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Poll Are You More Angry At Your Perpetrating Parent Or Your Parent That Did Not Protect You?

Are You More Angry At Your Perpetrating Parent Or Your Parent That Did Not Protect You?

  • Perpetrating parent

    Votes: 94 43.9%
  • Parent that did not protect

    Votes: 133 62.1%
  • Does not apply to me

    Votes: 21 9.8%

  • Total voters
    214
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My Mother enabled the abuse. She knew he was a pervert and did nothing to stop it. She was cold and distant, never caring or loving. She never helped me and never loved me like a mother should and despite that I loved her anyway.
Ah. Yes, I guess I imagined if the second parent was complicit in the abuse, that really both parents were abusing, one actively and one passively. My mom did the best she could with my dad, didn't make excuses for him, and she'd usually discuss it in terms of alcoholism. Alcohol was the primary way his emotions would get uncorked. But work stress (or during the lean years, lack of work stress) would also sometimes cause his negative emotional cup to runneth over. So for me, at the time, it was more like something we all suffered through together (her, me, and my brother). She was the last holdout, staying with him long after she 'needed' to for purposes of raising me and my brother.

I think she held out hope that he could heal his emotional wound, kind of admirable really. She tells me that the first bunch of years together were pretty good. I don't remember any of that - good moments when I was young, but they became less and less as I got older.

What she did hurts more. A lot more. I don't think I will ever get over that.

Yeah, I feel ya on that. The thought of a parent collaborating, aiding, abetting in their own child's emotional damage is a tough idea for me to swallow, even though I know it happens. There may be some extenuating circumstances in some situations - nothing that makes it 100% OK, but I can understand how it would happen. People who are financially dependent or have few other options might put up with what seems like an intolerable situation. People who are emotionally compromised themselves (by abuse or trauma or emotional wounds of their own) and not able to bring a real A-game to problem solving their dysfunctions. But that's nothing the kid can really fully understand at the time. And then all that affects the children potentially for decades if not for life.

If my mom were complicit in my dad's emotional abuse, that would definitely have changed our relationship and probably other things in my life really negatively. She has been there for me whenever I needed emotional support, all through adulthood through the present and future. She actually has really helped just as a positive role model, as I try to un-learn bad habits I picked up from Dad and re-learn more positive emotional habits.
 
LC23,
I hate to say it really but I think in abusive situations someone not giving up on the person is an unhealthy sign. I hope that doesnt offend too much and I know I can't see into your personal experience. I know that I have done this and have had to look at myself. I also think that always looking at the why can be one of the main fuels of enabling behaviour. I think financial and safety issues are different though. Some times it is more dangerous to leave for some.

I think it is to your mothers credit that she did not excuse the behaviour.

She has been there for me whenever I needed emotional support, all through adulthood through the present and future. She actually has really helped just as a positive role model, as I try to un-learn bad habits I picked up from Dad and re-learn more positive emotional habits.
I think that is amazing and it is no wonder you don't feel blame.
 
That's hard. I told my mother, she said he was a good dad and I needed to apologize, I carry a lot of hate because of it ! Yet I'm not sure it overcomes the 11 years of torture I went Through, not only is she mom, but a nurse she should have know/listened.
 
My Father - he adopted me

This especially irritates me Shellbell. I guess I expect a person who adopts to be more loving because they chose you. I mean, why adopt otherwise? I know that there are plenty of people who adopt who are cruel. It just bugs me to the core.


not only is she mom, but a nurse she should have know/listened.

My mom was too. Her belief was if you didn't talk about it then it was dealt with. End of discussion. When I was and adult, my sister and I told her about when I was attacked in my teens. She couldn't believe we didn't tell her. Funny thing is(not in a haha way), that day it happened, my sister ran to get her. She finally came to the door and I just ran pass her. My sister chose not to tell her because she was mad at her for not coming to the door sooner. You know, after that happened, I started sleeping in the hallway between the bedrooms and I sometimes crawled into bed with my sister. My mom never asked why. She chose not to know. She had put the blame on me for not telling her later in life, but I never accepted it.

I use to dream of being saved by my dad. Thing is, especially from the things my half/step siblings told me, my dad was just as abusive if not more so.
 
LC23,
I hate to say it really but I think in abusive situations someone not giving up on the person is an unhealthy sign. I hope that doesnt offend too much and I know I can't see into your personal experience.

I think it is to your mothers credit that she did not excuse the behaviour.

I'd have to agree with you about the unhealthy sign, and I'm not offended, I have had to have the same conversation with myself. And I don't honestly know what possessed her to stay as long as she did and endure as much as she must have (including seven plus years after both kids were grown up and out of the house.) She doesn't have any other obvious dysfunctions; at least, not that are obvious to me after over a decade of observing her post-Dad. She doesn't even have any vices that I can observe - only social or occasional mild drinking, like a glass of wine with dinner. No drugs at all, no risky behaviors or compulsive habits like gambling or overeating or workaholism. She remains one of the more grounded, consistently positive, and emotionally even-keel people I've known; a total contrast to the pent-up, self-loathing, angry at any opposition, easily insulted, prone to deep depression, xenophobic, afraid of the future but haunted by the past (PTSD in denial), energy of Dad.

Again, I honestly don't know what possessed her to stay as long as she did. I'm not aware of any major trauma or childhood abuse that would have set her off on that course. Part of me just thinks that women of the previous generation endured much more from their husbands than women of my generation. Part of me thinks that my mom just wanted to know for herself that she had tried everything, and I mean everything, for the man she said she'd spend the rest of her life with.

But in the end, she did make the healthy choice (for herself, anyway) to leave and has really re-defined her life. Where the house I grew up in eventually became a slowly decaying pit of despair (think a less-extreme version of a house from that show Hoarders), her new place is clean, functional, comfortable for guests, and drama-free. She stepped off the emotional rollercoaster, finished out a career that she was dedicated to for three decades, and retired shortly before the number of grandkids she had went from one to three. So now she lives a quiet life peacefully, does a little volunteer work, and gets to enjoy her grandkids growing up on a weekly or more basis. And now that I moved back to my hometown after a couple decades being gone, she gets to see me pretty frequently too. She hasn't taken up with any other abusive jerks, and makes a point of avoiding people and situations that are overly negative.

She did apologize to me once for not leaving him sooner, like when I was a teenager and things were getting really dark. That conversation was only recently, after I'd been diagnosed with PTSD and started to really make headway on those issues, which I would talk with her about as they unfolded. The apology actually strangely didn't faze me; by that time I had already gone in the life direction that became how I see myself now. Sure, it would have been nice at the time to not have had to live through all that. My whole adult life would have changed. I probably would have gone to a different school after high school, met a whole different group of people, taken a whole different path... it's just so hard to imagine what that would have been, not making the friends I've made or seeing the things I've seen and doing the things that I've done. I feel like I COULD be angry at her, but that I'd really need to try hard at it, which isn't my style.
 
This especially irritates me Shellbell. I guess I expect a person who adopts to be more loving because they chose you. I mean, why adopt otherwise? I know that there are plenty of people who adopt who are cruel. It just bugs me to the core.

My mother refused to marry him if he didn't adopt me. I didn't like him from being 5 yrs old. I never felt safe around him. I knew there was something wrong with him at a very young age. Once my sister came along, he made it very clear they were the favourites and I was the outcast.

I think a lot of perverts find single women with young children.
 
I think a lot of them do too. I don't understand these women who let them into their life and allow them to mistreat their children.

Before my dad and step mom married, she had a little girl(by his best friend). My dad told the story of when my stepsister was 7 months and crying one night. He went in there and spanked her. This is before he adopted her. My dad was so proud of this story. Yet, my stepmother still married him. I would have kicked his butt out.

I guess my mom did do something right. She kicked him to the curb when he hit her and she never brought any men home while we were there. I know she still had boyfriends, but she preferred to keep them away from her kids. Looking back, I appreciate that.

I'm sorry you had to go through that. No child deserves that!
 
Brit.F7, I'm really glad your Mom did the right thing and kick him to the curb. It is what real Mom's do. She did the right thing by you as a Mom should.

I don't understand enabling your child to be abused either. My mother wasn't a weak woman and she was very capable of standing up to my father and did about things for herself. She wasn't an abused wife. I could understand more, if she was a battered wife who was scared of her husband, but she wasn't at all.

To me, what my mother did was worse than my father. She set me up to abused and didn't care when it was happening. That's unforgivable.
 
I picked the parent that didn't protect... I don't blame my mom for the fact that everything that happened happened, but I am angrier at her. I grew up protecting her and making sure she was ok. One specific time we had a conversation where she mentioned that I looked out for her and my siblings and asked who looked out for me. I answered that I did. She looked sad and said that I was too young to have to answer that (I was about 8) and then said that she'd look out for me. The NEXT DAY I was beaten to the ground and kicked repeatedly by my father and she just walked passed and didn't do anything like nothing was going on. This happened multiple times... she'd say things like she'd leave him if he ever did anything to me again, but nothing.

I don't blame her for my father's actions, but I sure as hell blame her for hers.
 
I am furious with my main abuser, my dad. I really hate what he did to me. I had to turn the feelings off today because they were so intense. I am glad he is dead and he cannot hurt anyone ever again. He was a really creepy guy. He grossed me out and disgusted me. He tried to break my spirit. I had to cut him off over twenty years ago. I am so glad he is gone.
 
I voted for both the perpetrator parent and whom did not protect me.

I have grown up in a hostile environment where a lot of the blame and anger is displaced and therefore, emotional/psychological/ physical abuse occurred. Both of my parents have contributed to my anger and pain. My mom would blame me for my brother's mistakes and would make me feel/look like the guilty one if I defended myself. Dad, on the other hand, never spoke up when needed and therefore, he wouldn't know what reaction was correct or necessary for the situation at hand. My brother is included in this mess also, but that's a different ballgame.
 
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