For me, another significantly liberating day, was the day my father posted on my blog "stop being a victim, shit happens." I got to post back, and I know he read it though he had nothing to respond "I have stopped being a victim the day I let you know my boundaries. I am no longer a victim, but I think you are."
I let him know previous to that a continued relationship with me meant 1) we work on our relationship before we talk or discuss the monster 2) I am never likely to have a relationship with the monster, so deal 3) my father and I will not have an "open" communication to be whatever he wants, unless that communication is earned. He had wanted the topics to suddenly open up to everything, and he has never had that place in my life. Few people do, and those people have earned my trust, love, and respect simply by being nice people that I wish to talk things out with. Just because he got my mother pregnant, does not mean he suddenly has the right to pry in my life, as he used to try to. Or in other words 4) your control of me is over not beginning.
He couldn't agree to any of it. That was one liberating moment, when I realized that someone not able to meet me on these simple facts, isn't worth considering as being part of my life. He had 18 years where I "complied" with his wishes, and he abused that.
The final liberating moment when I was able to say, "no, you don't understand, I stopped being the victim when I stopped catering to you." I am free now, you are not. (if you still feel the need to try and contact me) That was the last time he visited my blog, which is not geared for him anyway, but to discuss this with other people (and there are a frightening amount of people experiencing the worst of this) about this. This board and other people have been very eye opening in that what I experienced/am experiencing is not unusual, just not talked about very openly or at all.
That "programing" not to disagree, not to discuss, to be ashamed of not getting along with your parents (or kids, or siblings, or uncles, aunts et all) no matter their behavior, is so ingrained in us, especially if we came from a family of dysfunction. Anyone who sought to help us, was encouraged to be erased from our life.
Until a conversation with my husband, I didn't even think I had talked to him about all this early on. I don't know how early on, but he had said that he was aware of those things for awhile. In fact, now that I think of it, he was around when I moved in with my father and monster, so it would have been kind of hard for him to be unaware. That happened early on in our relationship, it's amazing he didn't run far away. It's amazing that my parents tried to discount him, while he was always encouraging me to work on (and then not when it became apparent it was not working) my relationship with him, and he tried to help (albeit perhaps a bit misguidedly). See his relationship with his parents is and has been so great, it's really hard for him to have imagined (back then) how awful my relationship was with my parents.
Anywho, just some more thoughts that came to me as a result of this thread. I think these liberating moments are times that freed us up from that place we WERE frozen in or announce a step in walking away from that frozen state. A lot of my procrastination, for instance, is (IMHO) a learned response from the stress in my family. I used to go into my closet with a flashlight (and my stuffed animals) to get away from my family. I find I still use this response of freezing up somewhere with something comforting to deal, and keep trying to change this behavior in myself, but backslide frequently.
I let him know previous to that a continued relationship with me meant 1) we work on our relationship before we talk or discuss the monster 2) I am never likely to have a relationship with the monster, so deal 3) my father and I will not have an "open" communication to be whatever he wants, unless that communication is earned. He had wanted the topics to suddenly open up to everything, and he has never had that place in my life. Few people do, and those people have earned my trust, love, and respect simply by being nice people that I wish to talk things out with. Just because he got my mother pregnant, does not mean he suddenly has the right to pry in my life, as he used to try to. Or in other words 4) your control of me is over not beginning.
He couldn't agree to any of it. That was one liberating moment, when I realized that someone not able to meet me on these simple facts, isn't worth considering as being part of my life. He had 18 years where I "complied" with his wishes, and he abused that.
The final liberating moment when I was able to say, "no, you don't understand, I stopped being the victim when I stopped catering to you." I am free now, you are not. (if you still feel the need to try and contact me) That was the last time he visited my blog, which is not geared for him anyway, but to discuss this with other people (and there are a frightening amount of people experiencing the worst of this) about this. This board and other people have been very eye opening in that what I experienced/am experiencing is not unusual, just not talked about very openly or at all.
That "programing" not to disagree, not to discuss, to be ashamed of not getting along with your parents (or kids, or siblings, or uncles, aunts et all) no matter their behavior, is so ingrained in us, especially if we came from a family of dysfunction. Anyone who sought to help us, was encouraged to be erased from our life.
Until a conversation with my husband, I didn't even think I had talked to him about all this early on. I don't know how early on, but he had said that he was aware of those things for awhile. In fact, now that I think of it, he was around when I moved in with my father and monster, so it would have been kind of hard for him to be unaware
Anywho, just some more thoughts that came to me as a result of this thread. I think these liberating moments are times that freed us up from that place we WERE frozen in or announce a step in walking away from that frozen state. A lot of my procrastination, for instance, is (IMHO) a learned response from the stress in my family. I used to go into my closet with a flashlight (and my stuffed animals) to get away from my family. I find I still use this response of freezing up somewhere with something comforting to deal, and keep trying to change this behavior in myself, but backslide frequently.
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