I am really struggling with my relationship with my sister and would cherish any advice. Here is my story.
I was sexually assaulted by a family friend when I was eleven, and on numerous other occasions throughout my early teens. I never told anyone at the time because I didn't want to hurt my family, blamed myself, felt ashamed. I didn't really recover the memories until my mid twenties. And although my father never touched me he acted inappropriately towards me, was voyeuristic, invaded my privacy, kissed me inappropriately and treated me like a surrogate spouse, confiding all of his secrets to me, including intimate details of his private life. Then when I was in my early twenties he told me that he was sexually attracted to me and although he knew it was wrong that he fantasised about having sex with me. I was horrified and from that point on withdrew from him and had as little as possible to do with him, but I never told anyone about it at the time and didn't really understand why I couldn't have a relationship with him. I just knew that I felt disgusted by him. It was made worse by him insisting on talking/bragging about all of the women that find him attractive, that he believes are flirting with him, that he is sleeping with etc. And some of these women were my age. He also never protected me from his friends who acted inappropriately towards me in a way that was very overt. I don't blame him for the sexual assaults. I don't think he knew. But other friends of his were quite blatantly inappropriate towards me and he never stopped them. I would try to set boundaries with him and tell him I wasn't interested in hearing about his sex life, that I am his daughter not his friend and that I don't want to know. But he couldn't help himself. Every time I spoke to him it was the same thing, talking about his sexual interests and conquests. I couldn't be around him and cut contact until I was in my early 40s, although my sister kept in touch.
This changed when his housing situation fell apart and he lived with my husband and I for a while. He was on his best behaviour during this time and it wasn't quite so bad. He was tolerable. He has since moved into a nursing home as he had a series of strokes and has a number of high medical care needs requiring that he be accompanied to a lot of medical appointments. My sister was taking on most of this, partly because she lives much closer to him (15 minutes away, I live 90+ minutes away), but was feeling overwhelmed and resentful that I wasn't helping so I agreed to take over most of the appointments. This is when things got bad again. Every time i saw him he would talk about inappropriate things, including that he had (if what he said is to be believed) molested one of the carers at the nursing home. I am increasingly finding this all very triggering. I have always had a tendency to dissociate and freeze, and a great capacity to numb my emotions. Since having therapy I have less of a tendency to dissociate, and I don't numb my feelings anymore either. Which is fantastic in most of my life, and I am feeling very emotionally healthy in most areas of my life. But it means that I feel much more vulnerable around my father. He triggers something in me and I freeze and go into a what feels like a flashback or panic attack. i feel like that frightened, speechless, helpless 11 year old. I can't talk or fight back. I just sit there frozen and scared. And there is no point in trying to set boundaries with him. He has dementia, is an alcoholic and probably meets the criteria for a narcissistic personality disorder.
Everything came to a head at Christmas. He announced to everyone present that he was beginning a relationship with one of the 27 year old carers at the nursing home, and then proceed to personally attack me in front of everyone for not being supportive of his relationships with younger women. The upshot of this was that I left the tale, broke down in tears and disclosed everything to my mum, then my sister. Mum was really supportive. She understood what he is like and confided that my cousin, who had lived with us for a time when she was 19, had moved out because she felt that my father was spying on her and she felt uncomfortable around him. Mum wants me to have nothing to do with him and my therapist agrees. I feel like I can't be in his presence. This has really upset my sister as she feels like all of the burden for his care is now falling on her. Even though mum has offered to take him to his appointments and I have offered to pay a carer to do it. She just feels like it is all an excuse and that I should jut suck it up and take him. She knows he is selfish and abusive, he abuses her in other ways. But she doesn't get that I can't be around him. I have tried to explain it but she thinks because he never physically abused me I should just get over it. And if he could just keep his mouth shut and not say things that are triggering I could tolerate him. I do feel selfish and guilty, but I also feel like he has used and abused every person in his life and that he is a lonely old man because he has treated everyone who has ever cared about him like dirt. I am happy to help my sister with his care in any way that doesn't involve me being in his presence (shopping for him, paying his bills, running errands etc), but she has rejected all of those offers. If it was my mum in need of care things would be totally different. Any thoughts on this would be really helpful. I would love to have a healthy relationship with my sister, and she claims that she wants one too, but I can't have a relationship that is conditional on putting up with his continued abuse. And he hasn't mellowed with age, he has just got worse. Sorry this is so long. I didn't mean for it to be. And any thoughts on this would be wonderful. Am I being selfish? Over-reacting? In my rational moments i don't believe I am, but then the doubts creep in. My therapist had warned me that my sister was unlikely to "get it" if i didn't give her what she wanted, ie. taking dad to all of his appointments and social visits. I am just feeling hurt an confused.
I was sexually assaulted by a family friend when I was eleven, and on numerous other occasions throughout my early teens. I never told anyone at the time because I didn't want to hurt my family, blamed myself, felt ashamed. I didn't really recover the memories until my mid twenties. And although my father never touched me he acted inappropriately towards me, was voyeuristic, invaded my privacy, kissed me inappropriately and treated me like a surrogate spouse, confiding all of his secrets to me, including intimate details of his private life. Then when I was in my early twenties he told me that he was sexually attracted to me and although he knew it was wrong that he fantasised about having sex with me. I was horrified and from that point on withdrew from him and had as little as possible to do with him, but I never told anyone about it at the time and didn't really understand why I couldn't have a relationship with him. I just knew that I felt disgusted by him. It was made worse by him insisting on talking/bragging about all of the women that find him attractive, that he believes are flirting with him, that he is sleeping with etc. And some of these women were my age. He also never protected me from his friends who acted inappropriately towards me in a way that was very overt. I don't blame him for the sexual assaults. I don't think he knew. But other friends of his were quite blatantly inappropriate towards me and he never stopped them. I would try to set boundaries with him and tell him I wasn't interested in hearing about his sex life, that I am his daughter not his friend and that I don't want to know. But he couldn't help himself. Every time I spoke to him it was the same thing, talking about his sexual interests and conquests. I couldn't be around him and cut contact until I was in my early 40s, although my sister kept in touch.
This changed when his housing situation fell apart and he lived with my husband and I for a while. He was on his best behaviour during this time and it wasn't quite so bad. He was tolerable. He has since moved into a nursing home as he had a series of strokes and has a number of high medical care needs requiring that he be accompanied to a lot of medical appointments. My sister was taking on most of this, partly because she lives much closer to him (15 minutes away, I live 90+ minutes away), but was feeling overwhelmed and resentful that I wasn't helping so I agreed to take over most of the appointments. This is when things got bad again. Every time i saw him he would talk about inappropriate things, including that he had (if what he said is to be believed) molested one of the carers at the nursing home. I am increasingly finding this all very triggering. I have always had a tendency to dissociate and freeze, and a great capacity to numb my emotions. Since having therapy I have less of a tendency to dissociate, and I don't numb my feelings anymore either. Which is fantastic in most of my life, and I am feeling very emotionally healthy in most areas of my life. But it means that I feel much more vulnerable around my father. He triggers something in me and I freeze and go into a what feels like a flashback or panic attack. i feel like that frightened, speechless, helpless 11 year old. I can't talk or fight back. I just sit there frozen and scared. And there is no point in trying to set boundaries with him. He has dementia, is an alcoholic and probably meets the criteria for a narcissistic personality disorder.
Everything came to a head at Christmas. He announced to everyone present that he was beginning a relationship with one of the 27 year old carers at the nursing home, and then proceed to personally attack me in front of everyone for not being supportive of his relationships with younger women. The upshot of this was that I left the tale, broke down in tears and disclosed everything to my mum, then my sister. Mum was really supportive. She understood what he is like and confided that my cousin, who had lived with us for a time when she was 19, had moved out because she felt that my father was spying on her and she felt uncomfortable around him. Mum wants me to have nothing to do with him and my therapist agrees. I feel like I can't be in his presence. This has really upset my sister as she feels like all of the burden for his care is now falling on her. Even though mum has offered to take him to his appointments and I have offered to pay a carer to do it. She just feels like it is all an excuse and that I should jut suck it up and take him. She knows he is selfish and abusive, he abuses her in other ways. But she doesn't get that I can't be around him. I have tried to explain it but she thinks because he never physically abused me I should just get over it. And if he could just keep his mouth shut and not say things that are triggering I could tolerate him. I do feel selfish and guilty, but I also feel like he has used and abused every person in his life and that he is a lonely old man because he has treated everyone who has ever cared about him like dirt. I am happy to help my sister with his care in any way that doesn't involve me being in his presence (shopping for him, paying his bills, running errands etc), but she has rejected all of those offers. If it was my mum in need of care things would be totally different. Any thoughts on this would be really helpful. I would love to have a healthy relationship with my sister, and she claims that she wants one too, but I can't have a relationship that is conditional on putting up with his continued abuse. And he hasn't mellowed with age, he has just got worse. Sorry this is so long. I didn't mean for it to be. And any thoughts on this would be wonderful. Am I being selfish? Over-reacting? In my rational moments i don't believe I am, but then the doubts creep in. My therapist had warned me that my sister was unlikely to "get it" if i didn't give her what she wanted, ie. taking dad to all of his appointments and social visits. I am just feeling hurt an confused.
