer in dysfunctional families.
Also, “mom found out somehow”; I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if Amaryllis actually violated Evette’s privacy and watched her diary regularly.
I hope this gives Abeille confirmation that she made a good decision to stay on Monotropa; girl, this would be your life if you returned to Pasque, but multiply it by six, because the scapegoat always has it worse.
“violated Evette’s privacy and watched her diary regularly”. Oh, it’s not violating privacy, it is protecting her daughter. All for her best. Without her mother, she would not even have a privacy worth protecting. And her mother will use that information only for her best. And by that, I mean Evette’s best. Probably.
Amaryllis didn’t necessarily have to had violated Evette’s privacy to find out.
I had a friend who had parents more overbearing than my mother (And my mother was already pretty far into narcissism territory). He and a couple of friends from his university dragon boat club had made plans to rent a car and transport some equipment to UBC for their race – about a 12 hour drive through the mountains (including stops). His parents generally didn’t let him go further away from them than the university campus, so he was worried they wouldn’t let him go.
I had managed to get away from my mom by this point, and I advised him as he was 20, and legally an adult, to just do what I did and not tell them until after he was on the road so they couldn’t try and talk him out of it. One of his friends left a message on the house answering machine to confirm meeting times (this was before cell phones were a common thing), and his mom found out and crap hit the fan. My friend had gone to rent the car which was why he missed the call. His dad actually drove him back to the rental agency, made him return the car and then called his friends to let them know he wasn’t going.
With my mom back in the day, she didn’t necessarily need to read my diary. All it might take was one careless phrase in a casual conversation she overheard (“I won’t make it to regular thing that weekend, I have plans” Mom swooping in: “OH??!? What plans do you have I don’t recall you talking about plans?!?!”)
Ah, shit. Sorry for both you and your friend. My mom has a teeny-tiny fraction of Amaryllis’ overbearingness, can’t imagine having to deal with the whole package.
Not surprising she affected Evette as well ~_~
Doesn’t look like Evette faired all that much better… I have the suspicion that Amaryllis doesn’t know about that diary.
Yuuuuuup.
She can go to a doctor on Monotropa and use that diary as actual evidence of emotional abuse to both herself and her sister. I also think that her sister locked herself out in the cold on purpose to finally escape her mother’s reach. I can only hope that there’s a message for Abeille in that diary.
Locked herself out of purpose? Evette wouldn’t do that with Abeille on the line. If she had wanted to leave like that, she’d have done it alone.
I have no guess about what is going to happen with Amaryllis. Restraining order sounds like a good idea and this also sounds like a good idea, to me. If those will be needed.
Catastrophizing now is probably not good and would be a hard sell to people that would have the power to help her with an imagined future threat.
Abeille seems to me like an eyes open person. She is driven to be true to herself and others. The time she was reactionary, that I saw, was in the cafeteria dumping food on mr. troll dude.
Her “friends” from the cafeteria cheered her on. I got a little thrill out of that scene too. But, that’s the heat of the moment. Ultimately it hurt her to associate all of what she endured, with this one incident; to catastrophize, making a drama out of the very real and clear harm that her mother is responsible for.
I think it shows Abeille is not likely to harbor grudges. She is so strong that she can be real. What she does turns out for the best, ultimately, so far. With Miel and his family having her back, she is in a very good place.
Oh HOT DAMN, it was Mallow’s gift!!!
The gift of perspective – that the way Amaryllis is treating her is not her fault.
I know the mother type all so well.
I finally closed the door behind me and cut off all contact with my own mother.
I was way in to my 40’s and I was living on my own for years, but she still wanted to control MY life.
Now she is all alone for none of her children want to have any contact with her.
The only thing Abeille can do is turn in to a rage against Amaryllis when there are a lot of strangers around her, and in the end turn her back to her mother with the final words: “I don’t want to have anything to do with you any more. Till never!”
I try to imagine what it must feel like for Abeille to watch Evette in these clips. The entire story relates to Evette and Abeille is on Monotropa to honor her sister.
Contrasting with Abeille’s memory where Evette says she’ll talk to their mom about Abeille’s ringette practice getting stomped on https://lovenotfound.com/comic/ch21-p17/ it’s difficult for me to work out what the dynamic was between the 3, except for obviously Amaryllis is toxic.
It reminds me of how my sisters, all older than me, would act as stand-in parent, in absence of our mother. When Evette reassures Abeille that there’s nothing wrong with her playing ringette and she’ll talk to Amaryllis, it’s supportive. I don’t think it’s dismissing Abeille. She’s protecting and encouraging Abeille.
That could also be part of why Mallow says Amaryllis means well. It seems like Mallow is struggling with new realizations. Imagine your father saying, yeah your mom is horrible. Then your pals?
Mallow is being parental, trying to be hands off and also protective, and doing an admirable job right now.
If this is the first time Abeille is seeing that Evette had trouble with Amaryllis too, that’s probably helpful. It seemed to me that Abeille has already decided she will have her independence and is well past needing help deciding that.
Abeille may blame herself for Evette’s death, but it’s pretty clear from this that life under Amaryllis was killing her.
It’s a good example for her that it never really mattered if she lived up to expectations or not. Her mom would have moved the goalposts to jerk her around no matter what she achieved.
Mom is starting to run out of excuses by us, the readers and simply being a crap parent.
I understand that people don’t simply become what Amaryllis is from nothing, but this behavior isn’t new. She’s had PLENTY of time reevaluate and notice her actions. If anything, Abeille running away should’ve set off some alarm that her attitude needs adjusting. It’s honestly coming off as her simply being a crap parent that needs to be cut off.
Yes but notice the difference in *how* amaryllis ruined their plans. For example, Abeille was being punished for being too “immature” and “lacking drive”. Abeille is “too unreliable” to deserve the things that she wants, such as being on the ringette team. While Evette is “needed” and Amaryllis simply cant spare her. Evette is “too good” for the things she wants, such as going on a hike with friends.
It seems like a good thing that she had this last interaction with Mallow and that she gets to see this diary, whatever the contents might be. I’m happy she didn’t blot them out of her life, back when all we saw from Mallow was him enabling Amaryllis.
Her last visit to Amaryllis seemed very healthy to me. I took it as her asserting that she is going to be independent. I think she is in a very stable place now. But, we’ll see.
Interesting. She thought mom was only hard on her, but will see she was on her sister too (and probably can then realize on her dad too) because she just is a control freak with everyone.
A little bit of triggering going on…yes, there are parents out there who act just like Amaraylis. Yeah, I’m 72. BTDT & WTTS (Been there, done that, and worn the Tshirt) Healing ONLY takes place when the toxicity is gone and the victimized child can reach out to find healthy ways of relating to others. I feel THIS is why Abeille is reaching out to “touch”- it’s the primary need of an infant in order to feel secure and safe. Abeille has never had that. Mallow hadn’t done much to stand between Abeille and Amarylis” toxicity- up until coming to say Goodbye to her as she left. Back to Amarylis- what a monster to destroy both her own child and Miel’s careers! This is a part of toxicity. And IRL there are toxics who perjure themselves to take grandchildren away from their parents to punish their adult children further…I’ll save all my comments on biology (especially flowers) being all about “sex”until I stop shaking with remembered humilitation sorrow and anger.
Back to Amarylis- what a monster to destroy both her own child and Miel’s careers!
Miel deserved it, and clearly Eyebright was not a suitable environment for Abeille, given that they employ child molesters. The world is a better place now; mommy knows best.
David, was this said as a joke or something?
Well, the first line was enclosed in a “quote” tag (referencing Mitzi Agnew Giles) which happens to not result in a visible change. Oops. And the rest was enclosed in a virtual quote tag (referencing you-know-who) which also happens to not result in a visible change.
I really appreciate Gina’s use of symbolism in Love Not Found even if it isn’t intentional (doubtful). It’s a whole other level of beauty that I rarely find in web comics; especially at the kind of scale I find here.
The amaryllis plant is the symbol of pride, determination and radiant beauty derived from the Greek words for ‘to sparkle’ and ‘bitter’ because the flower’s bulb has a bitter taste. How appropriate that Amaryllis is a bitter pill to swallow (so to speak) because of her dramatic tendencies, egotistical nature, and unrelenting overbearingness.
Mallow is also appropriately small (in terms of room presence or vocal opinion), meek, and pale like the mallow flower, which is named after the Greek word ‘to heal’ as it’s often used in poultices and teas to soothe and coat irritated spots.
Evette doesn’t seem like a ‘planty’ name, but it’s a French name associated with the yew tree, which symbolizes death and resurrection. She was literally choked out of growth and happiness by Amaryllis.
So, how wonderful to have Abeille (French for bee) be the one who isn’t rooted to Pasque, be the pollinator/enabler of Evette’s dream by creating a fruitful, successful/happy/stable life away from the iron thumb of Amaryllis with Miel (her honey) and a garden of their own. And how appropriate that Mallow would deliver the diary to Abeille in an attempt to soothe the irritation Amaryllis riled up.
I love it too. There is this on an unofficial wiki https://lovenotfound-fans.fandom.com/wiki/Amaryllis and there’s a flora page. You and everyone can edit that wiki. I think it certainly needs those meanings added. I didn’t see right away where the bitter meaning comes from.
That was fun finding citations for the “bitter” and “to heal” correspondences. I hope I didn’t butcher your comments.
It’s funny that I thought Mallow corresponded to the Mallow plant (as opposed to Marshmallow), which grows in the worst of conditions: vacant lots and cracks in pavement. Mallow has endured much and he is meek and pale and soothing. Marshmallow is a hair detangler. That was a very useful comment. Thanks.