I've posted about my parents before (and my family). At the moment they have decided they are separating - fine and probably long overdue. As an adult in my 40s all I want is that they are both happy and both able to move on with their lives.
My DF has MH problems stemming back from his childhood. He has moods and explosions and this has just been part and parcel of our lives. We all sympathise and want to help him but it takes an absolute crisis to make him realise he has been behaving unreasonably and then he just expects everyone to be ok around him. Again that has just been the way it has been forever.
My DM just cannot seem to make a decision to save her life, she loves him I am sure and she sympathises with him and feels responsible for him, I get that. But her method of communicating is equally destructive in my view. If she is slighted she goes silent treatment and it can go on for weeks and months.
The situation now is that my DF is isolating himself from all of us, he has been round upset and apologetic but nothing since and he has been avoiding me and others for weeks now (although he says we are avoiding him, that is not true). If I do see him he is feeling very sorry for himself etc.
My DM is just plodding on the same, still can't decide if they are splitting up or not but complaining that DF is not speaking to her when I know for certain she will be silent just as much as he is.
My DM came to see me last night after a long stressful day at work and spent an hour moaning and complaining about DF but when I challenged her about what she was complaining about she admitted she had not spoken to DF about these things.
I feel down and upset today. I don't see DM that often although I speak to her on the phone every week. She spent the whole hour slating my DF. She did not once ask how I was, about the weekend away I had just had, about my life at all. I just felt like a sounding board. I know my DF's faults but she has faults too. I don't want to be involved.
I want to tell her how she made me feel last night but I will then get the silent treatment and the family will be even more fractured than it already is (the entire family is a real mess which is not how we have been historically). I just feel shit. I have never suffered from depression or anything like that but today I just feel depressed. It's just been one thing after the other this year. Parents' relationship was just terrible over Xmas, DF treated DB and DSIL terribly which they are struggling to get over, parents say they are separating, we've had a bereavement in the family, my DB had a serious health crisis recently (very serious, immediately and life-threatening but he's ok now thankfully). DF is telling everyone and anyone how badly treated he is by his family (untrue). As I said he is withdrawing from everyone and in the meantime I am a sounding board for DM. She also talks to DSIL but she has a support there as DF has really upset her.
What on earth do I do. I love all of my family but I feel like I want to withdraw from them at the moment. I just feel drained and awful.
Sorry this has turned into a rant but it feels good to write it down. I have friends who I can talk to but I feel they get bored or they say I should just tell them not to talk to me about it but I know my parents and that will result in more accusations from one and a lengthy silent treatment from the other. I just feel sad