« edit Monday, 21 December 2015 by Dutch Uncle »: changed the title a bit to reflect current events. Months after I started (and locked ;D ) the thread.
« edit Thursday, 28 April 2016 by Dutch Uncle »: changed the title again to reflect current events. Months after I reopened the thread
Right! This was bound to happen sooner or later, but here it is. And I would like to get some advise and/or insights and/or questions from you all.
I am NC with my sister, for 8 months now. Before that I had a long and strenuous relationship with her, and went LC/Grey Rock/MC/etc. for 3 years before I went NC. I never told her I 'went' NC, I simply did at some point, after she had (emotionally) blackmailed me. (see further down below)
I've written some on me and my sis, so some of you might have a clue, but I'm happy willing to elaborate/explain further. Might even be 'purgatory' to do so. So feel free to ask.
Today I received this e-mail (note to mods: It's a translation, so it's not a verbatim quote. I trust quoting this mail as such is not a breach of site-policy)
"In a few weeks it will be my birthday. I'll celebrate it with a small party.
I would want to invite you(1), and [would want to] call you to inform you additionally on my birthday[party]. But there is something wedged in between us to [prevent me from] do that just normally. I would like to re-establish our contact, so we can call each other if there is something to tell.
I hope you want the same and we can arrange for a meeting/deal/get-together/conversation.
Sis."
(1) note: NOT "I hereby invite you."
So, the first question is: do I respond or not.
I'm in a way caught between a rock and a hard place, so I'll share some of my thoughts on this.
1) A reason TO respond would be to make it clear to her I'm "Over and Done with", which I have already told my Father and Brother. So saying that would be merely to re-assert my commitment to NC. To Bro and Dad I have said the blackmail was the proverbial "drop in the bucket that made it spill over".
(I'm not sure if that's something that is being said in English, but I have come across the expression "I hope your bucket of water doesn't spill over.", so it might resonate. To elaborate: her blackmail wasn't exactly the 'drop' that made it spill over, but more 'the brick smashed in at great force' that would even make a half-filled bucket spill over, violently. :fallingbricks: But I digress.)
I left mom out of all this, for various reasons, but mostly because she would definitely interfere and do everything she wants to get me back in line. Abusive if need be.
2) The reasons NOT to respond are multiple, and I do need to elaborate on them at great lengths. So please bear with me:
- I already referred to this in the note: She "would like to invite me", but DOES NOT invite me... yet. So the ball is being placed in my court. To me, this sounds as I will have to make an effort so I can reap the generosity of my sis to grant me an (royal) Audience to the Court of the Drama Queen. (I suspect she is HPD, like my mom)
- "there is something wedged between us". Right. What is this Wedge? She doesn't say! I'm left guessing. It's "Chaos Manufacture." She's damned right there is a Wedge, but I'm left to 'disclose' this Wedge. It's up to me. She's too Chicken. And trust me: It's not (just) me who is driving this Wedge. I'd argue I bloody well see the Wedge, but SHE is the one driving it in, time and again, and I have simply stopped trying to pull it out. And now it's again being put on me to 'clear the Wedge'. I'm trying hard to be the Stubborn Mule who says: "you may drag it out yourself ma'am. I ain't movin'."
- She would like to re-establish contact. Really? Is this a constructive way to re-establish contact? I'm being lured out in the open. She's sitting safely behind the fence. Well stocked up on ammo, no doubt. She's waving a carrot-on-a-stick, but this Donkey is not moving.
- She hopes I want the same. Well, execute me, but I don't see a move forward from her, so what 'same' am I actually to reciprocate?
At this point I think it's imperative to tell that one of the HUGE grudges she has held against for ages is that "everything is always about you (=me, Dutch Uncle)", that "You don't care about anything I have to say", that "You don't care about anybody (!) else".
YET... "we can always talk things over so well" :stars:
I did take that into account very well (That's obviously what I say, might be a bit biased there ;) ) over the three years MC etc. In that timeframe I already noticed how often the conversation got turned onto me. Like in this very mail. It's not ME who makes 'any' conversation about me, it's HER who does it. And i've been the fool who always kicked the ball in an effort to score. In a team-effort, I thought. But only to find out I was the actual opponent. Or had made an 'own goal', confused gaslighted into where the goalpost actually were.
What exactly does she say about HER in this mail? It's all about me, as I can figure out, and it only draws on me to make a move. It doesn't say anything on what she considers to be 'the Wedge", it doesn't say anything on how SHE thinks/wants to get it out of the way. It's all about ME having to make the effort so 'the Wedge' can get out of the way and I can happily show up at her party.
The Blackmail
This is exactly what the blackmail was all about, and it's about time I spill the beans on that, here in this thread:
"I assume you want as much as me that the birthday party (a Jubilee) for our mom will be a pleasant one. Well, for me there is something that is really bothering me [another Wedge! (DU)] and I need to have that cleared up before that. Any ideas on how to do that? I hope we can have a meeting/deal/get-together/conversation before the event."
I had no idea what she was talking about (of course I could IMAGINE a few). She was clearly not telling me what this "really bothering" thing was about, so in a fit of FOGlessness I replied: "Perhaps you need/want to apologize?" [for what's bothering you] (in hindsight I probably should have stayed mute. :doh:)
She had already pulled quite some stunts on me that might have warranted an apology, and nothing is more stress-releasing than admitting a wrong, no?
Not in the least since I had, many months prior, tried to arrange a 'siblings-gift' to give to uHPD-mom on her Jubilee (basically a lets-just-show-up-together-so-mom-can't-whine,-she'll-bite-the-dust-soon-anyway,-what-do-we-care,-at-least-we-can-have-fun-together-can't-we,-she'll-be-happy-as-a-clown) which Sis had effectively sabotaged.
This is a whole lot I bring to bear, and I'm sure I'll need my time to make a decision, any-which-way.
There's still weeks to go before this party takes place, so I'll leave this thread open for replies, ideas and additional information for quite a while.
I have not threaded lightly on my decision to go NC, and so I will not thread lightly on my response to this either. I need to give this great consideration. Whatever I'l do, the consequences will be felt many years from now.
Thanks for reading this diatribe/confusion.
Dutch Uncle.
Dutch Uncle, it makes me angry on your behalf to watch this woman at work on you. she sounds proper scary. seriously.
QuoteShe's too Chicken
no, she's too clever. too clever to say anything outright, straightforward and honest. not cowardice, D/U, but skill. if it wasn't so destructive i might almost admire it. clever clever clever...
to me, she seems to be a supremely accomplished manipulator; to me, everything she says here is calculated, (sorry, but it's true, whether or not she is totally conscious of it)... calculated to
FOG you into becoming enmeshed again.
she has achieved a lot with this one email... she's climbed skilfully into your mind and pressed a lot of well established buttons in there, trying to con you into letting your soul's energy be drained off into her bottomless reservoir.
Crazy-makers always want you to expend your mind's hard-won energy and resources, to think it all out, be cornered into explaining to yourself, justifying to yourself, fighting off the inevitable guilt.
exhausting. but my feeling would be that perhaps you don't need to do that, don't need any more to enter into the arguments in your head that this is prompting. it's only that you have been so conditioned over the years to think that you are obliged to engage with it.
and in true manipulator style she has already made it look like it is your responsibility to respond, but only responding in the way she requires will suffice. she has provided a lot of clever emotional cues here, letting you know what is expected of you.
But:
you do not need to respond.
if you decide to respond, you are free to respond in the way that you decide is
most beneficial to you, to your emotional health, without guilt, fear or any obligation to look after hers.
oh D/Uncle, would you present your jugular to a vampire? grrrrr i want to shake her, she is so destructive. protect yourself my friend. you are in control of this. not her.
i am going to admit this to you, Dutch Uncle. i want to say "Run, put as much distance between her and you as possible!" but i know it's not my place to. However, i know that you are wise, and you are perfectly able to make the decision that is the best for you. i just had to say that, becos i don't like the idea of your being hurt by her.
i really hope i haven't been too forward with all this, but i do just hate a bully. if i have, ignore what i say, but be assured of my support. i believe you are a strong person. you will resolve this. :bighug:
Dutch Uncle,
I just somehow lost the message I was draft, so this is a second try.
Your sister is indeed "hoovering." And you are asking questions I know well. You will want, I think, to ask yourself two overarching questions. The first is whether you see any prospects for change on her part. You don't report any. But you know the dynamics here.
The second question is whether making contact to inform her of no contact is worthwhile. It's a contradiction, of course, and in my experience is a message rarely heard.
I went NC with an abusive mother almost twenty-five years ago. I don't think I ever said so directly, but I'd have had to shout over the barrage of ridicule and contempt that was her constant message. Gradually, she realized that I meant business. But the hoovering has never stopped. I still receive letters describing my many faults and the ways in which I've let her down. Like your sister, she apparently has no awareness of her own behavior. The final cutoff came after a particularly violent episode, but it's the emotional abuse, which was constant, that still makes me shudder.
My thinking goes something like this: if she could ever take at least some responsibility for her own behavior, I might consider contact, at least in a limited way. But messages are anything but acknowledgment of her behavior. Instead, they're all about my deficiencies. I don't believe I've ever heard her apologize for anything. Faced with someone so intractable, I've seen few options but not to respond to the messages. Still, they haven't stopped. I've not been hoovered, but neither am I recovered.
Your sister's message is different, but what you've quoted suggests little acknowledgment that she needs to examine her behavior. Rather, she's adept at shifting blame for problematic family dynamics. From what you describe, she seems always to take the initiative to name a problem and so puts you on the defensive. Taking the initiative allows her to set the terms of the conflict (whatever it is at the moment). I note that someone concerned for you might more openly ask what was wrong/what she might have done/how she might help make it right.
You are right, I think, in judging that your response now will have consequences for some time to come. You are establishing a new pattern. You will probably want to consider what you would truly want (is NC preferable?) and what may truly be possible.
Thanks so much, arpy1
Quote from: arpy1 on September 04, 2015, 05:14:34 PM
QuoteShe's too Chicken
no, she's too clever. too clever to say anything outright, straightforward and honest. not cowardice, D/U, but skill. if it wasn't so destructive i might almost admire it. clever clever clever...
Sly, isn't it ;D
I remember, as a young boy, my parents had (multiple) friends over (they were into 'Ecumenism': give credit where credit is due ;D . Yay parents!) . This particular couple, Jewish immigrants (not that THAT particularly matters), told me on the difference between clever and sly. I guess the only way it DOES matter is that as an immigrant one gets to 'think' about what part of your native language goes into what into your 'adopted' language.
It has stuck ever since.
It's a sly trick of her, isn't it?
Burn the witch! [/jest]
(can we have the :witch: smiley over from OOTF?)
(oh LOL. It IS here! Though for certain it does not show up as a choice! Praise [whoever] for making this happen.)
Quote from: stillhere on September 04, 2015, 05:29:41 PM
You will want, I think, to ask yourself two overarching questions. The first is whether you see any prospects for change on her part. You don't report any. But you know the dynamics here.
The second question is whether making contact to inform her of no contact is worthwhile. It's a contradiction, of course, and in my experience is a message rarely heard.
[...] Like your sister, she apparently has no awareness of her own behavior. [...] But messages are anything but acknowledgment of her behavior. Instead, they're all about my deficiencies.[...] Your sister's message is different, but what you've quoted suggests little acknowledgment that she needs to examine her behavior. Rather, she's adept at shifting blame for problematic family dynamics. From what you describe, she seems always to take the initiative to name a problem and so puts you on the defensive. Taking the initiative allows her to set the terms of the conflict (whatever it is at the moment). I note that someone concerned for you might more openly ask what was wrong/what she might have done/how she might help make it right.
You are right, I think, in judging that your response now will have consequences for some time to come. You are establishing a new pattern. You will probably want to consider what you would truly want (is NC preferable?) and what may truly be possible.
Thanks a lot. These are exactly the questions I'm pondering.
Yay! I'm not alone in this! :cheer:
I'd :kiss: you if I could.
Thanks again.
Dutch Uncle,
If my experience is any gauge, your sister will make escalating efforts to "hoover" you back in. She will be probably do so no matter what you decide about the current questions. Change on your part is an indication that you're assuming control of your own life. However vaguely an abuser may understand what that means, the prospect threatens the abuser's control.
I have an advantage, of sorts, in that I live far away from my uNPD mother. Our paths won't cross without someone boarding a plane. (I'm in the U. S., so the same applies to people in Europe.)
If you live in the same community with your sister, the challenges may be different.
Sis has distanced herself sufficiently (geographically) not to worry about that.
I'm the one, from all of the FOO (including my parents), who has stayed closest to 'home ground'. And even I left the suburb/village we grew up in for the 'Big City' some tens of Km's away. Everybody is at least two hours travel away.
Thanks for your concern consideration, much appreciated. :thumbup:
Quote from: arpy1 on September 04, 2015, 05:14:34 PM
QuoteShe's too Chicken
no, she's too clever.
I'm so happy you said this. For I'm pretty sure I often take the role of the 'scout' to 'protect' sis (she's 6 years older than me, LOL). Brave little Uncle getting his head shot of... The Gallant Prince just has to wrestle his way through the thorn-bushes, but than he may kiss Sleeping Beauty awake and live happily ever after... But Life is not a fairy-tale, now is it?
I
should re-frame her chickenness... :thumbup:
Quoteto me, she seems to be a supremely accomplished manipulator; to me, everything she says here is calculated, (sorry, but it's true, whether or not she is totally conscious of it)... calculated to FOG you into becoming enmeshed again. [...] and in true manipulator style she has already made it look like it is your responsibility to respond, but only responding in the way she requires will suffice. she has provided a lot of clever emotional cues here, letting you know what is expected of you.
Thanks. I feel validated. Whether she is conscious of it or not doesn't really matter, does it?
During the three years LC, and reading a lot of stuff on dysfunctional behavior, I started to see clearly a lot of that in my sis (and whole FOO). Double-binds for example, and other manipulative tricks.
Quoteshe has achieved a lot with this one email... she's climbed skilfully into your mind and pressed a lot of well established buttons in there, trying to con you into letting your soul's energy be drained off into her bottomless reservoir.
And I'm so grateful to have found this safe haven where I can just vent this, and lay down on my back and relax a bit, come back and see these replies that resonate so strongly with what is happening inside my head, heart and body. :thumbup:
QuoteCrazy-makers always want you to expend your mind's hard-won energy and resources, to think it all out, be cornered into explaining to yourself, justifying to yourself, fighting off the inevitable guilt.
Going NC has been such a relief, a reprieve of all that crap.
Quoteexhausting. but my feeling would be that perhaps you don't need to do that, don't need any more to enter into the arguments in your head that this is prompting. it's only that you have been so conditioned over the years to think that you are obliged to engage with it.
It's obsessive-compulsive. :doh:
Quoteprotect yourself my friend. you are in control of this. not her.
[...] be assured of my support. i believe you are a strong person. you will resolve this.
Thanks a lot. It will be a great asset while I ponder my options, my wants and my own skills to deal with this. :thumbup:
:hug:
Quote from: stillhere on September 04, 2015, 05:29:41 PM
Dutch Uncle,
You will want, I think, to ask yourself two overarching questions. The first is whether you see any prospects for change on her part.
I do not see ANY prospects. I've given it three years in LC/MC, also putting up firm and clear rules and boundaries, followed up on them, only to see it worsening with the Blackmail as the 'Grand Finale'.
For me it's quite telling that this mail is practically a copy of that. Only now it's her birthday, not mom's Jubilee.
QuoteThe second question is whether making contact to inform her of no contact is worthwhile.
My gut says "No". After a good nights sleep I think that IF I reply it will be along the lines of "I'm not coming. Enjoy the party and Happy Birthday Sis." No JADE as to why not. No mention of "The Wedge" whatsoever.
Quotewhat you've quoted suggests little acknowledgment that she needs to examine her behavior. Rather, she's adept at shifting blame for problematic family dynamics. From what you describe, she seems always to take the initiative to name a problem and so puts you on the defensive. Taking the initiative allows her to set the terms of the conflict (whatever it is at the moment).
No acknowledgment whatsoever.
A quite telling story is what happened in the three years LC/MC:
At some point I receive a mail in which she shows regret for our diminished contact. And she asks if her "Grave 'misstep' (blunder/ step-out-of-line) " had something to do with it. "Wow," I thought, "we're getting somewhere." So I asked her what this "Grave misstep" was, because I could not say if it had anything to do with it if I didn't know what it was. (I was clearly already getting out of the FOG there). She phoned me the next day. After some chit-chat
I asked about it :doh: . "Oh, that was no big thing", she said, "and I have already apologized."
WHAT?!
"No you didn't", I said.
"Yes I did!" she replied, "but I'll do it here again. There." (and that's all the words she used)
That was it. My sister coming clean on what SHE had called a "
Grave misstep/blunder". :rofl:
Actually I chuckled inwards. And changed the subject. The Grave Misstep would clearly never be revealed, nor would 'ownership' of it be acknowledged by her. She had brushed it off.
I felt cheated, used. But it had been a significant lesson for me. SHE was not going to make things 'better'.
QuoteYou are right, I think, in judging that your response now will have consequences for some time to come. You are establishing a new pattern. You will probably want to consider what you would truly want (is NC preferable?) and what may truly be possible.
Thanks again. That's exactly what I need to decide on. What will be the new pattern. And to a large degree the pattern is already woven. I'm arriving at the centre piece of the quilt/carpet now.
QuoteI went NC with an abusive mother almost twenty-five years ago. [...], but it's the emotional abuse, which was constant, that still makes me shudder. [...] messages are anything but acknowledgment of her behavior. Instead, they're all about my deficiencies. [...] Still, they haven't stopped. I've not been hoovered, but neither am I recovered.
I'm so sorry you have been going, and still are going through the same crap. I share your pain.
:hug:
Yay, Dutch Uncle, :yourock: :hug: :hug:
It's now been 36 hours since I got the mail, and only now it is dawning on me:
First I have to arrange some contact so that whatever is "between us" can get straightened out, THEN my sis will tell me additional info on her birthday party, and THEN I will be invited.
Right?
What the * is going on?
Will I be instructed how to make a proper curtsey?
Will I be required to wear a lackey-jacket?
What?
It's a four hour trip to even get to her :doh: .
She's bonkers.
Good point, Dutch Uncle. We become so used to patterns of acquiescence that they seem normal. Breaking the pattern reveals a great many bizarre behaviors and outrageous expectations.
Your sister seems so familiar. If the similarities hold, you will be hearing much more from her.
HI Dutch,
You have done well here, grasshopper! But, can tell that you are still struggling a bit with the decision, choice, you want to make here. She is bonkers. But, most people do not realize that. She has probably presented to many that it is rather you that is bonkers. That is how Uhpd's and NPD's operate. So, just remember perception is reality. I think that you IF you reply, you hit it right on head. Be cordial, maybe add a "Sis, I would love to come to your B-Day party but unfortunately I already have other plans and will not be able to attend", followed by the rest.
Kill her with kindness, these types do not know how to handle that. It just drives them more crazy. Believe me, I know. It is a skill I learned working with my insane family and there were lawyers involved trying to handle financial matters - forgery, theft, business ownership transfer that was attempted while my GF was still alive and then the real transfer after he passed. Drove the "mastermind" :rofl: behind it all (the daughter-in-law) completely insane. And I just kept getting more and more written responses that proved her insanity if we ever actually had to go to a court of law.
You are not alone on this one. You are a intelligent, warm, and caring person. Please do not let your sis get the better of you. Please take care of yourself on this one, do what is best for you. Do not let her pull her into her web and put you through unnecessary drama. I know that you will ultimately make the best decision for you. :thumbup: Best Wishes!
Mary Ann :hug:
P.S. and thank you for the info on what to do to get all the new symbols. That is awesome.... love the Udawoman and the Witchypoo (she reminds me of the witch from HR Puffnstuff) on the broom.
I'm posting this mostly for self-reference. But anybody may feel free to chime in.
It's from a site I found when about two years ago I finally had the nerve to actually type "How to break up with your family" into the Google search-machine.
1. Acceptance. It may sound cliche, but it is very true that you have to be willing to accept the past history and the way the relationship has evolved over the years to the way it is now. There may never be a divine intervention to bring you two together or they may never have an epiphany one afternoon and wake up a changed person to your liking. [...]
2. You Can Not Reason With The Unreasonable. You may want to believe that when dealing with an intelligent person, that they will be reasonable when dealing with you. This is not always the case when handling issues with a dysfunctional family member. Trying to reason with an unreasonable family member is like plumbing; once you attempt to fix it yourself, you've got a turd sliding across the tile and you soon find yourself knee-deep in crap wondering how you got here. Especially when dealing with substance abusers who typically stop growing emotionally once addiction sets in. Or the family manipulator, who can play the victim card with you or your parents, using them to achieve and push their agenda, while hurting others in the process.
It is important to understand that a person can not reason with an unreasonable person. Understand that you can not win an argument, make arrangements, intervene to help without being taken advantage of, have a sit-down discussion with them about your concerns and fears and think that they will understand, change, agree or acknowledge it and move forward without some sort of outrageous backlash. Manipulators will always try to pull a fast one over family and friends to get what they want. [...] Identify those people who are *-bent on having things stay the way they are, are argumentative and defensive about the smallest things, or could care less about what ideas you have about helping them. [...] Unreasonable family members will mud-sling, yell, curse, lash-out and make a scene all because they are unwilling to attempt to compromise to reach a common goal you both have. Always keep a level head and never engage a crazy person, someone that just does not see things your way or a complete idiot. Because even if they are a blood relative, its a fight that goes nowhere...
3. Never Judge Past Mistakes. The past is the past. [...] Dysfunctional family members will use past incidents and guilt as ammunition against shameful family members as an excuse for their own questionable behavior. [...]
4. Never, Ever Argue! When you have an adult family member that is argumentative, manipulative, spoiled, a substance abuser, bi-polar, unreasonable, or is opportunistic and self-centered; why argue with them? Never allow yourself to get sucked into confrontations when you know that this person is dramatic and easily offended. As adults, we know what topics of discussion are sensitive to our closest family members and relatives. Do not push those buttons unless your looking to ruin your own day. If you have a strained relationship with certain family members, be courteous and respectful at a distance if it can not be fixed, repaired or in their eyes, nothing is wrong. [...] Not being confrontational with irrational family members does not make you passive, it makes you stress free concerning them. It takes 2 people to argue and without one of them, the other person still yelling and ranting seems unstable and crazy. Arguing is the most no productive form of communication. Arguing with a dysfunctional family member is just plain stupid on your part, especially if you know better. So avoid the headaches, stress, and the pointless questions the sane members of your family can not even answer and do not argue with the insane problematic ones! You will live longer...
Thanks MaryAnn :wave:
Quote from: MaryAnn on September 05, 2015, 03:46:11 PM
You have done well here, grasshopper! But, can tell that you are still struggling a bit with the decision, choice, you want to make here.
You bet. And I want to take my time.
Better not make rash decisions, while there is still plenty of time to respond.
QuoteKill her with kindness,
Love that concept :thumbup:
QuoteYou are a intelligent, warm, and caring person. Please do not let your sis get the better of you.
Thanks so much!
:hug:
Dutch, that is an awesome read!
QuoteTrying to reason with an unreasonable family member is like plumbing; once you attempt to fix it yourself, you've got a turd sliding across the tile and you soon find yourself knee-deep in crap wondering how you got here.
[/b] :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:
That is so true. I totally relate to this one. :rofl: I am so PROUD of myself.... I actually learned all of this on my own in life and it is exactly what I have done with my crazy family. Kill'em with kindness, stay at a distance, and never waste time arguing with them. It is completely unproductive. Now, if I could just get my husband to learn that one.
QuoteIf you have a strained relationship with certain family members, be courteous and respectful at a distance if it can not be fixed, repaired or in their eyes, nothing is wrong. [...] Not being confrontational with irrational family members does not make you passive, it makes you stress free concerning them.
Perfect!
Thank you for sharing this Dutch, this made my day! I actually feel good, validated, that I have been doing the right thing as far as family is concerned in the effort to take care of myself. Now, I just have to figure out everything else.....
Your the best! :udaman:
MaryAnn :wave:
Hi Dutch,
Well, I made a clean break 40 years ago and never looked back. So it's not like I can put myself out there and say I know what you're going through; mine was a 1-way ticket out without regrets. As I've prob said here a few times, yes I created a physical escape from the pain, but the EF's rage on despite it all.
***trigger ahead--end of first sentence***
Nowadays, the only threat to my FOO peace would be a much older sister who, back in the dark days, abetted the m in all sorts of abuse, like holding the bathroom door shut when m would follow me in and.... Other stuff occurred all along, at least she'd moved out by the time I hit high school, which was bad enough as it was (hideous as it turned out, I partially chose to go to a private religious * in lieu of going to where she'd gone).
Years later, she did find where I'd gone. The worst was when she found one of my acting gigs and showed up in the audience. I toughed it out, ignored her after, drank a few extra that night, but the terror passed and she lost the track again.
Later she tried to contact me via holiday and b-day cards for a while; at first I responded with either snide or downright insulting cards of my own (albeit creative). Then I just stopped; what/why/am I doing this to myself, period. Mary Ann said to "kill with kindness" but I'd have to really dig to find any k for what she was a part of. The terrific website piece you posted talks about not having to accept the stress. Yup! :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:. No stress has always been bottom line for me.
Once she made it to where I am; but she thought it wise, I think, to have 2 of her grown kids accompany her, sensing how nasty I might be if she just showed up alone. The kids turned out to be marvelous distractions; didn't even need to look at her. Lately, the good news is the cards have stopped coming. ;D
I sense from how this thread has come down that you're leaning towards cutting the ties (and they sure do bind, eh?). It seems that you're still slightly hesitant. Regardless of your choices, at least it seems like you're approaching it from a much better place with with regard to the emotional storm.
I wish you the best. :hug:
Thanks so much, woodsgnome. :thumbup:
I did need some time to ponder what you posted. :thumbup:
Quote from: woodsgnome on September 06, 2015, 01:07:14 AM
Well, I made a clean break 40 years ago and never looked back.
I'd like to do that as well. The only complicating factor is that my (divorced) parents, in their 80's now, are likely to pass away at some point in the not-so-far-away future. So I'll have to deal with her at those events. And I don't want to stir the hornet's nest unnecessarily before that.
Having made the NC as far as it is now has already been a big decision for me, and telling my dad and bro that...
If it hadn't been for the expected funerals I think I'd have made a 'clean cut' already.
So I'm firm in my commitment to NC, but the question is: just how NC? If that makes any sense...
Quote***trigger ahead--end of first sentence***
Nowadays, the only threat to my FOO peace would be a much older sister who, back in the dark days, abetted the m in all sorts of abuse, like holding the bathroom door shut when m would follow me in and....
That's hideously sadistic. :sadno: :thumbdown:
QuoteYears later, she did find where I'd gone. The worst was when she found one of my acting gigs and showed up in the audience. I toughed it out, ignored her after, drank a few extra that night, but the terror passed and she lost the track again.
Yay you! :thumbup:
QuoteMary Ann said to "kill with kindness" but I'd have to really dig to find any k for what she was a part of.
I would be hard pressed as well to find kindness for sis... :pissed:
I've read it though that I could 'kill her' with kindness for/by myself. I could be kind to myself, and in my manners, and still 'finish her off'.
I wish my sis no ill, will do her no ill, but that's about it.
QuoteI sense from how this thread has come down that you're leaning towards cutting the ties (and they sure do bind, eh?).
They sure do :pissed: .
Thanks again :thumbup: .
Hi Dutch Uncle & Woodsgnome :wave:
Woodsgnome, I agree with DU. The abuse you suffered as kid from you M and Sis is "hideously sadistic" and you deserved better. I can't imagine that type of abuse from a M and Sister :'(. I can understand why you would not be able to extend any K to her and no one would blame you. I have a younger brother that is following in his dad's footsteps and later in life has decided on the Narcissistic path and thinks he is better than everyone else. I do not fall for his manipulation nor do I care what my FOO thinks of me anymore. As a result, no one calls anymore because they know that I will not relay information to other family member's to assist them in their agenda's or let them use me. :woohoo:
Like DU, I have minimal contact with my D and B simply because of my mom. She is only in her late 60's so I will have to try to not make too many waves so that when the time comes, I can work with them through it and then NC will happen. I will have no reason to remain in contact. Family does not make me feel warm and fuzzy :sadno:. For people that had loving families, they do not seem able to really relate, do they? It is like they look at you and think that you are exaggerating how your FOO is and that it could have never been that bad.
DU - Exactly. That is the message I intended. I do not kill them with kindness to be nice to them, it is for myself and self care :thumbup:. Using a positive against a negative. And a Narcissist and / or a manipulator do not see it as kindness towards them, believe me, they are :pissed:. I have lived it. It was tough sometimes not to stoop down as low as they would. Nothing aggravates a manipulator more than not being able to get a reaction out of your or manipulate you to get the desired results. And, in their frustration, they will eventually show their true colors. But, taking the high ground, staying positive and use appropriate manners, it allows us to still feel good about ourselves. We didn't use a negative to respond to a negative. It isn't like math, 2 negatives do not make a positive in terms of how we think and feel. That does not mean that we said anything "Kind" to them to validate them or make them feel good. It just means we kept it professional, used manners, politeness and gave them no reaction to their selfishness, abuse or hatred. I know that may be difficult for some but just like the article you posted, it really does work or at least it did for me. Many times, when they say ugly things, judge, or attack me, I simply play stupid. I do not give them any reaction at all. I play the part of Miss Woosh and just let them think I didn't catch what they said. I mean, really, who are they anyway? They live in their own little world and their messages of hate and disapproval just really do not matter. Nobody is listening to them anyway.
MaryAnn :thumbup:
So, i have reached a decision.
I have send her this:
Dear [name], (Dear as in "dear customer service")
I'm not coming to your birthday party.
I wish you a pleasant day, and also:
Congratulations on your birthday, and many more years to come. (a rather standard wish to grant on somebody's birthday)
Greetings, Dutch Uncle.
Thank you all for your help, aid and support, and/or for just listening to me :yourock:
I have made an elaborate post on this decision in my Recovery Journal. http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=2170.msg14838#new
So if you find this ending with a fizzle: I redirect you there. :wave:
BONUS:
I have wanted to post this video a long time...
This is my sis.
(the laugh-tape that's inserted is a bit annoying, but what the heck)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gk-OfmmRaqs
PS: I actually send my mom this once, and her reply was: "That kid will surely make it in life! Bravo!" :stars: Not exactly what I had expected :sadno: .
Perfect! i am proud of you D/Uncle. you done good. that was a tough one. :bighug: :bighug: :bighug: :waveline:
The downer is she'll try again.
The upper is you know yourself better, your strength of spirit and where you need to be.
:applause: :applause: :applause:
Quote from: woodsgnome on September 07, 2015, 04:19:44 PM
The downer is she'll try again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Wl_FsEc_Gk
QuoteThe upper is you know yourself better, your strength of spirit and where you need to be.
:applause: :applause: :applause:
Thanks so much! :umbrella:
(edited to add (in case it wasn't clear): your reply has strengthened me in feeling confident that if she is to "bring it on", I'll withstand the assault.
Pfff, effortlessly. I got an umbrella now. I whole bunch of them, if I were to lose my own. Thanks people!. :thumbup:)
Congratulations, Dutch Uncle! You've not only made a decision, but you've also thought through many possibilities. And then, at last, you've done what you need to do.
I usually find that, if I give a decision enough time and attention, I can be confident enough not to look back. I wish that much peace for you.
But you are right in knowing that your sister will try to draw you back. She may eventually give up but probably not after many tries. You are also right, I think, in anticipating the loss of your parents. Even if you can predict your own response to some extent, you can't know the circumstances.
My father died about five years ago. He spent about a week in a hospice far away from me. My mother and brothers were present, as I was "supposed" to be and would have been if I didn't so fear my mother's violence, both physical and emotional. And apparently she now has a gun (I'm in the U. S.). I knew I couldn't go to the hospice with any assurance of safety.
I've wondered, off and on, whether I'd have gone if my "only" fear had been emotional abuse. I actually dread it more. And it would have been a protracted period of verbal denigration and blame for my father's death (even though he was elderly).
Perhaps you'll be able to avoid such decisions. You are wise, though, to know that they are coming.
I'm with Arpy1 on this one :yes:. You response is perfect. It is professional, respectful, and you left her nothing to use against you :applause:. And, Woodsgnome is right, she will try again :yes:. But, if you keep her to emails you should be fine. It will always give you time to think about how you are going to respond. It will drive her crazy and eventually she will either stop or do something that crosses a major line and warrants that restraining order you had contemplated getting once upon a time.
Talking to someone like this in person is a bigger challenge. It is hard face to face to not give them the satisfaction of at least a reaction. Mine situation worked in reverse order. It is one time that my ability to dissociate and depersonalize served me well. I actually drove my aunt crazy face to face first, then she said she would only communicate by phone or email. It was easier for me to pull of by telephone and I was even better at it. She finally got made and said she would only communicate by email. Even better, I had everything in writing. And, I am a pretty good writer, at least I think, and she is not all the smart, so the email was a cake walk. Then she would only communicate through lawyers which was perfect. Hers was her son-in-law. It was so awesome when he had to go back and explain to her what would happen if she forged any signatures on any more checks. I guess she thought with the further she distanced me the more she could get away with stealing. But it was quite the opposite, she only made it easier to document all the criminal things she pulled. But this process took months before it got to the point of no contact.
Good Job Dutch Uncle! :thumbup:
:witch:
Oh, and I think I just saw your sis fly by.... she really gets around doesn't she!
And, the video is hilarious but your mom's reaction is very disturbing :stars:
Quote from: stillhere on September 07, 2015, 06:13:33 PM
I usually find that, if I give a decision enough time and attention, I can be confident enough not to look back. I wish that much peace for you.
Thank you.
And I agree that it is in general beneficial to give decisions time and attention to gain confidence in them.
QuoteI've wondered, off and on, whether I'd have gone if my "only" fear had been emotional abuse. I actually dread it more. And it would have been a protracted period of verbal denigration and blame for my father's death (even though he was elderly).
Perhaps you'll be able to avoid such decisions. You are wise, though, to know that they are coming.
I hope I'll have gained more resources by the time my parents will pass away. And I actually have confidence in that. I also have the feelings that episodes like this are 'great' practice. Bro and dad will probably not take 'her side', but be 'sitting on the fence' most likely. And I have friends as a support system. I could probably stay in a hotel with one of them (they could work shifts ;) ), so I can blow of steam.
A hospice situation or long sickbed is going to be stressful no doubt, but probably manageable. Sis can act out all her wailing besides their beds. They'll be in 'good care' ;) . uHPDmom and she can be as dramatic together as they'll always have been, and Dad is an introvert, so he'll not want people besides his bed every day, all day anyway. Sis can have 'em.
Thanks for sharing. :wave:
Thank you, MaryAnn.
Quote from: MaryAnn on September 08, 2015, 03:31:16 AM
It will drive her crazy and eventually she will either stop or do something that crosses a major line and warrants that restraining order you had contemplated getting once upon a time.
She's been quiet for 8 months. :thumbup: I think that hurricane has died out. Pfew, that was a close call.
QuoteTalking to someone like this in person is a bigger challenge.
I've given up on meeting her completely. The last time we met on neutral ground was horrible. I might bump into her at some social occasion, but that's it. The stalking episode happened when I refused to meet her face to face. Calls I then let ring, and when she decided to spill her bile on my answering machine, I made her a post-card cut out of a brown cardboard-box saying: "*?" (frontside: Full size) and told her my answering machine was not a garbage dump for her discontent. "Oh, but I wasn't discontent at aaalllll. How could you think that? :dramaqueen: ". I ignored that. Never heard from her on the phone again. :thumbup:
QuoteAnd, the video is hilarious but your mom's reaction is very disturbing :stars:
Very. I was still in the FOG to fully 'appreciate' her reply, but it did puzzle me, something was definitely 'Off'. Now I think she saw herself in it. She's like that too, and has gotten away with it most of her life. So yeah, I can see now why she said: "That kid will rule the world." The sad thing is: (s)he might. But at least the (supposedly) Grandparents, and the dog, are not falling for it (pun intended). There still is some hope for the kiddo. ;D
For mom and sis: not so much...
Quote.......and when she decided to spill her bile on my answering machine, I made her a post-card cut out of a brown cardboard-box saying: "*?" (frontside: Full size) and told her my answering machine was not a garbage dump for her discontent. "Oh, but I wasn't discontent at aaalllll. How could you think that? :dramaqueen: ".
Oh, that is awesomely hilarious! :rofl:
And love the reply, typical of a :dramaqueen:
Didn't think of that, but you probably hit the nail on the head, she probably did see herself. Scary! :aaauuugh:
Good night Dutch Uncle! I will check to see if you have any more adventures tomorrow!
MaryAnn :hug:
So, it's been three full days... And I must confess I have lived with the Fear of Anticipation of the 'other shoe to drop'. (as I think the expression is).
No shoe, no drop. ;D
No flying monkeys, no nothing.
I'm starting to feel better and better about it all.
I feel I might really pull this off, this NC thingy. :excited:
:sharkbait:
we are so rooting for you with this one, dear D/U, that even if 5 pairs of hobnail boots drop and a whole flock of monkeys start winging their way through the blue, you will not come to harm. besides, you really have got stronger through this last episode. i have a feeling that any further incursions of her part will not get far with you now that you have stood your ground. :yahoo: :hug: :hug:
Quick update. (And everything is still cool at the moment).
Phone rings. My female parent.
I know the party is this weekend.
No doubt the female parent wants to stick her nose in. In what exactly I don't know, of course, and that's just how I want it.
I've let the phone ring, will probably not listen to the answering machine at all, though may do it AFTER the party, so I can laugh my butt of with relief of the poo I have refused to step in.
Wind is picking up folks! May rise to gale force. But I have a solid brick house. I may need to crawl into a safe corner, away from possible shattering windows. That's OK. Better safe than sorry. I'll bring my laptop with me. WiFi works fine there. ;D
And then there were two.
:witch: :witch:
well done, Dutch Uncle, for refusing to step in it. yes, the storm may be brewing (the one thing crazy-makers can't bear is no response!! in my experience they always try kicking off with their strategies of choice.... :pissed: ... Mr/Ms Nice, Mr/Ms Nasty, Mr/Ms Needy, Mr/Ms Sick, Mr/Ms Hurt.......... :blahblahblah: )
hope you have some goodies stashed in that safe corner, to keep you going while you wait it out! :bigwink:
Obviously this is stirring the emotional pot. So I'm reaffirming myself, in the privacy of my own house, and my own support-group, e.g. you all.
What I should tell my female parent (which I won't, I'm going to stay put in LC, and this is not a moment to reply) is:
"No, [name], I don't have to tell you if i go or not to a party. Period."
And that if she would pry for the why, which she would certainly do, is to say "I don't have to tell you if I go to a party or not. Period. The issue of why is therefore not an issue to begin with."
Bugger off! Drama queen! Go play with the other drama queen. Have fun! (while thinking: Which you won't, and you know it, but that's just what you crave! win-win. You just can't loose out on this one!)
:dramaqueen: :dramaqueen:
you go for it D/U, kudos to you for standing your ground! :applause: :applause:
(p.s., i know it's hard, actually. :blink: but we're right with you, :hug: :hug: :hug: :hug: cheering you on :yourock:.)
So today I finally listened to the voicemail my mother had left me.
I felt up to it.
It turned out to be pretty easy. She was visiting near where I live, and wanted to drop by on the way back home. But since I didn't answer the phone she said "Never mind, see you next time."
Her mood was pretty cheerful, by he sound of it.
So my response to it is, pretty immediately afterwards:
"Great, she sounds cheerful, so I'm going to take it as cheerful. No worries. Well handled, great tactic this 'No reply'/LC. What a great way to avoid having to say "No.", which I find difficult to do (with good reason ;) ). What a happy ending, no Drama."
So, I think I can put the final nail in the coffin of female sibling's birthday-party, and bury it in an unmarked grave. I have no intention to visit it, nor to dig it up.
Thank you all for your support, it's been a great help.
I'll lock this thread, and I'm sure we'll meet elsewhere.
This is over and done with.
:spooked:
Well, I unlocked the thread since this prediction has come true:
Quote from: woodsgnome on September 07, 2015, 04:19:44 PM
The downer is she'll try again.
The upper is you know yourself better, your strength of spirit and where you need to be.
:applause: :applause: :applause:
and rather than starting a new thread, it seems better to continue this.
I posted this the other day in another thread, but since there are now more developments, rather than hijacking that thread I'll post my contribution here, again.
I trust this is not a breach of site policy.This X-mas will mark 1 year of NC with my 'sister' and LC (bordering on NC) with my 'mom'.
Relations with my brother and dad are also strained at the moment as I have started to take a lot less crap than I used to.
I addressed (via mail) a pressing issue with my brother, to which he replied AND inserted the totally unrelated business with my 'sis' and 'mom'.
He told me I was "
making things very difficult for all family-members."
He is aware (since I told him) that I'm NC with 'sis' because she (emotionally) blackmailed me. (I left out the adjective "emotionally" in order to make the Blackmail stand out more clear.) And I had told him what the blackmail was. This was 10 months ago, when I realized my (by then) two months NC would be of an indefinite nature, and my dad and brother needed to know I would be NC with 'sis'.
I was furious with bro that he said
I was making things difficult.
And I was furious for dragging this issue into the issue at hand between him and me.
"Great deflection effort bro!", I thought sarcastically.
In my answer to him I dropped the issue with him altogether, and focussed on his deflection, to end it (hopefully) once and for all: I will not have him being my 'sister's' "Flying Monkey". (
I didn't tell him that, he won't know what I'll be talking about: he's completely FOGged and enmeshed.)
So I told him in no uncertain terms: "I am not the one MAKING things very difficult 'for all family-members' when I refuse to have any contact with someone who knowingly, willingly, premeditatedly and persistently blackmails me.
I will not have you foist that on me/ have you rub that on me.
I must make that perfectly clear to you."
He had asked me to come over to his place (which I don't want to, for reasons I will not delve into here and now*) and so I told him that I will not visit him now and not before the family X-mas (& 'mom's' birthday) gathering' he and sis and mom (no dad: divorced) will attend, with me being absent for the first time in over 20 years, for reasons largely unrelated to 'sis'.
(
This is an event he has not attended for 15 years at least, since he was an ex-pat. Which has always been fine with me: his decision and I have always been OK with it. Why wouldn't I? It never even crossed my mind to make any fuzz about that, ever.
I didn't write any of this to him either.)
In his reply to that he cowardly backtracked (saying he hadn't want to "suggest" I was "making it difficult"... Damned right he wasn't "suggesting" it: He was bloody stating it as a FACT ("I find that..." was the phrase he used)) and out came what apparently has been going on behind my back:
'Sis' is working him over, didn't get what she wanted what she blackmailed me for (AND she actually has executed her blackmail threat when I didn't budge!) and now she's trying to get it via recruiting him. So the "Flying Monkey" suspicion has been validated.
Off-course: how could it not?I'm keeping my peace at the moment (easier said than done ;) ) and simply have kept my mouth shut since. I haven't replied, in accordance with my previous stated "I will not see you before X-mas", even though he made a poor effort to reel me in by writing: "I hope we can still see each other before X-mas, but if not (*,
"if" not?) I wish you a happy X-mas :blahblahblah: :blahblahblah: :blahblahblah: ."
I feel bloody good about it all, but must admit I'm pretty tense, and typing this up let's me relive all this tension.
Oh well, it takes an effort, so what. ;D
[The bolded parts relate directly to 'sis's' involvement in this.]edit: changed the title onlythe story continues below. It's just a different Monkey that warrants it's own post.
Last Friday I got a phone call from 'mom'. I picked up the phone, as I knew this would be X-mas/birthday related, and wanted (and still want) it out of my system. For this specific call I decided that the best way to do that was to face it head on and deal with it now.
It was a quite horrible phone call, but I stood my ground.
It was short, since I cut her short.
The highlight was that she wanted to give me a present, she was in full hoover-mode, and had put up a very meek voice. :dramaqueen:
"I want to give you something, and you can say "yes" or "no" to it."
["Really mom?", I thought, "how very generous of you. You probably feel you deserve a medal now and a big bouquet of roses for this token of the goodness of your heart: you allow your 50 year old son to say "Yes" or "No". Where's the crew of the national newsreel, you must wonder. What keeps them waiting!"]
I kept my mouth shut. (Medium chill and all that)
"I know a man in your city..." "NO."
"by the name of X ..." "NO."
"who can read your horoscope..." "no No NO NO NO!" I repeated until I didn't hear any voice on the other side of the line anymore.
Some 'bickering' ensued where she tried to sound meek and understanding (LOL) and me spelling out to her she was pulling my leg by saying I could say 'yes or no' but when I actually said "NO" she simply continued on.
Fauxpologies ensued (what else :pissed: )
Which I did sort of accept, save for I insisted she should STOP (with this crap! But that I didn't say that out loud. No need to. Medium Chill and all. I think, LOL.)
More meek compliance followed. :dramaqueen:
"Good." and I told her I was going to hang up. Which I did.
Wait for it, this isn't done yet.
Just now I received a letter from "The Ox" a.k.a. 'dad'.
The guy that my 'mom' told: "I want a divorce, bye" 15 years ago, but is still her lapdog. (When she lets him, obviously. She kicks him as easily (well, more easily most probably) when she feels like it.)
This letter I have left unopened, with a note on it: DO NOT OPEN until after the 'X-mas/birthday event'.
Good grief. Now I have The Ox as a Flying Monkey for 'mom' as well.
edit: This letter sitting on my (virtual) desk was bothering me, so I opened it after all. It was holding me back.
He was not being a Flying Monkey. Well, not in a discernible way. I still smell something fishy, but i may well be I'm not smelling him. ;D
Still, it was a rather poor letter, but at least it was all about him, and not about 'mom'.
The fact it was all about him actually makes it a poor letter, and a hoover of sorts, but that's the man I know him to be.
Low expectations: confirmed.
Drama fears: unwarranted.
'Verdict': positive.
LOL. Good grief.
Do y'all think this may contribute to having cPTSD? :rofl:
Well, I'm kicking it off.
With a bit of luck I'll look back at this X-mas as the best ever.
At the moment I feel like :pissed: , and I will revel in it. ;D
second edit: song for 'mom' and her "cosmic debris" that supposedly would reel me back in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dp6LT2MdaPI
Third edit: title only.
The last part of this triple-post:
In the Opening Post of this thread I referred to the "The Blackmail" by 'sis', and all this crap is related to it.
Only a few days ago I realized that 'sis' has actually carried out her Blackmail threats. Until now I had thought that by ignoring the Blackmail I had thwarted it: I was not going to let her spoil my birthday-party-with-mom (in which I succeeded) and by doing so had brushed off her actions that day (and the scheming that must have taken many days of preparation before the actual date): she couldn't have spoiled (to some extend) both mine and 'mom's' 80th-year-birthday.
I had completely viewed her spoiling behavior as something separate. :blink:
Which I so desperately wanted and needed: her not succeeding, and me being 'above it all'.
Only NOW, a full year later, I see she actually had 'made good' on her promise blackmail !
What I have until now viewed as mere 'more annoying and stupid' behavior that day has in fact been the execution of her premeditated threat.
Good grief.
Wow, the power of denial Chaos Manufacture (https://tariq-thowfeek-2g43.squarespace.com/top-100-trait-blog/2015/10/30/chaos-manufacture).
edit: Title only.
I suspect her 26 year old son has now been recruited.
'sis' -----> :witch:
Or is it?: >:D
Out of the blue he suggests we 'could have a beer', somewhere halfway between our places of residence, "as I will be meeting a friend there for [mutual activity with said friend]".
*?
Not a "Hi uncle, let's have a beer!" :cheers: , no, an elaborate "by 'chance' I'm somewhere halfway, that's perhaps a good moment to meet halfway."
This has terrible cesspool smell to it. :doh:
Nephew's reluctance to meet me strait up, but having to come up with an 'excuse', sounds to me as a huge
Red Flag. Not only to me, but a clear signal Nephew views this 'meet' as such as well. The kid's all right. :applause:
I hope I have given him the 'easy way out' by replying: "No, can't do." A bit blunt, but at least something he can 'report back' with. ;)
"Sorry mom, I tried, but all he said was "No, can't do." He doesn't want to, mom. I did my best."
update: "Alas" he has replied. :thumbup:
edit: Title only.
Damn Flying Monkeys! :hug:
Now he wants to try again in two weeks. Same deal. He will have this event with his friend, halfway, if we can have a beer there. :doh:
"No, neither."
This is getting preposterous.
The last time he contacted me was when he was 15.
edit: Title only.
The way things work, the way memories enter my 'now'.
Did I already profess my love for Nietzsche's quote "Deeds need time, even after they are done, in order to be seen or heard." ?
Yes I did. Yet the appreciation of it keeps coming back. Keeps being reinforced.
This nephew (and his brother), when did I last see him at my (s)mother's birthday?
When she turned 65. So he was 11, and I was around 35. Well, I have seen him at DramaMom's birthday once in between... Twice even? Possibly. But that really has been about it.
So 'sis' had organized for us (=She, both her children, me and the 65-year-old Therapist) to go to a X-mas-Circus. Fine. Great. We had a good time. I even got to 'Pull an Elephant'. With a lot of other people from the crowd after we were 'challenged' to do so by the 'director'.
I stepped up. Is this a male thing? I don't know. There were only a bunch of guys in the end though.
Sure, I confess: I wanted to impress. Yet, being 'impressive' meant: I wanted this for 'being part of the party'. Why would I stay seated when such a challenge was presented? When 'audience participation' was part of the game, the show? A challenge that clearly was construed for the entertainment of all? Yes, I wanted to impress: Dutch Uncle will step on the Stage. As an obvious Stooge. Surely nobody in my FOO, nor in the overall audience, nor in the bunch-of-guys entering The Ring was expecting we could actually pull this Beast around, now would we/they?
No.
We would be pulled a fast one. And everybody knew it. Including us. Never mind.
We pulled as Mad Men, and then the Elephant let go, so we all fell on our backs. :rofl: <--- that's the audience ;D . I limped off... :bawl:
;)
When we arrived at the home of 'mom' after the Circus, Divorced Dad was waiting there. Shining Brightly.
I'll never forget the moment.
"* is he doing here?", I wondered.
He was happy as a clown.
Yet had missed all of the circus.
An encore I could have done without. "Bye bye, Pierrot, * are you doing here?"
I don't remember much of what happened after. I guess I just fully dissociated. And left. At some point.
edit: after reading this I can't really tell what the connection is. :stars:
I guess since my 15-year old and 11-year old nephew are more or less 'the same', history wise, and I wonder why he suddenly he is showing up. *cough* Independently. *cough*
plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/the_more_things_change,_the_more_they_stay_the_same): Enmeshment. Proxy recruitment. Drama-triangles. Codependency.
This morning I woke with a very calm feeling about 'not having (contact with) a sister'. Hard to put in words, but I guess it's best described as not having the urge any more to JADE in one form or another to anybody that I don't see her.
I could picture myself in a conversation where somebody would ask: "Do you have a sister?" and I would answer: "Yes, but we have no contact." with no emotional 'energy' attached. No sadness, no anger, no longing... Nothing really.
Well, peace I guess. Relaxation.
Perhaps this is one of the famed (and hoped for) paradigm-shifts. I bet it's one more step along the way of (the 5 stages of) mourning.
It feels pretty good.
Quote from: Dutch Uncle on December 21, 2015, 12:43:13 PM
I addressed (via mail) a pressing issue with my brother, to which he replied AND inserted the totally unrelated business with my 'sis' and 'mom'.
He told me I was "making things very difficult for all family-members."
I was furious with bro that he said I was making things difficult.
And I was furious for dragging this issue into the issue at hand between him and me.
"Great deflection effort bro!", I thought sarcastically.
Yesterday I had a 'meet' with bro. (The same from the "History repeats itself" thread. I have just one.)
For days before I had EF's on a whole range of FOO issues, but kept reminding myself to be MC and Grey Rock with him. It has been a full year since I last saw him, so I guess I'm LC with him as well. :yes:
I had kept the 'meet' short, two hours, at a 'Grand Cafe' near the railway station in my city.
It went well, we discussed all kinds of stuff (economy, politics, world affairs, last weeks news, etc.) but NOT 'sis', dramaMama or his wife. :thumbup:
I felt obliged to inquire about the kids: "How are the kids doing?", was all I asked. Somewhat to my surprise he was very MC about them. Clearly not a subject he wanted to get into. I didn't press on. ;D
Right on the dot after two hours
he wanted to go! :thumbup:
I hope we can keep our contact like this. LC, and when we meet: MC.
Bye bro :wave: , I hope it'll stay this way, and you'll never again be the Flying Monkey.
I think I handled the situation back then very well, as I have made it very clear then I was not going to put up with his Flying Monkey crap. So he didn't bother this time.
Yay me. ;D :groovey:
edit: Title only.
And the saga continues.
Though I am in doubt if this post should not be a continuation of the "Progress? I guess so. I vented my anger." (http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=2736.0) thread. But that's what you get when you come from/are part of an enmeshed family.
Short version at the end of this 'novella'. ;D
Friday I went to visit my dad on his birthday. Traditionally we would celebrate on a weekend day with DramaSis, her two sons (plus GF's at times), SiL (about half of the time) and dad's brother (who passed away two years ago) and his wife, my aunt.
Last year I didn't go and went to visit dad on his actual birthday as well.
While my NC with DramaSis certainly is not insignificant in deciding to go there or not, I told/asked my dad, truthfully, if I could come on the day itself as dad has voiced numerous times over the past years he prefers 1-on-1 contact, in general (f.e. with friends as well). He doesn't like 'groups'. (I think this ties in well with my 'Amateur Diagnosis' he is Asperger's, but that's besides the point here)
He agreed with ease, somewhat to my surprise, but hey: success. :thumbup:
So I went over, we talked, I was MC, had read up on my Asperger's notes again so I would not trigger him and I would not get triggered by him, all was fine and we would start cooking diner together when dad asked at what time I would want to go home again.
"8- or 9-ish. After the dishes are done and we have had a coffee together." I answered.
Dad insisted he'd drive me to the railway station, which is odd since the last couple of years I walk there. The old man (80+) isn't that good a driver and doesn't drive that much as he himself is not very confident anymore either.
Then a small bomb exploded. Remarkably, it was more a small firecracker in my experience after all.
It proved to be a ploy of sorts: He could only drive me to the station after my DramaSis had arrived around 8, 8:30. So his insistence on driving me there was meant to make sure I was there until 'sis' had arrived. :doh:
Hmmm... I stayed remarkably calm. Possibly this was due because I had privately raged the first half of the day about DramaSis using my bro as a Flying Monkey around X-mas. My DramaSis-radar had been right on target and tracked her insidious manipulations with ease, apparently... So I was prepared. And in my preparations for this meet I had also prepared myself that in the event of DramaSis (or DramaMama for that matter) showing up I would be MC, and be firm in my boundaries.
So that worked like a charm: I was calm and firm: "In that case I'll leave before she's here, and I'll walk." A "Flight" response with regard to 'sis', and a proper/valid one, combined with a "Fight" response to Enabling Dad with regard to keeping my NC boundary in place. Also quite appropriate.
We had a talk on it. That was OK, I got to reiterate my stance once more. We didn't get into too much detail (which is good: no elaborate JADE-ing going on) but it was pretty clear to me that DramaSis had pulled the same stunt as she had done with bro: She's the victim. To dad she had told: "I don't know what I have done wrong" and probably a whole load of other nonsense (She claims I'm the one who makes it impossible for her to apologize, I'm the one who prevents her from changing her behavior (! as if she were a puppet on a string and I'm the puppet-master, LOL) etc. This my bro told me after this post in this very thread (http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=2310.msg19507#msg19507)).
I told dad, truthfully, that [name] hadn't contacted me about this AT ALL in the last year. This confused dad, as it should: that doesn't tie in with "I don't know what I did wrong". Why doesn't she ask then, right?
Since dad doesn't want to know what exactly the "(emotional) blackmail" was that DramaSis pulled on me, we couldn't get into too much detail, which only serves my MC and Grey Rock, so that's OK. (I commend dad for not wanting to know in some way: at least he doesn't want to get enmeshed. To a degree only, as he let's 'sis' pull him in, but never mind. I respect him for not wanting to know the details of the Blackmail at least. But off course it's also "neglect", neglect he has shown to me (and us siblings as a whole) during our entire childhood and beyond. Yet, nowadays I'm an adult, so the 'charge' isn't that severe anymore. From a crime (to a child) it's more a misdemeanor to an adult. Not something I should allow him to get away with though. Which I didn't.)
But I could get the point across that 'sis' must know very well what she did do wrong, she blackmailed me after all, so off course she knows. One doesn't blackmail somebody by accident. And I gave dad the example of the only message I got from 'sis' the past 13 months: An invitation to her birthday-party that started with "I possibly would like to invite you" (*?) "but something is bothering me". To dad I said: "That is not an invitation, and if something is bothering her, she should speak up. This is nonsense and I don't take bait like that, dad." (or words to that effect)
That registered with dad.
I had to reiterate all that once more, which I did calmly and happily: It doesn't make sense at all so it's OK he struggles with it. I struggle with it too, after all. The manipulation, the Crazy Making, the Chaos Manufacture, the Gaslighting... It still boggles my mind, so he's entitled to his own boggling mind. I can relate.
So, I put up a good "Fight" there as well.
Diner took a bit long (mostly since we had started cooking late because of the talk we had on DramaSis' nonsense) so I could only leave 'on time' if I would leave the dishes.
"Nah," I said to myself, "I'm not going to let DramaSis rule my evening." So I stayed to do the dishes. I'd see if I would still be making it out 'on time' to avoid her, but I made no rush. That felt pretty good (though a bit tense as well, off course). I told dad: "Don't worry, it's OK. One has to set priorities." Wow, while I said it, I thought: "Yeah, that's the way, Dutch. Priorities. That's what often it is all about."
The doorbell rang. "It's OK dad." I once again calmly said to my dad, in case he was tense about the 'confrontation' that would now take place.
I still was MC. I was not going to start a row. I would not "Fight", I would disengage calmly and peacefully. An appropriate "Flight" response.
'Sis' and I kissed (with me having my hands still in the dishwasher. I had my priorities straight ;D ), there was a sort-of-three-way chit-chat while I finished up the dishes, I calmly packed my stuff, said "I was already on the way out, [name] ", said goodbye to both and left.
Note: Probably needless to say, but a lot what I just wrote I did on 'automatic', it was 'improvisations' mostly. Sure, I was "aware" and "there", but the conscious thoughts/analysis I attribute to my actions came later, during the trip home. (Yay for trains that don't require brain-activity to stay safe on the road. :thumbup: )
Too Long Didn't Read:
Sis used dad as a Flying Monkey, dad Enabled (and thereby crossed my NC boundary with sis that he knows off), I stayed calm, stayed the course, handled my boundaries flexible (!), chose the appropriate Fight and Flight responses, amended them when circumstances required without folding them altogether.
This is a big progress for me.
I was happy all the way going home, even while several boundaries had been violated. And I'm still not angry.
DramaSis will stay the Boundary-Buster she is, probably forever.
I think dad is getting more and more respect for what I do, even though it probably brakes his heart to see his daughter and son being NC. But that's OK. It shows he has a heart.
I have the feeling this is the last time he has Enabled his daughter. It's surely something that I hope for. Somewhere along the way I did say to dad: "I don't agree with the way [name] is putting you in between me and her." He answered: "I do that, not her." "Yes, that's true," I replied. End of (a calm) conversation. There is a considerable chance dad will not take the bait next time.
Fingers crossed. :groovey:
if it looks like hoovering, if it sounds like hoovering, if it feels like hoovering, it is hoovering.
that being said, if you indeed see no contact as the best way to deal with your sister, then any contact, no matter how short and sweet, is no longer no contact. no contact is something to decide on, then stick to, or it only feeds the narcissist more attention, more narcissistic supply. the npd NEEDS attention in order to feel his or her own existence. as long as you give the npd any attention, you are giving him/her what s/he wants and needs. do you want to continue enabling your sister to have this abusive relationship with you? it's up to you. she won't change, and anything you give her will be used against you. but, you already know this. so, if you want to make it final, that you don't want to hear from her anymore, that's up to you. a simple 'i don't want to hear from you anymore' will do. explanations will make no difference. if you want to leave things as they are but continue in no contact, then you don't have to respond to her. that message is a bunch of gobbledygook - to try to make sense of the senseless is futility. i've had to cut my daughter off, it's been a year, and it's been very difficult. last month was the one-year anniversary, and it sent me into a tizzy from which i'm still working my way out of. but, when i told her i didn't want to hear from her anymore, i meant it. she continued to send me emails, so i blocked her. i don't go to her facebook page - why would i want to re-stress myself in that way? and, i think that's a large part of the question. it's been a major change to begin living without the drama, without the bad feelings about myself, without the worry, without the 'trying to please', without puttng so much of my energy in her direction. but, the farther away i get from what had been, the relationship i had with her, the more i am able to do other, better things for myself. i now have more energy for me and the relationships that are healthy and strong and caring and supportive. and, i wish that type of strength and energy for you as well. there are ups and downs, of course, but everything is clearer now, and for that i'm grateful, and glad i'm staying away. trust your gut. it always knows what's best for you.
Thank you, sanmagic7.
Quote from: sanmagic7 on February 16, 2016, 12:13:29 AM
so, if you want to make it final, that you don't want to hear from her anymore, that's up to you. a simple 'i don't want to hear from you anymore' will do. explanations will make no difference. if you want to leave things as they are but continue in no contact, then you don't have to respond to her.
Yes, I know all that. But as you may have seen, since my opening post the Flying Monkeys have arrived.
In force.
Well, they are pretty week, but they have arrived in droves. ;D Which gives them ample 'combined strength'. :sadno:
More to the point:
Today the predictable other shoe dropped: a hoover mail by sis. :fallingbricks:
So I'm now faced, again, with the choice:
Do I respond? Which even if I make this an "It's over" reply, with very little if any JADE, it will still feed into her 'supply'.
Or do I keep still?
One reason to reply would be that last weekend she has wiggled herself in between me and Enabler Dad on his birthday, and I don't want that. So replying (without mentioning my upset about that! Obviously! (Well, not
at all obvious if she wasn't uHPD ;) )) could 'kill' that. On the other hand... Ammo for DramaSis.
I already wrote two drafts. The first one full of JADE.
The second one much less already. Better. I simply edited out what I thought would expose my weaknesses and be used against me.
That didn't change the overall message I want to send, in fact it made it stronger, more to the point, so #1 JADE-draft is a no-go. Good.
But do I dare to bet on my suspicion that Enabler Dad is fed up as well after this*, and no matter what I do now, this has been her last "Flying Monkey" attempt?
*) I'm pretty sure Dad has seen he failed (I left regardless after all), and that his 'failure'
had at least as much to do with DramaSis drawing him in on 'fabrications' (e.g. claiming she doesn't know "what's wrong", yet not having asked ME what was wrong... That fact didn't sit well with dad, I got the impression... (NB: Dad is uAspergers, so how on earth will I be able to 'read' what sits well with dad or not...)) than it had to do with any perceived 'stubbornness to make amends" on my part...
I'll let this simmer for a week more at least.
Input welcome.
Last week I read through the whole thread as well, and there is still a lot of valuable feedback I loved.
So, today I know I'll do that again. And not just once. :wave:
for one thing, i appreciate your dilemma. for another, i can see you want it two ways - to get a message through to your sister (as in, having her hear you), but also wanting her to change (not wanting her to get in between you and your dad). unfortunately, i don't see either of those happening. jade is gobbledygook to npd's. it just doesn't make sense to them. and, all it does, like you noted, is gives them ammo toward you. if you decide to respond, it may be in your best interest to kiss - keep it simple, sweetie - , and the simpler the better. nothing personal - that's all ammo. as far as not wanting her to insinuate herself between you and dad, well, that is just what npd's do. they gather an army around them against us. and, we can't stop that. i know that from experience. you may want to question yourself about whether you really are teetering on the edge of the fence because you don't really feel ready to let go yet. nothing wrong with that, it's just not time yet, for you right now. i do believe that whatever it is we do is the right thing for us to do at that particular moment. breaking these bonds is very difficult. give yourself a break. take a break from it. maybe you'll want to talk to your therapist before you take any action. you have so many options with this. so many ways to look at it. it can definitely be confusing. one question i've come to ask myself frequently before doing or saying something is 'how will this benefit my life?' it's opened my eyes more times than i can say. best to you with this.
I'll post my 'draft as it is' here.
Any comments welcome.
They will be taken into account/consideration.
I don't think it's necessary, or even useful, to try to translate/post sis's "hoover" here. Many of you know what they are like, and there are a couple of references to her mail in my reply.
Her hoover-mail wasn't that long anyway, and void of 'content'.
No, [first name],
I have no want to meet you in [the city I live in].
I've heard nothing of you the last year. Except a so-called invitation to your birthday-party with the caveat: "Something is blocking me to just invite you". Not very inviting.
And now you write: "I heard from dad that our communication has been unclear and things have gone wrong."
The communication between us has been clear enough as far as I'm concerned: in your communication to me you regularly make clear that according to you something is amiss in our communication. What is amiss you don't say. You want to have a meet. Well [first name], not an appealing offer at all. And so I decline.
This is the way it's been for years now. You say.
Not me.
You.
That this is the way it's been for years, that's what you have been telling me for years as well.
You make it abundantly clear. No misunderstanding there.
'Things' are bothering you a lot.
Do you clear it up? No.
Do you tell me what's bothering you? No.
[my first name] has to come up with a proposition how 'we' can deal with "what's bothering you".
That is what constitutes as you making contact with me.
I don't want these "meetings" anymore. Where I'm told whatever is bothering you about me this time. You've made that clear already, I don't need the be told again. I got it already.
I don't think that's "good contact". And so I don't want it.
To say we have had that much contact where no "this is bothering me" has surfaced... No, [first name].
Don't call anymore, don't write anymore, don't mail me anymore, don't visit, etc.
(exception: if it's urgent. I'll do the same.)
[I'm alalluding to the funerals of both our parents here.]
So long. Perhaps the next time we meet there will not be something "bothering you".
That would be nice.
That meeting will be one that's driven by circumstances neither of us have any control of.
Apart from that I'm done with meetings and contact.
[my first name]
edit: I have already scrapped a lot more. As indicated. I'll leave it up is it (was) for self reference. Since it sums up pretty well how I feel about it. AND how I think about it.
I'll also remove all the bolding I originally intended.
Still not sure about sending anything. But it's tempting.
Quote from: sanmagic7 on February 17, 2016, 06:33:37 PM
for one thing, i appreciate your dilemma. for another, i can see you want it two ways - to get a message through to your sister (as in, having her hear you), but also wanting her to change (not wanting her to get in between you and your dad). unfortunately, i don't see either of those happening.
No. Not really. Or is it: really not?
I don't want her to hear me. It's talking to deaf ears. I went NC a bit over a year ago. Above all else: I don't want
to hear her anymore! :pissed:
Not even via the Flying Monkeys.
But I have to take that up with them (if even that). Not DramaSis. I don't want her even to know I'm bothered by her Flying Monkeys! (which I am ;D )
No, I've given up on the idea I
could change her, or even the whole dysfunctional family dynamic. I dare say I have even given up on
wanting that. Which is different to "longing" for that, I guess.
Or so I definitely experience. I crave for it, but I have given up on "wanting" it.
Quoteyou may want to question yourself about whether you really are teetering on the edge of the fence because you don't really feel ready to let go yet.
Good question.
Answer: I'm ready to let go. I even have let go.
I'm not ready yet to let go of uAsperger's dad.
I'm ready to let go of Enabler Dad though. And I have. Trouble is, they are both one person. Will
he be able to 'split' the two?
Nothing I have any influence over... I can only wait and see. And act accordingly.
The way I see it, expressing any emotion whatsoever is giving her what she desires -- a reaction from you.
If it were me, I would clearly state my boundary, clearly state what the consequences of breaking that boundary are, and do it in the least emotional, most detached way possible while still remaining polite.
So, perhaps I would say something like:
Dear <sister's name>,
I'm sorry, but I will not be meeting you now, nor in the future, in <city> or elsewhere.
While I would love for us to have a healthy relationship, it has become clear to me that you are unwilling to engage me with the respect necessary to make that happen. So it is with regret that I must request that you cease contacting me in any way, shape, or form.
Please do not call me, do not write to me, and do not visit me.
If you cannot honor my wishes on this matter, I will take action to enforce no-contact between the two of us that may include, but is not limited to, <what sort of things you'd do if she broke the boundary -- perhaps block her phone number, block her email address, file a restraining order with the courts, have police remove her from your residence, whatever it is that seems appropriate to you that you absolutely will follow through on> .
Signed,
<name>
Tempting... Very tempting...
Thanks. Into the stew it goes.
I made a vow to myself to let it simmer for at least the time it took her to 'bait'/hoover me.
So that's... friday to wednesday ---> Monday.
No sooner, maybe later.
:sharkbait:
Taking your time and really thinking about it before you reply is definitely a good idea :)
I know my "template" is a bit on the bold side. I know that I've just found that giving too much explanation to an abuser gives them more ammo, not less, and feeds the cycle.
I'd point out that if the end goal really is to not see or talk to her, you have control over whether or not that happens. Even your edited message seems to be trying to control her behavior, or, rather, get her to control her own behavior. And that's kind of futile, though it's a natural inclination. Deep down, I think we all want to be able to trust our family members to treat us with respect and honor our boundaries -- and even help us protect them from other people's breaches of them. But, sometimes, that's just not a realistic desire. And, given all you've said about your situation, it doesn't sound like something that's likely to happen here, no matter how hard you try.
So, the other option is to just, well, not reply at all. Sure, it's polite to reply, and it's polite to state your boundaries, what the consequences are, and give someone a chance to follow them. But if someone's not shown themselves to be trustworthy about respecting boundaries? You don't need to be polite. Sometimes just ceasing contact on your own is enough to send the message.
That's how I've handled things with my mother (uNPD). I didn't inform her of my boundaries before enforcing them. I didn't list off the consequences. I knew that doing that would just incite criticism from her, more boundary violation, more attempts to undermine me and manipulate me. So I just stopped talking to her unless it was absolutely necessary. I only responded to emails that were necessary (i.e. family business that required my input). I would answer her phone calls, in case it was something family business/emergency related, but the moment I didn't like the conversation I said I had to go and hung up. I ignore her texts, if they're not urgent. Now, when I do talk to her, she's much more reserved about how she speaks to me, and tends to keep things civil. If she ever slips, I say I have to go and hang up. I haven't seen her, face to face, in 5 years. And I don't plan on changing that any time soon, barring some sort of death in the family or something else catastrophic happening.
It was hard to do, at first. I felt like a horrible person, not doing the "polite" thing by replying, or staying on the phone. But I wasn't being a horrible person. I was protecting myself from an abuser. Realizing how much happier and stable I was, not talking to her, helped make maintaining that boundary on my own easier, and I feel a lot less bad about it now.
Thank you very much for sharing your personal experience as well.
So far I've been down the road like you are with your uNPD mother. And I may continue to do so.
On the other hand, perhaps a full NC is what I need/want.
I did realize today how violated I am by the combo Enabler Dad & sis.
So I need to re-assess my contact with Dad too. He tricked me into this, he knows very well I stopped contacting sis.
The whole family dynamic is sick. Nobody respects anybody's boundaries. Perhaps NC with all is what's in store. I wrote an angry (draft) letter to dad as well. Telling him that the 1-on-1 meet we agreed on has been violated, and I now cannot trust he won't drag sis into any meet I have with him, even IF it's clearly 'branded' as 1-on-1...
I feel calmer now, but had a rough day. Reminded myself of a thought I had about 18 months ago: "She can have him." That helped. Why on earth AM I putting up with these folks that don't have any respect for anyone's boundaries? And to a large extend have no respect for their own either?
To dad I want to say (though I won't ;) ): "I'm not going to have a relationship with sis like you have with your ex-wife, who 15 years after she has divorced you, still nags you about the relationship you had and have with her." Which is true.
And sis has a 40-year-long nagging, horrible relationship with 'mom' as well. They both nag each other to pieces, they tear each other to threads. Then there's bro who want's to quit his marriage for 10 years or more now, but is in the very same dynamic as we have grown up with: A relationship is there to nag endlessly, while claiming and pretending to "work on it", to have a "good relationship."
So there's four other people who are going for the "lifetime achievement award" for nagging and "working on it", and they use and feed on each other to achieve this. Who am I fooling I can have any sort of healthy relationship with any of them? There's always one who'll support another nagging a third party. It's what we do.
"They can have each other" is probably the healthiest attitude to take. And get the * out of there.
In that sense, possibly a letter you drafted won't help either. But since other approaches don't work...
Hmmm... I might. It can't possibly get any worse.
Dad, oh dad. What did you drag me into now?
I know: In your own marriage.
His dead-marriage.
His Zombie-Marriage. ;D
Good grief. Dad the necromancer.
I'm out for a walk. To a peaceful pond nearby.
edited to add:
Well, that was a nice calming walk and sit by the pond.
The prospect of not doing anything is getting really appealing as well.
I'm reminded of a plan I had to "remain the Invisible Child" in my FOO, and be "visible" outside that enmeshed mess.
I'm also reminded of what I've read somewhere on boundaries, along the lines of: "When we start working on developing healthy boundaries, we tend to think: 'When I'm done with this, nobody will ever trespass on my by boundaries again, ever'. The truth is that sometime, somewhere, somebody will trespass on our boundaries again. There's no such thing as 'never again'."
And so, probably this Boundary-Busting-Babe will continue to trespass on my boundaries again, and again, and again, on every opportunity she sees. And Enabler Dad might well continue to enable. He's a Boundary-Busting-Bert* himself. (*Think Bert from Sesame-street. Dad's name starts with a B as well ;D ) Writing her or not, it will most likely make no difference at all.
So, I handled the boundary violations pretty well in the moment itself. The EF's only overwhelmed me now, with this mail. A sort of delayed fuse. That's progress.
And I knew this would happen, the other shoe would drop. I was actually surprised it took her so long.
So, the jury is still out, as I avowed.
But now I feel pressure to make a decision on deciding "not to", :rofl:
Lets just say folks, dear folks on OOTS:
If I will not post here on what I've written her, then I will not have contacted her at all, nor my dad, nor any of the other enmeshed-FOO-naggers on this subject.
Which reminds me of a cartoon: Two characters laying on the couch like 16-year-olds do, and saying "The trouble with doing nothing / is that you never know when you're done." ;D
Ah, here it is. Caption: Fokke & Sukke got problems of their own:
(https://www.cptsd.org/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffoksuk.nl%2Fcontent%2Fformfield_files%2Fformcartoon_6091_9a10e23d1e269923f34d91d5b01942a85f60f4de.gif&hash=8b032caa48403fc8b7ef2d69de3b1d4d7d33454b)
Edited to add some more:
I've read through the whole thread again. Very reassuring. And I want to say thanks again for all the support that's been given to me here the last 4+ months.
I'm much calmer now, and even had a few bouts of roaring laughter about it all. The idea of not responding makes me feel relaxed, while I got very tense yesterday while contemplating a reply. I think it just throws me into a massive and all-consuming EF.
So I think I should honor that:
- thinking about ignoring it all: I feel relaxed.
- thinking about writing her: I feel stressed out beyond measure.
Lets see how reminding myself the coming days of "nah, just leave it as it is." will hold up, relaxing-wise.
edited to add, again (I do this to avoid spamming the "most recent post" thingy with my continuous issue)
For my own reference when she'll again Hoover me (almost a certain thing):
Hoovers: Don't Let the Crazy Suck You Back In (http://shrink4men.com/2012/03/28/hoovers-dont-let-the-crazy-suck-you-back-in/)
(I have by now so many bookmarks on all kind of crazy FOO stuff, it's hard to find the right one for he right situation. Now I have this at the relevant OOTS thread.)
OK. I have found some more comfort to stick to my NC with sis, and not to let that be undermined by the Triangulation / Divide & Conquer (http://outofthefog.website/top-100-trait-blog/2015/11/4/triangulation-divide-conquer) that clearly is going on here.
Whether Enabler-Dad was manipulated by DramaSis to do this (i.e. a Flying Monkey), or that he started to Enable of how own accord doesn't really matter. What matters is that this is a triangulation. From the start I have done my best to avoid this from happening by telling Dad & Bro about my NC with DramaSis a year ago, told them why (=(emotional) Blackmail) and gave them a choice in hearing the full story (i.e. the details of the blackmail, and my argumentation why it is blackmail) or not. Bro wanted to know, dad not.
Equally valid choices, I respect and accept them both.
I took that action on advice from the Strained Family Relationships; When To Cut The Ties (http://hubpages.com/family/Strained-Family-Relationships-When-You-Should-Cut-The-Ties-and-Say-Goodbye) article, which stated:
Quote#7 When applicable, talk to other family members about your situation, and let them know this person in particular and yourself will not be having as much contact, if any. Briefly explain and don't back down.
I only did this after I had run out of options after having done (consciously) #1 to 6 over the course of at least a year, most probably two, and then I'm discounting the many, many times I unsuccessfully upheld my boundaries, and fell for the Intermittent Reinforcement (http://outofthefog.website/what-not-to-do-1/2015/12/3/intermittent-reinforcement)Trap. Still, those years count too in the Grand Scheme of all this. :yes:
The triangulation is evident since I made the 'talk' I had a year ago
an announcement, a "this is not up for discussion", a "this is now a boundary" kind of talk, with the only 'option' for them to ask questions to get better informed. So the talk with my bro was long (he had quite a few questions), with dad short.
Dad has since brought up the subject a few times, enabler style (i.e. tried to change things) but I stood strong. Basically told him again the subject/my resolve/the boundary was not up for discussion, though I was prepared to share information, which he didn't want to have, so I kept silent. Apart from reiterating it was because of "Blackmail" I went NC.
And so now he brought it up again, set me up for a meeting: triangulation, no doubt about it.
I again made clear (as I've posted earlier) that the blackmail was crystal-clear for me, and that sis
must know "what's wrong", despite her claiming she doesn't know. And that she has never asked ME "what's wrong".
Now DramaSis claims that she understood from 'dad' that "in the communication between us there was a lot unclear and went awry."
Well NO, this is not the case. This is NOT what I told dad. Again, wether or not she correctly 'quotes' dad or not, is not relevant here.
Triangulation, Divide and Conquer, Proxy-Recruitment is the issue here. Either by uHPD-sis or uAsperger's/Enabler dad.
edited to add: And now I realize that the phrase 'sis' used is a form of 'minimization': the Blackmail (and by extension all other crap she pulled on me) is just "unclear communication", "misunderstanding". Off-course she'll be able to 'explain'. "Talk it over". DARVO. She's just misunderstood. Boohoohoo.
Well, I don't play that game anymore. And most probably she knows that too. That's why she keeps it vague. It's the only way to make sure she can be 'misunderstood'. That she can 'claim' such a thing. "Plausible deniability" and all that.
It's crystal clear.
She's sly.
The other day I told myself (my Inner Child, or my Inner Adult, I don't know who, and it doesn't really matter): "Dutch Boy, on many occasions she decided not to communicate at all, and by doing so she screwed you over. Information that was relevant to/for you was withheld to harm you. That cannot be "unclear communication or "a misunderstanding". How can "no communication" be "unclear communication" or "misunderstood communication"? It can't, by definition. There has to be communication to begin with before it can be unclear or misunderstood."
Mind games.
And I have learned to think outside the box.And so I can take the following advice at heart:
What NOT to Do: • Don't believe everything you are told by a person who suffers from a personality disorder. They may just be telling you something false as a means to an end.
Sis' quote is false. • Don't react quickly to surprising news. You have the prerogative to think for as long as you want and to react how and when you want.
:yes: • Don't lose your temper or lose control of your emotions. You can't control other people but you always have control over your own words and actions and that is where you have the most power.
Well, I probably had a massive EF, but kept it for myself :thumbup: • Don't sit still and allow someone to rain down on you insults or criticism in the name of another person. If the room is a painful place to sit, then it is perhaps a good time to go sit in a different room.
I left as soon as possible on the night in question :thumbup: • Don't make promises, commitments or contracts that will hurt your relationship with people whom you trust, you love, people whose company you enjoy, old friends, and trusted relatives. No-one who truly loves you will want to take healthy, supportive, positive relationships away from you.
The way I look at it now, I almost fell into that trap with writing her. :thumbdown: :thumbup:
What TO Do: • Objectively verify anything you are told before acting on it.
Well, I made notes on the trip home. And I don't need to check them. I know what I have told dad (this has been at least the third time I told him the same consistent story) AND I have the "Blackmail"-mail. • Keep in touch with those you love and trust and tell them about any problems or issues you are having.
Hi folks :hug: • Maintain a healthy balance between family, friends, work and play. You need them all in the right measure to keep a healthy balance.
I went to the Humanistic Society monthly Sunday-morning meeting, even though I felt compelled to "work on this". :thumbup: . It was a nice 'lecture' with follow-up conversation/discussion on Frans de Waal's book The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates. In the discussion I even managed to bring up that Humanism is a valuable approach-to-life but that for 'cluster B' PD's it might not be a doable path. :sadno: That was met by a lot of resistance, LOL. As was to be expected. Basically it was discarded, PD's were pathological (true) and thus the whole issue was swept 'under the rug'. How convenient. I didn't press on. :thumbup:
• Politely refuse to engage in Divide and Conquer without starting a fight about it. Remove yourself from a conversation if it is an unhealthy or dysfunctional one.
I think if I reply to DramaSis I will be falling for the trap. Because obviously a fight will break out, I'll be dealing the first (counter)punch. Same story if I'll confront dad with his boundary-busting regarding forcing me to meet sis. I think the message I've send by first stating I would leave before she would arrive, and in the end left 5 minutes after she had arrived, due to circumstance I described above. There's no need to rub 'salt in the wound', again I would be picking a fight. However 'in my right' I might be. My behavior has already shown I will not put up with this crap. • Maintain your self-control. This is how you keep your power and demonstrate that you are not going to be manipulated like that.
By letting myself not be 'lured out in the open' by replying, I think I'm asserting my self-control the best. I will not be manipulated to take up contact again with sis.I hear my Inner Critic yelling I'm JADE-ing here, and I should not post this.
But I'm not JADE-ing. I'm sharing, and I'm putting my own thoughts and experiences in order. With people like EnablerDad and DramaSis such documentationn and archiving of events as they actually happened is very important. History revision (either by them or by my own FOG-susceptible mind) is a real danger.
Thanks for listening.
it's a process, isn't it, to figure out what's best for our own selves, especially in the beginning. it sounds like you've come to some self-loving conclusions on what to do. happily, as we progress, as we stay out of our own way, the entire process becomes easier. we see what's happening more quickly, we know more surely how to respond, and we remember to take care of ourselves first and foremost. your physical messages re: what would be stressful to do, what would be more beneficial for you to do sound loud and clear, and the fact that you're listening to them speaks volumes about your progress with this matter. keep taking care of yourself.
Well, not responding it is.
I still have an urge to respond and 'out it all', much like in this video: Resisting the Temptation to Break No Contact (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW7ovZyywtU) (She has a great YouTube channel on her experiences with Narcissistic parents and her NC)
It's really annoying, the two of them got into my head, and some Inner Me's tend to argue with them. :pissed:
So it's not easy, but I'll stick to my NC. It's the only way to stop the bickering. I must cut the supply.
Here's another video on the effects of going NC, it's the video that is referred to in the other video I posted, and her channel looks also very worthwhile for me. The Narcissist Loves to Call You Crazy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G15OjQZavO0)
Thanks all.
edited to add some more video's:
Narcissism Top 10 ways to deal with your Narcissist. [1 to 10: No contact!] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3womK70af0)
Which reminded me of this awesome video by a Law Professor (unrelated to PD's or cPTSD):
Why You Should Never Talk To Police [even if you're innocent] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au4_EdPwTkE)
Added an article that may help me resist the next one as well: Hoovering is a Timeless Tactic In a Narcissist's World (http://www.thenarcissisticpersonality.com/hoovering-is-timeless/)
added another video to keep me on track the next time: Narcissism No Contact and Right from Wrong (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgYize3axEE)
This is a great article. I find this so awesome it's worth a 'bump' :jumping: of the thread, IMHO.
I'm still going strong with my NC, btw, yet I still need to read validating articles to calm my Inner Critic (I suppose), as well as for additional backing since there is a lack of (sufficient) support from my friends. REALLY cutting contact with no possible reconciliation in mind IS a bit hard to swallow for even those who earlier were quite adamant in their advice to me to cut down contact and "don't be bothered by them anymore" type of advise. Full and decisive NC is crossing the Rubicon a bit for many, I've come to learn. :'(
It's not that they oppose me (thank heavens) but it's small remarks like: "Yeah, well, possibly in the future things will look brighter." Which is a bummer if you're in a position like me who is just coming to grips on how awful and premeditated these hoovers are, and that 'sis' definitely is not interested in a brighter future for me, only for her: she misses her punching bag and would like to have it back.
In this article the author (who has spend 13 years in a relationship with a narcissist) tells about her own hoovers to suck the narcissist back in.
Quite recognizable... I hoovered 'sis' and 'mom' back in as well, no doubt, and I know from my past I have always have had great trouble with break up's with girlfriends, even while I did most of the time the breaking up. I've often wandered if these were hoovers and/or if I was 'bad' for doing this, so I relate to her story quite a lot.
I never pushed it as far as her though.
A good read, she has many great insights from her own experiences with a narc. I've learned a lot from all her articles.
The Narcissist's Hoover & Our Conditioned Response (http://www.thenarcissisticpersonality.com/hoover-participation/)
Going completely NC is a really hard thing to do, and it's not surprising that you're needing support in continuing it. I think it's pretty natural to hope for an eventual reconciliation, especially when it comes to enmeshed families. This is someone (or multiple someones) who played a very large part in your life and probably shared a bunch of good times with you. Wanting to be able to have that again, well, it's entirely understandable.
It's hard. SO HARD. To accept that this person (or persons) is fundamentally toxic for you, and is just not safe for you to interact with. I've had that struggle in dealing with my mother. I'm having that struggle in dealing with my most recent Ex. I want, badly, to be able to go to them and share my happiness over things, but I know that doing that will just open me up to more hurt, more pain, more suffering, and set me backwards in my recovery. It hurts again, every time I remind myself of that, and I imagine it will keep hurting for a long time.
But you have support. You have people who genuinely do want to see you have a brighter future. I'm pretty sure that everyone here on this forum wants that for you. I know I do, and I barely know you.
I have faith that you can keep up the NC with your sis, and that you will be infinitely better for it both in the short term and the long term. :hug:
Quote from: tesscaline on March 06, 2016, 07:44:02 PM
Going completely NC is a really hard thing to do, and it's not surprising that you're needing support in continuing it. I think it's pretty natural to hope for an eventual reconciliation, especially when it comes to enmeshed families. This is someone (or multiple someones) who played a very large part in your life and probably shared a bunch of good times with you. Wanting to be able to have that again, well, it's entirely understandable.
It's hard. SO HARD. To accept that this person (or persons) is fundamentally toxic for you, and is just not safe for you to interact with. I've had that struggle in dealing with my mother. I'm having that struggle in dealing with my most recent Ex. I want, badly, to be able to go to them and share my happiness over things, but I know that doing that will just open me up to more hurt, more pain, more suffering, and set me backwards in my recovery. It hurts again, every time I remind myself of that, and I imagine it will keep hurting for a long time.
Thank you very much.
It is hard to see them for the toxic people they are. To accept that there really weren't that
much good times I had with them. And that insofar I had them, the good times are overshadowed by much more bad times, both in number as well as intensity. And that they actually sabotaged quite a few good times for me.
Slowly but steadily I'm getting there. It's a struggle though.
I'm reminded now of something somebody said, which is ringing more true by the day: "We are still hoping for the
promises of good times they [=the PD's] made, time and again, but never followed through on. We are in love with the fantasy they presented us with, and find it so hard let go of that."
My 'sis' still does that, in her hoovers: "I want to have a good relationship with you." Yet I know, from experience, that with her the relationship will always be exactly that: the 'good relationship' is (and has been) always something that will happen at some point
in the future. There will never be a point, nor has there been a point where 'sis' says: "OK, it's good now, it's not something I want anymore, because we
have a good relationship now, my needs are met."
The same blogger made a post about it, that I only read today, and it does strike home: Narcissists & The Art of Future-Faking (http://www.thenarcissisticpersonality.com/future-faking/)
QuoteBut you have support. You have people who genuinely do want to see you have a brighter future. I'm pretty sure that everyone here on this forum wants that for you. I know I do, and I barely know you.
Thanks a lot, again.
Yes, this community is such a great support, such a beacon, such an anchor. I couldn't do this without you. :hug:
Quote from: Dutch Uncle on March 07, 2016, 12:31:53 AM
My 'sis' still does that, in her hoovers: "I want to have a good relationship with you." Yet I know, from experience, that with her the relationship will always be exactly that: the 'good relationship' is (and has been) always something that will happen at some point in the future. There will never be a point, nor has there been a point where 'sis' says: "OK, it's good now, it's not something I want anymore, because we have a good relationship now, my needs are met."
The same blogger made a post about it, that I only read today, and it does strike home: Narcissists & The Art of Future-Faking (http://www.thenarcissisticpersonality.com/future-faking/)
I'm not sure that they're actually lying, so much as that their idea of what a "good relationship" looks like is so warped and corrupted, that they can't understand the complaint that the relationship is bad. I think they also can't see beyond themselves, so when the relationship is good
for them, they think it's good for
everyone, even when it's actively destructive to everyone else. Which is sad, in it's own way. :(
Quote from: tesscaline on March 07, 2016, 08:21:35 PM
I'm not sure that they're actually lying
Quite probably she's not lying. This is actually something I'm learning nowadays. As far as I understand it, Narcissists (cluster B's) are brutally honest. Alas the focus is on the brutality, not so much the honesty... :'(
(
I think that in one of the articles I linked to, or in some others where she tells her about her experiences with a narc, she tells that her husband for 13 years would say "I can take you or leave you". It took her many years to realize that no truer words were ever spoken.
Ah, here it is: Historical Rejection: Why the Narcissist Gives Us Up (http://www.thenarcissisticpersonality.com/why-the-narcissist-gives-us-up/) )
I think you summed it up quite well, I see it the same way you do.
She wants to have a good relationship with me. And that's it. No hidden agenda's or anything. This is what she wants: to want it. Not to have it. I think this also where co-dependecy comes into play, although I haven't figured out exactly how.
I may never even try to understand that all the way through. Dealing with the results/outcome/effects of what causing it is hard enough as it is. What's understanding the cause of it going to help me? Still, "curious minds want to know" and all that, but quite possibly that is what's keeping me 'hooked'.
It's my sis who for 20 years at least has been bugging me "she wants to have a good relationship" followed or preceded (often both ;) ) by a long list of flaws of mine.
The last years I've started to feel she wants me to love her as the husband she doesn't want to have (she's gay). I have to be the perfect man (for her or in general "how men
should be"), yet she'll never want one.
She's very good at "double binds". Once I learned of that concept I was able to get her of my back a lot better, since I saw through the no-win scenarios and refused to play the games (which I had done far too often in our long relationship).
Only for her to up-the-ante, unfortunately. Resulting in (emotional) blackmail. (which is a "double bind" without any pretense left that there's any good in it for the victim, I guess.)
edited to add, just for my record:
Two days a go I received an SMS. Which was meant from somebody else, whose name is a bit like mine. So she might just ave mis-selected the addressee for the SMS, or it might have been a very veiled hoover-attempt. The message itself was far from pressing, which makes me wonder.
Or probably I should better say: "How crazy is it I even wonder what intent could be behind such a plausible deniable 'faux pas' on her behalf..." Was she hoping I would contact her with: "Hey sis, you send this to the wrong guy. You better text him again, as he will not have received your SMS." I deleted the message without much ado. But the fact I'm typing this up, days after the event itself, is telling in itself: It takes just a misdirected SMS to occupy a part in my brain and memory. And this memory gets 'uploaded' in my consciousness at random.
Whatever it is, she is a crazy-maker, as far as I experience.
I hope I'm not boring and/or upsetting people with my continuous whine about uHPDsis, but I need to vent it somewhere...
So feel free to ignore this "here they go again"... This is becoming more of a "recovery from sis"-journal than anything else...
I got another text-message today: "Hi [name=me], this Easter Monday I'll be doing an EasterBrunch at noon. [name=bro] will be there too. If you feel like it you're welcome. In that case, send me a text message you will attend. Love, [name=sis]."
That's less than 48 hour notice. And she lives a 4 hour drive away. Not really a "just hop by"-case is it? (What? I need to get up at 7, to even be able to get there by noon!)
She has never done an EasterBrunch before. That I know off. She's not religious by the way.
*?
I'll tell you (=me) what the :pissed: this is: DramaSis is taking the place of the "Mater-of-the-Family" after her "Narcissistic Discard" of me when she excluded me, willfully, from the Jubilee-birthday-party for our 'mom', post-her-(emotional)-Blackmail.
I'm set up for being ScapeGoated for not attending.
I can't find the article, but in one someone said: "I will not attend any Family-get-together that is sprung on me with less then 48 hours". Good grief, the straws I clutch to keep my balance in this madness.
Found it at last: Freeing Yourself From the Influences of Harmful Relatives (http://hubpages.com/relationships/Freeing-Yourself-From-Harmful-Influences)
The whole paragraph resonates with my experiences over the last years with my FOO:
QuoteI tried for a few years to make things work. I made allowances for their lifestyles, beliefs and opinions. I was candid with those family members about my boundaries and how I wished to be treated. I asked that they respect me, my work and my time. I enforced my boundaries by rewarding respectful treatment and rebuking disrespectful behaviour. I refused to attend family functions that violated my safety or that were sprung on me with less than 48 hours notice. Eventually, I was missing more family events than I was attending.
[/i]
I also see TherapistMom has called today.
edited to add: I listened to the voicemail (I had to listen to a lot of other voicemails as well) and she has ALSO arranged for a get-togheter, tonight, with EnablerDad, Bro with his kids (not his wife) and she wondered if she could "seduce" me as well.
Good Grief. Are uHPD-TherapistMom and uHPDsis in direct competition with each other? Quite possibly. This would fit with the Narcissist Mother and her competition with her daughter. And vice versa with the Narcissist Daughter competing with her Mom I suppose.
Dirty 'mom' KNOWS I don't want to meet her and dad on the same day. She really thrives on 'creating' pain... It's so nasty, so devious: under the veil of a nice family-diner,
oh how thoughtful and harmonious she is :dramaqueen: , she is luring me in a situation she is very well aware of I'm not comfortable with. :witch:
Bro has a busy weekend! :rofl: I guess he will take the opportunity to :dramaqueen: on the unfair visa-regulations in place so his wife can't be there as well. Who he in fact would rather not have around at all.
This family is bonkers.
Somebody please tell me I'm not going bananas.
On a side-note: Easter is the only Christian Holiday I have ever felt worthwhile/valuable/significant (in contrast to X-mas). "Original Sin has been lifted, let's live unburdened." has been my (perhaps somewhat heathen/frivolous) take on it. This year easter will mark, almost to the day, me getting the results of my SCID-II test that conclusively has proven that the fear TherapistMom has installed in me of being 'flawed' were unfounded. I'll celebrate THAT. If there has been anything that has propelled me to recovery, and joining this community, it's been that a year ago I finally had the guts to voice my suspicion that TherapistMom has been the prime 'cause' for my mental struggle.
And that this suspicion has been validated by the SCID-II. :phoot: edited to add: I couldn't stand it I couldn't find the website with the "48 hour"-rule, but now I've found it. I'm not sure if this a OCD-trait, or just a deep sense of safety I'm craving for. Possibly both.
Hi Dutch Uncle,
You are definitely not going or are bananas. From my own experience there are actually more dysfunctional, bonkers family's than there are healthy ones. But my experience is limited to my FOO and my husbands FOO so there might be plenty of healthy families out there, I have just never met or experienced one. My husbands FOO is bonkers due to a generational cycle of abuse but it is a result of, hate to say this, some inbreeding a couple of generations ago and sexual abuse of children.
It is Easter Sunday and I am working on my second cup of coffee with Irish Cream to numb myself for the days events. Going to both sides today. My obligatory LC for the year. I will be drinking wine later in order to cope. Why can't we just accept that these people do not accept us for us and stop worrying or allowing anything they do upset us? You have at least learned to say "No" I am not going. I haven't even been brave enough to take that step yet. I keep telling myself it is easier to go and get it over with rather than deal with the backlash of not going at all. But easier for who? I think it is easier for them because they know that I somehow still feel a responsibility to family regardless of how awful they treat me. But, it is not easier on me. Depending on what is said and how I am triggered, it can take days or weeks to get myself back on track again.
So, Dutch, you are not bananas, not bonkers. You are seeing it all in the right perspective unfortunately. They play games, the manipulate, they are devious all in the name of making themselves somehow feel better about who they are. They are not really worried about you, us. I have a mother in law that is undiagnosed PS and she pits her 2 sons against each other, I have a grandma who is PS and she works to pit her 3 siblings against one another. A father that is an uNPD, a brother that has become his spitting image, a codependent mother. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. Many people would say that it is not possible to have all of that, that it has to be you, not them. So in a way, I guess they are right. It is us because we do not think like our family. We can't change how they think. We can only change ourselves. And I think you would agree, there is no way that I am going to change who I am and what I believe so that I can be accepted by my FOO, because they are full of hate, fear, and contempt. I have to accept that I need to find a new family of friends, like this forum, who think much the same as I do and want, need acceptance, kindness, support, and love.
Hang in there DU, you are doing okay and do not let the phone calls, the texts, the intentional games devised to make you feel guilt or to look bad to others in your family. Screw them. They are the ones that are miserable in all reality. What a small life they lead. We can see the big picture and have so much more to offer and deserve to be free and happy.
Lol, Mary Ann :hug: :hug: :hug: :hug:
Thank you so much, MaryAnn. :hug:
Quote from: MaryAnn on March 27, 2016, 04:25:50 PM
Hi Dutch Uncle,
You are definitely not going or are bananas. From my own experience there are actually more dysfunctional, bonkers family's than there are healthy ones. But my experience is limited to my FOO and my husbands FOO so there might be plenty of healthy families out there, I have just never met or experienced one.
Unfortunately, I think your assessment is spot on.
QuoteIt is Easter Sunday and I am working on my second cup of coffee with Irish Cream to numb myself for the days events. Going to both sides today.
You have my sympathy. And that is not meant in any derogatorative way.
QuoteI keep telling myself it is easier to go and get it over with rather than deal with the backlash of not going at all. But easier for who? I think it is easier for them because they know that I somehow still feel a responsibility to family regardless of how awful they treat me. But, it is not easier on me. Depending on what is said and how I am triggered, it can take days or weeks to get myself back on track again.
Quite. It's been one year of NC for me now, and I must confess it's only marginally better this year.
But I
guess am convinced it's the margin that counts. Can't be sure until next year though. ;D
It's validations like yours here that I crave for in moments like this. These people ARE crazy makers. So hard to convince one-self of one's sanity, when they show up in droves (even if just one person is attracting the crowd and passing it on as "see? they side with me!" )
QuoteSo, Dutch, you are not bananas, not bonkers. You are seeing it all in the right perspective unfortunately. They play games, the manipulate, they are devious all in the name of making themselves somehow feel better about who they are. [...] Hang in there DU, you are doing okay and do not let the phone calls, the texts, the intentional games devised to make you feel guilt or to look bad to others in your family. Screw them. They are the ones that are miserable in all reality. What a small life they lead. We can see the big picture and have so much more to offer and deserve to be free and happy.
Lol, Mary Ann :hug: :hug: :hug: :hug:
Thanks again, and to you I say as well: Hang in there, dear MaryAnn. You'll survive this year too. :hug:
Rather than starting a new thread, I'll continue here, even though enablerDad is at it now. I just need a place to vent. I guess you are all as bored with this as I am. But I'm angry and frustrated as well. What a drain.
Enabler uAspergersDad is going to throw a family-get-together.
First boundary-violation: he isn't supposed to e-mail me (unless it's urgent). He circumvented this by sending me the mail in print (neat) with a question added in handwriting he would like to add me to the group-e-mail "for speed". So far so good. It turned out he added me straight away.
Then why ask? Rhetorical question. Plausible deniability. Right?
Second boundary violation: I don't want to see DramaSis, nor DramaMama.
Third boundary violation: He sprung DramaSis on me a month or two back already. Sneaky weasel. :pissed:
So I got into a bit of an EF, wrote four different replies, just for the * of it (one was very good: I spilled all the beans. ;D Might not be the smartest though). Decided to let it simmer for a while, the date is six weeks from now.
I open my e-mail program (and saw then he had already mailed me) and there is a mail from the women who divorced him (DramaMama a.k.a. TherapistMom) ("ex" is a dirty word in his vocabulary, he practically starts to have a fit/seizure if I say that) that she can't make it that day as she's somewhere else, she suggests other dates, but then... oops...wait...ehrmm... perhaps she can make it that day after all... "Good luck preparing", ditched Enabler!
Good Grief. This spells HPD, right? The ball has hardly started rolling or it's Chaos Manufacture already.
Now I've decided to go and watch this whole mess play out. I almost posted a "I will not be there at any date, please get me of this list." But decided not to.
I'm curious, and it may be even schadenfreude I'm anticipating, but I am really curious how NC-DramaSis is going to handle this, and bro too.
I think it might be wise for me to tell everybody only at the latest possible time I can't come. Why rush the news? Last time I proposed to organize something with bro and sis for mom's jubilee, it took them eight months to royally screw me over in the end by cutting me out from their private diner with mom.
For curiosity and novice sake, I'll hold my cards to my chest for once. Whaddayathink? One has to try everything once in your life, right?
Good Grief, this event has me pre-occupied.
I have written a very clear letter to my parents and siblings, that I intend to send them at some point. Just them, not the extended 'family' consisting of spouses and grandchildren (of whom two are young adults now), as they have nothing to do with this mess.
I also have clearly stated that as far as I'm concerned it's up to my siblings to decide what will be shared of my letter with their children and spouse, and that it's not up to the grandparents to bring this subject up with the grandchildren, unless first discussed and approved by the respective parents.
My aim? To protect the grandchildren of the Narcs. If it will do any good is anybody's guess, but it's my last contribution to end the family-poisoning.
I will be spilling some beans in the letter, making it clear I'm NC with DramaSis and DramaMama with the only JADE being: "they know why, and you all know why, either because I already told you or because you were there." (verbatim)
Apart from telling everybody the obvious about my NC, I also told everybody the obvious about my LC with Bro (the one who is passing on the abuse to his children) and EnablerDad. Again, the only JADE being: "They know why, and some of you may also know why, and if you don't it's because I don't owe you any explanation, period. I can handle my own relationships without it being any of your business, thank you."
Oh, and I do mention I've been 'pulled a fast one' once too many and this (the NC's and the LC's) are the result of it.
And I'm not backing down.
At the moment I feel I have to send this. As it is, everybody DOES know. Yet everybody can hide behind the facade that they don't and/or don't know what the others know. Given the enmeshment, triangulation, gossip, backstabbing, chaos manufacture and overall manipulation the "not knowing" is nonsense off course, but the Plausible Deniability is a fact.
So, it's my shot to end the plausible deniability at least. The rest will stay, of course. :yes: But that can't be helped.
I guess it's also an attempt to stop the Flying Monkeys falling for the 'victim blaming' tricks, the DARVO of the Narcs. It probably won't work, but at least I will be a 100% certain I have left no room for wiggling, on any party involved.
I hope it will cure my "Learned Helplessness", bit by bit.
I feel pretty good, strong, firm and ready to take the Fight to my abusers. And then calmly walk away, leaving the mess where it originates. A descent and appropriate Flight.
Shifting the Burden.
One adult grandson is not coming. Citing graduation time, and too much travel (he's living abroad).
Sounds legit. Though perhaps also convenient.
My plan is to wait to reply in any way until either bro or sis has replied first.
I'm expecting to see 'private' (as in: behind dad's back, hidden from public view) e-mails from both of them before that. As it is, I happen to have an appointment with bro this week (made previously). I plan on not discussing this 'party' with him, keep MC/Grey Rock ("I haven't decided yet").
Quote from: To-Be-Continued on April 10, 2016, 05:01:10 PM
If I've read it right, you've gone no contact with your sister, is that correct?
I am NC.
Lots of Flying Monkeys and enablers around.
Who try to hold down my arm for her to push the cigarette butts in. ;)
I probably will have to ditch them all.
Thanks for the analogy and helpful advise. :thumbup:
I had a long meeting with bro today.
Originally I thought this would be primarily on why I am not visiting, but the whole FOOdoo is a tricky subject as well, including his Flying Monkey behavior.
Since I don't want to deal with both issues at the same time (a de-enmeshment strategy I am following) I asked him which one he wanted to address today:
- me not visiting him
- FOOdoo
He chose to address FOOdoo, specifically my NC with 'mom'. :ninja:
Fine.
I told him I don't want to see her ever again. Explained why: she always does what one has specifically told her not to do.
Brought up the subject of 'sis' too: same deal.
It was a long conversation, with me doing most of the talking as I had to keep reiterate it was over and done with, and that all talk he now receives of both :dramaqueen: :dramaqueen: is nonsense, that they know perfectly well what is wrong, their neither of them have even asked me what is wrong etc. etc. , despite the fact they tell him they can't contact me.
He suspected I wouldn't be at dad's 'party' (good thinking bro) and I said it indeed was very unlikely, and that I was going to see how others would react in any case, but chances were indeed slim. (no need to be too 'certain'/outspoken at this point, the message needs to sink in with him in any case.)
Overall impression: he now has seen 'this is it', he even sees/acknowledges some of my points (even though he does not necessarily agree or has had the same experiences with them). I spilled a lot of additional beans. I don't know if this will do any good or will backfire, but at the time he was baffled by some of the stuff I told him.
I feel good about it in general: I reiterated my NC with them, made clear the ball is not in my court and specifically told him that even IF they would 'take ownership' and apologize, it might still not make a difference for my NC. He appeared accepting of the idea: "I understand" he said.
I DID NOT BACK DOWN ONE INCH.
I feel proud, self-assured, and at peace in this eye of the storm.
Come * or high water: I'm staying my course, and will live my truth.
:band:
edit: Changed the title to (hopefully) reflect better to what part of this thread it actually is an update on. DramaSis is largely out of the picture, she's more a 'collateral IED' doing her damage through Flying Monkeys than anything else. And this meeting with bro is more of a 'removing the fuse' of DramaSis' machinations (hopefully) than that it's about her.
Right.
I got snail-mail today from dad.
Behind the scenes grandson II and GF have replied to dad: no show.
Bro also replied: Show. (as far as I can make out: together with his whole (dysfunctional) FOC)
DramaSis does what can be expected of a uHPD: has to reschedule stuff, may or may not work, changes to the proposed plan of dad will have to be made in any case. Most likely. Not sure off course! Keep the reigns! Can't afford to loose any semblance of control, now can we. Or opt out at the last moment, citing: Hey, I never said I would be able to come. All bases are covered. Such a sly :dramaqueen:
Apparently will bring her wife along, who has a longstanding NC with her Mother-in-Law. :rofl: <--- or is that mean? ;D
:witch:
So much for his breach of "No e-mail anymore, dad": most of them simply e-mail him privately, hidden from public 'exposure'. And it's left up to him to inform the others... :sadno: What a disrespectful bunch. Well, they are his own 'breed', so I guess I should not take pity on the 'man'.
So I've written another draft to dad. Will have to think if I will really send it. But as it stands right now I will tell him I'm not coming, will reaffirm my NC with Dramamama and DramaSis, will express my disappointment all this has become another cloak-and-dagger thing, that I will publicly state my non-show a day or so after he will have received the letter (so he doesn't have to make the same effort to them as he now has to do on their behalf to me) but that contrary to what I will have written in my letter to him, I will not state why I'm not coming. With the caveat (in my letter to him) that they all already know all to well, despite their woe-is-me attitude (fakery/gaslighting/chaos manufacture. <---
that crucial information I will not tell dad, as it will blow up in my face. :sadno: ).
I wrote a letter to dad where I reaffirmed my NC with 'sis' and 'mom'. I told him once again they
know why, even if they claim to be totally unaware. (Playing the "Murdered Innocence" is the phrase we use in Dutch for such behavior.) I didn't specify (JADE) as he doesn't want to know anyway. Why I don't want to see his ex-wife will hit an even bigger wall of denial than with sis, so I'm not bothering with telling him. I didn't use the word "denial" (nor "ex-wife" as this throws him in a fit) but that's about the only 'softening' I did.
I also made clear that since most family-members choose to write him, and thus he has to inform me on what they write him on their 'plans' is a disappointment, and for me shows there's no mutual effort in this AND it makes clear they don't inform me, contact me, not even through such a simple thing as a group-mail. Then I spilled the beans that bro and sis excluded me from a social event I wanted to organize together with them, and they in the end did it together without even informing me.
I felt I could and should as I had confronted bro about this last week. Where I also made clear to bro that this exclusion-event (closely tied to DramaSis' (emotional) Blackmail: in fact this was the planned result if I wouldn't fall for the Blackmail) makes clear that 'sis' is shutting/cutting
me out, not vice versa. I simply have stopped trying to get back in a relationship where I am discarded at a whim.
Told dad I would post my choice of not coming to this event myself in the group-mail, that I'm an adult man and I have no need for dad to pass on the message to the others, that I'm capable of addressing my family-members myself, and that I would do so on the day I expected him to get my letter. And that I would keep it short.
And so I posted a short message to all:
QuoteHi all,
I've understood from dad I'm the only one who hasn't replied to the invitation yet. Oops! I had no idea. Surprising!
So forthwith I've made my choice: I'm not participating.
I would appreciatie if I could be taken off the list of addressees of this event's group mail.
[My name].
I had made a lot of drafts before, some of them like this, some of them elaborate and full of JADE. I decided that since I'm so convinced I'm dealing with a couple of Narcissists here that would only backfire.
"Detach, disengage, defect" is a mantra I'm repeating to myself: it's the only way to get really OUT of this enmeshed FOO.
I felt pretty relieved after posting my mail, which supposedly is a good sign. ;)
Of course, I am also waiting for the other shoe to drop.
But in any case: it's another step forward, another step out of the way of my Traumatizing Stressors.
A healthy "Flight" reaction, or as I heard once somebody say who had gone NC with his mom and dad too: "It wasn't a Flight, it was an Escape."
At times I think I have yet to start on my
Post-traumatic stress disorder...
:hug:
edited to add: and today one of my favorite vlogsters on Narcissism Survival (and No Contact) posted this nice and inspirational video:
Happy Anniversary to Me: Two Years after the Discard (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=np_MDLFHFX4)
Today I got a letter saying the Family-day is cancelled. :worship: & :woohoo:
Dad wrote some more than just that, but as he wrote in the opening sentence: "This letter may appear to deal with the family-day, but in reality it's about me."
Which I like, as at least this may be an opening to get out of the family-enmeshment.
Not that I expect me and my uAsperger'sDad/enablerDad to have a cuddly-snugly-cozy relationship at any point, but I'm happy my announced absence has not blown up in my face.
First impression overall: :thumbup:
Another hoover survived. ;D
:yahoo:
Oh, and I almost forgot the most important part: My boundaries are holding, despite the onslaught, either frontal or by flanking maneuvering via the Flying Monkeys. :groovey:
I'm so happy for you! :hug:
Quote from: Dutch Uncle on April 28, 2016, 11:32:51 AM
Today I got a letter saying the Family-day is cancelled. :worship: & :woohoo:
Dad wrote some more than just that, but as he wrote in the opening sentence: "This letter may appear to deal with the family-day, but in reality it's about me."
Which I like, as at least this may be an opening to get out of the family-enmeshment.
Not that I expect me and my uAsperger'sDad/enablerDad to have a cuddly-snugly-cozy relationship at any point, but I'm happy my announced absence has not blown up in my face.
First impression overall: :thumbup:
Another hoover survived. ;D
:yahoo:
Oh, and I almost forgot the most important part: My boundaries are holding, despite the onslaught, either frontal or by flanking maneuvering via the Flying Monkeys. :groovey:
Oh dear. Another hoover-mail from Drama-sis.
A very elaborate one this time.
She doesn't know what's wrong :blahblahblah: .
Then she says: "Yeah I did something wrong. I'm sorry". What did she do wrong? It doesn't say. What is she sorry for? It doesn't say.
Then she lists all kind of things that maybe I think is wrong. (note to self: notice how it is about me. Not her.)
So, the set-up is clear.
She doesn't know what's wrong, I have to tell her. What she does know is wrong, she doesn't say. The "sorry" is a pre-emptive "I don't have to talk about it". Well, I'm not going to ask. I've done that before, and got no answer.
The other stuff: at best it's me who thinks/considers it wrong. Not her. And that is exactly what I can expect if I were to reply: she might acknowledge I think it's wrong, not her.
But fat change of even that happening. :doh:
She misses me. Yeah, she misses abusing me! She misses her Scapegoat. She misses her gaslighting me, triangulating me, manipulating me. She misses her pity-parties. The drama's she can play out. :dramaqueen:
I wrote a sort of reply for myself, but I'm not going to respond.
It's a classic attempt to let me air my grievances, so they can be countered. Now that I have come to understand narcissistic supply, narcissistic injury etc. I know she will have a manipulative answer to any of the things she thinks that may be wrong. And a lot of them were wrong, indeed. The fact she lists them as 'possibly wrong' just means that she revels in having them done and thinking she could/can get away with them.
She will never admit they were 'wrongs'. If she would, she would have done so here and now. But just like the "I did wrong, I'm sorry" and not owning up what that wrong actually was, so will she admit any other wrong.
Because she's right after all.
I'm the crazy one for finding it wrong.
But she knows damned well she's wrong.
This is all par of the course that these people know damned well what they are doing, and they just want to be able to keep doing it. Deliberately.
I archived the hoover-mail.
Mails like these are my anchor to NC.
Another Storm weathered.
Huzzah! :cheer: :cheer: you rock! That is awesome you're not allowing her to "hoover" you into further manipulation. Way to go! :cheer:
Oh dear, these hoover-mails do get to me...
Here's a draft I might send after DramaSis' latest attempt... (For the content of the letter, see this in the 'letters never sent' section: A reply to your hoover, DramaSis. (http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=4118.0))
Name,
I don't want to have contact with you. Your mails, phone-calls and our meetings are on the whole just like this one.
I'm done with the "difficult years" (1) that your contact with me characterizes. The years have never become better, they do not become better and will not become better, as our long history has shown me.
I have not responded to your efforts for contact, nor will I.
Dutch.
(1): She did write "very difficult years". Maybe I should use the full quote.
I've been NC with her for 18 months now. (with a few bumps. I think I only wrote her 9 months ago I would not come to her birthday party. And she showed up at my dad's birthday party where I swiftly left).
But she keeps begging for a talk and/or explanation and somehow I think I should tell her I will not answer.
I think the above draft is a good no-JADE note.
What do you all think?
Somehow to keep 'ignoring' her doesn't sit well with me.
And what do I have to lose with this, really? Either she keeps sending me mails (which she already does), and I can keep on ignoring them, or she'll stop.
:Idunno:
I'm in limbo over this.
damn i just wrote a long post and then lost the lot! :blink:
here is what i feel, in response to what you say. i will try to remember just what i wanted to say !
first, i am so sorry this is happening again, D/U. i am not surprised but i am sorry becos it's so triggering for you and so hard to deal with.
dramasis is trying so hard, isn't she? she is desperate to draw you back into the family dynamic, and to retrieve an important part of her narcissistic supply chain. i feel that her repeated harrassment (it is that, i think) is all to this end. her wish to 'talk about things', and 'sort things out' and her apparent willingness to 'acknowledge her faults', and her 'hurt feelings' are all techniques to manipulate you into feeling that you are the one who is being unreasonable/immature/cruel or whatever. she is using adult conflict resolution tools to guilt trip you into responding. i suspect if and when you do, she will use your response, even if it is to say 'i won't respond', as a platform to re-open discussion. what are the chances of her just accepting it, respecting your wishes and going away?
imo she is pressing some well worn and proven buttons here. you've already told her you won't be in contact with her. and why. is there any point going over it again, from your point of view? is the triggering you get from being harrassed greater than the damage you'd get from responding?
would you feel able to block her email address? or to relegate them to Spam so that you don't have to read them? seems to me reading them is causing you pain. so why do it?
i hope this is not too pushy. whatever you decide you know i support you anyway.
Well, thank you arpy1 for your advice.
Asking myself what button's she had pressed gave me a tough EF, more than one really. But I think I worked through it.
Things I realized:
- She will never stop, whatever I do. And this includes NC.
- Boundary busting is a sport pet peeve for her, so it's probably best NOT to give her a 'new' stated boundary she can bust. Possibly even it's best to keep this boundary 'to myself', so at least I will not be confronted with her also deliberately busting that boundary. I'm not sure about this 'mechanic' yet, but possibly I'll find it easier to cope with her *cough* unwittingly *cough* busting my NC, than spelling it out to her. She will not stop anyway. She has such a habit of no respect for any boundary (of many people, not just in my case), that it's really naive, if not dumb, to expect spelling it out to her will be of any help to me. Rather the contrary...
- After one and a half year she now brings up mom's jubilee. It's a trap. She knows damned well how she discarded me there, and how she (emotionally) blackmailed me in the run up to it. It has all been so deliberately and maliciously planned, I'm still sick of it (when in an EF). And now, after all that time where she has not been able to trick me into responding to her petty pleas for "wanting a good relationship with you, Dutch" she is now finally bringing up the jubilee, with all plausible deniability with it, pre-emptive excuses (fauxpologies in fact) so that if she woud trick me into spilling my gut out, she has apologized already. She can always 'fall back' on her lame and non-specific excuses, in case she doesn't have a ready answer already prepared to what she (in her mail) suggests might be some things I feel bad about.
- That same jubilee also made me go NC with DramaMama, so that adds to the stress, even if that has nothing to do with DramaSis.
- Bringing up dad, and her sneaky presence when I had arranged for a private meeting with dad. And so I get EF's to his horrible Enabling behavior, and triggers memories to how he never has had my back when I was being beaten up, physically and/or verbally/mentally, by bro, sis, or 'mom'. And I realized that he is as boundary busting as everybody else in the FOO. Boundaries have never been respected, not by anybody.
- Bringing up the "very difficult years" we have had, and bringing up the eternal difficult relationship she has with DramaMama makes perfectly clear that having permanent difficult relationships is what she does. Not having a difficult relationship, having difficult years is not something she is capable of doing apparently. And it does further prove that whatever the improvement might be be 'today', it will inevitably, deliberately even, revert back to getting "difficult years".
It's mindbogling, I cannot wrap my head around how a person can live that way, but she does. I've tried to ignore this fact so long now, that it's very hard to stop ignoring what I now see.
- and even some other stuff is all tied to this. I guess any boundary bust of whatever kind nowadays triggers all boundaries ever busted. Sometimes it's just so hard when the new knowledge I have gained over the past years on boundaries and abuse, trigger EF's and how for such a long period this has been past of the course in my relationships. With my FOO first and foremost, but also elsewhere.
I feel much calmer now, but it's been a * of a ride the last couple of days.
this is so hard, D/U. :'( sending you a hug and :thumbup: for all the wise, if painful insights that you have gleaned even from the flashbacking the last few days. i know it's so difficult to see it, but you get stronger and wiser each time you go through this. only hope i wasnt responsible for making it worse :fallingbricks: much support to you
Quote from: arpy1 on June 23, 2016, 09:33:05 AM
only hope i wasnt responsible for making it worse :fallingbricks: much support to you
No, it's hasn't been.
However painful and confrontational it is to look at my own 'buttons'/triggers, it's well worth-while, especially when dealing with types like the :dramaqueen: 's.
As the only way to learning to deal with them (as in: not dealing with them ;) ) is to
know the buttons that so hurt when pressed.
Your reply has been very helpful, even if it meant for me to re-visit the painful buttons. But hey, I could have left your advice for what it was. It was me who picked it up and did what I did.
So please don't feel bad about it. :hug:
:hug:
And positive news for a change. :cheer:
A letter from DramaMama. The first half is a bunch of :hoovering: , her usual tricks , doesn't know what she can to do get into contact, she doesn't know what's wrong :blahblahblah: . That part was dated early June.
Then she added something more recently.
That's where the good part is: "I could have never have imagined a child of mine [ !! dead give away. :yes: I'm hers. Oh dear, once the blinders come off, one gets to see it...] would ever want to have no contact with me. Still, that is what it is now. I will have to respect that " :blahblahblah: etc.
[ stuff in between brackets is mine ]
:yahoo:
Yeah, she'll probably rescind, but with a little luck she really has seen the light: no more Narc supply to be had from me. With a little luck she'll now whine to others about how she could have never imagined this would ever happen to her child.
Which is complete nonsense (and therefor possibly a trap to get me to respond, ghegheghe ;) ) as my DramaSis has gone NC with her for a year (decades ago), I previously have been NC for a year (one decade ago) her DiL (from DramaSis) has been NC with her already decades long...
So I feel pretty good about this. The first signs of her capitulating. I know this probably will not be the end of it, but it's cause for a small celebration today. :elephant:
edited to add, for my own benefit: this video I only saw the other day, but it fits so well this situation. The situation of te stubborn boundary-busting, and the stubborn "I don't know what's wrong by I'm going to accept (boohoohoo) my child doesn't want to have contact"...
The Narcissist Excessive Stubbornness Tactic (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE5IbjtS_X4)
That's great to hear, DU!
Well, I'm still a bit elated over my DramaTherapistMama's letter.
I try to get not too happy, as I know this will be far from over.
I don't know if I have ever shared this on this forum, but my 'mom' is capable of being full of understanding with "I hear you", "I understand", "I will respect this" and other 'magic spells' like that, and then in the very next sentence start again with what I had just told her i didn't want her to do. And what the 'magic spells' were supposed to address.
Since I started coming out of the FOG a few years back, I began to see and hear the ridiculousness of it, and called her out on it. With laughter I must add. The anger, the confusion, the FOG usually set in later, yet slowly but steadily my boundaries improved.
So, this will most likely be just one of those. It's her efforts to lull me into a false sense of security, only to strike back immediately after.
Like I said, this could happen in the very next sentence she uttered.
And there wasn't even a pause. Just right on after. In fact I should doubt it was even a next sentence, LOL.
Still, I feel good. It IS a first crack. I suspect (and silently hope) that I will now get the Silent Treatment from her.
She did write that she respected this, that I had every right to be the man that I am, but so had she to be every right to be the woman she is. Ergo: she is of the opinion she has handled everything wonderfully, and will continue to do just that.
And I know very well how boundary-busting she is, so this boundary that she supposedly acknowledges will be stormed again.
Oh well, I think I can wear her down, in time.
But a bloody nuisance it is, and will forever be. I can only hope the frequency will tone down, and perhaps the intensity as well, but it will not be over.
I mostly type this to let myself know I should not let my guard down.
I'm on to you DramaMama! Never again wil you surprise me. And I will not fall for your fake New Age Psychobabble Therapies. They have taught you how to say just the right words, the right magic spells to let others lower their guard so you could strike all the more destructively. It's p(r)etty disgusting really.
I received an invitation for a Birthdaybrunch by sis.
I send a "reply to all" (to sis, mom, dad, bro, bro's wife, and his two kids (a bit odd to send each member of bro's FOC' a separate invitation, no. I mean, his kids are teens...?)) :
I'm not coming,
[my first name]
Apart from the obvious hoover, and the 'let's pretend everything is fine', it's again at noon, which is an impossible time for practically each and all invitees. Me and bro would have to start traveling at 8 o'clock in the morning. Mom and dad around 9.
She knows this! Her wedding-brunch/party was at noon too, and I could only arrive at 12:30 at the earliest if I took the first train out. (which I did)
Oh well, I mostly post this as a matter of record for myself.
Why did I reply at all?
It's a small effort, and I reiterate the message to all of my FOO I will not be seeing DramaSis ever again, and things will not go back to the way they were.
And I reiterate the same message to myself as well this way.
A big thanks for all the support I already received in this loooong thread about the NC-hoovering.
I love you all.
:hug:
We love you back! :heythere:
love you, too. i'm so glad for you that your boundaries are so strong. that's great!
I have strong boundaries? Thank you.
It's hard work! Gut wrenching.
DramaMama is back. Just a few months ago I got a mail where she sort of acknowledged I had gone NC. (here (http://outofthefog.net/C-PTSD/forum/index.php?topic=2310.msg25131#msg25131)).
***posible triggers on life threatening conditions and anger issues of me***
Today I received a new mail of her, addressed to DramaSis, bro and me, that a friend of her has had a stroke, and is a "lost cause". This friend of hers is one of her 'disciples' as I like to call them nowadays. She met this friend in a mothers-who-find-it-o-so-difficult-to-accept-their-daughters-homosexuality-group my sis did with DramaMama (and friend's-daughter.) They have been best buddies ever since.
Apparently my mom was out camping, and the header says: "Going home".
Actually, this is a positive sign in some sense, as DramaMama used to mail me (us) everytime she went out camping with details on how to contact her in case of emergency.
So obviously she has ditched that, I'm of the e-mail list for that anymore. Yay! :cheer:
Which also is 'proof' this is a hoover. She needs to get the pity! Not mailing me about te good stuff (=holidays) is easy. To pass on the opportunity to be needy: not so much.
DramaMama writes she's "so upset, I want to be at home so much, staying at the camping site is not an option [ :dramaqueen: BooHooHoo!] and I'll go packing right now. [Yeah, RIGHT NOW, you all hear! I'm in misery now! :dramaqueen: ] Kisses [and you all better send some back! ], your mom. [Yep, you better know this is your MOM, mailing you. :heythere: Not just anybody! ]
I will not send her a word.
I'm almost happy I have got a reminder of what friendship means to my DramaMama a few days ago with the funeral of the-friend-who-dared-to-question.
I can't say I feel too proud about me writing all this, I feel a bit bad/guilty about the resentment to my DramaMama I express here, the lack of compassion I show her when a friend is about to die, etc. etc., but I've come too far in my recovery to not see this for what it is: a pity-party hoover, which in all likelihood (or dare I say: certainty?... Ehrmmm, no, I'm too chicken to say that) will only result (If I were to answer and show my compassion) in her dragging up ALL the hardship she and friend endured and how much support they have been able to give each other in the difficult period of working through accepting my sis being a lesbian. Which in the good tradition of a :dramaqueen: is of course still a sour spot, to be displayed like a stigma (DramaMama's stigma of course: way worse than the stigma homosexuals are confronted with...) 4 decades after my sister 'coming out'.
A sardonic part of me wants to write to her (I realize this very moment I'm typing this): "Happy pity-party mom! May the decision to take your friend off life support be a long and difficult one, and may you be witness of all the gut-wrenching agony your friend's family will be going through in that process, and don't forget to put your agony paramount to all when telling about it! Hang in there! I know you can do that!"
(I have had stories about that when other friends of her have died. Disgusting stories really, where it all was about her as well.)
Of course I won't, I'll stick to my NC, but possibly for my own recovery it's a good thing to acknowledge I have that sardonic part in me.
And give it all a rest.
Perhaps an opportunity to lay that part to rest, together with DramaMama's DramaFriend. (Who, like my mom (and lets not forget: my sister's 'mom'...) has probably never passed an opportunity to be still 'upset' about her daughters homosexuality, and all the rest of her being her.)
*** end of triggers ***
It never stops, now does it...
Good Grief... :thumbdown:
hey, dutch uncle,
i've noticed in quite a few of your posts you talk about the inner critic. may i suggest that it's your inner critic making you feel bad/guilty about this? about how you feel? conversely, about how you don't feel re: her troubles? i think your feelings are valid - they are simply part of who you are and where you are, and don't need to be judged.
i applaud you on continuing you nc, and on resisting the hoovering. not always easy, either in choice or action. and, i'm also glad that you have a safe and healthy place where you can put those random thoughts and feelings, instead of sending them out and inviting a disruptive and unhealthy re-connection. nicely done!
***trigger warning: this is a rant***
Quote from: sanmagic7 on September 03, 2016, 03:25:55 PM
i've noticed in quite a few of your posts you talk about the inner critic. may i suggest that it's your inner critic making you feel bad/guilty about this?
Yes, it should be, no? And as far as I now have come to understand, and cognitively comprehend, the Inner Critic is the Internalized voice of the abuse(r). No?
So it's my DramaMama who's the Inner Critic in this case. And this Drama *) is hers. Not mine. Though the Inner Critic/Her is pulling all my string/pushing all the buttons to press me into making it mine.
Says my cognition.
Which fits with how I feel about it, by the way.
Quoteconversely, about how you don't feel re: her troubles?
Personally, I couldn't care less, to be honest, to use that offensive line.
I don't know her terminal friend. I've met her twice or so, many decades ago. I can't exactly remember when, but I think I was still living in the parental house. Which would make sense, as the whole
OMG-my-daughter-is-gay happened when sis had left home a year or so (possibly even less), which would make me 12, and fully a child still at that time (yet my memories are still very vivid about it all). So that drama lasted for may years (if it not lasts up to now that is) so that gives me seven years to meet my mom's
DramaTwin. And not having seen her since. Or perhaps once or twice more in passing at some social occasion (a jubilee of mom or wedding anniversary of (since divorced) mom and dad).
*) what is the Drama? What I really DO feel is that I'm being dragged into the perpetual Drama, and by me posting on this she has actually succeeded in doing so.
So I do feel it as a
task, for lack of a better term, to renounce the task given to me today by her/the Inner Critic.
And to cognitively say to me: You are not a dis-compassionate man, Dutch, by reacting the way you do. It's not compassion or empathy that is required of me here, but submission and feeding mom's
need. To be the emotional crutch of her.
And I must say, this all is enmeshed with DramaSis as well, who sort of is the origin of this whole enmeshment of DramaMama with her DramaTwin (i.e. this friend and sis' fellow 'lesbian-daughter-of' (through no fault of DramaSis I want to add) who has for over two decades has told me again and again: "You never take into account anybody else, you only care about you."
Well, i'll say here and now, in this very post: I have been made to "take into account" my sis's lesbianism, my mom's internal struggle with it, my mom & sis mutual struggle because of this, mom's DramaTwin and daughters struggle with it all, since the age of 12, a child still, all through my adolescence that followed years later, up to this day.
I have been made to care for DramaMama, DramaSis, DramaTwin and AdoptedDramaTwinSister and somehow feed te needs of ALL OF THEM SIMULTANEOUSLY.
And each and everyone of them (though DramaTwin and her daughter can effectively be scrapped from the equation as they are a mere sideshow in this, not active participants) have for decades put me in between them, gave me loyalty tests time and again, and being neutral in all this (i.e. just being myself and NOT having a problem with
their problem) has only earned me life-long scorn, rebuke, resentment and revenge from both of them.
Dare I say it? Yes I dare: I hate it my sister is a lesbian. For I have been put on the battlefield as a pawn since I was a child of 12 years old. By both of them. They are equally culpable for it.
And I know that by having gone NC with both of them is the only way to detach myself fro the Drama they perpetuate.
I have to fulfill both the needs of DramaMama and DramaSis at the same time.
And for what? Because someone loves someone of the same gender. What a non-issue. IMHO.
A no-win proposition.
***end of triggers***
Quotei think your feelings are valid - they are simply part of who you are and where you are, and don't need to be judged
Thank you. :cheer:
quite twisted and convoluted, all over the place! talk about crazy-making! i'm just glad you've been able to pull yourself out of it, even when they're attempting to pull you back in. well done!
I feel pretty good this morning.
Thank heavens for having this place to share, I used to have to keep all this madness inside.
Wow. DramaMama showed up at my door. She managed to get in with a chat trick that she had to go to the toilet. Hesitant I agreed under condition she would leave immediately after that.
Of course she didn't.
I called the cops, LOL.
Currently I'm waiting for them to show up. I will press charges. (for what it's worth)
She has left after I hung up on the 911-call (normal police-line was busy)
I'll be back after the cops have been here.
Good grief. But I feel good.
I stuck up for my boundaries! :cheer:
:cheer: Maybe she'll get it, now. :D
OK. So this will be a double post with the previous.
Cops are busy, called me back to check. All is OK, since she has left.
I will press charges tomorrow.
My mom protested heavily I used the term chat trick while talking to the cops. LOL. "It wasn't a chat trick! I really had to pee!". "Then why are you not leaving!", I shouted, "that's why it's a chat trick!"
Talking about presence of mind, from my side.
And plausible deniability from hers.
A couple of times she tried to have an argument, and I struggled not to get drawn into it. She really knows how to press my buttons. She had some crappy presents for me (socks, is what I saw at the top of the plastic bag) and when she tried to hand them over to me (after her toilet visit) I found myself kicking the bag! "Out, out OUT!" I shouted. I tried to push her out of my home, and it became a struggle. She resisted with all her might. Which then gave me the luminous idea to call the cops. Yay for self-restraint, even when one looses it.
I was clearly loosing it... almost too far.
There was the expected whining that "this can't go on" ("Yes it can, I feel fine with it" was my reply), "I am your mother!" (note: not "you are my son". Being OOTF is such a blessing) to which I even managed to say "Well, sort off only, you are my therapist." BAM! There, I've said it. Whine, whine, :dramaqueen: from her: "I'm sorry for that, and I see how much pain I have caused you" ("and I 'd like to do that some more, please let me in again" is of course the (not so) secret (anymore) message behind it).
While I was on the phone (her downstairs at my door, me sitting on the staircase leading up to my floor) she tried to distract me with sentences like "this is the best I can do" "I'm only doing the best I can" etc., which I let pass as I was trying to get a cop on the phone, or was actually talking to a cop.
She wanted to know "why", to which I said nothing more than "read our last e-mail exchange, it's all there" (this is the infamous exchange where she blamed me for her forgetting to tell me her Jubileeeeee had been moved to another date, and she "knew how that came about" (the forgetting) as I had "offended" her there months earlier. Such a blatant blame-shifting tactic was even too much for my well ingrained denial and servitude, and both surrendered to the truth.)
She tried the "I don't have them anymore trick, to which I replied: "Too bad". She wanted me to resend them ("No").
At some point I also managed to get out that what she was doing right now (chatting her way in and then not leaving) was exactly the problem (a veiled attempt to tell her she is a professional boundary-buster. Probably best to keep it veiled as well. For any normal person it would not be veiled in the first place, it's her blindness to obfuscates her vision. SHE is wearing the veil after all, although that's probably a scam: she has 20/20 vision pretending to be blind.) And the therapeutic-New Age-psychoballe of her "wanting to see and hear you" popped up as well.
So I expect lots of :hoovering: over the next days and weeks, not in the least since DramaSis' birthday party is coming this weekend, so she and sis will have excellent opportunity to play the pity-party together to LC-bro and enabler-dad.
Quite probably this effort of DramaMama was more inspired by being able to poke sis' eyes out she had "such a good talk with Dutch" and shame DramaSis in the proces of her own party.
Good grief, is it sick to think like that or is it sick I don't even invent this stuff, but only imagine this because it has happened so often... That's a rhetorical question of course. Two uHPD's... (I should come up with a joke someday: Two HPD's are standing on X. Says one HPD to the other:" :bawl:" to which the other HPD replies " :dramaqueen:".
But I digress :excited: )
Good thing is I've made such progress the last week(s), that my house was actually presentable. Not that she did see much, but I had been a mess just a few days earlier.
I've survived one more! :yahoo: The tests get harder every time, but I'm getting stronger faster then they can get creepier. ;D
edited to add: I went to the police station to press charges. I have an appointment to do so on the 2nd of October :roll: . The two female officers behind the desk (whom I spoke to separately) did look at me funny. The first one had to giggle when I told her DramaMama had used a chat trick to get in (she of course had to ask if I had asked my mother to leave, to which I reiterated she wasn't even allowed in except for her chat trick about needing a pee) but quickly regained her composure by immediately following up with "that's not funny". "No, it isn't", I said. When I told the second one I had been wrestling with my 'mom' to get her out of my house before I called the police she said "Ahhh..." out of pity for 'mom' of course. "Yeah! 'Ahhh...' for me!", I responded. That shut her up allright.
I had hoped I could press charges today and tomorrow she would get a nice visit by the cops to tell her not to anything like that again, as she would be in serious trouble. Now it'll take two weeks. Oh well...
Quote from: Three Roses on September 22, 2016, 04:45:15 PM
:cheer: Maybe she'll get it, now. :D
Yeah... (bolding mine) ;)
I got an e-mail from her: "You said I had been your therapist, and that's true. That never should have happened. I'm sorry.
Your mother."
:hoovering:
I feel OK about having told her that though, as it's one of the (many) prime reasons why I'm NC. And as I've said elsewhere here (primarily in my recovery journal): "Mrs. Therapist, you're fired!"
Too bad that she, as an adult, has made the choice to forfeit her role as mother in favor of her narcissistic ambitions as a therapist. And imposed it on her small child(ren). (Un?)fortunately I now know it's up to me to (re-)parent, (re-)mother myself, and that her opportunity obligation to do so has now long passed and that in no way her neglect can be undone.
She'll probably try to leverage this to try and hoover me into "let's do our best to now get the mother-son relationship we never had", but that's futile if not outright dangerous for me to expose me to the never ending narcissistic abuse.
There has never been a secure bonding between her and me, a secure bonding only she could have provided at my age at the time.
And given her "breach of homely peace" (as Tresspass to land (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_land) is named in Dutch) using a chat or confidence trick yesterday only fortifies my conviction and knowledge I'll never be even remotely secure or safe with her.
I will press charges for trespassing. I'm not even going for "stalking". This is worse than stalking.
Dutch, i have been catching up. Im so sorry you have been going through all of this.
How are you doing?
May be triggers...
Im wondering if you have any support in real life? Im really concerned reading your posts for your safety and your emotional well being.
We are all here for you on the forum.
Firstly, you must of had to pluck up a lot of courage...and or you must have been really angry...to go to the police- i know it was necessary for your safety and your own boundaries and I'm glad you did it.
Im sorry to hear that that woman laughed. She obviously didnt understand...and I'm proud of you for standing up for your boundaries.
Quote
Too bad that she, as an adult, has made the choice to forfeit her role as mother in favor of her narcissistic ambitions as a therapist. And imposed it on her small child(ren). (Un?)fortunately I now know it's up to me to (re-)parent, (re-)mother myself, and that her opportunity obligation to do so has now long passed and that in no way her neglect can be undone.
It is unfortunate that its now up to you to reparent and re-mother yourself. You never asked for this. I know how it feels when it is just too late for them. It imagine it is hard...having her trying to come back in, when she was never there *as a mother* before.
I don't know if you feel this way, but i know its quite normal, when something has come to and end..ie. a relationship to just want that person to leave you alone. Especially if you want more from a person who can not give it.
I think Dutch, that if you don't feel safe with her, then maybe that is worth listening to. I know its hard.
If you look at her actions, and maybe if you can bear it, if you look at them after some time has passed- for a little more clarity, maybe make a list if you havent...if your feel that will help of course, it might help you to logically see her behaviour for what it is.
I know that emotions can come into play and things can get scrambled in our heads.
It sounds really scary what happened to you. I hope you are safe, and...it would be great if you felt safe too. I hope you can take care of yourself and just...that you take it easy. :hug:
Thank you.
It's hard to feel safe around her, as was proven again two days ago. The fact I actually got overtly aggressive (kicking the 'gift'-bag and pushing her out) does and did show to me how unsafe I was. Not only felt, but actually was. Also the fact she stayed until I actually finished the call with the police shows how big her lack of boundaries is. While I was on the phone she actually debated she had not used a chat trick as she had actually went to the toilet. As if that matters! What matters is she didn't leave, as I had put as a condition to use the toilet in the first place. I will make sure that gets in the report I'm filing: She wasn't allowed in in the first place, after which she pulled the chat trick of needing to pee urgently. (I know she has a 'weak bladder' from having given childbirth, a condition not uncommon,)
I bet she would have loved to wrest my phone from her hands and start an argument with the officer on the other side of the line! Good thing I was literally holding the high ground, sitting on top of the stairs. ;D
I know that in/with my FOO I will never be safe. Too many narcs and enablers.
I hope law-enforcement will be able to help me out to some degree. But an element of risk will always be there. Physically only my sister is a real threat (as she is a martial arts trainer), but she has not been physically abusive to me since I was a child, and then it was only very sparse (she took it out on bro). It was my bro who was the culprit there and then for me, in combination with dad.
In a sense I hope this story will 'leak', as then also DramaSis knows she can't pull the same stunt as DramaMama did.
Hey Dutch
It definitely sounds like you are not safe.
May be denial and gas slighting from your mother. -debating she used a chat trick-
Dutch, is this a narcissist term-chat trick? I have to say -I do find the word amusing (in a good way)
And yes-I agree -she should have left. You are meant to listen to your children!
If she is not allowed on to yours on the first lace -it brings up the question- why was she there? -
Unless to speak to you outside.
I'm sorry that you bring kind and letting her in to pee backfired.
I know it sucks and o dont know where you are on your healing, I'm just thinking that this including your own anger, may be a source of validation and proof for you that your mothers behaviour and your feelings go about it are valid and real.
I wish you all luck possible with law enforcement and I hope your sis doesn't try anything,
I am glad you think you are safe physically- I hope they don't physically cross your boundeies again...then hopefully you can start to feel emotionally more safe instead of living in what I guessing is fear and hypervigelancr.
Ive only just joined the site and have been reading many posts.
So much resonates, phrases used, im glad you are in contact with your anger, i wasnt able to.
All this * , guilt, manipulation
All power to you
Thank you Hazy111. It's unfortunate this stuff resonates with you. A :hug: for that.
Quote from: Sienna on September 24, 2016, 08:05:45 PM
May be denial and gas slighting from your mother. -debating she used a chat trick-
Dutch, is this a narcissist term-chat trick? I have to say -I do find the word amusing (in a good way)
I don't know. They lie a lot. Con-artists. It's a red flag for sure.
QuoteIf she is not allowed on to yours on the first lace -it brings up the question- why was she there? -
Unless to speak to you outside.
Right. She wasn't there to speak to me, no matter where. She was there to get INTO my house, and shred me to pieces on
home ground. Literally. If she would have succeeded, the more devastating the effect would have been. She has used that trick before, always successfully until 3,5 years ago, when it was only partially successful. I'm not sure, but I think she's been never been in since that one. I arranged to meet her in-town since.
Quotehopefully you can start to feel emotionally more safe instead of living in what I guessing is fear and hypervigelance.
Thanks. It will probably take a while more, but I'm already feeling more safe. Having asked for police protection is for me a sign I'm getting aware safety is an actual achievable goal. Before this I thought Freezing or Fawning were the only options I had. Now I've added Fight. With her Fleeing the scene. ;D
Quote
Right. She wasn't there to speak to me, no matter where. She was there to get INTO my house, and shred me to pieces on home ground. Literally. If she would have succeeded, the more devastating the effect would have been. She has used that trick before, always successfully until 3,5 years ago, when it was only partially successful. I'm not sure, but I think she's been never been in since that one. I arranged to meet her in-town since.
I understand. From what you told me yesterday about your views /knowlege on my X's behavour- maybe the same applies here.
Good thing i think to meet her else where.
Oh yes, it will take some time to feel safer, there is the possibility that it could happen again.
Quotepolice protection is for me a sign I'm getting aware safety is an actual achievable goal. Before this I thought Freezing or Fawning were the only options I had. Now I've added Fight. With her Fleeing the scene. ;D
;D Yes, I do hope you get what you need from the help of the police - i hope they help basically, as you should have that help as you've asked for it and obviously need it.
I like what you did with the ending there. haha.
oh, and ps.- sorry Dutch about my spellings - so bad! in the last post. auto correct perhaps.
Quote from: Sienna on September 28, 2016, 01:46:22 PM
From what you told me yesterday about your views /knowlege on my X's behavour- maybe the same applies here.
I think so, yes.
QuoteYes, I do hope you get what you need from the help of the police - i hope they help basically, as you should have that help as you've asked for it and obviously need it.
I think I gained two things with this already:
1) I will now call the police much quicker, I think. I've now crossed that bridge once, the second time will be easier.
2) She will not get in again with a trick. I have already a mental image of her peeing in her pants, knocking at the neighbors etc. I'm past caring for that. If she is going to up the ante with fainting or a heart-attack or god-knows-what: I'll close the door and phone the emergency services. I don't know how to do first-aid anyway.
QuoteI like what you did with the ending there. haha.
I had a spark of creativity there. Glad you liked it. It made me smile too.
Hey Duch, I know it can be hard to tell whats what when your in it.
QuoteFrom what you told me yesterday about your views /knowlege on my X's behavour- maybe the same applies here.
I think so, yes.
Quote1) I will now call the police much quicker, I think. I've now crossed that bridge once, the second time will be easier.
2) She will not get in again with a trick. I have already a mental image of her peeing in her pants, knocking at the neighbors etc. I'm past caring for that. If she is going to up the ante with fainting or a heart-attack or god-knows-what: I'll close the door and phone the emergency services. I don't know how to do first-aid anyway.
Dutch i think you are doing the right thing by calling the emergency services if it happens again.
You are so kind to want to let her in to pee, - i would not let her in next time either if she is going to behave the way she does and did the last time.
You have rights as a human being, as a Dutch Uncle, to not be treated that way, so if she cant gratefully accept that you let her in to pee- you - thinking about her feelings-
then i would personally, forget letting her in.
On the videos about how to deal with narcs-they say you may know- that if the narc has or threatens an emergency- just call the emergency services.
And, I'm glad you will call the police quicker.
I realise i know understand exactly what a chat trick means! when you said trick- simple isn't it but i wasnt entirely sure...a trick via chatting to get in.
QuoteI had a spark of creativity there. Glad you liked it. It made me smile too.
;D Im glad it made you smile for a brief while :hug: