December 2024 - but we took you to Stately Homes

[AttilaTheMeerkat]

New thread

@Happyfarm You are right. I do worry that if the man that keeps sitting outside our house in his car is watching us (and possibly is a private detective), then he’s just going to follow us wherever we go or tip them off that we are leaving. It’s weird. He doesn’t get out of the car, doesn’t drop anyone off, doesn’t pick anyone up, just sits there for ages every morning at the times we are all leaving. I suppose he could be watching somebody else’s house, but as we have had bad private detectives follow us before (actually photographing us with big cameras and getting out of their cars to do it, subtle as a brick), I think it’s more likely he is watching us.

@VWSC3 I am afraid wishing they would this or that is just woulda, shoulda, coulda.
You have 2 choices

1. Suck it up and be a punch bag
2. Do something about it

I mean this kindly.
Your children are young but not stupid if you think you are protecting them from anything. I grew up with a weak enabler father, that is how I have always seen him, not my dad but a weak pathetic man. My parents always pretend they stayed together for us kids [bastards] but the truth is they just couldn't be bothered to sort their shit out. It sounds harsh but don't think sacrificing yourself will gain their love or respect. Your husband is up for moving but you won't and you are blaming the kids for that decision.
People only treat us badly when we allow them to.

You need to trust yourself and act accordingly. Hiding is the wrong response to this behaviour. It’s the response of a child who doesn’t have the means or independence or knowledge to behave any other way. I’m not too sure of the names of the parts of the brain but you need to listen to the adult side of the brain and not the part that is being triggered back to hide. You need to know that you are under attack, it is serious because your body and mind are trying to get you to respond only you are not responding accordingly. You are working against yourself a bit. It’s shit. Our parent’s are supposed to teach how to safely respond to our nervous system so that we can go through life acting accordingly. I’m personally in a position where my neurodivergence was missed so everything under the sun provoked my nervous system to respond and I learned to hide and never tell anyone anything until M.E developed and now I am forced to listen.

Your body will not stop reacting until you respond in a suitable way to naturally let this happen. You will never be you until you remove yourself. So you will never be real mum and real self in this situation.

@binkie163 Im really not blaming the children. They would never ever know my thought processes on this.

I just want to do what’s right by them like somebody would in a normal situation. All most of us want for our children is for them to be happy, be in a good school and for them to have friends and not to be bullied. And I’m very thankful that my children have all of these things currently. I don’t want to take that from them. More in a defiance sort of way. In a why should my children have all that ripped away from them sort of way. Not many parents would want their children to have to give all of that up. They have built lives for themselves and by giving it up and moving away it would be yet something else our abusive family’s will have taken away. They aren’t exposed to our family’s at all, so currently our family’s do not effect them directly, they only effect me. Like if someone was bullied at work by their boss, it wouldn’t be effecting their family as such. I just have a lot of anxiety around the thought that they might target them later on. But I’m also well aware they would more likely do that through social media anyway, so the uprooting would be for nothing in the long run.

It’s a very hard thing to weigh up when you are in the thick of it.

It’s why when I started posting about this I added the warning to others from toxic family’s to move away from their family when their children are tiny or before they consider having children and don’t tell the family your children exist. It’s much harder (and unfair) for everyone else when there are strong roots formed.

What the right response?
I have contacted the police and they didn’t want to know. We don’t hide from him. I glare at him, I’ve photographed the car. He’s well aware that we are aware of him and doesn’t care. I don’t even know if it’s us he is watching and have no way of knowing.

@VWSC3 I want my kids to have a healthy mum. This is my motherhood as well as their childhood. We are intertwined. You are more important then schools and friends and bullies, you are in a way projecting onto them what you believe a child needs. They need you to be the healthiest person possible, all the rest will fall into place wherever “you” are. It hurts to hear this because it hurt me when I was told on here. Your kids energy and yours are intertwined, we all know this, the looks, the tone, this link is so super sensitive. They know and they feel it via you. Me going on and on about my in-laws, getting anxious, getting down was most definitely effecting my children. I’ve had to have massive words with myself.

Just living in your area is crazy making, anxiety is in over drive with the crazies at every turn. The right response is to run, run as far away from the crazy making people.

It reminds me of the horror movies where they always go hide in the bathroom, no escape. I’m always yelling why don’t they just run out the front door. It doesn‘t make such a good anxiety thriller if they run out the front door and live happily ever after (maybe).

@VWSC3 you are using your kids as an excuse not to move.
If you were a normal family and you got offered a great job elsewhere you and family would move because it is what is best for the family.
How do you think that the weird life you are living is what is best for the family?
I agree with @Happyfarm you are massively projecting onto your kids, moving schools is pretty normal and doesn't= being bullied. How many school friends do you still see regularly? School friends come and go, moving on and making friends is a normal part of life.
Contact women's aid.
Freedom program
Get forceful with police complaints procedure
See your Dr about suicidal thoughts and get counseling.
Social media tell your kids to use nick name not full name. If you know the family will tell your kids about you stop sitting there waiting for it to happen, you will lose them then by sticking them in the firing line. Stop being a victim, you have choices and responsibilities.

@Happyfarm I do understand what you are saying. I probably am projecting a bit. I value school and friends a lot because that was the only place I felt safe and happy as a child. Because we don’t have a wider family to spend time with, I feel like the children need their friends to be their constant in terms of having peers, people their own age they can rely on. At the same time though I know they also really value their friends. We floated the idea of moving with them, but they were horrified. Then I cast my mind back to that age and thought I would have hated to have moved away too.

But then maybe my parents would have been different if we had have moved away. The whole family has toxicity running through it. I didn’t see it at the time as a child, but as an adult when I got to know the wider family better I could see it. Once I learnt about the Narcissistic family dynamics my eyes were opened and everything made sense. Perhaps my parents were damaged by the rest of the family? Maybe if they had chosen to move away from them all they would have been different people and we wouldn’t be in the mess we are in now? I don’t see any of the school friends that meant so much to me as a child as we drifted over time and it was before social media, so I do understand that it’s not a given they will be friends for life.

@VWSC3 yeah your kids needs friends but there is a massive friend pool to choose from all through their life. They get one mum, there is no mum pool they can pull a replacement out of. I think you are most definitely placing your needs as a child onto them. You had no choice but to choose friends, this could end up becoming there situation if you aren’t healthily available. This is exactly how dysfunction travels down families. Honestly I can see it in myself also.

Do it scared, just move on.

vw when I was getting badly gaslit and believing that I was some weird worm with horrible motives in everything I had to constantly check everything about myself with my best friend.

Is your husband your friend, do you trust him? Can you say to him that you've been made ill and can he please help you.

Here's something to think about. Now that I'm no longer ill (from them) and all the scales have fallen from my eyes I can see that a more assertive person than I was could have taken different courses of action.

However I'm saying that from a massive position of privilege in that M&D are dead and i have moved across the country so that i never run across anyone who could give any information on me to monster sister. I've also cut out any mutual acquaintances. I'm sorry about that but I had to.

@Dogaredabomb Yes, my DH listens, but he’s heard it so much that I think he’s run out of things to say about it. I’m trapped in the trauma. Everything is as fresh in my mind as when every traumatic thing happened. It’s like I have a snowball of trauma in my head and there isn’t much room for anything else. I have diagnosed severe anxiety and PTSD (as well as a load of physical illnesses). It has impacted my life so much.
When you moved away did you find it easy to make new connections? I’m so aware of Narcissistic behaviours that if a new person in a place I see often (eg a new neighbour) starts being (too) nice to me I automatically think they are lovebombing me. I feel like I don’t know what’s normal behaviour from people anymore. That’s why I’m unsure moving will solve anything for me too. I’ve lost my ability to take people at face value and make connections because I’ve had so many flying monkeys come after me.

wvcs3 you could make a plan for moving. How long since you had new things? You could slowly get rid of anything not essential and towards the end even a few things that are, then buy a whole load of new stuff for the new place, adding it onto the costs of moving and perhaps taking out a slightly larger mortgage than you need, to pay for it. The council will take away large items for £10 per item here and charities like British Heart Foundation will take things like washing machine and bed, so on the last day you could arrange this and put the remaining stuff outside for the council or if you have a large enough vehicle you could load it into a car and take to the tip. There doesn't need to be a for sale board outside and you could show viewers around yourselves so no estate agents always showing up. It would just look like friends visiting. On moving day you can just go out like a normal family day out or weekend away with a few bags in the boot and not come back. It might mean a night in sleeping bags on the floor but after that you can get everything either yourself instantly from a shop or next day delivery online. The DC won't mind they'll see this sort of thing as an adventure and will be excited to get new things and decorate their new rooms. If DH hit the shops at 9am the day after moving and you stayed home to do the online bits, you could be very productive about obtaining a lot of what you need in just one day. Things like having to buy a few extra clothes because you don't have a washing machine yet, having to sit on cushions for a few days until the sofa arrives, spending a week eating sandwiches and take away because you've no cooker yet etc it doesn't harm you at all. You could read, play board games or do soduku until you get a TV. If you've laptops you could easily pack them in a weekend bag to take with you. So there doesn't need to be a big lorry outside on moving day and time for people to realise you're leaving. There's ways around everything. You should speak to women's aid, part of what they do is helping people make a plan to leave.

You don't need to make new connections on day one, you're overthinking that. You can just have basic conversation that doesn't divulge personal information and isn't aimed specifically at making friends, while you get your head straightened out a little. If you think someone is love bombing you that doesn't mean it has to have an effect on you. You can note it mentally and carry on being polite to them, whilst remaining wary, until you feel in a position to make a decision about whether they're genuine or not. Life doesn't have to be complicated, everyone doesn't have to know your business or history. It's ok to stay friendly but distant to start with if that's what suits you. If people ask why you moved say you fancied trying somewhere new or you moved for DH job or whatever. You can tell people you don't have a family. You don't have to say you're ill you can tell people you're a homemaker and like nothing better than to be indoors pottering around.

@SamAndAnnie Thank you for that thoughtful reply. It helps seeing it broken down like that, it actually feels less overwhelming and less anxiety inducing. The positive side of it all, rather than the negative side that my brain swings to.

Thanks to everyone who has replied to me the last couple of days, it’s helped me as I’ve been spiralling.
Sorry for dominating the thread. I will step back for a bit now and let somebody else have a turn! X

vw I haven't made new connections no. I have a few very good friends, my two adult dc, my dog and that's enough for me.

I enjoy my own company a lot and just saying a cheery hello to neighbours and shop staff is enough for the moment.

I'd been very badly gaslit for many years and didn't know up from down to begin with. But very quickly it was an enormous relief, maybe 3 months if that.

If I ever feel like it i might seek a couple of light connections maybe volunteer at the food bank or something or I've been looking at an astronomy group i might join. I wouldn't want anything too close i don't think and I don't feel the lack.

Basically I view myself as convalescing still and I won't be rushing anything.

@Dogaredabomb I actually think I would be content with that too. I’m glad that it’s brought you relief to have moved away. Did your adult DC move away with you? Or did they stay in your hometown?

vw my younger dc came with me but my oldest stayed behind as was already very settled in their own life. I go back and stay with them frequently though, lives at enough of a distance from my old house for me to feel relaxed about being there.

Now that I've had this respite I honestly feel so much better. You have your husband and dc and with a cheery wave at new neighbours it's enough.

I've been reading you all (had to catch up with +600 unread posts!) and wanted to send you all my love and best wishes 💐🙏
@VWSC3 please move out with your family away from your abusers: of course you'd be doing it for your DC. They deserve to know the real you, their actual mother, able to care for and protect them from evil: you'd no longer be a shell of yourself. You deserve to live free from abuse and you'd be teaching them a lesson of self-preservation, one that I dare to say anyone here got when we were young. We're all learning it now as adults. They've twisted your own natural instincts so that you now believe they're bad and selfish but the opposite is true! Other pps have said it better than me: they are the dysfunctional ones, they are the ones from the upside down. We're all rooting for you 🙏💐

@Lonelyscarecrow your posts really struck a chord with me, sending you my sympathies 💐🙏

I've been thinking about smear campaigns in general. Let's say I'm sitting on a park bench and someone else also sits down.

We look at our dogs, comment on the weather and she says 'oh I'm so disappointed in my daughter, she's a filthy whore' a person like us says 'better a whore than a harpy' gets up and leaves. It ends.

Monster ex sister was frantic after mum died running around to all mum's neighbours saying all sorts of shit about me. I guess the person needs to know both people?

I ran into her decorator, before I left, and had a little chat about paint and his grandchildren.

We'd never had a deeper conversation. Suddenly he said 'will you two stay in touch?' i didn't react very much just said 'we lead different lives'.

I thought about what he said a fair amount and thought what a left field comment. It doesn't bother me and didn't at the time but it just showed me that she was such a saddo sprinting around acquaintances saying ridiculous things about me.

vw I've been thinking about something else, do you think you could dig deep and get well and look the flying monkeys in the eyes and say 'believe what you want' and just keep walking? Can you bang on the watching man's car window and ask who he is and what he wants?

NOW I could because I've recovered but I don't know if I could have back when I was in it.

I think what I would do if the monster turned up on my doorstep now. I think I'd just say get off my property and shut the door. I think I'm more inclined to tell people to fuck off these days.

I think it’s very hard, maybe impossible for someone who’s suffering ptsd to recover whilst still in the middle of the war zone. It’s like asking a solder to just ignore the shooting and the bangs. I really think it’s an impossible task to ask of anyone no matter how strong a personality.

Yes I agree happyfarm I'm just thinking aloud. But i wasn't able to do it, I had to move across the country.