Our 5th visit to the Stately Home

[Nabster]

Here we go again.

Also pinkyminxy it is possible to get to the stage of being able to say no to toxic parents. It is not about cowardice, it is about undoing the conditioning I mentioned earlier

My parents wanted to come and visit for a week soon after my baby is born (as well as being there as soon as she is born) and use that as their holiday. I told my mother no and that was so liberating. I don't want any stress (and I am very stressed around them) ruining those early weeks with my precious daughter.

I used to worry so much about what other people thought but I am beginning to realise that people that know and love me and matter in my life wouldn't judge me for restricting contact with abusive parents.

Sorry to keep relating back to my experiences. I just want you to know that your thoughts and feelings are shared by others and that you can get through this

Rosability thsnk you. I have been having a major wobble today.

Hello, I have posted on this thread in the past but have not been on mn regularly for a long while now. But I spotted this thred in the active convos tonight, so wanted to post.

So, hello again

Hi naswm. Not seen you here in ages. Hope you are well.

Sorry for not posting much the past few days. Have had two lots of bad. life changing news the past couple of days.
I've lost my job and today, the senco and edu psych at school told me my DD2 has dyscalulia. Just seeing it written in black and white was such a shock
And my job? Sacked by text FFS. Does no one ever pick the phone up anymore? A bloody text! and after 5.5 yrs of service I feel rather aggrieved. Thinking of firing one back but it's not gonna get me my job back is it?

This is my anger coming out. I don't know how to deal with it in a constructive way. It's either lash out or keep it in and drink some more.
Exh has been patronising me on the phone today too. Offering to up the maintenance by £15 a MONTH. He only pays £16 a week as it is...yet he just got back from Iceland, and is off to New York next month. Acively said to me today, that if we (me and dd's) end up in a b and b, it'l be no big deal!!
Tells me he's struggling to pay his mortgage..yeah but I have his children and we're struggling too.

It's like he's waiting to see me fail.

Honestly there is such a lump in my throat, it is giving me a headache...and I can't let it go.

PO - long time no speak. So sorry to hear about your shitty day. Want to CAT me and chat on MSN? Nx

hello naswm

AN the thing you said about the box of things from your childhood mkaes a lot of sense. THere are some things that I love, and have passed on to my children. Some things just seem hidous to me. The things I love were made for me by my auntie. My mother threw away one of my favourite toys as soon as she could get away with it- because my auntie made it and she was jealous. Even my ted, when I looked at him today, he seemed a nbit scarey at the same time as being someone who had seen me through some very difficult times.

One of the things I have done today is to get rid of some of my mother's cr*p gifts. The clothes she didn't like that she gave to me as presents, even though they are way too big and mostly quite hideous. All gifts that I have obviously accepted with thanks, even though they were given as acts of contempt, and until now have felt obliged to keep. I felt a bit better for throwing them out.

I agree with Bop. Your parents were the ones in the responsible role when yopu were a child. I can appreciate a little of how you feel, because my mother is a narcissist, she used to be very passive if I was being bullied. I was consistently bullied by her friend's two children, and she just let it happen. My brother was hit one time by the friend's son, and my mother went mad, and made a point of seeing him punished. WHen the same boy punched me hard in the face and gave me a serious nosebleed, she told me to get over it. I remeber that day. It was one of the days when I got homee from school and there was nobody there. I had been given a beautiful white scarf by my nana, and the nosebleed ruined it. I was not allowed to be upset about that aspect of it, either. Sorry, nothing like as bad as your situation. Mine were just a lot of little things like this, that happened every day.

I also agree with your thoughts on rosability's situation. It doesd not really matter what the parents intention was- it is how the child receives it that matters. Most people would, I think see if their approach was badly received and try to make ammends. But clearly our parents did not have our best interests at heart.

Does anyone else find iut hard to sense their own emotions? I find I just get an ovewhelming anxiety when I 'feel' somehing strongly. I say I fear my mother, because I'm guessing that's what it is. But really I caN'T separate the feelings easily. not so much with happy feelings, but most others- excitement, fear, nervous. shy, unease etc. I'm not sure about them. they all come with a big black cloud of anxiety. Does that make sense?

I am sorry I feel very self-absorbed on here, that I do not do enough to support others. But I read it all and I think you are all going through so much and are very brave and insightful.

cross posts PurpleOne. I am so sorry you have had such a terrible day.

Hi Pinky - yes, I have v confused emotions too. Took me years to start 'feeling' them, and yet now, I often still try to block those feelings out (alcohol, drugs, sh, food) cos they are too painful. Keep talking, I am listening...

nas - i dont have cat. email me at cazkenton2003 at yahoo dot com with your msn addy and ill add you from there,
struglling to cope at mo, and i know my parents are behind it all.

i am just too scared to release the anger. theres no one to release it to. my kids would see it, but no one else, and i cant do that.
i can't 'feel' cos no one in rl, and to scared to let it go. and too pissed to deal with it / sleep when dd's go to bed. iyswim?

i dont like going back in memories while sober. got no safety net.

g'night x

PinkyMinxy,
you said you cleared out your old wardrobe. I read (and this actually happened to me) that when you start uncovering your childhood emotions and hurt, you start wanting to do a real physical clear-out of things in your home. You may find that clothes you thought looked good no longer seem "right" anymore. This is because you change so much inside (and become stronger, even if it doesn't feel like it at the time).
On the first thread a poster called Greensleeves mentioned that she was "camping out in her own life" i.e she hadn't organised her cupboards or anything in a way that made sense to her, because she couldn'T really be herself. But I think as she started healing she started to organise her home.

Just posted on mental health.

This has been going on so long now I am not sure how I will get through it and out the other side.

Nabster - I was in foster care for a while although I don't remember it. Please keep talking to us. Your heart has been broken by your first love? and your mother. I sometimes feel you have to hit rock bottom (I did when DS was born), be broken into pieces so that you can begin the healing process of piecing yourself back together like a jigsaw and mend yourself. I remember thinking my family would be better off without me and I should just walk off a bridge. I have come a long way since then but I know when you are in that black pit, it feels like there is no way out. So sorry you are having a bad day

AN - Thanks for your kind words. I am shocked and saddened by your experience of sexual abuse. Don't ever feel it was in anyway because of you (although I think it is common to feel this way). Look at your own children, their innocence. It is NEVER the child's fault. Your adoptive mother should have protected you. There is a myth that adoptive parents must be wonderful, loving people. There was an article in the Family section of The Gaurdian on Saturday about a guy who was abused by his adoptive parents. He has wrote a book so I will try to look it up.

Letting him go just breaks my heart but I haven't even got him anyway.

I can relate to the having a clearout urge. I have felt like buying a whole new wardrobe recently. And I want a completely different look to what I have had until now. New colours, new styles, definately more feminine and girly. Until now i have been in black/cowpat (AN's description) jeans, boots. Really blokeish and manly. And I have felt perfectly 'at home' in these sorts of clothers. But recently I have felt 'uncomfortable' and just want to look completely different. I am a little (or a lot) scared about trying new styles/colours etc but I am determined to do it. It is I'm sure something to do with 'off with the old (me) and on with the new'.

Also childhood things. I actually feel sad that i have nothing from my childhood, no toys, preents, 'things'. Although i don't know how i would feel if i was given a box of stuff, possibly quite sick as AN has described. I don't even know if there is any 'stuff' left from my childhood, i think my parents may have thrown it all away. Even before i cut them off they didn't seem to have any stuff from my childhood. They were hoarders over everything else but i remember they threw out many of my school books that i had wanted to keep. I have bought boxes for my DC's and am keeping little bits and pieces that i think they and I would like to look at again in years to come. I don't think my parents thought that way at all about any of my school 'creations'. They didn't keep anything, and yet our house was always full of clutter and untidy. Just goes to show how much they valued me, or didn't rather.

Nabster just read your thread in mental health. People were being quite black and white, but it is rarely that simple is it?

Funny about the childhood box. Last time I was at my parents they gave me a box of stuff to look through. My mother got offended because I didn't want to keep a lot of it. There was a lot of medals, books and badges from my running days. I chucked it all out when I got home. That was my father's dream not mine. I did it to please him, was pushed and bullied into it. It felt so good chucking it.

I kept a photo of me and my birth mother. My adoptive mother does not seem to like or accept that I have feelings towards my birth mother. Why? It is almost as if she wanted to take that away from my birth mother, a power thing.

That is very sad they didn't keep your things oneplusone. I will be sure to keep things for my children. I am at least glad my parents kept some stuff that means something to me.

Just had a little row with DH about something completely ridiculous. I asked him if was taking any anti-histamines at the moment as he has allergies. He said no and he asked me (i have hayfever) i said no and he said he thought i should take something every day now that hayfever season is starting. I said no, i'd rather only take something if my hayfever kicks off as some years i don't get it so i don't want to take medication unnessecarily (sp?). I suppose i was annoyed with him as i felt like he was telling me what to ie take medication instead of leaving it to my own judgement.

Anyway, he said that i was unable to just accept listen to his opinion on things and that i always got 'aggressive' with him if i disagreed with his opinion. He said i should just calmly say no to his opinion and say i would rather just do things my way.

I just don't know. I think i do get agressive at times with him over things where we are disagreeing, but i realise now i am probably being 'triggered' by him in some way, hence my ott aggressive reaction when really all i need to say to him is thanks but no thanks or something similar.

I haven't attempted to explain this 'triggering' thing to DH as yet. I just don't think he'll understand and he'll probably feel aggrieved that once again he is having to bear the brunt of some more cr*p my parents have left me.

I definately do not take kindly to being told what to do, even in the nicest possible way. It really gets me going and i am sure it is from when i always felt i was ordered about by my dad. DH is nothing like my dad and doesn't order me about at all.

But i think i was feeling a bit tense even before we 'talked' about anti-histamines (!) and tbh i think anything he said would have 'triggered' me off. Don't know why i was feeling angry though....I really need to pay more attention to feelings being triggered. I have such a habit of ignoring my feelings though, it is automatic for me to ignore any angry/painful feelings. But they stay somewhere there just below the surface and burst out at the slightest little thing.

I can relate to what somebody said above (sorry not sure who) about not really being able to identify what exactly you are feeling but just knowing in general that you are feeling something and just feeling anxious/tense in general. That is me. I find it really hard to identify to myself what exactly i am feeling sometimes, whether i am tense/anxious/angry/upset, i just have this general feeling of perhaps all those emotions rolled into one. And then it is usually when i am triggered by DH/DC's or anything really, that my emotions spill out and i can begin to work out what they are.

Again i am sure this is a legacy from childhood, always ignoring my feelings, always burying them and never having any help/support from my parents in making sense of my feelings. Lots of the books talk about this, about how important it is for parents to help their children 'manage' their emotions. Help identify and cope with them. I never had that, my mother was way too scared of any sort of emotion except 'happy' to even allow me to express it to her never mind help me identify and cope with it.

I know one thing that definately sets me off is when DH says something but it is as if his mother is talking. She's a total keeping up appearances nutter and seems to think the world will end if she or anyone in her family commits what she thinks is a social faux pas. She has brainwashed DH into thinking the same way and so he often comes out with things that could have come straight out of her mouth and i immediately react - badly.

I also get irritated when DH does well meaning things without thinking or asking me first and ends up wasting money by buying things we/I don't need. But i don't know how to handle my irritation, i try and bottle it but of course it just comes out later at something else.

I guess at the core of it all is that when growing up we simply were not shown how to communicate, particularly when somebody in the family did something we did not like. I had the same pattern as a child/teenager/young adult. People within my family would do little things that irritated/annoyed me, i would bottle it all up and eventually would explode at something seemingly minor or trivial. So the person at whom i exploded would be getting all my bottled annoyances/irritations thrown at them. This would start a massive row as said person would feel i was totally flying off the handle which i was but had no idea then what was happening.

I can see the same pattern now but don't know how to stop it as i don't know how to manage the minor irritations of day to day life. Some i do genuinely manage to ignore and let go of fairly easily but other things really irriate me and i need to air my feelings but i just don't know how. And often it is not until a while later that i even realise i am annoyed/irritated/upset and it seems inappropriate to bring it up so much later.

If anyone has any experience or ideas on how to tackle this i would be very grateful.

My sister has arrived back at her home. She has rung our house 3 times and my mobile twice. I haven't answered. She will be getting drunk, no doubt. This is usually when I get the endless phonecalls. If I answer she stays on the phone for hours and hours and the stories get more and more ridiculous as time goes on. I am just not prepared to have my children's day spoiled because I have her bending my ear all day whilst she gets drunk.

I have only really started noticing how my mum and my sis do this with the phone. Most people leave a messsage then I ring them back at some point when it'a convenient. But my sis and my mum expect an immediate response. Sis keeps ringing and ringing until I answer, h him. I think maybe I am just more tolerant of children this age than he is. I have worked wioth preschool and primary age children most of my adult life, so I suppose I have the experience to fall back on.but I am no t doing it anymore. My mum expects me to react immediately to her calls. She has taken to ringing my husband if I don't answer straight away- she is clearly trying to coerce him. I almost jumped out of my skin when DH's phone went yesterday with yet another call from my mum. MY therapist was trying to explain this reacting thing to me. DH described it as neuro linguistic programming, I'm guessing you are all familiar with it. Because my mother and my sis call me so much I am in a near constant stae of anxiety, but DH says that because I am not answering them, as they expect me to, they will be experiencing anxiety, because they need to manipulate me to feel better. Just as I needed to tell thenm everything or else the guilt of not doing so seemed unbearable. But I am obviously getting better, as I don't want to tell them anything much anymore. But the reaction is still there.

I have been thinking again about the toys. I have as I say, one or two that I like- one that I have given to my son, it holds happy memories fro me of playing with my nana. It was made by my auntie and my mother couldn't wait to get rid, but I rescued it. But my ted I have left in the back of my wardrobe. I find it hard to look at him, but I can't get rid of him.

Many of my toys turned out not actually to be mine, when it came down to it. I was punished as a teenager for making other things out of some of my old posessions, because apparrently they were not really mine to do as I please with. In the same way as my doll cot was re-given to my DD by them. They didn't even dust it or wash the tatty bedding, I was disgusted by the state of it and felt ashamed for my DD. I have made all new bedding for it, but I'm not sure she likes it. I may buy her a new one.

oneplusone I would love to know, too, as this happens with me. DH and I can be very irritable with each other.

I also bottle up day to day irritations from people, but usually talk to my DH about them. It is an interesting concept, how families should communiacte their irritations to each other? Even the most functional, loving families get annoyed with each other.

I suppose it is distinguishing between those minor irritations which are worth letting go and those which you need to, and should voice.

It is about being assertive and having the self confidence to express your wishes. Something all of us on here struggle with because of our past. Supposedly this can be done in a nice way which doesn't offend others.

Currently my SIL and her kids are visiting and staying with my MIL. I am always expected to go and visit them. It is not far and my MIL does have a much bigger house but I am irritated because I am pregnant and believe they should come here sometimes and maybe give me a break. Now I should just express this and explain that I am tired and could they come here. They are not toxic, so they would probably listen. Instead I stew about it and get annoyed with them.

It is also trying to understand that people rarely do things to personally annoy you, but I think with our pasts we feel people don't value us and do it on purpose. I always take things personally.

Don't know if I can write this but - here goes. Had an invitation yesterday, out of the blue. To my aunt and uncle's diamond wedding do, in July. (mother's bro). We have had no contact with them for 2 or 3 years now. I was never close to them - hardly knew them growing up, they lived abroad (like all my aunts, uncles and cousins) for a lot of my childhood, and never lived close even when back in the UK. Their only DC is 11 years older than me and never took the slightest bit of interest in me; she might as well be a stranger. It was like having a virtual extended family rather than a real one.

I was estranged from my own old family once before, for several years, but then got back in touch with them (at the encouragement of a therapist I was working with). After that, there were a few family reunions, often at the home of the aunt and uncle this invitation has come from. I was at one of these some years back - maybe 10 years or so - and this aunt (mother's bro's wife) started talking to me about an incident that happened when I was about 15. They and my maternal grandparents (mother's father and stepmother) were visiting us, and we were all in the back yard for a photo, when my brother called out to me from the first floor and when I looked up, poured a bucket of water over my head. I had completely forgotten this incident, there were so very many like that, he almost never said anything to me that wasn't an insult or did anything that wasn't offensive/hurtful/a put down/threatening.

My aunt, when recalling this, expressed shock that no one in my family had done anything about this, that it was just passed off as if nothing had happened, as she thought it was really unacceptable. It was and is the only time anyone in my family at all has actually volunteered information like that to suggest that my brother did not behave properly towards me (although another cousin I also got to know much later once said that in her fanily he was referred to as "the monster child" because he was so obnoxious, and they only ever met him about 3 times). My parents always minimised and legitimised his behaviour in every way possible, which is why I kind of know where you're coming from, AN, and they even punished me for trying to stand up to him. I would have loved for my aunt to say all this in front of my family but it was only said in a very (for her) quiet voice, and I wasn't even sure if she was slightly blaming me too for not defending myself more.

Anyway.. a bit more context... so, no contact with this aunt and uncle, not even xmas cards for a few years now; they didn't even send a card when DS was born 18 months ago, or for his 1st birthday; they must know that there is an estrangement because we weren't at my parents' golden wedding do or my niece's 18th (although I do see my niece and nephew, and being left out of that was very hurtful indeed but that's another story) but this invite came addressed to me, my DH and DS. And it COMPLETELY threw me.

And today I completely lost it. DS fell asleep early in the car and then woke up which meant he wouldn't go down for his long lunchtime nap, and if I don't have that time to stop I get really desperate. (18 months with not a single unbroken night, and for the first year he wouldn't sleep at home in the day except on me, so my breaks are really precious to me now.) I kept walking into things today and hurting myself, which is something I do a lot of when I'm upset (I too got called clumsy and cack-handed on a virtually daily basis, PinkyMinxy, by my "loving" parents) the old feeling of somebody being out to really hurt me ballooned out of control, and it was terrifying. I couldn't take it and deal with it with on my own as an adult because DS was just wide awake, and I felt like I was going insane - I just kept yelling at him, sobbing, and practically screaming because I just couldn't cope. I really couldn't cope. Times like that I have nothing for him, I'm so desperate myself that there's nothing left over, and it kills me. I could feel all the violence swirling round in me - this feeling of wanting to hit out, at him (though I never, never would) and at myself -and even while it's happening, I know intellectually where it's coming from and why BUT IT'S NO USE, knowing what the feelings are doesn't stop them and in some ways it just makes it worse, because I think that I SHOULD be able to deal with it, and when I know what I went through, the terror of doing that to my precious, precious darling son...

I use a particular form of writing as my main technique for dealing with things on my own, but I haven't been able to do nearly as much of that since he was born, obviously, and holding it all in is so hard. I only got out of it eventually today by managing to connect with my anger about it all - one f**ing invitation and this is the effect it has on me, any contact with that family at all, because of the very thought of being anywhere near them and their concrete denial yet again. I wish I could just let go - but I still fantasise about being part of the big loving happy family they pretend they are, although the longer it goes on the more I know it's doomed never to be. I was so scared today at the strength of my reaction, at the bare fact that deep inside I am STILL - after TWENTY YEARS of trying to resolve this - so indelibly hurt and incapacitated by them.

It's really hard for me to admit how bad this is, but at the same time I do feel better for getting it out, and once again, thank you everyone who posts on here for creating a place where we can share the stuff that can't be talked about most of the time. Sorry I haven't been able to answer anyone else's posts today; will try and come back when things are easier. Just - PurpleOne, I am so sad for you.

Saying a quick hello - not sure I am up to 'sharing' much here atm, but I will look for your other thread Nabster.

Re toys, I have one toy, rediscovered fairly recently - altho I was given it when I was a teenager, but it got 'put in a box' and 'fogotten' about for xxx years.

that makes me think about photos. I am looking at 3 photos of little me. That is all I have of me. I am supposed to be 'loving' her and being compassionate with her. But I look at that child and it isnt me....

Nx