Brother is blackmailing me. wwyd?

[Polishedshoesalways]

My brother and I grew up in the 70s, this is relevant because he says our childhood is ‘normal’ and ‘fine’ and just like everyone else’s childhood at that time.

To be clear my father hit my mother, and was very violent from my earliest memory. He would lock me in the loft, or stand over me pummelling my body with his fists as a very young child. He would fly into a temper at the slightest provocation, and we all lived in total fear of him. The police and neighbours came to our house on more than a few occasions.

My father said repeatedly that he never wanted kids, and we didn’t have a relationship at all as we grew up. He hated spending any time with us. We spent most of our childhood trying to stay safe and avoid his violent outbursts.

I developed anorexia as a teenager due to his unkind comments about my body, and later tried to commit suicide because I found it hard to imagine continuing and I could see no way out. I recovered in time and grew into an healthy (ish) happy (ish) adult, and made a life for myself.

Fast forward to now I have had extensive and very helpful therapy for a few years, and after my father started to make my own children cry by humiliating them and calling them horrible names, I finally found the courage to cut contact with him.

My psychotherapist at the time said he is unwilling and unable to change and I must prioritise my dc. I understood I could not allow my dc to suffer in the same way I did. It hurt so much, but I took the decision to keep them safe from him.

My brother stopped talking to me around this time. He said I am being ‘cruel’ to my father by refusing to see him. That he is getting older and cutting him off is unforgivable of me. I am evil apparently.

I have now lost almost all of my family. My mother barely keeps in contact bar a daily text and I occasionally visit her alone or with dc. My brother continues to abuse me by email saying he ‘hates’ me and why can’t I just ‘put up with it’. My aunt now has family gatherings but doesn’t invite us.

I am being made to feel like the unreasonable person here, despite my therapists and my dh and all of my friends saying what happened to me is child abuse.

It’s been such a high price to pay to keep my children safe, and I feel broken by my brother’s relentless efforts to emotionally blackmail me into contact with my father (my abuser) or he will continue to ignore me as he has done for the last few years. My brother has given me an ultimatum- accept my father back into mine and my children’s life or be exiled by the whole family basically. I do not want any contact with father, my brother disregards this.

My mother has enabled all of this, but I see her as a victim of DV although he doesn’t hit her anymore - he is cruel in other ways, she has said she will never leave him. So she has made her choice, and it’s to stay with him.

What would you do?

I do not understand why you are still in contact with your abusive brother.

I completely appreciate the pain of accepting you can't have contact with your family, but continuing to be an emotional punch bag for your abusive brother is really damaging.

What would you tell your daughter to do in this situation? I assume you would tell her to prioritise her mental health. You deserve the same - you do not have to put up with this treatment.

This charity may help, there are more people than you realise who are no contact with their whole family: https://www.standalone.org.uk/

My situation as an adult was a lot like yours: I went NC with my parents & my brother didn't, & in the beginning he said he didn't remember any abuse. But he didn't push me to pretend, like your brother's doing to you OP. These days we've reached a kind of truce: he has his contact with the family & I don't. We're on friendly terms.

I lost a lot of my family when I went NC with my parents. It often happens. People are invested in not seeing & not knowing what's going on - in denying it, basically, because the alternative is too difficult or inconvenient for them. And some genuinely don't know. Some people launch a smear campaign against you when you leave, because you need to be seen as the bad one so that they can be the good ones.

It doesn't sound like your father has changed, so the only thing to do is to protect yourself, your DH/DP & your children from him. If it was me, I'd block the brother because you don't need all the stuff he's sending you.

Your brother is a bully. Leave them all to it. You are doing the best thing by not exposing your children to it.

Your brother is in denial about the past because it's too painful for him to think about it.

He is just like his dad - he learned from him. I think his wife will be living in fear of him, just as your mum is with your dad. He, like your dad, will panic as he sees himself lose control of you.

I think that you should say to your mum - in person - you know I love you very much, no matter what Brother might say, and if anything happens to dad I want you to come and live near me. I'll sort everything out. If you live near Brother he'll be after you for your money.

She knows about the money side as she's been giving him money all along.

OP, there's always a scapegoat in these set-ups and it's you.

There's sometimes very good reasons for being estranged from your family of origin.

You might gain some comfort from reading through this organisation's site.

We are here to support and raise awareness about adults that are estranged from their family or children.Stand Alone offers support services to prevent estranged adults becoming vulnerable. We talk openly about the experience of family estrangement to help others lead lives that are less isolated.

https://www.standalone.org.uk/

1 in 5 UK families are touched by estrangement and it may be more common that that.

https://www.standalone.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/StandAlonePrevalenceRESEARCH3.pdf

ETA: I see I crossed with a PP. Apologies.

I am sorry for everyone that is going through this. It’s very painful. 💐

Just to answer some questions. My aunt is my mums sister and would often be called when things got really out of hand. She stood there in our living room with my uncle many a time with the house hysterical after one of his rampages. She knows very well what he is like, but she has to keep quiet because she is my mother’s twin. She practices staying out of things and looking the other way as far as I can tell.

My brother has grown into a vicious bully himself. I can’t imagine what he is like to live with but the callous messages are indicative of a truly awful, damaged man.

One of the reasons I haven’t completely cut off everyone, perhaps the only reason is the future funeral(s) I always imagined I would have to go, how could I not? I don’t honestly know what I would even say at my father’s. I wouldn’t be able to think of even a single nice thing to say about him.

I have decided to tell my friends the truth. This thread has given me the confidence to tell them my shameful secret, that my family are toxic bullies that cause nothing but misery and harm. I would want to know if this had happened/was happening to them.

You already are without a family in the proper sense - you are not loved, protected or nurtured by these people & have never been - so what’s left is feeling tied by guilt, grief and fear. And maybe hope.

I think that in some ways it may be grief.

OP is mourning the childhood and family she should have had- that every child should have - loving, supportive parents and siblings who are there to share the good times, and to be a shoulder to lean on in the bad.

That hope of an "ideal" family died many years ago, but the ache of grief still remains.

Bless you ...cut them off you don't need these horrible bastard s in your life I hate bullies ...there is no place for these ppl in your life family or not ..disgusting...hope you find the strength to get them out of your life sending hugs

I've cut my father off and couldn't give a shit about his funeral he's already dead to me

Exactly this !

Again, first answer has it

None of them bring anything to your life and will actively cause damage to you and your DC

Walk away

OP you don’t have to go to any of their funerals. You owe them nothing as they’ve not been a real family to you. Real families don’t treat each other like this. I have a lot I could say but really it boils down to - walk away and never look back. It’s immensely freeing.

Avoid the lot of them. Who will end up being responsible for your abusive father care when he needs it? Not your brother to be sure. Go NC they will ruin your life

That wasn't just a normal 70s childhood and well done to you for getting out of it well enough to not accept it for your children.

Leave your brother and aunt to it. If they want to pretend they are a happy extended family let them get on with it. You have your own family and friends. You don't need to go to anyone's funeral or speak at anyone's funeral. Have confidence in your decision. You are not denying your kids a loving extended family, you are protecting them from traumas that you weren't protected from.

I'm older than you. This was not normal in the 1970s. It was still very very difficult for women to leave and I doubt you can understand just how bad it was. The council wouldnt help you. The first womens refuge was not until 1971, and only in London. Refuge almost went broke in 1992. Your mother probably didnt work and even if she did landlords would probably not have rented to her. Her family probably wouldnt help either, there was still an expectation that women put up with it.

Even when you were grown - where was she to go and how was she to live? Any confidence she ever had would have been beaten out of her. Unless a child or relative took her in she would still find it very hard to find a way to live. If she had managed to get away (one of her children would probably have had to rent a place) she could have got benefit payments but they would have tried to get her to claim maintenance.

A daily text is actually quite a lot of communication from your mother and she probably has to hide that from your father and brother. Dont cut her off completely. If you cant try to rescue her at least try to forgive her. The rest of the family - forget them. Block your brother, he is being abusive himself. You might like to tell him first that only abusive men think that behaviour is normal and you refuse to be abused by him.

I think that's a good idea to
Chat to your friends. You might find others in the same situation. My husbands dad was a nasty bully but the whole family covered for him, even my husband. They all hated him but it was too much for them to go against him. Even after he died no one really admits to what he was like. It's strange. My husband will say it occasionally in private. No one has nice things to say about the Dad .
My husbands Mum isn't British and I wonder if there is a cultural element that makes it worse. I'm not sure but I think there is more of an element of shame and pride involved.

I really feel for you. I'm currently dealing with a lot of childhood trauma and have lost my sister as a result. I experienced emotional and physical abuse from my father and as we grew older I kept calling out the dysfunction in the family but my sister kept enabling it and acting in the same rude dismissive way as my father. My sister then experienced a health crisis that made her address her childhood but she then tried to convince me I was sexually abused by my father until a teenager and said we had both repressed the memory. I had no memory of this but remember all the physical and emotional abuse so don't believe this has happened to me (it may have happened to her) but trying to convince me of memories that didn't happen dismisses the memories that did and made me feel gaslighted. Anyway, I have no contact with my dad and haven't really for a couple of years but still speak to my mum. I see her as a victim too as she was abused by my father but I do resent the fact she always chooses my father over me. Counselling weekly is really helping me and I'm starting to realise my worth. I still view my sister as a victim as well as we both experienced an abusive childhood but it doesn't give her the right to treat me badly like she has always done so I choose to remain no contact with her. Sadly we cannot choose our family but you sound like you're a great mum prioritising your children (my father also spoke to my kids like crap and commented on their weight so I vowed to only see my mum without him from now on)

I am so proud that I managed to raise my own children without violence, threats or fear. I couldn’t have done that had my family remained in my life.

I have one quiet silent supporter in all of this and that’s my mum. She has never lied, or tried to cover up the truth or say it didn’t happen. She does acknowledge it fully but then says something like ‘but your dad does love you’ she finds it hard to admit that he really doesn’t, he doesn’t love any of us. Just hearing her say it was awful and I do remember it too, it’s very validating. It’s not to say I don’t hold her responsible for never standing up for me, just that she doesn’t gas light me as well like the others.

She told me to walk away, let go and never look back last month because she couldn’t bear to see how much it hurts me. I wish I could take her away from all of this but it’s not my decision to make. It sickens me what he has done to her, far more than what he has done to me. I don’t want to leave her at their mercy. She is more vulnerable than she realises.

One thing that struck me OP is you say your shameful secret. You have nothing to feel shame over you are not responsible for the evil in your dad, nor your brother. Your mum is a victim but hasn't sought the help to leave that is her choice.

You have broken the cycle and protected your children there's no shame in that in fact the opposite. Take strength from all you have done to protect your children and break the cycle. You don't need this nor the emotional turmoil it causes. Let your brother see his threats have no effect over you. Your better happy and healthy.

Am so sorry that you experienced this growing up. It sounds horrendous.

What I don’t understand is why you’ve maintained contact? I appreciate that your mum will never leave your dad, which is tragic, but she also chose to allow him to abuse you. I would have been (in fact after a similar childhood, I was) out that door the second I had earned enough to leave at 18/19.

Also, when I got engaged and my mother kicked off about the wedding, chose to go entirely NC as my DH and I decided we did not want our children exposed to it, or to see me in tears every time my abusive mother called.

I felt guilty about it for a long time - and especially when I got a call to say she had died alone and been discovered by her lodger - but it was the best decision I could have made.

Let them go and focus on your kids and healing.

Op do you have a husband if so what is his take on it

This is their loss 🤷🏼‍♀️
Prioritise yourself and your child/children.

I'd leave the door open potentially in case things change in the future buuttt you're not in the wrong here.

Block your brother - do not give him the headspace. He doesn't deserve it.

As for your Mum, I would try and maintain the texts each day of possible and you are OK doing so. But don't get suckered in to arrange support etc. Keep distant. No amount of inheritance is worth your mental well being.

And when the time comes, funerals are only for the living, and you do not want to be "support" for your dysfunctional family so don't go.

You can remember the dead in any way you please. A walk, a place, a picture you buy in their memory, plant a tree. You will know what you want to do if your Mum passes, and who you want to do it with.

I said YABU purely because you’re trying to salvage relationships with any of these people. It’s like self harm. You’re protecting your children from them, and it’s time for you to protect yourself. The way you were treated is literally criminal. You might see your mother as a victim but she is just as guilty as your father for failing to protect you. Presumably she knew your father was beating you yet did nothing- can you imagine that? Would you ever stand by whilst someone beat your children? No. So why excuse your mother?
Your brother threatening to exile you is a fantastic invitation and opportunity to be free of these awful, toxic people. Embrace the chance with open arms. You can’t choose your family but you can choose to emancipate yourself from them.

Don’t you dare feel shame.

You are not paying a price by giving up these people who have abused and manipulated you all this time. A true family don’t do that. Good people don’t do that. They are a millstone around your neck.

It is time to cut them off and to feel proud that you are taking a stand against wickedness. You are taking a stand to ensure your children do not put up with the same evil behaviour you have been subjected to in
the past. You are showing your children it is not ok.

You still have a family. You have your DH, children and friends.

You never have to see those toxic people ever again. You never have to go to their funerals. Funerals are about showing respect and those manipulative, abusive, narcissists deserve no respect.

Go forward with your life and don’t look back.