Alcoholic would like a F & F reality check.
I'm an alcoholic. I am also bipolar/MDD/choose your diagnosis....but I've been on fairly heavy-duty meds for about 15 years. I have lived on a different continent from the rest of my immediate family, I have not asked for or expected a penny or minute of help or support from family since I was 17 years old and left home; I am now 53. My family does not have a culture of being supportive with each other; mostly we're indifferent and distant.
Back in 1996, I got very trashed at a family function. I don't believe I impacted anyone directly except for being trashed and embarrasing (and I paid my own way out of it) but it, and I, have become She Who Must Never Be Mentioned. This is how my birth family is - any hint of imperfection is completely ignored. Even after I communicated separately with everyone to apologise, it was ignored, like it never happened. I quit drinking shortly after that.
A couple of years later, there was another family function planned....I sent a sort of perky letter to everyone, saying that it was OK to mention that I was an alcoholic, no need to ignore the fact, and that I did NOT make any sort of big deal about it....I just sort of wanted to make the point it wasn't a verboten or shameful topic. This was in response to the crashing silence on the topic from my family...I guess it was both a prod and a reminder that it was something I was OK with and nobody needed to feel weird about it.
Well that went down like a lead balloon; silence! OK, fine. Except in the last ten years or so I have had some very bad things happen in my life mostly out of my control - an arson fire, a resurgence of bad mental issues which landed me briefly in hospital and rendered me somewhat uncommunicative for about a year. Also I started drinking again. During this entire time, I never asked anyone for help and relied on my savings and working when I could - I've never taken a penny of government or family assistance. I have a couple of times leaned on friends for support, but over the last 30 or so years, the few times I have asked for understanding or (only once, after the fire) a loan, it's gone rebuffed.
During the last 15 years, I have called and sent letters or emails to family members apologising for my few misdeeds as they related to the family (including to my sister, who is a psychologist.) I'm not lying when I say that over the last 20 years, I have provided a place to stay, free use of vehicles, support, money, rides, etc, to family members who have come to the US...it's not like I've ever been a user or taker. In fact, in a weird sense, I've been the "enabler" big sister even though I am the most farked up and poorest of the family.
Yet to this day, not a single soul in my family has ever said "how are you doing with the not-drinking thing?" or "how are you doing with the bipolar thing" or even made a passing mention. (I made a point a few years ago to tell my mother and sister that I did not want sympathy or pity, I didn't want concessions, but I would appreciate an occasional check-in or acknowledgement.) Mental illness (and to a lesser degree, drug and alcohol use) has been huge part of my life. I hide it mostly, but I love the friends in my life that accept me warts and all.
Anyway, since then my uber-religious psychologist sister has not spoken to me, and my mother mentions nothing that doesn't involve fairies farting sparkly rainbows in her direction because the notion that any of her children is less than perfect is a personal affront. Apparently I am a threat to the illusion of family perfection and genetic purity?
I'm miles from being perfect but I am not a horrible person. I volunteer, I do stuff in the community, I pay my own way in life, I help people, I'm a good friend. But this shutting-out by my own family hurts like a mother*******. I read people writing here about being worried and stressed about their alcoholic or addicted family members and feel sad that nobody in my family feels that way. Perhaps that's common, I don't know.
Sorry this is probably way long. I guess my question for F & F is...is it normal and OK for a family to circle the wagons and exclude someone who has mental health/addiction issues? I swear to God I have made a point not to involve anyone in the family (heck they mostly live 3,000 miles away), and the only time I can think of my drinking ever, EVER had an impact was my brother's wedding in 1996...and I have turned myself inside-out apologising for that because I felt so guilty.
Did I reap what I sowed, and is it a healthy thing for family to cut me off?