Babbling Update

Babbling Update
I talked to my therapist about speaking again with my mother. He asked what I thought her response would be. I imagined her looking away, finding a way to race to the end, holding on to everything is now OK.

That is what she did in January when I told her about being kidnapped “but you are OK now”

WTF Mom, I just told you what happened when I went missing for 5 days, you know the time you had cops casing a man’s house, Dad went to AC looking for me. The time I reappeared 60 miles to the north of home in a girls shirt, no socks, no underwear smelling like hell. You ever fucking wonder what that smell was? No, you made sure I had cigarettes and gave me a beer. Sure you asked if I wanted to talk, but you sure slipped off quick when I said no.

Yes I am pissed. Not at her as a person, but as a mother. She doesn’t have a place to put it. But either did I.

How many times do I need to feel this barren gap before I accept it? It hurts.

It was huge that I acknowledged my bravery here. I’ve often written off my escape has the only option. But I could have just as easily have stayed. It wasn’t autopilot that snuck me out of there. It was me, my core being. I’m coming to own that now.

I wish I could share it with my mom in a meaningful way, but I also know she can’t hear, no matter how much I want otherwise.

You guys can, my therapist can, my husband knows it now. For that, I am grateful.
 
Doesn't sound like babbling to me. It sounds like a well thought out response to decades of pain culminating in horrible disappointment. I'm glad you can be so open with us. We're here for you.
 
Sometimes we come to a place of discovery about all of this - some people simply cannot process, don't possess the capacity to process, live in a land where nothing like that ever happens and want you to live there with them, don't know how to handle the reality of what happened so they don't do anything......or some other answer. I'm glad you know this is a safe place where we will listen, talk, weep and listen some more. You're safe with us.
 
I wish I could share it with my mom in a meaningful way, but I also know she can’t hear, no matter how much I want otherwise.
So true. Many of our Family members are so lost on their own pain, they have no empathy for the pain in others, not in their own family members.... not in their own children.

I am glad you have a husband who can support you through this. Understanding and supportive spouses are rare. My wife is only half way in between your mother and your husband. She understands and is supportive to a point, but is too bogged down in her own pain (physical and mental) to have much time to be supportive of me and mine.
 
Talking to my father feels like banging my head against a wall. I know he did his best, I know he loves me, he just can't hear me. I know he is also a survivor of (non-sexual) abuse, he swore never to get drunk and beat his wife and kids (and he never did) and I am forever grateful for that. Unfortunately not beating your kids is not the same as showing the love and attention they craved (and still do). I have stopped trying to talk to him because he can't hear me but that feels like giving up (on myself as much as him). I hope you do find a way to share it in a meaningful way.
What comes to mind is asking her to help you by asking her to share her story. "Hey mom, when I came home and you asked me if I wanted to talk, what where you feeling? Why didn't you keep asking? I really wish we could have talked back then, but it's never too late, right?"
I will be asking my brother to get me my dad's phone number because you posted this, thanks.
 
Just a few years ago, coming to head with these feelings would have been a crisis. But today I am more accepting of the truth I’ve known all along.

I grew up knowing something didn’t belong in my family, in my world. In my self hatred, I assumed it was me. But the unwanted elephant was my trauma. They had no where to put any of it. No words. I was alone.

I can’t thank you enough for the love and support you all give me. I am learning to accept it. Yes, just sitting with it. Thank you.

EQCR, good luck talking to your father.
I hope you are clear what you want and need and that the call can give you some of that.
 
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BDD,
We cannot chose our family and sometimes if we sit back and reflect, we can see the issues/brokenness/faults within them as well. While our parents are supposed to keep us safe, nurture and provide, sometimes their own issues get in the way. What has helped me is reading Brene' Brown "Rising Strong". One of the key tenets is that "people do the best they can". We do the best we can with what tools, coping strategies and support we have. While YOUR best may look vastly different than your mothers, "she did the best she could". That doesn't mean it met your needs, which it clearly hasn't and doesn't. But for me accepting that people do the best they can, has helped me let go of that resentment I harbor against my own mother.
Just to (hopefully) help;
My mother have five children (two husbands) by age 23. The level of neediness she herself carried was huge. I'm the ONLY one to go to college, etc. Yet, I wasn't the favorite, as she didn't view me as needing her. My train wreck (for other reasons) siblings were favored as they all needed her for various reasons. Add to it, I shared my abuse with her and got a "if it happens again, let me know". I needed her to rally around me then, protect me, help me. Instead she buried her head in the sand. She did the best she could with what she had.
Prayers for you!
 
Brennan87,

Thank you!

And she did do her best. I know she did. I don't blame her. I'm just getting so much clarity on the place I came from.
None of this diminishes my love for her.

My mother had a brother who was schizophrenic, a husband who was crippled with severe depression, and my angry/hostile older brother. Her approach to me was "I would figure it out". Something tells me that probably sounds familiar to you. Ha, she was right, I am finally figuring it out!

Just an hour ago I mentioned I never learned the 9 times table.
The person I was telling asked why no one ever told me the digits add up to 9.
Why would they, I never let on that I didn't know it.
I was thought of as "smart", but I knew the truth.
I always figured it out.
 
BDD,
I'm glad you realize that. That is key. I totally get it. I literally thought I grew up in the brady bunch, happy, carefree, nurturing (as I've pointed out in MY STORY) I could take a full week of Jerry Springer episodes. HA
I totally can relate to figuring it out. I was the "Strong one". Good for you for figuring it out! Keep doing you!
 
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