To be hurt that my brother won't take my side

[estrogone]

We were raised in a home with an unstable, alcoholic mother, lots of domestic violence, suicide attempts. I was subject to some physical abuse from my father and an enormous barrage of verbal and emotional abuse from my drunk mother. I was SA as a 6 year old on one of their benders by the teenage daughter of one of their friends. I told them about this year's later and they ignored me, later welcoming that person into their home.

I bore the brunt. So I am not in contact with my parents. My brother just pretends nothing is wrong. He goes about his business as if it was all normal. AIBU to feel hurt that he has never had the balls to call this out? I dont expect him to go NC or even say anything to my parents at all, but he could at least acknowledge it to me. I know he knows. He told me once in a single sentence, that he remembers.

I haven't said anything to him, but this is starting to burn a hole in my brain. I feel hurt and irrational. It feels like he is taking sides just by his lack of anything. I tried talking him about it and ever since he has been distant.

EDIT to fix autocorrect.

Hi OP. You'd DB will have experienced trauma as well. Sometimes it can take us years to deal with trauma. It is not at all unusual to find people still seeking approval or an ongoing relationship with their abuser and it might be years before he realises he does not need their approval or an ongoing relationship. It is not his fault. Be as supportive as you can be and maintain contact. At some stage he might really need this. Trauma can sometimes hit you many years later and when it does it can be paralysing.

Thank you - somehow just hearing that somebody understands this is really helpful.

I truly dont expect him to cut my parents off. His words to me, were 'I remember'. That is it. I feel lonely in my life experience, it is a very surreal thing to have been treated so terribly and the one person in the world who understands pretends nothing happened. I can't help feeling the way I feel. I must reiterate that he does not know I feel this way about him. I am not cruel and would not put that on him. When I raised it with him it was on the basis that he too suffered. Not on the basis of me being a bit tormented by him rewriting history too.

It's a complex and very difficult thing. I feel very scared to start therapy but I am resolved to.

Counselling will help you. And it might be the key to saving the relationship with your brother - neither of you were to blame for what happened to you. My experience of
counselling in a similar situation is that it was uncomfortable and tiring but a massive relief. Do it.

What I just dont get is why and how they have managed to forget it all. They call me evil for not letting this go. It's like they truly believe it did not happen. That I am making it up. That makes me feel like I am going crazy. My Dad in particular thinks he is an amazing person and a fantastic father / grandfather. It is so so warped.

Edit to add that this post refers to my parents not my DB.

@estrogone denial, as you can see, runs deep. For years my sister and I were united in the idea that our mother was crazy and our father was weak, however as soon as I started seeking therapy and really started to look at my reality things changed. I think the issue is that the things I was talking about were too real for her, they were simply issues she couldn’t handle, she couldn’t stay neutral and just have a relationship with me. She is completely enmeshed with my mother in particular and can’t see it. As time went on, and I started to heal more through therapy (5 years) I began to be disgusted by my sisters blind loyalty to my abusers. She would tell me one thing but, when push came to shove, she was never able to stand up to them, and that’s the trauma she lives with. My sister is brainwashed by them, she normalises the abnormal and will do anything not to rock the boat with them. Strangely, she knows all about narcissism, personality disorders and childhood abuse (her job is in this area) and yet the abuse I suffered (same as what you suffered) is somehow filed away in her mind. I’m the “difficult” one since childhood and she’s happy to perpetuate this narrative now as it’s easier for her, she needs to think this way in order to live her life. Sorry for the essay but I truly understand how devastating and isolating this experience can be. You seem to have done so much of the hard work that therapy, while painful, will be so healing for you.

Now I haven’t been in your position but I have met people who have done pretty awful things and behaved badly. XH was emotionally abusive towards me. His mother was another level. But they twist the narrative based on what they tell people to the point that they believe their own stories. Easier to do that than live with their actual behaviour. Of course there are people who just don’t care about what they’ve done but I suspect your parents fall into the first category.
I do think talking therapy and maybe a support group would help. You won’t get that understanding from family but you may find support from others who have been through similar.

You're not crazy. They were - and still are - terrible destructive parents. They terrorised you when you were a young child and teenager. They've left lifelong psychological scars on you. They should apologise, and keep apologising, and try to make amends, and try to reach across the divide that they created. That they don't is not because of who YOU are. It's because they are weak and selfish and emotionally immature. They're really bad parents and crappy humans too.

It's really hard to go against the parent-set narrative - where they present themselves as benevolent loving Mother Teresas who "made a few mistakes" - because people who didn't have horrid parents think you must be exaggerating, you must have been a difficult child, etc. And then there's cowed and complicit people like your brother who prop up the mendacity and lies and refuse to acknowledge what really happened, and that makes you wonder whether you imagined it, or whether you're unreasonable or crazy for not accepting it.

You're NOT crazy, OP. And you're not the only one. There's a long running thread here called "Well, we took you to stately homes" that's all about harm committed by abusive parents like yours. Maybe it might help you to read there.

If they were alcoholics on benders it’s very likely that they don’t remember a lot of it. Alcohol stops you being able to form memories. So that could be part of it as well as them wanting to preserve their self image as a ‘good guy’.

Thank you. I have heard of that thread but have never looked in on it. I will have a good look when I get home from work later.

I am sorry you have suffered too. Thank you for this perspective. It is very helpful and comforting.

My brother (2 years younger) and i went through stuff with our parenrs we had different experiences and remembers different things about what happened.

YABU to be angry with DB and I think it demonstrates you could benefit from further counselling.

I said I was hurt. I didn't say I was angry.

All of this.

Your brother is a victim too. He was very young. You don’t know that he hasn’t said something to them?

maybe this is insensitive… but do you feel jealous he had an easier life?

Yes but the tone of your posts also indicates to me that you’re angry as well as hurt. Which is understandable and you’ve been through a lot to then not have had counselling.

I hear you on that. I am already booked into my GP for the referral.

I’m so sorry for your childhood. Your brother is just trying to cope with his experience of his childhood the best way he knows how. This may be my blocking out things, denial or deflection.

The best thing you can do is get some therapy.

Good luck xx

I am not angry with my brother. I feel hurt that he is not able to acknowledge our shared history. By rewriting history to protect himself he is unwittingly making it much harder for me to deal with it as I don't only have to deal with my traumatic past, I am constantly questioning if it was actually real (it definitely was).

I am not remotely jealous of him. I protected him, as best I could. As a nearly 50 year old man, there is a part of me that hurts and is bewildered that he isn't able to look after me.

When you go to therapy (if the wait is too long look into private affordable therapy) focus on how you can maintain a relationship with your brother as it sounds like you care about him. You will have a big sister / little brother dynamic going on too and that can be a hard one to shift. It will be a lot to unpack but worth it

It sounds like he learned to be small and quiet and hes still doing it. He's still reacting like a very young, scared boy. In a big grown up body. His mind is still there.

Im sorry @estrogone. You were/are both victims, in different ways.

I have been trying and failing to deal with this for more than 30 years. If you weren't abused and then gaslit about that abuse its not easy to explain. My heart hurts for my DB but it is also very sad and troubled that it doesn't work both ways. I am human.

It is a mess that needs professional help. I do take comfort that I broke this horrific cycle with my children. I have such a normal, loving relationship with them. It has made my life very good in most ways. So there is a lot I am grateful for.

He’s probably buried his childhood and own trauma so deep that he’s so scared to even admit it happened and open the flood gates to dealing with it. Just remember he isn’t acting this way to hurt you, it’s just the only way he knows how to deal with it.

I know. Logically I 100% know this is true. Its just another gift from those fuckers.

I don't have any answers as to why, OP, but I understand how you feel about people who witnessed your abuse trying to rewrite history. My older brother was a nasty, abusive narcissist who was mentally and physically abusive to me, our parents and (although less so, as the rest of us tried to protect him) my younger brother. He was also abusive towards his wife and girlfriends (there was always at least one 'on the side'). At the time, our parents acknowledged that his behaviour was not right but expected me to keep quiet to avoid 'provoking' him and making it worse. When I left home I eventually went NC with older brother and our parents and my younger brother were outraged. They, and older brother, claimed not to understand why. Examples of shitty behaviour that I gave were either denied or bushed off as 'all children fight sometimes' (despite the fact that at the time he was a fully grown adult and I was a child being punched and kicked). Excuses were made for behaviour that couldn't be denied (eg. of course he cheated on his wife, she didn't keep the house clean enough! Police had to be called to stop him hitting mum because 'he was under a lot ogf stress'). Older brother became and alcoholic (in my view because he found that 'I was drunk' made people more likely to accept or even laugh about his awful behaviour) and passed away. I am still seen as the difficult one, told how awful it was that I didn't support older brother when he was ill, accused of lying for attention etc. Younger brother and parents talk of older brother as though he was a saint, and younger brother even named his child after him. I've been through self doubt (have I somehow imagined things?), upset, anger and now I've realised I need to distance myself from them all.

I think you would benefit greatly from therapy.

I went for my childhood trauma and was able to find some peace and release.

It’s not about excusing or minimising what they did to you it’s about learning to leave it in the past and taking your revenge which is a life well lived.

You deserve to be able to be happy and not just be a product of your shitty upbringing.