Prep for breaking contact (Stately Homes grads advice particularly welcomed)

[TheRealProfessorYaffle]

Hello all, and thanks in advance for any guidance. I've made the decision to break all contact with my surviving parent and with one of my siblings (possibly both, but at present certainly one). As many of you will be well aware, such decisions are rarely taken lightly and for me have come following decades of thought and therapy.

One of the posters on Mumsnet, and I wish I'd noted who, made a comment on someone else's thread that helped me finally make sense of why I felt such responsibility and guilt about prioritising my own health and happiness. My thanks to them. It was something along the lines of staying in touch with damaging parents, and that if one of you is going to be unhappy no matter what you choose, make sure it's not you. I realised that I had assumed I was the only one in the family strong enough to tolerate the pain, so I had to carry it. I see now that this is perhaps not always true. In any case, at the ripe old age of approaching fifty, it's time to prioritise my future and the years I have left.

I'd hugely appreciate any advice and tips on preparation. I plan to write individual letters to family members. These will be, I hope, warm, non blaming, filled with well wishes for their future, and acknowledging of the historical events that led they themselves to be part of the dynamic, but making it absolutely clear that I wish and will engage in no contact in any form going forward. I have planned some dates in the next few weeks to write these letters, and plan to send them recorded delivery at the same time. I plan to take that delivery week off work in acknowledgement that my brain will spend lots of time feeling anxious and fantasising about the possible reception to those letters.

What else do I need to think about or plan to make this process as effective and as safe as possible?

With many thanks for the continued support of the stately homes and other similar threads. I have frequently name changed and often lurked, but your collective experience and wisdom has helped immeasurably. Thanks again.

I'd be very grateful for any thoughts, even from people who haven't had this specific experience. Bumping for the evening visitors.

You might have done this already as its a few weeks since you posted but I’d repost this in the stately homes thread itself as it’s likely yours got missed as it’s in a more tricky to find area of MN.

This will be a long one but hope it’s useful and you get it in time.

I came across this post trying to find the stately homes annexe as mentioned in the Jan 24 thread if anyone can PM me in the right direction?

As a fellow stately homer (also lurker and name changer) coming up to a year of NC (dreading my first mothers day and just received a seriously nasty letter AT MY WORK from ‘D’M in anticipation) I too find the wisdom and insights and marvellous people there invaluable. That thread helped me see that yes the behaviour of both my parents and DB was toxic and that NC was the only option as it was starting to affect my DC and my marriage as well as being a serious risk to my own mental health.

Thank you for sharing that comment of ‘if one of you is always going to be unhappy no matter what you choose, make sure its not you’. I hadn’t seen that but it really resonates. In my case it took a big argument in front of my children when I asked my parents 5/6 times to stop and have this discussion as adults when the kids weren’t there and even more requests to stop shouting, for me to go NC. They never apologised or tried to reconcile and see nothing wrong with their behaviour and are now trying to tell people my DH is abusive and keeping me from them which couldn’t be further from the truth! (My ‘D’F on the other hand has always been controlling).

Prior to that my then 4 year old DC had said to DH ‘I don’t think DGPs are very nice to Mummy but I don’t think Mummy knows. She just thinks they are her Mummy and Daddy’. From the mouth of babes!

For years I had thought if I just took their put downs etc quietly and ‘kept the peace’ all would be well but now I see what on earth was I teaching my DC?! ‘If someone is related to you, let them treat you like crap to avoid conflict’ - definitely not a good life lesson.

So I am relatively new to this journey but the advice I would give from what I have learned in this last almost year of NC which might help you is:

1. Stay on the Stately Homes thread even just as a lurker. NC can be a lonely decision to make if your friends/colleagues/extended family all have happy families (although in my case it was gratifying that not a single person I explained my situation to felt I should rejoin the family fold as they all agreed my family of origin’s behaviour was damaging to my DC) and you get understanding on that thread ahead of triggers like mothers day and Christmas Day which others simply won’t get.

2. You don’t have to send letters and if you do, don’t expect them to be received with acceptance. Susan Forward is big on sending letters and I can understand it might help with some closure for you, however expect all your words to be twisted when relayed to others and if you think you are going to be worried about the receipt of the letters, consider who are you sending them for? However ‘warmly’ you will feel you have written them, they are likely to provoke narcissistic rage and injury (Dr Ramani has some good info on this on youtube). If you don’t think they will heed them anyway maybe just send a short note along the lines of ‘I cannot tolerate your behaviour any more and don’t wish to have any further contact with you’ and write the longer ones for your sake and burn or shred them.

3. Expect them to use every trick in the book, so make sure you’re familiar with tactics of narcissists especially gaslighting, love bombing, using flying monkeys and hoovering to try to get you back in your ‘assigned family role’ so that you can anticipate these, label them for what they are and deal with them accordingly. Again Dr Ramani is good for this as is Dr Sherrie Campbell’s book ‘But it’s your family: cutting ties with toxic family members and loving yourself in the aftermath’.

4. Block, delete, move on: Once you have said what you need to say in whatever medium you choose, don’t wait for replies. Block on Facebook, whatsapp, your phone and email as the replies will likely be abusive anyway. As we drove away from the scene of the argument, I blocked each of my family of origin and anyone I knew they would use as flying monkeys on my phone which was one of the best steps I could have taken.

5. Anticipate flying monkeys ahead of time. If you can still see your family’s facebook pages etc, take time to scroll through their friend’s list to anticipate who they might enlist to drag you back in. You don’t have to block all of those people but it helps to know who you might not wish to share much personal info with in future (try yellow rock Dr Ramani). If you have children think about how they may be used as flying monkeys unwittingly.

6. Be aware of chinks in your armour - postal abuse is something I am now familiar with. We haven’t been able to stop my family from sending abusive letters in the post yet. We might consider a cease and desist letter in future. Also you can’t block landlines although these can go to voicemail if blocked and it won’t show up. I got a surprise listening to my voicemail with an unexpected landline message a couple of times. Also check what is visible about you online e.g. can only selected contacts see if you are online on whatsapp? Who can see your social media?

7. Find some helpful mantras for bad days. I like ‘rock bottom was the solid foundation from which I rebuilt my life’ by JK Rowling and my own ‘their happiness is not my responsibility and it’s liberating to know it never was’.

8. Seek support in real life - do you have a DP who is supportive? If not can you access counselling so that you have someone to talk to whilst all this is going on. You will need to offload. Journalling is also very helpful.

9. Self care, self care, self care! Be kind to yourself. I can’t state this one enough. When you are ‘keeping your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you’ you need to fortify yourself to be as strong as you can. Keep a list of some of the behaviour and how it made you feel to remind yourself why you are doing this. I think your week off work is wise but make sure you fill it with fun and engaging activities so you are not just hiding under the duvet waiting for the first bombs to land. Prioritise your nutrition, sleep, meditation if you can (the balance app is good and free for the first year - no affiliation!) and doing things with kind people who love you for who you are to strengthen that you are still a good person and still loved. I found decluttering tremendously helpful. As mentioned on the Stately Homes thread recently narcissists are crap gift givers and now you won’t be seeing them you can get rid of all the crap you’ve been hoarding from them ‘so as not to offend them’. My Minimalist Home book by Joshua Becker would be an ideal project during your week off…

10. As is often reiterated on the Stately Homes thread, No contact means No contact. Anticipate how you plan to deal with joint family get togethers, weddings, funerals etc. Parents aging and needing more support is a classic time for them to try to reel you back in as the ‘dutiful daughter’ as are hospital admissions and funerals… Think about these in advance. Funerals are for those left behind. You don’t HAVE to attend them.

Last of all remember, ‘Reputation is out of your control, character is within it’. They will likely try to destroy your reputation. Try to keep the moral high ground by not stooping to their level. You don’t need to defend yourself as you know your reasons for your actions. The best revenge is a life well lived.

Hope that’s helpful. At least for me, it makes me feel all this pain in the last year has at least helped me add some advice for you. I am feeling better now I am not in their orbit. I won’t say it doesn’t hurt and it helps to see it as complex grief but I now feel
much happier since I am not absorbing all of their toxicity and negativity…

Best of luck and keep us posted!!