How Do You Grieve Having Disordered Family Members?

[zachira]

I often wonder if some members on PSI are able to deeply cry about the life long losses that come from having disordered family members. I have heard that crying deeply is what helps people to heal from tragic losses. I am also wondering if some members on PSI are able to get in touch with the sadness that underlies the anger of being abused by disordered family members. I have read that there is healthy anger and dysfunctional anger. The healthy anger is when we become extremely resposive to a dangerous situation and act quickly to do what we need to do. Unhealthy anger is about not being able to let go of the anger and not being able to get in touch with the sadness that underlies the anger. If we can truly feel our sadness, than we can cry deeply and feel relief. I often meditate and let myself get in touch with my sadness and sometimes cry, though still feel stuck in my tears, not able to let go enough to cry deeply like people do after the sudden tragic death of a beloved young person. I keep asking about grief indirectly on many of my posts by saying that having ------in the family is a lifelong loss.

[Riv3rW0lf]

Last January, Im1109 mentioned using music to help her travel back to the most hurtful times... I tried it, and this is the only time I was truly able to cry. I had a specific singer and one album in particular I really loved as a kid. And for many years, never listened to again.

When I listened to it last January, I was shocked. The whole album is about emotions abuse. All. The. Songs.

I didn't know it back then. I listened to it when I was 5 or 6 years old, I was dancing on it, and listening to some songs to help me fall asleep. I don't think I truly grasped all the underlying messages of those songs.

One of them is called "Encore et encore" (Again and again) and it talks about a little girl who is being abused and used until her soul tears, and the singer talks to her, and tells her she tried very hard to save her but couldn't in the end. That she faced the wind, the abusers, asking them to leave her be, to not take her away, and no one would listen, and just laughs at her. But the singer loved her and will always love her. I would fall asleep to this specific song.. it felt comforting to me.

When I listened to this album, in current days, I bawled my eyes out like I had never cried before. And I would do sessions of it. I would listen to this album, and I could hear little Riverwolf... She was telling me all about her pain... And it connected, and I cried it all like I never could. In the car, by myself. It felt safe to cry it all out. Those are the only moment I truly remember crying the grief out. Because the grief is about having a disordered person, but also about the childhood we lost to their disorder. 

Anyway... Music can help connect to it, if you have an album from the past maybe.

[zachira]

Riv3rWOlf,
So heartwarming to know you can connect to your sadness with music. I am going to try to do the same. Thank you for sharing. What is the name of the album? I know French and might want to listen to it, if I can find it on Youtube.
I started this thread because so many of us are told be quiet and not show our emotions as children because it upsets our disordered family members. I know I was impaired for a long time in not being able to feel comfortable with my feelings and stuffed them. Still working on going deeper into my feelings as I find acknowledging and processing feelings liberating and healing.

[Riv3rW0lf]

Riv3rWOlf,
So heartwarming to know you can connect to your sadness with music. I am going to try to do the same. Thank you for sharing. What is the name of the album? I know French and might want to listen to it, if I can find it on Youtube.

The album is Corridor from Laurence Jalbert.

Albeit, it's not an album that usually makes people cry. I think for me it's just linked to many repressed memories and emotions and they come up when I listen to it. It used to be very intense, now it's more manageable.

I started this thread because so many of us are told be quiet and not show our emotions as children because it upsets our disordered family members. I know I was impaired for a long time in not being able to feel comfortable with my feelings and stuffed them. Still working on going deeper into my feelings as I find acknowledging and processing feelings liberating and healing.

Yes I think this is true for most of society to be honest. The trauma of having a BPD parent is intense, but a great many people were taught to repress feelings as children, often even unwillingly, by parents who saw the feelings as uncomfortable to deal with. Gabor Maté talks at length about this, if you want to listen to him in YouTube, it's very interesting work.

For some people, emotions are meant to be controlled and repressed, and reason holds the answers. For others, one should be able to deeply cry and always be able to express their emotions.

My daughter started school and I've been giving all this a lot of thoughts. They want to encourage her to cry with her teacher when she is sad and all. The new guidelines are that they need to be able to express their emotions all the time... I'm not sure I agree. I think we need a balance. I don't think one should just go into the public world emoting all the time either. Uncontrolled emotions can be dangerous, for others but also for the one acting them out. One has to be able to control them and then release in a safe place (at home). Controlling pain and anger is decreasing their level to a manageable level, not necessarily repression... Reasoning our emotions is quite an important part of the human psyche as well... But I think I digress.  

I understand what you mean, and if it feels good for you to connect to your pain and live it freely, then you might need it to heal.

For me, I needed it when I started my journey, but I don't feel a need to seek it willingly anymore. However, I don't try to repress my emotions anymore, I acknowledge them and discuss them, which to me feels validating. Then they often go away without a need for deep cries, or punching a pillow.

[Notwendy]

I hadn't heard of that song but there are versions on YouTube with English translations so I listened and wow, what a voice and the words are haunting.

Even the title "Again and Again" references the cycle.

[Cait]

You bring up a good point, there is real grief in having a disordered family member. I have cried many times before and I think I need to begin grieving in a similar way as if my brother has died. In many ways, he has...I have lost him to this illness.

[Couscous]

I Dreamed a Dream from the Les Miserables musical is a real tear jerker for me. With a few minor tweaks to the lyrics it is quite applicable to someone who has grown up in a narcissistic family.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wHdtwKCGzZU

[pursuingJoy]

I appreciate the distinction between healthy and unhealthy anger.

I have cried many times before and I think I need to begin grieving in a similar way as if my brother has died.

I grieved my dad as if he had died. This was layered and took time, because I had to grieve the dad I needed and didn't have. I had to grieve the wrongs done to me, and then I had to grieve the wrongs done to him as a child that led to his behavior. I then had to grieve losing contact, even if it was my choice. All this time, I had to grieve without the community support one would receive if a family member had really died.

My counselor advised me to set aside intentional time to grieve. She also encouraged me to scream and rage (privately and safely) when the emotions became too much. When tears don't help, I think about all I've endured and I let out a good scream of rage, which is truly what the experiences merit. My physical self appreciates it.

[Couscous]

Zachira, it may be possible that you need support from a compassionate therapist or facilitator, or may even a sponsor from 12 Step group like ACA, in order to be able to access your painful feelings so that you aren’t overwhelmed by them.

Bodywork is another way to access emotions. Rolfing and cranial sacral therapy are a couple of examples, but you would need to feel safe with the practitioner.

[Couscous]

I have actually been pondering this exact question for most of the year, and have finally come to conclusion that there isn't actually anything to grieve. I have realized that since I never actually had healthy relationships with my siblings and as such, I am not really losing anything. Instead of feeling sad, I am actually beginning to feel relief. It's a huge relief to no longer be in the line of fire and subjected to constant bullying and dealing with the feelings of worthlessness/shame that would get triggered. I do think that I may have some amount of grieving to do with respect to the buried sadness from my childhood though.

I thought this video made an excellent case for why emotional release is not enough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbF6dNmpu8M

What really resonated with me were the parts (at 13m00s) where he talks about how expressing our anger will do no good whatsoever if we are still attached to it, such as, if we don't want to let someone off the hook. Likewise, if we have a false belief about something, like believing we are worthless, it will also do no good to express our hurt feelings about that either because the solution is that we have to start "disbelieving" that we are worthless. I thought his solution to this was brilliant, which is to tell our inner child that it is not worthless even though our mother treats us like crap, but rather, it's because she is miserable, confused, in pain and projecting onto us. I loved that line and think I'm going to write it out on Post It notes and stick it one up in every room of the house.

[Riv3rW0lf]

Part of me also feels relief.

I had to grieve the childhood I never had, I had to grieve the safe attachment I could never develop with my mother. But it was grieving what didn't happen, as opposed to grieving my mother herself.

What I realize now is that it's not my BPD mother I had to kill figuratively in the end... What I had to do is to let go of this idea of what my mother might someday be. Because the hope of change is what kept me in the abuse cycle.

In the end, I was the lost child of my family...so no contact feels almost normal to me. And now that I truly learned to parent myself, now that I can stand up for myself, and have a safe husband to depend on and who can depend on me... This "loneliness away from my FOO" actually feels safe and good.

What didn't feel normal was my mother trying to suddenly be a huge part of my life the second I had children. This felt forced and scary and uncomfortable. She never acted like my mother, so I don't see why I needed to include her as grandmother... It was the remnant of little riverwolf holding on to hope...this hope is what I needed to grieve and let go of.