"But we took you to Statley Homes" Dysfunctional families thread

[MummieHunnie]

Forerunning threads:
December 2007
March 2008
August 2008
February 2009
May 2009
January 2010
April 2010
August 2010

Please check later posts in this thread for links & quotes. The main thing is: "they did do it to you" - and you can recover.

If i told you all about my problems with my family i dont think any one would believe me. There are all so abnormal in there behaviour and actions and i think my siblings have learnt it from my mum and dad.

Now i have some space from them and i'm a mum myself i have stared questioning all the things that they have done and i just think its nuts.

I'm so envous of everyone who has no contact. I just feel so guilty that i stoped trying to sort it all out and given up on them when really there was nothing to give up on as they were never intrested or cared for me anyway.

Now i'm starting to relise that they just dont care and its starting to sink in it hurts so much not to be loved and cared for by my mum and dad or my sisters.

I need to learn how to distance myself emotionally from them and try to change my behaviour in relation to them but its so hard.

I feel like i owe them something but i'm beinging to see that i dont.

hello there,
have viewed this thread from afar for a while, i'm finally going to try and join in, so hello.
Feel a bit too defeated to write much more, but hope to come back and introduce self properly soon.

Hello and welcome ?doublelife?. Well done for being brave enough to join us, it can be very daunting when you feel as if you are hopelessly overwhelmed and confused, whereas some of the regulars on here are so knowledgeable and articulate and have gone so far towards healing their trauma. But they are very understanding and helpful to those of us who are still taking the first tiny steps.
I am glad to hear ?nemo* is around. Has anyone seen ?Grace? recently? I hope she's all right. And everyone else.

findingthe path ... do yourself a favour ... tell your sister to stop assuming you will do exactly what she wants or give her exactly what she wants. Its good manners to accept something thats offered , not demand to be given.

Id burn your DS`s too small clothes before id hand them over to such a spoiled obnoxious brat of a woman.

...or better still tell her your going to ebay them , but if shes got her heart set on them then the price is £???. .

HOPE EVERYONE HAS A TOXIC FREE DAY TODAY !

Findingthepath i would believe you if you told us everything.
I have often thought the same thing myself , about my own childhood family .

As far as siblings go , i have often thought they , at first, went along with the toxic parents out of fear that the toxics would turn on them. Unfortunatly it went on so long , and they became entrenched in their "roles" that they now , as adults dont know how to act any differently. They have became toxic themselves.

The thing that has hurt me the most , in my entire life , is not the fact that my parents were abusive and neglectful , ignorant and spiteful ...but the fact it has filtered through to my sisters attitude to my children.
She has banned any niece having any contact with my dd2.
What has dd2 done ?Nothing.
She is a bright , beautiful , kind hearted , hardworking, caring amazing wonderful 15 year old who is loved and adored bu all who meet her. She is top pupil in her year and often helps her younger silblings and friends (especially homework).She has a strong moral compass and at school often stands up for other children who are bullied .She is the most wonderul daughter and i am truly blessed to be priveledged to be her mother.
My dd2 is living proof i am not the deviant , drug taking, callus cruel monster that my ex-family claim me to be.

If my dd2 , is allowed to have contact with my niece , then my niece will be confused. We are not how we are painted.

We are nice kind people, who honestly love each other and do everything we can to help each other. In my home there is no abuse, there is a clean comfortable home where the children are encouraged to from frendships and acheive their personal goals.

Obviously this must be what my sister is afraid i will corupt her child with.
Showing her love ? .
OR is it more likely that she is afraid i will show her home to be lacking in that ? (because she has followed our mothers example and neglects her children , screams at them, and they have to live in a kim and aggie type horror).Obviously she does not allow them to have friends over.

I am and at the same time, about this.

I always thought dsis was too afraid of mother to do anything other than commanded , now i see she has turned into ex-mothers clone.

Hello Double.

Sorry your are hurt Droves.

I am trying to deal with some real life things I have been avoiding, they have become critical, which is a habbit I have gotten into with very painfull things, I used to deal with them head on, I am not doing well.

I have been thinking about my exh this afternoon, maybe not for this thread.

i did that . not good . its much better to deal with as things come up. not sit and stew on it.

re :your ex . im wondering if you fell into the pick a rotten bloke , because you didnt know to avoid the bad ones. (because of the toxic childhood).

I did that.
EX-H was an utter bastard.
I thought he was great to begin with because he said nice things, later on because he said he was sorry after he hurt me.(There is a difference between saying sorry and being sorry iykwim?).
I forgave to easily , simply because he was the only person ever to ask forgiveness.

I stayed with him far too long because i didnt want to give the toxics another excuse to ridicule/humiliate me.

I left when my 2 1/2 year old said he was going to hit daddy when "im big" because he hits you mummy.

Up until then i believed the kids didnt know what was happening.Because i didnt cry , because i didnt argue, because i hid the bruses with long sleeved tops and makeup.

Its all connected. If i had a nice family , i would have spotted he was wrong. If i hadnt, i would have left him long before i had.
A nice family would have helped.

Mine just laughed , & said theyd never liked him and knew he was a wierdo.

( this is what they thought and they didnt tell me??? wtf? )

oh and my mother , stood in my kitchen after saying how much she hated him , that she wouldnt help me leave him.

She hated him , but wanted me to stay with him .????. wtf . She knew he would bully me, he would hit me . Now i think she hated him because they are too similar .

I was told regularly as a child "god help the man you marry"

Droves, I am so sorry you went through that. I had a different experience with my exh. Your poor kids.

Droves

Im not having a good day i just feel down

Hugs ftp droves MH quiddity and welcome DoubleLife

I'm up for that but i have to go to tai chi at 7 with MIL. I have sent DH out for choclate cake.

Ok so who wants to go first?

I'll have an irish coffee please [smiles]

Welcome Doublelife

Hello everyone (comes out from under duvet to wave hand at computer like an idiot).

So, spongecake sounds great! let me get a cup of tea, I have some panetonne (someone gave me at christmas), fancy a bite?

oh, the newbie has a question, I see you all typing so knowledgeably about your pasts, how did you get to this point? how did you learn about phrases like gas lighting and other ones like that?

"Attila, forgive me if I've already read this - how does your H deal with his mother? Does her craziness cause tension between you, or have you figured out a working approach"

Hi Grace,

Just seen the above to me.

DH now thinks she can do wrong sometimes. He has been conditioned by her to think that she did all the hard work re raising both he and his brother from childhood whilst her H did bugger all re childrearing.

(I honestly don't think that FIL had any idea re parenting or even nuturing; his mother died when he was young with a result that he went to live with his aunt. Father was emotionally unavailable).

I think we have made some progress over the years; DH does now think his mum has made mistakes and a rod for her own back (he stops short of calling her a martyr though) and does not disagree with me when I say that I blame his parents equally for BILs ills. He is far less willing to talk about his parents (so a lot of gentle type probing tactics are needed on my part) than I am even though he does think they are all dysfunctional and not emotionally healthy. I think this is partly because he now has his own life and family unit (not just to say work) to think about.

Welcome Doublelife.

Passes Droves also a bloody big virtual slice of the "can't belive you made that" cake as seen on BBC2 last evening. I am definately going to make that cake cos I heart raspberries and chocolate together!.

Got some nice Assam tea as well, anyone for a cuppa?.

i think a good place to start is a book called toxic pearents and counciling?

I haven't read the book yet but it is recommened on here.

Ijust know that what they did is wrong and how they treat me now is wrong and i would not do that to my children but they dont even seem to relise that themselves even when i have pointed it out to them.

hum, I will add that to the list of books to read, at the moment am reading 'why love matters' and 'they fuck you up'... its unthinkable that i could end up being like my parents and am determined not to be. I mean unthinkable as in, it just cannot happen, I look at my baby and I think I'd kill myself if I damage him like mine did me. I've lost alot of my fight recently, but that is something I've still got fight left for.

I am trying to get myself out of a situation that has a lot of parallels to my childhood scripts, but its sooooo hard. Its taken me ages to realise I am acting out things from my childhood, but even I cannot fail to notice some of it. The trouble is its not an easy lift, but all twisted and screwed up patterns, which is maybe cos I know what they did was wrong but can't work out how to do it better? or what even was exactly wrong as it was all so insidious and confusing.

So I have a weird feeling at the moment... can you explain it at all?

I have split up with my abusive h, where I managed to find someone who combined the worst traits of both parents and me to act out the misery of both parents. I am trapped in a horrible situation, and alot of the pain of my childhood is coming back, and a feeling its 'now or never' to sort it out & evolve beyond them (as it were).

And one of the things that is galvanising me is the idea that I want to have more children, little brothers and sisters for my ds, and i want to find someone lovely to love (& i am getting on in age to do this, even if there is anyone who would want me).

I am lonely and would love to find someone else, but know I am not ready yet, but why, when I think about the idea of another partner, why am I really angry at him? (not that i've met him yet!)... any ideas? its so weird, shouldn't I be angry at my parents, and h?

oh also findingthepath I totally empathise with you on the 'they don't know they did anything wrong', isn't that the most screwy thing? my head feels like it spins round when I think about it, and I know if I ever tried to talk to them about it (which I wont), they would claim i was making it up/ too sensitive/ brought it all on myself/ was selfish for making it all about me etc etc etc...

I read gaslighting on here and googled, it as I do with lots of other terms others use on here.

I think you have a lot of self awareness Double.

I had to be on my own, I did the dating thing for the first year or so, after I split, I think it is the best thing I could do to be alone for a bit, I would like to meet someoen one day, there is no way I could have grown in a relationship with a guy, also I would have picked the wrong sort.

I am struggling so much and am getting there with regards to cleaning up motivation, the script I learned from Mother was to get angry and clean up, or to clean up for fear of others judgements, or to clean up for germs sake for others in the home. I am trying really hard to clean up for my comfort and for no one else and to do it with no anger, so I am kind of stuck at times, and getting anxiety at times, and I stop and keep trying to do it with no negative feelings and for me and no one else, this is really important to me to change this particular script as I have given it to my children, and I want it to stop.

My mum would confort eat and now so do i. Im working hard to change this so i dont pass it on.

I also do not neglect my son.

I also had the now or never feeling but i relise its a journey and there is no quick fix.

My Mother was a feeder and very slim herself, I began to abuse food when my parents split to deal with things, and have been abusing food since, and I have passed it on and it bothers me, that is one reason I went to see the psychologist, I want this to stop.

I think the hardest thing for me is looking at how i behavour and see what i need to change. I dont think i'm there yet but i'm taking small steps.

Doublelife we are here if you need to talk. I think it is very confusing and caotic (sp?) when i relised that i needed to sort myself out for the sake of my son.

Talking about son's i wish mine would go to sleep already. gerr he is still up and wide awake and downstairs with me as DH working in morning and DS just keeps running round bedroom

Hello, have not been able to write on here because am feeling very low and have had to accept depression has taken hold yet again. Feel very defeated at the moment. Started re-taking Ad's this am.
I also had an incident on Monday evening which has triggered me badly. A guy blocked the kids and I into a carpark and when I asked him to move he began to be abusive and then refused to move his car. I had to threaten to call the police and two guys from inside the building had to come out and ask him to be reasonable .
I came home shaking with anxiety but also with anger. I felt what it was like to be in front of my father again and for him to have all the power because he was physically stronger and had proven again and again he would use that physical strength to shut us up. That or abandon us. It was therefore very frightening.
I also remembered how that all transferred onto my two brothers especially middle db so that he thought he could push me around and younger db could push my mum and younger sis around.
I actually think on some level I hate men as a result. I took it out on dh later on ( a man I can vent anger on.
My anger is palpable right now. I could quite easily take my car down to this place where I know this man will be again and ram his car over and over again. I know this is the result though of the years of abuse from my father which I never saw as abuse because I had to have one good parent in my child minds eye.
I also know what was the biggest trigger from this incident. It was because I said if I was a man you wouldn't behave like this, To which he replied 'if you were a bloke you'd be on your back'. Threat of violence, intimidation.
It is ok in this world for a man to frighten and abuse women. It happens all accross the world and there are threads full of it. It happened in our home growing up every day.
For this I hate being a woman. I want to be a man and have all the physical strength and power so no-one will intimidate me again just because of my gender again. Beacuse they can.