This happened to me when I told my father that his banker (a man my father’s age) had been calling me to ask me out and had sent me flowers. This also happened to me when my father sent me to see his psychoanalyst (a man twenty years older than my father) while I was pregnant. I told my father that Dr. Mc Guire had been suggesting that I deliver my baby on his analyst’s couch.

In both of these situations, my father’s attitude was similar to your mother’s — I was wrong for even suggesting that these things happened. He just didn’t believe me.