Thread 50 - Covid GCSE Cohort - New Year of Adulting

[OrangeSpicedBun]

2024 here we are... our young people are still getting used to adulting and we're still doing that adulting thing ...it's tough !

This is a support thread for our young adults post GCSEs 2020, regardless of their educational setting, and their results ( or life updates for those who went into work or have had results earlier). It is respectfully requested that all are supportive and helpful to each other. If you want to start a debate, e.g state vs private, uni vs employment please don't within this thread.

Some of us have been here since first thread back in yr10, some will be new. Everyone has been friendly and helpful in the past. Everyone is welcome. It is hoped this will continue. We were previously on the secondary board and then further education, now we shall be here in 'Parents of Adult Children' gulp

Our DS/DD may continue down various pathways ( employment, apprenticeships, higher ed). Experience is that everyone is welcomed wherever, whatever their child is doing we have some in work, gap years , apprenticeships etc too. Lots of contributors with different experiences and always sympathy and advice to be had.
Previous thread
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/parents_of_adult_children/4922401-thread-49-covid-gcse-cohort-the-nights-are-drawing-in?page=10

It sounds very much like your mother and aunt made your cousin a scapegoat.

In my experience people are often in denial that how children were treated back then was wrong. Especially children in their own family. And it’s not just physical abuse, a lot of how kids were brought up back then would be classed as neglect or emotional abuse now.

And sometimes the victims only start to think again about what happened to them (because it becomes normalised) when they have children themselves and realise that small human beings should not have been treated that way.

Shimy, I hope that whilst what you are now discovering must be abhorrent to understand about your own mother, regardless of different times, hopefully you and your cousin can now support each other; I'm glad you have regained a relationship with her. Remind yourselves how brave, well turned out and strong you both are in spite of your pasts.

Families. I'll leave it there.

I don't get the feeling DM has any remorse. I think she may feel embarrassment at knowing what she did and that the cousin could likely 'talk'and was trying to manipulate her a bit but there's no genuine remorse.

That’s horrific @Shimy , I’m not surprised you are so upset, even given the already known issues with your DM this is a whole different level. I’m glad you and your cousin have each other for support.

I feel sullied, like I'm a part of something macabre because I am her DD .

No @shimy! This was not of your doing. You were not party to it. You had no idea it was happening. From what you have said you had enough to deal with.
You have shown that you are nothing like your Mum.
Have you ever tried counselling over your experiences?

No I've never tried counselling though thought about it. I can't stop thinking maybe given the right circumstances, that type of wickedness is in me also. How do i know, how do i really know?

Goodness Shimy. Poor you. At least you and cousin can support eachother. This will take time to get over. but whilst it is a shock now, deep down you probably aren't that shocked because you already knew your mum has the ability to be so vile. Even if you did talk to her, these types are normally so deluded they'd play it down. So the victim never gets the heartfelt apology they want because the person is unable to give it. Accepting that is hard.

That's the thing @Oblomov24 I am shocked, deeply shocked. I never knew she had it in her. DM was always a campaigner against DV. I knew she could be petty, a master of passive aggression, narcissistic as well as vindictive but NEVER could i have imagined her beating my cousin, with electrical wires, and over such stupid things. Its the state of the mind behind that i find so frightening, the wanting her to strip off before the beating, the infliction of old wounds and new wounds. My cousin said once the lashed caught her in the eye. For months she couldn't see properly with her eye, it kept hurting and weeping. (Stepdad who didnt know what was going on or why the eye was giving problems) One day suggested going to the opticians. He told her to be ready for 3pm following week and he was coming to take her. Cousin said she was watching DM's face and could see she was not happy. When stepddad left, she could hear them having some sort of argument downstairs. The ff. week came and stepdad never showed up. He also never mentioned going to the opticians again.

Thankfully, her eye eventually healed on its own.

These are all the little spiteful and dangerous things i had no idea DM was capable of.

Oh Shimy I'm so sorry. What a disturbing revelation. I hope you and your cousin can help each other going forward.
NEVER could i have imagined and this how you can be reassured that you would never go there. You do not have it in you. Your mother is unfortunately a piece of work.

Oh, I'm sorry to read that, Shimy. Not your fault in any way.

Thanks for all your support and comments. I've had to ask for the fist post to be deleted as I felt it it could be identified and it was also making me feel sick reading it back.

Shimy, I’m sorry, I’ve been out and didn’t read your message, but I get the gist. That is absolutely awful. Please don’t feel tainted. You haven’t abused anyone. My family history has stuff like this in, in my case it was my sister who was sadistic. I did my absolute best for her children, but ultimately couldn’t protect them and the trauma has a long reach. I felt guilty for years, and have only now stopped feeling that I have to fix everything for them all. This will ease in time, it will explain so much that you have puzzled over. The guilt and responsibility belongs with your mother. It’s an absolute testament to you that you have created a loving family for yourself.

Oh shimy I've not seen your first post but it sounds like you've been through hell. I hope that you and your cousin can work through this. I gather you've only found out recently.

Oh @Shimy I missed the first post but am getting the gist. Not your fault and what your mum did doesn’t define you. I pray for peace and healing in this situation xx

I’m so sorry you’ve had this bombshell @Shimy . I totally understand that this sort of brutal, sadistic behaviour is on another level from what you already knew she was capable of. I hope you and your cousin can support each other. You’re obviously nothing like your mother, so don’t worry about that.

@Shimy just want to send you best wishes. Of course you are not like her, we all have horrible family members if you go back far enough. But that does not make you like her, as others have said your wouldn't be horrified if you were like her.

I had a Hungarian friend with a very cruel mother, she and her sister were beaten with nettles on the backs of their bare legs for moving a bench in their village when they were 5 and 7. Lots of other horrible stories of emotional abuse. It is extraordinary to us now what some people did not question less than 50 years ago.

@Shimy another one who has not seen the original message but can get the gist. What a horrible shock for you to find out and shatters the world you grew up in. Even if you knew it wasn’t great, you had no idea what was going on. There is no way you can be to blame, harder than it sounds but you need to be fair and kind to yourself. You are in shock and innocent in all of this. Sending hugs

@NCTDN a good friend's DD is at Sheffield and the support has been amazing. We often contrasted the lack of support DS got at Bath with the amazing support she is getting at Sheffield. It really has been outstanding.

@Seeline well done to DD on her award!!

To add to the lack of support DS got at Bath, he never even had a response from his personal tutor to his email saying he was withdrawing.

And to top it all, he had an email from admin this week asking why he didn’t attend his tutor session. I despair 🙄😬.

Need to get him to log all of these things before he loses access to uni emails in a week or so. We will at some stage do a formal complaint.

@Shimy I haven't seen your original message but just wanted to add my best wishes and support.

26 degrees in Lanzarote and in full relax mode. Doing lots of exercise classes at hotel and walking about 25k steps a day to burn off breakfast pastries!

oh @Shimy you are nothing alike - you would know by now. Another vote for counselling to talk it through when you're ready.

Thanks all for your kind support and helpful comments. It has been a total shock and I'm still going to talk about it with cousin. I've asked for the 2nd large post to be deleted as well as I feel the thread has been derailed enough and I've been able to talk about it with you lovely people instead of mouthing off to the mirror and i feel much calmer. Just in disbelief.

Lots of strength and best wishes to @Zebracat with a similar story and hope the whole family can heal from the trauma.

@2024Newnames 2024 Funny isn't it? Bath is usually lauded for its great pastoral care. I think it's down to staffing, resources given to pastoral care at that particular time they're at uni. One yr is different from the next sort of thing. DS who has SEN and who we put DSA in place for thanks to God has not really needed anything special at all, so far he has handed in just one assignment past the deadline this term and had to use the extension, but that's available to everyone. He was having regular counselling/mentoring support last term but I haven't heard anything about it this term which usually means things are going well.

I'm a bit concerned WRT pastoral care, student support etc that all these rounds of redundancies and cuts we keep hearing about at various unis are going to mean these services are "streamlined" and with general thinning out of academic staff too it is the more vulnerable students that are likely to suffer.

I wouldn't say Nottingham's pastoral and student support has been anything to write home about tbh.

Nope, I agree @omnishambles , pretty poor at Nottingham in our experience. And yes, it will only get worse with all the cuts.