Well, it's like this. We all in our family have varying degrees of ishoos and hangups about our slightly weird childhood at the hands of a depressive alcoholic father with grandiose ideas about childrearing mainly inspired by his own neglected wartime childhood, and a passive aggressive mother, more passive than anything when it came to actually defending us against his excesses.
Ok so all five of had a weird childhood, tempered by birth position, level of intelligence, prettiness, etc....
Roll forwards 30 years my father is still a bully, my mother is still passive, and we've all built our lives in spite of them. I cope with my childhood by shelving it and not really ever getting it out of cold storage.
Except that my sister (no 3 of 5) will keep going on and on and on about every single perceived slight from either of them at any time. Usually by phone, usually at around 7-8 pm (just after her children go to bed, just when we're having supper).
And guess who is her sounding board?
She continually rehashes the past, gets brusque and aggressive if interrupted or contradicted or challenged on any of her assertions, and sounds and reacts basically like our father. I don't want to say to her that she is sounding like our father, because that would be deeply unproductive, and if she is, well that's who she is.
I just do not want to spend 20mn on the phone to her during supper 2-3 times a week listening to her tell me how mean our parents are to her, how they appreciate her, how it's everyone's right (HA!) to a perfect childhood with an attentive set of parents, yadda yadda yadda
I know that there's no such thing as perfect parents, and that quite possibly ours pretty much did the best they could (not excusing them, just can't see the point of dwelling), and I really really do not want to listen to her yaddering on time after time about the same things. I just feel that she is an intelligent woman and ought to sort it out in her own mind and how to deal with it so that it doesn't poison her relationships (as I did around the age of 22). I can't see why she thinks it's OK to ring up quite to frequently to try to get approval for her opinions, and will not even talk about it. Frankly I'm not cut out for the sounding board role, particularly on this.
Anyway, this evening, I put the phone down on her pretty much mid-sentence after muttering a feeble excuse through a half chewed boiled potato. I'm feeling ashamed now.