Anyone else the black sheep of their family?

[HexagonalQueenOfEverything]

I am!

It used to upset me a lot but after having counselling I'm ok with it, and see it as my mum and sister's problem rather than mine. If anything, these days I find the way they speak to me quite amusing, and I do limit the amount of time I spend with them and have very firm boundaries in place.

It's funny though that even though my sister and I are now in our thirties, my sister still keeps to her role as the 'favourite', and seems to almost get pleasure from speaking to me badly and with contempt.

aw porridge. You wrote that so well.

I identify with wondering if I have something wrong with me (I've also wondered about aspergers for the same reasons you have). My family are convinced I have a mental illness and have alighted on one in particular - to make sense of the fact I don't fit in, presumably and don't follow the family script . I don't have a mental illness (unless you count depression...) but for a short second I wondered about agreeing with it to get them off my back.

It was a very short second - but tantalising nonetheless. Everything would slot into place: them sane, me mad - voila, sorted.

Ah, i have that condition too!

Odd One Out Syndrome!

Constant feeling of being a disappointment, of not being loved, never expected to be good at anything, 'trouble'

Depression, suicide attempt, abusive relationship, all caused by a low self esteem, thanks to crappy parenting.

I just realised last night that when at school, i thought i was fairly crap at everything, but i was good at languages. The one thing i can do, that nobody else in my family can do.

Thing is, a language IS by its definition, foreign, so there's no chance they could be any competition, not like in other subjects.

I see now how actually good i was in everything, but lacked the confidence to just get on with it.

I've cut 2 of them, one more to go, but the improvement in my life is immense!

I'm not anyones black sheep anymore, people in my life love me, want to see me happy, are proud of me! For the first time in my life, aged 44, I know what its like to be happy, to be proud of myself, and to be loved. Sometimes i feel like I'll implode with happiness!

Springy, you're not mad... well perhaps mad to have anything to do with them..!

Yes yes to Odd One Out syndrome! My family think I'm bonkers in an unspecific way. I have seriously considered taking some kind of mood elevating pills when I'm around my family so that I would not react in the way that I do, exactly like you said springydaffs, so that I would fit in with the family script and go along with all of their crap. It's so flaming that so many of us have questioned our sanity and our mental health because of how our families have made us feel.

I'm slowly realising (through lots of therapy) that the only thing to do is to keep my distance from them and to be all about the boundaries. I'm ok, it's them who have the problem.

HighJumpingHissy, I'm so glad for you that you feel happy, I can imagine how much work it took for you to get to ths point. I'm jealous too - I absolutely long to feel content and happy deep down inside, instead of utterly miserable, with a thin glaze of happiness on top. I hope I will get there

re social skills. I have always thought I had very poor social skills. Without meaning to boast, like you Hissy I'm generally quite good at most things. I have always thought it wasn't much use to be good at things if I have poor social skills.

Now I'm wondering about the 'poor social skills' !!

I've just been reading a short story about exile, and realised us 'black sheep' can relate to the idea of 'exile'

ie we are outside, not in our home turf; rejected/forced out of it; displaced. re the scapegoat - a biblical term in which a goat was symbolically laden with the 'sins' of the community and put outside the town as an atonement.

Familiar, huh

Pianos, if I can get there, ANYONE can.

I suppose I'm lucky in a way, the shitty abusive relationship both prepared me, and brought the shittiness of my family into sharp focus.

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

We'll all get there, just got to dig deep and believe in ourselves, and hang onto the truth for dear life; that we are worth more than this, better than them.

Lovely post springy!

I found realising that my family all have some need to see me unhappy, suppressed means that they are all wrong, they are miserable/jealous, whatever (who cares) there mau be more of them than there are of us in the family unit, but its their behaviour that's wrong.

We woildnt be able to be like them, we're too nice! Being raised by wolves would've been better tbh.

I'm happpy being cast out of that nest of wankers!

Scapegoats of the www UNITE!

ah springy you are always so complimentary about what I write. You would have me believing I am normal next

What I would love to know is how to be strong enough to spend time in the same place as them all (in their company implies a reciprocation of listening and loving which I now know wont happen). I would like to be able to visit my childhood home without a knot in my tummy on the drive there, losing my temper while there and driving home feeling like crap personified.
Or can that just not happen?
I love the physical location of my home. I love the 'in-jokes' (when I am not the butt of them). I love to bring my kids there as they are fairly ok with them (unless there are other GC around; then we are 2nd class).

On another note, Hissy, I recently realised that while I thought and still feel the odd one out, the scapegoat that springy talks about; actually my siblings are all damaged too. I believe that their basic insecurity with our parents means that they must have someone to turn on to relieve their anxieties when the family is together. That someone is me. I fill a need. We are too sensitive (as they say) and unable to reciprocate the nastiness as we dont want to hurt.

yes porridge, and when we STOP being the scapegoat, when we stand up and tell them to all FF off, or we remove ourselves from their shooting range, they FREAK OUT!

I shut my phone off on holiday for the entire week and it was my birthday while I was away.

My mother was actually CROSS that I had my phone off, "We ALL tried to call you on your birthday"

No, they didn't. I got a Happy Birthday text, nothing more, from SisterDearest, a voicemail I'm assuming from Mum. Dad left a message on my home phone, I got it, and a text also sent to the home number when I got back. Fair enough, he'd not contacted me since March, how was he to know.

But it was in indignance of her that surprised me, I can't put my finger on it, but it's not how you or I would react. There was an energy, an anger, a panic.

I'm GLAD i am not like them, I'm PROUD I'm not like them, I think I'd HATE myself if I were as mean, selfish, twattish and out and out vicious as them. I couldn't live with myself tbh.

I discussed this with my lovely Boyf, I said that I couldn't understand why people are so mean, when it takes so much effort to do that stuff. He said 'That's cos you are NICE.... for them it's not an effort, being mean, nasty, petty, jealous and vicious IS what comes first for them. For them being nice is an EFFORT.

I think he has a point.

Porridge, i think in time you might be able to detach enough to stop the fear, but you might have to stay away from there for a while to get your strength together. Psyche yourself up as it were.

I think your mum panicked because imo the family think they own us, that we are their property - to do with what they will. ie no boundaries, we belong to them. Or that's how they see it anyway. We are like a resource that they use, inanimate. Which is why they freak out if we move out of position/don't follow the script/aren't available 24/7.

As for spending time with them and not being done in - erm, impossible imo. I cut my family off for about 2 years and then this and that happened... and I thought I was ok to resume contact. BIG MISTAKE. They were madder than ever (I was astounded by that tbh - you kind of lull yourself into a false belief that, surely, they've progressed, mellowed with time??), the toxicity had stepped up a gear BIG time. They hadn't had cinderella me all that time to offload their shit onto, prolly.

I didn't last long. I went down the pan in record time and was back in that desperate confusion place where you can't think straight and nothing makes sense. jammed the airwaves, they did.

Now they're out for good. TRA LA LA

Although... when I saw my mum recently at my parents house for the obligatory 10 minutes (to give her a sanitised update about myself, which is all she wants to hear), the place looked so lovely, y'know? I was momentarily seduced by it: family home, lovely sunshine day, garden looking fabulous (dad's work). All peaceful and calm. It did pull on my heartstrings a bit. It's a myth though. It all looks good but it isn't underneath.

Hissy I kinda recognise that indignation- is it that when you reject their (false) interest, it reflects badly on them? You know....like deep down, they know how they are is NOT ok (and as long as you play to the script, it's your fault they feel cross/unhappy/mean). So if you move away, they will have to face the feeling as well as being rejected by you and OMG what will people think?

I feel sad that staying away is the only answer. But last time I was there, I lost my temper with DD at a minor thing. Thats not fair to her and I'm not doing it again. So away I am staying.........
......til I feel guilted to going again
Hmmm, I feel a trip to my counsellor coming again.

< TRA LA LA LA LA

I think it's about us having to feel GRATEFUL for their attention. I denied them that by leaving the phone off. It was GLORIOUS.

When mum sells the family home and moves 3hours away, that will be it for me.

This christmas will be tricky though, as I can't see them having sold up before then. I'm going to have to stay away... there will be trouble, I know it.

yes porridge, it's validation that they haven't been that hideous to us, they haven't overstepped the mark this time.. cos the silly bint our DD is still speaking to us.

My mum does a xmas stocking for her GC, she says she does it out of kindness etc etc, but actually its usurping MY tradition isn't it? devaluing MY stocking as the one the FC delivers.

I have to put a stop to that too.

Talk about Bah FFing Humbug! How shit am I going to be painted as?

I just think some people want to feel good about themselves and they mistake how to achieve this. Something doesn't work out - you are born with the wrong nose, or you are a girl when they wanted a boy, or you don't sleep through the night like someone else's baby, or you turn out to be better at sport than the sibling who had already been designated 'the sporty one', things generally start to go a bit wrong, but instead of having the strength of character to parent the child that they have, they wrap all their bad feelings up in a big ball and hand them to you. Phew! It's not their fault - its YOUR fault. Usually your behaviour/happiness will suffer, and you become moody, anxious, angry and so the vicious circle gains momentum...

And you get told it is your fault because you are neurotic, or you are 'difficult', or jealous.... and that you should be more 'grateful' for phone calls, or any small bit of attention that they give you.

Family occasions are difficult because the whole family effectively rolls back time. The last time I spent a week with my family I had 10 weeks of counselling to prepare! Actually it went well and I got lots of credit for helping to make my mums birthday special, but I could see that this didn't go down well with my 'golden child' brother who likes to be the star turn but is tight-fisted, lazy and thoughtless. My strategy is to behave the very best that I can manage and to be realistic about what that is. Usually that means setting things up so that I do stuff in advance to help (eg making food, offering to come early to get things ready) then I make sure I have a good reason to leave early.