February 2025 Well we took you to Stately Homes

[AttilaTheMeerkat]

A new thread indeed!.

I think not only do they keep score they are so deeply resentful. Present exchanges are a nightmare even if you give better and more expensive they resent what they spent. It's like a weird narrative they have in their own heads that forgets very simple facts ie she gave me £30 and I gave her £20 becomes she forced £20 out of me.

Money is also a weird one with them, ever watchful that they're not being ripped off.

I’ve said this on other posts but my mother used to say proudly that I never bothered them in the night when I was ill I just sorted myself out and went to bed. Hmm.

Oh god yes the screaming and then the silent treatment if I made a mistake ( for which read behaved like a teenager) in reality I was so low maintenance and well behaved. Then in other ways the complete emneshment and parentification. Really confusing.

I remember being about 18 and away at university, and telling a friend that I had brought myself up from about the age of 12. There was just no interest in me other than as a vessel to receive my father's irritations or worries.
I was laughing as I said it but it's very sad to me now, as someone said, teenagers need so much love and parenting.

@TorroFerneyI was so low maintenance also, I suppose because I knew I wasn’t going to get any support, or a lift to a friends house, or a lift home after a night out. When I think of the danger I got myself into trying to do everything myself.

Yet my brother got lifts home from the pub in his 20s and 30s!

The first time it really struck me was when I needed a lift to a hospital appointment, I couldn’t drive, I had a broken wrist. Her response was no, my brother needed something so it didn’t suit.

@CheekySnakeI think maybe the big sacrifice thing is an attempt to convince themselves that they were a good parent. Even when they did just about the bare minimum in their head it was a massive sacrifice no one else would make. Totally delusional really.

Aghhhh, I got a text thanking me for the flowers in the early hours of the morning (Monday morning, they were delivered Saturday). Plus today is my Fathers birthday. So now I’m all stressed again and don’t know what to do

Do nothing. Just sit for a few days until the stressed feeling passes, which it will, and then see if you want to do anything. You might find that actually you feel ok doing nothing.

Agree, to quote the therapists mantra, sit with the feeling. Don’t pander or fawn in an attempt to make the feeling go away (I should obviously take this advice myself!). As cheekysnake says it will go away.

Thank you both @CheekySnake @TorroFerney

I keep flip flopping between sending a text about my Fathers birthday or just doing nothing.

I feel bad for him, I had sent a gift but I know it’s been delayed

Why is this so hard

It's not the text or the present that's difficult. It's your emotional reaction to it. If you felt nothing and didn't care this would be easy, right?

Don't feel bad about a delay that isn't your fault.

What are you worried will happen if you do send a text?

I don’t know what I’m worried about if I send a text to be honest. It is totally my reaction that is the problem, it stresses me out so much for no reason. I really need a bit of space from them all.

Well, you sent a gift, so you did your part. It's ok not to text if that doesn't work for you right now. Or even to delay texting for a couple of days.

You are right @CheekySnake, I’m going to give it a couple of days and see how I feel.

Thank you so much, you have all been so helpful ❤️

Chant along with me - feelings aren’t facts, feelings aren’t facts.

I had a weird phone call from my mother last night, got a missed call (I don't talk on the phone, it's messages only). DH said just ring back and get it over with because obvs the worry is that she's ill.

Turned out she was drunk (7pm and on her own) and dialed by accident 🙄 so I guess I now know that she's started drinking again. It was a bit of a non event, really, she talked about trump a lot and then that was it.

What I didn't expect was really how disconnected I felt from the whole thing. I don't want her to be unhappy or lonely and it seemed like she wasn't. I felt like she's gone back to not being bothered about me. My therapist said to focus on how she behaves not what she says and that her behaviour clearly signalled not that bothered (moved abroad when my kids were very small, when she came back, she bought a flat around the corner from stepson and nowhere near from her bio children).

I wonder sometimes if she struggles with us because we remind her of my father and I feel that's a bit of a taboo that no-one talks about - how women feel about the children of an abusive spouse.

@CheekySnake I have a lot of very mixed feelings about sharing a daughter with my abusive ex. I love her very much but she reminds me of him, she looks like him and she has parts of his personality. I’m not going to lie at times it’s very hard. She also talks positively of him and that’s really difficult to deal with. It requires a lot of very deep work on myself to not get triggered (I would be lying if I say I never have) .I can see how some people might struggle depending on the triggers are. But as an adult this is my responsibility to deal with because she is just a child and none of it is her responsibility. I talk honest and open and apologise because I had a different experience of her dad.

I've already posted on the Relationships about my problems before I noticed this thread

My mother is a narc. I went NC in 2014 but had to see her twice in 2022 (DD wedding)
When I met my DH I was having Psychotherapy and going through very difficult time. I made no secret of how damaged i was

We married in 2015, life has been as near perfect as it could be until he had falling out with his family last April. Last December he told me his love for me had died. I was devastated. Few days ago he said its because I can't let the past and problems with my mother go.

Just wondering has anyone else had similar issues with marriage/relationships?

What sort of problems did he have with his family last April? Is he NC with his family too?

Im sorry that must be hard. Do you bring up your mother a lot in conversation?
How does you being NC effect him exactly? It’s very unfair that he’s emotionally manipulating you by saying the love has died because you can’t move on from your mother.

He had massive argument with his niece about his DM when she was due to leave hospital, then his sister put alot of pressure on him expecting him to give more care than he/we physically could due to distance and work commitments. I stupidly got involved and v politely messaged his sister explaining what he could and couldn't do to help with DM. He went NC , blocking their calls/social media etc and told me to do the same. A month later he had an awful argument with his DM where ( Of course) I got the blame for everything, his DM said I never wanted to be part of the family, totally untrue
I've done more for his DM than I've done or wanted to do for my own. He did defend me and left feeling very annoyed. However since that day ,(April 2024) our relationship has gone downhill.
I only realised recently they are now all friends again on Facebook and he likes their pics and comments on their posts.
We decided as a couple last March not to send cards/presents to his family (other than to his DM) then at Christmas he decided to send all his family Christmas cards, seemed very hypocritical to me.

I don't think i bring my mother up that often, maybe I do but I've never wished her dead. In fact I always say I abhor her but I wish her no evil I just don't want her in my life. Whereas when he had falling out with his family he said he didn't want to see his mother again until "she's in her box" but that's all forgotten. Apparently, people say these things

So, sorry this is so long, after saying the love has died he again said " people say things" and he's trying to rekindle the love
But in my head love is either there or its not

I've tried since before Christmas to make this work. He's on anti depressants and having counselling but I'm just done now

Thank you for replying

@ByLemonFish It sounds like your husband along with his family are now using you as the scapegoat to blame for their falling out which is very manipulative. The fact they have all friended each other and are interacting, and you are left out in the cold is doubling down on the blame of you.
The way your husband is behaving is quite untrustworthy - going behind your back with his family, and saying hurtful comments to you then backtracking on them, that must feel very destabilising.
Do you want to stay in a relationship with him? Because he and his family seem quite toxic. What are his positive qualities?

@ByLemonFish I just read your other post before answering.
Is this your 1st marriage?
You say the arguments are frequent and nasty. He tells you to leave, it is your choice to stay or leave. If these arguments usually blow over what's different about the latest one. Why do you think it's down to your past? You've been NC 10 years.
You are financially dependent on him, the house is in his name only. Leaving PT work just leaves you even more dependent and as DV is involved you have made yourself vulnerable. Divorce can take ages until marital assets split, how will you support yourself. Over 55's accommodation and see a solicitor is a plan but you need to get on it.
Not much we can say here unless you harp on about your damaged childhood all day, I suspect that is just him being nasty.

Lemonfish I do think love can wax and wane to an extent possibly. I don't know how I'd come back from it in a romantic relationship though.

For instance sometimes, of course, I'm mighty pissed off with my kids. But then I do always love them and wouldn't SAY otherwise. So I think a person can hold two feelings about someone at the same time. Like when your beloved dog shits up the carpet.

But it's a big loss of control and very immature of him to say something so nasty and do you need all this bullshit about his family? Surviving my own foo was hard enough i could not be arsed with someone else's.

Just seen Binkies post, yes divorce takes sooooo long, you need a short term plan while waiting for anything from the divorce. My friend said she was being financially abused and got universal credit.

Thank you all

I'm looking at getting a over 55s council place in my home town, I can't live like this. I have a small private pension and I think I'll be entitled to some benefits with my health issues

I have good friends and family back home

Thank you for support, much appreciated

When I was 4 my mother had night terrors, when I told Dad (he worked nights) she poked her index finger in my face shouting "if I go back into that hospital it will be all your fault "
She had been sectioned 5 years before my birth. This has never left me. BUT I know this marriage breakdown is NOT my fault and he's not going to make me feel it is

Oh this isn't my first marriage. My first husband died of cancer in 2004, he was an alcoholic but I don't ever remember feeling this miserable during what could be a difficult marriage.

Can I join this thread please? I'm not sure what I want out of it but felt compelled to join!

I've made a couple of threads recently, but then discovered this thread.

I'm not sure what I want to discuss yet, but what I will say is I'm 36 and feel ridiculous that I'm just starting to discuss things properly now.

I started seeing a psychologist in January for therapy related to infertility/multiple pregnancy losses/anxiety etc etc... and inevitably childhood came up, which we're slowly starting to discuss but the priority has been my anxiety so we still haven't gone deeply into childhood.

I think I've buried everything away for so long but therapy has brought it all to the surface that it's all I can think about.

In a nutshell, I had a childhood filled with emotional abuse, a textbook controlling stepfather, an absent biological father and the rest....