Hi Liese,

What a great topic to ponder.

I am in my early 30s, both of my parents have died, I have a sadistic and somewhat sociopathic and abusive brother I dont speak to. My own aunts and uncles pretty much abandoned me when my mum died 15 years ago.

So for me, the lack of family has been an incredibly painful acknowledgement for a long time. I am incredibly lucky to have a wonderful husband and a one year old boy. My in-laws are very dysfunctional but they aren't abusive so I "manage" them.

I think having a really close and intimate relationship with your T that is safe allows you to have really close relationships with others. You develop the implicit relational skills to determine who its safe to be really close with and those who cant relate from a deep level. However I've found that it also illuminates the reality that there are probably only a handful of people in your life that you will be really "close" to, and that all other relationships will be based on varying levels of superficiality.

It sounds like you are maybe grappling with issues around intimacy and closeness that have their origins early in life. When our caregivers hurt, ignore, neglect, abuse or invalidate us, we learn that being close to another is painful and dangerous.

Great topic.

Having recently lost my mother (October) and have already lost my 2 brothers my family is greatly reduced. My own family is dysfunctional (my fault, I believe). I have no sense of "roots" and am constantly searching for "something". When if comes to family I have come to realise that blood ties do not count. I would consider my friends to my family. I have a few close ones and I would do anything for them and they would do the same for me. It is that connection that makes me use the word family. Everyone else as GE said falls into varying levels of superficiality.

Family is what you make of it, forget traditional thoughts on it.

Liese,

This is a great topic.

I think it's fair to say that own sense of family is limited. My connection to either of my parents is at best, weak; especially emotionally; and i only have one sibling to connect with. The larger family 'group' is also very small. On my fathers side we never saw any of his family at all even as kids and so grandparents and uncles or aunts on that side just don't exist for me. On my mothers side; my grandad died when I was very young and my nan about 10 years ago, and my mother only had one brother who, as an uncle, I'm not at all close to.

Thinking of 'family' as just one of those boxes that make up our lives; if we have enough other boxes besides family, it ought to be possible to live a fulfilled life without that one. I cut off ALL contact with the whole of my family for 15 years; and whilst I made a desperately poor job of it; I did survive, and in some ways made progress in spite of it. Ultimately, we come into the world alone, we depart it alone, and in between we are individually responsible for our own survival, fulfillment and happiness. We have to be since we can't guarantee that anyone else will be around when we need them.

Do you think we live in a society today; in the Western world especially, where the tradional sense of family has been diluted? Since the time when ease of movement has allowed the old family groups to become more easily and quickly fragmented, has it become more important to find other 'family' as Scars has mentioned? Having said that; the tradional idea of the younger generation taking care of the parents in their old age still seems to exist; and I guess those fortunate to have children at least secretly hope they would be there for us in our old age, just as we expect to have to share the looking after of our parents with our siblings.

Greeneyes and Scars are right in that there are perhaps only a small number of people throughout our lives that we allow ourselves to become close to, and the rest exist in various levels of superficiality; one of those being our spouse, one would hope. In a secure relationship with a spouse they, and any children, become the important family.

I know it's a well worn cliche but it's true; you can't choose your family, but you can choose your friends; and I think Scars is right:-

quote:

Family is what you make of it, forget traditional thoughts on it

Good topic, Liese.

I've danced around a reply on this for a long time, and by the looks of the number of people who have read vs who have posted, I think I'm not alone.

Family is a four letter word for me. Between the trauma, abandonment and incest from my natural family and numerous step-parents in my life, there are no warm fuzzies there...only fear and anguish.

As a child, I found my ability to survive in nature. I would escape to my animals and to the mountains for safety. (Thus, my nickname.) Over the years, there were people who would help me on my path, but eventually, they moved on, too.

When I got married, I was bound and determined to not follow in the footsteps of my parents...to have a healthy marriage and a healthy family, but that didn't work out so well, either. And given that my parents track record on subsequent marriages was pretty poor, I don't think I'm making any promises or setting any goals wrt future relationships.

So, now I have my daughter, and we have a really good relationship. She's entering the teen years, so I am prepared for some rough years ahead, but at least I've gotten some experience that I can be a part of a family, and that it can be as healthy as possible.

And I still have nature.

"Family" has reared it's head again in my life.

My hubby's parents are separated and my FIL is remarried. Step MIL has two kids from her first marriage and has always hated DH and his sisters bc she's off the scale insecure and jealous. FIL is youngest of 4 sibs.

This past weekend step MILs daughter got married and me, DH and his sisters weren't invited to the wedding. I found about the wedding via Facebook. There have been countless fights over the years her DH and his sisters have been accused of being rude to step MIL and being made to fel unwanted and unwelcome at FILs home. Can guarantee that if step MILs kids weren't invited to DZh or sisters wedding there would be hell to pay.

Secondly, DHs cousins daughter got married yesterday and there are photos all over Facebook that clearly show all cousins except FILs kids were invited. This has happened before and we were promised it wouldn't happen again. These cousins are narcissistic, snobby elitists who I have little in common with and only speak to at family functions.

I've spent much of the day trying to figure out why I'm so bothered about this. There are the obvious reasons that its hurtful to be left out, to be disrespected and to be on the receiving end of unfair discrmintory actions, not to mention the stench of hypocrisy.

But when I dig a bit deeper I'm really offended my FIL was too cowardly to speak to us beforehand and that he attended both functions. To me this says "treat my kids like shit, I don't care". The collusion, selfishness and ok of loyalty really stings. I'm also annoyed at myself because I'm so sensitive ; I wish I didn't feel hurt or left out or that it didn't bother me so much.

Hey Greeneyes,

quote:

I wish I didn't feel hurt or left out or that it didn't bother me so much.

I hear you on that one. My H went through something similar with his Dad and step-M. Everyone blamed the step-M for a long time until they realized that the Dad's silence was acquiescence. I have another friend who went through something similar with her Dad and step-M. It seems like the women run the family show and the Dad's kids often get neglected.

It is too bad that no one talked to you guys ahead of time. It might have made it a little easier to work through. I don't know about you but it always feels a lot more hurtful when you find out something like this from a third party (in your case, facebook) than if say, your H's Dad, had taken the time and care to explain it face to face. It was cowardly.

Thanks Liese
And yes I would prefer to hear difficult news first hand than through the grapevine.
I think the other reasons this has been so hard is that there is a little girl inside who wants the fairy tale happy ever after family. And unfortunately it's also triggered inner shame ( which is exactly how narcs operate) even though I've done nothing wrong.