MARCH 2026 - Well we took you to Stately Homes

[AttilaTheMeerkat]

have now set up a new thread as the previous one is now full.
This long runnning thread has become a safe haven for Adult children of abusive families.
The title refers to an original poster's family who claimed they could not have been abusive as they had taken her to plenty of Stately Homes during her childhood!
One thing you will never hear on this thread is that your abuse or experience was not that bad. You will never have your feelings minimised the way they were when you were a child, or now that you are an adult. To coin the phrase of a much respected past poster Ally90;
'Nobody can judge how sad your childhood made you, even if you wrote a novel on it, only you know that. I can well imagine any of us saying some of the seemingly trivial things our parents/ siblings did to us to many of our real life acquaintances and them not understanding why we were upset/ angry/ hurt etc. And that is why this thread is here. It's a safe place to vent our true feelings, validate our childhood/ lifetime experiences of being hurt/ angry etc by our parents behaviour and to get support for dealing with family in the here and now.'
Most new posters generally start off their posts by saying; but it wasn't that bad for me or my experience wasn't as awful as x,y or z's.
Some on here have been emotionally abused and/ or physically abused. Some are not sure what category (there doesn't have to be any) they fall into.
NONE of that matters. What matters is how 'YOU' felt growing up, how 'YOU' feel now and a chance to talk about how and why those childhood experiences and/ or current parental contact, has left you feeling damaged, falling apart from the inside out and stumbling around trying to find your sense of self-worth.
You might also find the following links and information useful, if you have come this far and are still not sure whether you belong here or not.
'Toxic Parents' by Susan Forward.
I started with this book and found it really useful.
Here are some excerpts:
"Once you get going, most toxic parents will counterattack. After all, if they had the capacity to listen, to hear, to be reasonable, to respect your feelings, and to promote your independence, they wouldn't be toxic parents. They will probably perceive your words as treacherous personal assaults. They will tend to fall back on the same tactics and defences that they have always used, only more so.
Remember, the important thing is not their reaction but your response. If you can stand fast in the face of your parents' fury, accusations, threats and guilt-peddling, you will experience your finest hour.
Here are some typical parental reactions to confrontation:
"It never happened". Parents who have used denial to avoid their own feelings of inadequacy or anxiety, will undoubtedly use it during confrontation, to promote their version of reality. They'll insist that your allegations never happened, or that you're exaggerating. They won't remember, or they will accuse you of lying.
YOUR RESPONSE: Just because you don't remember, doesn't mean it didn't happen".
"It was your fault." Toxic parents are almost never willing to accept responsibility for their destructive behaviour. Instead, they will blame you. They will say that you were bad, or that you were difficult. They will claim that they did the best that they could but that you always created problems for them. They will say that you drove them crazy. They will offer as proof, the fact that everybody in the family knew what a problem you were. They will offer up a laundry list of your alleged offences against them.
YOUR RESPONSE: "You can keep trying to make this my fault, but I'm not going to accept the responsibility for what you did to me, when I was a child".
"I said I was sorry what more do you want?" Some parents may acknowledge a few of the things that you say but be unwilling to do anything about it.
YOUR RESPONSE: "I appreciate your apology, but that is just a beginning. If you're truly sorry, you'll work through this with me, to make a better relationship."
"We did the best we could." Some parents will remind you of how tough they had it while you were growing up and how hard they struggled. They will say such things as "You'll never understand what I was going through," or "I did the best I could". This particular style of response will often stir up a lot of sympathy and compassion for your parents. This is understandable, but it makes it difficult for you to remain focused on what you need to say in your confrontation. The temptation is for you once again to put their needs ahead of your own. It is important that you be able to acknowledge their difficulties, without invalidating your own.
YOUR RESPONSE: "I understand that you had a hard time, and I'm sure that you didn't hurt me on purpose, but I need you to understand that the way you dealt with your problems really did hurt me"
"Look what we did for you." Many parents will attempt to counter your assertions by recalling the wonderful times you had as a child and the loving moments you and they shared. By focusing on the good things, they can avoid looking at the darker side of their behaviour. Parents will typically remind you of gifts they gave you, places they took you, sacrifices they made for you, and thoughtful things they did. They will say things like, "this is the thanks we get" or "nothing was ever enough for you."
YOUR RESPONSE: "I appreciate those things very much, but they didn't make up for ...."
"How can you do this to me?" Some parents act like martyrs. They'll collapse into tears, wring their hands, and express shock and disbelief at your "cruelty". They will act as if your confrontation has victimized them. They will accuse you of hurting them, or disappointing them. They will complain that they don't need this, they have enough problems. They will tell you that they are not strong enough or healthy enough to take this, that the heartache will kill them. Some of their sadness will, of course, be genuine. It is sad for parents to face their own shortcomings, to realise that they have caused their children significant pain. But their sadness can also be manipulative and controlling. It is their way of using guilt to try to make you back down from the confrontation.
YOUR RESPONSE: "I'm sorry you're upset. I'm sorry you're hurt. But I'm not willing to give up on this. I've been hurting for a long time, too."
Helpful Websites
Alice Miller
Personality Disorders definition
Daughters of narcissistic mothers
Out of the FOG
You carry the cure in your own heart
Help for adult children of child abuse
Pete Walker
The Echo Society
There are also one or two less public offshoots of Stately Homes, PM AttilaTheMeerkat for details.
Some books:
Toxic Parents by Susan Forward
Homecoming by John Bradshaw
Will I ever be good enough? by Karyl McBride
If you had controlling parents by Dan Neuharth
When you and your mother can't be friends by Victoria Segunda
Children of the self-absorbed by Nina Brown - check reviews on this, I didn't find it useful myself.
Recovery of your inner child by Lucia Capacchione
Childhood Disrupted by Donna Jackson Nazakawa
This final quote is from smithfield posting as therealsmithfield:
"I'm sure the other posters will be along shortly to add anything they feel I have left out. I personally don't claim to be sorted but I will say my head has become a helluva lot straighter since I started posting here. You will receive a lot of wisdom but above all else the insights and advice given will 'always' be delivered with warmth and support."
6

Laughing doesn't mean it's funny Must, some people laugh out of nervousness or to cover up sadness. People who grew up with chaos are familiar with chaos and the familiar feels comforting on some level, even when it's harmful and makes them unhappy. She doesn't leave when she should because she maybe doesn't know she should in that moment, even if she works it out later (and some people don't ever work it out). She couldn't just up and leave in childhood, so she learned to ignore those warning signs and learned to tolerate things nobody should tolerate, because that was necessary for survival. She's desensitized to her experiences because to her they are her version of normal and she perhaps doesn't even realise how abnormal they were/are, or that it might upset someone to hear about it and to know their friend went through that.

Yes to all of that. So basically she is built to withstand abuse. She keeps going back. I’ve tried to explain that I think perhaps peace and calm feels wrong to her. It’s the kids I worry about. As with all of us if we don’t look at our own behaviour we pass this trauma down. I have tried though, I can’t do anymore than that. I have learnt from past experience you just can’t fix people even if it’s plain to see.

I know we are all victims on here of something. But the fact we are aware and trying is something special. I think it takes strength to look at yourself and vow to not repeat cycles.

I'm an old poster, haven't been around in a few months, just checking in to see how everyone is doing. Short history: abusive father who I am pretty certain was npd (he did eventually end up having a catastrophic breakdown and spent months in a psychiatric unit). Fitted the criteria for grandiose narcissism perfectly. My mother was an immature enabler who eventually left him for someone else when I was in my late teens. I was NC with father for decades and I'm very LC with mother, we don't even talk on the phone. I've had to work really hard to unpick my own unhealthy behaviours (people pleasing, codependency, anxiety) and it's still a work in progress. My relationship with my mother is a disaster, really. When I realised I was people pleasing and how toxic that was, and I stopped, our relationship died because she doesn't seem to know how else to interact with me.

Anyway, I wanted to say that I've recently been using Google Gemini (the AI) to thrash out some of this and I'm finding it really helpful. It can identify toxic behaviour patterns and offers suggestions for diet and breath work etc to help manage the anxiety. Might be worth a try if anyone is interested.

How do you know if you are toxic or have toxic behaviours? When does being nice turn to people pleasing?

Fwiw Gemini identified (without me having to tell it) grandiose narcissism, parentification, enmeshment, and emotional immaturity, and it described my parents to a t.

People pleasing is more than just being helpful, it's when the help becomes controlling and you're doing it as a way to handle your own anxiety. So for example, my father had a very unpredictable temper. He could flip from calm to enraged in a heartbeat. Really scary bloke. So I developed people pleasing as a way of trying to keep his mood good. I would rush in to fix things without having to be asked, try and take over, try and be what he wanted to keep his mood good. A sensible strategy with someone like that, but unhealthy when you start doing it with other people.

A healthy person can let other people have their own negative moods without feeling the need to try and fix it.

Indeed people pleasing behaviour often arises from wanting to parent please a difficult or otherwise emotionally absent parent.

So basically it’s the behaviours we used to use to keep us safe. Behaviours that should never had needed to come into effect?

So things like minimising would have kept my friend from feeling her terrible feelings as a child? Only now she still does this and chooses terrible partners. Basically erodes and distorts your boundaries. It’s very interesting and very sad. I have to admit I was a keep everything to myself child as my mum was unwell.

I have realised as an adult that I didn't just playact to try and keep my father calm, I also people pleased desperately with my mother because I was terrified that something would happen and I'd be left with just him. Its a lot more complicated than that but she used me as a support human and took the people pleasing as my personality and took it for granted that she could lean on me to do stuff. So I took that into other relationships like friendships. The problem with that is that healthy people get the ick and then you're left with only the people who want a support human. It took me a long time to realise that was why I so often made friends with users and the friendships were disasters and I was left distressed and often ended up ghosting the other person. I had to fix it about myself. I have to take a deep breath and not say anything when my immediate reaction is to volunteer to fix things when deep down I know I don't want to.

Hi @PithyOtter. I’ve been using ChatGPT (daily!) with a similar finding for my dysfunctional original family. I’ve found it very useful in terms of talking me down from a ledge. It’s so ingrained in us to try and fix it but I’ve been doing that all my life. Now I have my own family and I’ve found my parents’ and particularly sibling’s behaviours untenable - I don’t want their negative influence seeping into this house and I’ve started to see the effect their shitty behaviour is having on my own children. Emotionally immature parents really resonates with me. My father lost his mother at 5 and my mother was brought up by violent alcoholic parents so I’ve just started to wrap my head around the fact that they simply don’t have the emotional tools to act normally and lovingly. Struggle to sympathise too much though because they have behaved terribly to me, but at least I know that however much I try I can never connect with them in the way that I’d like so it’s time to stop pouring all of my attention into that.

This is happening within my friendship. I mentioned up thread somewhere that she keeps asking me if I need help, if I need anything she’s right here. I don’t need help though and if I did I will ask or sort it out myself. She is now pulling away from me because I think she can sense I do not need permanent help. It is also weird. I want her to come over or we go out and enjoy the thing we are doing not just her doing things. I have a H to help me really if I need it.

It can be about people pleasing but it can also be a sort of attention seeking narcissism, wanting to be the great saviour. People pleasing is more about control and anxiety.

This is exactly where I am right now. My parents were raised by violent alcoholic parents. I grew up thinking I was so lucky my parents weren’t like that. I was so busy seeing the good in them, I didn’t realise it had become my job to support their feelings as they had no idea how to support mine. I do sympathise that they had little help in this department, but I also just have to face that they are not supportive when it matters most and that means they can’t really be there for me in a meaningful way.

This is the one thing that baffles me is that my mother, or so I am led to believe, lead a wonderful childhood. Now three of her siblings had alcohol issues and two died from alcohol related issues and all three moved away from home early on so for me that screams dysfunction but my dad who vehemently abhores my mother swears she had a good upbringing, no dysfunction, the best father on the planet - I was born after he died so never met him but my father sings my grandad who was only his father in law, his praises so I can only assume my grandmother who was quite scathing, was the problem and perhaps a narc herself and my mother was her victim but instead of pushing back and becoming different she became a worse version. I could be talking out of my arse because I never came across anyone who disliked my granny either so could it be that my mother did in fact just have three siblings who moved away and had alcohol issues for no reason and my mother just turned into a narc? I mean I cant follow the line of it if that makes any sense at all.

Maybe one of those refrigerator mothers, perhaps some undiagnosed mental health issues or some undiagnosed Autism or something making her emotionally a bit distant. I just think back then there was no support and no understanding of many things so things happened unnoticed a lot more.

@Genuineweddingone on the advice of posters here, I have just been asking AI where the line is drawn between dysfunctional and abusive upbringing. Obviously, it is not an actual
qualified therapist but it is drawing on psychiatrists guidebooks etc. I gave it similar background to what I have given here regarding never having thought my upbringing was abusive, but that myself and my sister have both had alcohol problems and that I had self harmed and my sister had been in an abusive relationship.

The answer was that children don’t turn to self harm, or young adults turn to alcohol to cope with their feelings or their stress for no reason - that they do these things because they have suffered a lack of emotional support and don’t posses the necessary emotional equipment to navigate life without these unhealthy coping mechanisms.

I asked it about a particular incident I remember from childhood and whether it would be classed as a dysfunctional dynamic or if it crossed the line into abuse and it said it would be classed as severe emotional abuse and listed the reasons why.

Until a few months ago, when my DD was discovered to be being sexually abused, I would have said I had a loving family and a good childhood. If my DD had not been abused and I had not been met with a total
lack of support, I might still believe that more or less. I had thought I had some issues with my family, but all good families have little things etc. The more I think about my upbringing the more I see that was wrong.

It sounds very likely that your mum had a dysfunctional or abusive childhood and just doesn’t recognise it as such, or doesn’t want to be seen that way. It’s entirely possible she has romanticised it to herself
or to you subconsciously or on purpose. I am not entirely sure if my own mum was abused and just never told anyone as I am
aware that her step dad went to prison for abusing his subsequent step children. She insists this never happened to her, but some people post things on here saying they’ve never told anyone in real life certain things. Some people have such shame and obviously not talking about it doesn’t help them see it any differently.

The more I learn about this stuff the more I just realise that many people are not what they say they are, or think they are. They have ideas in their head, “I’m empathetic”, but when you look at their actions they are not, they are self reflecting. Doing something for someone indiscriminately does not make you kind. They in a way trick themselves. It’s quite a hard pattern to spot. I have noticed this a lot in my H’s family….They are all very “kind” but the direction of the kind is wonky. We sit and struggle and their empathy doesn’t kick in. Someone down the street on the other hand that’s a different matter. It’s all just a little wonky. But once you spot it you can’t unsee it.

My FOO would all consider themselves 'kind' and empathetic. Like your H's family, there were/are certain circumstances/people where they would bend over backwards to be helpful and seem caring, but others where they were/are at best dismissive. I've concluded it's all about presenting the right image and/or ego boost. So my parents/siblings would go out of their way to 'fix' something for a neighbour or friend (often without asking whether they needed/wanted help and I suspect sometimes when it was not wanted) because this gave them a feeling of superiority and they enjoyed telling people about it, parents would do whatever was necessary to help brothers/protect them from consequences of their actions because this enabled them to control the narrative and present them as lovely boys who made a mistake and had their family behind them. My FOO seem to divide people in to two groups- people who should be helped (either because it boosts their ego or helps manage the family image) and people who should be helpers (to assist them with their ego boosts/image management). A 'helper' is expected to just get on with things without needing any assistance and if they won't fulfil their role they will be shouted at/talked about/emotionally blackmailed etc. Recognising this has helped my understand why my FOO seem to be willing to excuse terrible behaviour from some people (claiming we should not judge, it's just a mistake, forgive and forget etc) and bend over backwards to get involved in solving problems for some people, but act like certain people (myself included) are deeply and unforgiveably bad for simply saying 'no'.

I have autism. My mother does not and having autism does not make a person evil. My mother is evil to the core. Shes like an emotional cancer eating away at everyone in her life until they are either a shell of themselves or they cut her off. Her own 'disorder' is narcissism.

@Eeriefairy I managed to have the talk I wanted with golden sister. I am still in shock because she actually was the first one to reach out by text and even started the call by asking how I felt coming away from my dad’s funeral (!!?) She has never, ever in my life asked me how I am, ever, not even when I had serious health issues etc., never wanted to know my feelings at all about anything. I can only assume that she has done some soul searching, because it became clear she feels alone in her position of the only child to feel positive about our childhood and about our mum, who she is now looking after more or less on her own, because she just runs around after her like she is the queen, and other sister and me just can’t hack it. Anyway, I managed to say what I wanted and she was quite open as well, so all in all it was as good as it could be. She still definitely doesn’t see, though, what went on, and still goes on with the whole narc behaviour. Doesn’t see the manipulation at all. So, yeah, I am not sure what to think. I am glad that she has finally listened to my side of the story, and that we can now be civil with each other without me always feeling like I have the lower hand by default. One thing I did have to laugh at afterwards is that she said she struggles with the family situation because she is so sensitive to tension in the air. Says the person who has conflicts with her neighbours both sides (of her own doing, very unreasonable entitled behaviour) and with her in-laws (same reason). And now with my mum and dad’s house for sale, again, a conflict with their neighbour that sister has turned into an actual court case, you couldn’t make it up. OK, I am still bitter, that’s clear!

Sorry I was talking about your mother’s mother. I thought you were saying your mum had great parents but all the kids have suffered so couldn’t understand why. Back then life must have been so different from now in terms of understanding ourselves and trauma etc. My grandparents were definitely much colder then my parents.

@Eeriefairy I definitely think there has to be something underlying but my father is adamant that my grandfather was a wonderful human being so I can only assume then it was my grandmother that was the issue. For context one uncle moved to the other side of the world at 17, one moved to another country and turned out to be a disgusting individual and the other went abroad for work so my mother was left at home till she met my dad but always revered my gran so I can only assume due to it that my gran was the issue however I can also ultimately now see I was my mothers scapegoat child and I can see how thats moulded my life and now I am recovering from that psychological abuse. If it is the case my mother was abused in the same way by her mother and tried to change then I would feel empathy for her but shes an evil bitch through and through. Every single day she drips poison and lies to someone. I can stand in front of her right this second and she will be singing my praises for raising such a wonderful child like she did almost 3 years ago to me right before going to his school and acusing me of child neglect. And she doesnt care she hurt me or him she was only fuming because I called her out on it, told people and stopped talking to her. I could write forever and hours about what I have been through at the hands of that woman and my sister will disagree with me.

Thing is my mothers family were the only ones that would have seen how my mother treated me. One uncle who lives over 10thousand miles away saw first hand her visciousness towards me as a grown adult however he has sadly passed away, my mothers sister was my fave person and i spent a lot of time in my grandmothers as a child and have more memories of being with her than with my mother so in a way maybe granny was vile to my mother and my mother hated me because granny loved me and thus started a cycle i have had to end but my mother has no empathy in her, no soul. Dead eyes characteristic of a narc. She thinks nothing of lying about people. Once told me my grandmothers carer in a nursing home had smothered her own baby - not one bit of fucking truth and it got out in the nursing home and the woman fired!