Estranged adult children

[Theestrangedone]

Hi all,

looking for a bit of moral support here. I recently made the choice to estrange myself from my mum parents and my sister and her husband as frankly I’m sick of their narcissistic behaviours.

I never had a great relationship with my mum and sister, my relationship with my dad has always been dictated to by my mum and if we ever fell out he was banished from speaking to me. I had times at home where I was sent to my room with a hard smack from my mum for things my sister had caused, my mum never listened to my version of events. Before my sister left to move out with her now husband, there would be a lot of times where my sister would stir between me and my mum and when my dad was at work they’d sit in the lounge together after sending my away and could be heard gossiping and bitching behind my back about me.

Gradually, as iv gotten older and I finally managed to move out with my current partner 7 years on that upset I felt has slowly turned to resentment. 7 years of being excluded, ostracised, excuses made for the choices to not involve me. Decisions and excuse to exclude my son, I’m 31 weeks pregnant with my second baby and after a really rough few days I finally cut contact with my Mum and Sister for good!
I’m sick of apologising for their wrong doings, I’m sick of being bullied into thinking things are my fault. I’m sick of being emotionally and mentally manipulated. Being excluded once again and having been given 3 poor excuses that were easily resolved with speaking to me iv had enough and decided ai deserved better. My children deserve better than to be trapped in this. The only person I’m going to miss and who will suffer not speaking to in all of this is my dad and my nephew when he’s old enough to work things out. There’s just so many things to say and explain what happened over the years but iv spent 32 years of my life believing I was wrong, believing it was my fault, believing that I’m a bad person.

As a mum myself I’m hurt that any parent can exclude one of their children without legitimate reasons like health issues, holidays etc. To just decide to not involve someone is just cruel. And I just hope that my children NEVER do this to each other or think I’m ever going to exclude them both from anything!

I guess my question is? How do you learn to adapt with this change? How do you begin to heal or recover?

You are right to leave that toxic situation. I am so sorry your mum and sister have treated you like this. I think you can only take it one day at a time. It may be helpful to get a few counseling sessions to help process and heal. Sending hugs.

I’m NC with my mother and sister. I found once the decision was made it was like a weight had been lifted. I ‘got over it’ pretty quickly as I wasn’t stressed or upset anymore. I hardly even think about them now. Don’t regret a thing! Xx

That sounds very drastic OP, it's very difficult to have no family. It's completely understandable that you feel angry and resentful but there are other ways of approaching the situation.

Dysfunctional families have assigned roles and from your description, your sister was the 'golden child'. This would stem from parents with unhealthy behaviour.

You can attempt to change the dynamic by changing how you feel about it and your behaviour. The first step is to emotionally disengage, this is where you try to get to the point where you're outside the triangle and their behaviour doesn't bother you.

You can lessen contact and remove yourself from any conflict. You can choose not to get involved and you can learn assertiveness skills and how to maintain good boundaries.

They'll kick off because you're no longer acting your part and they won't like the change. If you maintain your stance, the dynamic will be forced to change.

Thank you to both of you for replying.

it doesn’t feel great right at this very moment as I’m 31 weeks pregnant so some of my emotions are down to that predominantly.
But just the block button alone gave me great comfort and the message I sent to my mum about her deciding to not invite me out for Mother’s Day and trying to blame to my son, then finding a reason to blame me was enough to just send me to my final decision. The minute they blamed me and then blamed my son the argument was over. They have seen what exclusion does, my mum reprimanded my cousin for doing this to me and my mum did the same with my sister on her 30th and said it was cruel to exclude me and her from the brunch. My mum defended me both occasions, but suddenly decided it was ok for her to do? Like all the times it was ok for her to blame me for her wrong doings, forcing me to apologise for being upset, or hurt.

I’m not doing it anymore. My children deserve better than to see their mother treat so appallingly by their grandmother!

Sadly iv tried that approach and did the minute I moved out but the fact my mum continued to blame me for her behaviour drew the line in the sand for me.

I distanced myself and it just led to me being totally forgotten about. I’d reach out ‘sorry we’re busy’. But the minute my son was born my mum was like a bee around honey.

I can’t take anymore of the pushing away and pulling back and I don’t like the exclusions that have happened to me for years! Iv had to learn to be lonely to some extent and have a better relationship with my partner parents as they are very close nit which upsets me as I wish my mum was like that with me!

I have very little contact with my parents—just minimal interactions with my dad and almost none with my mum, who struggles with alcoholism. A lot of what you've described, I've been through too. My parents are incredibly toxic; they stir up arguments, pull me into them, and then quickly make up, leaving me as the villain. It's caused me endless stress, until one day I just told them to carry on with their dysfunctional, toxic lives and leave me out of it.

You say you hope your children never do this to each other but there's plenty of research that estrangement behaviour is passed down multiple generations. Children model the behaviour of their parents and you are teaching them to cut ties more easily.

Don't believe me? Here's just one of many sources of evidence.

<a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?q=www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/brothers-sisters-strangers/202206/how-family-estrangement-echoes-across-generations" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/brothers-sisters-strangers/202206/how-family-estrangement-echoes-across-generations%3famp

Whatever works for you. All the best.

Well it appears my link is buggered (on mobile). Search for "How family estrangement echoes across generations" in Psychology Today. It should be the first Google result.

I walked over a decade ago. I have days where I feel bereft, but in reality I’m grieving for something I never had.

in my own experience my crappy life had been less crappier without my mother and her enabling husband (biological father) in it - and that goes for the rest of yhd family too who just wanted peace which meant ostracising me.

Iv honestly tried a lot of tactics with my mum and the majority has resorted in me having to be the person to apologise even though I know deep down in my core it wasn’t my fault. I could provide multiple bits of evidence to my mum what she did wrong but I’d still be wrong!

I think I hurt the most as my dads not like this, my dads very alike me in the sense we are very think of the saying ‘Ohanna’ from lilo and stitch. We don’t leave anyone out! We make sure everyone has their fair chance to say no thank you, we firmly believe everyone should have the choice to be included. Iv always put my family first and it feels almost like it’s never returned. There’s be a lot of things go on over my 32 years, a lot of things where my mum could easily have LISTENED to me without reaching out to smack me or berate me with verbal abuse. I still remember as a really young girl my sister got herself caught on something I was trying to get her up and without even a what’s happened, I remember my mums hand wrapped around the side of my face and her telling me horrible of a child I was, how evil I was to my sister and how much she despised me. My sister made a joke about it not long ago and I just remember saying wasn’t that funny when I had a hand mark on my cheek and ear and still can hear my mum tell me how much she hated me? She’s been told before about saying things about me to my impressionable 5yr old as he repeats it back.

A lot of things my mum could have resolved by listening to me but didn’t. I’m lucky my son’s only 2 so he won’t remember all this, but eventually he will ask. When he’s old enough to say yes or no to seeing her if he says yes that’s fine. My dad’s by no shape or form extradited from his life, if he wants to see him with my mum that’s absolutely fine. He’s their grandchild but my mum has to learn actions have consequences the difference is I won’t resort to smacking her or saying how much I hate her, I’ll just not speak to her at all!

Look up Patrick Teahan on YouTube - he explains the different types of toxic families and also explains how families scapegoat 1 member who holds all the disowned negative feelings of the others - I think you would find it comforting to understand.

I’ve been put in the scapegoat role in my family but now do not accept that. Now they are choosing to exclude themselves from seeing me because they can’t bear to look in the mirror I’ve held up to their behaviour. They’d rather not see me than own the impact of their behaviour. Sad all round as I’m sure yours is.

watch out though for making your dad the “good one” - he is part of the toxic family system too. He is an adult and can choose not to collude with the scapegoating excluding behaviour.

I wish everything was better :/.

I just can’t apologise anymore for my mum failing to accept she is in the wrong! No child adult or adolescent should apologise for their parents behaviours.

My grandmas never understood my mum’s behaviour both her, my grandad before his stroke and 1 of my mums sisters (auntie) have ALL pulled her back on it and questioned why she’s cold with me. Why has she always failed to listen to me. My grandma said if you got a call tomorrow to tell you she was hurt or dead what would you do? And my mum couldn’t even give an answer other than ‘well I’d be upset’ that was it. My grandma got everything she needed from it and has essentially been my mum for at least 20 years of my life!

It’s a not a choice I want to make but if it means I stop having to apologise all the time and I stop feeling so lonely.

I mean it OP, do whatever works for you. If going no contact is the only option for you, then do that.

I would advise some therapy to help you process this as you sound like you're in a lot of pain. You can try BACP for a therapist. You might also find the book Toxic Parents by Susan Forward helpful.

Tbf I was hoping there might be some books! I don’t know if this is a temporary blocker on my relationships with them or permanent, it’s up to my mum this time. My sister was stupid enough to agree to my mums excuses, but using my child as the scapegoat for including a person is unacceptable. He’s a baby and his dad was available to stay with him.

I can get counselling through my work for things but I might try that book also! Thank you xx

It is very much more common than you think to have these types of family dynamics and as someone has pointed out above estrangement in families is nothing new but it is exceedingly painful. All you can do is recognise your own parts in the dynamics and change them. We have it on booths sides as mine and DHs families are both very dysfunctional, probably how we ended up together really. Try to get your head around the distortions you used to cope, the most common one is that things “could” somehow be different, they cannot. Then chance hoe you show up in the dynamic, ever hopeful that they will treat you right and include you, they won’t. Then you start acting like a person how is being treated poorly and excluded from a group by pulling very far back. There is nothing else you can do. Everything else is just a delusion that things can be different within that old dynamic, they can only be different if you play your part differently for ever.

I see it in my partners family there’s is far far worse!

like way worse but they all split off and his dads brother wouldn’t even attend his dads funeral after all the problems of the past. He never received an apology for his dad’s poor treatment of him!

if my mum could ever accept she’s in the wrong like I do with my son it would be great. I’m not a perfect parent at all, but I always make up for it by showing my son I love him and that the problem was me and not him. He’s been with his dad all day today as iv been in bed feeling miserable and he came home and gave me a funny look and I just put my arms out to him, gave him a cuddle and said I love you. My son returned the biggest cheesiest grin even and gave me a kiss.

I wish my mum was more like that but she was always very much ‘go away I’m busy’ or just not interested. I don’t remember her telling me she loved me or was proud of me. If she did it was that rare iv forgotten!

So you are saying that OP should just put up with this behaviour, otherwise her own children will cut her off?

Hopefully OP will be a loving and kind mum to her children so the impetus for them to cut ties just won't be there.

I think that research will soon be out of date as this generation of parents are more emotionally aware. OP you can break the patterns and have great relationships with your own kids. Just do the opposite to your own mum! You are protecting them from difficult unpleasant people.

@Theestrangedone

my dad has always been dictated to by my mum and if we ever fell out he was banished from speaking to me.

Your dad chose not to speak to you because it made his life easier. It is often easy to blame toxic mothers but your father is a grown man and should have protected you and supported you. He chose not to. I know that's hurtful to hear. But if what you said in your first post is true, then he's just as bad as the rest of your family.

Bethany Webster has a great blog about difficult relationships between women and their mothers, and a book. And Kelly McDaniels book on The Mother Wound is also very good. You're absolutely not alone, OP. It's painful to separate from family but you know when it's the right thing to do. Takes guts, well done.

@Ficklebricks Enstrangement from family is not something @op has done willy nilly. Most people in this situation have tried everything, but their family clearly do not want them or value them. It causes great distress to the victim and ven brings on illness. Unless you've been there, I don't think you understand or appreciate the toll it takes on the victims and talking about passing things down generations, you will also benormalising family abuse to your chidlren. What is the solution are you offering?

There’s an article in the telegraph today about a man who decided to estrange with his abusive mother . It’s surprisingly very common . My view is if someone is verbally , physically, emotionally abusive and you get nothing positive from the relationship then leave it behind and forge good relationships with others . If abuse is historical and never ending then let go .

Search for the Stately Homes thread on here- I’m not sure how to link it. There are plenty of people in similar situations to you. I am NC with my parents and it is painful but I was no longer going to allow my life to be miserable because of them. No regrets.