February 2025 Well we took you to Stately Homes

[AttilaTheMeerkat]

A new thread indeed!.

@tinaabbot they have it in their head that they are close to their kids when they are anything but. Then it's obviously our fault when they don't see much or anything at all of us and act all surprised. I wouldn't go to doctors app with my mother. I decided her old age and care is none of my business.

They wouldn’t know closeness if it smacked them in the face. They have trained all expectations out of their children. Some of us fall in line and some of us don’t.

Sometimes I think about how bizarre it is to live in denial like that your whole life. They have created a false reality in their heads and will never know us as real people.

I guess it’s not bizarre to them but totally normal. Someone like me comes along into this already formed family and expects love and attention and visits and connection and warmth and yeah it feels very bizarre to me but to them I am bizarre in my neediness and they all pretty well adapted to this. It’s just perception I suppose and learning who you can and who you can’t form a relationship with.

That is really really shocking. I had a similar experience at 2. It is very definitely deeply traumatising and the fact that they mock you is appalling.

@Meltedcandlewax how did it affect you? I still sometimes cry when I remember this. Just that feeling of being dragged out of the waiting room screaming when I was admitted and my parents just watching along. That feeling of total helplessness when the nurse took me to the hospital room with many other beds. I felt so alone.
Other kids were receiving visitors. I thought I would never see my parents or my brother again as they didn't come.

It led to me not wanting to stay with grandparents etc. which I got mocked for too. They made a big hoohaa about me not wanting to stay overnight, trying to convince me etc. I again just felt like a weirdo that had stuff wrong with them.

I am honestly speechless. That's horrible. I am so sorry that happened to you. It wasn't normal and it wasn't right.

Something I wanted to say, because a few people are talking about being worried about what other people must think of them based on the stories that their parents are telling.

When I was younger, I used to worry constantly about what other people thought of me. My father's fixation on my 'flaws' made me fixate on them too. I was terrified that other people saw what he saw. It left me with awful social anxiety, selective mutism, and panic attacks. Didn't have a boyfriend until I was in my 20's because I'd had it drummed into me that I was too ugly, and I believed it. I could barely go in a shop without bursting into tears. It was horrendous.

But out in the real world, no-one was judging me. They were barely even noticing me. They were all too busy with their own shit. He put in my head the idea that the whole world found me disgusting. I had an overinflated sense of my own importance, which I know sounds back to front, but that's really what was going on. I assumed I was important enough for other people to be making mental space for me and waste energy talking about me when I wasn't there. Dealing with a narcissist can turn you inwards until all you can think about is yourself.

Basically, we think other people are thinking and talking about us far more than they actually are.

@CheekySnake that's a good approach and my therapist is trying to get me to see this too. Mostly I manage to in work settings or with strangers for example. But the thought that my relatives are still ganging up on me still haunts me.

I suppose the question is, do you really think that they've got time to think about you that much, and do you think they are, each of them, the sort of person to behave that way?

Unfortunately yes. Obviously not every minute of the day, but when they get together I'm sure they talk as it falls under 'current affairs' for them. They have no life. They discuss others instead to feel superior. It's all they do. It's always negative talk. It's not like they say 'did you see Sally's lovely new hair cut' but they say 'did you see her horrible hair cut, she needs to get a grip. It's not that she's 25 still'. It's very harsh.

The vindictive part in me wants to drop a bomb into this family by telling my brother and SiL what my parents really think about SiL and her family. They say my brother deserves better, that her family are the lowest of the low etc.

Oh ok I know the type. That's how they entertain themselves/socialise/connect - they don't talk about TV/sport/a book they read/something interesting but gossip instead. Drama llamas.

I wouldn't do the vindictive thing because you have to live with yourself afterwards, though I understand the temptation.

It's a shame we can't take our families back to the shop and exchange them for one that isn't faulty.

@CheekySnake I'm starting to realise I'm a liability to myself when Im around my brother and SiL. They can still push all the buttons and it triggers me to a degree I might say something I will regret.

Even if they discuss a sport, book or whatever one of them will always start the negative talk. But yeah they don't truly connect over this kind of stuff the way I do with my people. At the end you'd always feel on edge and down instead of refreshed.

@Twatalert my mother is like this. Negative about everything. I used to do it too, and I've got to be honest, I didn't even realise until my DH pointed it out. It was how my relationship with my mother worked. It was how we talked. It seemed normal to me, even though I knew I felt drained and upset after talking to her, and never felt cheered up or uplifted or positive.

But once I knew I was doing it and 'heard' myself, I was horrified and I've worked really hard not to do it. It has made conversations with my mother painful though because they don't work when you won't join in with the complaining and she has nothing else to say. She loves to discuss the news because it's all negative. Nope don't care. After she left (after her last visit) my son said 'she complains a lot doesn't she' 😶

@CheekySnake well done on gaining that awareness and then turning the negative talk around. I'm in the same boat. I wonder how people put up with me when I was like that. I was seeking it out too. It's the only way of conversing I knew. We would leave after a visit at relatives and in the car the gossip about them would start. When I got older I instigated it myself.

On occasion I even tell myself good things about myself now 😂

How would you deal with this? My little one keeps saying I miss nanny and grandad. I’ve been on a visit strike because I’m fed up of us doing all the work.(plus the narcissistic crap we have to listen to). Now I feel guilty because little one obviously loves them and has no idea about all this stuff. Would you visit? I’m the only one who would make the first move, partner is happily busy and has very few emotions so feels nothing either way. You just know in the future it will be painted that I ruined the relationship because I didn’t want to take her.

How old is your child?

Mine went through a little phase of asking to visit family when they were around 6/7, but they have now forgotten they exist. Very occasionally my DH will mention them (which annoys me because it then gets confusing for the DC), and then the children say things like “you have a sister?”.

In your shoes I wouldn’t visit if they upset you. I would say something like “hopefully they will visit us some time, but they are busy at the moment”. Kick the can down the road for a while.

No I would not visit Happyfarm. Distract your child and talk about doing something else nice with her if she goes on about Nanny and Grandad. Give her the age appropriate truth re these people.

You get to make these decisions without apology or excessive justification. You can assure your child that you are making a wise and loving decision for them as well as yourself. I am not going to script what you should say because you are the only one who knows your children, but you must convey that this isn't up for negotiation. This is not a decision that the child gets to make. Yes, children usually love their grandparents. Children are often quite indiscriminate in their love which is why they need parents to guide them. Not every person is safe to have around and this is a good time to teach that important life lesson. The more matter-of-fact you are, the more matter-of-fact your children will be. When we act hysterical, they will usually reflect our hysteria. If you act anxious, they will act anxious. If you appear unsure, they will push. Model the reaction and attitude you want your children to adopt.

Your youngest is very young, right? It's a tough one. ATEOTD this is your husband's job. It seems to be really common that it falls on the wife to do all the extended family work. I think I would be saying 'let's talk to daddy about this' every time it's raised and bringing him into the conversation. You can't force him to arrange anything but he needs to be hearing the request.

The alternative is that you make a decision that it's important to facilitate a relationship between your child and her grandparents regardless of how you feel about them, but you set the rules for what this looks like. How often you will go, how long for, where you're willing to meet etc. So if you feel you can cope with 1 visit a month for 1 hour, then make that the routine, and hold tight to your rules. You don't have to tell anyone else what they are, they are for you, it doesn't need a public declaration, but you need to trust yourself to stick to them.

@Happyfarm but obviously as others have said, if you feel that the decision you've made not to go is the right one, stick to it. You're the parent. Our role as parents is often to put boundaries in place for our children that they can't put in place for themselves. That's what they need us to do. No you can't run into the road, you can't eat soap powder, you can't play with matches, you can't have contact with people I judge to be unsafe.

Thanks. I’ve had a pretty good week until my eldest has returned from her dad’s and now I’m all over the place again. I’m not coping well with the relationship with her dad. She came home telling me that the gf had a private chat about how none of what happened to me was real. Told her to look at how well he treats her so how could I possibly tell the truth. They’ve taken daughter out everyday, bought her whatever she wants. I am really struggling with this. I don’t care anymore who is telling the truth and who isn’t. My whole experience is being erased and re-written and he has much more power and people to help him than I do. I can’t help but feel it’s better she lives with him and I just lie and admit it was all my fault. I’ve had enough of narcs.

Can you need to see a counsellor or something regularly happyfarm to combat the psychological effects of him on your own MH? He's trying to tear you down to your DC and she's not necessarily being horrible repeating it, she's maybe confused or concerned? So is raising it with you. But for you to hear it must be so difficult. Reckon you need to enlist the help of someone like a counsellor to shore you up until you're in a position where you don't need to hear about him and what he or his GF thinks any more.

@SamAndAnnie What he says doesn’t bother me in a sense, he can lie and be can be Disney day I’m happier in a more simple life anyway. What the gf said in a way was true, what does it all matter because it was in the past. It was in the past but it’s never been told by him. He’s only ever told a lie of a past. What I’m struggling with is that I am ill with m.e because of him. I can’t do the things I want, I can’t work as I want, my future scares me and that’s because of him and it’s never going to go away. So whilst he can work all the hours I have to decide if I have the energy to shower or wash my hair in the same day because my energy is low. I only work one shift and I’m struggling with that and I’m exhausted and in pain. He has affected my future badly with autoimmune diseases. It’s easy to say oh it was in the past to our daughter.

I agree with @SamAndAnnie