Originally Posted by miss communicat

its hard, but sometimes we have to be willing to experience others' displeasure in us while we take care of ourselves and stay on our healthy path.

the choices as outlined to your sister, were the healthy response to an unhealthy family constellation. IE: you rocked the boat.

splish splash.

this situation will indded pass, and your life will be much better for the fact that you care enough to honor your own needs. I support you!

Originally Posted by karmakoma

Triangular Pain
Living on the Drama Triangle creates misery. The primary commonality is that none of the players know how to take responsibility for themselves. The cost is tremendous for all three roles and lead to emotional, mental and even physical pain.....

.....Rescuers, for instance, believe that their needs should be denied as unimportant and irrelevant. The only way they can legitimately connect with others and feel valued and have their needs met, is by taking care of someone else. Rescuers chastise themselves when they aren't care-taking others. Their primary myth is; "If I take care of others well enough and long enough, then I will be fulfilled and feel loved." Unfortunately, Rescuers are involved with life-time Victims who have no idea of how to be there for others. This reinforces the Caretaker's core belief that they shouldn’t be needy, which then produces more shame surrounding their needs.

Getting Off the Triangle
In order to get off the Triangle, we must first decide to take responsibility for ourselves. We then begin to allow ourselves to acknowledge and express our true feelings, even when doing so is uncomfortable. As we explore our core beliefs and starting gate positions, we become better able to recognize when someone is attempting to hook us into unhealthy behavior, and refuse to participate. Learning to have guilty feelings without acting on them is a big part of resisting the Victim game. Feeling guilt does not necessarily imply that we are behaving unethically. Guilt is a learned response. Sometimes guilt indicates that we've broken a dysfunctional family rule. Unhealthy beliefs about ourselves and the world, instilled in childhood, become rigid rules that need to be violated. Family dictums such as: don't talk about it, don't share feelings, or it's selfish to take care of yourself, must be overcome if we are to grow. We can expect, and even celebrate the guilt, when we defy these deeply entrenched family rules.

Getting honest with ourselves and others is a primary way to get off the triangle. Telling our truth is a key way of taking responsibility. We then must be willing to take necessary action for whatever that truth reveals. In order for a Rescuer to get honest, for instance, they have to confess their investment in keeping others dependent. This means acknowledging that being a rescuer fills their need for self-worth. In this way, Rescuers learn to recognize and address their own needs.

Ironically, the doorway off the triangle for all roles is through the persecutor position. This is because when we decide to get off the triangle, we are often seen as persecutors by those still on it. Once we decide to take self-responsibility and tell our truth, those still aboard are likely to accuse us of victimizing them. "How dare you refuse to take care of me," a Victim might cry. Or "What do you mean you don't need my help?" a primary enabler enrages when a victim decides to become accountable. In other words, to escape the victim grid, we must be willing to be perceived as the "bad guy." This doesn't make it so, but we must be willing to sit with the discomfort of being perceived as such.

© 2007 Lynne Forrest

Lynne Forrest: The Faces of Victim

Originally Posted by really_fed_up

The drama continues.

my husband and I went out to breakfast to discuss what Jane's options realistically are. We cannot have her stay here another day or night. i need some normalcy back in my life. I told her that and she got all defensive. My husband and I--while out to breakfast--decided that we would outline her options as:

stay with my brother and his wife for a night
move into another residential hotel
stay with another friend.

We came home and I told her "We have some options that we'd like to discuss with you: you can get in touch with your friend _________ and stay with her, you can move to this other residential hotel, or you can stay with our brother when he gets home from work tonight". She was very cold towards me and told me, "Don't worry, I'm leaving. I just talked to dad and he's going to pay for me to stay in a hotel tonight.". I said, "well, that's what I expected from him; I'm sure he thinks I'm the bad, evil, daughter now" and she said, "you don't even WANT to know what he said" in this smug way and then stormed off to our bathroom to take a shower.

So there you have it. Daddy dearest has rescued her once again, made me, my husband, my brother, and his wife to be the bad people, and is punishing us by playing up the "poor little Jane who can't take care of herself" routine.

I've completely separated myself from my parents. I am not going to talk to them and I deleted an email from them this morning before reading it. I am just so angry, upset, and I'm saying to myself, "WHY didn't I know better than to help her out again?" She doesn't give a damn that I spent my whole weekend helping her move her stuff out of the apartment she was evicted from, that I spent 4 hours of my day yesterday sitting in the lobby of this residential hotel with her while we waited for a key to the room, that I've put her up for two days and two nights.

and I know i'm to blame for caving in and enabling her...I can't stop this cycle. I feel physically sick; my heart won't stop pounding and I only slept three hours last night.
I'm going to talk to a therapist this morning, and then this afternoon I might seek out an Al Anon meeting. I just need normalcy and I feel like i'm on this sick rollercoaster that won't stop.