Adult child of BPD parents: NC navigating relationship with sibling in contact

[Depression = 72% of members]

I'm glad and hopeful to have found this community. This is my first post. Just looking for any resonance, empathy, relevant experiences, resources.

My bpd+npd dad (history of deep projective abuse) said he's "done with me" about 3 years ago after he blew up and projected rage at my wife and I called him out, adding that this is an ongoing issue.

Since then my stepmom went to bat for him in scapegoating me.

I have one sibling, a brother who choses to be in contact (works with him even). My wife has also continued to subscribe to fantasy that things could be mended and has engaged pleasantly with my stepmom trying to build rapport (I felt unsupported by this behavior)

I'm close to my brother but I'm realizing that I havent been feeling truly safe because the people in my inner circle have chosen different paths that do not feel allied with my truth of abuse, abusive scapegoating, aggressive invalidation and abandonment. (I hope my wife finally gets it that its eroding to me, and she said she will stop though she's said that before).

I see my brother as someone who sees any 'relationship' with his dad as more important than any boundaries. He went "to bat" for me before and my dad iced him out for a while. He had asked him to echo my reflections about my dad and not be bullied. I didn't ask him to go after him. I think my brother has deep codependency around people pleasing and absorbs the stress of bending to others, until he snaps.

I don't know what to do about this. My brother is one of my very closest friends, but I feel a deep invalidation/betrayal that I do not have clear vision of because its so close to home. I just know that when I imagine safety, it does not include proximity to others who have contact with my abusers and effectively enable the abuse by having a "relationship" despite foundational needs (accountability for anything, ever? empathy?) being met.

I worry about NOT being anchored in my own life because of this subtly eroding my own sense of KNOWING about my own abuse. Thats the worst part: I find it hard to stay anchored in knowing my legitimacy and the validity of my deep trauma journey (open to any suggestions for how to increase my anchoring in knowing -- I think talking to other survivors can help, though I feel a deep need for FRIENDSHIPS with people who get it).

Any others in a similar situation with a close sibling who tries to walk a stay in contact and please everybody line? I'm finding it hard to have clarity about my experiences because the family system is 3 people effectively ignoring my needs. It's hard because my brother says he gets it and supports me, but I feel his actions show differently, and it's subtly eroding. I see this as an impossible situation: as long as my brother bends his boundaries to stay in "relationship" I think he's taking on a FOG distortion in which he's not able to take stock of his own victimization because he's implicitly still in the (i think inevitable) fusion of required accommodation and therefore not able to truly honor MY victimization because maybe he's unconsciously disidentified with aspects of his victim experiences and implicitly identified with the oppressor.

This has been really hard for me to navigate, as it blends a real resource (who wants to be supportive and validating!) with someone who I think can have a deeply eroding impact because I believe he is dissociated from himself and the sense of healthy boundaries being his right or tolerable and participates in the toxic system. I find it really hard to feel truly anchored in my own validation.

Thank you!

[Ventralvagal]

I'm glad and hopeful to have found this community. This is my first post. Just looking for any resonance, empathy, relevant experiences, resources.

My bpd+npd dad (history of deep projective abuse) said he's "done with me" about 3 years ago after he blew up and projected rage at my wife and I called him out, adding that this is an ongoing issue.

Since then my stepmom went to bat for him in scapegoating me.

I have one sibling, a brother who choses to be in contact (works with him even). My wife has also continued to subscribe to fantasy that things could be mended and has engaged pleasantly with my stepmom trying to build rapport (I felt unsupported by this behavior)

I'm close to my brother but I'm realizing that I havent been feeling truly safe because the people in my inner circle have chosen different paths that do not feel allied with my truth of abuse, abusive scapegoating, aggressive invalidation and abandonment. (I hope my wife finally gets it that its eroding to me, and she said she will stop though she's said that before).

I see my brother as someone who sees any 'relationship' with his dad as more important than any boundaries. He went "to bat" for me before and my dad iced him out for a while. He had asked him to echo my reflections about my dad and not be bullied. I didn't ask him to go after him. I think my brother has deep codependency around people pleasing and absorbs the stress of bending to others, until he snaps.

I don't know what to do about this. My brother is one of my very closest friends, but I feel a deep invalidation/betrayal that I do not have clear vision of because its so close to home. I just know that when I imagine safety, it does not include proximity to others who have contact with my abusers and effectively enable the abuse by having a "relationship" despite foundational needs (accountability for anything, ever? empathy?) being met.

I worry about NOT being anchored in my own life because of this subtly eroding my own sense of KNOWING about my own abuse. Thats the worst part: I find it hard to stay anchored in knowing my legitimacy and the validity of my deep trauma journey (open to any suggestions for how to increase my anchoring in knowing -- I think talking to other survivors can help, though I feel a deep need for FRIENDSHIPS with people who get it).

Any others in a similar situation with a close sibling who tries to walk a stay in contact and please everybody line? I'm finding it hard to have clarity about my experiences because the family system is 3 people effectively ignoring my needs. It's hard because my brother says he gets it and supports me, but I feel his actions show differently, and it's subtly eroding. I see this as an impossible situation: as long as my brother bends his boundaries to stay in "relationship" I think he's taking on a FOG distortion in which he's not able to take stock of his own victimization because he's implicitly still in the (i think inevitable) fusion of required accommodation and therefore not able to truly honor MY victimization because maybe he's unconsciously disidentified with aspects of his victim experiences and implicitly identified with the oppressor.

This has been really hard for me to navigate, as it blends a real resource (who wants to be supportive and validating!) with someone who I think can have a deeply eroding impact because I believe he is dissociated from himself and the sense of healthy boundaries being his right or tolerable and participates in the toxic system. I find it really hard to feel truly anchored in my own validation.

Thank you!

[PinkPanther]

Hi
I am sorry you are experiencing this.

I am a woman and an experiencing this as well. My brother and I were not exactly close...we just had a greater shared experience than us and our younger sibling and we have the same parents. Younger sibling has different father so we had different experiences.

Anyway, my brother still lives with our BPDmom. At one time I felt I could trust him but that's no longer the case since mom has triangulated us further once I started establishing boundaries. The way I see it, once the BPD parent sees that a child of theirs is setting boundaries they want to make sure they don't lose the other child in their enmeshment so they will whine to the child that is still in contact, even lie. When I had my second child, things came to a head with me and our mom and I just couldn't take it anymore. As a result my mom turned to my brother to paint me as the bad guy in the scenario. He completely turned her way...where previously we had conversations about things he now just puts it on me as being the difficult sibling and making it all about me. Our younger sister and I never had a relationship and mom made sure of that a long time ago.

My husband is like your way wife...he just wanted us all to talk it out and move on. He didn't understand things because I never really laid it all out for him. I was enmeshed too at one point so that's all he knows. He comes from a better family than mine (they have some things they ignore which are dysfunctional, but they are def. NOT BPD) so my husband just couldn't get it. I had to sit down with him and break down how painful all of this is and share some examples of healthy parenting vs. BPD parenting. I also asked him to read on BPD so he could be more supportive.

It took some time but I am in a much better place with my spouse with this. I have recently been struggling to reconcile what I felt was him just ignoring everything and allowing me to suffer but I see that is unfair because this is my parent and unless you grow up with healthy boundaries, you dont know. I love my in-laws but due to cultural differences, they have no boundaries so we have had to work on that both individually and as a couple.

I don't want to have a close relationship with my siblings or my mom. I have accepted that everyone has chosen their role and I choose to no longer be a scapegoat for family failure. They are welcomed to continue without me and I am happier this way. It's sad but I choose health and modeling better relationships to my children than placating other adults.

As far as your wife is her family very loving, kind? Their dysfunction even if they are good people may be to gloss over everything, and I think that's the problem with a lot of people. Ignoring discomfort is easier for others esp. if it's not their own blood relatives.

Perhaps you can recommend counseling with a BPD specialist to help your wife understand?I asked my husband to read about it and I would check in occasionally to see if he has. I told him that I cannot be with him if he doesn't take it seriously because to ignore it is to essentially be ok with the abuse.

Your brother, that will just have to be something he would have to come around to. When people are in the grip of a pwBPD they are inclined to follow them esp. if there are some underlying family jealousies, unresolved issues etc.. my own brother has his own issues which are playing out in this saga between me and mom,so I just feel like I will give him space to see things how he feels he needs to. But I won't be the one enabling BPD mom. Everyone enables her.

I wish you luck, I def. know how difficult this is. No one understands and the people you care about don't seem to get it either it's very frustrating but it all just plays out into addressing issues that we have in all if these relationships that we tend to ignore. That's been a great gift for me is to choose healthy relationships over unhealthy ones even if that means letting people go. It's not worth it to drown with them.

[Notwendy]

I am in a similar situation. My golden child sibling has experienced abuse from BPD mother but being in the favored position, has also had some happy times with her and so is more emotionally bonded to her. I have been her scapegoat child. Her preference for Golden Child has been obvious even to family friends. BPD mother didn't bond with me. We don't have much of an emotional connection. On the other hand, I am the sibling who was most bonded to my (now deceased) father.

So while GC and I can be mutually supportive of each other, I know that GC also has a soft spot for BPD mother and so is under her influence. So I share most things with GC but know that anything I say might be shared with her, so I don't discuss anything I need to keep confidential.

My mother's FOO has begun to see her behaviors but they were mostly in support of her and so I keep a safe emotional distance with them.

Dad was the paradox. I loved him and thought he loved me but also now realize he was fully all about her and would choose her feelings over his relationship with me in an instance and disregard her behavior towards me.

So yes, I get it, we have family members who on one hand care about us but play both sides of the fence with the parent who is also abusive, and it's hard to make sense out of that.

Like your wife, my H "gets it" but he doesn't. He didn't experience this. Our culture assumes parents are loving and caring and most of them are so it's not something people can imagine. Even recently, a relative told me I needed to visit my mother more because "it's the right thing to do". She has some idea but if I ever told her all of it ( which I have no intention of doing as there's no point) she would not have said that. Your wife is doing the best she can to be supportive.

I found people who do understand here on this board and in 12 step CODA groups. The family dynamics with an alcoholic parent and a PD parent are very similar, so there is common ground.

[zachira]

You are not alone in experiencing having flying monkeys enable the cruel behaviors of close family members which is so hurtful and confusing. As I have gone no contact or low contact with my large extended family and siblings, it has helped me learn about flying monkeys and why they enable my abusive family members. Dr. Ramani has some good Youtube videos on flying monkeys. Probably the first step for you is setting boundaries with your flying monkeys that reduce the impact of the abuses on you. The boundaries might include no discussing of your father with the flying monkeys. It is heartbreaking to have nobody in your family support you, and understandable you would like to have some friends who have empathy for all the hurt and confusion you are feeling. This site has many members who are in similar situations as yours who are here to listen and help in any ways they can.  

[livednlearned]

Ventralvagal,

It's so painful to have a parent say something that awful. Who says that to his own kid? Having a disordered parent can feel like walking into a buzz saw expecting a hug.

Have you read about the Karpman drama triangle? Triangulation goes with narcissistic family patterns like rice and beans. It's a powerful force in our families.

If you grew up with these patterns, it tends to define the way we experience relationships. Seeing how drama triangles work can help navigate them to lessen chronic conflict for ourselves.

Some of us put ourselves in drama triangles because it's what we know.

Your brother is in a loyalty bind and probably lacks the sense of self needed to meet you where you want him. He can't rescue you because he's battling things out to the death on a different drama triangle.

What is your wife's family like? There is probably something there that helps explain her bind.

You've been deeply hurt and want them to come to your aid, to take your side. Unfortunately, taking sides is part of the thing that created the same wound you're hoping to heal.

They key is how to not be repeatedly injured in a way that inhibits your recovery. Only you can know what that means, and it may change over time as people respond to changes they sense in you.

I really resented becoming an emotional leader in my family. I'm the person most invested in getting better and that felt unfair since they're the ones who break everything. I even tried to get my parents to pay for my therapy during a divorce from an ex whose behavior rattled everyone. My mother agreed to send money behind my father's back so he took money out of my son's education trust to cover the costs and made my mother use her social security money (Canada) to pay it back, managing to   as many people in the family as possible over my desire to heal.

BPD dynamics drive wedges in relationships.

Don't give away what you are growing. This is your garden, your fruit.

[Ventralvagal]

Thank you all for sharing your resonant experiences and perspectives.

I am SO GRATEFUL my brother isn't under the manipulative gaslighting spell of my dad and stepmom. I struggle to imagine the degree of pain of all family members overtly invalidating and abusing or supporting / defending abuse. My boundary with him that I am discovering more about has to do with his 1) disidentification with his own experience of abuse whereby he just hasn't allied with and nurtured his own victimized self such that he implicitly or explicitly speaks to erase my reality because he has re-written his own history to be not traumatic and 2) the way he implicitly internalizes responsibility for his stress/abuse experiences from not having a sense of healthy boundaries that makes him enmeshed in MANAGING the abuse rather than being healthily individuated from it and able to hold its reality without blindness/numbness. Its painful how awareness is blunted -- to be the only one holding a traumatic reality others are unwilling to admit and then be blamed and seen as the "holder" of their disowned stress and a lightning rod for negative projection who just needs to "chill out." Beyond that I've felt traumatized by other friends who are similarly disidentified with their capacity to feel victimized and it can feel so condescendingly dismissive to not receive their empathy but rather their sense of burden of you as if their disowned discomfort is something like a static feature of who you are. Society does this with the broad narcissistic tendency to identify with the oppressor and reject identification with or memory of our capacity to experience pain and shame.

My wife has *some* idea of my dad, having grown up with a NPD dad. But she often displays this rosy obliviousness to the pain she once experienced in the oppressor-identified stance. And her dad wasn't NPD AND BPD. Also my dad is pretty severe on the BPD being nearly entirely cut off from any relationships apart from his flying monkey wife (and my brother...) and being a justice lawyer who has been confirming his worldview for 40 years. She had wanted family (as I do!) and let her fantasy become minimizing my acute trauma and abuse. I can empathize with her deep desire for family for our young son, as I so DEEPLY want it too. She says she will show me that she respects my needs in having no contact going forward and setting an informative boundary with my stepmom, and that can only be shown. I don't fully trust this as she's shown she can repeatedly revert to fantasy, but I trust that she intends to.

Together, and with some friends who are emotion-minimizers even in the mental health field as I am (our society conditions this deeply...) I feel something like a betrayal trauma of arrested development in here that vanishes as soon as I feel connected with a friend and like I can meet my needs and vanishes into a nearly BPD-like feeling of traumatic unsafety when I don't feel connected and cannot meet my needs in relationship. Gives me empathy into the experiences of the world of unsafety of BPD sufferers and makes me want to learn more about the emotion-brain state of a child that gets suspended when KEY human needs are not only not met but met with the opposite. As a dependent child, that violent and invalidating response to expressing a need is a existential mother****er of soul torture.

I read the article here on boundaries (https://bpdfamily.com/content/setting-boundaries) and that inspired me to hold better space of nurturance for myself as the vital garden for me to tend. Really I think the trauma is a developmental one harkening to a time where I needed an attachment figure to co-regulate in holding/validating my reality and understanding my needs. I need that now from others (we never don't need co-regulation) and thats a real weakness for me as I'm not very socially connected: 1) my trauma led to generalized dissociative fragmentation that made it hard to exist in much less show up in my very experience, 2) my dad made it so my power to connect made me unsafe because it was a threat to him 3) I stunted my self-expression self-actualization to protect him from usurping my selfhood to be a narcissistic object for him to distort and suck dry and 4) i have held back from connecting with people because my abuse happened IN RELATIONSHIP so I've been generally avoidant of people. So I hope to work on reclaiming my right and ability to make my own connections. Also, if that arrested developmental need for a co-regulating validator can somehow be shepherded to maturity, I know that what I ultimately need is to be able to just KNOW my reality and worth regardless, and to have access to FEELING safe no matter what. Ive worked on a lot of somatic mindfulness and breathing techniques that have helped, but I think what will help most is finding connection with others who are more 'heart-connected" and nurturing my *self-development* by tending my garden to increase my real power that no one can take away (part of the trauma here is working currently for a narcissistic boss and applying for a more senior position with them having power over hiring me -- I just want OUT of that toxic "family system" and am working on resourcing myself with other employment -- that will help TONS!)

[Riv3rW0lf]

My boundary with him that I am discovering more about has to do with his 1) disidentification with his own experience of abuse whereby he just hasn't allied with and nurtured his own victimized self such that he implicitly or explicitly speaks to erase my reality because he has re-written his own history to be not traumatic and 2) the way he implicitly internalizes responsibility for his stress/abuse experiences from not having a sense of healthy boundaries that makes him enmeshed in MANAGING the abuse rather than being healthily individuated from it and able to hold its reality without blindness/numbness. Its painful how awareness is blunted -- to be the only one holding a traumatic reality others are unwilling to admit and then be blamed and seen as the "holder" of their disowned stress and a lightning rod for negative projection who just needs to "chill out."

Hear, hear!

Seriously though, I couldn't have written it this way, but this describes my brother to a T, and it's taken quite a toll on him.

I am no contact with my BPD mother. I have two brothers, with whom I share this mother, only one of them with whom I share a father too.

Both have said they would remain neutral in this whole event, to give me time to heal. Over time though, with the pressure our BPD mother puts on them, they both don't contact me anymore. I think they are both actively protecting themselves. This way, when they visit her, she "won", and she leaves them be... I imagine.

One of them never put pressure on me (my father works to steer him toward responsibility and compassion and away from our BPD mother's manipulations, it helps) while the other one told me I would rot inside out if I didn't pacify the relationship with our mother before cutting me off. This had be building up for some time. I can't really tell what I said to deserve the emotional dumping, because I didn't say anything. He had been basically acting like my mother's vessel for a while, doing her emotional dumping in her stead, and the cutoff was inevitable. Wasn't a surprise. We weren't exactly close so I can't say that it really changed anything for me, except confirming my family's dysfunctions.

All this to say, I am not in a very good situation to give you any advice. I am grateful to read your brother can maintain his relationship with you, and doesn't seem to feel a need to scapegoat you to gain your father's approval. This is a big deal, and it gives me a lot of hope for your relationship with him in the future.  

You seem honestly well grounded, and as though you have this situation well in hands. I understand finding it hard to connect. I think many of us here share a similar trauma on this front. Having a BPD parent is confusing, and scary. Part of growing up includes an iterative process to pinpoint the accepted behaviors VS the behaviour that will be frowned upon. It's learning about our own power by reading our parents, knowing when to smile to get out of a "bad deed". My two years old son masters this one... drawing on walls, and he knows exactly, already, what face to make to get out of it... but for us, when there was nothing to keep the rages at bay, nothing to predict how the parent would behave, no way to adapt, no way to prepare, no way to influence... it makes for a very scary connection, and a sense of powerlessness to abuse that runs deep... Also it makes us socially illiterate, in a way... I certainly feel socially illiterate at times. Good for you for stepping up for yourself, and regaining your power.

[So Stressed]

my inner circle have chosen different paths that do not feel allied with my truth of abuse, abusive scapegoating, aggressive invalidation and abandonment.

Welcome Ventralvagal! I relate to this statement above very much. I have experienced a lot of abuse, scapegoating, invalidation, abandonment, gaslighting ... it is hard to relate to family members who do not seem to see this or don't want to see it.

I see my brother as someone who sees any 'relationship' with his dad as more important than any boundaries.

I believe that my sibling has chosen to have a relationship with our bpd mother despite the costs.  She knows what Mom is like; yet seems to have decided to just live in denial and  not acknowledge the behaviors.

I worry about NOT being anchored in my own life because of this subtly eroding my own sense of KNOWING about my own abuse. Thats the worst part: I find it hard to stay anchored in knowing my legitimacy and the validity of my deep trauma journey (open to any suggestions for how to increase my anchoring in knowing -- I think talking to other survivors can help, though I feel a deep need for FRIENDSHIPS with people who get it).

Any others in a similar situation with a close sibling who tries to walk a stay in contact and please everybody line? I'm finding it hard to have clarity about my experiences because the family system is 3 people effectively ignoring my needs. It's hard because my brother says he gets it and supports me, but I feel his actions show differently, and it's subtly eroding. I see this as an impossible situation: as long as my brother bends his boundaries to stay in "relationship" I think he's taking on a FOG distortion in which he's not able to take stock of his own victimization because he's implicitly still in the (i think inevitable) fusion of required accommodation and therefore not able to truly honor MY victimization because maybe he's unconsciously disidentified with aspects of his victim experiences and implicitly identified with the oppressor.

I am no longer in contact with my sibling. I didn't choose it, but that is the way it is.  She is in denial about Mom's mental health and chooses to not see it and chooses to join in the scapegoating, gaslighting, and blaming of me for anything that goes wrong in our family. It is heartbreaking.  I chose to set some boundaries, which have not been met well by family members, and thus I am being scapegoated and abused more than before.  Sometimes, it is just easier to do what they want, but then I am not being true to myself.

I have found support and validation here on this site. I hope you will too.

[Notwendy]

How we cope with this type of parent can vary between siblings. When comparing memories with mine, many childhood events we both remember but others, we don't. We also feel different attachments to the disordered parent.

I know you are aware of the differences in attributes such as resistance, personality, sensitivity even in siblings and all these are a part of how siblings might respond differently to family situations. In addition, disordered families have different roles for siblings- golden child, scapegoat, etc. I think the genders of both parents and children also have an impact as the disordered parent might relate differently to them. It might be that your father treated you, a son, differently than your wife's NPD father treated her which is part of your different perspectives.

This is not to defend them or take their perspective but may explain why you find it difficult to feel they relate to your experience. I can also relate to that feeling of not finding others who "connect" with me in general. I have found more of a connection on the issues of a disordered parent in ACA groups and here on this board.

What I am dealing with now is that my mother's extended FOO has become aware of her issues and are trying to help her- and they are experiencing her behavior when they do. Yet, they still want me to try with them. On my part, I have been in their situation for longer, I know her patterns and am reluctant to make efforts that I have learned are not effective. They don't understand the whole of it yet. But I also appreciate their support and so don't want to dismiss their concerns. So it's a combination of feeling more support from family than ever before, in addition to feeling more pressure to be involved with her. The latter, I need to have boundaries with.

My mother's extended family and my GC sibling don't have the exact same perspective as I do, yet, they are supportive in their own way. In other ways, they can't be. It's a mixed bag but I also want to maintain these connections. So with your sibling and spouse- they are probably doing the best they can with what they have experienced.

[Ventralvagal]

I just want to say thank you to each of you who responded, and very thoughtfully so. Hearing about your situations has helped me feel less alone, and I've felt buoyed by the encouragement (e.g. "don't give away what you are growing. This is your garden, your fruit"), validation and suggestions.

I hope to engage with you all more about these topics (just now finding the time/space to come back to the website to read new responses - I'm a new parent trying to launch a not-yet-paying career as the single earner..and honestly fried rn too) and have more of an engaged, relational dialogue. That's important to me, and I feel bad that its been now several days that I haven't come back to receive your caring responses to my own damn post.. sorry.

For now I just want to say thanks, and I will be returning to this space because the fact of others "getting it" really helps me and is helping me to find out more about what I need in order to really heal and manage my own symptoms of traumatic stress. Also hearing the difference in many variables of each person's circumstances/position helps me to feel a validation in the impersonality of all of this (vs the bpd feeling--which does exist as a latent possibility in me--of 'reading' such lack of validation as the same kind of threatening invalidation of the original trauma).

I'll be back!

[So Stressed]

Anyway, my brother still lives with our BPDmom. At one time I felt I could trust him but that's no longer the case since mom has triangulated us further once I started establishing boundaries. The way I see it, once the BPD parent sees that a child of theirs is setting boundaries they want to make sure they don't lose the other child in their enmeshment so they will whine to the child that is still in contact, even lie. When I had my second child, things came to a head with me and our mom and I just couldn't take it anymore. As a result my mom turned to my brother to paint me as the bad guy in the scenario. He completely turned her way...where previously we had conversations about things he now just puts it on me as being the difficult sibling and making it all about me. Our younger sister and I never had a relationship and mom made sure of that a long time ago.

Thanks Pink Panther.  This really helped. I just couldn't understand why my sibling turned on me. We were not that close, but I was relying on her for some support and would call and say what our Mother had said or done and shared about how abusive Mom is to me. A few times, it was mentioned that my sibling and I had been talking ... I guess that is when Mom started the triangulating. I don't understand why this works?  How can these bpd people turn others against us? Maybe the bpd's are so convincing at lying that it works?

[zachira]

You are wondering about flying monkeys, people that side with the disordered people, how the flying monkeys so easily become enablers. This happened with your sister and brother siding with your mother. I have a similar situation with both my sister and brother, with a BPD mother who is now deceased. In disordered families, the roles are reversed; the children are parentified, taught to take care of the parents feelings' and ignore their own. In healthy families, children's feelings are respected and validated; parents support the children in becoming separate people from the parents and their best selves, even in ways that can be very different from the parents. When children are enmeshed with their parents in a dysfunctional family system, the children usually do not develop the ego strength to see people for who they are, to have empathy for themselves, and to decide how they feel about another person based on their own experiences. There is also fear installed in the children from an early age that he/she will be abandonned and smeared if he/she does not cater to the disordered parent/parents' wishes.The siding of the flying monkeys with the abuser/abusers, can often be the most painful of all the betrayals. My heart goes out to you.

[So Stressed]

Thanks for explaining Zachira and Pink Panther.  It is painful.

[Ventralvagal]

In disordered families, the roles are reversed; the children are parentified, taught to take care of the parents feelings' and ignore their own. ... When children are enmeshed with their parents in a dysfunctional family system, the children usually do not develop the ego strength to see people for who they are, to have empathy for themselves, and to decide how they feel about another person based on their own experiences. There is also fear installed in the children from an early age that he/she will be abandonned and smeared if he/she does not cater to the disordered parent/parents' wishes.The siding of the flying monkeys with the abuser/abusers, can often be the most painful of all the betrayals. My heart goes out to you.

Thank you for this insight Zachira. That really resonates and makes sense. In my experience the flying monkey betrayal was the most painful. Authenticity has to be worth it. I’m sorry for your experience with your brother and sister. Maybe they can gain some freedom of self to grow now that your mom has passed?

[Ventralvagal]

Just had the insight that my brother will not truly know the cold truth of our dad’s complete inability to love him because he will not set the healthy boundaries in which he would, as a natural result of our dad’s pathology, experience being cut off for life. He thinks he stood up for me and the 10 months of silent treatment from our dad shook him and put him into a dark place and he says he’ll never do that again. What he doesn’t realize is if he is merely himself in a healthy way that is the outcome. He is not facing that existential reality and will be deluded for life about his experiences (what is his and what isn’t).

That realization made me think to what I reflected in hope to you about your siblings Zachira. I don’t think that without facing, and then metabolizing, this reality of your mom’s being categorically unable to love, they will be able to find their own experiences from which to have growth of freedom of self, they will always have a delusion that she did have the capacity to love, because they warped their awareness of their own experiences  and the truth of their circumstances to make a make believe reality appear true: they’ll always be deluded if they cannot face the deep pain of that basic truth and the basic truth of that deep pain.

I worry my brother will never get to that point. He also has a narcissistic wife and enables her by being and staying with her. It’s really truly sad that this stuff breaks up families and tears people from being able to stand in the simple truth of knowing their experience, which is foundational for all knowing of self and the world, foundational for joy and creativity and spontaneity and freedom and peace and also self-actualization, making meaningful impacts on the world and deep connection. All of which I’m still working towards. But I won’t sacrifice the only sensible foundation there is to being in this world. Actually being in it and being with myself. Living a lie is wasting the gift of life in some deep existential way.

[zachira]

It takes tremendous courage and determination to face our own pain to be able to recognize disordered family members, especially a mother. Most family members are too enmeshed in the dysfunction to see the truth. Living a life bogged down in lies means missing the most meaningful people and experiences; most of all we miss having an authentic loving respectful relationship with ourselves.