Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I was talking with my brother, who at this point is my sole surviving sibling. Our mother, who passed 25 years ago, was an abusive alcoholic and a malignant narcissist. She was verbally, emotionally and sometimes physically abusive person. None of us was left unscathed. However, as the oldest and only daughter, I took the brunt of her abuse. Meanwhile, our father never confronted her about her behavior. Rather, when we kids would try to defend ourselves when she was verbally abusive, he would pull us aside and tell us not to argue with her. He said when we argued with her, he caught h*ll for it later on. Instead, we were told to ignore her (as if we could do that).
As I got older, I realized that his behavior was just as bad as hers. He enabled her to the point where no one was allowed to confront her on her drinking. No matter how horrible the things she said and did to us kids, he would never speak up. For example, as a teen, she made a salad and ordered me to add olives to it. The only ones I saw in the fridge were green olives. I put some on top. She saw it and went into a rage, then said she was going to get the dog chain and beat me. My father was nearby and didn't say a word or even attempt to intervene. If I hadn't grabbed the chain from her, she would have beat me.
Well...when my brother and I talked, he told me that he found an old photo of our mother and put it up on FB. I hadn't checked FB yet that day. I said to him "I don't miss her at all." That shocked him. Then I pointed out that our father was just as bad for not defending us in any way. BTW, along with the photo of our mother, he left a mushy note calling her "my dear mother".
He then argued with me and claimed that our father was defending us by staying married to her. Plus he thought it was his way of protecting us. I told him "no". If he wanted to protect us, he would have left her and gotten custody of us kids.
My brother as of late, has been watching YouTube videos about narcissists. He said you can't ever escape them. Also, he said he saw videos of men who stayed with their narcissist because of the kids.
When I was in high school, I told a teacher what was going on in our house. Where we were living at the time, when my mother was drunk and screaming at us, crowds would gather outside the house to listen to her.
My mother was very manipulative. People who didn't live with her thought she was so nice. She told people that we never helped her around the house and we were all mean to her. Her friends bought it all. They would talk to me and ask me why I didn't help my mother. When I would tell them that I did help (I did most of her housework), they would tell me it wasn't enough.
So...I told my brother that if I had told a teacher today what was going on in our home, they would have reported it to CPS. My brother refused to believe that.
Long story and thanks for reading.
My question is --- Do you think my brother's take was the correct one where he said by allowing our mother to abuse us all, our father was protecting us? Or do you think my take on this was that he was enabling her by allowing her to abuse us is correct?
It can cause deep wounds and the person's receiving it may or may not be able to acknowledge that it is happening to them.
I don't think what your father did was the correct thing and it surprises me that your brother sees it so differently from you. We all have our own coping mechanisms though.
I would refrain from making comments about your father being as bad as your mom though. Both behaviours aren't good but I'm sure you can understand the difference between being a perpetrator and an victim that has learned to enable that behaviour.
Can you imagine if someone told you that you should have gone to the police to report her, and because you didn't you are as bad as her? Of course it's not the same because your father was an adult at the time, but the principle still stands. It is complicated and messy and in my personal opinion, you are better off not trying to figure out the reasons. Your mother had a mental illness and if it still heavily weighs on you, a good solution is to talk to a psychotherapist.
Your brother is his own person too, so if you believe his behaviour is not healthy you can also suggest that he goes to a psychotherapist. I think these kinds of topics are hard to discuss with people who were immediately involved.
I was talking with my brother, who at this point is my sole surviving sibling. Our mother, who passed 25 years ago, was an abusive alcoholic and a malignant narcissist. She was verbally, emotionally and sometimes physically abusive person. None of us was left unscathed. However, as the oldest and only daughter, I took the brunt of her abuse. Meanwhile, our father never confronted her about her behavior. Rather, when we kids would try to defend ourselves when she was verbally abusive, he would pull us aside and tell us not to argue with her. He said when we argued with her, he caught h*ll for it later on. Instead, we were told to ignore her (as if we could do that).
As I got older, I realized that his behavior was just as bad as hers. He enabled her to the point where no one was allowed to confront her on her drinking. No matter how horrible the things she said and did to us kids, he would never speak up. For example, as a teen, she made a salad and ordered me to add olives to it. The only ones I saw in the fridge were green olives. I put some on top. She saw it and went into a rage, then said she was going to get the dog chain and beat me. My father was nearby and didn't say a word or even attempt to intervene. If I hadn't grabbed the chain from her, she would have beat me.
Well...when my brother and I talked, he told me that he found an old photo of our mother and put it up on FB. I hadn't checked FB yet that day. I said to him "I don't miss her at all." That shocked him. Then I pointed out that our father was just as bad for not defending us in any way. BTW, along with the photo of our mother, he left a mushy note calling her "my dear mother".
He then argued with me and claimed that our father was defending us by staying married to her. Plus he thought it was his way of protecting us. I told him "no". If he wanted to protect us, he would have left her and gotten custody of us kids.
My brother as of late, has been watching YouTube videos about narcissists. He said you can't ever escape them. Also, he said he saw videos of men who stayed with their narcissist because of the kids.
When I was in high school, I told a teacher what was going on in our house. Where we were living at the time, when my mother was drunk and screaming at us, crowds would gather outside the house to listen to her.
My mother was very manipulative. People who didn't live with her thought she was so nice. She told people that we never helped her around the house and we were all mean to her. Her friends bought it all. They would talk to me and ask me why I didn't help my mother. When I would tell them that I did help (I did most of her housework), they would tell me it wasn't enough.
So...I told my brother that if I had told a teacher today what was going on in our home, they would have reported it to CPS. My brother refused to believe that.
Long story and thanks for reading.
My question is --- Do you think my brother's take was the correct one where he said by allowing our mother to abuse us all, our father was protecting us? Or do you think my take on this was that he was enabling her by allowing her to abuse us is correct?
Your Dad was codependent with your Mom and was definitely a classic enabler. He was so afraid of being alone, he stayed so he wouldn't have to deal with a little heartache. The result was a lifetime of misery, not only for himself, but for you kids.
The really sad thing is that if nobody had enabled your Mom, she may have hit bottom and tried to get help and eventually found her place in this world with some quality of life and some peace. I guess that never happened and that is truly sad.
As for your brother, he's in denial. He too is afraid to face the facts and accept them for what they are. This does not mean that your Mother was a narcissist. A lot of people hear that word and before you know it, everyone they know is a narcissist. Narcissistic behavior is quite unique but it could be that your Mom was just an alcoholic, emotionally dependent on your Dad. Your Dad was emotionally dependent on her and definitely did not step up to the plate to get you kids out of that misery.
I'm sorry your relationship with your parents turned out so badly and I'm sorry you still deal with the leftovers. Counseling is the only way to put all of this behind you and start a new life making good memories. I urge you both to do that. Good Luck
Thank you, Both, for your responses. I will address some of the points made.
GoHangr---If, as I child, I had gone to a police station and reported my mothers' behavior, at that time nothing would have been done. I would be told to go home and obey my parents.
My father rarely talked about his childhood but from what I could piece together from his sisters was that their stepmother was a shrewish person. Their mother had died in childbirth (as did the baby) and their father left all but one of the kids with the nuns in a convent. The youngest child was taken in by relatives and she had a better life than my father and older siblings. When my grandfather married a widow who had one child of her own, he took the children home from the convent. So...my father ended up being attracted to women like my mother. I do believe that my mother was a malignant narcissist as well as a mentally ill alcoholic.
As for talking to someone about all of this --- I have tried in the past but our health plan didn't offer much help. Once I saw a social worker during a time when our daughter had gone off the rails. I spent one session discussing this and my husband was called in to talk. In the end, the social worker said we were both fine and didn't need to see him again. So...seeing someone else means paying for it out of pocket which I don't know if we could afford.
Bootsamillion---Everything I've read about narcissists had me nodding along when symptoms were mentioned. For example, she pitted us kids against one another so we never grew up being all that close to each other. My father allowed her to be a tyrant and dictate everything that happened in our home. For example, some weekends my father would suggest that we all take a day trip. My mother was rarely on board with that. Instead of her saying something like "sure, go ahead. I'll stay home." She would make up some job that needed to be done right then and there like cleaning all the screens.
I'll leave it there as there are many more examples. As the only daughter and the oldest, she treated me as her personal slave. To this day, I believe she hated me and nothing I could have done would have changed her mind. She always looked for ways to sabotage me. Here's the real irony --- a few times she cried about her and I not being close. She was that clueless that she thought that despite being abusive we should have had a close relationship.
Once I became a mother, I vowed to never treat my daughter the way I was treated. My husband and I would check each other if we thought the other was being too harsh with her. That was important to me---speaking up if someone was harsh to her.
I went through the same thing, and I am no contact with my parents. My advice to you is GET THERAPY. Narcissists want nothing more than to destroy you and make you as miserable as they are. They think they are justified in everything they do because they are completely insane. If a narcissist had a rallying cry, it would be "if you weren't so stupid, lazy, defective and difficult, I would not have to respond by abusing you".
I'm serious. These people will tear apart families, isolate you, leave you broke or jobless, wipe out your entire support system and not think twice about it. Even worse, they will manipulate you in to thinking you are somehow responsible for their behavior.
If you have the chance, do a search on H.G Tudor. He is a self proclaimed narcissist who got tired of tanking his own relationships, and went in to therapy. As part of his therapy, he has published a handful of books, describing exactly who his type is and what they do. It is an eye opener, and has played a big part in my recovery.
But it also makes sense that you and your brother would see this differently (you were the only girl and you were the oldest; you took the brunt of her) and there is no real need for the two of you to see this the same. Even though you were both in the same place at the same time, your experiences were different.
I hope it doesn't bother you much (if at all) that he sees it differently. It was what it was and it is what it is. After all these years, let it be. Be proud that you endured in spite of it all.
Thank you, Both, for your responses. I will address some of the points made.
GoHangr---If, as I child, I had gone to a police station and reported my mothers' behavior, at that time nothing would have been done. I would be told to go home and obey my parents.
This is a good point. People forget, or aren't aware, that there was a time when children's testimony was dismissed as unreliable. Children did not have credibility against adults. There was a belief among many adults that children were natural liars and manipulators. Dark ages, indeed.
So there was no escape from a child molester in the family, for example. It was extremely controversial once light began to be shed on abuse in families, and incest and other horrors became part of public discourse. A lot of people weren't comfortable with the growing media coverage of such taboo topics, and the acknowledgement that all was not rosy in American families. Fortunately for the child victims, that has changed.
All members of a family where there is active alcoholism have their own unique coping mechanisms to survive the emotional and physical pain. Generally the style of coping depends on the relationship to the alcoholic and the birth order. They are all caught in a system together that they are trying to make work but without understanding the dynamics of the malady are probably working at odds with each other.
I think rather than trying to figure out who was right or wrong it's more productive to look at the way members were shaped by the negative experiences and how to adjust those maladaptive coping mechanisms. You might want to do some exploring in the Adult Children of Alcoholics information page and see if there's something to help you make sense of your confusing childhood.
Because I believe education is part of the solution -
In an effort to encourage understanding of overdrinking and the effects it has on family members I'd like to repeat what I often say.
Current pop psychology borrowed from media dictates that we are awash in Narcissists. Everywhere you read in chat rooms someone is being troubled by it.
It's been my observation that those who habitually drink too much alcohol exhibit all the traits of Narcissism. We see the behavior but not the cause behind it.
The clinical truth is that no one who abuses alcohol can be professionally diagnosed until a lengthy period of abstention. But it is a guarantee if one member of a family is having a substance abuse problem, everyone in the family is confronted with that problem.
Some ignore, some blame, some try to fix, some abandon, some pick up a bottle and join in and the most unfortunate go mad. Most all of those responses will have no positive effect.
A family, in psychology, is a unit, the patient. We see everyone being part of the problem but ourselves.
Did that ever make me feel angry the first time I heard that!
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
