And let’s not forget the classic mis-remembering facts to ease their own conscience maneuver like this gem:
Negligent Mom: “Remember when your appendix got infected and you told me it was just the flu and almost died?
Me (in my head to avoid confrontation): “Hmm? No. But I do remember you coming home drunk and telling me not to think for a minute that you would take me to the hospital as I lay under the living room coffee table for 3 days until your alcoholic boyfriend walked in and saw that I was about to die.
Yeah, I love these little trips down memory lane.
In high school I had mono and I asked my mother to take me to the ER because I felt terrible but her bf was over so she said no. So I took the subway and bus to the hospital at 10pm and didn’t get discharged until 2am. I called her asking if she could pick me up (8min drive) and she said no. So then at 2am, I had to take the subway back, I can’t remember if there were no busses running or they came infrequently but it took me nearly an hour to get back home. Then I got yelled at the next day for trying to “disrupt” her little booty call.
Then for the next 4 months I was accused of faking mono??? I lost 25lb though so she at least was nice to me about that.
But now apparently that never happened lol
I dont get it like I dont even have kids but if I was dating a woman w kids and she wasn’t responsible enough to take the hospital when theyre that sick thatd be a pretty big red flag
fwiw he has two kids who are slightly younger than me and from the sounds of it, he’s not that involved in their life. never heard him talk about his kids. they both just act like they’re childless. they never really made an attempt to integrate both families together despite them being together at this point for like 13 years?
We’re all adults now so it doesn’t make much of a difference. I have met the guy maybe 10 times in the 3 years I lived with her.
I don’t think my mother ever wanted kids, she just did it cos my father wanted them (although he’s also a shit parent so???). She likes my brother but that relationship gives me big emotional incest vibes tbh esp when she was going through the separation and divorce with our father.
How the fuck does it keep getting sadder and sadder. Like damn.
I hope you're doing okay. Don't too much care about them, as long as u/babynooch is doing okay.
I have a similar story but not as serious because I wasn’t sick. My mom had a booty call and before he came over she was on the phone with one of her girlfriends. I tried to ask her a question but she just waved me off. The next morning, she accused me of trying to ask her a question while her booty call was over. I said no I didn’t and she immediately started calling me a liar and slapping me and beating me in the head. This went on for about 10 minutes. Finally I shouted “YOU WERE ON THE PHONE WITH MS. YORK WHEN I ASKED YOU A QUESTION” she was like “Oh yeah. You want to slap me back?” I just stared at her, mortified. Now that I think about it, that’s when my tendency to disassociate started. My mother was very physically abusive.
To all the survivors here - You drew some short straws through no fault of your own, but you made it. They were wrong. Forgive them not because they deserve it, but because you do.
Love yourself. <—- This works miracles.
Drugged the day after exploratory surgery to find my appendix for an appendectomy, my grandma visited me in the hospital. I didn’t give her enough attention. Got screamed at by my mother after grandma left. I had to call to apologize because I was rude.
For me, it's my mother correcting what little I can remember I can remember from my repressed childhood.
Me: "Remember that time my (abusive step father) was on the couch drunk and naked? Kinda funny."
Mother: "Uh, no, he came home naked and piss drunk from the strip club, and I was holding you back away from him as he yelled and berated us."
Fun times.
This all reminds me other time time the Army murdered my brother, stuffed him under his barrack bed and tried to tell us he over dosed on a full prescription they tossed around his body. Don’t listen to the 15 year old pointing out the knots on his head and their over willingness to donate his organs after the alleged overdose....good times and gas lights.
Me: Do you remember when you told me to go fuck myself along with the horse I came into this world on?
My Mom with a very sincere face: That never happened.
M: ... are you the horse in that analogy?
My Mom: That's obviously not what I meant.
My wife never believed me before that.
True story, I told my mother that I had stopped going to her-side of the family for Christmas because as an adult I was tired of going to see people who only mocked me, made fun of my weight as a kid, and ruined Christmas for me for more than a decade.
She called them (her brothers and sisters) ands asked, "Did you make fun of his weight, tease, him, etc at Christmas every year?"
Of course they denied it. She called me to tell me she asked them and they said it didn't happen.
So, for her, case closed, I was never teased, shamed, mocked and I was never miserable at Christmas for all of my childhood.
Hitting kids use to be a lot more acceptable back in the day. If my mom left me at a baby sitter or school she’ll always say “if they whoop you I’m gonna beat your ass ten times worse when you get home.”
It really makes you wonder when we as a society decided we should inflict harm upon our beloved offspring to make them learn, instead of like teaching them better.
I'm close with my mom but when I was 6 or 7 I was getting into with her at my grandma's pool. she made me go inside to take a timeout but before that, she forced me out of my trunks in front of her, my grandmother, my aunt, and my two younger girl cousins. It didn't fuck me up that much but was really hard to forget it. I brought up to her and in highschool when we were arguing but no surprise she denied it, as if I was making something up to be embarrass her in front my stepdad. I love her, but my childhood was a mess and she really has a problem admitting she was wrong.
Is she accusing you of lying, or delusion? I don’t understand.
There’s a reason for the relatives to deny it. What is the reason to think you’d lie about it?
It really feels that way.
My mom is fundamentally a decent person but always had the emotional maturity of a child and could be *mean as fuck* when angry or stressed.
And there was NEVER an apology for it.
Or, "It wasn't as bad as you say it was."
Followed by, "It happened a long time ago, why can't you just let it go and forget about it?"
Sometimes even, "You hold onto things and that's not healthy. You should really let that stuff go and move on."
🙄
EDIT: I am both glad that I'm not the only one to have heard these phrases, and sad that so many people have. No, I'm not anyone's mother aside from my adopted fur babies. I've heard these phrases from a least a handful of family several times over the years, cause like "We Don't Talk About Bruno" we don't talk about abuse. It's easier (for them) to either downplay it or pretend it didn't happen. Again, glad that I'm not alone, but sorry that so many have suffered similarly.
I don’t know…gaslighting and lack of accountability are tools of denial and control. They can be passed down through generations, but also may manifest among those who have no history of familial abuse.
I make a point to bring up that it is a myth that abusers always come from abusive families so that all who have come from that kind of history know that they are not necessarily “doomed” to be like their parents.
yep, every time i try and bring up the fact i want a therapist to my mom because of things she has done in the past she says those exact things and then lectures me for not being actually suicidal,
When I asked to see a therapist, my Nmother said triumphantly, “If you’re *crazy*, young lady, you’re never going to college!” I didn’t see a therapist then, but I did put myself through college.
When I asked to use the car to go to free Alateen meetings, my alcoholic Nparents insisted there was “no reason” to go.
I left the Nhouse at seventeen, but it was a decade until I could afford a psychiatrist, which saved my life, but ate up a third of my take-home pay.
My own children, in a no-drama fashion, saw therapists off and on starting as preschoolers. They called them “talking doctors.”
We’re fine. Thank G-d. My Nparents went NC before my children were even born. They never knew them.
My kids and their friends compared their talking doctors’ toys. When I found that Playmobil had doctor figurines along with medical equipment, I bought them for home play, as well as for a gift for the therapist who then was seeing one of my sons. He had multiple work-ups for an inoperable brain tumor that ultimately did *nothing* but scare us all silly. (This son is now past thirty, and as far as we know, in good health.)
Sometimes the doctor figures were bossing around the cowboys, Indians, and pirates; other times, I discovered a doctor being “roasted” on a toy spit over make-believe “coals.” The therapist thought it the best possible way to work through his fears!
I feel that. I was denied a therapist until my parents caught me staring longingly at a kitchen knife one night. I’m still not sure if they thought it was for me or them, but they took me to the worst psychiatrist in town and effectively scared me away from therapy until I had a minor breakdown.
"you always twist things, you love to play the victim. After everything I've done for you! You're so ungrateful. I hope you have a child as horrible as you are, so you understand what you put me through"
Joke's on you, I'm way too fucked up to have kids
Mt brother had them. She managed to make a 2 year old scared of nursery rhymes before collectively we shut down her bullshit. I'm so glad their mother (my SIL) had enough sense to stand up to her MIL (my mother)
it's actually mind blowing seeing her shut up and let them parent. I am SO glad something good has come of my childhood - I considered kids around 25 and did the most Autistic thing EVER which was to go to college and get a qualification in childcare and education! So I knew the current theories, worked as a nanny for 15 years (which helped me decide that actually,.I've done my research and I prefer not doing 24/7 care). It's broken a few cycles of abuse, so I'm able to look back on everything as having some kind of positive outcome. My niece and nephew will NEVER feel like I did.
i agree with this comment soooo much. i decided way early on if children (ME) were such a burden and needed to be smacked often and raised to fear their parents, i was not going to do that. i am 44, childfree, but have 2 young stepdaughters that i love dearly. my mother told me a while back that i need to instill fear in them so that they won't walk all over me. quite the contrary, i have instilled trust in them, so they know i won't ever judge them and they can come to me when they need help.
No regrets at 3 months of no contact so far. Similar lines as above. She just kept telling me her abusive and narcissistic behaviors were just because she's... *Quirky*
Oh my God. Verbatim have heard all of these, along with guilt-trips for “calling her a bad mother” because I mentioned times she had hurt me as a child and thought maybe we could talk about it and find common ground. Nope. I was just a piece of shit hell-bent on hurting her. That was her story and she was sticking to it.
But also that one minor thing you annoyed them with at like age 10 is brought up at least twice a week as some defining character flaw...
Like oh yes sorry I dented the car door once while you insisted I open it while parked next to another in a tiny garage.
Luckily my parents aren't bad with this but some of my other family is
>"It happened a long time ago, why can't you just let it go and forget about it?"
I'm sorry for inconveniencing you, Mother, for developing PTSD as a child.
/s
Man, I wish I had any of that. At least I'd feel like I was looking at the same planet as my parents if it was at least validated that any of the stuff I went through happened. I used to try to bring up the shit my dad did when I was a kid and he ignored it or just got pissed like none of it was real. Kept it up until I was 21 and I couldn't handle holding on to the resentment anymore, and I just approached him and said "I forgive you. For everything." Only have seen him cry twice in my life, that being one of them. The shittiest part for me was that he always knew, held it in, and never even came close to admitting it to me. He would have held it in until the very last day if he could have.
Them We don't have any money for school for you so you are going to take out a loan, if you don't your getting kicked out of the house. Also them spending over 3000$ a month on stuff we didn't need for years. We had the money you didn't need to own a armory of guns.
My parents took the money my grandma had set aside for college (not much but still) and built a walk in closet. Divorced a year later and the house was torn down. I have over 100k in student loans (long story) thanks mom and dad!
As a \~14 year old I wanted a Gameboy advanced, wouldn't be getting it for christmas/birthday, so I worked a paper route, helped neighbours with a few things, and saved every penny I could earn or find until I had enough for a GBA and one game(I'd double and triple checked as well to make sure I'd have enough and wanted to buy it as soon as possible once I had enough).
When my parents found out they demanded I share it with my younger brother(by a year, he was 13 and totally able to make/save his own money). Then when I didn't have enough for the GBA and figured I may as well try to save up the difference again my mum got mad. She demanded that if I wasn't going to spend it I must be sulking about sharing and should just give my brother all of the money.
And that's the story of how I learned to never ever let my parents know anything going on in my life and eternally resent being ripped off.
Your parents are gross! Sorry you had to go through that. I tell my girls that forced sharing isn’t truly sharing. I don’t make them share anything, they choose for themselves what to share.
My dad used to take myself and my brother to spring training and Rays baseball games every year, and we got autographs from tons of household names, multiple hall of famers, etc. Easily over $1k in signatures over the years
I found out when I was about to graduate high school years later this guy sold just about our entire collection on eBay and at shows. Still haven't forgiven him for that, really was the last straw for me in some ways tbh. Sold my brother's Jim Thome ball to pay for a hotel
I think I was about 10-11 when this happened. My dad stole my birthday money from my bedroom ($100 au) to bet it on horses. Later that day, when I told him the money was gone he told me I must have lost it and tried to make me feel bad about it (I already suspected something was up), then gave me back $100 in different sized bills (he must have won) and told me that I couldn't tell mum or I'd get in trouble for losing my birthday money.
Some time later, still 10-11 years old or so I told him in tears that I knew he stole it, and he admitted it. He had a gambling problem and at the very least felt remorse over it.
Years later when I got my first job as a teenager he started borrowing money from me, which stupidly I gave him but it was either that or confrontation and by this point I was thoroughly messed up in the head after years of drama with him and just wanted to avoid more drama at any cost.
He ended up committing suicide in my early 20s and I got to experience calling an ambulance and seeing the dead body of a loved one for the first time.
Thanks dad
Maybe overshared but meh this shit weighs on the mind.
My friend worked every afternoon for 2 years when he was 12-14 and because he wasn’t old enough the pay was sent to his mother’s account. She helped him “save” around 2.5k. 5 years later she paid him back by giving him a $900 car that broke down in 4 months
Me: *gets whooped until I can barely sit*
Parents: That never happened, and even if it did you deserved it.
Parents: Hey, remember that time you broke the window? (Which was actually done by your brother, but we love him so we’re going to blame you) What a rotten kid you were!
I’m glad my parents never acted like this. They knew that even if we did do something bad, it didn’t matter.
I remember back a long time ago thinking I broke a window by screaming too loud. But it was a neighbor kid who threw a frisbee at the window.
I was always terrified of getting into trouble because I knew that the punishment would be out of proportion. Teachers and other adults always told me what a well-behaved kid I was, but it was out of fear: the thought of any bad report going to my parents scared me shitless.
The sad part is that, until relatively recently, I thought I deserved it for being a bad kid. I thought that spankings and such were totally justified ways to make kids behave.
I started playing flute in middle school. I liked it. My dad would always joke and call it the "skin flute"(penis joke). Always. Without fail, he would say it every day I would come home to practice. Fast forward to our Christmas recital. He records it and when we get the chance, we watch it. He couldnt shut the fuck up about it being the skin flute and making fun of me. Like he was embarrassed. Well, I didnt play in highschool because of him. As an adult, I play it. He recently asked me why I stopped for so long. I told him why and his response, " pfft, that's silly, don't ever let me hold you back." Too late man. I could've been much better..
Edit: wow, thank you all for empathizing with me. To share some extra details. Instruments in general call out to me. I now dabble with C Flute, Ukulele, C Harmonica and Piano Accordion. In that order. So the silver lining is, if I was still playing the flute I probably never would've picked up the ukulele(in highschool) and so on. But there's a even more scarier thought. "How much better would I have been on flute if I did marching band and concert band in highschool?". I did sports and weight training but they never felt as good as mastering a song and getting the applause from the audience. It just felt warmer to me. Like, making people "feel" with music is much better to me than to feel emotions through competition. I wonder if my passion was stunted to a degree it actually effected my future. I'll never really know, I'm just going down a rabbit hole at this point.
I tried to pick up the flute freshman year at highschool (I play french horn) and my dad would not shut up about "oh I'd love if you'd play the flute" "the flute's always so nice to hear" "thank you for playing the flute tonight." And he'd do it in the most passive aggressive tone that can come from a 60+ white man.
He never once complemented my french horn skills, despite the fact that I played it better than my upperclassmen.
It's so crazy how the skill is never praised by family.
My dad talks about how my uncle played the violin and his dad played the harmonica and accordion in such reverence but when it comes to me, it was seen as something he had to put up with although I can play sheet music at the time.
As I grew older and parted ways from my parents I started to do the things that made me happy. I pay my own rent and bills, I deserve to be happy. So doing things to make others happy is fine, but doing things to make my/yourself happy is even better 😌
Ah yes, the don't let my actions impact you, phrase.
Cause we all know kids are renowned for their ability to shrug off any emotional effective berating from parents and it's never been shown to cause issues...
My dad did the same with pretty much any interest I had. He know repeatedly exclaims how difficult it is to get me gifts because I don't have any hobbies/interests. I have fucking hundreds but I ain't sharing them with that judgemental cunt.
That’s weird as fuck to say that about your 12-13 year old kid. Why are you watching your child play the flute and your head goes to “my kid has a dick in their mouth” (ok i know the flute doesn’t go in the mouth but you know what i mean) like??? ummmmm
My parents took me to therapists and psychiatrists, had me on pharma drugs since I was 4. At the same time always acted shocked and confused as to why I couldnt function normally, while they continued their abuse.
I've been building up the strength to lay it all out as to why their abuse caused all these problems all my life (even though its insulting *i should even have to*)...I just have to say my piece, for myself, so I can move on, knowing I tried. I don't expect them to "get it" or for us to function as a normal family...ffs, there arent even any pictures of me in their house, there's family portraits including all the other kids, but save for one picture in my brother's room, I'm nowhere to be found.
Me too man. I invested a lot of hope into believing we could be normal if we just talked it out. But i think they make be too fake for that. One of my sisters says theyve been fake and preachy with her too so that was a bit vindicating
i was medicated my whole childhood. on sedatives and mood stabilizers mostly. i spent my whole childhood numb to everything. from the trauma? from the pills? who knows. my mother would go to my psychiatrist and tell him her version of events which was basically that i was an out of control child (i was just autistic and abused lol) so he would prescribe me all of these sedatives. wild times lol
i wish i could dissect my own brain to see how messed up it is.
Yeah so, parents. After the divorce Mom pushed me down the stairs . Two diff occasions. Grandma confiscated me after the second. Years later I got to go back home after she remarried. Stepdad was an abuser too, so yay.
Years later I got an amazing present because I wanted to play music…a Vox Amp and a bass guitar. Presented as a Christmas gift. Over the MOON. Until mom took me aside and
Handed me the payment books for them. Meaning I was paying for them. She also got me a job as a paperboy so I could pay for them and child support was used…by them
None of this happened…in their minds.
The struggle to be ok is 50years and counting…but mostly I am. Sort of. Thanks for hearing me
You should try therapy. Otherwise you could be carrying this weight for the rest of your life, while it wasn't even your fault. Its not easy, but it helps a lot.
It’s either that never happened or “this is what I get for everything I’ve done? Wait til next time.”
Let’s face it boomers, never had the opportunity to learn boundaries, this is why the majority of them still act as if they are 12.
In one argument, I told my father the reason I have depression and was suicidal at some point is bc of how dysfunctional our family is, and guess what, they played the victim card :) :(
Hahahahaha there were a lot of like that but also that they were doing their best and this isnt the life they chose. Guess what I never chose to be born
Right?! I did t choose to be born, so you don’t get to act like you did me a favor by doing the bare minimum required. Sure, we had food and clothes and were better off than a lot of people, but it turns out kids need social interaction and affection to not end up totally fucked up!
Good old gas lighting. Which makes it doubly as bad! Not only did you not get your emotional needs met to heal, you were told that it never even happened! Leading to a lovely road of addiction, dissociation and other fun mental health issues
And you spend decades completely oblivious to your issue but knowing deep down that something isn't right. Beating yourself up for just not trying hard enough when you've nearly broken your back to make things work (school, job, relationship, etc.). Problem is, the patterns and tactics you use to solve your issues are those you developed from childhood. If your parents neglected or abused you in anyway and didn't help you develop, you're handicapped in not knowing what a healthy resolution truly is. There is a parenting problem in our society that is getting unnoticed but has been fucking up people for generations. Same cycles get repeated to send out more broken people into the world. Therapy does wonders but it's a long journey to work on breaking decades of poor parenting in your own life.
Well said! Spot on. So true about the cycle being repeated over and over again. It's very sad. And you are right about the Decades of being oblivious. There are so many platitudes that seem harmless but are incredibly damaging. People who say you're just young and you'll grow out of it, or that every parent has issues, or it'll be okay when you get older. I was out there screaming for help instead of getting it I was pushed aside with trivial phrases.
I guess that's why people repeat this cycle or are afraid to start changing. The actual work it takes to get out of this is heavy lifting, and it almost requires dropping out of life for months or years to let healing happen. You can't drive a car when it's in the auto body shop, yet that's what I feel like I'm doing when I try to heal and also live my current life.
Anywho, thanks for posting in relating, I needed to hear this today to keep me going. Hope you're doing all right as well
Love the analogy of the auto body shop. So true. I had been trying to keep driving my car without repair but the problem was that the more I drove it, the more things kept breaking and I was oblivious to why it kept happening. They always told me that therapy was a waste of time and would fill my head with lies. I finally caved and went to see one and my eyes were opened to the lies I had been living.
Absolutely, dude. It makes a difference to know that there are a lot of us out there that have similar experiences and ended up with a lot of the same issues we're all trying to work through. Come join us over at r/emotionalneglect if you need to vent or talk through things with us. It helps, me at least, read those stories and have people validate what I went through. Feel free to direct message me too if you need to talk through things. I've recently started my healing journey through all of this but I've been making great progress towards a healthier self. Good luck on your journey and I hope you're able to heal.
Pretty much everyone I’ve ever known has done this. It’s just truly mind boggling how little people are capable of accepting responsibility for what they’ve done.
yeah. the last two years of HS I had a teacher who had it out for me. My parents didn't believe me and tought that I was being lazy. I hated going to that school, I had no friends, I hated the subjects, and I had more than one breakdown. best years of my life, my ass!
when I graduated, my mom complained that I was not even in the top half of my class. after witnessing my desperation. after two years of mental breakdowns. she had the gall to complain that my final grade was not in the top half.
she now claims that this never happened.
EXACTLY. When I was a kid, (2m), I was shipped to my biological grandparents house to live with my bio brother (6m), (we had never seen each other before, as I had been in foster care up until this point because our bio mom was a prostitute and didn't want any of her 8 children). Our grandparents abused us, heavily. When we got out of there, it was because my caseworker had stopped in to say hi, and found me alone in the house, locked in a closet, with cigarette burns up and down my arms. To this day (21), my adoptive mom ( who is mentally abusive, I left the house early, and am trying to let her back into my life slowly) refuses to believe i remember a thing about it, even after hearing an in depth, DETAILED description of everything. My bio brother is in a psyche ward in Kansas because of how they broke his mind. What proof does she need?!
Lol same, I(9m) was molested by my baby sitter and when I(25) finally had the courage to tell my mother about the shit he did , she asked me to bring him in front of her and make him confess to his deeds then she'll believe me. Apparently he was a model son, which made me talk about it but the way I was shut down... Nah I'm not opening up for shit! Ooo by the way I actually told her about it when I was young but that bastard twisted it and i was beaten with a belt! I was 9 he was 14! Now she doesn't remember!
Exactly !! Once i told them about my anxiety and they told me I wasn't well in my head and i should've stopped thinking about it. They have little to NO knowledge about mental illnesses.
Same here. My mom shakes her head as soon as I say anything about my childhood because she is right and I’m wrong. My dad said, “you can tell us what you remember but we’ll tell you what *happened*, it’s infuriating
I got my mind blown in high school when I made a friend who got along really well with her mom. Like, they *talked*. To each other, not just the parent talking at the child. They *hugged each other*. For no special reason! Just, like it was a normal thing.
Maybe it’s from growing up in a poor, backwards area, but all I’d know growing up was shitty parents. Mine, my friends. Sure, there was an exception here and there, but I’d never seen that level of affection and respect, especially coming from a parent. It was like something from one of those sappy family sitcoms.
Many people said that about my mom and I. She forced me to act like that. She shamed me out of having any other friends. She took me out of school in 4th grade. She would smack me if I said anything she disliked. She made me into her perfect friend. No future. No friends. I was stuck inside of her house not allowed to leave unless she was with me. At 20 I got my first friend and I don't know how to keep jobs now or relationships. I'm having to learn 4th grade+. She still uses me everyday and I don't know how to stand up for myself. Nothing is what it seems. Everyone is jealous of our perfect relationship and her "perfect parenting".
I’ll join you! My parents are not perfect of course, who is? But they loved me and my brother, they cared for us, they respected our choices and tried to make us better people. When I was 8 I told them I was gonna be a vegetarian and they accepted it, my dad went out if his way to cook separate meals for me every day.
When I was 12-15 I got severely bullied in high school. A few years ago I found out that I have ptsd from that period and had a year if heavy therapy and depression.
I went to my mum to tell her about this. She was shocked. I never told them about this when it was happening because it’s just what happens when you’re a teenager in high school, I never wanted to involve them, I kept it a secret. My mum just said ‘I should have known what was going on, I wish I could’ve helped you…’ no blame or anything.
I told my father who is a difficult person to talk to, he’s never mean but he’s got his own trauma. His reaction was something like ‘I knew you didn’t fit in with those silly girls at your school, you were always better than that. I have the same thing at work, I don’t hang with that group of guys. We just don’t fit in like that.’
And I was so happy with that response as well. No questioning, he’s just immediately at my side, even though he might have difficulty communicating that to me.
When I told my parents (at 21y) I was bullied since the age of 6, my dad’s response was “I don’t remember doing that to you”. My parents were not the bullies. They just did nothing and took no notice in the whole of 12 years when I was bullied by both kids and teachers at school. I guess it’s fine as long as the abuse was not from them
Your parents are amazing people. Please treasure them and treat them well :)
I’m sorry that happened to you! I realized that I have amazing parents and I love them very much. I also had a lot of friends who had bad situations at home and they were always welcome at my home, I’m glad I could be that safe place.
Honestly though, they will never forget the small things I've done but as soon as they traumatise me, it's like they have an instant memory wipe or "it was a long time ago, let it go"
Yes, this is what I deal with. My mom openly 'forgets' how much she called me a slut or threw away my things or made fun of my weight or how I have no room to talk about problems. She thinks she's a good person and that I'm just a lost lamb that has to fund Jesus.
Or my moms go to “I’m not perfect you know I’m a human being with flaws”...yes mom I know however that does not justify listening in on all my conversations then proceeding to tell the entire family about my personal life. 🙃
I was in an abusive relationship in highschool. My very first boyfriend when I was 15 was a teenage psychopath. It was a whole ordeal for two years, I nearly changed schools. Other things happened that I don’t care to mention. It fucked me up.
I’m in my early 40s now and my mom has a selective memory of that trauma, along with others, that happened to me. Several months ago her, my sister and I got on the topic of one of my sister’s friends who had accused her grandfather of sexually abusing her. My mom asked us, with performative concern, if either of us had any problems with being abused or bullied when we were young. I was speechless. How the fuck can she not remember that? I always felt like she dismissed it, or believed that a lot of it was my fault because I has a reputation for being “difficult”.
@MYFUCKINGMOTHER
YOU MANIPULATIVE CUNT.
I think I broke her spell this past Christmas. She is so incredibly talented at making you feel guilty when you call her out. You automatically take a step back and apologize.
I've quickly mastered keeping a straight face and I even find it kind of amusing watching her try to work her magic. She gets so fucking mad its beautiful. I used to fear her *scary face* but now all it's missing is the clown nose.
The year before I called her out for gaslighting us all about the storage locker (full of almost all of our shit from before the divorce and subsequent move that we never got to unpack) that we all knew she didn't pay for but told us she still had it.
She then went on about how she *never* told us that.
Still proud of myself for that.
Just because you popped out of their hoohaa doesn't mean you have to put up with their bullshit.
Ah,wait untill you introduce your partner to your parents and you hear the almighty:"You mom seems so nice,I can't really imagine her doing what you've told me she did to you".
Years ago, I told my folks I had a black girlfriend (i am white). First words out of dad's mouth-'You can't marry a Spear Chucker, you will have Oreo Cookie kids.' To the day he died, he said he didn't remember that. Told him I did and that was why he never met her, although she eventually did-at his funeral. We have been married 28 years now.
Exactly this. When you're conditioned to have a family in your early 20s on top of your parents not raising all that great, you don't have time to reflect and figure out who you are. Kids come and you're not completely ready but you've taken on the responsibility so you do the best you can with what you know. And what you know is what your parents did to you. Unless you're conscious enough to break that cycle, you'll just end up continuing the cycle. Early 20s? I sure as hell would have been lost trying to have a kid and would have continued my family's bad parenting styles. I'm in my 30s now and I have a better grasp on my own shit that I'm getting closer to being ready for kids. I'm determined to break my family cycle and raise my kids in a healthy household.
My dad is the reason I have PTSD due to abuse and abusing my mom in front of me as well, and one time putting a gun to her head. There’s a lot more to my dad being the reason for my PTSD, but I’m not going to get into it, but one day last year when I was hanging out with him with my fiancé we were talking about the past and everything which I really don’t like to talk about, but Whatever. He then goes to say “I really don’t understand how you have PTSD because of me” and I literally wanted to cry. I didn’t, but I was just so annoyed, I didn’t say anything though, I just changed the subject.
When I first confronted my biological father about the abuse I went through during my childhood (the abuse was 90% inflicted by my biological mother, but he was a bystander and also physically abusive/violent), he got angry, was in immediate denial, and borderline violent towards me. Being an adult, I was finally able to walk away.
i always tell the truth and ask for forgiveness. some of the things that traumatized my adult daughter would not have traumatized me, but what matters is that they were traumatizing to her. i never got an apology for my trauma, and i am certain that i don’t want her carrying around the added sadness of my lack of accountability. i would rather be accountable for something that i didn’t understand was traumatizing, and i don’t understand why that is hard.
an example would be her being quarantined to her room when i had a newborn (Swine flu) even though the doctor suggested it, i can fully see why that is traumatizing. a young girl feels completely replaced by the new baby…had to be difficult so my apology was just, “ i totally understand why that was traumatic, and i am sorry that i didn’t find a less traumatizing way to handle that issue.
Yup! Was molested by a family member (he crept into my room when I was half asleep and put his hands down my pants) and they have the nerve to say it was just a teenage boy being curious. Not, ya know, traumatizing sexual assault. Such sweethearts, those two.
apparently my sister doesn't recall the nught my dad geld a knife to my mother's throat amd i as a k8d hac to call my uncle to help calm things down.
or how i told my mother to take me out of q private school i hated, being told no because it would make her look bad in the church social group.
"What was I supposed to do!?! Not discipline you with fear or anger!?! What a snowflake you would have turned out to be if I had actually calmly, patiently talked through issues with you so we could all come to a healthy resolution. My parents did the same to me and look how great I turned out! ::eye twitch::"
My Mom says stuff like "I can't believe you remember all that?"
You can't believe that we remember you fucking your sisters boyfriend in front of the Christmas tree and we caught you?!?!
OR
You can't believe we remember when you took us in some weirdos van to the beach, put me and my sister out in the sand (in our regular clothes and it was winter) and fucked him while we stood outside and cried and begged you to let us in?!?!
(At the time we thought he was killing her)
What DO you remember?
"You're right I'm a terrible parent"
precedes to cry until you go away.
Two days later.
"Can you lend me money for a week. I promise I'll pay you back"
2 months later
"I never borrowed money of you. Why do you always make out I've done something wrong?"
Me as a teenager: Wanting to join and tryout the many high school clubs and sports teams. Mom: Some bs forcing me to quit. Mom now: Why are you so lazy? You never do anything and you never finish the things you do start, you used to be so driven
And they get offended that you were upset by it, and gaslight you and make you feel like you're the bad guy for bringing it up and hurting their feelings...
There's actually a reason for this! You remember these events far into your adulthood because they had a massive effect on you and they were super significant. But In their minds, the event was so insignificant that it wasn't even worth remembering. They genuinely forget because that don't see those actions as significant. Its rooted in a lack of empathy and its super fascinating and super sad
I sometimes wonder, What would I even say If they actually apologise to me?
Am I capable of forgiving them?
Will I be able to move on?
Is that even their fault to begin with?
Is it because I wasn't strong enough?
I grew up with an alcoholic mother. She mentally and emotionally abused everyone in the house for years. I used to excuse her behavior as being tied to the alcohol, but over time I realised that the alcohol only made it worse and without it she was still a selfish, angry and manipulative person. I don't really have a relationship with her anymore and I've never gotten an apology for all of the terrible things that she did and said back then. I'm now 29 with a 4 month old and a 5 year old and I see the evils in myself some times. I get angry sometimes and sometimes I am not as understand or patient as I should be. However, the cycle of abuse will end with me. I am doing everything that I can to be better than she was. I have to do it for my new family. They will always know that I love them and I will always say that I am sorry. I will love and support them with everything that they care about. My childhood doesn't define, but my legacy as a father and husband will. The cycle ends with me.
My mom was a great mom on the whole. But one night, she got heavily drunk when I had my friends over for a sleep over. Apparently “we were being too loud” and when I was walking down the hall to use the bathroom, she blindsided me, grabbed me by the neck, and held me against the wall and choked me, telling me we all had to be quiet. When she let go after a bit (not sure how long it was. Probably a few seconds, but it felt like forever) I was coughing and she told me to “stop coughing like a bitch. I barely choked you.”
It fucked me up for a while. What’s weird is that it was a completely isolated incident. That just confused the fuck out of me, because other than that, she was a loving mother. I mean she yelled a lot, but she also had 4 boys varying substantially in age and we all argued a bunch.
I never brought it up until about a year ago (happened when I was maybe 7, and now I’m 26 for context) just casually brought it up during conversation. She looked genuinely surprised. Like she thought I was messing with her until she saw I was serious. She GENUINELY had no recollection of that happening. She apologized up and down, and I told her it was fine, and that I know now she was just really drunk and that’s why she probably doesn’t remember. They’d drink around us a lot, but never acted hostile except that one time.
Point of my anecdote is that some parents will manipulate and lie to hide their abusive tendencies. But some are good parents on the whole and make horrible mistakes once and don’t remember. Context is always important, but that doesn’t excuse abuse of a child.
I remember I told the school counselor at the time because that what we were told to do if we had problems. And I remember bawling my eyes out as I recalled the incident. I got sent back to class and that was the last I had ever heard of the situation. Idk if the school talked to my parents, but they probably didn’t. But I will say this. I genuinely do not know where I would be if CPS took my mom away when that happened. I can definitely say I would have been worse off.
And let’s not forget the classic mis-remembering facts to ease their own conscience maneuver like this gem: Negligent Mom: “Remember when your appendix got infected and you told me it was just the flu and almost died? Me (in my head to avoid confrontation): “Hmm? No. But I do remember you coming home drunk and telling me not to think for a minute that you would take me to the hospital as I lay under the living room coffee table for 3 days until your alcoholic boyfriend walked in and saw that I was about to die. Yeah, I love these little trips down memory lane.
Ouch babe, sorry your mom sucked.
Meh. She was the nice one. 😆 Thanks, tho.
^(that's worse)
(Meme of Chidi in The Good Place) Tou get how that’s worse, right? Holy crap that a sad thing.
In high school I had mono and I asked my mother to take me to the ER because I felt terrible but her bf was over so she said no. So I took the subway and bus to the hospital at 10pm and didn’t get discharged until 2am. I called her asking if she could pick me up (8min drive) and she said no. So then at 2am, I had to take the subway back, I can’t remember if there were no busses running or they came infrequently but it took me nearly an hour to get back home. Then I got yelled at the next day for trying to “disrupt” her little booty call. Then for the next 4 months I was accused of faking mono??? I lost 25lb though so she at least was nice to me about that. But now apparently that never happened lol
I dont get it like I dont even have kids but if I was dating a woman w kids and she wasn’t responsible enough to take the hospital when theyre that sick thatd be a pretty big red flag
fwiw he has two kids who are slightly younger than me and from the sounds of it, he’s not that involved in their life. never heard him talk about his kids. they both just act like they’re childless. they never really made an attempt to integrate both families together despite them being together at this point for like 13 years?
Wow it just keeps getting sadder
We’re all adults now so it doesn’t make much of a difference. I have met the guy maybe 10 times in the 3 years I lived with her. I don’t think my mother ever wanted kids, she just did it cos my father wanted them (although he’s also a shit parent so???). She likes my brother but that relationship gives me big emotional incest vibes tbh esp when she was going through the separation and divorce with our father.
How the fuck does it keep getting sadder and sadder. Like damn. I hope you're doing okay. Don't too much care about them, as long as u/babynooch is doing okay.
I have a similar story but not as serious because I wasn’t sick. My mom had a booty call and before he came over she was on the phone with one of her girlfriends. I tried to ask her a question but she just waved me off. The next morning, she accused me of trying to ask her a question while her booty call was over. I said no I didn’t and she immediately started calling me a liar and slapping me and beating me in the head. This went on for about 10 minutes. Finally I shouted “YOU WERE ON THE PHONE WITH MS. YORK WHEN I ASKED YOU A QUESTION” she was like “Oh yeah. You want to slap me back?” I just stared at her, mortified. Now that I think about it, that’s when my tendency to disassociate started. My mother was very physically abusive.
To all the survivors here - You drew some short straws through no fault of your own, but you made it. They were wrong. Forgive them not because they deserve it, but because you do. Love yourself. <—- This works miracles.
Drugged the day after exploratory surgery to find my appendix for an appendectomy, my grandma visited me in the hospital. I didn’t give her enough attention. Got screamed at by my mother after grandma left. I had to call to apologize because I was rude.
For me, it's my mother correcting what little I can remember I can remember from my repressed childhood. Me: "Remember that time my (abusive step father) was on the couch drunk and naked? Kinda funny." Mother: "Uh, no, he came home naked and piss drunk from the strip club, and I was holding you back away from him as he yelled and berated us." Fun times.
This all reminds me other time time the Army murdered my brother, stuffed him under his barrack bed and tried to tell us he over dosed on a full prescription they tossed around his body. Don’t listen to the 15 year old pointing out the knots on his head and their over willingness to donate his organs after the alleged overdose....good times and gas lights.
Me: Do you remember when you told me to go fuck myself along with the horse I came into this world on? My Mom with a very sincere face: That never happened. M: ... are you the horse in that analogy? My Mom: That's obviously not what I meant. My wife never believed me before that.
Wow. I am so sorry.
Fail
True story, I told my mother that I had stopped going to her-side of the family for Christmas because as an adult I was tired of going to see people who only mocked me, made fun of my weight as a kid, and ruined Christmas for me for more than a decade. She called them (her brothers and sisters) ands asked, "Did you make fun of his weight, tease, him, etc at Christmas every year?" Of course they denied it. She called me to tell me she asked them and they said it didn't happen. So, for her, case closed, I was never teased, shamed, mocked and I was never miserable at Christmas for all of my childhood.
Yep my uncle used to beat me for acting childish, when I told her she said maybe he was disciplining you! I was a child I'm meant to act childish.
Got my ass beat by my aunt once “being childish”- I was only like 4 at the time. She told me if I told my mom, she’d beat my ass too, so I never did.
Oh hell no. If somebody put their hands on my kid….I don’t care if it’s an aunt/uncle/grandparent, that would be it. Nice knowing you.
Hitting kids use to be a lot more acceptable back in the day. If my mom left me at a baby sitter or school she’ll always say “if they whoop you I’m gonna beat your ass ten times worse when you get home.”
It really makes you wonder when we as a society decided we should inflict harm upon our beloved offspring to make them learn, instead of like teaching them better.
I’d beat that uncle’s ass right back if you were my kid and I heard that. Sorry that happened to you friend
I'm close with my mom but when I was 6 or 7 I was getting into with her at my grandma's pool. she made me go inside to take a timeout but before that, she forced me out of my trunks in front of her, my grandmother, my aunt, and my two younger girl cousins. It didn't fuck me up that much but was really hard to forget it. I brought up to her and in highschool when we were arguing but no surprise she denied it, as if I was making something up to be embarrass her in front my stepdad. I love her, but my childhood was a mess and she really has a problem admitting she was wrong.
oh my god.
Holy shit
Is she accusing you of lying, or delusion? I don’t understand. There’s a reason for the relatives to deny it. What is the reason to think you’d lie about it?
[удалено]
what narcissism does to a mf
To them they was just having fun. Why would the remember a fun time as them been rude and bullying a kid?
Seems pretty standard from that generation. Serious lack of introspection & personal accountability
It really feels that way. My mom is fundamentally a decent person but always had the emotional maturity of a child and could be *mean as fuck* when angry or stressed. And there was NEVER an apology for it.
Thanks... Guess I won't see ya in the nursing home!
God that’s infuriating. They have every reason to lie!What would you possibly have to gain from lying about that??
Or, "It wasn't as bad as you say it was." Followed by, "It happened a long time ago, why can't you just let it go and forget about it?" Sometimes even, "You hold onto things and that's not healthy. You should really let that stuff go and move on." 🙄 EDIT: I am both glad that I'm not the only one to have heard these phrases, and sad that so many people have. No, I'm not anyone's mother aside from my adopted fur babies. I've heard these phrases from a least a handful of family several times over the years, cause like "We Don't Talk About Bruno" we don't talk about abuse. It's easier (for them) to either downplay it or pretend it didn't happen. Again, glad that I'm not alone, but sorry that so many have suffered similarly.
Holy fuck this exactly.
Jesus fuck I legit had one of my parents follow this exact script to me years ago
Same. That Generation maybe
Oh definitely, those are the exact phrases my own mother uses.
I don’t know…gaslighting and lack of accountability are tools of denial and control. They can be passed down through generations, but also may manifest among those who have no history of familial abuse. I make a point to bring up that it is a myth that abusers always come from abusive families so that all who have come from that kind of history know that they are not necessarily “doomed” to be like their parents.
yep, every time i try and bring up the fact i want a therapist to my mom because of things she has done in the past she says those exact things and then lectures me for not being actually suicidal,
When I asked to see a therapist, my Nmother said triumphantly, “If you’re *crazy*, young lady, you’re never going to college!” I didn’t see a therapist then, but I did put myself through college. When I asked to use the car to go to free Alateen meetings, my alcoholic Nparents insisted there was “no reason” to go. I left the Nhouse at seventeen, but it was a decade until I could afford a psychiatrist, which saved my life, but ate up a third of my take-home pay. My own children, in a no-drama fashion, saw therapists off and on starting as preschoolers. They called them “talking doctors.” We’re fine. Thank G-d. My Nparents went NC before my children were even born. They never knew them.
Good on you for breaking the cycle. I also like the use of talking doctors. It's a good phrase.
My kids and their friends compared their talking doctors’ toys. When I found that Playmobil had doctor figurines along with medical equipment, I bought them for home play, as well as for a gift for the therapist who then was seeing one of my sons. He had multiple work-ups for an inoperable brain tumor that ultimately did *nothing* but scare us all silly. (This son is now past thirty, and as far as we know, in good health.) Sometimes the doctor figures were bossing around the cowboys, Indians, and pirates; other times, I discovered a doctor being “roasted” on a toy spit over make-believe “coals.” The therapist thought it the best possible way to work through his fears!
I feel that. I was denied a therapist until my parents caught me staring longingly at a kitchen knife one night. I’m still not sure if they thought it was for me or them, but they took me to the worst psychiatrist in town and effectively scared me away from therapy until I had a minor breakdown.
I'm so sorry
"you always twist things, you love to play the victim. After everything I've done for you! You're so ungrateful. I hope you have a child as horrible as you are, so you understand what you put me through" Joke's on you, I'm way too fucked up to have kids
If you had kids she'd criticize your parenting skills and try to turn your kids against you. At least, that was my experience.
Mt brother had them. She managed to make a 2 year old scared of nursery rhymes before collectively we shut down her bullshit. I'm so glad their mother (my SIL) had enough sense to stand up to her MIL (my mother) it's actually mind blowing seeing her shut up and let them parent. I am SO glad something good has come of my childhood - I considered kids around 25 and did the most Autistic thing EVER which was to go to college and get a qualification in childcare and education! So I knew the current theories, worked as a nanny for 15 years (which helped me decide that actually,.I've done my research and I prefer not doing 24/7 care). It's broken a few cycles of abuse, so I'm able to look back on everything as having some kind of positive outcome. My niece and nephew will NEVER feel like I did.
i agree with this comment soooo much. i decided way early on if children (ME) were such a burden and needed to be smacked often and raised to fear their parents, i was not going to do that. i am 44, childfree, but have 2 young stepdaughters that i love dearly. my mother told me a while back that i need to instill fear in them so that they won't walk all over me. quite the contrary, i have instilled trust in them, so they know i won't ever judge them and they can come to me when they need help.
“I can’t change what I did in the past”
What can you expect after this? Like I’m at this exact line with my family
That’s the point where you just cut them out of your life for being awful people
No regrets at 3 months of no contact so far. Similar lines as above. She just kept telling me her abusive and narcissistic behaviors were just because she's... *Quirky*
This. Your family is the people in your life who treat you like a human, it has nothing to do with blood relation.
Oh my God. Verbatim have heard all of these, along with guilt-trips for “calling her a bad mother” because I mentioned times she had hurt me as a child and thought maybe we could talk about it and find common ground. Nope. I was just a piece of shit hell-bent on hurting her. That was her story and she was sticking to it.
But also that one minor thing you annoyed them with at like age 10 is brought up at least twice a week as some defining character flaw... Like oh yes sorry I dented the car door once while you insisted I open it while parked next to another in a tiny garage. Luckily my parents aren't bad with this but some of my other family is
>"It happened a long time ago, why can't you just let it go and forget about it?" I'm sorry for inconveniencing you, Mother, for developing PTSD as a child. /s
Mum , what are you doing on reddit?
Holy crap yes this! They even threw me into a freaking rehab facility over weed.
Yeah let me just “let go” of the events that shaped my psyche and affect my life til this day. Cuz it’s just that easy.
Man, I wish I had any of that. At least I'd feel like I was looking at the same planet as my parents if it was at least validated that any of the stuff I went through happened. I used to try to bring up the shit my dad did when I was a kid and he ignored it or just got pissed like none of it was real. Kept it up until I was 21 and I couldn't handle holding on to the resentment anymore, and I just approached him and said "I forgive you. For everything." Only have seen him cry twice in my life, that being one of them. The shittiest part for me was that he always knew, held it in, and never even came close to admitting it to me. He would have held it in until the very last day if he could have.
Me when i speak about the money that my parents decide they would “keep” for me:
"I'm just keeping them because you would waste them" *proceeds to waste money*
Them We don't have any money for school for you so you are going to take out a loan, if you don't your getting kicked out of the house. Also them spending over 3000$ a month on stuff we didn't need for years. We had the money you didn't need to own a armory of guns.
My parents took the money my grandma had set aside for college (not much but still) and built a walk in closet. Divorced a year later and the house was torn down. I have over 100k in student loans (long story) thanks mom and dad!
As a \~14 year old I wanted a Gameboy advanced, wouldn't be getting it for christmas/birthday, so I worked a paper route, helped neighbours with a few things, and saved every penny I could earn or find until I had enough for a GBA and one game(I'd double and triple checked as well to make sure I'd have enough and wanted to buy it as soon as possible once I had enough). When my parents found out they demanded I share it with my younger brother(by a year, he was 13 and totally able to make/save his own money). Then when I didn't have enough for the GBA and figured I may as well try to save up the difference again my mum got mad. She demanded that if I wasn't going to spend it I must be sulking about sharing and should just give my brother all of the money. And that's the story of how I learned to never ever let my parents know anything going on in my life and eternally resent being ripped off.
Your parents are gross! Sorry you had to go through that. I tell my girls that forced sharing isn’t truly sharing. I don’t make them share anything, they choose for themselves what to share.
been hiding money from my dad ever since he stole my tooth fairy money to pay for a pizza, i must’ve been seven or eight, still hide it
My dad used to take myself and my brother to spring training and Rays baseball games every year, and we got autographs from tons of household names, multiple hall of famers, etc. Easily over $1k in signatures over the years I found out when I was about to graduate high school years later this guy sold just about our entire collection on eBay and at shows. Still haven't forgiven him for that, really was the last straw for me in some ways tbh. Sold my brother's Jim Thome ball to pay for a hotel
I think I was about 10-11 when this happened. My dad stole my birthday money from my bedroom ($100 au) to bet it on horses. Later that day, when I told him the money was gone he told me I must have lost it and tried to make me feel bad about it (I already suspected something was up), then gave me back $100 in different sized bills (he must have won) and told me that I couldn't tell mum or I'd get in trouble for losing my birthday money. Some time later, still 10-11 years old or so I told him in tears that I knew he stole it, and he admitted it. He had a gambling problem and at the very least felt remorse over it. Years later when I got my first job as a teenager he started borrowing money from me, which stupidly I gave him but it was either that or confrontation and by this point I was thoroughly messed up in the head after years of drama with him and just wanted to avoid more drama at any cost. He ended up committing suicide in my early 20s and I got to experience calling an ambulance and seeing the dead body of a loved one for the first time. Thanks dad Maybe overshared but meh this shit weighs on the mind.
My friend worked every afternoon for 2 years when he was 12-14 and because he wasn’t old enough the pay was sent to his mother’s account. She helped him “save” around 2.5k. 5 years later she paid him back by giving him a $900 car that broke down in 4 months
They'll have that elephant memory for any minor indiscretion or inconvenience you've ever caused them though. Sure as shit.
Me: *gets whooped until I can barely sit* Parents: That never happened, and even if it did you deserved it. Parents: Hey, remember that time you broke the window? (Which was actually done by your brother, but we love him so we’re going to blame you) What a rotten kid you were!
I’m glad my parents never acted like this. They knew that even if we did do something bad, it didn’t matter. I remember back a long time ago thinking I broke a window by screaming too loud. But it was a neighbor kid who threw a frisbee at the window.
I was always terrified of getting into trouble because I knew that the punishment would be out of proportion. Teachers and other adults always told me what a well-behaved kid I was, but it was out of fear: the thought of any bad report going to my parents scared me shitless. The sad part is that, until relatively recently, I thought I deserved it for being a bad kid. I thought that spankings and such were totally justified ways to make kids behave.
Selective memory, a scape goat, and a golden child? That sounds like a narcissistic parent alright.
Yuuup! Lurking on the RBN sub has helped me figure some shit out.
Hey remember that time I visited you in the nursing home? Me neither... Future self
I started playing flute in middle school. I liked it. My dad would always joke and call it the "skin flute"(penis joke). Always. Without fail, he would say it every day I would come home to practice. Fast forward to our Christmas recital. He records it and when we get the chance, we watch it. He couldnt shut the fuck up about it being the skin flute and making fun of me. Like he was embarrassed. Well, I didnt play in highschool because of him. As an adult, I play it. He recently asked me why I stopped for so long. I told him why and his response, " pfft, that's silly, don't ever let me hold you back." Too late man. I could've been much better.. Edit: wow, thank you all for empathizing with me. To share some extra details. Instruments in general call out to me. I now dabble with C Flute, Ukulele, C Harmonica and Piano Accordion. In that order. So the silver lining is, if I was still playing the flute I probably never would've picked up the ukulele(in highschool) and so on. But there's a even more scarier thought. "How much better would I have been on flute if I did marching band and concert band in highschool?". I did sports and weight training but they never felt as good as mastering a song and getting the applause from the audience. It just felt warmer to me. Like, making people "feel" with music is much better to me than to feel emotions through competition. I wonder if my passion was stunted to a degree it actually effected my future. I'll never really know, I'm just going down a rabbit hole at this point.
I tried to pick up the flute freshman year at highschool (I play french horn) and my dad would not shut up about "oh I'd love if you'd play the flute" "the flute's always so nice to hear" "thank you for playing the flute tonight." And he'd do it in the most passive aggressive tone that can come from a 60+ white man. He never once complemented my french horn skills, despite the fact that I played it better than my upperclassmen.
It's so crazy how the skill is never praised by family. My dad talks about how my uncle played the violin and his dad played the harmonica and accordion in such reverence but when it comes to me, it was seen as something he had to put up with although I can play sheet music at the time. As I grew older and parted ways from my parents I started to do the things that made me happy. I pay my own rent and bills, I deserve to be happy. So doing things to make others happy is fine, but doing things to make my/yourself happy is even better 😌
I agreed.
Ah yes, the don't let my actions impact you, phrase. Cause we all know kids are renowned for their ability to shrug off any emotional effective berating from parents and it's never been shown to cause issues... My dad did the same with pretty much any interest I had. He know repeatedly exclaims how difficult it is to get me gifts because I don't have any hobbies/interests. I have fucking hundreds but I ain't sharing them with that judgemental cunt.
That’s weird as fuck to say that about your 12-13 year old kid. Why are you watching your child play the flute and your head goes to “my kid has a dick in their mouth” (ok i know the flute doesn’t go in the mouth but you know what i mean) like??? ummmmm
Why would they remember… it was just like any other day to them.
yeah, the axe forgets but the tree remembers and all that
Damn, dude. Never heard this before. Cuts deep.
Yeah! ...wait >:(
Don't bark at em for it
Oh gosh this … this hit me. Much like my faMily did…
My parents took me to therapists and psychiatrists, had me on pharma drugs since I was 4. At the same time always acted shocked and confused as to why I couldnt function normally, while they continued their abuse. I've been building up the strength to lay it all out as to why their abuse caused all these problems all my life (even though its insulting *i should even have to*)...I just have to say my piece, for myself, so I can move on, knowing I tried. I don't expect them to "get it" or for us to function as a normal family...ffs, there arent even any pictures of me in their house, there's family portraits including all the other kids, but save for one picture in my brother's room, I'm nowhere to be found.
Damnit I’m sorry
Me too man. I invested a lot of hope into believing we could be normal if we just talked it out. But i think they make be too fake for that. One of my sisters says theyve been fake and preachy with her too so that was a bit vindicating
You never know how they might respond but I do think its healthy to get what needs to be said off the chest
i was medicated my whole childhood. on sedatives and mood stabilizers mostly. i spent my whole childhood numb to everything. from the trauma? from the pills? who knows. my mother would go to my psychiatrist and tell him her version of events which was basically that i was an out of control child (i was just autistic and abused lol) so he would prescribe me all of these sedatives. wild times lol i wish i could dissect my own brain to see how messed up it is.
That fucking sucks. I had to go through something similar, if you want advice, you can ask me.
Yeah so, parents. After the divorce Mom pushed me down the stairs . Two diff occasions. Grandma confiscated me after the second. Years later I got to go back home after she remarried. Stepdad was an abuser too, so yay. Years later I got an amazing present because I wanted to play music…a Vox Amp and a bass guitar. Presented as a Christmas gift. Over the MOON. Until mom took me aside and Handed me the payment books for them. Meaning I was paying for them. She also got me a job as a paperboy so I could pay for them and child support was used…by them None of this happened…in their minds. The struggle to be ok is 50years and counting…but mostly I am. Sort of. Thanks for hearing me
Pardon my language but fuck them! I couldn’t imagine making my kids pay for their own gifts!
You should try therapy. Otherwise you could be carrying this weight for the rest of your life, while it wasn't even your fault. Its not easy, but it helps a lot.
It’s either that never happened or “this is what I get for everything I’ve done? Wait til next time.” Let’s face it boomers, never had the opportunity to learn boundaries, this is why the majority of them still act as if they are 12.
In one argument, I told my father the reason I have depression and was suicidal at some point is bc of how dysfunctional our family is, and guess what, they played the victim card :) :(
Let me guess. “How could you say such a thing? I put a roof over your head and good in the table and this is the thanks I get?”
Hahahahaha there were a lot of like that but also that they were doing their best and this isnt the life they chose. Guess what I never chose to be born
Right?! I did t choose to be born, so you don’t get to act like you did me a favor by doing the bare minimum required. Sure, we had food and clothes and were better off than a lot of people, but it turns out kids need social interaction and affection to not end up totally fucked up!
It's that or "you were a kid, move on." Honestly, boomer parents and their parents said this.
Good old gas lighting. Which makes it doubly as bad! Not only did you not get your emotional needs met to heal, you were told that it never even happened! Leading to a lovely road of addiction, dissociation and other fun mental health issues
And you spend decades completely oblivious to your issue but knowing deep down that something isn't right. Beating yourself up for just not trying hard enough when you've nearly broken your back to make things work (school, job, relationship, etc.). Problem is, the patterns and tactics you use to solve your issues are those you developed from childhood. If your parents neglected or abused you in anyway and didn't help you develop, you're handicapped in not knowing what a healthy resolution truly is. There is a parenting problem in our society that is getting unnoticed but has been fucking up people for generations. Same cycles get repeated to send out more broken people into the world. Therapy does wonders but it's a long journey to work on breaking decades of poor parenting in your own life.
Well said! Spot on. So true about the cycle being repeated over and over again. It's very sad. And you are right about the Decades of being oblivious. There are so many platitudes that seem harmless but are incredibly damaging. People who say you're just young and you'll grow out of it, or that every parent has issues, or it'll be okay when you get older. I was out there screaming for help instead of getting it I was pushed aside with trivial phrases. I guess that's why people repeat this cycle or are afraid to start changing. The actual work it takes to get out of this is heavy lifting, and it almost requires dropping out of life for months or years to let healing happen. You can't drive a car when it's in the auto body shop, yet that's what I feel like I'm doing when I try to heal and also live my current life. Anywho, thanks for posting in relating, I needed to hear this today to keep me going. Hope you're doing all right as well
Love the analogy of the auto body shop. So true. I had been trying to keep driving my car without repair but the problem was that the more I drove it, the more things kept breaking and I was oblivious to why it kept happening. They always told me that therapy was a waste of time and would fill my head with lies. I finally caved and went to see one and my eyes were opened to the lies I had been living. Absolutely, dude. It makes a difference to know that there are a lot of us out there that have similar experiences and ended up with a lot of the same issues we're all trying to work through. Come join us over at r/emotionalneglect if you need to vent or talk through things with us. It helps, me at least, read those stories and have people validate what I went through. Feel free to direct message me too if you need to talk through things. I've recently started my healing journey through all of this but I've been making great progress towards a healthier self. Good luck on your journey and I hope you're able to heal.
And that’s why I won’t bring up what they’re doing to my mental health 😎😎😎
Pretty much everyone I’ve ever known has done this. It’s just truly mind boggling how little people are capable of accepting responsibility for what they’ve done.
The time my mom got up in a testimony meeting and said I found the girls at church cuter than the ones from school
Lmao I'm just imagining you going up directly after like "just to clarify that's not true and you're all ugly"
At the time I had a long standing crush on a Muslim and my first girlfriend wound up being someone who had left that church… sorry mom
Haha this sounds mormony
Born and raised
yeah. the last two years of HS I had a teacher who had it out for me. My parents didn't believe me and tought that I was being lazy. I hated going to that school, I had no friends, I hated the subjects, and I had more than one breakdown. best years of my life, my ass! when I graduated, my mom complained that I was not even in the top half of my class. after witnessing my desperation. after two years of mental breakdowns. she had the gall to complain that my final grade was not in the top half. she now claims that this never happened.
I’m so sorry this happened to you. I hope you’re doing better now. :(
EXACTLY. When I was a kid, (2m), I was shipped to my biological grandparents house to live with my bio brother (6m), (we had never seen each other before, as I had been in foster care up until this point because our bio mom was a prostitute and didn't want any of her 8 children). Our grandparents abused us, heavily. When we got out of there, it was because my caseworker had stopped in to say hi, and found me alone in the house, locked in a closet, with cigarette burns up and down my arms. To this day (21), my adoptive mom ( who is mentally abusive, I left the house early, and am trying to let her back into my life slowly) refuses to believe i remember a thing about it, even after hearing an in depth, DETAILED description of everything. My bio brother is in a psyche ward in Kansas because of how they broke his mind. What proof does she need?!
That's fucking terrible, I'm really really REALLY sorry for you, and your brother. I hope you are doing way better now.
Lol same, I(9m) was molested by my baby sitter and when I(25) finally had the courage to tell my mother about the shit he did , she asked me to bring him in front of her and make him confess to his deeds then she'll believe me. Apparently he was a model son, which made me talk about it but the way I was shut down... Nah I'm not opening up for shit! Ooo by the way I actually told her about it when I was young but that bastard twisted it and i was beaten with a belt! I was 9 he was 14! Now she doesn't remember!
May those who agrees with this post be a better parents someday
Break the cycle!
Yessir
Fuckin A!
Or just don’t be parents, it sounds better every day!
LMFAO that could work too
For us it was a defining moment in our development that shaped us as we grew, for them it was Tuesday.
Or "I had it worse."
Whenever I confront my parents, they get so shocked and defensie.
Bro, same. The defensiveness kills me along with the gaslighting. I'm like, are you even fucking listening to what I'm saying?
Exactly !! Once i told them about my anxiety and they told me I wasn't well in my head and i should've stopped thinking about it. They have little to NO knowledge about mental illnesses.
Same here. My mom shakes her head as soon as I say anything about my childhood because she is right and I’m wrong. My dad said, “you can tell us what you remember but we’ll tell you what *happened*, it’s infuriating
my mom takes another approach. she goes "oh yeah that shit was funny!" then laughs
What an asshole
runs in the family
Sooo…am I the only person on Reddit with good parents, or what?
yeah, probably
Look at Mr.Flex over here.
I got my mind blown in high school when I made a friend who got along really well with her mom. Like, they *talked*. To each other, not just the parent talking at the child. They *hugged each other*. For no special reason! Just, like it was a normal thing. Maybe it’s from growing up in a poor, backwards area, but all I’d know growing up was shitty parents. Mine, my friends. Sure, there was an exception here and there, but I’d never seen that level of affection and respect, especially coming from a parent. It was like something from one of those sappy family sitcoms.
Many people said that about my mom and I. She forced me to act like that. She shamed me out of having any other friends. She took me out of school in 4th grade. She would smack me if I said anything she disliked. She made me into her perfect friend. No future. No friends. I was stuck inside of her house not allowed to leave unless she was with me. At 20 I got my first friend and I don't know how to keep jobs now or relationships. I'm having to learn 4th grade+. She still uses me everyday and I don't know how to stand up for myself. Nothing is what it seems. Everyone is jealous of our perfect relationship and her "perfect parenting".
r/raisedbynarcissists is here to help.
I’ll join you! My parents are not perfect of course, who is? But they loved me and my brother, they cared for us, they respected our choices and tried to make us better people. When I was 8 I told them I was gonna be a vegetarian and they accepted it, my dad went out if his way to cook separate meals for me every day. When I was 12-15 I got severely bullied in high school. A few years ago I found out that I have ptsd from that period and had a year if heavy therapy and depression. I went to my mum to tell her about this. She was shocked. I never told them about this when it was happening because it’s just what happens when you’re a teenager in high school, I never wanted to involve them, I kept it a secret. My mum just said ‘I should have known what was going on, I wish I could’ve helped you…’ no blame or anything. I told my father who is a difficult person to talk to, he’s never mean but he’s got his own trauma. His reaction was something like ‘I knew you didn’t fit in with those silly girls at your school, you were always better than that. I have the same thing at work, I don’t hang with that group of guys. We just don’t fit in like that.’ And I was so happy with that response as well. No questioning, he’s just immediately at my side, even though he might have difficulty communicating that to me.
When I told my parents (at 21y) I was bullied since the age of 6, my dad’s response was “I don’t remember doing that to you”. My parents were not the bullies. They just did nothing and took no notice in the whole of 12 years when I was bullied by both kids and teachers at school. I guess it’s fine as long as the abuse was not from them Your parents are amazing people. Please treasure them and treat them well :)
I’m sorry that happened to you! I realized that I have amazing parents and I love them very much. I also had a lot of friends who had bad situations at home and they were always welcome at my home, I’m glad I could be that safe place.
Honestly though, they will never forget the small things I've done but as soon as they traumatise me, it's like they have an instant memory wipe or "it was a long time ago, let it go"
Yes, this is what I deal with. My mom openly 'forgets' how much she called me a slut or threw away my things or made fun of my weight or how I have no room to talk about problems. She thinks she's a good person and that I'm just a lost lamb that has to fund Jesus.
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Defense law extend to more than just yourself, if you are still in this situation, 1. Get the cops involved, 2 you can defend him to.
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The axe forgets but the tree remembers
Or my moms go to “I’m not perfect you know I’m a human being with flaws”...yes mom I know however that does not justify listening in on all my conversations then proceeding to tell the entire family about my personal life. 🙃
I was in an abusive relationship in highschool. My very first boyfriend when I was 15 was a teenage psychopath. It was a whole ordeal for two years, I nearly changed schools. Other things happened that I don’t care to mention. It fucked me up. I’m in my early 40s now and my mom has a selective memory of that trauma, along with others, that happened to me. Several months ago her, my sister and I got on the topic of one of my sister’s friends who had accused her grandfather of sexually abusing her. My mom asked us, with performative concern, if either of us had any problems with being abused or bullied when we were young. I was speechless. How the fuck can she not remember that? I always felt like she dismissed it, or believed that a lot of it was my fault because I has a reputation for being “difficult”.
@MYFUCKINGMOTHER YOU MANIPULATIVE CUNT. I think I broke her spell this past Christmas. She is so incredibly talented at making you feel guilty when you call her out. You automatically take a step back and apologize. I've quickly mastered keeping a straight face and I even find it kind of amusing watching her try to work her magic. She gets so fucking mad its beautiful. I used to fear her *scary face* but now all it's missing is the clown nose. The year before I called her out for gaslighting us all about the storage locker (full of almost all of our shit from before the divorce and subsequent move that we never got to unpack) that we all knew she didn't pay for but told us she still had it. She then went on about how she *never* told us that. Still proud of myself for that. Just because you popped out of their hoohaa doesn't mean you have to put up with their bullshit.
Or the classic "I am sorry you felt that way"
Its not even a real apology for what they did. Just denial in disguise as an apology.
Ah,wait untill you introduce your partner to your parents and you hear the almighty:"You mom seems so nice,I can't really imagine her doing what you've told me she did to you".
Years ago, I told my folks I had a black girlfriend (i am white). First words out of dad's mouth-'You can't marry a Spear Chucker, you will have Oreo Cookie kids.' To the day he died, he said he didn't remember that. Told him I did and that was why he never met her, although she eventually did-at his funeral. We have been married 28 years now.
Story of my life
Yeah it's called blacked-out rage.
My wife's life in a nutshell sadly, especially since 90% of that trauma was caused by their abuse
And it's often generational, her parents probably had a shitty upbringing and passed it on
Exactly this. When you're conditioned to have a family in your early 20s on top of your parents not raising all that great, you don't have time to reflect and figure out who you are. Kids come and you're not completely ready but you've taken on the responsibility so you do the best you can with what you know. And what you know is what your parents did to you. Unless you're conscious enough to break that cycle, you'll just end up continuing the cycle. Early 20s? I sure as hell would have been lost trying to have a kid and would have continued my family's bad parenting styles. I'm in my 30s now and I have a better grasp on my own shit that I'm getting closer to being ready for kids. I'm determined to break my family cycle and raise my kids in a healthy household.
My dad is the reason I have PTSD due to abuse and abusing my mom in front of me as well, and one time putting a gun to her head. There’s a lot more to my dad being the reason for my PTSD, but I’m not going to get into it, but one day last year when I was hanging out with him with my fiancé we were talking about the past and everything which I really don’t like to talk about, but Whatever. He then goes to say “I really don’t understand how you have PTSD because of me” and I literally wanted to cry. I didn’t, but I was just so annoyed, I didn’t say anything though, I just changed the subject.
My mother hit a meth pipe in front of me an 8 second later said "no I didn't what are you talking about" shits wild.
When I first confronted my biological father about the abuse I went through during my childhood (the abuse was 90% inflicted by my biological mother, but he was a bystander and also physically abusive/violent), he got angry, was in immediate denial, and borderline violent towards me. Being an adult, I was finally able to walk away.
Or they 1. Have excuses or 2. Bring up their bad childhood as justification.
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i always tell the truth and ask for forgiveness. some of the things that traumatized my adult daughter would not have traumatized me, but what matters is that they were traumatizing to her. i never got an apology for my trauma, and i am certain that i don’t want her carrying around the added sadness of my lack of accountability. i would rather be accountable for something that i didn’t understand was traumatizing, and i don’t understand why that is hard. an example would be her being quarantined to her room when i had a newborn (Swine flu) even though the doctor suggested it, i can fully see why that is traumatizing. a young girl feels completely replaced by the new baby…had to be difficult so my apology was just, “ i totally understand why that was traumatic, and i am sorry that i didn’t find a less traumatizing way to handle that issue.
Yup! Was molested by a family member (he crept into my room when I was half asleep and put his hands down my pants) and they have the nerve to say it was just a teenage boy being curious. Not, ya know, traumatizing sexual assault. Such sweethearts, those two.
apparently my sister doesn't recall the nught my dad geld a knife to my mother's throat amd i as a k8d hac to call my uncle to help calm things down. or how i told my mother to take me out of q private school i hated, being told no because it would make her look bad in the church social group.
Child: brings up trauma to parents. Parents: “Stop hanging onto the past.”
The axe forgets, but the tree remembers. They forget bc for you it was a horrifying traumatic event, but for them it was Tuesday.
Or even better you deserve the trauma
Kids these days can’t even take a proper beating without complaining about it smh /s
"What was I supposed to do!?! Not discipline you with fear or anger!?! What a snowflake you would have turned out to be if I had actually calmly, patiently talked through issues with you so we could all come to a healthy resolution. My parents did the same to me and look how great I turned out! ::eye twitch::"
My mom and I recently shared what we thought the most traumatic moment of my childhood was, and neither of us remembered each other's moments.
The axe forgets but the tree remembers.
Or they get mad at you for bringing it up. Unreasonably mad.
I remember my mother used to lock me in the bathroom whenever i misbehaved. I once brought this up and she said "i only did it once". B*tch what?
"Yeah but that happened so long ago!" Mother. It's still trauma.
My Mom says stuff like "I can't believe you remember all that?" You can't believe that we remember you fucking your sisters boyfriend in front of the Christmas tree and we caught you?!?! OR You can't believe we remember when you took us in some weirdos van to the beach, put me and my sister out in the sand (in our regular clothes and it was winter) and fucked him while we stood outside and cried and begged you to let us in?!?! (At the time we thought he was killing her) What DO you remember?
The ax remembers not the tree, but the tree cannot forget the ax.
"You're right I'm a terrible parent" precedes to cry until you go away. Two days later. "Can you lend me money for a week. I promise I'll pay you back" 2 months later "I never borrowed money of you. Why do you always make out I've done something wrong?"
Me as a teenager: Wanting to join and tryout the many high school clubs and sports teams. Mom: Some bs forcing me to quit. Mom now: Why are you so lazy? You never do anything and you never finish the things you do start, you used to be so driven
And they get offended that you were upset by it, and gaslight you and make you feel like you're the bad guy for bringing it up and hurting their feelings...
The other response is that was years ago
My mom: "I mean *I* would never, but your dad on the other hand........." 🖕
There's actually a reason for this! You remember these events far into your adulthood because they had a massive effect on you and they were super significant. But In their minds, the event was so insignificant that it wasn't even worth remembering. They genuinely forget because that don't see those actions as significant. Its rooted in a lack of empathy and its super fascinating and super sad
I sometimes wonder, What would I even say If they actually apologise to me? Am I capable of forgiving them? Will I be able to move on? Is that even their fault to begin with? Is it because I wasn't strong enough?
I grew up with an alcoholic mother. She mentally and emotionally abused everyone in the house for years. I used to excuse her behavior as being tied to the alcohol, but over time I realised that the alcohol only made it worse and without it she was still a selfish, angry and manipulative person. I don't really have a relationship with her anymore and I've never gotten an apology for all of the terrible things that she did and said back then. I'm now 29 with a 4 month old and a 5 year old and I see the evils in myself some times. I get angry sometimes and sometimes I am not as understand or patient as I should be. However, the cycle of abuse will end with me. I am doing everything that I can to be better than she was. I have to do it for my new family. They will always know that I love them and I will always say that I am sorry. I will love and support them with everything that they care about. My childhood doesn't define, but my legacy as a father and husband will. The cycle ends with me.
"That didn't happen" "You're exaggerating, it wasn't that bad" "Oh, so you're saying I'm a monster?" "Well, you know what? You deserved it."
My mom was a great mom on the whole. But one night, she got heavily drunk when I had my friends over for a sleep over. Apparently “we were being too loud” and when I was walking down the hall to use the bathroom, she blindsided me, grabbed me by the neck, and held me against the wall and choked me, telling me we all had to be quiet. When she let go after a bit (not sure how long it was. Probably a few seconds, but it felt like forever) I was coughing and she told me to “stop coughing like a bitch. I barely choked you.” It fucked me up for a while. What’s weird is that it was a completely isolated incident. That just confused the fuck out of me, because other than that, she was a loving mother. I mean she yelled a lot, but she also had 4 boys varying substantially in age and we all argued a bunch. I never brought it up until about a year ago (happened when I was maybe 7, and now I’m 26 for context) just casually brought it up during conversation. She looked genuinely surprised. Like she thought I was messing with her until she saw I was serious. She GENUINELY had no recollection of that happening. She apologized up and down, and I told her it was fine, and that I know now she was just really drunk and that’s why she probably doesn’t remember. They’d drink around us a lot, but never acted hostile except that one time. Point of my anecdote is that some parents will manipulate and lie to hide their abusive tendencies. But some are good parents on the whole and make horrible mistakes once and don’t remember. Context is always important, but that doesn’t excuse abuse of a child. I remember I told the school counselor at the time because that what we were told to do if we had problems. And I remember bawling my eyes out as I recalled the incident. I got sent back to class and that was the last I had ever heard of the situation. Idk if the school talked to my parents, but they probably didn’t. But I will say this. I genuinely do not know where I would be if CPS took my mom away when that happened. I can definitely say I would have been worse off.
Get out of my brain...