Can't believe the things my toxic parents come out with

[jasminerice]

They moaned at me for talking about my abusive past because it was ruining their retirement which they wanted to enjoy in peace. Err, what about them ruining my childhood which I would have liked to enjoy without being abused and neglected?

My mother, who stood back and watched my dad verbally and mentally abuse me for years without even once standing up for me or trying to stop him, agreed that she had been a coward because she had not stood up for herself more.

Both parents in a letter in which they whined about not being able to see my DC's and trying to persuade me to let them see them said they knew that children needed lots of love, nurturing, and attention. Err, so why didn't I get any of that then when I was a child?

They told me I was mad and should see a psychiatrist. Well I did and was applauded for my decision to cut all ties with my toxic family. Now that same toxic family want me to let them back into my life.

[pinkhalf]

It is all about them, their needs, their wants.

The day they write to you and ask what you need and what they can do for you is the day you can consider contact.

That day is when hell freezes over, btw. I've done this myself, and if your parents are truly toxic, it will never happen.

I know it must hurt very badly, but just wanted to post and say that I admire your guts. Cutting contact is not an easy thing to do.

[MizzyFrizzy]

If you managed to cut all ties, things must have been really bad to force you into such a decision...my only advice is to really look at the events leading up to your NC decision.

IF you feel you would be able to cope and survive the events reasonably unscathed now, then maybe contact is an option.

IF past events happening again cause you to break out in a cold sweat and to start packing for your emigration to Timbucktoo - then perhaps NC should stay that way for now.

The mere thought of contact with my lot makes Timbucktoo seem like heaven!

[Jux]

Do you want to stay with NC?

If so, don't open letters, just bin them straightaway. Well done for having shucked them off in the first place; now just keep them out.

[suburbophobe]

Hmm, Mizzy, I actually DO have contacts/friends in Timbuctu, but that is neither here nor there....(funny, but everyone is fleeing that city too).

jasimne, Hold fast to your decision. Don't feel guilty for trying to protect your children from your toxic parents.

I've had this too, you bring up certain stuff, but they won't and don't want to see it, better for them to keep it under the carpet (cos that's their pattern). They will try to make YOU look like the crazy one....

[jasminerice]

Thanks all. I do want to stay NC. Although I do have moments when I feel guilty. But not for long.

The letters seem to have stopped now. I think I opened them thinking maybe this time they might say what I want them to. But no, it's been 5 years of NC and like you say, pinkhalf it's still all about them, their needs.

I just find it so incredible that they can say the things I've mentioned. And not see the irony of it all. They are so so so deluded.

[MizzyFrizzy]

I flippin' knew I spelt 'Timbuctu' wrong but after many attempts at trying to spell it and none of them looking right - I gave up and put what I hoped would make some sense!

Thanks suburbophobe for the correct spelling.

[jasminerice]

Mizzy, I knew what you were talking about! And yes, even Mars wouldn't be far enough away from my parents.

I just wonder how they are able to erase 10 years from all our lives.

[MizzyFrizzy]

I dunno how they manage to erase it all either jasminerice.

Somehow my parents have managed to forget basically everything from my early childhood...it's as if I just suddenly arrived at 13 years of age and started being 'difficult' and 'over sensitive'!

Any mention of anything 'nasty' happening is met with a shocked face and an "I don't remember that....", thing is I have medical records that match my memories...if there was/is medical evidence for the physical abuse, then surely it MUST have happened and THEY were/are the culprits!

They either have no memory or used to tell me to "Just let the past stay in the past...move on FGS"....problem is my past has made my who I am...if I deny my past that means the real me doesn't get a chance to exist...the part they want to exist is the part that appeases their every whim and nothing more.

[jasminerice]

Mizzy, EXACTLY! I also arrived aged 14, angry and hostile towards my dad for no apparent reason.

And when I get asked why I'm hostile towards him, and I answer because of the past, he tells me to stop dragging the past up all the time! And he says I'm mad.....

[MizzyFrizzy]

Well, I don't get called mad....but as I've had depression since a teen until very recently....then for them that puts me in the 'mentally unhinged' camp.

Funny how my depression and anxiety has lifted and I am AD free - only since NC with them though....

[lazyarse]

offering a prior apology for going slightly off topic, but wanted to ask OP regarding the mental and verbal abuse from her dad.

I'm having a really rough time, fleeting between being in floods of tears to major depressive bouts when I think about my horrific temper with my DCs (4, 6). I'm taking active steps to change and being v strict on myself about not going off course, but something that continually preys on my mind is that my DCs will remember me being overly harsh with them as adults. I hate myself for doing this in the past (i think it stems from learned behaviour from my own childhood).

But I wanted to ask specifically what you remember about the verbal and mental abuse, what kind of things did he say/do?

Please feel free to ignore my post if its too traumatic to go into. As I said I'm sorry I couldnt contribute anything positive to your thread, and for thread hijacking. I'm just trying to sort things out with my DCs before its too late, and they resent me later on in life.

[jasminerice]

lazy, (please change your name, you are NOT lazy), my dad called me a bitch and a whore and a cow once when I was 10, because I had complained there had been no hot water for my bath. He used to constantly tell me to get out of the house. He held a knife up to me during breakfast once when i was about 13/14.

I know about the anger. I used to feel murderous towards my poor little DD. She was just a trigger, but I didn't always realise that. I read in Toxic Parents that every abused child has a 'volcanoe of rage' inside them. I certainly did.

[MizzyFrizzy]

Lazy...the main thing I remember apart from the actual words - was that the rage/verbal abuse was personal and the tone of the comments important...statements such as "You dirty bitch (spat at me with venom)...get in the bath." I was about 5/6 at the time.

Why I wasn't told, just to get in the bath now - as it was bath time, I dunno?!

PS. I have had to monitor myself re my own DC's and even lock them in the house (when they were little and driving me nuts) whilst I sat the other side of the back door (outside) crying and trying to control my anger. Until we learn what our parents taught us was wrong, sadly we do as we were taught...especially in times of stress...instinct rather than logic kicks in.

FWIW I found physically moving away gave me the space to re-orientate how I was dealing with the DC's. x

[jasminerice]

I worked through my anger physically ie got a baseball bat and bashed the furniture imagining it was my mother/father. I wrote letters to my parents which I didn't send, full of all the hatred and anger I felt towards them. It took time but I don't get angry now, unless I get triggered, but generally I stay very calm with the DC's even when they are being very challenging.

[jasminerice]

Mizzy, yes the venom and coldness in the words was as bad as the words themselves. The knowing that my dad literally didn't give a sh*t about me was what hurt the most. He was totally detached from me, he couldn't care less.

[jasminerice]

But the craziness of it all is what gets me. My mother genuinely believes to this day that she was a great mother and my horrible childhood was ALL my dad's fault. Who was she then? Some random stranger who lived with us who was nothing to do with us and had nothing to do with what happened to me?

And my parents now bleating on about what wonderful grandparents they are because they know all about what children need. It's totally mad. They are totally mad.

[NeedlesCuties]

You have great insight OP into how your parents treated you, how you felt and how you never want your own DC to feel.

I've had a similar thing with a grandparent being a toxic person. She abused my dad as a child and then turned her attention to me when I was a child. In his hope that she'd changed my dad let her see me.

I'm now in my 20s and she is still trying to abuse me emotionally via letters and messages passed from family members. My dad cut contact with her a long time ago and doesn't know that she still writes twisty nasty letters to me.

The most recent letter was a week ago when my cousin told her I was pregnant again. I made the choice myself to cut contact 2 years ago when my PFB was young and she was making digs at me, the child, my husband etc etc.

My advice to you is the advice I need to take myself: if you get any more letters from them either bin them straight away or return them unopened with FUCK YOU written on the envelope.

[NeedlesCuties]

By the way, my gran also believes she was a fantastic parent to my dad - the fact of depriving him of electricity, heating, food and affection as a young child clearly doesn't ring a bell in her ears.

She also thinks she has been a great grandparent to me and my siblings. I give a hollow laugh at the mere idea of it and think she needs her head checked.

[MizzyFrizzy]

My own Grandparents on both sides were pretty good...I can remember having fun times with both sides of the family...got to stay over night and had fun days out...I miss them.

Anyhoo...my own parents however are a different story...it finally hit me how much I don't trust them around my DC's when I realised that I was happier to have neighbours (ones we had only known 6 months) babysit my DC's than my own blood relatives...how crap is that!

In fact, my parents have never spent any time alone with my DC's - not a conscious choice by me an just an instinctive one - an act I never realised I'd done until I started on this journey.

My eldest DC is now 15 y/o.

It was my parents interaction with my DC's - playing one off against the other - making one a Goldenchild, one a scapegoat and one an invisible child that forced me into a NC decision.

I will not let my parents fuck up my DC's the way they fucked up their own.

Me and my siblings are all damaged by our upbringing by quite a significant degree - for my family of choice this shit stops with me.

[MizzyFrizzy]

I just noticed the comment about your Mother acting as if everything was your Fathers fault....mine too...not a hint of her loading Father up with crap, beforehand and then sending him off to let rip at us DC's!

Oh no....Mrs Victim " Your Father is so mean to me...." YOU WERE JUST AS BAD!

[jasminerice]

Mizzy, once again EXACTLY! My mother would wind up my dad, he would explode and then she would act like the innocent victim. She still thinks she's the victim. She doesn't realise that we, the children are the victims. We're the ones who lost our childhood. To this day, I'm 42 this year, I realise I'm still always looking for a mother figure, a caring, loving, nurturing person. I subconsciously look to friends to be that mother I never had and of course I'm always disappointed. Because you only have one mother and if she turns out to be sh*t then you're stuffed because nobody else will do her job.