Did anyone have a sibling that was abused?

[Sashamalia]

I had an abusive mother. My dad wasn't around. I had one brother. I'd say that my mother was on a pretty serious level of being abusive. She didn't hit us but she did everything else. She emotionally and verbally tortured us.

She was awful to me, but she was ten times worse to my brother. I think it's common where parents like my mother choose one child to severely abuse. For whatever reason.

I read the book "a child called it" about child abuse. It was about a family where the mother has four sons. She treats three of the sons really well. And then she severely abused one son. And he wrote a book about it.

My mum was like that to my brother . I felt like I spent my young childhood trying to save him from her, trying to help him.

Then when I was older , my mind got brainwashed by her. She kept telling me he was bad, and I began to see him as bad. I would say things to him like "why can't you be better then she wouldn't treat you like that". I relly thought he was the problem for a while. As she kept saying thst he was.

It was only when I was older again that I tried to work it all out, and I saw that she was abusive

I just feel very sad about it all. We both survived a terrible childhood, the two of us have had a lot of emotional problems in our adult life.

I was just wondering did that happen to anyone else?

I was that sibling. The black sheep. It started when I was around 6. Abused continually while the golden children were given Christmas presents, holidays, cars, later even houses. I was emotionally abused, given coal in my stocking, birthdays ignored, physically attacked, expected to clean up after everyone but not allowed food myself, sexually abused, and then finally thrown out and made homeless at 16.

I also read that book many years ago. He wrote two more which are also well worth reading, about how he dealt with it in later life, how different it made him with his own son and what happiness a normal parent/ child relationship brought to him. This is how I feel now, too, but the scars never go away. The worst part of it all is that as a child you know no different so you assume this must be normal. It took me many years to process - when I started to meet friends' families - the true extent of how horrific it all was.

I wasn't in your position, but unfortunately your brothers, my siblings were "step" siblings and although we had the same mum, different dads, but I was mentally and emotionally abused and at times, physically.
They were treated completely differently. Were you a child when you said about him being 'better' so she'd leave him alone? I'm a bit older than my siblings and both had said something similar to me when they were 8/9 ish and I really think it was them struggling to find a reason for me being so obviously treated differently, and when you've been brought up hearing it constantly, it sinks in.

The biggest thing for me was when my siblings agreed that I had been treated differently and badly, I never held it against them and we are actually close now, it wasn't their fault and I can see why they'd think I was 'bad' - I believed it myself for a long time. They were the best placed to reassure me I wasn't making it up (my parents would deny that they were doing or did anything abusive and that I was exaggerating or that I deserved it if they couldn't deny it) and that I didn't deserve it.

Have you had/could you have that conversation with your brother? Honestly it helped me a lot and to work out it wasn't me, I wasn't bad, they were the ones with the issue.

Sorry to hear that happen to you.

Yeah , just to add to that the "golden children" also suffer terribly too.

No one thrives in an abusive household.

I spent many years of my young childhood trying to save my older brother from my mother. I tried to help him. I was only small.

I am still traumatised by what I saw happen to him

Thanks for that. Yes me and my brother are very close. We get on well.
He knows none of it was my fault. We did our best in the house we were in

I wonder why so many adults are abusive

It must be very horrible for you that when you were a child yourself you were manipulated by the abuser into joining in with it. This also happened with my siblings. The way they treat me even now still carries some of that deeply embedded belief that I am difficult or undeserving in some way, deficient, because this was hammered into them in early childhood. Even now they know the truth of what happened it still colours how they behave towards me, even though rationally they know I was the victim. Perhaps it is partly guilt for having gone along with it, but they were children too so I do not blame them at all. But it has damaged our relationships because it has made them distant in how they treat me.

How is your relationship with your brother now? And also, now you see the truth, have you confronted the abuser about what she did to him and to you? Do you still maintain contact with her? I can't understand how you could really, if you genuinely care about what she did to him.

OP I wasn't blaming you at all. I understand why you are defensive, though. You were a child and also a victim.

No I didn't think you were blaming me.

It was just such a sad time to go through.

I don't think I ever joined in with it.

I just think if someone tells you over and over again that someone is bad, you start to believe it. But i was never nasty to him. I just said to him once "why can't you act better" or something.

Until you sit down and start questioning it.

Yeah me and my brother are very close now

Its how abusers work.

They abuse someone, then they tell everyone that the person they are abusing is the bad one.

I've seen it happen in different scenarios. Abusers use mind games and psychological tricks.

My kids are going through this at the moment from their dad who is separated from me.

There can be different combinations - a few children scapegoated, one golden child, or the other way around.

I think it is more common than not for it to be like this households where there is a narcissistic type person.

The whole extended family on dad's side has a narcissistic grandparent also, so the whole family ends up siding with the narcissist rather than anyone who is being victimised, because they were raised to defend and believe a narcissist and think anyone complaining must obviously have the problem.

There is no safety for people being victimised within a family, those people deeply entrenched in protecting a narcissist become very cowardly - no one wants to stand up to a narcissist parent! And this is in a family of people who are active in standing up for social justice issues, involved in church, charity, etc.

It is horrific and I think we X posted but glad to hear you are close with your brother despite this. You can be the family to each other that you lacked growing up. It is such a huge trauma you both went through and you need each other, and therapy as well.

I am also baffled as to why people do these things. I will never understand it. But eventually I concluded they had ruined so much of my life and caused so much damage that I don't want to waste yet more of it trying to contemplate their reasons. It's pointless because no excuse exists. I hate all of the "oh, well, their own childhood was hard" nonsense: you and I are living proof that it is always a choice whether to follow in their footsteps or become the opposite. There are many of us who have made being kind people and excellent parents an absolute priority above all else due to having been abused. The best thing to do is focus on healing the wounds as much as you can and building a happy life and continue the close relationship with your brother and cut the abusive people out of it entirely. Don't waste any more of your life on them. Focus on the people who actually matter.

Yes my brother and sister had that sibling in me. We are now all in our 40's and they still turn a blind eye to her mental and emotional abuse towards me. I have seen over the years they have joined in though. Very hard but thank you for the name of that book as I will look forward to reading it.
There is a thread on here called we took you to stately homes. Many of us have dealt with this. You may find some solice or advice there.

Yes. Terribly so. I had a lot of siblings, some half, and my older half siblings were treated terribly by my dad. The boys were beaten - heads smashed together, kicked, punched, hosed down, and the girls were sexually abused.

His own children, though he would occasionally hit the boys, we escaped any physical harm. The mental scars of watching the abuse will last forever. I had it easy, compared to them, but it’s still affected me emotionally, mentally, permanently.

As for my abused siblings, well, it goes without saying how they are. One was treated so badly that even therapy couldn’t help him. He’s no contact with all of us.