I have an Abusive Parent #TruthCampaign

In this episode, we discuss what it feels like when you come to the realization that your parents have been abusive (whether they meant to be or not).

For me, it was like the death of hope. I read this term in an article one day and it hit the nail on the head. 

For a long time, I kept going back to my parents in the hope that they would be well, that they would treat me well. That they would love and treat me the way that I deserved and wanted. I questioned my own actions, I felt guilty, but most of all I longed for them to be the people that they portrayed to the outside world. 

Skipping between the Line of hope and realization.

Imagine a line. On one side, it is the absolute realization that your parent(s) ar abusive and are incapable of treating you well. On the other side is the hope that they will be the parents you need and want. The parents they promise, the parents that they act to be to the outside world. For a long time, i walked with one foot on either side. Because standing on the side of realization meant giving up any hope that I would have the parents that I wanted.  

Coming to that ABSOLUTE realization and standing with both feet on that side of the line took a long time to get too. I kept playing and toying with the idea that they could change. It was hard to get there and once I was there, it hurt.

The normal cycle of grief that doesn't feel very normal

I went through a grieving process, not unlike grieving the loss of any loved one. Except I grieved the loss of the parents I never had but always wanted. 

I went through sadness. I was frustrated at myself for putting up with it for so long, I was frustrated that they could not be anything other than who they were. I questioned myself, I questioned if my feelings were right and the part that I had played.  I got angry and upset. I had to let go of the fantasy of happy family life with my extended family and realize that other people did not have the same view of my parents because they treated them well. 

And then, after some time, I became numb. Sometimes I went back to feeling anger and hurt, but over time, I went for long periods where I was not frustrated or hurt. Longer times of non-effect when I thought about it. Eventually, the thought of my parents had no real impact on my emotions because I had begun to create a vision and realization of a much happier life without them and their army in it. 

Struggling with Negative Emotions

I could not truly go through this process and get to this space until I had let myself feel and experience the full range of 'negative emotions'. I had been taught that feeling angry made you a bit crazy and being sad was embarrassing. I had felt ashamed to speak of my experience and show these emotions in front of people. 

The positive scale emotions like joy and love are much easier because they feel better. Once I rewired my brain to realize that the negative scale emotions were just that, emotions, they just felt different in my body and my body needed to feel them in order to cleanse and move forward. I let myself go through them. It was not easy. Somedays I thought I was okay and then the feelings would come back harder than before and I had to let them naturally be with me and go through me. 

And now, This is my new normal. I don't long or hope for them to be something different anymore. I don't wish that they were around anymore. Life is much better this way.

In this episode, we explicitly discuss the different roles that the other parent or less abusive parent can play for both you and the abusive parent. 

I feel like I have experienced the death of my father and he has not died yet. I grieve my dads disappearance and the disappearance of our father/daughter relationship. 

My father was my rock, I was his little girl growing up. He protected me from my mum, he listened to my feelings and validated my experience. He provided subtle strategies to protect me from my mum and make me feel better about the abuse. 

He was also my mother's enabler, in that instead of stopping her, he would make excuses for her. This role grew in strength over time as (I believe) he became more and more worn down). The dialogue began to turn against me. My father would blame me for my behaviors instead of acknowledging my mum.

The day that I chose that I would no longer allow my mother around my children without her getting the help that she needed, that my father had said that she needed after he had told me she wasn't safe... that all changed. He pleaded with me not to do it as he couldn't take my side because his life at home wouldn't be worth living. 

He then became my mother's echo. His words and behaviors were exactly the same as my mum's. He did all of the things that he used to protect me from. The abuse goes worse. 

I no longer knew him. I no longer know him. He is not my father. I do not know who this man is, he is not recognizable. 

My parents knew about my sexual abuse and they did nothing. 

My parents were aware of my sexual abuse. They found journals that I had written as a child. They did nothing. We all pretended like they were unaware. 

My mother questioned me one time. I was about 13.. I told her. She responded by telling me that she was sexually abused by my abuser's father. She did not offer any support. She made it about her. There was no action taken, no further conversation, and we continued to be around both of the abusers. 

Interestingly, my parents allowed us to be around and even babysat, by her perpetrator... both before and after revealing her abuse to me. At the time, I didn't think much about it. I was told and learned that you just act as nothing happened. I watched my mum be best friends with her abuser. I learned that is what you do. So I grew up being friendly with mine. 

When I had my own children I asked them to support me in reporting the abuse to keep my kids safe. My mother begged me not to do anything out of the fear of the family and community turn against her. Her social consequence was more important than her daughter and grandchildren's safety.

My parents use my sexual abuse to control and intimidate me

My father had chosen to have a secret conversation with my abuser as an alternative to a police report. They told him to no longer contact me or bully me. This gave me some power back.

After beginning to put in boundaries and expectations for my parents and the way that they treated me, they got angry. The abuse became worse, the attempts to control me were out of control.

They buddied back up to my abuser. They would cuddle him and shake his hand, and treat him wonderfully, in front of me. They threw my power away and made it very clear how much they hated me being an autonomous adult. 

My parents chose to Keep up Practice Instead of protecting Me

Most parents would do whatever it takes to protect their children from known sexual abusers. Not mine. My parent's image in the community and family was more important. Social Currency is the only currency that speaks to them and their social status was more important than taking me away from these people and supporting me to report them. 

My parents happily have my own children around the known abusers. In my eyes, this point and this point alone, make my parents unsafe to my own children now. They are not able to provide my children with the basic requirements of safety. 

My parents projected their failures onto me

Eventually, I have gone no contact with my parents. I refused to accept their behavior any more. The only way they could reach me is through the legal system, claiming grandparents standing and defamation because I have been talking about my experience. 

They have accused me of knowingly putting my child in known danger with a sexual predator. The person he is talking about was a 5 year old at my child's school who had a habit of tickling other children. 

My child told me she was being tickled and she didn't like it because it was annoying and the child would sometimes move her hands near her vagina when she was tickling her. Even at 4, my child had great protective behaviors and language. 

Although this is normal behavior for children, and the tickling child was not trying to assault my child, we took immediate action.  We spoke with the school who implemented a safe touching program to educate the children and help them to form protective and safe behaviors. We spoke with the parents to let them know what was happening and how we were talking and teaching Ayla to deal with it. My child and the tickling child do not hang out or go to the same school anymore. 

VERY DIFFERENT

Most people consider abuse to be emotional and/or physical. There is such a thing as financial abuse in which you are financially dependent on the abuser, the abuser creates a financial crisis for you, or controls your money. Abuse may also utilize other forms of abuse such as emotional abuse or isolation to carry out their goals with financial abuse. 

Financial abuse is when someone controls or manipulates how or when you spend your money. Like other forms of abuse, financial abuse may be subtle at first, and progress in severity over time. You may not have noticed the financial control as it seems as if your parents re 'helping you'. You feel selfish for questioning it, or the 'help they have given is used to make you feel guilty. They may be reminding you of all of the help they have given you, years later. 

Psychologist Gretchen Kubacky said financial abusers often blame their victims and exhibit extreme behavior. “Financial abuse takes many forms, including blaming the significant other for financial strain, putting the significant other on an absurdly strict budget, public shaming about expenditures, utilizing all or most of the income on an addiction, and taking earned or gifted money away from the significant other,” Kubacky told The Cheat Sheet.

Interestingly, many sources suggest that most people who suffer from Domestic and Family Violence experience financial abuse. 

In this episode we look at:

I have experienced financial abuse that was disguised as loving parents helping me, for years and years.  Much of the early help conditioned a dependency in me that made adult abuse much easier for my parents. I am not even sure if they knew that they were doing it. But any help, including financial help, was never given without expectations of how to use it, what they wanted in return (which was usually just to fall in line with them), and I have been constantly reminded my whole life of the help they have given me (from birth to now).

I needed to put a stop to the handouts. I was receiving money I did not ask for. This was another entry point for emotional abuse. My mum would call me and suffocate me with her complaining about their awful financial situation because of me. She was not at all willing to take the money back, nor was she willing to stop the emotionally abusive calls. The money was used to control me, to complain to me and about me. The thought of receiving any help from my parents (help that I ask for or didn't ask for), makes my stomach wrench.. because it results in negative consequences. 

Interestingly. My father was not aware of the incessant calls and had a different perspective on their financial situation. According to mum, giving me money (that I had not asked for), had put them under so much financial stress and pressure; yet my dad outright denied this and painted a different story. He simply brushed it off and made excuses for my mum. Yet neither of them would accept it back and the calls continued. 

Keep in mind that there are differences between healthy help, help used for coercion or abuse (what we are discussing today) and enabling by 'saving'

In this episode, we discuss:

DEPENDENCY

Children who had healthy relationships with their parents will experience a normal transition from teenage years to adulthood. They go from being dependant to independent. Their parents provide foundations for them to be autonomous individuals, capable of making their own decisions. 

If you have an abusive parent, you may find that your parents pay for things that most adults pay for themselves. Or they are over-involved and take care of your affairs for you. Maybe you feel the need to expose every area of your life, like your money and relationship situation. You may find that your parents jump in to help you at the drop of a hat, with or without your permission. They will take over conflicts for you or be the driver in your life decisions. YOu may find that if you do not follow what your parents feel yous should do, that you are punished emotionally, they may threaten to or actually remove the help that they are giving. They may also try and degrade your abilities with words such as "I have been a parent longer than you, I know better". 

This often results in Adult children with abusive parents who may find themselves with a 'Dependent Personality'. They lack the confidence to make their own life decisions in the area of relationships, parenting, money because they seek the approval of their parents before making any moves or need to check in with others and make sure they have support, instead of making a decision themselves. The fear of their parent finding out that they did something without checking in first. They may also rely on their parents to undertake tasks that are normally undertaken by that individual as an adult. 

Many people with toxic parents will find that they were not given the opportunity to learn valuable life skills such as financial skills or conflict resolution because their parents took care of all of that for them. They then need to rely on others to help them with these basic things. 

HELP

In a healthy world, help is something that is given freely, without consequences, and without strings attached. Healthy parents do not give help without expecting anything in return and forcing conditions. 

If you had an abusive parent, you may find that you fear help. You may find that you always feel like you need to 'return the favor', or are waiting to be reminded of the help that you are given and feel bad if you have not met the expected returned favor.  You may find yourself people pleasing because you have learned from your toxic childhood that giving to your parents and others is a measure of your worth and a way in which your parents would be happy with you

Just like a person dependent on drugs, you become dependent on your parent's expectation of returning the favor because it means that you are left alone... at least for a short while. 

CONTROL

Dependency and Help can be used by the abusive parent or parents to control their child. Dependency and help can be masked as a loving and caring parent, willing to give and sacrifice for their children. It may even feel like that to you. But if you think clearly, you may realize that help and dependency are always given with an outcome other than support in mind. 

You may feel guilty for questioning your parents or going against their will because it is easy to be manipulated when your parent is constantly reminding you of everything that they have done for you.

I have two abusive parents.

And... I am not the only one. 

There are so many adult children with abusive parents and it is detrimental to our quality of life, our mental health and it affects so many different avenues of our life. It feels unfair, It is confusing. 

Sometimes we suffer abuse as a child and it carries on into our adult life. We often don't recognize our parent's behavior as abuse until we are adults, because we were in it, it was our normal, we were given excuses and manipulated by our parent or parents. We question whether what we experienced in our childhood that now follows through in our adult life is abuse at all. We question if it is us (the child) or them (our parents) that are unhealthy or abusive. 

Sometimes we go low contact or try to go no contact, and then take them back with the hope that we will receive the love that we deserve and be loved in the way that we so deeply long for. We feel like we owe them, we question our sanity,k we feel guilty and ungrateful because after all, they are your parents and we are meant to be kind to them because they sacrificed things in their life to bring us up. Right? WRONG!

My abuse was hidden, it started off as emotional abuse masked as a fragile and damaged mother. My parents hid my sexual abuse and protected my sexual abuser. They used help as a form of control and to hold me hostage. The more I fought for autonomy and making choices, the worse the abuse became. 

I finally found the ability and saw the logic to cut my parents off and keep my children and I safe from them. My parents are currently accessing the legal system as an attempt to coercively abuse and force me back into the game.

This podcast is designed to help others feel connected and identify abusive behaviors from outside of the stage that your parent or parents are controlling. It is designed to help me to continue to heal. It is designed to help me create a record for my up and coming legal case with my parents and in finally reporting my historical sexual abuse without the support of my parents.