If you feel let down by a parent is there anything they could do to help?

[IhateSPSS]

I would really appreciate your input if you are a child of a parent who let you down or a parent who has let down their child and what you did to make reparation for your relationship? I will understand if people want to berate me for my previous actions, and I have fully accepted that I am not the mother I wanted to be or should have been to my DC and I take full accountability for that and give no excuse. It's on me and I accept that, there is no avoidance in my mind about that and it's the thing I am truly sorry about. I let my vulnerabilities get my child and I into a dangerous situation and dragged two other DC into the situation.

Context: I was in a DV relationship from DS1 being 3 years old until he was 11. I was 24. I married exH (the first massive mistake) and it started out as coercive control and ended up with me having broken bones. ExH never physically abused the children (DS2 and DD are his, another bad decision on my part to have DC with him). He was however coercively controlling of us all and financially abusive to all of us - e.g. he wouldn't let us have heating or hot water, sugar in the house, was mean with food particularly, clothing and generally was tyrannical. It took a lot of planning and me asking outside agencies to help me to be able to leave as it was dangerous but we managed. I was a mess for 2 years but had therapy, re trained and went from a household income of 9k to 90k to try and redefine us (we were from a small community and were the subject of a lot of snideness and snobbery about being poor and a lone parent family and insecurely housed for a while). DS1 was 11, DS2 was 6 and DD was 3 when we got out. They didn't directly witness me being hurt physically but they must have heard it and as I said experienced a difficult life with exH.

DS1 (who is 20) came out with a bit of a shocker conversation on Friday evening. He has been having flashbacks, asked how I cope with the trauma and said I don't know my DC as well as I think I do and that I didn't protect them as DC. That DS2 (now 16) is 'way he is because of you not leaving' (DS2 hasn't got much motivation at school but is a lovely kind boy who I thought was doing okay emotionally) and that I didn't handle leaving the way I should (I got the police to help us leave and left the marital home plunging us into poverty as I was so scared obviously the DC were scared too). He said I was ridiculous to give away the family home in the divorce (I got 30%). DS1 then got out of the car and went back to uni. I immediately scrabbled around to find some support for him emotionally at university and he is going to talk to someone about his MH. I have apologised to him for not protecting him. He has said I need to talk to DS2 and that I 'made' DS2 see his father, a court child arrangement order for DS2 and DD was put in place as ExH took me to court. I am wracked with guilt and want to know how the hell I go about fixing this? I feel desperate if I am honest and I am sat at work like a zombie.

DS1 has started smoking weed and this seems to have opened the floodgates emotionally for him. I admit that I have buried a lot of this - I seem to have blocked out a lot of this time and can't really get a grip on what flashbacks he could be having and he won't tell me. I also feel like I am stood on the edge of an abyss where I am going to drag us all back into hell emotionally and selfishly I don't want to go there but if my DC need this I will. DD doesn't even know any of this as she was so young. She hasn't actually asked either which is concerning and really likes her DF, who she sees regularly and has a new partner. Anyone got any advice? Sorry for War and Peace. I am not sure how I'd condense this.

Actually your DS2 could of got out of visits by at least age 14, if not before, courts take the DC's wishes into consideration, so you no longer need to abide by the court order if he doesn't want to see him.
When your DD gets to around 12, ask her what she wants too, as by that age, the courts would ask their opinion.

It sounds as if your DD is now 13 too. If she doesn't want to go alone then realistically by the time he gets to court it won't be enforceable against you to make her go. Protect your kids. They are old enough to have a view now and you need to stop letting this man bully you.

It must be absolutely awful for poor DS2 to remember the abuse and have to play happy families and have his sister be totally oblivious to it all.

I think posters are right that DS1 and DS2 have been discussing this between them. As @Merryoldgoat advised I need to sit DS2 down separately, and ask him what he remembers of that time, what he needs me to do to support him and how he feels about it and how he wants me to tackle how he feels about seeing Ex. I approached ex face to face in September of last year to say DS2 had expressed a wish to just see him as and when he wants, instead of what has been ordered but he completely blanked me. He is controlling of the DC time and is inflexible about that. I have been too avoidant. I have been too scared of poking the bear that is Ex and been fooling myself that I am taking the high road for the DC and it hasn't done them any favours.

I have spoken to DS1 this morning and he said he is going to ring the specialist support service in his uni area and I have asked him to meet me in his uni city next week to talk face to face. Have taken on board the comments about being dramatic and a drama queen. My DS's will really hate that attribute in me. It has helped to hear that and look at catastrophising being unhelpful.

I don't think you're being dramatic FWIW.

I'm sorry your ex abused you all, for that is what you did. Well done for getting out and bettering your life.

You have apologized (even though not your fault), acknowledged, and tried to repair, that's the main thing. Be there for them and make it clear you're open to discussion. Be vulnerable in an age appropriate way and talk about what you can do now or do different from now.

As someone who had a shit childhood at the hands of two narc parents, only one of which I am now still in contact with, what would help me enormously (but I also know I will never ever ever get) would be them taking some goddamn fucking responsibility.

I went complete no contact with my father when I was 21 - that's now nearly 35 years ago. I deliberately live on the other side of the world from my mother, and am very low contact with her. Not seen her in 15 years.

To this day she refuses to accept any of the 'blame' for what happened....even though she was a willing and very active participant in what transpired. If I try to discuss my childhood with her, she gets very defensive, then turns it around (the famous DARVO), gets personally insulting and ultimately places all responsibility on my father.

@Peakypolly That poem is goddamn fucking awful trite nonsense and if my mother ever had the nerve to read it to me I'd tell her to fuck off for good.

@IhateSPSS

I agree with your approach and I think you are doing a really good thing. It's their history and it's their relationship with their father that they need to work through, with your support but without having to deal with your emotional response to that.

I also want to say how proud I would be of my child if they advocated for their sibling even if it meant telling me uncomfortable truths. Your DS1 has done a really good and brave thing.

I certainly don't think your relationship is too damaged

DS1 is a grown up, moved away from home and got a little bit of perspective but is still too young and immature and lacks the life experience to understand the nuance of adult relationships and life, often you don't gain that until you have your own children or are in your own long-term relationship. Often when children get to that age the parent gets removed from the pedestal and seen as human but also as the 'baddy' and responsible for all the negatives in their life.

You did the best you could with the resources (physical, financial and emotional) you had at the time.

Yes have conversations with the middle child, even if they seem fine and it happened a long time ago things can resurface as they get older.

Something traumatic happened to my son when he was 11 and he didn’t want to talk about it until years later. I’ve read on here that it’s common for children to realise they’ve been through a big event years later.

If ds2 is secondary age or above then a judge would side with his wishes with regards to contact but I understand that he may not be ready to tell CAFCASS this because he may be scared of his dad’s reaction. It sounds like your ex won’t accept ds2 ‘s decision on this so he needs to be prepared for the possibility that his dad goes NC. If ds2 goes through with this then you need to keep an eye on your dd. She will either be smothered with gifts etc because ex thinks that will annoy ds2 or she will have to endure listening to her dad badmouth her brother.

Don’t be scared of the parental alienation argument. He can’t prove this because it’s not true and your dd is happily having contact.

I agree with your plan to talk to ds2 separately to find out what he remembers and what details he’s heard from ds1. While I understand why you don’t want to discuss this, it’s important for the boys to talk about it so that they can properly heal too.

Gosh! Well, you are very brave and absolutely clearly trying to prioritise your DC.

You’ve had some good advice from the later posters, and your DS1 is clearly on board with working with you on this.

Make sure you don’t unintentionally assume your dc need the same things. DS1 could be wrong about DS2, projecting his own feelings, or he could be right.

Allow them to support each other however they wish, but establish a separate support relationship with each of them. So look after DS1 as you are, and chat to DS2 and DD about what they need. It may not be the same.

DS1 is young and won’t yet understand the enormity of your situation, how hard it was to escape and how well you’ve done to rebuild. The day will come when he has a better idea.

It’s also fine for everyone to continue to carry adverse memories and feelings about that time. It was a crap time. It’s ok to acknowledge it, to recognise it was really dangerous and hard to manage, and to regret it.

I think you are being very resilient and proactive. Do pay attention to self care. It isn’t dramatic to admit that it was a terrifying time and you are afraid of revisiting those emotions.

Therapy for him needs to come from someone else, if talking about it would plunge you back into ptsd. You experienced the trauma too.

It sounds like you have all been on survival mode and now your son has had the time to begin processing his experience. You could all do with some individual counseling to work through the fall out. Until your son gets a more balanced view of the events you are still his mum and he will probably continue to get angry at you as a parent. It’s not fair but it’s what kids do. Definitely start your own individual counseling now, get the mental resources you’ll need for this healing stage

@BoohooWoohoo I am so sorry your DS1 experienced that. It is too common and as a parent you never want your child to live it and you want to protect them don't you but I have gone about it in completely the wrong way.

@ChatBFP He has done a good thing. He has pushed me to accept that sweeping this under the carpet isn't working for him and his sibling. I am prone to self deception and disassociation and I can imagine that's pretty galling to him when he didn't ask to be dragged along for the toxic ride of that marriage and he is now getting flashbacks of shit experiences. Add to that this worry about DS2 he has. It's a nightmare for him, no wonder he has turned to weed.

Trying to wrap my head around how to tackle this with DD. And I apologise for being dramatic but I am terrified of how this will play out with her.

@IhateSPSS

Lots of teenagers turn to weed. I'd try to keep some of the emotion out of it for now. There are lots of positives - your DS1 has felt able to speak to his brother and to you. Try not to catastrophise.

Your DD needs to hear that you won't be cross with her for wanting to maintain a relationship with her dad and that you don't expect her to choose, but personally I would try not to shelter her with pretence. It's not alienation to be clear about why she and her brother have choices now they are older. Try to get some therapy so that you can try to stay calm and factual about the whole situation.

But that’s the sting isn’t it?! You remove the emotion and stay factual and people suggest you are dissociating!

Compartmentalising is a perfectly good strategy. It recognises that DD’s relationship and experiences with her dad are not the same as yours or your sons’.

Work out what is best for each of you. Get therapeutic support for them from school or wherever you can. Look after yourself as well.

Thank you all. I have had some brilliant advice on this thread. I am very glad I posted.