How to keep in contact with parents who were abusive in the past

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I’m so stuck in my situation with my parents, they were physically and verbally abusive up until my late 20’s. It’s been more than 5 years since I’ve moved away but I do go to family gatherings which I find very hard. The last one I had a fight with my mum and said awful things to her, a bit of context I was angry with my brother as he had shouted at me and made awful comments to me, I then stupidly took that anger out on my mum. She’s very upset and hurt and has asked me if I can’t move on to no longer see them. I don’t know if I’m in my head or not but I can’t seem to figure out what to do, I get so angry and upset and I lash out but my family are the only people I have and if I stop contact I’ll be alone. If I stop contact that also means that I’ll no longer have a relationship with my siblings as they also feel fed up with me and are siding with my parents. I don’t want to lose all my family relationships. What do I do? Do I just move on and play happy families? Or do I cut contact and come to terms with being alone? Is it even possible to continue a relationship with those who hurt us? What do I do with all this anger inside me?

There are worse things than being alone.

Continuing to spend time with people who mess up your head and cause anguish are best cut off.

However, if your siblings are siding with your parents, and you are prone to getting angry and lashing out, it may be worth seeking some therapy to unpick what is actually going on.

What caused your brother to shout at you, and why did you then turn that on your ‘D’M?

You are in a precarious position only having your abusive family as “support”, why is this?

I cut off my horribly abusive mother many years ago. I have friends I can rely on, and have deliberately cultivated friendships over the years with older women who can provide me with the wisdom and emotional support that I never would have got from my mother.

Can you focus on building a substitute “family” so that you are in a stronger position to go NC with your abusers? 💐

You owe your parents nothing, let alone a relationship here. You are under no obligation whatsoever to continue a relationship with people who have abused you in childhood. You are also under no obligation to attend family gatherings particularly if they are making you feel uncomfortable understandably.

Your parents were and remain abusive towards you and they have not changed. They have not apologised nor have accepted any responsibility for their actions. She took your brother's side and basically wanted you to "move on" from his abusive comments to save her own neck. She's not so much upset and hurt so much as pissed off that you challenged your family of origin's rotten to the core dynamic.

People from dysfunctional families end up playing roles; what is your role/s here and what are theirs?. You are likely to be the scapegoat here amongst them; the one they all blame for their inherent ills. Your siblings chose their parents side (also because they likely saw how you were treated) and so they are unlikely to ever want to see your point of view. You are better off staying away from all of them. With you out of the picture they are likely to further turn against each other.

Where is your own real life support here?.

I would suggest you read and or post on the current Well we took you to Stately Homes thread on these Relationships pages. Deal with your anger and FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) in therapy. BACP are good re therapists and I would interview each person you contact carefully and at length before choosing any particular one to work with. Another organisation you may want to contact is NAPAC.

I would keep contact with them very low and build yourself a network of friends in the meantime. No family is better than family that makes you feel like shit. I would also get some counselling to address the anger you are feeling about past abuse. It's normal to have these feelings but bottling them up can lead to depression or explosive expressions of that anger.

This is an organisation that offer support to survivors of parental abuse https://napac.org.uk/

She’s very upset and hurt and has asked me if I can’t move on to no longer see them.

That is a very typical stance for abusive people. Your reaction and not the abuse is the problem for them what you are describing is not support it is not connection it is not safety it is not love. You accept that those types of relationships are not what you can have in your family and you start having what you can have very LC/NC and a lot of grey rock.

Go low contact with them and get some therapy. You really need it.