Over It

[tea-the-artist]

A handful of days before christmas I called mom to update her on a medical situation I was dealing with. Felt distant and just neutral with her, but then we started getting into old trauma again and "when are we going to see you again? we don't want this to carry over into the new year." Lately my temper and patience with her has been very difficult to deal with leading to this call, and I repeatedly have found that they still do not understand why I moved. And that all of their "reflection and talking" they've done together seems to center around how they felt hurt by me moving out without telling them.

Days later after therapy session, dad calls (despite my boundary of "Don't call unless it's an emergency") and the conversation turns south pretty quickly. Picking at me again about why I cut my hair (the last official last straw for me before moving out), why I hold grudges despite his empty apology. I told him he wouldn't even take responsibility for what he's done and said to me like (tw ableism, self harm) when he called me a psycho for crying horribly and pulling at my hair when I was sent home by a counselor who thought I was cutting my wrists. I was not and never had been, but was definitely dealing with huge stress) and he responded "responsibility for what?!" and I lost it. Can't remember much else about the call except that I hung up on him.

The attempts to reach some sort of understanding and potentially build a relationship with my family of origin is tiring me out. I've set boundaries about bringing up the past, knowing that I shouldn't have to recount the worst in order to have worth and for them to understand and recognize my pain. But mom has broken that numerous times, and I've only spoken to dad twice in the last 3 years on the phone, both times in the last 5 months.

I don't think it's worth it anymore. Little One (IC) really wants some connection, and I'm trying to build that for myself, but she still bears the pain of neglect and wanting to feel loved by her parents. 17 (IC, teen) very much feels the anger, and I feel tired from both perspectives. I don't know if I will ever not cry over feeling unloved by my family of origin. And I don't know when I will fully feel loved by my found family I wish they would just leave me alone, but I have decided to take a break from the very minimal low contacting them. Therapist suggested inviting mom to a session, but that was right before the call with dad. We'll see. 

[Armee]

I would be over it, too. 

It sounds very much like they want you to admit you and you alone are the one who is wrong and for you to change. They seem very uninterested in hearing you and changing. That's hurtful and frustrating.  They also don't sound interested in respecting your boundaries.

[woodsgnome]

From this distance, it seems as if you've been the one willing to have been open, and then they've closed up from their end. Owing someone only out of someone's (even one's own Inner Critic) hinting that you 'should' be a certain way or always do more ... it just makes everything seem petty.

There's genuine hurt, you've tried to indicate that, and yet their response is only the conditioned sort that seems too common.

The only thing that ever worked for me was to honour the boundaries I felt I needed to effectively start healing. That you had the courage to do what you felt needed doing, seems to need no further explanation from you.

I feel bad that this has happened this way, but I laud you for having set the boundaries you felt you needed, and seem intent on abiding by them. It's hard, but you did well to listen to your heart. 

[Blueberry]

Hello tea,

It's good to see you again though I'm sorry about the reason.

What you write about how FOO acts towards you sounds very familiar. I understand that you feel over it, I would too and/or have felt similar.

[Kizzie]

I can relate to how you're feeling Tea, it is such a grievous loss for you and for all of us whose parents wouldn't or couldn't love and care for us the way we deserved. It's just sad and painful all around.

If it helps I found the pain did become manageable talking about it here, in therapy, etc., acknowledging the loss and grieving it, allowing myself to be angry and not stuffing it down or pretending it didn't matter. I also distanced myself from them which made a big difference.  The biggest help was coming to understand the why; that it wasn't me, it was them and that I couldn't build a relationship with them, they just weren't able to.

FWIW it seems like you are moving toward doing what is healthiest for you and your parts but I know how hard and tiring that can be. 

[tea-the-artist]

thanks yall for the supportive words (good to hear from you blueberry!)  it's been such a heavy task of keeping boundaries with them. i do wish they would leave me alone, but there's a guilt response from me at the words M would say ("we're not so young anymore"), but more processing in therapy is the plan for now like you said kizzie. I've made a promise to myself to take a break from contacting M until I'm ready to approach the subject of her joining a session, but I think that will be the last effort. my last effort with F was me hanging up on him.

armee and woodsgnome, yep they definitely don't want to hear any of it. they've pretended to hear me out back in august, the first time talking with F since moving in '18, but clearly no self reflection of their actions has been done. While my mantra of "This is not going to get better or change if we keep doing this" helped me move out, soon I will have to close the chapter of "getting through to them."