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My evil mother's birthday today

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Woke up in tears again, the third morning in a row. Following nightmares about my horrible mum's abysmal mistreatment of me growing up. And what she also did to me as an adult until I finally jogged her on 14 years ago. Her birthday always triggers these awful memories and feelings in me. While I was still smoking pot heavily and drinking excessive amounts of alcohol I could keep a lot of it at bay, you know, stay 'comfortably numb'. Indeed that song from Pink Floyd's 1979 album was one of my anthems. I used the booze and green to aid and abet my disassociation from those memories and emotions. To block out the images in my head and kill the pain fear shame sorrow anger etc. And I can't do that now I'm straight and mostly sober.

I've been having flashbacks all morning about her sexual assault of me when I was just 3 years old. I repressed this memory for 45 years till it started coming back to me 9 months ago. At first I thought I was losing my mind and that my mind was playing tricks on me and that I was imagining it all because of coming off drink and drugs. It started coming through as snapshots and kind of like stills in a movie. Which I was viewing from a distance. You know like watching it on a screen in a cinema. And I started remembering it in reverse as well as in me remembering what she did to me at the end of her assault before I remembered the middle and the start of her attack. The 'least' of it I remembered first and the 'worst' I remembered last. It was really fragmented to begin with and all muddled up in my head. And I didn't get the feelings until I remembered the 'worst'. All I can conclude is that I must have left my body when the assault started happening. I also remember my mum making me drink something really vile tasting before she hurt me. And me feeling woozy and sort of 'out of it' as she began to molest me. Then I lose the feeling altogether until the end of this episode when she finished the assault with something really really painful. The woozy feeling I now recognise as alcohol. And possibly Valium as well because when my dad died suddenly almost 17 years ago my GP prescribed me some Valium to get me through the worst of the shock. I recognised how the Valium made me feel from somewhere in my past but until now I was unable to make the connection. Also until now I never realised the connection between me having boiling hot baths as an adult and what my mum did to me after attacking me as a 3 year old. But it's all start to make horrible sense now.

I can't get over how disturbed and psychotic my mum must have been to ply her only daughter with booze and pills at a tender age and then do such evil depraved things to me that my poor little mind at the time had no way of comprehending much less describe because I was only just starting to talk at the time. The feelings I get with the images are just like a pure out of control scream of extreme hurt and fear. I believe this was a one off isolated incident with my mum but I can't be sure because I have blocked a lot of other incidents of abuse concerning my older brothers' sexual abuse of me out of my head as well. I blocked out the memory of my eldest brother's attempted rape of me when I was 6 years old for 17 years and it only came back when I was 23 and he refused to come to my wedding because I was marrying a man he didn't approve of plus the fact I was getting married in a registry office not a church plus the fact I hadn't known my intended that long when we tied the knot plus the fact he made much of me 'depriving mum and dad of their big day' when actually it was MY big day not theirs. All this rage at my eldest brother came exploding up and out of me when he said all that to me, seemingly from nowhere. And then the same thing that has recently happened with the memory of my mum molesting me started happening with the memory of my eldest brother try to rape me. Again to begin with I doubted the veracity of the pictures in my head but when it kept popping up over and over again and I started joining the dots about my anger at him in the here and now with him violating me at such a tender age once again it all added up in an awful way.

The same thing happened with a memory I have of witnessing my mum molesting my other older brother in front of me when I was 11 years old and he would have been 15. I repressed that memory for over 25 years. Again, snapshots at first, then the feeling of shock disgust fear and confusion. I now recall how they both acted like it was the most normal thing in the world. And that within a year of this incident occurring that brother started grooming me and our mum put us in the same hotel room on holiday after him grooming me by showing me pornography and trying to French kiss me and then his abuse of me began. Which then happened on a daily basis for the next 5 years a lot of which I disassociated from but there are stand out memories which I have flashbacks about including the first time he raped me in my school uniform when I was 14 followed a couple of months later by him and his best mate gang raping me in my bedroom at home while our mum sat downstairs in the living room watching TV and me hearing her slam the living room door shut and turning the volume up on the telly to drown out the sound of me screaming and begging them to stop and screaming for my mum to stop them as well. I don't suppose I really need to remember the rest of it that my mind has 'forgotten', only what my mind knows I need to know.

But why couldn't I have remembered these incidents before I put my kids in danger of be abused themselves by my mum? Because if I had I wouldn't have had anything to do with her and I wouldn't have let her anywhere near my babies. My God I was in so much denial. It was bad enough knowing one of my older brothers had raped and molested me throughout my teens and that his mates were also involved (there were 2 others besides his best mate) but to know my eldest brother AND our mum also sexually abused me is just too bloody much to cope with at times. Especially now I know my mum also molested my eldest kid and hit my youngest. And it's one thing knowing it but quite another thing entirely believing and accepting it as fact.

And it's yet another thing knowing that I can't do anything about any of it. Even if I got a solicitor to represent me in a civil court to go after my mum and brothers for damages on a no win no fee basis there's no guarantee I would win and they would probably get away with it because they are all so wealthy they could afford the best defence barrister their noncey money could buy. And that barrister would violate me and rip me apart on the witness stand on their behalf and use all my own mistakes against me to discredit me, mistakes I wouldn't have even made if not for the dire effects my mum and brothers collective abuse of me had on me as a person.

I really want to let this go so it doesn't destroy me anymore and so I don't take it out on myself or the wrong people anymore but right now I feel I could go out smashing heads because of my outrage at being so severely hurt like that and my kids too especially my eldest who's now returned to his grandmother a victim of her original brainwashing which was continued by social services once he went into care 19 years ago a fortnight this Sunday. And the least said about social services the better I think in light of the response I've had on my other recent posts regarding them lol.

I'm just really struggling today and I wonder what I can do to channel the energy from all this fury in a positive healthy way. Cracking up, breaking down, attempting suicide, drinking and drugging myself into a numb stupor or threatening stabbing battering and killing my poxy evil mother and siblings are not the way to go lol. I have a blinding headache and I feel so tense and wound up all this shit literally makes me feel physically ill. I've already been out for a long walk with the dog, we walked over 2 miles today and yesterday. Distraction in the form of books telly music adult colouring books etc isn't working. I cleaned the house from top to bottom the other day just to discharge some of this energy so there's no cleaning to be done now. I was thinking about strimming my back and front lawns but it's been pissing down with rain the last couple of days where I am so the grass will be wet and I don't fancy getting myself electrocuted lol. I wish I had one of those punchbags boxers use in training or a pile of old crockery I could smash into smithereens. This anger has got to go somewhere before I bloody explode or to the other extreme implode. I'm trying to find the middle way and some balance here but so far it's eluding me. Sigh.

Suggestions advice positive constructive feedback welcome. And can I please have some big hugs as well?! Lol. I surely can't be the only one here with a rotten cow of a mum like mine? At least I don't have to deal with her anymore since we went our separate ways 14 years ago. But the memories will never leave me.

Cheers

Crazydiamond47
 
My only child is 3. My mom was inappropriate with all her kids and my older brothers (her step kids), but mostly she neglected us and was just a crazy pothead weirdo. She took us out of school when we were kids so we couldn't tell on her. I am the only one who escaped. The others are dead, still there, or became abusers.

I started talking to her again when I was pregnant. She still lives with my little brother, who is...31 now, and autistic, so he can't defend himself. I think she has been molesting him, but I don't have any proof so there's nothing I can do. She showed slight interest in my pregnancy but then didn't come to the hospital. For some reason I took my son to see her when he was a few months old. She was okay for maybe an hour and then we left and she sent me multiple crazy emails. But I had already realized my mistake. My baby was sitting there in that house where we'd suffered, with this monster smiling down at him. What the holy hell was I doing?

I haven't talked to her since.

I realized that my autistic brother is as good as dead. He is only mildly autistic and by now he can make his own decisions. Even if he can't, he is stuck there and it's past time to walk away. Sometimes other people have ruined a person you love and you can't do anything about it. It's not your fault and it's also not your place to try to save them. It never works.

You should have stopped talking to these people when you came of age. You shouldn't have ever let your kids be around them. You can't use drugs or drink. The reason is because a person who has grown up like you (and me) needs sharp wits to survive and to protect her kids. Using drugs and alcohol is like clubbing yourself in the knee when you're trying to run away from a lion.

Think positive. Fill your mind with new things, new interests. Learn things. If you don't know what to do in a situation, think to yourself, "what would a normal person do?" If that is confusing, think, "what would mum do?" and do the opposite. It also helps to remember that now your life is not about you, it is about your kids. Focusing on your most important positive contribution to the world will help you to rebuild your sense of self and your pride as a human being. If you are inclined to believe in a religion, do that. If not, learn about something else that will help you see your part in humanity, which is a collective of overwhelming good and should help you to move away from your family, which frankly tried to kill you. Stay strong, keep working on yourself, and protect your children.
 
Holy crap. That you went thru all that as a child and came thru even slightly sane is amazing. Of course you are angry! You have every right to be. And I'm not surprised you were in denial. It was to save your sanity.

How to get rid of the anger? Sorry but I can't help. I'm still trying to figure out how to feel it. I'm guessing it just needs to run its course?? Maybe accepting you deserve to feel it will help?


a battle buddy taught me this mantra. "You made the best least bad decision." It means that NONE of my options were good. They were all horrible. I had to pick the least bad one if I was going to survive. That's what you have been doing. And that's ok.

@Gamera3000 I loved this!

Think positive. Fill your mind with new things, new interests. Learn things. If you don't know what to do in a situation, think to yourself, "what would a normal person do?
 
Thanks Gamera and Frieda. Yes I know now what I should have done but hindsight is 20/20 isn't it? All I can conclude is that I must have been so brainwashed myself and f*cked up and immobilised through terror that I literally couldn't do anything to save myself or my own kids. Stockholm syndrome anyone? Fancy some trauma bonding on the side? Sorry to be flippant but I honestly think that's what happened to me. I don't know why else I kept going back. Maybe I had the foolish hope that it would get better but it never bloody did. I think that's where the denial comes in. And the repetition compulsion Freud spoke about. I was always totally disassociated. Literally on auto pilot not in my body not feeling the feelings I should have been feeling. My fight/flight/freeze/fawning mechanism was literally screwed at a very young age. The addictions my mum encouraged me to develop certainly didn't help. If she was feeding me alcohol and Valium from the age of 3 what chance did I have of avoiding mental illness and addiction? Throw in the trauma and her emotional unavailability and my dad's part in things (I've not really talked much about him as yet but he believed her and my brothers over me for decades and what with what he saw them do to me with his own eyes, yes his denial too, and the fact that while he never sexually abused me himself he did physically and emotionally abuse me on my mum and brothers behalf to try and bring me into line on several occasions, maybe he was brainwashed too) and absolutely nobody else in the family immediate or extended looking out for my welfare, my fate was sealed. As was my kids'.

I should never have become a mother myself and I say that not for myself but for my kids' sake. I had no way of knowing how to protect them or myself from all this abuse. Both my kids are adults now, aged 20 and 23 respectively. It's too late for me to save or protect them, the damage is well and truly done. They both went through care because I couldn't protect them and I failed them terribly even though I never meant to, the end result is still the same. They don't want to know me and frankly I don't blame them. They feel as hurt and angry at me for my failings towards them as I feel towards my own mother. I admit I hit my eldest kid only the once mind, and I couldn't stop his step dad hitting him either. Only the once as well, and we never emotionally or sexually abused him or my youngest, or neglected them, but we failed to protect them from other people my mum included, never mind if we meant to or not, and that's what neither of my kids can forgive me for. Plus having to go through the care system and all the shit they both endured while in it.

I turned out every bit as weak and ineffectual as my dad, sad to say. But there were reasons for that however I'm not going to make excuses for it anymore or put the blame on anyone or anything else anymore, either. Oh what a sorry state of affairs for us all. Yes my mum and brothers did try to kill me Gamera you're right. And yes Frieda the denial did help me to hold on to at least a sliver of sanity. But not much else. That family was like a cult or a concentration camp and very much a war zone and I was declared the enemy at birth. And I was outnumbered. My dad had a foot in both camps and most of the time my only ally was the family dog and even he got abused as well.

I don't know why my life has been spared or what my purpose in life is. I guess all I can do now is to try to figure it out as I go along and just hope and pray it will be revealed to me in the fullness of time. And hope and pray my kids can forgive me one day. I forgave my dad in the end because I came to understand he had his own frailties and vulnerability as a result of his own childhood. He was adopted as a baby. He was never told about it until the man he was told was his uncle died when he was just 13 then his adoptive parents told my dad that man was really his real dad. My dad went off the rails and a year later he met my mum. She'd been abused and I'm not sure who by but it points to her own dad my grandad who she strangely always put on a pedestal as a really lovely man while absolutely detesting her own mum my Nanny. My mum was a bit older than my dad when they met 15 to his 14 and the rest as they say is history.

My mum lost her dad 2 years before I was born and I think it unhinged her. She and my Nanny fell out when I was born and they didn't speak or see each other until I was 5 years old. So abuse and the resulting estrangement between parents and kids seems to be a family pattern. I so wish I could have changed that with my own kids but sadly it wasn't to be because I unconsciously repeated some of my own parents and grandparents mistakes with them. I can only hope my kids break that pattern with my grandkids if they have them, and they will succeed where I and their ancestors failed. I also hope my kids will let me be part of that one day but I have to accept that may never happen. With a very heavy heart.

So thanks again for your replies. I do appreciate the support and validation. And yes I probably do deserve the telling off as well. I was an ignorant fool and my kids paid the price for that, as I did before them with my own parents, as my parents did before me with their parents as well, all the way back down the generations. It's just so sad and heartbreaking for all concerned. And so unnecessary. Oh this guilt.... It's overwhelming. I just hope it leads me to do the right thing in the future. And I hope I get the chance to make amends to my now grown kids one day. Before it's too late.
 
I don't mean to sound cranky but. STOP selling yourself short!

Here's the difference between you and your parents.

You recognise the problems and you acknowledge them. And you are doing something about it!!!!! Too little too late? That's an answer you won't know until far into the future. For today? You are sweating blood and tears trying to be someone different than those around you!

Made to many mistakes? Sure. You made a shit ton of them and the cost was high. But!

You recognise the problems and you acknowledge them. And you are doing something about it!!!!!

Wondering if your kids will forgive you? Maybe. Maybe not
But they can look at you and see someone doing something to make sure she doesn't make the same mistakes in the future!

Why were you spared and what is your purpose? Who knows. Maybe it's to lead others out from the dark. Maybe it's to provide inspiration to those who struggle because you have been where they are. Maybe you will become an underwater basket weaver! The point is thast...unlike those in your family...you are breaking the cycle. You are going forward. And that is freaking amazing!!!I

Whew. :hug:
 
But why couldn't I have remembered these incidents before I put my kids in danger of be abused themselves by my mum? Because if I had I wouldn't have had anything to do with her and I wouldn't have let her anywhere near my babies.

You do not remember until you feel safe to remember, it is the shock absorber for the soul in order for you to have survived that hellish childhood. Kids have three choices I heard a therapist say to me, you block it out, you can kill yourself or go crazy.

You survived the best you could. I am sorry things are so bad for you right now. So here is a great big hug:hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug::hug:

Hopefully tomorrow will be a lightning of your heavy load you are carrying. I know that just get through this day the best you can. What a horrible mother you have. I am glad that you are getting treatment now. You will come out of this okay, it is just hell going through it.:hug:
 
Yeah, no, I was not telling you off. Your story is important and you should keep talking. I kind of feel that many therapists (mine included) like to take a "you couldn't have done anything else" approach to the past, which I dislike. I think it's good to admit that you messed up. Things were weighted against you, yes, but there were also good choices then, which seem clearer now that the time has past. See, if you didn't ever mess up, you'd be a superhuman, a person with the mind of a child who has no accountability, or some other kind of unrealistic character. Now that you have learned from things that went wrong, you are much better equipped to take care of yourself and help others.
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There used to be (probably still is) a documentary on Netflix called..."I am Not Your Guru" (I think) about Tony Robbins, the motivational speaker. Make sure you watch it through to the Children of God survivor. If you already know what that is, don't let it scare you way. That young woman's story, and how Robbins helps her, is probably the most powerful example of love, survival, and the importance of life that I can think of.

Of course you should have had your children. I'm sure they appreciate walking around alive right now. Life is always a gift! Something I have learned from having a terrible upbringing is that it helps me to identify and protect other people in need, which gives me a lot of satisfaction. If I'd had a nice life, maybe I wouldn't be like that. Maybe my early suffering gave me something to prevent suffering in many other people who I care about.
 
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