(((kashley)))

I know this is such a bind. I'm in a similar situation in that I feel compelled to do SOMETHING about the stuff those inside share with me, but can't fully believe it enough to do anything. And I'm scared to death of being "proved" wrong. These are people who were routinely able to convince me things I knew were true were either lies or exaggerations. Even if they're no threat to me anymore, I'd rather anything than have to hurt that way again. I guess, I have the benefit that my parents haven't been in contact with one another almost at all since my childhood. Also, they are both flakes who mostly forget about me if I don't initiate. Since all this stuff has come up, I guess I stopped trying as much to be the good daughter and just started thinking about my safety and how triggering it is to see or hear from them.

I think, if I had your situation, I still might not be able to do anything, but if I were going to do it, having my T with me at the time would be absolutely the way to go. I don't think I could do it without him. I was at lunch with my mom and my little sister for her birthday a few months ago and my little sister started antagonizing mom, saying, "Remember when you used to forget all of us at school, you wouldn't pick up our little brother and then we'd all get phone calls to come get him, because you forgot?" and stuff like that. She did the same thing at mom's birthday last October, literally pointing out at my own mom's birthday breakfast that she considered ME her mom. I started dissociating and freaking out and trying to hint to knock it off. Mom tried to laugh it off. I dissociated so bad and triggered the part who grew up in that home I had a car incident on my way home and didn't even realize it until hours later. I'm sharing a lot of my own stuff, I'm sorry, but I'm trying to say, I guess I understand how it can feel so unsafe or scary to confront, even if the person in question doesn't seem threatening (or anymore). I think, even though your T is trying to help you take care of yourself, she will still understand if this is just not something you're ready to do.

I struggle with the same wonder of whether it is legitimate to not want to hurt others who don't know the extent of how bad things were (or else, how badly I was affected, as others weren't affected as much), and to not want to put myself in the way of more abuse or invalidation. The guy who did the worst stuff that nobody knows also physically abused my older sisters (which is known to the whole family) and they got taken away as a result and I got left alone with my mom while she had a breakdown as a result and I have zero memories of that time period. So, I think we have always kind of known that mom can't handle stuff. Even if she weren't neglectful and emotionally abusive, she needed to be taken care of. It sounds to me like somewhere inside you learned too that your mom needed to be taken care of in that way. It seems instinctive. I do think, even if you're not ready, that whatever decisions you can make to separate, make things safer, are good. I don't know if this is any help. I'm kind of in a weird, fuzzy place, and it might not make much sense.

I guess, the biggest thing is, I understand and I'm sorry that I'm not wise enough to know what is "right," except I think whatever keeps things feeling safest inside as you move forward in your work with your T would be a good thing to plan on. If confronting all of this before you're ready will make things less safe inside than slowly cutting off contact until you're ready, I'm sure that's not what your T would want.

Thank you both, so much. I'm so sorry - I'm just not in a good place to respond right now. I feel so stupid for it (my T would hate that I wrote the word stupid), but I'm just feeling too much pain over my father's visit that is coming up. It's still about two weeks away, but I already feel like I can't deal with it. And it's all my fault! Ughhh.

Sorry for complaining. I shouldn't be, considering I could have changed this.

((((((KASHLEY))))))

Go on and complain. You are stuck in a terrible position. I am a little hesitant to agree with your T that this needs to be addressed because it doesn't sound like you are ready. It also sounds like it's on your T's agenda, not yours. I can totally identify with the feeling of feeling crushed, negated, destroyed and invalidated if your mother reacts in any kind of negative manner or blows it up and tells your father, all of that on top of your OWN pain, that is yours and yours alone. I know your T wants to help you but maybe you are just not ready to do this yet. Will you still see your T after you graduate? Is she feeling some kind of pressure to do this now because you won't be seeing her anymore?



Liese

((((Kashley))))

I’m really sorry for all you’re going through right now. I know it is a horrible place to be in. My T also recently suggested a joint session with my mother. His suggestion freaked me out so much I had my first panic attack that night. The truth is that I am just not ready for that step yet. I still feel a huge amount of shame that I am acting like my childhood was awful. I still feel like I am lying when I talk about abuse that I know really happened. I know that right now, if I were to have a session with my mother and she didn’t believe me or acted like what happened to me wasn’t a big deal, I wouldn’t be able to deal with it.

Can I see it happening at some point in the future? Yes, although it is terrifying to think about. But right now, I know I am not ready, and I am OK with that truth. My T accepts that as well, which is hugely important for me, because if he kept bringing it up, I know I would try to make him happy and give in before I was ready. So if you do this, make sure it is because it is what you want to do, and you feel strong enough to handle whatever happens, rather than doing it because your T wants you to do it.

I also have struggled with the decision of whether to cut off contact with my father or not. For me, it is complicated by the fact that I have two younger half-sisters (ages 4 and 9) who still live with him. While I would like nothing more than to never have to see him again, right now I still maintain contact so that I can have a relationship with my sisters, and try to make sure that they are protected. (For what it’s worth, if I thought I could make a legal case against him I would, but the abuse happened in Latin America and my father currently lives in Asia, and our laws aren’t set up for that situation.) So I can understand you keeping in contact with your father to protect your mother, even when others around us can’t understand why we wouldn’t cut our abusers out of our lives. That said, your mother is an adult and has the ability to protect herself, even if it may not seem like it, and you are completely justified in cutting off contact with your father if that is what you want to do.

I’m sorry your upcoming graduation is so stressful for you because of your father. It can be extremely hard to see your abuser in person and have to act like everything is normal. My father, step-mother, and two sisters stayed at my house for a month over Christmas, and it was agonizing. I felt like I didn’t deserve my T’s support because I had caused the situation to happen by allowing the visit. It was really hard to go into my first session after my family arrived, but I was able to talk about it with my T, and he was able to reassure me that he didn’t judge me for creating the situation. That he was there to support me no matter what, and that even though it would be better for me to not have to see my father, he understood why I kept in contact. He also helped me see that I was an adult and did have alternatives (like leaving the house and staying with a friend or at a hotel) if it got too bad at home, even if those alternatives seemed hard to do, because my first priority had to be protecting myself.

So I say get through this visit however you can. See your T and don't worry about her judging you. Can you schedule more frequent sessions with your T while your father is there? Do any of your friends know about your father? Can you set up something with them where they can call you with an "emergency" to get you out of a situation if you need it? Or have them stay around you so you can limit the time you are alone with your family? Sometimes just knowing you have options can make the visit easier to get through. Good luck, and we are here to support you whatever happens.

-Bee

CTL, thank you for the support. It helps to know that I'm not the only one struggling to figure out what the best thing to do is. Here's to hoping we both eventually can work it out.

((Yaku)), please don't be sorry for sharing. Just like you've said me sharing my stuff is helpful to you, reading about your experiences is tremendously helpful to me as well. I think I feel almost incapacitated (or "frozen") and stuck in a fear response where I can't decide which choice will ultimately result in the least amount of hurt. And I guess I'm still in the place where staying with something that is familiar yet harmful is preferable to choosing an unknown, even if it could be a safer situation. I feel like I'm old enough to have enough forethought about which decision will be best, but some little parts are not. Another part of me is also worried that T will terminate me if I don't stop doing these things that are harmful to me. I was reading back over some past journals and about a year and a half ago I was really stressing out about the new semester starting and I was taking a lot of credits. And T made some comment and then T said that I was putting her in an awkward position. She said that it was like if I came in and wanted to cut off my leg and asked her support, and it's just not something she can support. I asked her at the time if she was giving me an ultimatum, and she said she didn't want it to "seem like that." I still am not quite sure how to interpret that. Anyway, I'm afraid that I'm putting her in that same position now and that it's only a matter of time before she says, "You either need to stay out of contact with your father somehow, or I can't help you anymore." I don't know what I would do if she said something like that.

Hey Liese, thank you for your support. ((hug)). I will continue to see T after I graduate, as I go off campus to see her. I think it is really hard for her to see me in pain (which is something that is hard to realize and admit, because it means I'm acknowledging she even cares) and so I think she really wants me to get out of this situation where I will inevitably come face to face with the source of my pain over and over again. She also asked me last session what steps I thought I would need to take before I could tell my mother, and I said that I'd essentially have to be okay with seeing anything my father does or says to her as a result of my actions (because there's no way she won't mention anything), and that I'd also have to be okay with her blaming me for it. I don't know how to be okay with that. It's pretty much the crux of the matter, really. What if I end up doing more hurt to more people of I say something, rather than just continuing to tolerate what I'm used to if I stay quiet? T keeps telling me that we are all selfish in many ways, but what if this is too selfish?

Hi Nannabee, I'm so glad you're able to accept that you're not ready and that your T is accepting of that too. That really is so important. My T has said before that she wants me to make the decision because I want to do it and not because I'm trying to please her. But I'm such a people pleaser, and with how often she's bringing it up, I'm finding it hard to parse out whether I'm actually feeling a tiny bit more ready to say something or if I'm just convincing myself that I'm ready so that I can please my T.

I can't imagine how hard that was over Christmas. I had a hard enough time over Christmas and my father was only here for four days. I've thought about asking T for an extra session during the time he is here, but I haven't felt deserving enough of it. I'm even without a session next week because the only thing she had was a couple days sooner than a week, and she mentioned that that wouldn't be a full week, and I of course took that as her saying that she can't stand to see me more often than at least every 7 days. So I'm not sure how I'll get up the gall to ask for more sessions, although I'm going to try.

Thanks everyone. I'm sorry if this reads like a pity party. Yuck. And I apologize for any spelling or grammar mistakes. I won't have my computer for a couple days and somehow managed to write this long post from my phone. Not quite sure how!

And now, here I am again, completely triggered, thinking thoughts I haven't had in a long time, because of being in a situation that I wouldn't have to be in if I just did what my T is wantin me to do. And I completely get why, but I just don't know if I can. But I also don't know if I can handle this either. I feel like I'm going to lose it. I keep seeing flashes of myself in my head completely falling apart or just going crazy. And any time I'm out walking or doing something I look down at the ground and think about how much I wish I could just collapse and have nothing matter anymore, including me.

I'm being dramatic, I know, and I'm sorry. Im calling my T tomorrow about scheduling a session, and I'm hoping she's had a cancellation this week so that I don't have to wait until the week after that to see her.