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

[Pages]

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.

Pages- The session I spoke of was with a psychologist o/seas. Unfortunately it was 1 session. I didnt go back. It is only now that I look back and see how astute she was at reading the subtext.
I was having a dreadful time at work. I would leave on a Friday and slump into depression knowing I had to return on the monday.
Basically I had had a change of management and felt persecuted. The upshot of the therapy session was that my parents had been 'highly' authoritarian, black and white people. The new manager causing me stress had the same 'managerial style', plus I had gone from working in the field for years to an office based environment. So again more structure and rules (lunchbreaks, time to arrive depart).
Because I was linking in to how this made me feel growing up, I began to react to this environment physically. Anxiety, depression, but also emotionally as I would have done as a child.
This ties in with how each of us individually responded to our environments as kids.
So for you pages you learnt to please your mother by excelling. So you did well.
So yes you are probably re-enacting this with your employers. For you not to feel percieved as doing well by a management figure would then become a source of huge anxiety.
It is hard to have esteem or too much emotion bound up in professional life, because 'ultimately' things may happen beyond our control (like the management change for me, redundancies, change of colleagues etc)
My way of responding as a child was different to you pages. Seeing the authority figure as my parents would send me back to my childhood response of becoming very closed down, beligerant.
In the given scenario it became 'so' painful for me I resigned without another job to go to. (should have continued those sessions!)
So in my long winded way [hmmm] the pyschologist session taught me (in retrospect) that 'any' authority figure can become our parents and we react as we learnt to as children. We become emotionally invested.
I can honestly say I wouldnt be able to bare to work in an office environment again because it takes me back to my restricted childhood and I end up feeling powerless and as a result I'm unable to deal with the feelings that brings up.
I think recognising this is a step forward. We can start to detatch ourselves maybe by working through these scenarios as they come up but with the huge benefit of insight.

Smithfield, thanks so much for the insight - my situation mirrors yours entirely. I too, after being happy in the same company for many years, have had a change of management, have been more office based lately and there is more clock watching etc - whereas we all used to be treated like adults, we all feel "watched", as if we are children. It's funny because some have responded well to it, almost as if they needed to be told what to do, whereas I used to enjoy being my own boss in effect. I don't respond well to authority, and I even told my previous boss this and he laughed and said that neither did he! I guess I will just have to use this as a learning experience and try and deal with it in my "adult" rather than my "wounded child".

Just caught up to some extent, up to page 28, and wanted to say...

Oneplusone... I am sorry you are going through such a hard time. Everything you say is very poignant for me and I am now wondering how much I actually did bond with my mother, after all. She has always TOLD me that I did! She told me how much she held me as a baby, never put me down, etc. and yet I can totally relate from toddlerhood (earliest memory)onwards to the feelings of isolation within the family that you describe. I know that she was a "friend" to me as I got older, as and when it suited her, but I don't know now whether or not that real bonding was there, as Danae describes, the voice in your head that tells you "You are loved, you are wonderful" just isn't and wasn't there. At least, not unless I am doing something I am good at and getting praise for it...

Smithfield, I too have had many moments of reality checking... "Was it really that bad? Maybe I am making all this up?" I think it is natural, but like you I just remind myself how I felt in the worst moment when she stabbed me in the back (both in the recent and distant past) and that I would never do that to my own lovely dc. Also what you said about the gang mentality and paranoia about siblings joining your mother's side against you - I guess I have feared that all my life (still cowtow to the secretaries at work to make sure they don't gang up on me!) but in fact, even though I have older brother on side, he is in Australia and I do feel very much on my own in all this (have even dreamed they have got him against me too!) and it is okay, actually. Please don't apologise for talking about my DS1/my mother's letter btw, I think you are spot on about the similarity with your mother.

Finally (for now ) thanks Sakura for what you said about emotional abuse being as bad if not worse than other types of abuse. I too cried when I read that American lawyer's website. Like you, the occasional physical abuse by my stepdad was an obvious indicator for me (and even was enough to make my mother leave him in the end)that something was wrong. It's only in recent years that I have realised how much the daily taunting, ridiculing, humiliation, being impossible to please, etc that occurred daily and went on for many years affected me and is still affecting me to this day.

smithfield-thanks for that. It explains it really clearly about work and the role authority figures play in re-creating our family drama.
I suspect that one of the reasons I have under-achieved so spectacularly is for this reason; I am scared of not doing my absolute best at something. My mother also expected me to be a high achiever and I think the standards were so high that I just gave up and opted out and became a SAHM, although I do want to be with DD, but still.. a part of me wonders. I do bits of work for an employer here teaching English and the amount of sheer preparation I do for each class is unreal. I have to do the absolute best in each single thing. Once I called my boss and told him I'd forgotten a book in his office. The next time I saw him he said "Oh, you are human then! I wasn't sure", meaning I'm such a perfectionist and so organised. But tHis means I can't function in a job that would require more responibilities- I'd just fizzle up or something.
Pages, I do think its partly human to want the esteem and repect of colleagues- I suppose the question is- how much? Also, how much of it is cultural? I've read a lot about Japan and the UK being island countries and how much of our cultural behaviour stems from this. In many ways both countries are quite similar- something about living in close quarters with other people with nowhere to go and therefore being forced to live side by side. We have to make sure relations run smoothly with other people much more than in continental countries. Its kind of essential on an island (perhaps less now with international travel)
In Japan if a murder is committed, the first thing the police and reporters do is interview the neighbours and everyone gets to find out whether the murderer did his morning and evening greetings "Hello, Good Morning, Its cold today, isn't it". Also there, in the past, if you were excluded from the group, you'D die because you depended on the group's rice for survival! SO "what people think" becomes essential for survival in such situations.

If you read "Watching the English" , there are lots of a brilliant insights into how the British behave.

Oh and regarding what you said about some people responding well to authority- that is also reflected in cultures too. Look at Russia- the people of that country are only happy if they have dictator telling them what they can and cannot do. Its as though they need the responsibility for themselves to be taken away. They feel more comfortable like that, without the responsibility of free choice, therefore dictatorships keep re-turning (now Putin!!)

Thanks to those who have wondered how I am.

Mum died last night. We knew it was coming, but it happened much more quickly than anyone anticipated.

I'm staring at a paper I must sign and fax back to the funeral home where I must state my name/address, relationship to the deceased, and that I agree for her body to be cremated.

It is surreal to think she is no longer here, and now my permission is needed to reduce her body to a pile of ash - so that there will be almost no tangible physical evidence of her life. But her legacy lives on....

earlybird- How are you feeling. Dont know if you would even be able to put it into words right now.

earlybird- I have posted on your other thread too. I am around most of today and will keep checking in so if your around post again if you feel you can or if you think it will help. ((((hug))))

Pages- Perhaps whenever bosses, managers take on a parental stance we respond to that accordingly.
This discussion has also helped me reflect now on how I respond to criticism at work. Uhm not very well. And with colleagues when 'they' recieve praise or attention from my manager. I feel I probably go back to child then aswell. I see the colleague recieving this attention as a threat, so basically as I would a sibling vying for parental love or attention. Its pure stomach jerking jelousy!
I do think staying in adult mode when dealing with situations like this are key. Of course the insight has to come first though doesnt it.

I also realised last night that my reaction to my parents was always (as soon as I was old enough)to remove myself from them physically. I would move away, although I would inevitably boomerang back again.
I now realise I do this with work...the longest I have ever managed to stay in a company is two years. Of course this creates self sabotage because I am unable to progress my career operating like this.

So obviously my defenceive response to any percieved parental threat is flight.

This spills into my recent revelations regarding my discomfort with MIL. I have felt like I have wanted to abscond back to australia, and have continually pestered DH about it.

Yet logically I know this would be a disasterous move financially.

Recently though, Since Ive begun to tackle my issues with MIL, I know longer feel the need to run away.

BUt its interesting that I instinctively choose the defence of flight, rather than fight.

This brings me back to the drama triangle. MAybe I see fight as stepping into the persecutor role and that role causes too much discomfort for me.

Sakura- I relate totally to what you were saying about your drive for perfectionism.
I do infact constantly 'shrivel up' under the pressure.
I end up in a form of paralysis. I notice thos especially with both work and study.

I am unable to do an assignment because it 'MUST BE' perfect. I ponder how I can make it perfect, I stall. I end up completing it in haste (usually almost missing the deadline) and so once again I've self sabotaged, handing in a dashed off piece of work. But at least in this instance I can say, well of course its not perfect...I didnt 'try'.

oneplusone- Wherever you are I hope your ok?
I hope you weren't discouraged by any responses you were given over MIL.

I was thinking of you the other day. In relation to my own current battle with MIL and thought actually what I said wasnt right. 'YOU' must do what is right for you, and if the need is there to confront MIL with all the damage she has done it is your right to do that. We should just be here as a support mecahanism for you no matter what you choose.
I have to thankyou as well because by talking through 'your' issues with MIL I realise I have been avoiding my issues with mine. Im starting to tackle that now.

----

BTW only 12 days to go!

earlybird, please write on here whenever you can. I hope the process of dealing with everything is not too difficult for you

SMithfield, loads of interesting points there about how this affects all areas of our lives. Very interesting about self-sabotage.

About re-enacting the drama- recently a poster on mumsnet on another thread (who I suspect knows my weak spots and sore points) replied to a comment I made when I diagreed with her. It left a bad taste in my mouth afterwards and couldn't put my finger on why her words had bothered me so much, after all, I don't know her. But now I realise she had adopted a kind of "adult" stance with me and was in fact talking down to me in her post as though I was the naughty child and she was the adult. Well of course this shouldn't have bothered me- we meet people who say things we don't like all the time, and I probably say things all the time that could be taken the wrong way, so I understood that it wasn't so much her who had upset me, but what she stood for i.e my mother!! So I felt as though my mother had scolded me, and it dregged up a lot of emotion again. I wanted to type a biting reply, but I calmed down, rationalized it and got it into perspective. This person wasn't my mother, she was just a random person and it didn't matter what she thought of me. Took a lot of willpower though!

Oh by the way smithfield- have you held out and not contacted your mother?!
GOod luck on the birth by the way

sakura- I think I know which post you mean. Although I in fact thought the posters reply to you was quite childlike and far less considered than your post.
But I know what you mean its our knee jerk responses. I dont know if you remember the first thread I wrote on which brought me here in the first place.
I had exactly the same experience as you, but unfortunately didnt wait to calm down and boy, did I let that poster have it .
I remember the reation her post brought up, anxiety, pumping heart. What a reaction created by a complete stranger in cyber space!
And apart from writing here... I now find it 'very' difficult to write my opinions on any other threads.... lest I lock horns with another virtual mother!

And sakura, I have held out, but got a bit of a shock this morning as I obviously had begun to feel a bit too safe and answered the phone.
Yep twas she! . I kind of panicked and said 'Oh I cant talk Im in the middle of something, I will call you back.' Of course I had to repeat myself several times but she said OK.
Bit guilted out again now. Oh well like many of you wise one's say on here... its a long long journey and sometimes it will be 1 step forward and a few back again!

Hi all. Have been unable to access the internet for a few days and DH was away on business (and i'm hopeless with technical stuff) so have only just manage to log on again.

The good thing about the lack of internet access was that i ended up reading 'The Drama' again; I've now read it about 3 times and i feel i learn something new from it every time and i feel i am finally understandig fully everything Alice Miller says.

I have had an emotional few days, I think i was bottling a lot of emotions whilst DH was away and almost the minute he stepped in the door everything came bursting out. I felt as if i did return to my childhood and felt some of pain i felt as a child but suppressed at the time. I had felt until now that i had had a mainly happy childhood but with some major traumas caused by my dad and some by my mum, but i am now actually coming to the realisation that my childhood, from a very very young age if not from birth, was a very sad, lonely and painful one. The only happy memories i have involve times when i was not at home but at a friend's house, or at school. This leads me to conclude that all my time at home i felt deeply lonely, ignored, isolated and simply not a part of my 'family'. I remember i was a complete 'bookworm' as a child and something in The Drama has made me feel now that my reading was a form of escapism, the only escape available to me as a child, from the pain of feeling so lonely and unwanted and unnoticed. I feel i realised at an early age that my mum did not want to hear about my worries or fears or indeed hear anything from me or have me bother her at all, and so i learned from a young age to keep all my feelings, thoughts and emotions to myself, especially if they were diffciult or painful emotions. My mum was always interested if i had something happy or nice to talk about, but didn't want to know if i was upset or sad or lonely. And that is how i am to this day, i bottle all my feelings, worries, emotions up and i find it very very hard to open up and talk to people. Although this 'habit' is slowly changing, i feel so sad at the thought of myself as a child, bewildered, lost, alone and pushed aside in favour of my sisters. I despise my mum for her treatment of me, and actually feel a bit of gratitude towards my dad who was kind to me until he had his mental breakdown.

My MIL issues seem to have faded away and i wonder now whether these were in fact 'transferance' (Alice Miller's words) and i have to thank Smithfield for pointing this out to me although i could not see it at the time. There is no doubt that my MIL has been spiteful and nasty to me, no doubt her toxic antennae could sense an easy target, but i know now that if she does ever say anything nasty to me in the future that DH will stand up for me, but more importantly, I will stand up for myself, something which i have been unable to do in the past.

I need to spend some time catching up on recent posts, so will go now but will be back soon. x

I have always had huge problems with authority figures, winding up all my bosses, not accepting criticism, not quite doing enough to succeed.

I still find tall men really hard to deal with even on a social level, tend to avoid talking to them (dad was 6ft and very intimaditing when I was a child).

I went off to university at the age of 18 and my only way of dealing with men was to pick arguements (normally about politics or religion) with them or sleep with them . Never had a boyfriend who was taller than me, would positively run a mile if any tall men showed an interest in me.

Just caught up.

Can totally relate to perfectionism re assignments, and I thought it was just me!

Authority figures at work, I acted like a small child...angry at times, other times giggling like a child . Hope you can overcome Pages.

Lots of interesting stuff said...mulling it over still and must go get Alice Miller its ringing bells for me

Currently starting on Healing your emotional self (or something like that title) by Beverly Engel.

12 days Smithfield...eeek! Its a shocker when you get the mother unexpectedly on the phone!

How long for you TMSB? Has your ms got her maternity leave yet? Still makes me take a shocked breath in when I think of that! I can imagine it making you angry (would me if my sis had done that) but also its so implausable its funny...hope your not offended by that...

to update everyone,

My father died yesterday, and I'm feeling a mix between relief and guilt. I haven't spoken to him for ages and I didn't expect to again, but I still feel very guilty. I'm not sure if I want to go to the funeral, I doubt it as it's a 13 hour plane ride and I m sure everyone will be arguing.

I will be volunteering for a charity for a few months to help with poor children. I had previously been helping disabled and sick children, along with a local school. I want to help these people so much, but its difficult due to the corruption and the culture.

I haven't decided about my business yet. My mother, after I changed my email, talked to one of my assistants and made the assistant feel sorry for her, again. So, I received a rather nasty email from this individual, stating that I'm unprofessional and that i shouldn't treat my mother this way. I had a friend of mine write to th e assistant and to my mother, saying that I didn't wish to speak to my mother, I had aske d her not to interfere with my colleagues and that it was ruining my health worrying. I had pneumonia a few months ago and have been ill twice since then. My friend got the email from my mother, my mother invented things just to make me look bad and insistesd she didn't know what my problem was. She said I had never had an "adult conversation" with her in which I had told her whaat the problem was. I have told her plenty of times its her. She also said that she calls me a bitch, tells me to fuck off, etc because "I insult her and she gets angry" then she worte a second email telling my friend that my father was dead......

I am receiving counseling, which is helping a bit. I am in Singapore for a few days so will look for some books. Tomorrow is the Chinese New Year and Friday is the funeral for my father.

Hi Sabaidii, just thinking of you as well as Earlybird, her mother has now passed away too.

So, how do we cope with being no contact with parents and then them passing away? We have all come here onto this thread to get support for breaking away, building up boundries which lead to estrangement but we have yet to deal with their death, and this is two people suffering a loss in a week. Anyone out there who has experience of this? TMSB your parents have passed away I think? But you were still in contact at the time?

The only book I know that deals with estrangement of a parent then death is Bevely Engels, but there may be others?

Sabaidii, have you Toxic Parents by Susan Forward? You may want to look up personality disorders on the net before you go to singapore and see if any ring a bell for your mothers and fathers behaviour. There are some good specific books our there for borderline and nacarrsistic PD.

I hope your doing okay Sabaidii, can't say much more for now, my dd is pulling me away.

((((hugs))))) to you

allyxxx

Hi
10 days smithfield! Good luck, best wishes, and bushels of positive energy/thoughts/prayers going your way. And I'm glad you've got past the time for premature delivery. I'm happy for you.

It's 20 days for me. DH left for a business trip today to return on the 13th. In the name of TMSB existing, having feelings, and expressing them: I did tell him I'd be more comfortable if he didn't go on this one (duh). He did immediately offer to not go, bless the man. But I know it is very important-his name is on the patent of the thingy that is being tested-so I said the cutoff for travel could be 10 days before the due date and he agreed-reasonable because I really have had no problems/concerns (besides my age) through out the pregnancy.

Ally90-I am laughing, now.
For others not familiar with my MS: Middle Sister heard from a colleague that if one's parents were deceased, than a sibling could apply for maternity leave to help with a new baby. MS did not ask me if this was ok, no offer, suggestion, "how about..."; she informed me (on the phone) that she applied for it. BTW, I am 46 and this is my third child .
She later told me she was denied, but said she insisted the HR person must have made some kind of mistake and made her "check again". She has not spoken of it since.

I went from shock (deer in the headlights-speechless!!!) I could not (at that time) express my feelings and said nothing, I thought to bide my time to see if she actually got it...

to figuring out what it meant-premium insult, diminishing me (and dh) as incapable, needing her sustained supervision and assistance! (although in her mind , shame on me : I suppose I was to feel grateful for the offer of so much help (her rescuing me)-thus being put in the position of never being able to thank her enough (counselor said-say 'thank you'-that is enough) being significantly in her debt for ages...

to understanding the significance of the insult-she manifesting her dominant, matriarchal position while keeping me in incompetent child mode, completely diminished...

which lead me to understand WHY WHY WHY for all these years- WHY things she does make me feel so uncomfortable: It is (I am) a continuous Power Play for her at my expense...

to discovery of the right words to put on it: she is narcissistic and I have been enabling her because I could not feel and express my feelings (from my childhood damage)...talk about an easy target!...

to now feeling joy at having a prime example of her NPD and at my expense: Validation and verification.

Thus, I LAUGH. Clarity at last.

Besides coming for the birthing day (perhaps the day after ), she went from "maternity leave", to how many weeks of vacation do I want her to take, to my saying Oldest Sister will be here first (she is a nurse) so come after that (which probably didn't sit too well with her-but she didn't say anything)-I said long weekends would be better (since we banished her dog from our pet free home), she pushed for taking Fridays and Mondays off-I said "No, one or the other-Fridays would be best for me". She uses the "she only wants what's best for me" line quite a bit, so she will be getting it back . That is where it stands(two weekends on/one off-and I did casually toss in there that she could take a weekend off for herself once in a while too -she didn't respond )...but only one silent stare down with my dd (13 yr),and she will be diminished further to one-one night visit per month.

Sorry this is so long-I need to get up and move around a bit. I do have thoughts for Earlybird and Sabaidii. to you both. It is a difficult time to endure. Sabaidii- check out "Surviving a Borderline Parent" by K. Roth. Available on Amazon.

Just quickly,
On "Surviving a Borderline Parent"-
that would be a place to (only) start- or as a supporting book. It was the first book I read on my self-reflection journey and it rang a clarion of bells for me.

Sabaidii and Earlybird, sorry to hear of what you are going through. If it would be helpful for you it would be helpful for us to hear how you feel, as Ally says we have this yet to come.

Thanks for the insights about authority figures at work, guys. I have a meeting coming up and am rehearsing staying in my adult.

My mother has been writing to my older brother as well as sending pics to me, and neither of us know what to do with her anymore. He has not replied but has suggested I ask her again for an apology, I personally feel it has gone beyond that and there is no point. I don't even feel any anger towards her really, I just think that it would be a bit like Gallileo or was it Darwin trying to tell people that the world is in fact round and and orbits the sun. I can just see my mother's face, her lip twisting up, "No it doesn't. The sun goes round the earth. Don't you listen to Radio 4?"...

Lots of happy thoughts to you TMSB and Smithfield, hope that it is a wondeful experience (this time) for you both. Will be thinking of you and keep us posted of course. TMSB, can't you give MS the job of posting on here to let us know?

Sabaidii, please read one of the books that are on this thread before you visit. It might help you to rationalise everything. I would stay separate from them-can you stay in hotel rather than in a relative's house. THis would help you a lot, I think. You don't have to tell them where you're staying.

I'M returning to the UK next week, but I haven't yet told my father. Obviously I've made no contact with my mother, because I don't want the sheer hell that she would put me through in the run up to stepping on that plane- hate mail/court threats, midnight phone calls.
I've been thinking about my maternal grandmother who I stayed with before my wedding -- she was a good grandmother, but obviously she was a toxic mother to my mother. Before I would have stayed at her place, but now the thought of it makes me sick. My uncles visit her every day and when I was there with 3 month old DD they would bully me by ganging up on me if I didn't do what they wanted (though I never realised at the time that it was bullying!)

So I've arranged to stay with my brothers in two separate towns and I'm really happy about that. Something is stopping me from contacting my father- I think I have repressed memories about him (not sexual abuse). But I feel that my mind is slowly releasing hurtful things that he has done in the past. Before, next to my mother he was the "good guy" because my brain had split the two of them, but now my mother is out of the picture and I have had a respite, I am putting the jigsaw pieces together in my head. I feel I was a kind of substitute wife for him- my mother made sure she was at work all day every weekend throughout my chilhood. My father would take us every Sunday for the hour-long drive to see his mother (can't blame my mother for not going TBH after my experience with MIL!). I realise that my father didn't give me space to be a child, I was his confidant, and extention of him, and in no way was it possible for me to express any authentic needs of my own and reveal my true character and self. If I did, I received a torrent of abuse and violence from him, and then had to continue being his shoulder to cry on. This is starting to make me sick too, because he is adamant that the reason I don't contact him by phone is because I have some mental problems. He "can't understand what is wrong with me". This makes me livid. I'm sure he has NPD (and my mother BPD/NPD?)

Hi

Could one of you wonderful people please look at and reply to the "Relationship with my Mother" thread that is one these pages. I have mentioned this particular thread to this lady in question so hope she does post here too.

Hi Attila - is it a seperate thread or is it on this thread. Think you will need to post it again as not sure where it is??

Hi Sakura, I can relate to so much of what you say about your father because your situation with him in fact mirrors mine with my mother. It's almost as if your parents are my mother and stepfather in reverse, my stepdad being the overtly abusive one and my mother, like your father, giving conditional love, making me her substitute "partner" (especially as I got older and she no longer had a real partner)and effectively brainwashing me into thinking she was a saint. Once she had left my stepdad she encouraged me to view him as the evil one and her as the "good guy", like your father, and that is how she remained to me until 18 months ago, when the shock of her abandoning me emotionally once again and letting me take the blame for something she had done released all the repressed feelings and memories of the countless times she had done similar throughout my life.

Message withdrawn

Hi Kaz33

The "relationship with my Mother" thread is a separate thread on the Relationships page in Mumsnet. The initial post was written by KacyB.

Danae - oh that sounds so positive, being able to see your mother for what she is and instead of thinking of her as all powerful you quite rightly see that you have the power . And lovely to hear that your relationship with your DD has improved.

I had that sort of realisation when I started to post on this thread. Since then things have been consistently better, I have had some down moments and I did let her get to me over one silly thing. It took me about a week to get over it and dust myself off. My relationship with the kids is so much better, I am much gentler on myself when I muck up - like this week I have been ill and DH is away so the boys have had a surfeit of computer games

I have decided that being in my family is like being in a hall of mirrors, nothing is ever as it seems, the rules and truth are constantly changing. It lacks consistency and is all about appearances not about truth.