I’m so fed up of being me and having this life. I’m so jealous of those who have nice lives.

[Itsalongtime]

It’s not even a bad life I have at the moment. I’ve got things other people would like to have. I’m just so fed up of the life that has got me here. I lived through emotional neglect as a child then onto a 12 year abusive marriage. I’ve got good qualifications but never used them and I have my own house, a good partner now and 1 child and 1 baby.

Yesterday my partners brother came over and told us they are moving house. The sister in law is a lovely person. She had a normal childhood and met him young and have two lovely children and now buying a lovely big home. I’m so jealous. Although she never worked they are still young. She’s looked after the kids and they have worked up from a small flat to now a lovely big house. Why couldn’t that of been me. Why do I have to be 40 with all these awful memories and life experiences. I feel life is just one big fight. It’s left me with life long health issues and I’m tired. I’m never just going to be normal, I’m jealous of everyone who has nice lives. Why couldn’t that of been me, I had so much potential once.

When I read your post I see things as an outsider different to you, I have never had a bad childhood so yes I feel for you in that respect! But look what you have achieved for a start good qualifications. How about being proud of yourself for obtaining those! I’m envious of that op. You had a bad start but managed to achieve those off your own merit, you have a good partner so many people don’t. And two children. Try to think positively op. And put the past in the past you cannot change it, you have mentioned on social media every post there will be the family saying how proud they are of your bro and sis in law I find that weird actually! Pass the sick bucket weird! I think the comment from your partners dad is strange too regarding your eldest! You have escaped an abusive relationship another thing to be proud of! Please don’t compare yourself to other people. I know who I’d rather have as a friend. And it isn’t some picture perfect social media loving. Look at our life types.

This is true

You cannot change the past

You can change your future

‐----

What do you want in your future ?

Make plans to do positive things

I’ve got good qualifications but never used them and I have my own house, a good partner now and 1 child and 1 baby.

That sounds like a pretty good life to me, and you still have time to make use of those qualifications.

It’s something that is missing deep down inside. It’s hard to explain unless you feel it.

Have you read up on Mother Wound?
https://www.healthline.com/health/mother-wound#healing

OP, you sound like you've been through a lot and achieved a huge amount and should be far prouder of yourself. This thread seems very over-focused on this girlfriend and also on social media. You also said you hide away. So perhaps you are seeing the falseness of social media as reality. If people post slightly boastful or even needy or just straightforward "isn't this nice" or "I've achieved something" posts on social media, of course people and friends come on and say nice stuff. That is social media. I imagine you aren't posting up that kind of thing as you said yourself you hide away and perhaps haven't the confidence?

Can I make another suggestion. I know it's very hard not to feel jealous of others. It sounds to me like you are not so much jealous of houses and money (although that would be understandable!) but jealous of the family relations and praise that this couple get on social media. Mostly over superficial things. (Which is also the nature of social media sadly.) Probably because your own past hasn't been supportive and praising. But from a different angle, people seek praise can often withhold it. It sounds like you are very focused on whether people say nice things to you. But people often feel more able to say nice things if you say nice things to others. Do you let others know you value them and give them compliments and praise them? Or has your background meant that can be hard for you to do this as well? I know people who wont accept praise and also begrudge it. Even on this thread when people are pointing out areas to feel really proud of, I'm noticing you don't acknowledge or reply to them or just accept the compliment which you could do. Is it easy for someone to give you a compliment? It sounds crazy but some people are actually quite hard to say complimentary things to, because they can't see it or won't accept it or start downgrading it or even take the compliment or nice thing wrong.

This may sound strange but I do think complimenting and accepting compliments is a skill that needs practise. Do you praise your children? The one who is difficult at the moment, do they know you are proud of them? Could you practise with your partner? Could you say a nice thing about each other each day? You are together so its clear you like each other. Do you express this to each other in words?

The last thing to remember is social media posts are sort of giving permission to praise. It is also an impersonal sort of praise to praise someone over possessions which is why so many rely on handbags and shoes to get praise. It is much harder to praise someone over something more personal. You don't know if you'll get it right or if the person wants that. The things you have listed you've achieved are amazing. But if someone came up to you and praised you directly for such personal things, might you even be offended or take it wrong?

I'd suggest concentrating the future and practising in the present, making sure your kids have lots of praise and compliments from you, practise saying nice things with your partner and find things you genuinely do admire about your partner's brother's girlfriend and just go and tell her. The fact you can tell her something really genuinely nice could feel really empowering in this situation. That you're the one that can give praise, not the child still looking for that praise you didn't get in the past. It might help you see her more as a potential ally and part of the family. It actually feels really good to say a genuine nice thing to someone and it can, oddly, need a bit of bravery to do sometimes.

I hope you feel better soon, OP.

This might not sound like a very nice way of dealing with it but sometimes, needs must...

I was brought up in an emotionally/physically abusive family. My brother was the Golden Child and suffered differently but I didn't see that at the time. He was also abusive towards me because my parents had convinced him that I was the problem. I had a good relationship with my grandma until my mother sabotaged that too with her lies. I have no other family.

I've been nc with mother for 11 years and also found myself in a loveless, sexless, emotionally and financially abusive marriage.

I put myself through university and got a first class degree and a masters in my 20s. I entered a profession but will never progress because a) the thought of it scares me (I have huge imposter syndrome) and b) after living with so much stress, I can't cope with it. It's taken years to be able to work full time. I'm now in my late 40s and this is 3rd year of working full time. That's an achievement for me.

I live in a nice, but small, house in a pretty crappy area. It's rented. My mother sabotaged my attempts/plans to buy a house (she deliberately gave me very bad advice and, by the time I realised she'd intentionally sabotaged that too it was too late for me financially).

She told me from being a young child that no one would ever be attracted to me, love me or want me because of... well reasons that were everything about me physically (body shape, hair colour, fingernail shape, ankle/wrist size, waist size, neck length, skin colour etc) and everything about my character and personality - too intelligent, too opinionated, too outspoken, too... everything else. But also not quiet, compliant, demure and everything else enough.

I was trained to be as mediocre, as middle of the road, as inoffensive as possible in the hope that some day someone would settle for me. Ultimately, she failed. That is an achievement on my part.

She spoke to my school to try and get them to reduce the number of GCSEs I did because I was a girl - want did I need qualifications for? And it might put a man off me if I got ideas above my station. School (fortunately) and I ignored her. That is an achievement.

I was a gifted musician but she sabotaged my plans to become a musician because a man wouldn't tolerate a wife in that industry. I didn't pursue a career in music but I have made it part of my job anyway and now play for pleasure in a gigging band. It took until I was 44 to do that but that is an achievement.

I resisted her attempts to teach me to cook because it didn't occur to me I'd need to feed myself one day, she only talked in terms of feeding my future hypothetical husband and entertaining his boss and the boss's wife. I had no intention of ever doing that. I taightyself as an adult and I'm a pretty decent cook now. That is an achievement.

I reached adulthood with no sense of who I was other than a failure in relation to men. Told I'd only ever live half a life without a husband but possessed none of the attributes required to find one.

And so it went on.

I've been homeless (at my mother's hands); I lived in a hostel with my newborn son. Nine of the staff understood why I was there. The other women were drug addicts, sex workers, women undergoing parenting assessments with the LA. I didn't have my child removed from me. In that environment, that was an achievement.

She tried to get SS involved with my son. Using the fact I lived in the hostel as the reason amd everyone else there had one. But everyone else had serious reasons for being there. My mum just wanted to perpetuate the narrative that I was a problem and she was my victim. I went to university upon leaving there. That was an achievement.

Anyway, I bumped into one of the women from there when I was in the final year of my degree (I was 29 then). She was still invovled with SS. Her boyfriend was in prison. She lived in a crappy flat where you could smell raw sewage in the bathroom. She didn't work. She'd had a 2 more children. She was on drugs. She'd been a really sweet girl who'd just had a shitty hand dealt in her early life and she'd never managed to get herself out of it.

And I took from that that at least I wasn't her living her life. And that was also an achievement.

There will always be people who have it easier and have better lives than you but there will always be someone who is worse off. That you have achieved what you have is your achievement.

Therapy will help but it isn't a magic wand. You have to see what you have overcome and the life you have built as valuable.

Everything you have. Everything you have done. Everything you have had to overcome in order to provide yourself with those things. That is your achievement.
Stop expecting external validation. Quite frankly, who gives a shit what anyone else thinks?

I get it OP, but the danger is we'll get to our death beds in Old age and realise we never enjoyed what we had.

If you got an Education, have a house in a safe country, have children, then you definitely are living somebody's dream.

I'm not having a go, I often feel the same way. I now take a moment to focus before going on social media, I prepare myself like I'm about to open a newspaper full of propaganda. I've done this since a day when I was skint, and saw one of my classmates flaunting her two mulberry handbags from Harrods sale on Facebook. I felt such a failure and like I'd played my life cards really badly. Found out afterwards she had a horribly abusive controlling husband. I'm not smug, I'm just using this as an example of things aren't always what they seem for others.

"The thing about the house isn’t about them owning a big house. It’s that they did it together with the support from each other and the family who’ve helped along the way. It’s that feeling they must feel that I so badly want to feel."

@Itsalongtime It might not be helpful but this just made me want to give you a big hug.

I hear you, OP.

I'm older than you, and am at a stage in life where I have fucked up quite a lot. I've made some rash choices, with severe irreversible repercussions for my future security. I've shot myself in the foot repeatedly. Like you, I have done an enormous amount without support and feel exhausted by the effort.

Recently I realised how much this has to do with my background. My entire family has put me down constantly from the minute I was born. I battle with an impulse to give and give until there's nothing left.

I'm proud of having escaped an abusive first marriage, but many of my life choices since have created further problems for myself. There is a sense that I just can't be trusted to know how to run my own life. I often just want to run away and hide.

Oh, sorry, but I meant to add:
The way I am dealing with it is to hope that if you just keep doing little things in the right direction, things will come good in the end.

You need to grieve your past. Ironically we usually only have emotional energy to do that when our life finally gets better. You now have a good life and have the space to grieve your past.
You might find reading about grieving your past helpful. Allow yourself space to do this, but to avoid getting stuck in this also remind yourself what you do have. Counting your blessings regularly really does work.

So a good life to you amounts to a big house, normal childhood and people being proud of you for something?
Most of us have their own crosses to bear, you are only judging superficially. Your focus on being a victim, being hard done by life and being jealous is your real problem.

Also accept you will always feel twinges of jealousy, it's normal. A friend yesterday was talking about her dad coming round to help her with diy. I left home at 18 and had zero help since. At 18 I had to move from one shared house to another and had no one to help me and could not afford to pay for help. An older woman who I barely knew I think felt sorry for me and helped me. I can't imagine just leaving my kids at 18 to figure everything out totally themselves.

I have a very similar background and used to feel the same as you OP. A lot of resentment over people with functioning, supportive families, happy memories, no trauma etc.

I know you've said you've tried counselling, but I would try again. It's often a process, not a one off thing, and it does sound like you're being triggered.

A huge thing for me was, and still is acceptance. The past has happened, it was shit, it wasn't and isn't fair, but I can't change it.

Focus on the present, plan for the future. Look at the things you do have. The things you are achieving. You will be a cycle-breaker and not let this pattern of abuse pass down the generations (as it so often can), you have achieved so much already.

What are your hopes and dreams for the future? What do you want this time in your life to look like of you look back in 10 years time? What is important to you?

Do not fall into comparing yourself to others, that's a sure-fire way to erode any contentment.

Does your partner not share they are proud of you?

It sounds like you have done really well for yourself and you should be proud. You've got qualifications and it sounds like a stable life. That's such an achievement after everything you've been through.

I work in social work and counselling. Loads and loads of professionals in those fields have had traumatic and abusive life experiences. You wouldn't know it to look at lots of us in the surface.

There is some research that says on average if your life had involved a lot of trauma and abuse you can have a good, healthy life but it takes longer to get there. Things get to the point where life is stable, secure and mature around 42 as the rest is doing the repair and recovery work and learning skills noone taught you. So in a way your life is just beginning.

You potentially have the possibility if your health allows it of another 20 years of working to use your qualification or do something else.

I also think as you get older you stop caring so much what other people think of you and realise what's important. Often you realise that having a big fancy career or house isn't actually what matters. Big houses are a lot of hassle and cleaning for example and a fancy career involves long, exhausting hours.

If you focus on what you want and what would actually make you feel healthy and well that's probably a good route to happiness. Have you thought about what that looks like

I had a rough childhood and a horrible start to be adult life. I didn't really get myself sorted until my mid 20s. I've had periods of wallowing and self pity but it doesn't get you anywhere.

Life is sink or swim. You can chose to let your past experiences ruin the rest of your life or you can put your energy into getting better.

It sounds like nonsense but spending a few minutes each day to practice gratitude has really helped me. I've also done bits of voluntary work over the years and helping others has a big impact.

If it’s just emotional though gratitude is the only way out if this hole.

At 40 you still have lots of potential, you need to focus on your own happiness not your perception of other people's lives none of which are ever perfect. Unfortunately the financial times we live in mean many people don't have the home their efforts deserve.
Sister in law not working might appear great but once her children are older she might be in for a fight on jobs market with a decade to make up for.
Try to make time for you to be calm you never completely get over a bad childhood you can though make the best of the life you have now
Do anything that spreads your wings and raises your self esteem never hunger for what others have. Set your own goals for you no matter how long it takes to achieve what you want.

I have my own house, a good partner now and 1 child and 1 baby.

It sounds like you have a good life now. Don't waste your energy rethinking the past. It's now your SIL's fault that she didn't have your upbringing. You never know what is in someone's past anyway.

You need to reframe your thinking and look forwards not back.

You say nobody understands you. Does that include your 'good partner'? I doubt it.

Time to move on with your life and definitely seek more counselling to help you do this.

I don’t think I’m a narcissistic person. I’m happy that people are happy, I don’t do and don’t want to sabotage it. I don’t try and control people or want to control people. I guess we all have traits though of everything.

I can also really relate to this. I had similar - zero emotional support growing up, drugs, self harm, mental health issues due to childhood, being moved constantly from school to school and no emotional support at home plus a narcissistic father and some physical and sexual abuse. Then I ended up having children with an abusive man who I now have to co parent with (which is impossible). I'm in my 40s and only just forging a life for myself and it's going ok but i'm nowhere near my peers.
The way I personally cope is reminding myself that everyone has their own struggles that most of the time isn't visible and that life is so fleeting, that every day is a blessing to be grateful of everything I have. Also, to not hang on to the past or worry too much about the future. I've started taking more time out for myself and exercising more which is helping more than anything else I've tried.

"Comparison is the thief of joy" as they say.

That was very inspirational. I can’t fathom your parents but I really admire you. 💐

@Itsalongtime You haven’t said whether your new partner is a good man and if he supports you. Is he helping with the kids and making you feel supported? If he isn’t, maybe that’s part of the problem.

If he is supportive and is willing to work with you, to make a nice life for your future, you are self-sabotaging by looking at others when maybe your own family needs you and your input. Focus on making you own lot as good as it can be. Can’t you work together to get a new house or the things you want?

For your brother in law and his partner to make things work, she is having to trust that he won’t up and leave her with the kids and no career. She is in a precarious place but if she trusts him and it all works out, all good. You could have that too, if you’re willing to lean on your partner like that. If you’re not willing to do that and aren’t able to feel good enough from your own achievements, things will never change. You have to want them to change and trust that they can do. Sometimes, that also means letting others in to help. Your partner and kids should be in that support, but only if you let them.