Every day is different. There are times I just cryother days I'm angry, I panic when I think this situation will never get fixed, disbelief . There are days when I live almost normal but my thoughts are never far from my daughter. A daughter who betrayed me, our family and most of all her father. Since the day she made it clear no relationship with her father, a relationship with me only is the day our family as we knew it changed. I constantly look for advice, something to validate that it's not me, it's not her father it's about her. Unless you are in it, nobody can truly understand the profound pain you feel. Sadly I've read so many cases that echo mine. When is it OK for our children to sentence their parents of this unspeakable situation that they had placed on us? How dare they. In our situation Tolerance, Respect and Patience for a three hour visit monthly, if these three were exercised , I wouldn't be ranting right now. How is it they think that their children won't treat them the same way? This is what they are inadvertently teaching their own children. Surely God , how can your own child inflict so much pain and get away with it. I read , parents should be the hero , turn the other way, beg for forgiveness, do anything to fix this epidemic . In my case I know that this will only empower them, and feed their need to control. To be right, but unhappy , or to be wrong but be happy. If that's the case , I accept total responsibility , my dignity, self respect would be destroyed . How happy really would we really be at the end of the day. That's my rant. Sorry
Our Daughter
- Thread starter Heather52
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Copabanana
Well-Known Member
I have suffered betrayal, too, by my son. The worst of it happened about 6 or 7 years ago. It feels like an hour ago.
When I think about it now I realize I gave my son too much power and I gave other people too much trust. Now I am very hesitant to involve myself with anybody.
My son talked to neighbors about me and his relationship. I was scapegoated and shunned. Most of it was lies.
My son did this for years. He is doing it less now. It is clear to anybody in his life that this has to do with him, not me or anybody else.
How I wish it was my fault and by accepting the blame he would be better and happy. How I wish it was this easy. It is not.
These are our children. There is no walking away but there is a way to find perspective. To find the simple joys in our lives or cultivate them. To protect and love your husband, and to respect him even more. To not accept the crumbs, or her conditions, her definition of happiness or family.
Define yourselves. Define your family. She chooses to accept your definitions, not the other way around. I may not have understood your post, but I would not allow her to shun her father, and continue a relationship with me. She accepts both or nobody. That is how I would respond. I would not accept her terms, however painful it is.
Take back your power. I will try too.
so ready to live
Well-Known Member
hi Kate. I read and then reread your post, such confusion and hurt. I'm sorry.
Your words are "sentence, unspeakable, placed upon us and they dare to" All words of her total power and control over your family. Relationships by definition are give and take, you don't seem to have that at all. Take some control back, how ever much you can stomach at this point. I have been in a pit like that, you don't even see the slippery slide when all of a sudden you hit bottom the only thing to do is crawl up--(p.s. it's like a can of worms, when you try to crawl out she and the whole situation will try to pull you back in). She has made an adult choice regarding your relationship, give her the reality of that choices consequences.
This is our hardest conflict-how to justify what we needed to do with our son vs the tenets of our faith. We still struggle with it, daily reaching the conclusion that God has boundaries too. Big ones. I finally realized that my biggest problem was how profoundly sad I was at the way my son was wasting his life, God was also, then I had the sudden revelation of how profoundly sad God must be for the way I was wasting mine. A kick in the head for me to STOP. Stop trying to fix, control, change anything but me. Don't waste these yrs. as I have, she has to fix this herself. Save you. Prayers.
Betrayal by ones own child is something I would not wish on anyone. My son has shattered my heart and trust in him too many times.
I am so sorry for the heartache you are experiencing. I know it all too well. Once I stopped allowing my son to hold my emotions hostage, it freed me. I was able to detach and move on with my life.
Do your best to focus on you. Be good to yourself.
The truth is, they only get away with it because we allow them to get away with it.
I don't want to be anyone's hero. As for turning the other way or begging for forgiveness will only reinforce a d_c's unacceptable behavior. Instead they need to be held accountable for their actions. If we as parents have done our best to raise our children then that should be sufficient. We do not owe them anything. I think a big part of the problem with many of our d_c's is that they feel "entitled" and it's worse if they feel they have been wronged in any way.
I am so sorry for the heartache you are experiencing. I know it all too well. Once I stopped allowing my son to hold my emotions hostage, it freed me. I was able to detach and move on with my life.
Do your best to focus on you. Be good to yourself.
I struggle with the fact that my 43 year old daughter thinks I'm the worst mother because she wants a relationship with me only and nothing to do with her father. She feels my rejection and feels awful about how I've treated her. Her friends thinks that it's ok to have a relationship with one and not the other.I know there is a mature coworker who had encouraged her all the way to this point. Her coworker has two daughters who she had said ,they comes first in her life , even before her husband. Her two daughters are my daughters age. My daughter started this whole mess, her father made three attempts to fix it, the last attempt he specifically told her it was his last. I'm backing my husband all the way but in turn I lost my daughter.
PonyGirl65
Active Member
SHE feels YOUR rejection and feels awful about how YOU treat HER? Hmmmm. Perhaps she should consider, THIS is how HER FATHER feels. Grrrr! Your daughter sounds very mean and selfish. I am so sorry that outside influences have changed her into a person who turns her back on her own dad.
I am with you 100%! I would back my husband, the exact same way you have. I am proud of you for choosing your spouse!!
Of course my heart breaks for the loss of your relationship with your daughter. Love her in your heart, as I'm sure your husband loves her in his heart. Be okay with that love. And let the rest go. Enjoy your lives together.
Perhaps someday someone will come into your daughter's life who will tell her what a complete ass she's being towards you, and she will listen to them just as easily as she's listened to the losers who tell her she's doing the right thing now. Perhaps she will choose to mend the relationship at that point.
But for now, she is who she is, today. You can love her as your daughter. You don't have to like her as a person. You don't have to accept her behavior towards you.
Peace
I am with you 100%! I would back my husband, the exact same way you have. I am proud of you for choosing your spouse!!
Of course my heart breaks for the loss of your relationship with your daughter. Love her in your heart, as I'm sure your husband loves her in his heart. Be okay with that love. And let the rest go. Enjoy your lives together.
Perhaps someday someone will come into your daughter's life who will tell her what a complete ass she's being towards you, and she will listen to them just as easily as she's listened to the losers who tell her she's doing the right thing now. Perhaps she will choose to mend the relationship at that point.
But for now, she is who she is, today. You can love her as your daughter. You don't have to like her as a person. You don't have to accept her behavior towards you.
Peace
Yes our daughter surrounds herself with like minded people including her husband , who has also cut his mother out of his life. He says she's dead to me. Yes she did a Terrible thing out of despair and desperation. That was 3 years ago. Is there not any forgiveness in this so called entitled and oh so perfect people in this generation. I am so grateful for all the kind words from so many understanding people. My husband quietly suffers , I'm more vocal and I worry about him too. He landed in the emergency room twice , thinking he was having a heart attack. Our daughters response. "He did it to himself". She's talking about a man that neither physically or emotionally abused her. His only crime was not showing her affection and she claims emotionally absent. How can you show affection when all you get is being pushed away. You just stop trying.
PonyGirl, you took the words right out of my mouth!!
While my husband is not a member on this site but I do share with him some of the posts. It has helped to open his eyes, to know that we are not alone in this. It might be helpful for you to share with your husband. No need for him to quietly suffer.
The thing about forgiveness is that it's for the person who forgives. My bio father sexually abused me. I had every right to hate him but that hate can live inside a person like a cancer and it will eat away at you. I forgave my bio father for me, not him.
There is a saying "Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die"
Yes, those who feel they are entitled probably do not understand the concept of forgiveness. I think many of them prefer to remain a victim. When you remain a victim you are not accountable for anything, as it's always someone else's fault.
Copabanana
Well-Known Member
Kate. Let us put this in perspective. Which is in no way to say that I cannot feel your pain. Parents deal with the death of their adult children who they whose voice they will never again hear.
Your daughter is alive. Only choosing to be vindictive and heartless, to her own peril.
Do our responsibilities as parents end, when they are grown? I do not think so. Neither do you, I think. Just as when they were tots we cannot reward their bad behavior. Nor can we take to heart their retaliations, to forget our proper role which is to take the high road when we have the strength to do so, and to return there when we have calmed and fortified ourselves.
Our responsibility as parents is to remind her who she is by our own conduct. That you are doing by your loyalty and love to your husband. She wants to split you two apart. You are not allowing this. You do not allow it because it is wrong. It would be wrong of you to do it, to betray him, in order to keep close to her. It would be wrong to her to allow her weakness, foolishness and wrongness to control the situation.
You have your daughter. What you are doing is standing up for what is right, for her, for yourself, for your family and for your husband.
And before my mother's death my sister did this to my mother.
Your daughter is alive. Only choosing to be vindictive and heartless, to her own peril.
Do our responsibilities as parents end, when they are grown? I do not think so. Neither do you, I think. Just as when they were tots we cannot reward their bad behavior. Nor can we take to heart their retaliations, to forget our proper role which is to take the high road when we have the strength to do so, and to return there when we have calmed and fortified ourselves.
You have NOT lost your daughter. It is she who has lost her way.
Our responsibility as parents is to remind her who she is by our own conduct. That you are doing by your loyalty and love to your husband. She wants to split you two apart. You are not allowing this. You do not allow it because it is wrong. It would be wrong of you to do it, to betray him, in order to keep close to her. It would be wrong to her to allow her weakness, foolishness and wrongness to control the situation.
You have your daughter. What you are doing is standing up for what is right, for her, for yourself, for your family and for your husband.
Yes.
My sister is like this. She insisted that her 3rd husband do likewise with her own mother. My mother sometime before her death told me with sadness that my sister's husband's mother asked her, "Why doesn't L like me? Why can I not go to their home?"
And before my mother's death my sister did this to my mother.
So, she is doing the same thing to him, that she believes he did to her. How is it different?
Copabanana
Well-Known Member
Yes. I did not forgive my mother until she was dying. I suffered untold agony in the months before she died and afterward.
I felt only too late what not forgiving my mother (and father) fully had cost me. Part of myself.
This is part of why you are doing what you are doing. To model to her what love is and should be.
Yes. This is very wise, Tanya, almost so wise I do not fully grasp it.
I think it may have to do with guilt--who bears the guilt. I wonder if people who blame others are really ridding themselves of the hot potato of guilt or shame. I will try to think about this.
This will help me find my compassion for my sister, I hope. I wonder if her sense of entitlement, because she was victimized by others, is a defense against shame she cannot bear.
And it justifies to the person who feels a victim to do anything they want either to redress their victimization by taking advantage or punishing anybody they choose. Vengeance. Like some kind of hate mob carrying flaming sticks.
Omg how true are your words. your words have really hit home. There is nothing I haven't said to my daughter to get her to see sense and stop thus circus. Unfortunately her husband and her choice of friends have more influence. I do t get it, how can your sister, my daughter, and other daughters and sons live with themselves. I don't get it doing such a despicable act on the two people who gave them lifefe.
so ready to live
Well-Known Member
hi Kate. Hang in there. we are here.
My husband and I have laughed (yes, someday you will laugh again) that if we only had $1 for every time we had said "we don't get it". Somedays it was the only thing we did understand-was that we didn't get it. Never. We've quit trying to understand 10 lbs of crazy in a 5 lb sack. Wasted effort in every respect. Go on with YOUR life. Of course you keep loving her, but it's ok to take a break from her drama for how ever long it takes to stabilize you and your family. It may be a long time.
Remember, hearing your story also helps me know I'm not alone and see just how strong we all really are. Warrior sisters every one. Prayers.
Copabanana
Well-Known Member
That is the question I ask myself everyday, sometimes more than once.
I cannot comprehend doing this to a dying mother. I was the one who had to try to make sense of it to my mother. In many was my sister was her favorite, the one she felt closest to. To be rejected was the cruelest of things. There is no perfect parent.
What I keep repeating to myself is this: How could she do this for eternity? I mean, allow my mother to go to her death with this rejection. To me, it is the height of cruelty. But I do not believe it is cruelty that drives my sister and your daughter, it is self-preservation, I believe.
I believe we shelter ourselves from our worst hurts because we believe at heart that we deserved them. She is protecting herself by blaming her father. But the thing is, she must confront her sense of self-blame, even though it was never deserved. Can she her whole life run from it? Forever finding new ways and new reasons to justify running from herself?
I feel compassion for her. It is harder to find for my sister. M my SO says that he fears that when my sister is very old she will become crazy with all of what she has done from her own cowardice and self-serving entitlement. The chickens will come home to roost so to speak.
I hope not. I remember her as a baby. I do not want her to suffer. You cannot run forever. Eventually it catches up. Is this the human condition?
Copabanana
Well-Known Member
What a breath of sanity, this.
The wisdom coming from the mouths of many parents who had suffered the same fate as ours has been so incredibly helpful to me. I come from a huge family with 7 sisters who has been so supportive. As supportive as they could possible me. Unless you're in it, unless your emotionally vested through no fault if their own , they could only imagine the pain but not comprehending how much pain we areal in. Like my younger sister who so elequently put it, "this never happened in our family before , we have no text book to refer to, we don't know the words. But what our daughter has done had a far reaching effect. Which she is oblivious to. They all love her, but completely baffled with the position she took. Our huge family and extended family naturally had problems but we are talkers . We settled any issues which were very few , by talking it out. We know the value of family especially since tragically we lost two of younger sibling at a young age.
Copabanana
Well-Known Member
How wonderful you had this and have this.
I did not.
M my SO is having to deal with a similar situation in his family--having been reared as were you, in a united family--one of his sisters has gone rogue and is causing untold damage. His parents are old and vulnerable, and in another country. He feels so helpless. And this sister is trying to destroy his kids (envy, I think) who are also in that other country.
These things happen. Each of you who have suffered, while I wish it had not happened for you this way, make it easier for me to bear. And to feel that it was not necessarily my fault.
We will each of us try to take the high road, protect ourselves and our mates and hope for sense and love to prevail.
What more is there to do?
