"But we took you to Stately Homes!" Survivors of Dysfunctional Families

[OnceAMeerNotAlwaysAMeer]

It's November '15, and the Stately Home is still open to visitors.

Forerunning threads:
December 2007
March 2008
August 2008
February 2009
May 2009
January 2010
April 2010
August 2010
March 2011
November 2011
January 2012
November 2012
January 2013
March 2013
August 2013
December 2013
February 2014
April 2014
July 2014
Oct 14 – Dec 14
Dec 14 – March 15
March - Nov 2015

Welcome to the Stately Homes Thread.

This is a long running thread which was originally started up by 'pages' see original thread here (December 2007)

So this thread originates from that thread and has become a safe haven for Adult children of abusive families.

One thing you will never hear on this thread is that your abuse or experience was not that bad. You will never have your feelings minimised the way they were when you were a child, or now that you are an adult. To coin the phrase of a much respected past poster Ally90;

'Nobody can judge how sad your childhood made you, even if you wrote a novel on it, only you know that. I can well imagine any of us saying some of the seemingly trivial things our parents/ siblings did to us to many of our real life acquaintances and them not understanding why we were upset/ angry/ hurt etc. And that is why this thread is here. It's a safe place to vent our true feelings, validate our childhood/ lifetime experiences of being hurt/ angry etc by our parents behaviour and to get support for dealing with family in the here and now.'

Most new posters generally start off their posts by saying; but it wasn't that bad for me or my experience wasn't as awful as x,y or z's.

Some on here have been emotionally abused and/ or physically abused. Some are not sure what category (there doesn't have to be any) they fall into.

NONE of that matters. What matters is how 'YOU' felt growing up, how 'YOU' feel now and a chance to talk about how and why those childhood experiences and/ or current parental contact, has left you feeling damaged, falling apart from the inside out and stumbling around trying to find your sense of self-worth.

You might also find the following links and information useful, if you have come this far and are still not sure whether you belong here or not.

'Toxic Parents' by Susan Forward.

I started with this book and found it really useful.

Here are some excerpts:

"Once you get going, most toxic parents will counterattack. After all, if they had the capacity to listen, to hear, to be reasonable, to respect your feelings, and to promote your independence, they wouldn't be toxic parents. They will probably perceive your words as treacherous personal assaults. They will tend to fall back on the same tactics and defences that they have always used, only more so.

Remember, the important thing is not their reaction but your response. If you can stand fast in the face of your parents' fury, accusations, threats and guilt-peddling, you will experience your finest hour.

Here are some typical parental reactions to confrontation:

"It never happened". Parents who have used denial to avoid their own feelings of inadequacy or anxiety, will undoubtedly use it during confrontation, to promote their version of reality. They'll insist that your allegations never happened, or that you're exaggerating. They won't remember, or they will accuse you of lying.

YOUR RESPONSE: Just because you don't remember, doesn't mean it didn't happen".

"It was your fault." Toxic parents are almost never willing to accept responsibility for their destructive behaviour. Instead, they will blame you. They will say that you were bad, or that you were difficult. They will claim that they did the best that they could but that you always created problems for them. They will say that you drove them crazy. They will offer as proof, the fact that everybody in the family knew what a problem you were. They will offer up a laundry list of your alleged offences against them.

YOUR RESPONSE: "You can keep trying to make this my fault, but I'm not going to accept the responsibility for what you did to me, when I was a child".

"I said I was sorry what more do you want?" Some parents may acknowledge a few of the things that you say but be unwilling to do anything about it.

YOUR RESPONSE: "I appreciate your apology, but that is just a beginning. If you're truly sorry, you'll work through this with me, to make a better relationship."

"We did the best we could." Some parents will remind you of how tough they had it while you were growing up and how hard they struggled. They will say such things as "You'll never understand what I was going through," or "I did the best I could". This particular style of response will often stir up a lot of sympathy and compassion for your parents. This is understandable, but it makes it difficult for you to remain focused on what you need to say in your confrontation. The temptation is for you once again to put their needs ahead of your own. It is important that you be able to acknowledge their difficulties, without invalidating your own.

YOUR RESPONSE: "I understand that you had a hard time, and I'm sure that you didn't hurt me on purpose, but I need you to understand that the way you dealt with your problems really did hurt me"

"Look what we did for you." Many parents will attempt to counter your assertions by recalling the wonderful times you had as a child and the loving moments you and they shared. By focusing on the good things, they can avoid looking at the darker side of their behaviour. Parents will typically remind you of gifts they gave you, places they took you, sacrifices they made for you, and thoughtful things they did. They will say things like, "this is the thanks we get" or "nothing was ever enough for you."

YOUR RESPONSE: "I appreciate those things very much, but they didn't make up for ...."

"How can you do this to me?" Some parents act like martyrs. They'll collapse into tears, wring their hands, and express shock and disbelief at your "cruelty". They will act as if your confrontation has victimized them. They will accuse you of hurting them, or disappointing them. They will complain that they don't need this, they have enough problems. They will tell you that they are not strong enough or healthy enough to take this, that the heartache will kill them. Some of their sadness will, of course, be genuine. It is sad for parents to face their own shortcomings, to realise that they have caused their children significant pain. But their sadness can also be manipulative and controlling. It is their way of using guilt to try to make you back down from the confrontation.

YOUR RESPONSE: "I'm sorry you're upset. I'm sorry you're hurt. But I'm not willing to give up on this. I've been hurting for a long time, too."

Helpful Websites

Alice Miller

Personality Disorders definition

More helpful links:

Daughters of narcissistic mothers
Out of the FOG
You carry the cure in your own heart
Help for adult children of child abuse
Pete Walker

Some books:

Homecoming
Will I ever be good enough?
If you had controlling parents
When you and your mother can't be friends
Children of the self-absorbed
Recovery of your inner child

This final quote is from smithfield posting as therealsmithfield:

"I'm sure the other posters will be along shortly to add anything they feel I have left out. I personally don't claim to be sorted but I will say my head has become a helluva lot straighter since I started posting here. You will receive a lot of wisdom but above all else the insights and advice given will 'always' be delivered with warmth and support."

Hi everyone, am an old Stately Homer and have been no contact with my family for years. I still come back now and then to read. This time of year is a wobble isn't it, with the expectation of happy families?

I have a bit of a dark humour about it now, though I know it's not funny and maybe time and distance has given me that.

For example, on the subject of awful presents, I remember the first year I stayed with my ILs (who are lovely) for Christmas. My parents were of course bitter that I wasn't going to them to partake in the usual dramas. So what did they give me to open in front of my ILs? The most gaudy, shocking pink bra and pants I think I've ever seen. Lined with thick, black lace. They honestly looked like something you would buy in a cheap sex shop. I was so embarrassed in front of my FIL. He's a very private, respectable man and I was a young woman at the time. I'm sure now, that they wanted embarrass me, just because I had the audacity to not be with them at this wonderful time of year.

Oh and I sometimes joke about the Christmas letter. Usually a nice letter one puts in with your cards to let people know how you are. For me, it comes in the form of poisonous rantings from my ex family. Blame, denial, gas lighting - you all now the score. I'm wondering if this will be the first year I hear nothing from them? Although I'm seriously tempted to send them a proper Christmas letter of my own, innocently showing that we've been doing great without them.

A poster's words struck me. About the anger that lurks beneath narcissists. And that is why I won't ever take them back. I'd actually be scared of their desire to get me back. For leaving and exposing them.

Thinking of you all. This time of year is a double edged sword. So lovely for our own, proper families. But a stark reminder of what we miss.

5 I will be happy and live a happy, productive life despite my childhood. I will make being happy my life's work as opposed to the way misery and complaining is my mother's life work.

was trying to think how to put it, but Good's line just sums it up perfectly. Sometimes it's so hard to be positive for the future, when you're hamstrung by active pain still. This sentence encapsulates the future, I hope

shaffron lovely post. Life sounds sooooo much better without your ex family. And your in laws sound lovely!

You know what, I always pooh-pooed positive thinking and all that crap. But once I seized the moment and thought, fuck this shit, I'm going NC and had some therapy and started looking at why I was always so negative and anxious about things and terrified of making mistakes, things started sort of falling together.
OBVIOUSLY there are limits and it's not a magic bullet, but there was a time during therapy when I felt myself beginning to blossom in confidence, once I saw where all the negative thought patterns were coming from and recognised them and started stopping them and I dared to try things I never would have before and it worked and gave me more confidence, so I tried more and so on.
Or at least I began to be able to stop being terrified about making mistakes and stop taking everything so personally that things got better, things began to open up and possibilities I couldn't have imagined began to appear because I opened up to them. This all sounds like wishy washy bollocks, I hope someone sort of knows what I mean. We, as children of toxics are trained to believe very powerful untruths about ourselves and the world and our place in it.

Hey Shaffron nice to have you here, you're right it can be a horrible time of year. The round robin of positivity is quite good, it has quite tickled me that idea. My mother has managed the narc top trumps this year by being diagnosed with a small malignant tumour. I've had one letter and am waiting for a rant over Christmas.
A poster's words struck me. About the anger that lurks beneath narcissists. And that is why I won't ever take them back. I'd actually be scared of their desire to get me back. For leaving and exposing them.
Totally understand that.
meer, glad you liked it. On my good days i feel quite "Fuck you, I will be happy despite you, my revenge will be happiness and love and a life well lived".

GoodtoBetter, I do know what you mean. It's a gradual process and I can be up and down, but I have felt much more creative and free and able to have ideas since I went NC with my mum. Even though I never saw her that often, I hadn't realised how deeply ingrained that feeling of "no I can't do that, that would just be stupid, don't stick your neck out" really was. I remember saying to my psych soon after that I felt like someone had taken their foot off my head.

I'm too busy at the moment with work, childcare and everything to blossom creatively in the way I'd like to, but I do feel like I've turned a corner mentally and can store up those ideas for when I have more time.

Somewhere in one of the blogs or self help books I read something along the lines of
" Start things you want to do and believe that you are going to be successful"
I have been trying that concept out - it is very powerful - to believe in your own success
I'm going to make that No 6

1. Start things you want to do and believe that you are going to be successful

love the other suggestions - and nice to see someone around with the long view on all this Shaffron

1. Learn the self-discipline and safe, self-caring rules and boundaries I need to go on in my life and do what I want to do.

1. Properly, fully listen to my sensible inner voice of self-love and self-preservation instead of the self-blaming neurotic idealistic voice put there by my stupid childhood.

These are great. My next one will sound a bit odd perhaps, legacy of a co-dependant childhood

1. Remember that my mother is not me. She is a whole separate person and we are different people. I am not responsible for her and also just because she is my mother does not mean she is a nice person or has my best interests at heart or feels the same as me. It's OK not to like her.

got the numbers wrong again, argh!

1. Accept that my inner child, Little Pockets, sometimes feels sad and scared, and it's my job to reassure her and comfort her at those times.

9a. At those times, be patient and understanding with myself instead of mentally shouting that I should pull myself together, bloody woman.

9b. Hand in hand with that, get better at taking my "emotional temperature" - this is something I've struggled with as I've been repressing my feelings for so long.

I think mine will be:

10 (?) Relax and don't feel you're not worthwhile unless you have done everything and kept everyone happy.

Your 9 is v important for me too Pockets but I find it so hard to think of a "Little Mash". There was never a little me, I was always the responsible grown-up for as long as I can remember. I mean I know I was a child, but I find it so hard to think of myself like that.

Buttery - I dont have a little me either
but I did find I had different me's

There’s what I think of as me-me and then there was "critical voice" who ran a vile commentary on everything I did, and there was "adult / parent" me, who other people got the benefit of. After reading about self parenting I thought I'd try to comfort myself as "adult/parent " - which I had never done...
critical voice just died ! right then..gone..never came back.
the effect has been amazing in terms of my ability to cope and my happiness. I am a fierce mother and a kind and loving friend
( and I can say this without dissembling because like most of you on here I've had to learn who I am piece by piece)
and its amazing to give myself the benefit of that.

I prefer to think the labels (like inner child) are there to give methods of conceptualising the problems rather than requiring us to conform to the label itself.
The me I was being was not a child either - much more like a high functioning alcoholic - huge problems - well hidden.

I have edited this about 4 times -

oh and
11. put on your own oxygen mask first - in order to help others I must invest in making sure I am looking after myself so I am able to do so effectively.

I really like the 'Little' us concept. Even if you didn't feel like a child, you can now, as an adult, have huge sympathy and empathy with your younger self for that very fact.

I, as the adult FB can look at what it was like to be LittleFB, having to be responsible, or guarded, or grownup or whatever, and from my own now maternal/adult position I can decide to mother that unfortunate child when she puts in an appearance, and mother her properly. Because sometimes when we feel something strongly, anger, pain, hurt, injustice, sadness, it's a good idea to ask ourselves whether it is our adult feeling it, or our 'child'. Some of our more extreme feelings come from that place of pain or forbearance we experienced before. Then, parenting ourselves as best we can seems a good idea. Treating and loving our 'selves' as well as we now treat our DCs. I'm writing this on my phone, so maybe it's a bit muddled.

Great ideas all. Sorry to jump in again but ffs I now get an email.(my addition in brackets as can't work mm system of striking out)
Hi meery, are you OK. Not heard for so long (3weeks) and no use phoning it seems. (well if you will call when you know I'm at work) Just very worried and hope dc1got present. Would be nice to know if all well.

I want to reply having waited a decent interval "all well with us. Dc1 voucher arrived safely thank you"

Any suggestions?

fantasticButtocks (such a good username, was chortling addressing you as that) on a related topic, my therapist asked me to think about the feelings of panic my mother and confrontation gave me.
He got me to think about the physical feeling and describe it (pain in my chest) and then to think about "what age" my panic feeling was.
He reckoned that it was like a learned response and related to experiences and so on in childhood.
He got me to think of a specific time when I was little when I felt it and what age. Mine was that the fear I got in my chest when in conflict with my mother was the same feeling I'd had when she'd had a row with my dad one night and they'd both stormed off. I was awake and listening and I realised they'd both gone and my brother (asleep) and I were alone at night in the house.
I remember the nightie I was wearing and the hall and stairs carpet (I'd crept halfway down the spiral staircase to listen) and I remember that crushing panic in my chest.
It's not quite the same but it really helped to recognise that panic as a throwback from the "LittleGoodtoBetter".
I hope that makes sense.

Meery unless you want to be NC I'd say that e mail is good. Don't get emotionally drawn in.

Good that must have been terrifying for the little you. Very useful technique from your therapist though.

Meery if you just want to continue LC and not getting drawn into drama then yes I think your reply is fine.

ES you sound like you're getting ready to use a wind machine to blow all that FOG away. Go you!

I like your resolution list.

I haven't experienced any dependency on therapy. I think if you do, your therapist should be working with you on ways to overcome that. A lot of therapists "taper off" sessions towards the end, so if you've been going weekly then you go down to fortnightly, then monthly, then that's it. and most will offer a "top up" by phone or a visit if you feel like you're crashing.

Eternal my heart goes out to you, you really have a lot on your plate to deal with and I hope you're able to see a way through.

You definitely win the worst prize award. What a bitch. (Sorry if the word offends anyone. I think it's deserved here though)

One of the "good" things about having a narcissistic parent is that you're likely to respond to therapy quickly, we don't tend to have tons of resistance to get through and for once we are getting what we were always denied i.e. someone with your best interests at heart who will listen. And I believe that because it's a healthy relationship it's not going to end in dependence - your therapist's aim is to make you self-sufficient, unlike your mother whose aim was always to keep you close and dependent.

Eternal - that was truly a crap gift you received there.

Re a therapist, you really do need to find someone who has NO bias about keeping families together despite the presence of mistreatment.

Would also be very wary about even sending a short e-mail Meery; its the contact that is the reward to such people like your mother which then gives them reason to bother you even more. That was certainly not sent out of any concern for your wellbeing at all

I am wondering if any of you have read the other thread entitled "helping DM come to terms re NC". I am horrified at some of the pronouncements made (perhaps by people who come from supposedly emotionally healthy families themselves), comparing it to a bereavement and another who wrote the words, "no doubt there are also toxic parents but there are also self obsessed and damaging children". That to me shows a complete lack of empathy let alone understanding. One does not cause the other then?.

What about the woman in all this who chose likely after a lot of heartache herself to go no contact; what about her own rights to do that?. She had every right to go NC; she made that choice of her own volition and she should be as valued as anyone else. She has been roundly denigrated and her choice criticised for what I see as no good reason at all. I would also like to hear the other sister's side of the story because that is not there, I always look for the missing truth in such instances and there is a lot of missing truth. I still think the mother knows full well why her DD has gone no contact, besides which ignorance is no excuse. What the other DD has written about her mother is most telling as well.

Oh Eternal that present sums it all up so well. The sitting there feeling hurt and let down by a pointedly crap present, while being told the present has been carefully chosen just for you and what a nice, thoughtful mum you have. :( And if you pulled her up on it, the waterworks or accusations would start.

Your mum sounds like mine in many ways. The not watching a small child properly and getting huffy about it (yes the same small child who they want to see them as world's best grandma ) and the undermining you in front of your DC.

I think your plans sound wise and you are making great progress. As someone who has gone NC (but was wavering, hence joining this thread) I can tell you it has helped so much with my severe anxiety.