My family and the art of deception

[lolaflores]

In recent months I thought something of a fundamental change had happened with regard to my relationship with my family. Following many years of bullying, ignoring, abusing and all the rest (which apparently I have imagined), things had felt a little easier. There seemed to be a new way forward in regards to how they behaved. Chief amongst this was my younger sisters attitude and frequent statements from her to the effect that if my depression and unmanagable mood swings were getting to me, I could always ring her.
Which was refreshing to hear, seeing as they all to a man took a very dim view of my mental health roundabout. This went in cycles from "interventions" that left me suicidal to telling me I was being "bold" ie. naughty and attention seeking. Did i not see how it affected everyone and so on.

So, yesterday. Mothers day. I ring my mum to pop round with a card and all the rest. No one home. Everyone is at my sisters. Much as I had guessed. We put the card in anyway. later that evening, my mother calls. A tone in her voice of light hearted "Oh thanks for the card, was at DS's, should couldn't find her phone to call you".
Right.
I cannot believe that I cannot trust my family an inch. I feel appalling, horrific. there are no words. who the fuck are these people? They deceive me into believing they care....then this. So callous, so casual and all of them colluding.

indeed, PF

like people in toxic families have not just simply told themselves all this

huh ?

I hope you find the strength to move on from these hurtful people. Or learn not to care what they think any longer.

Oh dear Pink, Is your opinion the only one? Do x y and z and bingo perfect life!!
Have you considered that OP is a victim - of really bad behaviour by her family and that to be hurt when someone you want to love you is horrid is really normal and healthy?If you turn off feelings like thatand 'choose' not too be hurt you are denying yourself. It is not more damaging and it is what others are doing - they are being hurtful

pinkpaws you have been very unpleasant on this thread and it was totally unwarranted.

OP, you need to detach from these people and stay detached. You seem intelligent and aware and I think you know that this is an unhealthy situation. You have a family of your own, just enjoy your life with them - more importantly, protect your little girl from the dysfunction within our birth family. You don't have to have a relationship with people just because you are linked by blood, there are plenty of nice people to share your life with, why put up with this crap?

lola you know the reason your dsis has stepped up being pleasant - you began to detach, when they need you to stay in touch and to stay in your role within the family - hence the 'pleasant' overtures, followed by the reminder of what your true place is
It's a power thing. I have very similar going on atm and it's difficult when dc are involved. I'd say make any decisions for your dc only in the light of your own relationship with your family - your dc can only benefit from loving relatives if they are genuinely loving, which means including respecting and including you as their mother
otherwise the contact is negative, and you have lost nothing by staying away

And of course the cancer analogy works. It's a very good analogy and has the effect of exposing people's discriminatory attitudes towards people with mental illness, as you intended. It worked with pinkpaws who "think[s] linking a mental illness to cancer is wrong". it's only "wrong" if you think that mental illness isn't a proper illness. Good luck, OP.

Many thanks all of you. The tone from Pink sounds soooo much like what I get from my family. If I were only normal then none of this would happen, i bring it on myself and what do I expect,.

So. Onwards backwards, stepping away from the crazy people. and as AnyFucker said, physically restrain myself when the nicey nicey starts again.
GIve me strenght

It sounds as if your family are failing you and the thing to bear in mind is that it is their failure. They know this - why else would they need to lie about the phone?

Its easy to tell someone to detach - hard indeed to actually do this.

Why do i want to find excuses for them? Running in circles finding a way for me to be in the wrong just so i don't have to believe they are the callous sods they appear to be? Is that to protect myself or them?

I often feel like a fraud when I tell people I am bipolar. secretly I think..no your not, you just want people to think you are special and that being such a cunt is down to being a cunt and not being unwell.n . you are not. you are shit. your family know that. they know the truth, about time I accepted it.

Hi Lola I so admire you for being able to look at yourself critically and appraise your own actions objectively. But "secretly I think" smacks of that critical inner voice that your family (?DM) have planted in you. Have you tried CBT to challenge some of those negative thoughts and examine where they come from? It might help you see how the script runs and how to counter it.

You sound a lovely person and maybe for your little family Mother's Day should be all about YOU and your DD not about making a fuss of the woman who hurts you. She doesn't deserve it.

You see lemeon this is where me and reality take a bit of a fork in the road. very often I don't even know what is real. things can get very distorted and it becomes distressing to say the least. The negative thoughts tend to surge when these things occur. it will quieten down again but in the teeth of it is soooo nasty.
My mother doesn't deserve a childs love. if you can twist the unconditional love of ones own children that way,, then you have forfeited respect due. how can you do that to your own children? And sleep at night? Cannot get the head round that.

Hello lola.

It's interesting isn't it, and bloody awful at the same time, that even though we know what they are like and how they operate, we can still let down our defences and keep on hoping that one day....maybe today is the day.....

It has happened to me time and again-a "crumb" comes along in the shape of some perceived kindness or thoughtfulness, and off we go again.

Why do you think there has been/may have been a change in your sister's behaviour? Has she shown some real understanding about it?

I was reading your op and thinking the same as a lot of PP, ie detachment is the only way. But it is so hard when you see a chink of light. I remember almost crying with gratitude and relief when my FOG bound sister once took my "side" against my toxic mother.

It was only a blip of course

I am probably projecting here, but if your Sis was starting to be more supportive, perhaps your mum tried to re-balance things by favouring her on Mother's Day.

I belive Rival that that may well be the case. Mother is the conduit for all communications which means no one gets anything but her version. She divides and conquers, manipulates those as she sees fit. Interestingly, any sign of cohesion amongst us and then something happens to pull it all asunder. People fall in and out of favour which means all attention remains firmly fixed on her as we stumble about wondering what the fuck is going on. she holds "secrets" which she drops like atom bombs (she did this to me on more than one occassion leaving me wondering how my sisters abuse at the hands of my uncle was my fault and why the information was delivered like a wallop in the face!)
Toxic isn't the word sometimes.
My therapist said last week about dysfunctional families identifying one amongst them as the problem, receptacle for all the ills. That had me written all over it.

You find reasons for thinking that it's all your fault because you spent your most formative years - your childhood - being made to feel responsible for other people's feelings and choices. It's a very hard habit to break free from. But it is possible.