To be confused by this comment

[BigTD45]

Please please be kind with your responses on this one, very sensitive topic for me.

Went to see my foster mum for a catch up. Mentioned to her that I'm seeing a Counsellor to help me deal with some childhood trauma I experienced. Alcoholic mum, watched men beat her etc.

The conversation went on and it led to her talking about the childhoods of other foster children she's had. She mentioned about her 2 of my foster siblings (they're biological siblings to eachother) "had a harder childhood than I had".

Honestly, I'm not sure why this comment upset me so much. I just feel like it was unnecessary to even mention, especially off the back of me mentioning the Counselling sessions (neither of them receive counselling). Surely it's not a competition fgs. Nobody wants to have had the most difficult childhood, but my childhood was extremely traumatic and hard, and I don't like being compared to someone else and being told my problems aren't as big as theirs if that makes sense?

I'm interested to know what this sounds like from an outsiders perspective, please.

I suspect it was just a comment op. Some kids do really have it terribly. That doesn’t mean you didn’t have it bad.

It's not a race to the bottom so please don't take it personally. I doubt she meant anything by it. Hard and harder are both still hard.

I think it was well intentioned (to try and make you feel better) but clumsy.

I’m sorry Op, that your feelings were hurt. Maybe she didn’t really think about it properly before she said it? It doesn’t excuse her seeing as she hurt you.
Equally, seeing as it’s not a competition, is she allowed to reflect on the fact that (in HER view), even worse things happened to the other two? I’m sure she wouldn’t have thought of it as a competition in her wording at all - she probably meant to acknowledge your past pain and also sharing yes, the other two foster children had it awful as well. Maybe she was trying to make you feel less alone?

Bottomline is your feelings were hurt so you could try to gently say that to her. It’s really not a competition in past trauma, see what she says.
I’m sure she didn’t mean to hurt you though - did she give you a fresh start and was/is caring in general? Those are factors that would heavily affect how hurt I’d be over her comment. Take care

It was a stupid comment to make and she should know better as a foster mum. If she was trying to imply that you have a tendency to overdramatise and felt it might be good to bring it up, there are other, much better way to do so.

You were to be upset, but ultimately, the most likely situation is that she was just bringing them up thinking that it would help to know she looked after others who went through a very hard time and didn't mean any hurt at all.

She should know better. Horrible thing to say, minimizing your own suffering.
It's along the lines of the 'pull yourself together' popular comment.
I feel extra surprised that a foster mum would say such a thing.

Not the most helpful/sensitive of comments but it also depends on the context

“X had a harder childhood than you and I know counselling made a huge difference for them”

Is very different to

“I don’t know why you think you need counselling, X had it so much harder and they didn’t”

The first is just a clumsy way of making a point, the second is mean.

I think she was maybe (wrongly) trying to give you some perspective. She will be in receipt of knowledge of what happened to you all, she may feel that their life before her was much worse and she is allowed to feel like that. She probably should have kept it to herself though.

Talk to her about it.

Thank you all so much for your comments.

She has always been kind to me, and caring. She does, however, have a habit of comparing people to eachother. I find it very odd.

Trigger warning

She said that my foster siblings "seen things no child should ever see", knowing full well I did too. I watched my mother get beaten on numerous occasions, and raped in the bed beside me once. Multiple times I was forced to be in the room with her whilst her and her partner had sex, I was between the ages of 3 and 8 when these things happened.

I just feel angry tbh.

I'm not surprised you feel angry but don't direct your anger at your foster mother. It was the men who abused your mother (and therefore indirectly you) who you should be angry at.

Suffering isn't a race to the bottom and there are no prizes for having a stiff upper lip. Surely it is a credit to you that you are able to look back on that part of your life, to confront it. For some people they might be too scarred or to scared or not strong enough or just not wanting to work on themselves. I think the comment speaks about her view of counselling (possibly as for not coping rather than actually a preparedness TO cope and put things into perspective). Maybe she misunderstands the personal work that counselling is.

You have a right to access counselling. Yes she might have fostered children with different issues but this doesn't take your experience away. You shouldn't be made to feel that way. It is no ones right for someone to listen to peoples experiences and decide who came off worse. It affects people in different ways, some people never understand it, some people may need help processing the past and some people have a harder shell and find it made them stronger.

My stepmum tried to tell me my experience wasn't bad as a child because my dad took beatings to protect me. Unfortunately when left unattended with my mother she was very emotionally abusive, very physically abusive, she denied food and there was a period of sexual abuse too. One of her favourite punishments she used frequently was when my younger sister would chose a item and she would thrash me with it. I blamed my dad for not protecting me, I blamed my sister for becoming involved and I blamed my mother for what happened. I couldn't understand why I was the one being targeted (age 7 to 12). I was eventually removed from the toxic environment. I also accessed counselling as a adult and was told how silly I was. I started self harming because a physical pain to focus on was better than my memories constantly flashing in my head. My councillor helped me break that, but family seen it as attention seeking. As a child you expect your parent to love and protect you, when you are brought up in a environment that is not safe, loving and warm with food and water accessible then you spend your whole life confused. I know I have severe anxiety and I find it very hard to trust, I never feel safe, if I am safe I feel as though something is bubbling to explode. I constantly look for a problem when there is none and even therapy and medication didn't help.

I've met people since that have had a horrible start to life. I've never once thought my situation is worse.

It was a clumsy comment OP one that is unsupportive of the trauma you went through

It isn't a competition as there's always people worse off- including in countries where genocide is going on. Doesn't make seeing what you saw any less traumatic

I'd talk to your counsellor about how your foster mums comments made you feel as it's added to your distress not helped it

She should know better and it was an insensitive comment to make. I'm sure it was either just thoughtless or to make you feel better though. It really isn't for anyone to judge who had it worse. If she is normally a good source of support and you say is usually kind try to let it go or tell her calmly that her comment hurt you. Good luck with the counselling.

She totally invalidated your feelings with that comment. It was unnecessary to say it even if it's true. As you say, it's not a competition. One person suffering doesn't take away from the suffering of another. It's not a finite resource to be closely guarded, there's plenty of to go round unfortunately! The unspoken meaning is that they've got bigger problems and they're "fine" (she actually doesn't know this, it's an assumption) so you should be too. It's rude and disrespectful to invalidate you in this way. She's basically just told you that what you went though doesn't matter. I'm not surprised you're angry and upset, that emotional reaction is perfectly normal under the circumstances. As for why she did it, who knows?

Don't talk to her about your trauma or counselling again, its not healthy for you if she's going to say stuff like this. You could consider pulling her up on what she did though, if she was thoughtless and you get a sincere apology you might feel better, but if she stands by what she said you might feel worse and not want to be in contact with her at all.

I don't think it was mean in any critical way, just a comment in the conversation

Also, did you know about your foster sister's childhoods before she told you? That was confidential information if you hadn't already been told by them themselves. I'd be having a word with her to remind her to keep your own life info both as child and adult private when she's talking to others. And I'd be limiting what I shared with her from now on.

I would ask her what she meant. Then if you experienced what she describes, just tell her that you experienced that too so her comment confused you. There may be a misunderstanding. Going forward I wouldn't discuss this with her.

Your childhood experiences sound horrific, @OP. I’m so sorry you went through that. Those are experiences no child should ever have to endure.

I don’t know how your foster mum meant her comment. As you say she is loving and caring I imagine she didn’t mean any harm. But I can see how that invalidated your feelings.

When you were growing up I suspect you learnt to squash your feelings down, that they weren’t important. You learnt this to survive. To acknowledge the pain you feel and to say that your feelings are so important that you deserve counselling, that goes totally against what you learnt. With that in mind, by telling your foster mum you are thinking about having counselling, you are prioritising your feelings. This is taking a huge emotional risk; I bet it took a lot of courage to decide to do this and to talk about it. You did a brave thing and let yourself feel vulnerable. Your foster mum’s comment hurt so much because when you opened yourself up and made yourself vulnerable, she made a comment which made you feel silly, small, ashamed. I’m sure she didn’t mean to hurt you, but it’s important to acknowledge that you were hurt by the comment, and that is a totally understandable and normal reaction to such a comment.

I would add to that that even if your foster mum does think that, her opinion is not fact. You can choose (it’s hard, I know) to leave it. It’s impossible to measure and compare the impact of people’s suffering. And fucking pointless. You had a really hard time. That is real, and valid. You deserve to speak to someone about that. You are doing an amazing thing for yourself. Take care of yourself OP.

Hey guys, I'm so sorry for the delay in responding. I've read all of your messages and taken things on board. I haven't spoken to my foster mum since, not have a ignored her because she hasn't contacted me. We haven't "fallen out", I just need time. I want to wait until I feel stronger about the comment, and then I'll contact her and let her know how her words made me feel, in the kindest way that I can approach the topic.

Thank you all so much xx

*nor have I ignored her