Iwanttoheal

Please join in with this thread, I'm sure we have a lot to share in this area.

It came as quite a shock to my system to learn that as an ACAO, I had lived half my life based on lies that were fed to me as a child and that I continued to believe as an adult. I am in the process of rejecting the lies and redefining my past in terms of new truths.

I'll start with one of the biggest lies that I was fed:

Lie Codie Mum: Your childhood wasn't as bad as all that.

Truth No Mum. It was bad, very bad indeed. I am lucky to be alive because you allowed me to continually be driven around by a drunk driver. I escaped being sexually molested by a hair's breadth - there but by the Grace of God go I.

And another:

Lie Codie Mum: It was all because of your father's drinking.

Truth No Mum. You were both equally responsible for my childhood, you both chose to abdicate your responsibilities to your children.

I'll leave you with a beauty:

Lie Codie Mum: Because of everything I have had to put up with due to your father's drinking, I have earnt the right to have a quiet retirement being looked after by my children. (I kid you not, she actually said that to me in all seriousness)

Truth No you egotistical *****, you have earnt NOTHING


Looking forward to hearing your lies and truths, IWTHxxx


Just to add, I AM serious about moving forward as well as redefining my past. I am going to my first Al-Anon meeting on Tuesday.

discontentmiser

yeah, I'm just going through the long process of sorting through all the lies and half-truths and conditioning.

I got really pissed off at my mom; she was speaking at a conference (AA and alanon) and talked about how she didn't realize she was abandoning us (brothers, sister and I) with our AF. She was just realizing her responsibility in our childhood.
Took her long enough.

I was so angry because she said it so casually; I cried right there among other people.

hooray for planning to go to alanon; I'm sure you'll find people with experiences like your own, only maybe they'll know how to handle some of it.

tromboneliness

Ain't that the truth! My sister and I used to be terrified when we'd be in the car with my Dad when he was hammered. He'd be going too fast, wavering this way and that, and sis and I would be sitting in back (as far back as possible, when we had a station wagon -- not sure what they call that type of car on your side of the pond); my sister would say, "Slow down, Dad, it's really foggy out there," when of course it was nothing of the sort -- but she wanted him to slow down so he wouldn't wrap the three of us around an oak tree!

Most teenagers look forward to the day they get their driver's license -- in my case, it was so I could go out with my parents and not have to worry about how pickled they got, because I had the car keys!

T

leelee5675

I remember the driving thing only too well, too! My parents' best friends lived on a lake about 20 minutes from our house. Very narrow, hilly, winding roads that were scary enough sober. I remember being 8-10 years old, laying in the backseat pretending to be asleep. The terror of wondering if we would make it home alive is very real to me even today (I'm 52).

I also remember wondering why my mother would let him risk the lives of me and my sister like that. All she had to do was stand up to him. He would be so drunk when we left there that even I (at 8 years old) could have knocked him over.

My big lie?
Lie: "Your older sister deserves to be spoiled and treated better than you because you were a better baby and your father ignored her after you were born. You can do without things that she can have. It'll make you a stronger person."

Just think for a minute about that statement, dissect it, and think about how seriously dysfunctional it really is. This attitude continued well into our adult lives.

Truth: WTF??? I didn't do anything but be born. That doesn't make her more important or worthy than me.

Iwanttoheal

(((LeeLee))) I feel your pain.

Yep, I had the "deprivation makes you stronger" lie fed to me as well. No deprivation makes you hungry, cold, ill, scared and feel unwanted, unloved and uncared for. Continued deprivation makes you learn to endure and eventually makes you feel that you are unworthy. You end up with no self-esteem or sense of self-worth.

I can relate to money being spent on your sibling and not on you. I was at college struggling to feed and clothe myself and pay my rent and bills. I was "doing without" big style in order not to get into debt. My brother was at home, not working and going out with his mates every night. My AF used to give him money EVERY night in order for my brother to go out and get drunk with his mates. He was under the LEGAL age for heaven's sake - 18 in the UK.

There's a message to give your kids - (son) you're worth spending money on because your going out drinking; (daughter) you're going hungry - too bad, you're on your own.

And from my codie Mum "I used to get so mad when I saw your Dad giving your brother money every night to go out and get drunk when I new you were really struggling at college. Oh yeah Mum and exactly WHAT did you do about it to make it right. Oh that's right, you did NOTHING just like you've ALWAYS done because you are so helpless - b*llsh*t.

Ooops, sorry for the rant, I'm doing a LOT of ranting these days - that's what comes with keeping it all inside for 44 years - there's a lesson there somewhere.

takincareome

Thanks for this post. I've found it and the responses extremely interesting.

I guess my big lie would be similar to one of yours: "It's all your dad's fault."

Because of this line of bull, fed to me by my mother starting at a very early age, I did blame my dad for everything in my life. I mean EVERYTHING. I was able to unravel a lot of it through therapy, but strangely I never felt like I'd accomplished much and I still wasn't happy. It's only been recently -- very recently -- that I've started looking at the role my mother -- martyr, perpetual victim -- has played in all this.

Her other lie, which was never actually said but might as well have been written in stone, was: "I can't take care of myself. It's your job to take care of me. You are supposed to be available to me 24/7, no matter what else is going on in my life, to listen to me and be my sounding board, wailing wall and cheerleader. It doesn't matter if I never take steps to remedy my situation, I still like to complain about it, and that's where you come in."

Glad to hear you're giving al-anon a try, iwth. It definitely can't hurt. I've enjoyed it for the most part.

Iwanttoheal

Hey takincareome, when did you sneak into my life, I could have written your post word-for-word (like many of us round here, I guess)


Ditto. I've only recently (as in the last month) looked at the role my own mother played in the mess that was my childhood and the role she continues to play in my adult life. The clarity is coming at me at 100 miles an hour and it ain't pretty.

I have wondered what made me start to look at her afresh and for me, it was the fact that I reached the point where I thought I've had enough of this, I don't want this any more, what do I GET out of my relationship with you, you are hurting me (a lot).


Here's todays lie:

Lie Women didn't go out to work in those days

Truth No. You were too scared / lazy to go and get yourself a job. My friend's Mums all went out to work.

takincareome

Here's my mom's current favorite lie:

I need you to support me financially. I can't get a job.

Truth: You can get a job. You've turned down several job offers because you didn't think they paid you enough. You'd rather complain about your circumstances, blame others for it and sit there with your hand out instead of take responsibility for your situation and take action to change it.

leelee5675

OMG...TCOM, IWTH and Discontent...we're quadruplets!!! Tromboneliness...what about your mother? We might actually be quintuplets!!

My point...I have felt so alone for so long about my mother (the codie) being more of a problem to me emotionally than my father's alcoholism ever was (not to say that wasn't a problem).

I have been posting on this site for about a month, but was mainly in the F/F Substance Abusers section, cause I'm currently dealing with a RAD. When I started dealing with that, and reading and educating myself on this site, I realized how badly I needed help with my emotions about my codie mother that I never confronted. I have allowed her to keep me feeling bad about myself since I was about 10.

I was just about to post and ask if I was the only one suffering from this. I am currently no contact with my mother, but I know that won't last forever. She's in a nursing home with dementia along with a host of other health problems. When my RAD's addiction blew up (about a month ago) and I had to take custody of my granddaughter (upon my attorney's advice), I stopped going to see my mother. Every time I had gone recently, she would get me in the community room in front of a bunch of fellow residents and try to humiliate me. With everything else going on in my life, I knew I would "snap" if I continued to see her right now. I called my sister (the golden child that has never been there for my mother) and told her I couldn't do it anymore...that she would have to take the reins. We're in the process of getting my mother moved to Dallas, where my sister lives. So for the first time in a long time I feel hope that I might get a chance to get some of my coping skills back in tact before I have to deal with my mother again.

IWTH, thank you so much for starting this thread, and thanks to each of you for your posts...I don't feel anywhere near alone as I did a couple of weeks ago.

Discontent...I felt a stab in my heart when I read your post. I know those feelings only too well. Many, many, many times I have left my mother's prescence and cried to my core because the things she would say in such a nonchalant manner made me feel unloved and insignificant.

From the things that have come out in this thread, I see that the codie parent can be just as much of a threat to our emotional well-being as the addict. I had always felt that way about my situation, but had not encountered others that expressed it before now. Even in Al-anon in our small town...the focus was always on the trauma caused by the addict.

Again...thank you, thank you, thank you. Please keep posting. Don't leave me now!!!

Leelee

tromboneliness

Well, that's where it gets complicated -- I actually didn't have too many she-needs-a-program problems with my Mom. Unfortunately, she was severely bipolar for the first several years of my life, until they discovered lithium (well, not discovered per se, but found out how good it was for bipolar disorder!) in the late '60s. So my "abandonment" issues were mostly on account of I was abandoned by my Mom -- who couldn't help it, because her brain was all out of whack!

Once she got healthy, we actually got to be good buddies -- I'd say when her meds were in balance, my Mom and I got along pretty well most of the time, and she had very little of the manipulative/control stuff going on. She basically let me grow up the way I wanted to and didn't do much of the bad stuff that causes us to need this forum, etc.

Unfortunately, it had a horrible ending -- she had a fall on the ice in December, 2007, and because of a series of complications that rapidly got out of control, her mental illness returned along with the physical injuries from the fall. She eventually picked up a MRSA infection in the hospital, and after suffering its debilitating effects for months, she died last November. My worst fear -- that she would die insane -- was realized, because the infection, painkillers (she developed a ferocious addiction to pain pills during her hospitalization), and other complications really messed with her head, to the point where she was rarely lucid at all during her last six months or so.

But I digress. Yeah, I'm happy to join the quintet!

T

leelee5675

I'm so sorry, Tromboneliness. What a roller coaster. I was married for 13 years to an undiagnosed bipolar. It is a very cruel condition. Had he been diagnosed, we might never have divorced.

A good part of my mother's current dementia problems are caused from falls and blows to the head, so I can relate to what you went through there, too. And that MRSA is a monster, from the documentary I watched about it.

Glad, though, that you had some good years where you guys got to be close. I actually had that for a short while when my kids were very young. She was attending al-anon and things seemed to get a little better. When the kids were pre-adolescent she quit attending meetings and seemed to revert back to at least twice the codie she was prior to attending.

Oh, well...glad I told you that cause it reminds me I need to get myself back to al-anon!

dothi

(((((((((((((Tromboneliness))))))))))))))


Lie: You have to be a perfect (i.e. willing to drop everything in your life to come home on a whim, excel at school, excel at work, eventually earn enough money to support us, etc.) daughter/son in order to earn love.

Truth: People will love me without demanding these sacrifices.

It's frustrating, because this fear makes it very hard for me to open up enough to feel comfortable when I meet new people. I really feel I have to project success in order to be liked, and the result is that I often feel really lonely because I don't feel able to just be myself. These days I find myself falling into a pattern of being the "good listener" when I meet people because I'm trying to be polite and let them speak.

You know, I even declined returning phone calls from a government-funding counselling service. I know that on my bad days here I get pretty depressed, and so I called and went on the waiting list (6 week minimum!). But when they called me, I delayed through two calls and a letter, thinking that they're probably not going to believe I really need help because I'm doing "well" (i.e. working professional, "appear" well, was even told by the last counsellor I saw that he didn't know how he was going to help me because I seemed to have it "under control" - sorry but not everyone who goes through an abusive childhood is going to bawl when they talk about it). This also probably comes from...

Lie: If you're not strong/successful all the time, how can I be?

Truth: You are the adult and responsible for modelling strength/success to me - not the other way around. It's clear now that you just didn't want to do the hark work of trying, but didn't want to admit that, so you pretended that if I achieved unreasonable expectations (e.g. fixed the family's problems), you might be inspired to change your life.

Still feeling pretty angry about this one. Wasted the first couple decades of my life honestly believing in this one How this relates to counselling is that combination that if you don't think I'm successful, then how will you care about me (and thus, want to listen to me)....... Anyone else struggle with this?