Abuser Is A Sibling, Should I Cut All Contact?

[Upas]

"Your brother was an unnaturally good kid. He was like a perfect angel." Oh... Really? He was? Why do I have PTSD, again, dad? Incest? No? Okay, angel it is then.

My dad doea this about my mom (divorced aost 13 yrs), he says alone to my step mom who told me and shouldnt of "I cant believe she would do that, we were married 20 yrs and she was a good mother", ummm, she changed, totally. Thats why I identify with kidnap victims and not abuse victims, i was isolated from my dad and all his family, all her family, her personality changed completely to conform to my step dad's "relgion" and his typed out bible and the cult i was forved into is what some kidnapped victims would go through but its a lot and my dad can seem to wrap his head around it. Im thinking of bringing him into a therapy session and my therapist can tell him why he believes me. I didnt her Borderline Personality Disorder, PTSD, Generalized Anxiety Disorder and possible Attachment Disorder cuz I had a wonderful childhood. Grrrrr!

 

[Ecil]

He has BPD and had a lot of issues growing up he very nearly succeeded in hanging himself was in the hospital for a while he very nearly died. So my parents have tiptoed around him for a long time. I've always felt eclipsed by him and have felt like I have to just deal with his emotional abuse as an adult, he would threaten suicide all the time.

Thank you everyone for your replies, I've been wanting to talk about this for a while but just haven't plucked up the currage. I haven't even been able to talk to my T about this yet. So it's very appreciated that you all took the time to reply. :hug: To all who accept them.

I think this is going to be the year for me. Me and my partner have talked about moving away and I think if I could get some distance from him it'll be easier to cut him out of my life completely. I can't see me telling everyone what he really is yet, but maybe oneday. I think I just need to take care of myself just now and do what's best for me.

I hope you all have a good holiday season.

 

[Nilos]

As children we are powerless victims at the hands of abusers.
No one rescues us. Nothing happens to stop it.
No one even noticed, let alone validate our painful experiences.
We were solitary in our fear, anger and shame.
At the time, fear helped us keep vigilant hoping to avoid threatening situations. We made decisions based on the level of our fear and it helped us survive.
Anger needed an outlet and demanded accountability. Fear had enough influence to steer anger clear of the unpredictable dangers voiced anger could cause and guided anger to the only safe place, inward.

We asked for it and deserved what ever happened. We aren't sure how we asked for the hell but that doesn't stop us from embracing the responsibility and making it our Self-Truth.
The acceptance of that "truth" fills us with self-disgust and shame.

Now we have the obligation to keep those we love from ever "finding out" and being hurt by our shameful secret.

As adults it's possible we are not only unable to see some things from a different perspective, we might be incapable of comprehending other (possible) truths.


Here are some possible truths.

Your family does not deserve your compassion and you are wasting your time and emotion on a bunch of people who bother with you now that you can take care of yourself. Where were they when you needed someone? Maybe you couldn't expect anything from your mother but what about your father and sisters?

Have you ever considered they could have known if they bothered to take the time with you.

Is it that you don't want to hurt them or are you afraid of having to face their indifference?

That you've never said anything says a lot about your family dynamic and its rules.

It's not really that easy when we share a family. I don't have anyone to talk to about this

If you had a loving, nurturing family like you deserve, you would have someone to talk to about this.

if he found me would use my posts against me to manipulate me.

The only power he has over you is what you give away.

This might sound odd but I don't really want to destroy his life too.

You don't have the power to destroy his life any more than he has to destroy yours.

I think that may be my fault for going along like nothing happened for years.[/QUOTE

Oh how we love to take the blame. It's so much easier and certainly more comfortable.

Here's the scoop. Blame just doesn't matter anymore. What happened, it can't be changed. You will not get what you need from these people. You might think, if they knew, they would feel your pain.
Nothing ever happens like we imagine it

I don't want to destroy him like how it feels with the guy who raped me I just don't want him near me ever again.

I am so very sorry for all your pain hon. God knows I've been there and still visit every now and then.

Stop believing the bullsh*t hype that everyone of your relatives has more value that you.

I am the youngest of four and I am 57 years old and just starting to heal. I know for me to continue healing, my parents and siblings cannot be in my life. It is very difficult some days, but most days its a blessing.
I don't know what my future holds. I'm not a very trusting person and I don't make friends. Friendships begin only to fizzle out. It's hard and its lonely.
I do know what my past held and I know I don't want that.
So I do the work. I go to therapy, read books and articles on PTSD, trauma and dissociation. I privately journal and I come on the board here. Eventually I want to get involved in advocacy for trauma survivors. I will always carry the pain, I may as well do something useful with it.

 

[Wubem]

OP here, I didn't realise it's been so long since I first asked this question.

I have moved to a different area and I wanted to see if the distance would make things easier for me to cope with him. Well it did, for a start, the longer I had away from him without any contact the more I could see. He has been keeping me primed. You notice with emotional abuse, it doesn't happen over night. It's years of conditioning, he is in my brain.

He is the voice in my head telling me that I'm crazy, unstable, reminding me frequently that my "memory is terrible and it can't be trusted". He's been gaslighting me and making me believe I'm truly loosing my mind all these years to try to protect himself. Everytime I had contact with him he would water his seeds in my mind. "That's not how that happened, you were real young your mind probably just filled in the blanks". A thousand little things I can't quite describe, nothing big I can say "look see what he's doing to me" to anyone. Having memory issues living with ptsd I already feel my mind can't always be trusted.

It makes me feel really stupid :banghead: Every time I saw him he's causing more damage :( I was giving him the chance, handing over the reins to my mental health.

So I've really not wanted to jump into any rash decisions. Like I said my mind can't always be trusted. I didn't want to do something I would later live to regret. It's been a few months I've given it a great deal if thought. And a week or so ago (can't exactly remember when) I had enough he tried to invite himself to come visit. I blocked him from anything he could possibly contact me on. Facebook, Instagram, messengers, I've even blocked his numbers and his wife's the same.

Now I'm terrified. It seems really passive aggressive I didn't tell him I was going to do this. Now he basically can't contact me I never "got round" to giving him my new address. If, well when he realises he's going to have to contact me by proxy through my folks or sisters.

Scared. I felt like I should undo it all then I remember I posted here about it and wanted to see what I said and my reasons. All the replies and what I said about it just makes me think I did the right thing.

Only thing is it's consuming my thoughts and I haven't been sleeping I'm so worried. Maybe I should make it more...I dunno less flimsy. Write him a letter tell him that it no more contact. Contact my parents tell them, the information would reach him quicker than if I sent it by email. That's just as passive aggressive if not worse. I don't know if I can deal with this right now. I've been speaking to my T about it but she has been very sounding board neutral. Any input would be appreciated a different perspective.

 

[Famad]

I'm glad that the distance has helped you.

If you want to reinforce the boundary between yourself and him, I would tell your family not to give your address out to him. I would tell them, if you have the energy in you to do so, that you do not want any contact from him. You don't owe anyone any explanations, and if you don't feel comfortable telling him to GTFO out of your life, tell those tied to both of you. If he shows up or attempts to pester you in other ways, I would view it (the very first time) as an act of harassment. Do not let him (or anyone else) dictate the rules here. If you don't want him in your life, he doesn't need to be in your life. End of story.

Unfortunately, for me, this has meant often being the one who had to make difficult sacrifices when it came to the rest of my family. I'm not sure I'll ever feel okay about missing my cousin's wedding, for instance, but such are the decisions I've made in support of my ultimate decision to cut out my brother.

 

[Iru]

All of my family lives in different areas codes now so it should be easy to avoide him with out any suspicion being drawn from it. Excuses can be made for the time being.

It feel like it's just taken out all of my energy to just block him everywhere. I don't know how I'll cope when it comes time to actually say to people I'm no longer in contact with him. It seems like there's a fine line between avoidance (not telling him straight, not explaining to my family) and self protection.

I know I'm not able to cope with a lot of this at once but maybe ripping off the bandage in one swift motion would be easier in the long run. I have to really take care of my self and not fall into the downward spiral. Anyway this feels like a really big step. It's just scary as hell.

But I know now I'm not losing it (well for the time being anyway) I'm not overly emotional, infact I'm really the opposite(I need to work on expressing my emotions more). I'm not crazy and my memory can be trusted a lot more than he would've had me believe. This is really big, it's huge that I can see what he's been doing to me for so many years. He's still in my brain pulling all the leavers but now I can fight back and tell those untrue thoughts that there days are numbered, I can see them now.

It's so hard working on cognitive distortions all the while someone's telling you they are true. Oh and here's a new one. It's like inception. I can't believe I've been so blind, and alowed him to hurt me over and over.

Well no more. I can't get better and do this work with worm tounge whispering in my ear.

 

[Facaz]

I had to cut contact with 2 abusive siblings, a 3rd I did not, In some ways I couldn't win either way. I miss having a family, but I couldn't take it either. I can love them easier from a distance.

It's also difficult to deal with abuse.

 

[Ikujo]

I skipped over the replies so if I repeat, I apologize.

My brother who's 9 years older molested me for five years. He's the family's golden boy. First grandchild and can do no wrong. My parents know but never talk about it and have made it clear they will never. I have another brother as well. I have slowly cut contact. Monday will be the first time I'll be in their town in three years. My phone calls have gone from nightly to once a month. Monday my brother will be officiating a funeral so that'll be something. It's not been easy but I'm healthier by distancing myself.