Its a shame that your relationship with your parents has broken down…
Id like to try and respond to a question that I often get in relation to my Parents. Its based on the relatively frequent statement that I get, from well meaning and concerned friends and also others, and its a difficult thing to try and explain, but I will do so anyway.
By the way, if you haven’t read it, there’s 30 parts to my survival story, and its here , and theres 15 things not to say to children who have abusive parents here – as there are others to that of above..
And I completely get it the sense that for some people they have a ‘normal relationship’ or even a viable relationship with their parents – one in which theres maturity, fun, highs, lows, conversations, and an emotional maturity – or an acceptance of growing, changing etc. Its viable, at least – no relationship is normal I guess.
The thing is though, a broken down relationship and reconciliation requires a number of factors – truth, honesty and also a requirement for change to happen – and importantly – a broken down relationship implies that there was actually a relationship in the first place.
This is the bit that is and has always been difficult to explain.
I have described already that I was given a variety of roles as a child – chief comforter of the abusive one, trophy child, ‘mature’ , the little grown up, having to work hard, fixer and responsible, being taken from for her glory – with high expectations of making them proud or avoiding giving them stress.
I was born with a role.
My Sister was also born with a role.
(My Dad was also given a role.)
All of these roles are in relation to the abusive one, my emotionally immature mother who was and is mother-child and has many indicators of dark-triad personality, showing high narcissism and psychopathy. It was impossible not to have a role-self as a child – and have the choice to comply or reject this role. With fear and punishment for rebelling or threatening too.
One of the reasons for this is that she played roles too. From an early age I can remember her having to articulate being ‘mum’ now or ‘putting on her ‘dinner lady’ hat on, or ‘loving wife deacon’ role – at church on a Sunday. This got worse as ‘grandma’ , ‘minister’ were added later on.
‘Im playing mum role now‘
Unbeknown to me as a very young child, or even later, this behaviour was normalised – even if it seemed weird – what it might reveal is a splintered personality, deeply – but as a child it meant that there was a falseness to how any interaction was, it was as if it was being played. Disintegrated.
Maybe this is normal too – but it was very obvious too that the mother ‘role’ was the one that she was grumpily reluctant to do, or fulfil – especially instead of work related, or professional ones – most notably anything to do with being a minister. This was the place where she could dedicate to avoid any parenting ‘role’ – which seemed inferior.
So, as part of my survival in this dynamic I had to develop a ‘role-self’ – growing up fast, keeping quiet – because what I wasn’t able to be was my true self – adapting myself into conformity in a role, trying hard to be – for security, belonging or reward – were that to ever come, but gave up on that ages ago.
Nothing around someone so emotionally immature, or psychopath can be seen for itself – it is seen for what it can be for that person to take from, like a parasite. This includes possessions, ceremonies like weddings or funerals (they destroy these) or the general public to denigrate (like waiters etc – big red flag). This included what the three of us around her could be taken from and destroyed.
If the persons around such a person are playing roles – to survive – with a person who is splintered themselves into roles and creates roles around them to take from … what kind of relationship is there?
There isn’t one.
Not a viable, safe one, not one where any sense of real self can be present. Just one in which roles are enforced, played or avoided.
Some of this ‘role’ / hat wearing is revealed when they make contact via writing or email – its often far too formal (going into business speak) , too spiritual (a high spiritualised self) , or mixing up tenses or mixing up writing in the first or third person in the space of one sentence or paragraph – and rarely using ‘I’ – I’ve written about the confusion of the toxic email here. They often write as if its from the other person – the partner who is ‘once’ – but there are usually clues to this – watch for it.
Anyway, what am I getting at.
I suppose what I’m getting at is that part of all of this is an acceptance, of seeing all the roles having to be played – and of realising that because of this – there wasnt an actual relationship – ever. Now, obviously to maintain a role there has to be a lot of pretending, hiding, lying, to maintain appearances and then patterns of denial or justification when threatened. Some of that is what im having to do with therapy, see the roles, and work out what I needed, or what I hid, and denied in myself, feelings, emotions and creativity.
There wasnt a relationship to breakdown. Just people playing parts to survive a psychopath.
James Ballantyne 