"But we took you to stately homes"... a thread for adult children of abusive families

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This thread is a follow up to "My mother has cut me out of her life - long sorry" because we reached the end of the thread life.

I originally posted on that thread to say that my mother had blamed me for something that was in fact her fault, called me a liar, got the rest of the family to gang up on me and then blamed me for splitting up the family.

It generated a huge amount of interest from a number of women who, like me, had grown up in an abusive, or "toxic" family environment where we had been the scapegoat or the dustbin for our parents to dump their own unresolved difficulties. My mother, like all our mothers, has refused to apologise for what she has done and many of us have cut ties with our families in order to recover our lost selves and self-esteem.

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I came here briefly before xmas, at Ally90's advice (and someone else who posted on my thread, apologies as no I can't remember their name) and have then found it very hard to come back.

I have read some of your stories, all so very very painful, and my admiration for youo all is immense......the fact that you all can come here to share, and also try to be a mum in the best possible way when the only examples shown to you were bad ones.

I think the 'blue ribbon' mentioned should have everyones name on it!!

my story, for what it is worth, is different from most I have read here (and I haven't read them all yet so maybe I will indeed find others like me??).

I was born to parents addicted to drugs. (heroin/lsd etc) (I feel some part of me wishes to go anonymous, but then, why should I 'hide', as it is not me who should be ashamed!). mum went into melt down after my birth (from what I have understood anyhow....me as a newborn can't argue as I have no memory). she ended up in a mental home and me in the care of my aunt at the age of 6mths.

my mother then 'recovered' enough to take back care of me, in time for my father (who had earlier vanished when mother became ill) to arrive back on the scene and take us both to the south of france.

(apparently at that time it was me who was the reason for this as I had missed my father. I was less than 1yr at this point, so how the blame can be mine confuses me)

anyhoo.....fast forward a few months and my aunt recieves a phone call from dover port authorities telling her they have a very ill woman and poorly toddler. the only sense coming from this woman was my aunts telephone number.
this woman was my mother, the poorly child was me, and we had been abandoned by my father in france after my mother had (it later turned out) taken LSD and had a very very bad trip. it turned her into something she has never recovered from and she is now schizophrenic and has been this way since I was 18mths, give or take a few lucid times when she got together with my stapfather (also schizophrenic) and had my brother.

I went on to live with my aunt, who it has to be said is not maternal to say the least!

my childhood wasn't hidious, nor was it 'normal'.

I missed out on having a loving mum n dad, aunt and uncle tried their best (if you can call it that when I spent my time being terrified of her temper), but their best involved forcing me to see a violent mother, sending me to stay with her and stepfather when they wee in a sheltered housing scheme (and then was abused by stepfather), not allowing me to have feelings about it all telling me they (well, my aunt......uncle did in fact try but aunt was too strong and had last word each time!) knew best about how often I should visit (every weekend), phone etc.

I became terrified of the phone.....it was normally my mother ranting at me about space men stealing me, men born in acid, my father being JFK, prince charles, each of the beatles [hey, rather cool being a beatle daughter maybe, think of the money], sorry, poor humour there).

on the times she was in hospital and not in a locked ward, she would escape and get to me at my school. and remeber this was the 80's before decent security and she could enter at will and find me. she was determined, I'll give her that......the 'asylum' she was in was over 30miles from us to try and ensure she couldn't get to me......she managed!

Of course that alos ensureed that all of the children I went to school with knew my 'situation' making for major unhappyness. you all know how cruel children can be

in goes on........bad stuff, okay stuff, stuff that should never happen, foster care for my brother and he was then adopted by his fathers family....

anyhoo......now I am here. here is a good place i have a wonderful husband and five gorgeous kiddies.

I do still have issues tho, to say otherwise would be lying.

I still have to vist my mother (i know, i know, I don't have to, but I feel like I do, and feel forced/pressured into doing so), and also my aunt. (uncle died nearly 10yrs ago)

to do this I feel the need to down several bottles of wine, and as this prooves I am nowhere near 'over' what I went thro.

I also had contact with my father for a time, but he was a painful eyeopener to what an addict is (I 'met' him wheh I was 18yrs, and then broke contact at 29yrs), even tho technically he is now a 'recovering addict'. he was all of the type that it wasn't his fault what happened and that I shouldn't cast blame without understanding who whould be blame. (soory, not making sense to myself here).

upshot is, he won't take blame, casts blame back at me, and treated me as tho I should be an adult and just accept what happened and forget it all. (HOW??????)

the rest of my side of the family (ignore my fathers, they are not counted here), 'disowned' me when I announced my fifth pregnancy. I have now had no contact with them for 6yrs, and they have not me DS2. maybe I should be sad (I was for a long time), I now see it is their loss and they will never know the joy I have with my children.

aunt however is still on the scene as she won't let go......still has the abilty to make me feel lke a child, puts me down in such a way I don't see it till later and too late to reort, makes me feel inadequate as a parent/woman/wife/person, and generally makes me at time physically sick whenever I have any form of contact.

having said all that tho, she actually (and believe me I am still shocked to the core by this, unless there is ulterior motive), told me that from an absolutely shitty start I have made a good life for myself and have wonderful kiddies!!!..

still feelings.

sorry sorry sorry for the length.....there is still more in me, but this is boring and long enough for now.. but thanks hugely if you have read this far

Welcome Psychomum - blimey what a story, you have so many things going on I can understand why its taken you so long to post. And you have got five kids - respect.

How well do you think you are coping? What if anything needs to change in your life?

For most of us it is putting our childhoods into context, admitting to ourselves that we were emotionally "abused" and setting boundaries with our mums/parents.

hello

ermmmmm.....coping.....guess I am! well, as long as I am not seeing them that is. My mother cannot contact me as she is not allowed my address/tel.no./no where the kiddies go to school etc. makes it very relaxing for me (in a way, there is always the unknown factor of someone mistakenly telling her, altho as I have been married for 14yrs now and not happened yet it is less likely).

tis a huge burden lifted knowing that the only two I actually have to deal with is aunt and mum. (well, unless I go visit and they unexpectedly throw in stepfather as like last week).

I tried councelling, altho that ended up just being a 'chat' with the lady and no constructive advice on how to cope with/speak to/handle them. she did tho ay that it is no way my fault.....it is all theirs.....and just knowing that (or rather, being told that) diD help. I now know that it isn't my fault to bear, but more thiers to hold IYGWIM. not that my mother would understand that being ill, but knowing it helps me!

I also went to a 'faith healer' for want of a better word. just talking to him and his answers validated my feelings and made me realise that for all that happened, it is in the past, and it made me the person I am now, and also led me onto the path that anabled me to meet my wonderful husband and have the kiddies I now have.

without my early life and childhood, then I would never have what I have now.....so I guess given the choice, I would not change what I went thro.......i so love what I now have, it makes up for it (do you undertand what I am getting at here????).

I hope I make sense???

in all, as it stands, I am happy. still not dealt with it all, (the drinking pre-visits proove that), but I am ME, the only me I am going to be, and I have to make the best of me to be the best mummy I can be for my children, so as to ensure they grow up with as least amount of issues as is possible!!!

Danae, I think it depends how you see success. I don't think you have wasted 20 years of your life. I'd rather be a jibbering mess and dealing with my issues than a cool, calm professional like my mother was, who abused her children! Don't measure success in monetary or status terms- I'm sure you don't anyway- but society does tend to see that money and professional status or relationship status (happily married) are the only measures of true success, but this just isn't true- what about growth, integrity, character development?
ITs true that some people don't have to deal with this shit in the way we are having to, and those people can go along their merry way and do well in their career and relationships. I used to look at refugees on TV and think "yes, you'Ve got it bad, but at least when it comes down to it, you know your mother loves you" I used to think "I'm not in a war but all the pain in my life has been caused by the one person who was supposed to protect me from that pain."...
But now I think its useless to compare with other people. I have beautiful DD. I remember sometimes that many women can't have children and may well be asking God (or whoever) why them? Other people don't have physical health. Our disadvantage is just different, thats all.
I think if you're artistically inclined, you can use your pain to create. In fact, we were saying earlier that if you look at all the actors, artists, writers and composers, all of the good ones had shitty childhoods and were to some extent mad!! SO I think we can use the gift of insight that we've been given and make sure that less of this gets passed onto our children. Then you've completed half your purpose for being here, I think.
Sorry if this sounds a bit corny and rambling, but I just don't want you to feel that time has been wasted. I am so under-employed, and I'll probably never have a real job, but I'm so glad I'm sorting out this now and maybe a lot of people (like my mother) hide behind their work and ostentation, because it stops them from having to look at the real them.

I can't explain PAges though! She's good at her job too, and has a lovely DH too!

Danae- Can I ask why you feel it is so important to 'catch up' as it were??
Achievements are relative as with most other things. To me, many times just managing to go a month without ending up in hospital close to death was a hue achievement, going a few days without having to get drunk or stoned to be able to sleep without nightmares and tears was a massive achievement, everytime I speak to my children and don't emulate my mothers presence (which unfortunately I see in myself all too often) is the greatest achievement I could ever hope for.

DP had a great childhood, has wonderful parents (they still have their faults obviously but he's the first to say they were great parents), he has done much more than me, and is an incredibly stable and sensible person, but to him I am amazing for what I have come through. To me, he is amazing for taking me on!!!

I'm sure in comparison to many of your work colleagues you have achieved much more. When the day-to-day living of life is easy, other goals are closer, much closer.

WRT bad relationships, oh gosh, yes! My first serious bf wasn't too bad by some standards, but he was violent at times and I believe he did cheat on me. Though I now think we were just too young for such an intense relationship. He met me whilst I was in fostered lodgings and the woman whose care I was in had BPD. I was a mess and he couldn'ty deal with it, so I don't blame him at all.

My childrens father though, was a loser. He was violent, a drinker, a serial cheat and I later discovered a cocaine addict. Until I had cut my mother out of my life, I was unable to see the problems with this, it was as if I was under her cloud, nothing could be as bad as it seemed. It reminds me of the video for Soundgarden's-black hole sun, like everything that could have been was swallowed up by her and her control over me. The main part of it being that she acted as if nothing had ever happened, so I was in constant denial myself.

Once I cut all contact with her and had grieved for my father I started to see things in a totally different light. Like the cloud had been lifted. I went through many feelings regarding her, I was desperate for her love and validation for a long time, then I hated her, then I pitied her, now I can honestly say I feel nothing. It's a void, and that's how I like it. I found when I was hating her it consumed me, it tunred me into a wreck, once I let go of that I could grow, like the flower that has been strangled by a weed that is finally cut away.

Until I had been through all that I couldn't address any other relationships I had going on, I was stuck in her chasm, but I did eventually and now I have the most wonderful man I could ever imagine.

Danae - yes, don't measure success by status - my parents did/still do and it has been the driving force of their lives. It doesn't make you or those around you happy.

For me, happiness will be being a better mum that my mum.

Psychomum - you don't have to see your mum/aunt. You can divorce them, their are several posters on this thread who have done that. Or you can just temporarily divorce them, create some distance. Nothing that makes you that unhappy or causes you to drink to blot out the pain is good. It is a cancer that affects everything else good in your life.

Psychomum, I'm with kaz.

IMO anyone I meet that is an idiot doesn't stay in my life for long, so why the heck should birth status change that???

I'm all for family but it really is only common blood, it doesn't give anyone rights they would be refused otherwise.

Telling my mum to fuck off was the best thing I ever did with my life. She is a horrible person why on earth would I want something to do with her?!??!?!

Thanks VS, for the 'common blood... does not give anyone rights they would be refused otherwise' statement.

This is the foundation upon which my toxic NPD Middle Sister operates on-I mean she presumes to have rights over my dc as their aunt "whether they like it or not" (her words).

I am still de-toxing from Christmas morning - from the way she treated dd (13yr). I am at the place where I can be detached for myself, but realizing she is using dd is a new barrel of crap for me to process.

I apologized to dd for what happened and she said she was ok and understood that her aunt would never change-as I have come to understand and realize and believe.
Thank you all for your counsel and coaching.

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Danae, your feelings of rage and anger are normal especially after what you have been through, or at least that's what I tell myself, where I, and you differ from our parents is being able to control them.
Being angry or wanting to fly off the handle is a natural human emotion, what makes the difference is being able to identify and admit when we feel that way and then proceed to deal with it.

I have spent many a day crying to myself scared to death I am going to become like my stepfather, my mother never really showed any emotion, but he would just flip and I wouldn't even know why.

So to counter it I have made a pact with myself that when I am angry I will walk away, sometimes I do shout at the Dc's, and then I kick myself for it, and I wait to calm down, (I think in order to have a reasonable talk with anyone you need to be calm) apologise to them, explaining I was wrong to act the way I did, that shouting isn't good and that I am sorry, that was something that never happened in my house, my parents did not take responsibilty for their actions, which I endeavor to change in my household.

I am also very aware of not brushing it under the carpet, allowing it to seem normal, I have to stop myself huging them as soon as I trip up because I don't want them to think that someone shouting and then hugging them is love, it's not.

Crikey, my 3&7 year olds get angry! they get frustrated, they get fed-up, and I tell them it's ok, it's normal, I give them a hug and ask what's upsetting them, then we try to work through it together.

Acknowledging feelings and dealing with them is much healthier than wanting not to feel them.

Sorry if I'm missing people here...due visitors soon and I'm scan reading...!

Psycho - so pleased your here! You say you are physically sick sometimes hearing from your aunt? Do you have 'Toxic Parents' by Susan Forward yet? It mentions to notice if you have any physical/emotional reactions to being in contact with your relatives. And you may want a different therapist to the one you had before. They may be able to help you more. Anyway, new years day tomorrow, what is your new years resolution regarding your mother and aunt? To stop visits by end of year? To cut down to phone contact only? To take up therapy again? Read a few self help books? Obviously its anything you choose but do something you feel comfortable with so you can begin to become unenmeshed (is there such a word? is now...) from your mother and aunt. Won't mention step father, could be not to see him again. And if he is there to walk out...okay would take some courage, which you do have, because your here reading this now...(hopefully!). And no, I haven't heard another story like yours yet. Sure there is someone who will come forward soon with something similar. Many lurk but don't come out of the woodwork till they feel safe. FWIW I'm impressed you are here, it would be only too easy to say 'my parents could not help it as they were ill/addicted to drugs'. You really have turned out healthy despite your isolated/abusive upbringing. That is something your children can be proud of. xx

Smithfield - sorry I was not clear...my birth of dd went totally fine...but still a stressful process in itself even if it is all pretty textbook. I cannot believe you went through that with your mother before birth of your ds!! That was my worst case scenario. How far away is your mother? I think you have said before but it may take me some hours to find it on here now! You really don't want your mother near you before/during/after.

Yes they do tend to get more assertive and bothered when you pull away/put distance between you. They get more insistant and their emotions highten. Whether that is just NPD I don't know, but that was my experience. Once they feel their control slipping they try harder to get it back again so they start pulling all the strings they have and pushing all your buttons to get a reaction of anger/fear/annoyance/irritation all negative reactions to normal people, but to people like our mothers they are positive reactions. They know they still have you. Give them a dead pan/slightly smiling in a contented way face...that stalls them. I think to keep yourself safe, don't tell her you are going in when you do. Don't tell her till as long after as you can make it. Could you try to be in bed 'sleeping' when she does come to see baby and let dh deal with her? Would it be possible to use the truth a little if it would stall her? Would she be put off by you being 'down' and 'depressed' and basically boring to be around? Or would that make her want to 'mother' (in the loosest possible use of the word...) you? Anyway keep posting...you sound like you are doing really well detaching when not around her.

Danae - re missing out on life. Can I join the club? I wish I had had a normal childhood with all the happy memories. I wish more than anything I had gone out to the pubs and had fun when I was a teenager. I wish I had run away from home when I was nine and became suicidal and not stayed with it all. I wish I had run away before I met my serious bf of 8 years and gone to france. I wish I had not gone out with bf of 8 yrs. I wish I had done more with my life. I wish I wasn't so deeply saddened and I wish I didn't constantly long with a deep ache to do all these things I never did because of my upbringing. But there is a time to let go of all this. Wishing for it all, comparing yourself to 'normal' people will not bring it all back. You have what you have now. That is it. You have been enmeshed for a very long time, this is your wake up time, its like being frozen in time (am I going off on a tangent here...?) and suddenly you come round and everyone has lived their life and had fun and experienced everything they wanted to in life. And you/we have none of it. Yes we are infants in some ways, but that is because we have just broken free from our mothers inprisionment of our very being. So we have to start from scratch and what we have today. I do see my childhood/life so far something to grieve over and hopefully and healthily in time let go of, so then we can move on from it all. Don't give yourself a hard time. You could see it as healthy you feel sad. It could be the beginning of the grieving process for all those lost years. I know nearly 2 years on I feel less obcessed by my past and I'm focussing more on the future. I've set new year resolutions last year for the first time and did them. I'm setting more this year. I'm doing an open university course again. I'm going to complete more tasks (painting etc) in house and garden. I may not be the vet I wanted to be, I may not have saved the world from disaster (i do get carried away in my daydreams...) but I do have a house, a car, a dh and a dd. And a brain and potential to still achieve things. I suppose age limits me, but given I will never win a gold medal at the olympics (my fantasys are far ranging...) due to my age I will accept something more suitable that I can achieve. Afterall we only depress ourselves if we set unrealistic goals. Perhaps a career for you is now unrealistic and you will depress yourself trying for something you will fail at? Given the right background you could have achieved it, but unfortunately you may have to let go of that dream. And grieve over it. And I did not mean that to sound harsh or saying you could not have done it...just it may be time to accept things as they are and move on. And I hope some of that waffle helped...helped me a bit as I didn't really realise that I've moved on a stage till now. So it does get better with time I suppose the moral is. Just allow yourself to be realistic about what you didn't have/cannot have, allow your time to grieve at what could have been, then move on to acceptance and new goals/new life.

Pages - your amazing. Was very impressed with notes. Really appreciate you keeping this thread and the other going. Just thought I should let you know!

Sorry danae, just read your recent post...that's scan reading for you...you do science!! wow...

and lack of achievement can be a sign of an abusive past. I fear doing my best incase I fail, so I never try. Something I'm determined to overcome this year with open uni thingy

Yours ally (now worshiping post you type on...)

danae- simply had to respond to your post. Im not sure I will be much help here. But my goodness I could have written your posts myself (although no where near As articulately, may I add).

I'll feel that it's all fake and in truth my mother is still running my show...'

Indeed she is inside your head and 'at your elbow' as you put it. I think what I have begun to realise is my mother is soo internalised I can barely tell which record is running at which time, the voices (mine and hers) have become indistinguishable in my head.
I have spent my life petrified of failure. I would rather hand the baton to someone else than face the fear of actually 'trying' to win the race just in case I do lose. Therefore I have come to the conclusion I either at some point believed the hype i.e my mothers continual critcism = foregone conclusion I am a loser no point trying then, or decided to rebel and become that loser her constant critique was supposed to stop me becoming just to wind her up?
But then I have to throw something else into the mix here as well. The goals I was always trying to achieve (then sabotaging), what if they were never my goals in the first place, after all I have just spent the best part of my life 'still' trying to gain her approval haven't I? I think thats what struck me in Pages post, when she wrote;

but I have got to where I want to be now and I think the richness of my experience in previous jobs adds to the one I am doing now

She talks in terms of the richness of the experience, that is 'her' measure, which makes it more satisfying to her. I have 'never' used this sort of measure, because instead of working out what 'I' wanted I was too busy trying t work out what she did. I know this may not apply to you danae but thought it might help to hear where I have got to with this.

I don't truly know what the answer is either, but let me just throw something else into the mix here for you (and I) to ponder.
Having just read your last post I was , this is a woman who believes she has wasted however many years??

I have received scholarships throughout my education, and won prestigious awards at post doctoral level. In what I do science-wise I have been told repeatedly that my ideas are breaking new ground at the forefront of the field -

That in istelf is more than most achieve in a lifetime!

but then I rarely publish anything and usually give the idea/project to someone else 'better than me'. Fear of envy, fear of success, fear of testing my intellectual limits and finding I'm a mediocre nobody after all?

So I ask, are you achievments not good enough truly for 'you' or not good enough for your mother? Whose measures are you using here.

And i'm BPD so I've not made any 'spiritual' progress either ...

Dont carry on doing your mothers work for her. The key to your unhappiness I dont believe is in your lack of achiement but in you ability to start distinguishing between her goals and measures she set 'for you' and your own. Start listening carefully to the voices and try praising yourself and giving yourself credit ....without the BUT.
I think if you can somehow eradicate her measures of you the pressure to just be yourself will shine through and you will soar.

Pages- found what you wrote to Danae so inspirational and soothing and the it occurred to me it was like hearing the voice of a mother I had always longed for, soothing, accepting, saying it's ok to be who you are!
So was wondering if you would think of adopting me

Ally- just cross posted, as I was saying in my long winded post to danae;

I fear doing my best incase I fail, so I never try

Ditto

haven't read all the thread, hope you all get to drop the baggage and stop wasting so much time and energy trying to work out if there is a shred of reasonableness or nonselfishness to these parents (it took me 37 years to get it)

My mother is over here for a month. and I just simply do not enjoy being with her. she is so entirely self serving and snide and sarcastic, not about me but about other people. She's so ungrateful and astonishingly rude and when I look in to her eyes I feel no sympathy between us or unconditional love or warmth or affection or empathy, even though she is superficially supportive and says she loves us. She's all about herself.
I'm doing my best to facilitate her holiday but she drives me fuckin' mad. I brought them over for lunch today, they stay in an apartment close by when they are here, and set out just the kind of food they like, listened to her sniping and bragging and talking about herself non stop, ignored the bickering and infighting between her and my father, got the children to get her to read books to them ( they can entirely take the her or leave her - ds1 thinks she is like CP30 as she never stops talking infact the woman starts a new sentence every 4 seconds and it is an enitrely one way conversation always) and when I got a mutual friend to give them a lift back an hour sooner than we had discussed she and my dad sulked and pouted and did the very English thing of rolling eyes and whinging indirectly to my friend that they had been shuffled out of my house early. Fucking ungrateful cow. I don't know why I bother. I dont' like her but I 'm determined to give them a holiday they can't complain about.

sorry this is so long, this is a therapy thread, right?

I found them a fabulous apartment to stay in. What did they say?" Oh darling it's very nice, but there are no hooks to hang our dressing gowns on"

Feeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeecccccccccccccccckkkkkkkkkkk!

When before they came they said " dont' worry darling,we dont' want to do anything special we'll just fit in with you and the kids" but now I hear she badmouths me behind my back to my friend if she get a lift home an hour earlier than discussed, I have to protecty myself by writing them out a schedule/itinerary including who will provide each and every meal, down to afternoon snacks. Will it stop them whinging? Will it fuck

But they took me to stately homes.

right, thaks for that, I'll get up off the couch now as our 50 mintues are up

oh blimey, I 'm sorry if I've betlittle the tone and meaning of this thread by moaning about my mother as I was never abused in the way s ome of you describe. Sorry

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SPRAY@ staring gormlessly in to the middle distance!

well I could and have spent a large portion of my time being irritated by almost everything she says and everything she does but I 'm well over that stage now, with the help and coaching of my wonderful dh. This visit, when she goes in to one, just astonishing rudeness/mannerlessness and inconsideration for those around her and extreme self serving-tude (is that a word)? It just makes me feel sad and crestfallen, not angry any more and guess that is a Good Thing. I think this visit she's being a bit more antognistic than usual as I wont' engage with her on any emotional leve as a form of self protection and therefore she can't get a rise out of me which would ulitmately lead to her being able to do the hurt-little-old-lady routine. Haaaaaaaaaaa!

right, bed time now, it's been NY 2008 for 52 mintues

HNY to you all

Welcome suzywong - abuse comes in many forms, my parents are superficially lovely, smart, successful, generous and supportive. But, I was their child and they did not/ or did not know how to love me. That is abuse. I have only just realised that my childhood wasn't just another way of doing things.

And actually it wasn't my fault. I wasn't a bad, moody, lazy child. And I forgive myself for whatever I may have done in the past because there is no room in my head for hate when I have loads of things to love

Danae- Im not sure about NPD, but definately I would say its a product of 'critical parent' syndrome. Both my parents were hyper critical, still are. Pleasing them was 'impossible'. Hence now, as I have internalised them, pleasing myself is impossible.

This is what strikes me so much about you danae, it's as though you are critically parenting yourself IYSWIM.

I suppose i do have a string of degrees which some might count as achievement. But (there goes that but again ...I sabotaged all of them.

And

'Science is no big deal'

Also interestingly You say it was your mother that pushed you toward perfection, have you though maybe she herself knew perfection was unavhievable therefore set you up for failure? Maybe 'she' was in fact sabotaging you, so that you wouldnt do 'better' than her.
NPD's dont like competition, and are hugely jelous people!