I love you, but, it is extremely difficult for me to talk to you right now. Life has been hard for me lately. I know it’s been difficult for you, too. Thing is, I’m trying to find my healthy and you aren’t. You’re not there yet. I hope you find it. I hope you find that reason to…find a reason. Until then, I love you, but, I need to save my words for people who want and work for good things.
I love you.
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Do you mean your literal family or do you mean us? Either way, I hope you turn a corner soon. These things are so hard, progress is messy and a struggle and it’s okay to honor that. I’m working on it too. I will miss you if you go again, but I hope to meet you again when you’re ready.
Also, fuck Ryan Adams.
My literal family and extended family. Too many people are trapped by their own inability to move forward from tragic events, real and imagined.
I can’t interact with most of.my own blood because the air that comes out of their mouth is toxic. I can’t be part of their unhealthy codependency. And it’s been this way for a very long time. Hell, my almost 16 year old son has never met any of them and likely never will.
Also. Fuck Ryan Adams.
It’s super hard to move forward with generational toxicity. I’m really struggling right now with figuring out how to love myself in the context of being brought up as the family scapegoat. It’s hard for me to not be angry. I get to be alive for all of 80 years, and here I’ve had to spend 36 of them not believing I deserve anything good, not trusting myself, pushing down anything I want or need, wondering why I have so much trouble connecting with other people. I want to be mad. But it’s just a distraction, I’ve been mad for years now at this point, I have to move on to being messy and mourning and forgiving her so I can forgive myself. But I think all the time how forgiving her would be so much easier if I didn’t have to deal with her.
What I’m trying to say is that I can relate. I am sorry that you’re having to make tough decisions. Things should have been better for you, 9000%. Keep healing and evolving and breaking patterns, but I admire you so much for being the father that you are and the man that you are knowing even just a little about how you started. You deserved to be safe and loved, that you know how to do that for yourself without anyone showing you, well, I hope I can be like you. I’m trying really hard to get there.
Beautiful, kind words, saf. I’m here if you need to talk to someone who’s been where you are and made it through. Life’s a challenge for just about anyone, anymore, but when you add this family disease that feels like an always present pair of leg weights around your ankles (and not really being able to always identify that as what it is) things can only seem worse. Know your worth. You deserve better from “them” and yourself.
i think you’re doing a pretty great job.
both of you. i’ve know monkey for years and i’m honestly so proud and honored to call him friend.
Not the same thing, but I was checking my LinkedIn profile and MY MOM endorsed me for a bunch of stuff.
Full body CRINGE. Why do parents wreck social media so effortlessly?
I remember the term deFOO, separating from your Family Of Origin.
It’s the healthiest move sometimes…
> What Is Parentification?
> Parentification occurs when parents look to their children for emotional and/or practical support, rather than providing it. Hence, the child becomes the caregiver. As a result, parentified children are forced to assume adult responsibilities and behaviors before they are ready to do so. In addition, they do not receive acknowledgment or support for taking on these responsibilities.
**> **
> The word parentification was coined by the Hungarian-American psychiatrist Ivan Boszormenyi-Nagy, one of the founders of the field of family therapy. The word describes what happens when the roles of parent and child are reversed. Consequently, this role reversal disrupts the natural process of child development. In most cases, it has far-reaching negative effects on the child’s mental and physical health.
When parentification assumes pathological proportions, parents are often unwittingly replaying painful and abusive scripts from their own childhood and setting the stage for succeeding generations to do the same.”
—Gregory J. Jurkovic, author of Lost Childhoods: The Plight of the Parentified Child
Enmeshment Definition:
Enmeshment is a description of a relationship between two or more people in which personal boundaries are permeable and unclear. This often happens on an emotional level in which two people “feel” each other’s emotions, or when one person becomes emotionally escalated and the other family member does as well. A good example of this is when a teenage daughter gets anxious and depressed and her mom, in turn, gets anxious and depressed. When they are enmeshed the mom is not able to separate her emotional experience from that of her daughter even though they both may state that they have clear personal boundaries with each other. Enmeshment between a parent and child will often result in over involvement in each other’s lives so that it makes it hard for the child to become developmentally independent and responsible for her choices.
I quit for 7 years because of her (my mom)
But let something truly awesome happen and crickets.
My father in law told me if I wanted a happy marriage to move away from the family. He meant happy LIFE and he was right.
My wife and I moved away from our immediate family and after 19 years I can say that it was the correct decision. My sister did the same thing. You are seen @Monkey (hoping I used that the right way).
