Her reputation preceded her. As Bourne approached the lectern for public comment — shouting about “healthy, whole women!” — scores of district-area teachers got up from their seats and walked out of the meeting.
Bourne went ballistic.
“Ask those teachers to stop interrupting my comment!” she shouted at the meeting chair. “I want my time back! I want my time back!”



Yeah. And it really does take that long. Usually the kid has to get out in the world and start swapping stories with other people, or get caught doing some damned Learned Behavior around normal people. After that the negotiation phase with the parent, and after that fails over and over again it’s no contact. It’s why I really hate the stories of people who got parentified…that’s their whole life spent and the one constant is you can’t get time back.
I wish it wasn’t so common for it to need articles that well written to exist. Parent attempts to capture kid in a false dichotomy, and when they find a way out and escape control, they parent tries to control the narrative. In the happy ending the kid loses their parent.
Congratulations keeping some family.