Always the last to be picked

[SansaStark90]

I don’t know if I’m feeling really sensitive or right to feel valid. I’ve been feeling very low on myself. Very. My family know this. I mentioned in passing to my mum I’d like a little tattoo to cover a scar. She said oh lovely idea. Then we had Sunday lunch with my brother who declared he was having a large tattoo on his arm. She said he’d look awful, begged him not to. I said well you didn’t mind when I said I wanted one. Bearing in mind me and my brother are in our 30’s. She said yeah, but he’s good looking. Meaning he’d spoil himself but must mean no chance of me spoiling myself. I went over this comment for now over three months.

Jump to Wednesday last week. A family member messaged my brother on social media. I’m not on it. Asking if he and I would like to come to see another family member perform at a large venue. Now everyone in my family know how down I am to the point of being suicidal and really struggling. So you’d think I’d be treated a little more gently. She said in the message which was forwarded to me, if my brother couldn’t make it. I should come along and join them. This event was in the next city. Having not been on any form of a night out other than meals I became excited and told him to message her id love to and for to text me the details. In the meantime, I ordered an outfit for next day delivery, booked my nails and lashes in and makeup for the Saturday the day of the event. Presuming as she’d asked and she was driving there, I’d be getting a lift.

So she text me. Tickets are available online. Brother has said he can’t make it due to working….i would have offered a lift but we have a car full (I had no idea and still think this was a lie as when I’ve heard of them going to these events, no mention of others attending.)

For one, heading there on my own where the nearest car park is a fifteen minute walk so I’d be walking to my car late at night in an unfamiliar city. And two, I just felt like she wanted my brother there. But not me. I felt small. Inferior. And unwanted. I’ve been very emotional about the whole thing since.

That feeling of being less than, of desperately wanting to be taken care of comes from your childhood - from what you’ve said about your background, from your Mum and her criticism and put downs. I’m sorry you were treated poorly by your family.

From personal experience, the only way you’re going to overcome those feelings is with therapy. You do have the inner strength to go therapy, you had the strength to get through an abusive childhood which means you have the strength to work through those feelings and memories. Minimising contact with your family whilst you work on those feelings will help.

EMDR is a good place to start.

And go for the tattoo, do something nice for yourself, it will be beautiful.

Your title is very misleading, you talk about being picked last. Why do you think you have worded it that way? Do you assume (without merit) that your brother would have been offered a lift had he agreed to go? Or do you maybe think the people inviting you could have assumed you and your brother might in fact drive in together?

No one has picked you last. Say this group decided together they would go, they have then thought about inviting you and your brother to genuinely spend time with you and because you’d enjoy it. Your reaction then is to get upset, saying “well you didn’t include me on the car ride” - what next? “Well you didn’t have me round for lunch beforehand” or “well I didn’t get to sleepover the night before.”

I say this again, with kindness, because I’ve had a good friend react just like this and it becomes very very difficult to invite them to anything! In fact, we had to stop inviting them anywhere because the invite always became so offensive in ways we could not anticipate. One time a friend asked me if we could all get together on the Friday, and if I could ask our friends. So I said yes. I came back and said “I’ve spoke to X, Y and Z and they would all love to hang out with you on Friday. Shall we do my place?”
Friend then got upset that I had spoke to the others and done all the ‘planning’ without them. Refused to attend because they felt left out. I said, this was YOUR plan. You asked me to invite people, there has been no planning. But there was no listening, just great upset at the presumption we had gone out of our way to exclude her from her own suggestion.

I think the biggest thing you can take away from this is that 99% of the time no one is thinking that deeply about you. They aren’t deliberately saying one thing because they said another to you, they aren’t choosing you last over others. They have chosen you, that should be all that matters and all you focus on.

I would take the good looking as a joke (is he incredibly handsome) and trying to stop him getting the tattoo. Could you not have got a taxi to and from the venue if you didn't want to walk alone? Or as others have said arrange to park in the same place so you walk with your relatives? Did you ask why you weren't invited to the wedding, it could have been an oversight rather than a sleight. It's easy to get into a habit of thinking the worst of people, I know it's hard but try to think people are generally good at heart.

Wow. Maybe no one makes the effort because you’re not a nice person 🤔

@SansaStark90 just because they are blood related, doesn't mean that they have to like you, or want to mix with you. Just like them being blood related to their Uncle , doesn't mean that they inherit. Personally, I'd have given them a dropsy. If you were willing to give half away, I'd have shared that out. Because relatives do our parents a favour, it doesn't mean that we owe them. They don't owe you time, like you didn't owe them money. Once cousins grow up, they get to pick who they mix with. It isn't a rejection. Stop trying to control who does/goes were, you aren't in competition with your brother. Foster friendships and get more support for your mental health.

My Money. My choice.

Well along similar lines:
My performance, my choice
My car, my choice

Mental health or not, you sound to have amean streak in you. I wouldn't invite you out either.

I have an aversion and hatred than 90% of the British public don’t know the difference between you are and your. That makes me horrid. Sure you aren’t the sensitive one?

You can choose to find offence in every minor thing/throw-away comment, but the only person that hurts is you. Loosen up a bit and stop looking for reasons to get offended. Your examples are really minor things that you have most likely taken the wrong way.

Says miss “animosity”. Funny name for someone laid back and lovely

Mean streak vs sarcastic dry humour. You take your pick. I’m quite funny in real life. You wouldn’t think it with my mental health woes

It wouldn't occur to me to give someone a lift who has a car and drives regularly 🤷‍♀️

People who are depressed often (and I've been there) are very self focused out of necessity. And that's how you come across.
A lot of "if they knew how I felt then they would xyx."
Thing is they don't know how you felt... But you also don't know how they feel. You don't know that they aren't hiding their depression, their fear of driving, their fear of rejection.

It's very easy to say "I would if I was them". But you aren't them, and you don't know their reasons, and you're assuming they know exactly how you feel.

You also use the expression (around giving lifts) "that's just the sort of person I am". Now my prejudice here is I've never known a person say that who isn't self centred and has no idea of how they really come across.
But you didn't offer them a lift!
Surely rather than assume they would offer a lift, if you are the sort of person who always thinks about such things, your reply to the invitation would be "thank you for offering the ticket. In return, let me drive"
That way you'd have been returning a favour and making sure you weren't on your own. So actually you aren't the sort of person who offers.

I don't think that you're being missed out, I don't think you're the scapegoat or less loved and it's not helpful to think you are because it's the depression talking. I've been there and it's not a good place, and you need professional help to climb out because you can't do it on your own.

I never said I am laid back and lovely. My username is just that: a username. Now stop your temper tantrum and behave like a grown up not a petulant child. You seem to be very entitled to other people's time and lifts but have very little understanding for others. Kindly, seek therapy. You will get yourself into a bigger self loathing hole than you already are in. Call me all names you want, I don't mind. But your family have the right to chose wjo they spend their time with. And if you are so dramatic I understand why no one would invite you, yoi go out to have a nice time not to look for flaws and missconstruct everything. I hope it makes sense

You’re (see I know the difference too) an utter dick OP.

Seriously.

Thank you.

I would have offered to drive had I not been told instantly our car is full. Given I don’t know anyone else I felt silly offering to drive. Maybe I could have tried more so I will take that on board.

I do think though life is swings and roundabouts. You do someone favours and they should return them - again I should learn this isn’t others thinking and I’ll stop doing them. I did x3 a week for six weeks round trip, waited while she had treatment all as a favour for her parent. I have dog sitted on holidays for free, babysat. I did take it for granted that this would have been a return favour. But lesson learned.

The way you are responding to people on here @SansaStark90 is giving a clue as to how you come across in real life and what the actual issue is.

I say this as someone with a long term MH issue and PTSD from childhood abuse - you need to take your head out of your arse and realise the only way you are ever going to find the happiness, inclusion and validation you are looking for is by admitting you are part of the problem.

You didn’t deserve your childhood or your mother’s continued behaviour but expecting your cousins, who you barely know, and seem to make no effort with beyond self righteously claiming they had no right to your uncle’s money because you were the only one who was nice to him, to place you at the centre of their thought process for a casual invitation is extremely self centred.

As is the ‘I would do x because I am nice and they are not’ thought process.

Depression and trauma isn’t a free ticket to being treated with kid gloves and being allowed to be a bit of a dick.
You might think you hide it and your public face is funny and care free but I can promise you, it isn’t. Depression deludes us in many ways. I am mortified at what a self centred ass I was at my worst, despite thinking I was hiding it.

Use your money to go to therapy. To learn ways of thinking that don’t centre you as a victim. To put boundaries in place. To learn how to cope with rejection, real or imagined.

Your current state of mind is never going to give you the outcome you want because no one owes it to you. You owe it to yourself to change that way of thinking. No one else is going to change, so you have to.

A tattoo on an arm is going to be seen, one on your back is not.

You get out what you put in to relationships.

This has worked out in your favour for your uncle and you are happy to accept it. It has worked out less well with family you don't really see not inviting you to a wedding - the principal is the same though, it's not personal.

You say things like "you would offer a lift," but do you actually invite people placed and given lifts or is it theoretical? People who Invite get invited in return, people who are proactive are included more, and first, by others.

The good news is that this is in your control once you feel up to it.

The tattoo comment could either have been vicious or could have been a way of shutting down a very childish conversation you started, an eye roll response. There's a difference between covering a scar with a tattoo nobody will see and having your whole, unscarred, arm done. 3 months is an unhealthy amount of headspace for a tit-fot-tat interaction, what did you want from the comment you made, there's no good answer?

@SansaStark90 there’s also a typo in your attack on another poster. Which undermines your self-righteousness quite significantly. There’s a lesson there, should you be open to it.

I'm not sure what you've been hoping for from this thread @SansaStark90 . It started out with you being upset about a range of family interactions, but you don't want to consider where you've misunderstood, nor counselling, nor your impact on situations. It seems more like you're here to argue with other posters now. Is that your coping mechanism, to start up a row?

I did notice. But I haven’t slept and I’m teary. The bare necessities of life

Attack? Again. Sure I’m the dramatic one

Muphry's law