Childhood neglect? How do you heal?

[donotmicrowave]

Hey lovely people,

 

Life is a mess. Maybe some are familiar with what's happening in my family right now, if not, not important!

 

There is something underneath all of that mess, hiding there, chewing on me constantly.

 

I was neglected by my mother. She already knew what type of a daughter she wanted even before I was born. So as I was growing up, she'd force me into dancing, ballet, art school (I know I am very talented, but years later still straight up traumatized by art), she forced specific behaviors on me, etc. Well, I turned out to be everything that she didn't want. It started out with lots of crying from my part, till I just became rebellious. I would not go dancing, not go to art school. I skipped classes, even in primary school. It became a big issue, but I just couldn't go, as I was being forced to. To this day, no one gets to force me to do anything. When it comes to art, whenever anyone simply mentions my talent, I throw all my art supplies in a box and hide it for at least 6 months.

 

So then my little sister started growing up, she's everything my mother wanted. A beautiful young girl with lots of friends, a dancer, and so on. So my mother just let go of me. She refused to love me, and punished me every opportunity she got. Even got my dad (who loves me dearly) to go along with her.

 

I remember sitting upstairs in my room, listening to mother, dad and little sister laughing and chatting away, having a nice family evening together. I was left out of trips, I was not introduced to family friends, I was not a part of the family. But my little sister was.

 

How does one ever get over it?

[CautiouslyOptimistic]

Therapy .

[amaysngrace]

I'm not sure you can ever get over it but there are ways to take the sting out some. For one don't envy your sister. She learned from you what not to do and did the opposite. But is she happy? Maybe only on the outside.

 

Secondly, be proud of who you are. You didn't allow yourself to be exploited, you stayed true to you, and no one can ever take that away from you.

 

And thirdly, recognize that you're most likely functioning at an emotional level of that when you were first traumatized. So when something happens in your life now that triggers bad feelings you felt then you react in same way you would because you haven't healed yet and haven't fully processed it all yet.

 

And yes, definitely therapy. But just because you heal doesn't mean you won't have scars. Being rejected as a little kid is a big wound but know it's not you who was the problem. You were just being who you are which is beautiful in itself.

[JeanGray]

If you had the chance to speak freely to your parents, what would you say to them?

 

Do you need them to recognise their behaviour and acknowledge that they were wrong?

 

I'm not sure if they will admit that you were neglected, in their eyes, you could have been lazy, ungrateful etc

 

What you need to do is acknowledge what happened, but focus on making your life happy and figuring out what you actually want to do with your life.

 

Focus on the positive and leave your parents behind. Try making yourself independent financially & by living alone.

[stillafool]

Therapy .

 

THIS^^^^^

 

You need professional help. No one here can help you. (((HUGS))))

[Onedaysoon]

Hi, I finished reading your other thread, and am glad I was able to find this one. Especially since you are wondering about a way to heal. And you mentioned that you were having trouble with therapy. Have you looked into EMDR therapy? It is used for PTSD, which you absolutely are suffering from. You don't need to revisit the traumatic events over and over again. The way I understand it is that it organizes those memories from the right side of your brain, which doesn't tell time, so the traumatic event is "fresh", to the left side of your brain, which does tell time, where it is stored neatly and remains in the past as a memory. It may be painful and sad. But it's not that gut wrenching, paralyzing fear anymore.

I really hope you try it... it won't hurt if you do.

Your mother sounds like a narcissist. There is no helping that. Learning how to set boundaries and keeping to them is so hard. They make sure and raise you not knowing anything about boundaries.

Good luck!