When Is It Right To Cut Off Relations With Family Member??

[Friday]

I think the better question is "When is it wrong to?"

Because that one's easy: You can only abandon kids & pets. Everyone else can take care of themselves.

 

[kath3141]

this is only a decision you can make. if your relationship with her is preventing you from healing then it's probably a good idea to at least limit contact. i've cut most of my family off completely because there's no hope.

It is making healing hard. I fact while I feel I've come far, this is one area in which I feel I'm dragged back in a direction I don't want to go.

^same as Melody

I've cut ties with most of my family too. I'm not sad, I don't miss them, I miss what they should have been: healthy, nurturing, supportive people, or at the very least, not harmful to others. Depends on what the motivation behind "ghosting" is.

While I originally, meant the "ghosting" in guest (at least to some extent). Mainly my concern is not wanting it to be a huge confrontation. I hope to simply cut my losses. At best I feel its best to keep my interaction to a minimum.

You can only abandon kids & pets. Everyone else can take care of themselves.

Very true!

 

[KuanYin]

It is making healing hard. I fact while I feel I've come far, this is one area in which I feel I'm dra...

I thought you meant ghosting as in just quietly cutting ties and leaving. The likelihood of confrontation depends greatly on the person or persons you're disconnecting from. There's nothing wrong with slipping away quietly to refocus your energy in a healthier direction. One thing I feel compelled to forewarn you of is the potential for character assassination against you. That can be, and was for me, a difficult phenomenon to come to terms with. Once I was no longer in the picture, some pretty horrible things were said (and believed) about me, that were totally unfounded, unwarranted and untrue. It was difficult knowing it was happening and knowing there was nothing I could do to stop it. It was hard seeing how "family" believed the lies without even bothering to find out the truth. But behaviors, expectations and practices that can be expected in normal, healthy, relationships, (friendships, familial connections), do not exist when the environment/situation/individuals are coming from an unhealthy or dysfunctional place.

 

[kath3141]

I thought you meant ghosting as in just quietly cutting ties and leaving. The likelihood of confrontatio...

Thx for your advice and willingness to communicate. In reality I was considering ghosting as a quiet Cutting of ties as you mentioned. In reality, I do think this is the only way to go...

...the troubling thing about this are your very warnings to me. I summarize the experience by saying it's like "the emperor has no clothes" and you're the kid who is pointing at the naked man. It's a troubling thing when families collude to engage in a willful denial of truth. There are rules of the game that require everyone to play a role. My therapist warned me about this sometime ago and told me that as I change, my relationships will. I see this happening.

I do have one question for you though. The most painful thing about this whole experience is the invalidation that feels like I'm expected to accept that the truth is not true. Instead perceptual falsehoods of others are. I feel hurt because my feelingS are ignored and judged as if they are wrong. I become highly stressed because I feel immense shame. Despite all these feelings, I stick to the idea of holding myself to standards. Does this get easier with time? How do you deal?

 

[KuanYin]

Thx for your advice and willingness to communicate. In reality I was considering ghosting as a quiet C...

The character assassination part was difficult for me, especially because I knew that the picture of me that was being painted was so far from who I am. Sometimes I still get frustrated by it. As an example, an uncle on my "mother's" side chewed me out one day when I expressed (via social media) my frustrations with having an abusive mother. (I think I simply posted that she was a Dementor, like from Harry Potter). He told me how rude and disrespectful I was, how he knew how much my "mother" loved me and how I would be upset if anything ever happened to her blah blah blah. That was really triggering for me. I need not look far to see the very tangible signs of the abuse I endured. I know the effects are real. Him not seeing that didn't negate their existence, didn't erase the scars, didn't change the truth.
With time I've come to realize that some people aren't strong enough to see through the bullshit, don't value the truth enough to seek it out and are content to simply drink the "kook-aid" because it easier to pretend nothing is wrong than to admit it and rectify it, I can't change what they choose to believe about me and in the end, what they think doesn't really matter anyway.
The healthy people in my life now, the ones who say they love me and actually demonstrate said love with action, theirs are the ones whose opinions matter. Sorry for rambling, I hope there's something useful to be had in there lol.