How do I face my family after this? How do I live with the shame?

[Pizzie]

Last year, I did something towards an extended family member that I am deeply ashamed of. There is no excuse for what I did and I have spent a long time regretting it and hurting her the way I did. It wasn't physical abuse from me but still. I eventually admitted what I done to the person involved and apologised sincerely.

My family, however, did not know the truth. At the time, I wasn't emotionally ready to tell them. I was working towards being honest with them in my own time, when I felt capable of having that conversation myself.

Unfortunately, someone who is an ex friend for more than a decade, identified me from online on a different site, found a vulnerable post I had written online while trying to work through the situation. This is someone with whom there has been a very long and painful history and someone I believe has remained extremely bitter towards me. Our falling out was different to the situation above. This person is just a drama queen and she can't cope with anything beyond herself and her own emotions and ego.
She identified me from the post, printed it, and sent it to members of my family.

So now the conversation I had been trying to prepare myself for has effectively been forced upon me.

What I am struggling with is the fact that I wanted to tell my family myself, after having time to process what I had done and find the courage to be honest.
Instead, someone else took something I had written when I was vulnerable and exposed it to them.

I am now facing a very difficult conversation with my family, and I am absolutely terrified.

I feel ashamed, overwhelmed and emotionally exhausted.

I suppose what I am looking for is some perspective from people who have had to admit something they deeply regret to their family. How did you find the courage to have that conversation? How did you cope with the shame afterwards?

I know I cannot undo what I did. I just want to find a way through this honestly and hopefully eventually find some peace.

It’s simple. You tell your family you have apologised to the person and you have both moved on. If they want to question you more about it or hate you for it, that’s on them, you don’t have to buy in to that.

Look this happened a year ago. I know you’ve apologised to your relative but you should have then quickly told your family members. The fact you now feel forced into telling the family, is irrelevant, you should have told them ages ago.

Put your big girl pants on and just go and tell them, do it this week and it means this time next week this whole drama will be over and you’ll feel much better.

f you have acknowledged that what you did was wrong and harmful to the person, it really is no one else's business. I would either say this to anyone who pried, or if you really feel the need to explain yourself to your family, just send one email to them all stating that you are aware someone is trolling you for something that happened, and in the interests of transparency and to stop this snowballing, you did something you bitterly regret, you have apologized to the person you hurt and uyou wont be making any further comment.

Its much better coming clean without being backed into a corner forcing yourself to come clean otherwise its not completely honest. Rip off the band aid, the longer you leave it the worse it will become.

Agreed. If you can’t be honest on here, there’s no point in posting.

Please try to be kind to yourself- self compassion. Sounds like you have had a very difficult time sitting with this. It doesn't matter what it was. The fact that you regret it and it has been troubling you for so long means something needs to shift, and only you can forgive yourself. Take care and try to remember, none of us are perfect. 🤗

Sent honestly kindly, this is not the big deal you think it is. I promise people do far worse things. You and the injured party (and were they genuinely injured beyond being insulted? I realise that’s not nice but they didn't eg lose their job or home or partner or anything due to your actions) are straight and have moved on. You didnmt tell your own immediate family as you were/are ashamed and sorry. Presumably they will see why. And then it’s over.

I think most of us occasionally think or say something dark or malicious about someone at some point. It’s not ok but feeling ashamed is a horrible feeling. With your family, all you can do is admit it was you, explain your shame and remorse and answer any questions they’ll likely have without making excuses .
In terms of yourself , you need to accept it’s over now. You can’t beat yourself up forever. Shame is such a horrible feeling , please don’t keep dwelling on something that’s done and you can’t change .

I haven’t spoken to a family member for 7yrs because of something unforgivable they said to me. Some things really are too awful to look past.
So I agree it depends what was said. The comment to me was after they got pissed off at me for not giving them enough attention, and they said they hoped I died from my cancer. Thankfully I pulled through the major surgery and treatment but I will never forget that comment that came at a really awful time for me as a mother to 2 young children.

You and the injured party (and were they genuinely injured beyond being insulted? I realise that’s not nice but they didn't eg lose their job or home or partner or anything due to your actions) are straight and have moved on.

From the way the OP describes the insult ("utterly utterly utterly dark", and so bad that the family member cut contact after discovering it was the OP) it was probably quite a bit worse than "not nice" for them. Receiving an abusive/threatening anonymous message can be very frightening.

I honestly think you need to stop living your life and expressing your feelings online. Talk to ChatGPT if you must but stop posting personal shit on public forums!

Do you live alone @Pizzie ?

Just pretend it never happened. Im sure your family still loves you. They will either bring it up, or sweep it under the rug. Ive yelled at my inlaw, it was recorded and sent to the parents.
They where mad for about 6 months. Then, the truth came out. It all got swept under the rug.

I think I recall your thread about this last year

It could have been a police matter but your relative didn’t go to the police in the end

Yes, that's how I read it.

It does seem to be a lot of angst. All you need to do is tell family - yes it's between me and cousin. We discussed it last year, I apologised, move along.

@Pizzie did you report the 3rd party for stalking and harrassment to the police? You should. With the family you can just say that you made a mistake and it has all been sorted out a while ago with the person concerned.

I think you’re cowardly and vile. And you had no intention of owning up to it, otherwise you would have done so in one year since it happened.

Clearly, another person thinks you’re nasty and in the wrong as that’s why they posted it was you to the victim.

I’ve noticed some posters on MN use it as some kind of therapy when they know they’ve done wrong, i.e. cheated, wrecked a marriage. Yet they couch the OP in a way the narrative illicits sympathy, exactly what they want, instead of owning evil behaviour. Or they diminish what they done wrong.

If you genuinely feel bad about what you did, you have to own it and fully confess to the victim as well as your entire family. Maybe they will forgive over time.

it’s crucial you learn from your mistakes and don’t keep on doing this spiteful malicious acts.

it’s no excuse saying you had other things going on at the time, this is deflecting blame. Plenty of people have trauma going on in their lives and just crack on with their lives/accept their fate. What they don’t do is do nasty things “to get their own back on life treating them bad”

Even if no-one has taught you the difference between right and wrong, you know now, or you know once you reach an adult aged 18.

I think you’re a coward and malicious and you really did send spiteful and malicious things anonymously.

You have to own it and if the consequences of this is people shun you, well this should teach you a lesson.

you need to be fully honest as well, not “I did this because I’d just been sacked, dumped by partner” etc.

Remember that if you try and dump blame or cover up any part of your wrong doing, this will come out in the wash and make it 1000x worse and the truth has a funny way of coming out at exactly the wrong time.

Try reading the bible/other religious text where they teach you to be honest, live a clean life, karma, do as you would be done by, what goes around comes around, what you reap you sow, be kind and nice, bad people get their just rewards etc , liars get their tongues ripped out, don’t do illegal things, don’t steal, don’t murder, don’t lie, don’t be jealous or envious of others.

Lead with the fact that you had already apologised to the victim, before the ex-friend outed you. It shows you came to your senses without having to be shamed.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/5446830-i-need-advice-about-family-conflict

This sounds like a lot of drama. Extended family, disgruntled ex friends.... found out through a post online yet you post about it again online!

I can't think of a "dark insult" from an unknown person would even register much with me, let alone my whole family finding out. I'd think it was just someone trolling me. Unless by "dark insult" you actually mean threats to harm?

As your family im sure they will just need to understand whatever it is you did and know that you're deeply sorry.
Its difficult to say without knowing .

What I sent was one big huge massive distastful insult. It could fall under offensive communications

“I was working through this….. “ for a year”!
WTF.
I agree with PPs the truth is you were never going to own up.
You’ve been bounced into it by your friend who is evidently disgusted that you were never going to come clean with your family and theyre labouring under false impression that you’re an angel rather than the perpetrator of some pretty nasty falsehoods.
Too late now.

Was the insult "true" in any sense of the word? E.g. you shut shamed them or was it just the worst random insult you could think of, like calling them a paedo?

I remember once a very malicious foreigner who sent an anonymous email to HR of a contracting company about a man they were jealous of as the innocent man was doing contracting and it seemed to the poison pen writer, they wanted to free up space so they could do his work instead.

The poison pen writer was a psychopath who themselves had lied all over their CV and had done all sorts of other unethical behaviour, not paid taxes, cheated and lied etc.

The victim was an innocent family man who was sacked and got depression. The innocent man was effectively blacklisted from his industry. His marriage broke down and he felt suicidal.

The psychopath effectively stole the innocent man’s livelihood and felt no shame.

Lots of coworkers recognised the psychopath mode of operation as the anonymous email emboldened them to also do the same on other work rivals.

The psychopath got a reputation and was shunned.

I believe in karma.