Was Doing Well Until Family Triggered Me

[littlestars]

For the last few weeks, I felt like I was winning the daily battle with PTSD. I'm still doing okay, but now I'm experiencing some symptoms again... and I came to the realization lately that it wasn't just my father that had hurt me (sexual abuse & rape), but that it was my mother and two older brothers as well (emotional/mental abuse).
My father is out of my life and has been for a while, but the rest of my family remains. And I am starting to think that they shouldn't be in my life either. It's hard to deal with and it is making me slip back into a depressed episode. My mother secretly hates me for what happened to me. I know this because one time we got into a horrible fight because she said something to me that I really don't want to repeat. And my brothers could honestly careless about me. They only talk to me when they need something from me.
I'm always the one making a call or sending a message to my mother or brothers too. They don't care enough to ask how I am doing on their own. I came to this realization lately and then an incident occurred...

To make this easier for me to explain I'm going to call my oldest brother "Paul" and second oldest brother "George".
My mother called me and told me George was abusing pain medication. Paul had a heroin problem and kicked it a few years back by staying at my mom's for a couple of weeks. They (my mother and Paul) came up with a plan to house George for a week or two until he completely came out of withdrawal. And then my mother said Paul suggested that I should give them some of my medication to help "ease the process of withdrawal" for George. Mind you, a few days earlier, Paul was asking me for some of my medicine for himself to use. (I take Xanax by the way. And instead of a heroin addiction, now Paul has a drinking problem.)

I'm not going to give anyone any of my medicine because it's unethical, I need it to function properly, and that's not even how you should help someone detox or whatever.

It makes me really angry for dozens of reasons. I feel used simply by them asking me for some of my Xanax. They don't care when I have problems and don't try to help me. I can't rely on them and learned that the hard way. I also feel extremely insignificant to them. And I feel so heartbroken and depressed over this whole thing. Everything got worse after I came out with what my father had done to me too.
I was doing so well and now a lot of memories about how my family has treated me poorly are popping up in my mind. And I'm getting flashbacks of my father again. I thought I saw him a couple of times and I had a panic attack every time I thought I saw someone that either looked like him or reminded me of him. (He lives in the SouthWestern US and I live in the NorthEast, So I wouldn't see him... but I am still afraid of him. I'm paranoid he's going to stalk me and murder me, even though I know that he couldn't. He is disabled from having a stroke and can barely talk or do anything.) I realize that not only did my father not love me one bit, but the rest of my family didn't either. I feel so alienated and alone and unwanted and used - even though I didn't help them.

I actually had a few thoughts of suicide over this, after not having any for once in the last few weeks. But I don't want to do that, but I can't help but feel that way because feeling not wanted or loved for who you are really hurts.


I spoke to my therapist about it today. He said that my mother is codependent and an enabler and that my two brothers are both drug addicts. He told me not to expect them to change or to care about me because I'll just continue feeling worse. He also told me that I need a new family.

I have some pets and a fiance and a best friend. My best friend lives 1,000 miles away though. My fiance's family likes me a lot, but I don't really feel a connection with them. I don't really feel connected to anyone really except my fiance and best friend. That's something at least, I am grateful for them... but I wish I had my own parental figures in my life. Or just more people who cared.

I'm a survivor of many suicide attempts as well. I wish at least one family member would have hugged me and told me that they were happy I was still here. I just feel so worthless and cast over. It actually breaks my heart to realize this about them, but in reality, it was always this way.




I feel like I just ranted/vented and this post didn't have a point. I'm sorry if you feel like you wasted your time in reading this, but I had to get it out.

 

[Nevermore]

Hi littlestars,
I don't feel like I wasted my time reading that at all! It helped me too because I can relate, and I had a similar experience myself recently - I was thinking I was on top of it all, but I saw my brother who said one little thing that had me feeling suicidal all week - and still I feel anxious!. There's something about your own family not supporting you/invalidating you that feels really....cold. I had a recent experience with my own family and ended up feeling as you describe - worthless, unloved, alone. I think inside of us all that kid that we once were still resides, the kid that wonders what's wrong with them because the way their family respond to them feels all wrong, and feels hurtful. And, speaking for myself anyway, even though I'm all grown up now I still feel that familiar sense of disillusionment and disappointment, a frightening feeling of aloneness in the world.

I just wanted to say that I think you're amazing to have survived what you have! I'm glad you have a new family - your fiance and your best friends. And I just wanted to send you a big HUG!! And hope this feeling passes soon xx

 

[anthony]

Don't you just love family? Ok... not always! Sounds like you have a stella group though there to not support you, yet help themselves as they see fit.

No need to have a point... as long as you feel better getting it out. Family are complicated, no doubt about it.

 

[user27357]

Look at the positives and negatives and make a decision. I tried a few times over the course of my life to leave my parents and step sisters behind and kept letting them back in and myself forgive and forget the damages they inflicted. After I was able to look at the siyuation objectively with the help of a good therapist I was able to weigh the pros and cons of continuing any contact with them and make a final decision that has been easy to accept and keep in place because self doubt and the instinct to maintain relationships have been eliminated from the equation. They are no longer able to hurt me because they are aware that I am not to be contacted or bothered and am willing to involve any legal action necessary to keep it that way. Years of peace and healing have resulted and I have no fantasies of ever reestablishing contact with the people I see so clearly as toxic now. It took time, but it is worth it.

I started by just writing out the pros and cons of being around them, and tracking my reactions to contact after every time we interacted. After seeing it laid out in an almost spread sheet type form, the decision was easy and I have no regrets.

Talk to a therapist if you are thinking of doing this, you sound like you are where I was when I started this and probably need the overseeing eye of a therapist right now. I think of it as being in the heat of battle and asking someone not directly involved for advice on how to win the war. My therapist played the role of the general on the hill watching the enemy objectively and helping me with my battleplan at a time when I was too busy to see anything but the hand to hand combat I was involved in at the time.

 

[Tinyflame]

I have rarely been confident what is the 'right' course, or my self-doubt & beliefs have made me question what is the right course or if the conclusions I've drawn are fair or accurate, if I am being too harsh on others or too easy on myself. One thing however I could not deny is how much it impacts on me & how badly it makes me feel. (Oddly enough, or not so oddly, really, it doesn't seem to have that same impact on them.) So I agree it helps to have sane feedback or other's perspective if they are honestly aware of the details.

 

[user27357]

Sometimes it seems like family acts like there is no accountability for what they do to us. Things they would never say to anyone else are easily said to a family member, doing things that would shame them if seen in public view are easily done when only family sees it. That goes for showing affection also, and for sharing humor and private thoughts and in the best families love without restraint or prerequisites. It is hard to walk away from a family, but if the family relationship is only a conduit for the worst and never a source of the best interractions, it is wise to see it for what it is and end it.

It would be a shame to eliminate the sole source you have for unlimited love, but if it isn't there it is a shame to keep taking the worst.