Sliding Doors

Has anyone seen the film Sliding Doors? I watched it when I was about 11 years old for the first time, I remember this clearly because there was a sex scene in it and I was watching it with my Nan and remember feeling extremely awkward!

The general concept of the film is about how life can go in different directions.  It begins with a story line of what happens when a character DOES make the train, and another storyline where the character DOES NOT catch the train.  From that point, their life goes in two different directions.

I have been thinking about this film today because I find myself wondering a lot these last few days how my life could have gone.  Not so much in general terms but specifically around the events with my mother and her NPD.  What would have happened if I had stayed the Golden Child and remained enmeshed with her – what would my life look like right now?

I’ve been reflecting on my life a lot since writing the Goodbye Mother letter and today I was thinking how the first 18 years or so my mother fell into the category of “Ignoring Narcissistic Mother” but when I became 18 and old enough to drink and smoke and go to clubs and date men and share clothes with her, idolise her… she fitted better in the category of “Engulfing Narcissistic Mother” – this is the stage where the control and enmeshment began.

Now what would have happened if I hadn’t met my current fiancé and started therapy? Would I still be enmeshed with her? Would I be a narcissist myself by now? Maybe I would have met another man but not started therapy and therefore never realised the dynamic I was in! Perhaps I would have met a narcissistic man or more of the same type I used to meet, emotionally unavailable.  Perhaps I would have spent my entire life trying to fix them and have the happy ending I never got with my mother.  It’s a sad thought.

The “storyline” I find myself in now is one where I am playing the starring role of “Narcissistic Mother’s Scapegoat”. I am not only her scapegoat mind, but also my sister’s who is playing the lead role of “Golden Child” and, not only that but I think potentially “Narcissistic Golden Child”.

There are basically two roles you can play when you have a mother as narcissistic as mine.  The Scapegoat or the Golden Child (you could also be a lost child but there is only two of us).  The perks of being the Golden Child are that you have the narcissistic mother’s protection.  She will agree with you (in public at least), she will tell you that you are “just like her” and if she is anything like my own mother, tell you that you are in fact a “mini me”. Now considering how much she thinks of herself, this is meant as the highest type of compliment. The downside to being the GC is that you are not allowed to be your true, authentic self, have your own (differing) opinions on things or allowed to say no or argue with her.  You are no longer a different person, a person with differing interests, hobbies, thoughts etc – you are enmeshed and an extension of the narcissist.  Also just because you are picked as GC doesn’t mean you are no longer abused in any way, you still are, it is just much more subtle and hard to detect.  In my case when I was GC my mother would regularly tell me how I needed to lose weight or change my hair, do my make up differently, shop in different shops and become more fashionable – but she would tell you that she loved you and this was all for your benefit! She just wanted you to make the best of yourself!

The downsides to being the Scapegoat are many: The narcissist and whoever her enablers are, perhaps siblings or step-parents project anything and everything negative onto you.  YOU are the sole cause of anything bad in the family or in life generally.  You are trouble, evil, mentally unstable.  It is VERY hard to have a strong enough sense of self/self-esteem to not start to feel guilty about all this crap that you are told repeatedly is your fault.  There is the gaslighting, the narcissistic family will make you doubt yourself and your memories and version of events.  At some stage you do think to yourself, “shit, they can’t all be wrong can they?”.  You start to think that if ALL of them have one story and you have a different story… well, maybe it is you after all? That is tough.  The gaslighting is the stage I’m at right now.  Apparently this is really stereotypical for a narcissist when confronted but my mother (and sister) are telling me that I “have gone fucking crazy”, am “brainwashed” and that they are not sure “what is going on in my head right now”.  Gaslighting at it’s finest.   This causes cognitive dissonance.. BIG TIME.

There is inevitably the fear element as well.  I struggled with this BIG TIME.  The fear and the guilt were definitely my biggest struggles.  There is also something really hard about admitting that you, adult you, is scared of your parent.  I DID NOT want to admit that I was scared of her, of what she would say, what she would do, of upsetting her.  What would the consequences me? How would she punish me? It was all very illogical but the fear was real.

And lastly, the worst one for me at present – you are isolated and ostracised from anyone that enables the narcissist or is scared of them or perhaps equally as abusive as them.  I currently find myself watching to see which member of my family is next to be “disappointed” with me or cut me off. Narcissists cannot and do not accept people disagreeing with them. That truly is the ultimate betrayal to them.  You are on their side (yes pathetic) or you are against them and that is that.  You will be shocked at the amount of people who “side” with the narcissist, even ones that know stories or have seen evidence of their abuse in the past.  It is shockingly shit and nothing can prepare you for it.  My sister was my mother’s scapegoat for years until we swapped places and she used to suffer with depression because of it – yet she is very happy abusing me right now and ganging up with my narcissistic mother against me.

That is a long and bleak list of downsides to being a scapegoat I know but what about the perks?

Anyone who finds themselves in the role of the scapegoat will be naturally empathetic and sensitive.  The fact that they find themselves in that role shows that they are a truth-seeker and more importantly, I think, they have somehow held on to their authentic true self and believe me that is not an easy thing to do against a narcissist and her army.  But the clear winner here has to be the pure fact that the scapegoat escapes the dysfunctional family – they ESCAPE!! They get away from playing roles and being gaslighted or projected onto.  They escape the FOG – the fear, obligation and guilt.  They no longer have to be on guard or put on a mask, a fake self to try to stay safe around the narcissistic/dysfunctional family.  They can heal and finally be validated for all of their struggles and pain.  They can have a kind and empathic witness emotionally hold them as they navigate their way through all the grief and pain and begin to heal from the years of abuse.

I saw a meme today which said it should be called the “Escape Goat” rather than the “Scapegoat” which I think is perfect.

Anyway, I feel at peace today for all of the reasons above and other reasons which I find harder to articulate that I would never wish to swap roles and be the GC again. Never.  Being the Scapegoat is emotionally very difficult, it can be extremely lonely and draining but I honestly felt like something was missing from my life until quite recently – I spent my life unconsciously desperate for approval, for affection and to be told that I was good enough.  I was always trying to fill the painful mother hole/wound that was still raw as hell and now, all of a sudden, I am seeing things differently.  Now I am truly seeing and believing fully that it wasn’t ever me or my fault.  She has a personality disorder.  I was not too sensitive, too needy, pathetic, boring, stupid, fat, brainwashed or evil.

This sounds a bit egotistical but I feel like I must have more strength than I’ve ever given myself credit for or was even aware of myself.  I have (thanks to T) been able to fight against her abuse, lies and punishment.

I feel lucky in a strange way, not lucky that I had to go through any of it of course and I do still grieve for the fantasy mother and probably will for a long time, but my life could have gone the other way, like in Sliding Doors – I could have never got away.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Golden Child In Therapy

How did I, an ex Golden Child end up in therapy… and how did I end up a Scapegoat?

I guess the answer to that is in the question itself isn’t it?  I ended up a scapegoat BECAUSE I ended up in therapy.  What I am actually thinking about is the fact that it is much more common for the scapegoated child of a narcissist to end up leaving the dysfunction and toxic mother than the golden child and yet I was the GC so how did it happen?

I guess it mainly came about because my romantic relationships were dreadful.  I was constantly in relationships. One after the other, literally.  Right from a child on the playground I was on the look-out for a boyfriend.  I guess I copied my mother like all kids do.

I picked the wrong men.  As in, for me.  Looking back I can see that I was picking the commitment phobic men, the avoidantly attached ones which for someone like me who has an anxious attachment style is a match made in hell, not heaven.  Those men kept me constantly triggered and anxious. I never felt secure and relaxed because even when things were going well, it was just a matter of time before it all fell apart. I was constantly fearing abandonment and in many cases, I was right to.  Or perhaps I pushed them away with my “neediness” I don’t know.

Because of my insecurity, anxiety and neediness in these relationships, I thought that there was clearly something very wrong with me and that I needed help.  I wanted to be fixed so that I wasn’t such a nightmare girlfriend and I wanted to feel like everybody else seemed to feel, calm and relaxed in their relationships and not a ball of nerves and so I took myself off to therapy.

I won’t go into what happened with me leaving and coming back and quitting and starting again here as that is for another post but I soon found out that T thought my mother suffered from Narcissistic Personality Disorder and all of a sudden my cares about being insecure in relationships took a back seat.  I had no idea then what attachment styles were, what mine was or what relevance that all had on me and my life.

SO that is how this ex-Golden Child came into therapy whilst my sister, the ex-scapegoat didn’t despite hating her family life and being very often seriously depressed.  And now, because of what I have learnt about the dysfunction of my enmeshment with my controlling mother, I began to pull away emotionally at first, and then physically and as you know, we are now not speaking at all.  My sister is now Golden Child, she is living my old role becoming more and more enmeshed with my mother and I am the scapegoat watching from a distance.

Mental.  I almost want to say thanks to all of the avoidantly attached men that I dated, for our disastrous relationships and for getting me to therapy, else I would have never got away from it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thoughts, Feelings & General pondering

Hi guys. It’s Saturday evening here, just gone 7pm as I sit to type this.  My fiancé is currently taking the kids back to their mum and I am finally sat on the sofa with a clean, tidy house and the only sound I can hear other than my typing, is the dishwasher. Heaven.

This morning we went to view a house.  The house is in a location that is new to me and I was pretty certain before we even left that it wasn’t “the one”.  On paper it was lovely, it had 4 bedrooms, an en-suite, a garage and it was close to the train station, shops, supermarket and gym.  What more could you want, right? BUT it is also MUCH further away from T (more on that later).  Anyway, when we got there, the house from the outside was pretty amazing. It looked like a house I would imagine rich people living in and let’s be honest, who doesn’t want a bit of that? LOL.  Inside the house was nice! It was big, lots of space, it had a utility room where I could do the washing and ironing and keep the hamster etc  and it had 3(!) toilets.  A downstairs toilet off of the utility room, the family bathroom and then the en-suite.  I have ALWAYS wanted an en-suite, always but even more since becoming a stepmum.  Showering at the weekend is a nightmare here and sometimes I really do crave just ten minutes of peace and quiet whilst getting ready so an en-suite would be lovely.

Anyway, cutting a long story short, 2 of the kids and myself loved the house.  One of the kids, the eldest boy who is nearly 16 was visibly miserable and said he hated it. I could feel my back go up.  “What is there to hate?” I said.  He simply shrugged and walked off head hanging low. Grrrr.. this annoyed me because without sounding cruel, the kids are only with us at weekends, we have to live there every day of the week, it’s us that have to pay the rent and bills and us that need to find a house big enough for them to have bedrooms that sit empty most of the week (slight bug bare of mine – can you tell).  We also have to make sure we live in an area close enough to them for pick ups and drop offs etc, not to mention near a train station so we can commute to the City for work.

Later at home, I got even more annoyed as I overheard my fiancé and said eldest boyo discussing the house and heard my fiancé saying that it was only the first house we had seen, that yes, it did have a lot of windows and the garage wasn’t quite what he wanted (the GARAGE???).  He then added that he had seen another house that HE would go and look at in the week. Cue me being pretty damn pissed off.  A while later I sent him some Whatsapps to this effect and he apologised.  We haven’t discussed the house yet, I am sure we will when he gets back, but without even having the discussion I know the house has been vito’d.

On a more positive note, we have a viewing Monday evening for another house in the same area that also has a garage and an en-suite so we shall see.

Now about the area.  Currently I drive about 20 minutes to T’s and it only takes me about 15 on the way home as it is late and everyone’s home from work by then.  According to Google Maps on my phone, the new house to T’s is a 30 minute drive using the fastest route, or a 33/34 minute drive going other ways.  It is all on busy dual carriageways and I would have to… “merge” agghhhhh.  Okay, so in theory it is only 10 minutes more driving and really that isn’t the end of the world is it? But that is now, at nearly 7.30pm on a Saturday.  The journey in rush hour on therapy day says 35-55 minutes, depending on traffic.  Eugh.

I won’t lie, it is more about my nerves than the time it would take. I am not the most confident driver and I only passed my test in September of 2016 so have only been driving just over a year.  Enough excuses yet?  On the flip side, I keep thinking, I would learn.  It would get less scary and could potentially make me a much more confident driver, that now I can drive, I shouldn’t limit myself to just local roads and short trips because well, what’s the point in having the freedom of being able to drive?

I have thought about this a lot recently because the first 6-9 months after passing my test, I was very keen to drive everywhere. I wanted to drive to loads of places, no matter how far away and then something changed and I don’t know what because I haven’t had an accident (touch wood), but I lost my confidence and now I find myself dreading driving anywhere or doing what I used to do when I first passed and planning the route in my head, visualising it before I would attempt to go anywhere.  Why?? I have no idea.

Mother/Sister

Moving on from the house move, my Facebook “reactivated” itself at some point, I don’t know when but my aunty text me to say she had seen my page back up this morning.  I went on there to close it back down but found myself snooping on my mother’s and sister’s pages before I did.  I saw that last night there was a party for a family friend and that everyone had gone.  When I say “everyone” what I mean is, my mother, stepdad, sister, her boyfriend and then the aunty, uncle, cousin and her husband who all think I am a “loose cannon”.  Unfortunately they were all there 3 years ago for Part 1 of confront mother on her shit parenting skills. It got very messy and needless to say, I was made to look like the bad guy and my mother the innocent victim.

The thing I noticed more than anything else was that my sister was there. My sister never used to spend any time with the family like this, especially at parties etc but recently my sister is constantly with my mother and whoever else living it up.  I hate this.  I hate it for several reasons. I hate it because it isn’t who my sister is and she has changed, I hate it because I admit I feel a bit jealous and left out – not from my mother or anyone but I haven’t seen my sister since I fell out with my mother and despite a million attempts at seeing her, she either doesn’t reply or cancels on me last-minute, just as she did 3 times over Christmas.  I’ve now given up trying to see her, I have a present here for her and she can’t even be arsed to pop over and get it.  She hasn’t even apologised for not trying to fix a new date with me and then just to make it worse, last night I made a group on WhatsApp for my bridesmaids trying to get a date for us to go dress shopping and my sister said she would send dates in an hour or so.. and 5 hours later she hadn’t so I reminded her… and now 24 hours later, surprise surprise, she still hasn’t.

My sister suddenly going out drinking and to parties etc with my mother is no real surprise. It is what the Golden Child does in my family. It  is what I did for many years.  My mother loves the child that is fun and will get drunk, smoke, sing karaoke and play inappropriate drinking games.  Just like she does. And my mother DOESN’T love the child who is “boring” and doesn’t do those things.

The roles have been reversed, the tables have turned.  I did that, that was my choice and I am pleased, really.. but it still bothers me a bit.  That sounds ridiculous doesn’t it.

I’ve seen more selfies of my mother and sister on her Instagram in the last few months than ever before.  There are photos of them on Xmas Day, NYE and this party last night that obviously I didn’t get told about or invited to.  Part of me questions if it is being done on purpose to make me feel excluded and jealous like my sister did all the years that I was the Golden Child and then I think, nah… she is just really happy my mother is treating her so well and is enjoying it.  I should be pleased for her, but I can’t be because I know how it has effected me being the chosen one.

Last night’s Dream

Last night I had a dream that there were two cars and one of the cars drove up fast behind me, lifting me into the air and throwing me across wherever I was until another car came and did the same thing until I was thrown into a wall.  I had injured my leg and had a huge wound, a chunk of my leg tissue had come out and was on the floor. Someone picked it up so that the hospital could sew it back in (gross I know).  I was crying in the dream and in pain.  A while later in the dream I was trying to phone my fiancé who wasn’t there and I had gone a bit numb.  I felt like I had given up to an extent. I looked down and all the blood which was all over me had turned blue.

Google says that dreaming of blood symbolises “feeling of being hurt or injured and of losing energy or the strength that enlivens you. But blood can represent pain, but also passions, deep feelings. It can refer to things that are deeply felt“.  Regarding dreaming of wounds, it says “something painful is being repressed” and “On the legs or feet, the message may be about the ability to move forward and feel empowered”.

I woke up from this dream feeling sad.  My fiancé, completely oblivious to my dream or my mood came and gave me a hug and I could feel tears prickling my eyes but he didn’t notice and then went downstairs.  I guess I kinda sucked the tears and the sadness back in and had to go and get the kids their breakfast.  I’m not really sure why I felt so sad waking up from that dream because at that stage I didn’t know about the party, perhaps it is just the sadness that my sister is so distant with me and is making it so painfully obvious that she doesn’t care – about Christmas or my wedding and that is shit.  She repeatedly makes it clear how little she cares about me and what can I do about it? My sister has a short fuse and if I told her I was getting annoyed or confronted her in ANY way, that would be it, she would use it as an excuse to let rip about something and part of me wonders if she is doing it on purpose so that I give her an excuse not to see or speak to me anymore.  I think that perhaps now she has her elevated position as Golden Child, she doesn’t want me around or coming back to potentially push her back to scapegoat? Perhaps she knows my mother won’t want her speaking to me and is waiting for a good excuse to be able to cut the ties with me and please my mother even more?? It’s all speculation after all.

Another reason moving half an hour further away is that I will have even more distance between me, my mother, stepdad and sister. Whilst things are like this, and God knows how long that will be…. it seems like a good idea.  At least I wouldn’t have to worry about seeing them or bumping into them I guess.  Is that running away? Perhaps.

Oh, and finally one final thought before I stop banging on….. I realised the other day that there are some comparisons between the way I fell out with my mother and the way I reacted when T sent me that text by accident.  In both situations I got angry and withdrew the only difference was that after a week or so, when I had calmed down enough, I wrote to T and explained how I was feeling trusting that she would be able to discuss it with me without being angry or attacking me – clearly I haven’t done that with my mother because it is pointless.  I’ve been wondering if that is wrong of me?

 

[EDIT: Since publishing, I read back the part about my dream and one car barging me and then the other one and wondered if perhaps the cars doing the damage are symbolic of my mother and then my sister.  Mother started, sister took over from where she left off.  Both hurt me? just throwing it out there.]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have no more fight left today

This is a warning that I am having some kind of melt down right now and this post is likely to be full of anger and rage and sadness and Christ knows what else. Maybe stop reading now if you are feeling delicate yourself.

I don’t know what’s happening but I am having a really horrible body reaction to how overwhelmed with anxiety, stress and anger I am feeling. I’ve never felt anything like it. My heart is beating out of my chest, my body is tingling and feels weak, I feel sick, my stomach is going crazy and I feel kind of dizzy and spaced out.  A minute ago I felt like if I took a sip of the very large glass of wine I have poured, I might be sick.  My entire body is triggered or something. It feels AWFUL.

If you have been reading lately, you will know the background around the shit storm that is happening at work.  Yesterday I was offered a new position within the company and I felt such intense relief that I could get out of that department and away from those two girls making me feel so shit. At 8pm last night, I got a call from a woman in HR to tell me that she couldn’t agree to me leaving until a replacement had been found and that it would take at least a month.  I totally broke down on the phone to her. I sobbed. I was unable to speak. I totally lost it.  She obviously needed me to tell her what has been going on and so I did, I didn’t have much choice by that stage and so I was honest. I told her how those two girls had been making me feel and that I couldn’t do that for another month and that actually, I seriously would have to leave the firm if that was the case. That wasn’t meant as blackmail – I really would have left.

Luckily once she witnessed the state I was in on the phone, she agreed I could leave my current team this Friday for the Xmas break and start my new department on 2 January.  I came off of that call utterly broken, but relieved.

Today I went into work, which believe me is not easy at the moment.  The 2 girls didn’t speak to me, nothing new there, but I felt more awkward than ever because I knew they probably knew. Later I was called into the head of the department’s office. He is a cold man at the best of times and he wasn’t very supportive. He asked me what was going on, I told him in brief detail that the department wasn’t for me and that it wasn’t working out.  He said “you seemed happy enough at the xmas meal last week” which REALLY pissed me off. What was he implying? That I am lying? Making the whole thing up? I snapped back at him “That was two weeks ago and last week was awful”.  He was blank-faced and even when tears began to fall down my face and I couldn’t get my words out, he just glared at me.  I felt like dying.

When the “meeting” was over, I left his office and the 2 girls were directly outside the room (which by the way is glass so they would have seen me and probably heard me which is just great..).  I walked to the bathroom where I, yet again, collapsed into tears.  I didn’t ever want to come out.

I then got a text message from my ‘aunty’.  She isn’t my blood aunty, but has been in my life since literally the day I was born. She was like a second mother to be growing up. I used to stay at her house all the time with her two boys who I refer to as my cousins.  My mother used to go off gallivanting with her latest bloke and I would stay there for weeks at a time. She was always so loving to me, I’ve always, always loved her.  Anyway, she said she needed to speak to me.  I knew instantly this had to be about my mother because she doesn’t often text me and she never says she “needs” to speak to me. Initially I thought she was going to be a flying monkey and was going to tell me my mum was upset or something and my back was up.  I was wrong.

I spoke to her on the phone at lunch time and what she had to tell me was that she has fallen out with my mother on a HUGE scale because my mother told her she is not to speak to me anymore. I can’t even believe I am typing this.

My aunt was very honest, she admitted that initially when this happened, which was apparently about 6 weeks ago, she said she rarely spoke to me and my mother said to her “If you speak to TT, please tell me” and she admitted that she agreed with that.  Well, you may remember it was this aunt’s birthday party a few weeks after me and my mother fell out and I knew I couldn’t go unless I wanted to see my mother, so I text her to say I couldn’t make it because of what had happened to the kids, and because I had fallen out with my mother and that we weren’t speaking.  She replied at the time to say she was shocked to hear we weren’t speaking and that she was sorry I couldn’t make it.  Well, she also admitted, she sent those messages to my mother when she next requested evidence of our communications.

Apparently my mother then rang her Friday night just gone to ask her if she had spoken to me and she told her that she had text me recently to say she was sick with the flu, but would send me some dates that we could get together as soon as she was better (this was because I asked when I could see her as I couldn’t make her party).  Apparently with this, my mother went APE SHIT at her and they ended up having a really horrible argument on the phone where my mother told her she should be loyal to her and not to me and that she does not expect her to speak to me at all.  I don’t know exactly what else was said but my aunty said that she told my mother she had done nothing wrong and that my mother wasn’t having any of it.

My aunt said she slept on this argument and then Sunday sent my mother a very long message which said………. wait for this…. that she thinks she needs to learn about sexual abuse and the implications it can have because she thinks this is where all the issues started.  That the fact my mother couldn’t and didn’t handle me telling her what happened to me is the start of our problems and said to my mum, that the same thing happened with her and her mother when she spoke out about her own sexual abuse. GOBSMACKED.

She said the message wasn’t aggressive or nasty or blaming, but that she said in it, she thinks if my mum were able to help me deal with it in a better way, we would be closer and that she thinks my mum’s reaction to me telling her what had happened has caused the anger and resentment in me which has led to this huge fall out between us.  I interjected here and said that our problems go way further back than that abuse.  I was 14 when that happened, she had been hurting me since the day I was born.

She then told me she doesn’t know why exactly we fell out. I laughed – literally. Funny that! So I told her the truth. The argument began by me confronting her about what she has been saying to my aunt and to my sister about me and my fiancé, which my mother furiously denied and called my aunt a liar.  She told me if I believed her over my own mother, I could get out of her house. I told her she then went on to tell me I was brainwashed and needed sectioning and all of the rest of it.  My aunt, understandably was gobsmacked.

Anyway, the very long story short is that we realised (well, she did) that my mother wanted to keep us apart so that aunt didn’t find out that the row was about the fact my mother had been caught out.

Apparently my mother never replied to my aunt’s text on Sunday. I’m genuinely very surprised at that because my mother ALWAYS has to have the last word. She told me she doesn’t think they will ever speak again now. I told her I think she might be right.  That’s two people in the last few months that have called my mother out on being a fuck up of a mother. Me and now my aunt. She will be steaming angry.

My aunt said that she does believe my mother is extremely upset that we aren’t speaking and that she will miss my wedding. I told her, well, if she would rather not speak to me again or come to my wedding than take a look in the mirror and admit her mistakes and apologise for them – then whose fault is that? She agreed.

My aunt also told me that a mutual friend of hers and my mother’s had been to see her since this and also said she should stop seeing me for my mother’s sake and that she had said to her she absolutely wouldn’t do that. This mutual friend apparently said to her, “She was a really terrible mother though, I know”.  She apparently said that repeatedly in front of my aunt, and her husband. Shame she doesn’t tell my mother that too.

I told my aunt that my mother was acting like a fucking dictator. Who does she think she is telling her who she can and can’t talk to? EUGH. Thank God she didn’t just comply with my mother. No wonder my mother hasn’t replied to her, she will have cut her off now as she is no longer compliant and enabling.

It’s a shame that not everyone stands up to my mother. My sister won’t see me now either and I know why.  She’s been promoted to golden child and is loving the attention she is getting. Little does she know she’s just been recruited as another rescuer. Someone to give my mother all the narcissistic fix she needs. To tell her how nothing is her fault and that me (and my aunt now) are horrible abusers who she is best off without.  It is only a matter of time before I get a message to tell me she wants nothing more to do with me “because of the way I am treating mum”.  I will link to this page when that happens.

I feel bad for my aunt. She will be feeling so shit right now. She won’t want to lose my mother’s friendship. She has been discarded now she is no use to my mother. It’s actually a GREAT thing but she won’t feel like it is right now, of course.  She’s put up with so much from my mother over the years, I did ask her why she is still in her life anyway. She then told me she would have to “return the lovely bracelet”…. what bracelet? Apparently a few weeks ago my mother gave my aunt an engraved bracelet which said “friends forever”….. clearly it should have said “friends forever.. as long as you do what I say”.

I brought my sister a present this morning. A necklace with an elephant on that symbolises love and a special gift box and gift bag which had stars on it which reminded me of our favourite bedding we had as kids at her dad’s house.  Now I’m not sure whether to send it to her or not, I mean… she clearly doesn’t want to be in my life now anyway. Will it be seen as emotional blackmail? Will it be sent back to me? Ignored? I don’t know what to do.

And then there’s the absolute fuck up with T.

After that wonderful phone call I went back to work and saw T had sent me a text. The text wasn’t for me. It was for Sonia. WHO THE FUCK IS SONIA? Now, accidents happen, mistakes happen – especially when using technology but the problem is, that the way T speaks to Sonia is NOT how she speaks to me.

Firstly “Dearest Sonia”….. then normal therapist shit and then… “Much Love”. OUCH OUCH OWWWW OWWW OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

Two tiny and simple words that somehow sliced through my heart.

Well this triggered me instantly of course. Why does she like, sorry LOVE, Sonia and not me? Why is she so warm to her and not to me? Why doesn’t she say things like that to me? How old is she? Why does that even matter? I don’t know.

I know this is totally illogical and irrational and totally immature, but I always hoped it was ME that she liked best. Maybe loved… I always hoped it was ME she had a soft spot for and that I was the only client. For some reason I want to be the only young client – mother/daughter fantasy I guess?

Anyway it fucking hurt and I text her to tell her she had sent it to me by mistake and she replied so casually saying oh yes it did, sorry, see you tonight.. and I thought PFFTTT no you won’t.

And so I cancelled my session.

I have NEVER cancelled a session. Ever. Not once in 3 years, not even for genuine illness.

In fact, my session should start in exactly 5 minutes and I have absolutely no fucks spare to give.

On top of the shit with work, the stuff with my mother and aunty, my sister and everything else, this really was the final nail in the coffin. I just can’t take any more today.  I know that sounds very victim like and poor me and I hate that but… that’s the absolute truth. I feel like if I let myself, I would have some sort of breakdown. I’m not sure I would be able to pick myself up from it very quickly.

I know T sent the text by accident. I know that. (Please God if you comment, don’t say that, I know it I promise) but it has made me feel like she is fake and she doesn’t like or love me in the way I had tricked myself into believing she did. Certainly not like she loves Sonia.

Maybe my attachment system has been activated and I’ve gone into flight mode by not having my session, I can see that at some point in the future, days or weeks, I will be over this enough to talk to her about calmly, but today is not that day and today’s session shouldn’t have been about that and it would have had to be. Not going isn’t about punishing her, it’s about trying to protect ME.

I’ve had enough of fighting this week. I feel mentally exhausted.

On that note, it’s dead on my session time. I bet she thinks I will still be there. I bet she doesn’t believe I won’t go. I pray she doesn’t phone me because I just can’t speak to her. There is no more fight in me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My Sister Heartache

This post is about me and my sister.

In my session last night, I read my blog about the dysfunctional relationship with my sister and what I had figured out at the weekend.  I read the blog easily until the end where I read about the nice memories I have with her when we were younger and then I felt a lump in my throat.

I told T “it is such a shame” and then began to cry a little. T agreed that it was a huge shame and that my mother had caused this dynamic, not me. I said I knew that but that I felt so sorry for my sister. In my head when I said those words, my sister was no longer 22, but about 6.  God the pain I felt in that moment. The shame, the guilt, the sadness. It was horrible.

I said to T “I should have helped her, I was so horrible to her, she must have felt so alone” and then I just broke down in floods of tears. I cried from the bottom of my heart in that moment. I felt ashamed of myself and felt such a loss of what cannot be repaired.

T, rather passionately, said to me that none of this was my fault. She said that I couldn’t have known, that I was caught up in this dysfunction and that I had no way of understanding any of this myself.  She spoke rather urgently so I gather she understood how much shame and sorrow I was feeling. Nothing she said really took the pain away.

I said to T “She hates me. She has always really hated me and I didn’t even realise!!”.  T said it wasn’t that she hated me but that it was misdirected anger towards my mother.

T said she imagined I just wanted to read that blog to my sister and to make her understand. I said I absolutely did but that it was pointless because my sister wouldn’t believe it or understand some of it.  T said that she wouldn’t be able to yet.  T suggested that one day my sister may realise the dysfunctional dynamic just like I had done, but I told her I wasn’t hopeful.  I said that my sister had finally gained what she thinks is my mother’s love and that she wouldn’t be wanting anything else.  T said she may realise when she starts to feel how toxic and fake it is, that she doesn’t get fulfilled in the way she may think she will. I appreciate what T was saying, but I don’t agree. I told T “I wish I was as optimistic as you“.

I said to T that it all felt so hopeless. It feels too late for me and my sister. I said that I have always felt so protective over her but that she won’t feel that at all and that hurts.  It is so sad that my mother has taught us that the three of us can’t all be getting along at the same time. Someone is always the bad guy. Drama/Relationship Triangle stuff.  There are 3 positions in the triangle, Victim, Rescuer and Prosecutor and my God, how true that is for my family.

Right now my mother is the Victim, my sister the Rescuer and me – the horrible persecutor and its painful because all I can do, all I have the power to do, is to remove myself from the triangle.  And that means leaving my sister there to play out her role(s).

I told T that I have felt such resistance and anger at my sister the last year or so but that now, I felt so much pain for her and pain for my own loss of having a healthy relationship with my sister.  As I said to T, things could have been so different. Something I find myself writing and saying more and more these days.

“I can’t save her”.
“No, you can’t”

I said to T that I had seen a photo of me and my sister a few days ago taken on Christmas Day in about 2013.  The photo is of me and my sister stroking the family dog wearing matching onesies. I said to her that you can’t even see our faces in the photo, but that I loved the photo.  I told her I would love nothing more than to have a healthy relationship with her. We could be close. We could be best friends.. but the reality right now is that we can’t – that isn’t possible.

T suggested I text my sister and said something like “I hope you had a nice holiday. I have been thinking of you”.  I was surprised she suggested that and was slightly taken aback.  I said I could, but that my sister is so argumentative and aggressive nowadays (since she’s become Golden Child) that it wouldn’t get me anywhere. I said I knew that my sister would reply to say “Well you upset me when you said X, Y, Z and you were so horrible to mum and mum is so upset” etc… and that would just annoy me.  T said I could do without that drama right now on top of everything else. I agreed.

T said that if I was able to speak to my sister, I would need to tell her that our relationship was separate to the relationship with our mother.  That we should be able to have a relationship regardless of whether I am speaking to my mother or not and vice-versa. She said I would need to put in some strong boundaries that we did not discuss things my mother has been saying – that she didn’t tell me anything at all.  I agreed but said to T that as ridiculous as it is, there is a part of me that wondered what we would speak about if it wasn’t our childhood or our mother. That is all we’ve ever really done!

T said we could still talk about our childhood but that we just don’t talk about things my mother is doing or saying now.  That I would have to tell my sister not to repeat anything we spoke about, anything I am doing etc. I said I doubted my sister would want to do that because she wouldn’t want to risk her newly promoted place as Golden Child.

T suggested that I sat on this for a while and thought about it. She said I would figure out what I needed to do when the time was right.

I said to T that when I got engaged in August, I was so disappointed with her reaction (or lack of more accurately).  T said that she was too envious to be happy for me.  I said I got that now but why? T said that there may be an element that I have escaped whilst my sister is still there, still stuck in the dynamic.  I said but he doesn’t need to be! She could escape it herself.  I said to T, I had imagined when I was planning my wedding that my sister would be really involved.  That she would be helping with the plans, planning the hen do and coming shopping for bridesmaid dresses! I wanted her to be the chief bridesmaid and I guess now, upon reflection, this was me saying “look how much I love you!“.  Stupidly I thought she knew that, but since discovering the childhood dynamic stuff, I guess she had too much displaced anger for me to feel that love plus the additional anger that I could have “saved her” and chose not to.  If only it were that easy.

I said to T that despite all of this, and that I felt stupid for even admitting this, there was a part of me that would feel really guilty if I reached out and contacted my sister whist I wasn’t speaking to my mother.  I said I knew that was insane.  T said I needed to feel and speak about those feelings and that we could keep talking about them.  That I didn’t need to act on them. I nodded.

I told T, my sister is totally unable to move forward with me and that she keeps on going on about how out-of-order I was for not missing a counselling session when she wanted me to.  T said it isn’t really about that, that is just my sister’s excuse. It is much, much deeper than that. I said I knew that now, but that my sister didn’t and so how do we get past that?

Eugh. What a mess.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another family dynamic identified

I spent some time reading about siblings from narcissistic mothers today.  I have figured out some more stuff about my family dynamic.  More eye-opening and rather painful/sad stuff.

I read about how in a family with a narcissistic mother, one child will be picked as the Golden Child and one will be the Scapegoat.  The Golden Child is picked as the most reliable source of narcissistic supply and tends to be the most similar to the narcissistic mother.  The Scapegoat therefore, is the outcast and gets far less attention.  They feel rejected.

In my case, this created sisterly rivalry between me and my sister.  2 sisters competing for the mother’s attention and love and only 1 of us getting it… or so it would have seemed at least.  This leaves the Scapegoat feeling intense jealousy towards The Golden Child.  To the Scapegoat, it is as though she is forgotten and the Golden Child gets a different mother.

For me and my sister, I was the Golden Child.  At least that is what my false-self had led us all to believe.  I morphed into what my mother needed me to be: her.  I would sit and drink and smoke with her.  I would dress how she told me to, God, I wore her clothes! I would do my make-up how she told me to, say what she told me to. I would go to clubs with her, talk about friends and family with her and agree with her always.  I even used to do her dirty work for her and dump her boyfriends for her!

To my sister, the Scapegoat, this would have looked like I was so similar to my mother – that therefore, she was so different.  Alone.  Because of the age difference between me and my sister, she couldn’t join in on a lot of this.  I wish she could know what a good thing that was. She felt left out and not as favoured.  When she voiced this, my mother would say that it wasn’t her fault my sister was too young to drink or go to clubs.  My sister never smoked, never drank.  She was different to her… to me.

The morphed me then went a step further.  My mother got a boob job and told me how I needed to have one like her.  So I did.  My mother loved this and I guess my sister probably hated this so much.  The supply that must have given my mother!

My sister decided she didn’t want a boyfriend for a few years, something which was totally foreign to my mother. My mother would tease her and say she was gay.  My mum always had a string of men, one after the other; sometimes more than one at a time.  And so I always had a boyfriend too! Another thing that my mum couldn’t relate to my sister about.  I provided endless drama with my ridiculous and disastrous relationships.  I told my mum WAY too much and would be at her house every single weekend crying over my latest failed relationship, drinking and smoking with her whilst she counselled me.  Naturally I was thankful and she got her well-needed supply.

You would think then that I would have been happy? But I wasn’t.  None of this was my real self. It was the false self that I had created in order to get some sort of approval from my mum after years of having nothing from her.  Also, just to create more of a headfuck, she would randomly befriend someone my age and they would become the best thing since sliced bread. One of these girls even moved in with us.  I hated her. I got so jealous – but I guess that is what taught me what I needed to become to get to her.

My sister would sometimes get upset and tell my mum how she felt.  Obviously my sister didn’t want me around.  I guess she probably hated me. I feel stupid that I’ve never realised this! My sister became pretty individual. She got lots of tattoos, piercings, she dyed her hair bright colours, pink and blue.  She developed a very funky sense of style.  Come to think of it, my sister calls herself a Wildflower on her social media bios.  I guess I understand why.  That must be how she felt.

Come to think of it, she pretty much did the opposite of my mother – and me.

Sometimes she would complain to my mum that she craved a normal family. She would say how she wanted a family night in with board games or a film with a chinese or a trip to the cinema with my mother.  My mother would say that she was pathetic and immature. That she needed to grow up.  My sister would go away angry and upset. My mother would slag her off to me and I learnt not to say the same things.  I would (shamefully) agree with my mother that our family just wasn’t like that.  How I wished it was.

My sister sometimes shouted at my mother that she didn’t know her at all. That she didn’t know her favourite colour, food or song.  My mother used to look completely flabbergasted at those comments.  My sister was right. She was clearly voicing that my mother couldn’t see her.  She didn’t.

My sister has suffered from depression since she was a young teenager.  I guess from growing up feeling rejected, unloved and unseen. Luckily she has a good and present dad in her life and she moved in with him for some years which would have helped a little at least.

What my sister will never understand, or perhaps believe, is that I have grown up feeling the same was as her.  It wasn’t until 18 or maybe 20 that my morphing into her took off. Until then, I had many years of being constantly told I was boring, dull, a boffin.  I was called Saffy from Absolutely Fabulous and humiliated.  She made it clear to me that I was a nuisance, in the way and not liked or loved.  I was in the way. I got in the way of her men, her social life and her sex.  Although that didn’t actually stop her!

So often when I was young I would be asleep in bed at home – alone and she would come home with loads of people to have a party. The music would suddenly come on very loud, and the house would fill up with strange men, drugs, drink, smoke and sex.  I hated it.  On the occasions when I would ask her to turn it down or tell her to be quiet, that they had woken me up, she would humiliate me for being so boring and tell me to go and read a book (God, it sounds like a scene from Matilda doesn’t it?!).  She would ignore me and carry on regardless. I hated it so much.  She always said the same thing – my house, my rules.  Whilst you are under my roof.. blah, blah, blah.

My sister probably won’t remember this, but I looked after my sister EVERY SINGLE DAY.  I looked after her when I was a kid myself. I fed her, bathed her, put her to bed. It was me that read her stories or tucked her in when she cried at night from nightmares.  We did help each other.  I have some nice memories with her actually.  We always shared a room and would play like kids did occasionally.  We used to make food from paper and pretend to run a cafe, we would play with dolls, make up dances.  Her dad used to take us both on holiday and we would have a nice time with him.

It is so sad that this all became so twisted. Yet again, things could have been so very different.

And now it has all changed again. Now my sister is the Golden Child and I am the Scapegoat.  Because of the work I am doing in therapy and the fact I have detached from my mother, my sister now has what she thinks she has wanted her entire life – my mother.  If only she knew.

I guess the only difference now is that I don’t want that place like my sister always did.  I feel so sad for her.  The anger I felt for her has subsided as I write this tonight. I know I can’t save her.