fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #3540 ]

⌈ Secret Post #3540 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.

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02.

[Tom Hanks & Aaron Eckhart in Sully]

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03.

[Star Trek: The Next Generation]

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04.

[The Hobbit (film)]

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05.

[Keeping Up Appearances]

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[Endeavour]

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07.

[Legend, Lily/Darkness]

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08.

[Anne of Green Gables remake]

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09.

[Macross Delta]

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 38 secrets from Secret Submission Post #506.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Not meant to be mean. Just curious.

Still in contact with my father, sometimes.

1. I am on his health insurance at the moment, no other options
2. I don't actually want to confront him about the abuse
3. I wish I didn't, but I still love him.

We have minimal contact, but yeah. I would describe our relationship as cordial and distant, but there is one there.

As someone who took too long to sever contact, I can tell you it can be a lot of things.

-loyalty
-judgment by society because you don't abandon family because FAAAAAAAAAAAMILY
-groomed to take on a certain important role in family (usually caretaker)
-holding on to the hope that one day abusive family member will be something that isn't a complete asshole and will show some sane and genuine form of love
-under control of AFM/don't believe it can get any better or that gtfo is an available option
-just don't know any better

For most, it's not some six-month-long ugly nightmare that you suddenly wake up from. The crazy has been going on your whole life and for a great portion of it, you believe the crazy treatment is actually normal. It's hard to undo that kind of thinking, so people stay.

I don't know that I'd call my situation abusive so much as really, really complicated, but:

- Still love them/aware their actions aren't representative of who they can be.
- Want to maintain contact with most of the family, which currently means staying in contact with the few who've hurt me.
- Guilt? Sympathy? Hope that it's all going to turn out okay?

This is me too.

No one ever believed me. We don't have anything to do with each other but no one warns me they'll be at a family gathering (they usually aren't so it's always a very nasty surprise) and people will tell me things about that person's life and expect me to care. Also, I do still hope that someday they'll apologise or even just be the person I thought they were before. I wish I didn't, but I do.

Because you grow up believing the abuse is normal. Even when outsiders say it's not, how do you go about looking at it differently when it's all you've ever known? Sure, you can try to look at it from an objective, rational point of view, but there's still a part of you that goes "yes, this is part of my world, this is normal".

Imagine your favorite color is red, and then someone comes along and says that the red color you've been looking at is actually blue.

My mother tries to avoid direct contact with my abusive aunt, but other family members haven't cut off contact with her. When they encounter each other and my mother doesn't make a scene, that makes my aunt think their relationship is fine now and it's okay to come over to our house. I've said to refuse to allow her entry, but my mother says you can't stop being related to someone. I think she needs to just lock the door and take whatever hostility the rest of the family dishes out for "abandoning" her sister.

1. I wasn't the victim, my mother was, and I take my cues from her.
2. I really wanted to cut contact, but that would have hurt my mother
3. She believes he has changed. I'm not sure if that is possible, but he's been through some rough stuff and seems maybe a better person possibly?
4. Mostly I talk to him for my mother's sake. I hate him. I have trouble being civil to him. But I do it for her sake because it would hurt her if I didn't, and also I'm not sure what would happen if he were to know that I know what he did to her.

Because it wasn't all bad, because I love them, and because my brother begged me to. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I was no contact for a while. I got tired of being homeless and sleeping in cheap rentals on floors with cockroaches running over me. He had a spare room.

I was making decent progress saving money to move out to a nicer place, but then I got sick, and now I'm disabled and I can't keep a job, even working from home.

It was a toss up between two fairly shit options, and being blunt, he's never raped me. I was sexually assaulted twice when I was on my own. I sleep better here. I'm not constantly cold. I get to keep my dog.

It's not all that bad, tbh. You get used to living with someone who blows up over nothing. You adapt. You learn how to act around them and around other people to cover up their behaviour. I've been doing this most of my life and at this point it's easier than being honest and forming real relationships with nice people.

When I was a kid people were jealous of me. They thought I was really lucky to have so many nice things. Sometimes it's easier to be what everyone thinks you are. It's a nice lie.
Even people who knew or suspected still thought that I was lucky. My grandmother grew up in a church run orphanage. She was just happy I had food and clothes. I think the only people who tried to help at all were my closest neighbours, because they had to hear everything. I spent a lot of time staying with the people who lived on either side of me and the lady directly across the street. I know some of them tried to talk my mum into leaving when I was little. He was worse when she wasn't home.

{{{HUGS}}}

Thanks anon. :)

[ SECRET POST #3540 ]

People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?

Re: People who are still in contact with abusive family members, why?