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Toxic family relationships

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  • January 13, 2019 at 7:45 am #274059
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Hi,

    I would like to get anyone’s take on my wife’s struggles. She has been through a horrendous time with her family, having had a mother who always put her down, saying how useless she was and comparing her to her older sister and younger brother who, in their mother’s eyes, were great successes. These siblings have behaved hatefully towards my wife all her life, particularly her sister who has shown her nothing but total contempt.

    This treatment stemmed from the fact that my wife confronted her mum once about the abuse that she was subjected to as a child including being made to sleep in a urine-stained bed time and time again. Her brother said to my wife “Perhaps you were the product of a rape!” and her sister has always referred to my wife as “That BITCH” every time her name comes up in a conversation. To this day, my wife is baffled as to what she has done to make her sister hate her so much. She has been nothing but nice to her sister, as well as everyonelse in her family, and even helped semi-raise her nephew who her sister got unexpectedly pregnant with when she was 19. While her sister was living it up in college my wife, who at 16 was only a child herself, did all the nappy changing and feeding for her nephew while also trying to do her school homework. When we got married my wife held out hope that her mum, sister and brother would change and start behaving nicely to her but, sadly, that has not been the case. We have two beautiful children, a 12 year old daughter and a 9 year old son, but they both have been diagnosed with ASD and, needless to say, we have had a very challenging time as parents. However, having zero family support from my wife’s side (my own family are decent but all live far away and my mum is too old and unwell to help) has made it all the more difficult. My wife is a strong person who is not prone to sitting around feeling sorry for herself but she does find it tough coming up to every Xmas and Easter when she hears other women talking about how much they look forward to catching up with their families and how helpful their mothers and sisters are when they mind their kids. This has had a profound effect on my wife’s self-esteem and she has felt suicidal on a couple of occasions.

    The reason I’m reaching out to this community is because I was very moved by some of the other stories of abuse and I would like to get your views on my wife’s toxic relationship with her family and how she can distance herself from these horrible people once and for all. Her mum passed away a year and a half ago and at her funeral her sister totally ignored our kids (her niece and nephew). She had also poisoned my wife’s niece (my wife’s god-daughter) against my wife. At the moment their mother’s will is being arranged and my wife is dealing with it via her solicitor rather than directly with her siblings as she cannot take any more hurt from these people. Not all her family are bad – her dad, who passed away when my wife was only 18, was a decent man who she had a good relationship with, she gets on well with her oldest brother but he is an alcoholic and is away with the fairies alot of the time and her other brother is okay but is a very unstable person having had a drink problem and gambling addiction in the past and spent a night in a police cell for attacking his wife. At this stage in her life (she’s 48) she wants to cut her family out of her life completely but, at the same time, she feels sad about slamming the door shut on her own flesh and blood.

    I would love to hear your views on this and any advice on how my wife (who’s such a lovely, decent person who deserves happiness) can move on once and for all from these horribly toxic people.

    Derek

    January 13, 2019 at 8:19 am #274233
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Derek:

    Your wife should “cut her family out of her life completely”, as soon as possible. Should have done so many years ago.

    Her mother was abusive, her father not decent enough to protect his children from their mother. Her sister caught her mother’s contempt toward your wife early on. All children suffered, some inflicted the suffering on their siblings into adulthood.

    You wrote that your wife “feels sad about slamming the door shut on her own flesh and blood”- well, she should worry about her own flesh, her own blood and yours, and our children’s, and slam the door shut on those who harm her, you and your children.

    I suppose she will feel guilty, maybe part of her believes that their contempt and abuse was justified. Children do believe what they are told as children.

    You wrote that your two children were diagnosed with ASD, what are their symptoms and since what age?

    anita

     

     

    January 13, 2019 at 2:49 pm #274291
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Hi Anita, thanks for your reply. Our kids were both diagnosed when they were approaching school going age. Their main symptoms were speech and language delay but it was more severe with our son.

    Early intervention has helped us enormously but the challenges continue.

    Our daughter also had anger management issues at the start of primary school which caused her to lash out at other kids when she’d get frustrated but thankfully she has conquered that problem through working with her resource teachers. Also, she is now able to converse normally with her peers. But she has had a miserable enough time for most of her primary school life with her classmates more or less isolating her. The situation finally improved when we approached the teachers and some of the parents but it’s sad that it’s taken until now, her final year in primary school, to reach that point.

    Our son, while fully verbal, still struggles with conversations and has fallen behind academically as a result. We are trying to get an SNA in place to give him the 1 to 1 support he needs at school to get up to speed but no joy with that yet. Needless to say, he has no friends and we have not exactly been bombarded with play date requests for either of our kids.

    Due to all this and the fact that we haven’t managed to get our house finished yet due to our challenges, my wife and I have found it near impossible to fit into our community and feel that we’re being looked down on by other parents. We never realised that society could be so cold and judgemental so this has been hard to take. So between this, my wife’s horrendous experience with her family and my own low self esteem (I suffered a lot of bullying throughout my school life and even in my first job), life has been tough going for us. To cope with this, we have each found our own support groups – my wife has found a support group for mental health struggles and I have found a mindfulness meditation group. We have found these very useful.

    I’m beginning to ramble here so I will sign off but it does feel good to reach out to a community like this and know that we are not alone.

    Derek

    January 14, 2019 at 4:58 am #274401
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Derek:

    You are welcome. If it helps you, for as long as it helps, post here anytime and I, for one, will be glad to reply to you whenever you do post.

    Notice this, you wrote this about you and your wife: “we’re being looked down on by other parents, We never realized that society could be so cold and judgmental so this has been hard to take”. But your wife’s society, that is her parents and sibling/s have been very cold and judgmental. So this cannot be news to her, or to you (the italicized)?

    I hope that your children did not spend time alone, unsupervised with her parents?

    I am wondering if your children from an early age witnessed arguments, aggression of any kind, or just a lot of anxiety in their home?

    anita

     

    January 14, 2019 at 6:08 am #274413
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Hi Anita,

    No, our kids were never left unsupervised with their granny (their grandfather was long dead by the time they came along). My wife’s mum had somewhat mellowed in later years and always behaved nicely to our kids but some of my wife’s siblings, particularly her sister, have continued to behave abominably towards her.

    In relation to our own household, yes we have had our ups and downs marriage-wise but this was to be expected due to all the challenges we have had to deal with and I’m sure the kids did pick up on this as these tensions would arise. However, as time has gone on we have been dealing with these challenges better and better and thankfully rarely row now (the mindfulness practice has really helped me here). I think the kids’ anxiety largely stems from their frustrations with their struggles and difficulty in trying to fit in with their peers. They are slowly but surely making progress though.

    Derek.

    January 14, 2019 at 6:33 am #274415
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Derek:

    I think that finding a support group for your wife and a mindfulness meditation group for yourself are excellent choices and I hope it continues to work for the two of you and for your children.

    Children need a calm home where they feel safe, as safe as can be. In that safety they develop well, free to explore life. Not having other parents call you for play dates really is of no consequence to the children in comparison to the safety they need in the home, with their mother and father. So I hope the two of you continue to provide them a safer/ calmer home, continue with the support and mindfulness groups, as well as keeping out of your lives abusive people, whomever they may be.

    anita

     

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