The Brainwashing Behind Going No Contact

I started to read the first link gummybears and that was enough for me. The common traits supposedly exhibited by EP's on EP sites were news to me.

I've been posting here on GN, predominantly on the estrangements threads, for more than 5 years and have yet to see, thank goodness, any EP for eg. fantasise about spanking, publicly shaming or euthanizing their AC. I regularly post on another estrangement site and haven't seen anything like it there either.

If I ever went onto a site where such things were mentioned, I'd leave immediately.

Over the years I have sympathised with posters who have talked frankly and openly about the abuse they have suffered at the hands of parents and/or p's.i.l. and I've seen plenty of other estranged P's and GP's do the same.

There's always been an acceptance that some AC have had no choice other than cut out these abusive adults from their lives and the lives of their children.

A couple of posters who have posted on this thread yesterday and today, clearly demonstrate that they are either unwilling or unable to accept that not all EP's and GP's are bad and abusive. That they are on the receiving end of bad and abusive behaviour from their AC.

Of course, we all speak from our own experiences which form our frame of reference. Perhaps some would do better to speak from their own personal experiences rather than rant about P's and GP's in general and tarring us all with the same brush.

Thanks again gummybears for the links.

nina has been researching this painful subject for some time allsortsofbags and it's good to know that she's been able to connect with the pain and suffering caused by being CO of an AC's and GC's lives.

nina1959

Tried to send you PM to say thank you for starting this post.

Really made me think and you have clearly put a lot of work into this. Much appreciated.

Also thanks to other contributors, I'll be going on Google.

When adults have children they may be triggered as they recall their parental abuse. Entitled grandparents should have an open honest discussion addressing their childrens' grievances. If there is no real remorse, there can be no forgiveness and there can be no future union. The adults will fear continued abuse seeping into their young families' lives,with their own views and boundaries being ignored, as usual. Expecting your actions to be forgotten is the epitome of narcissism, narcissists can work the crowd with virtue signalling but cannot address their disgraceful parenting. IE. Earn your children's respect by owning your failings. Ask yourself - why would they want you in their children's lives, if they feel ignored and invisible?

Thanks gummybears I'll have a read.

Sonofanarc, this is a forum for grandparents with a significant number of long time members who are estranged from adult children and grandchildren.

It is not a mixed forum nor is it a forum with a focus on estrangement, although there is a very long running support thread for those members.

I think it is helpful to remember that even if you are sure you spotted a narc, they are not your narc. There is nothing to be gained from confrontation here. There is never any point in challenging the established narrative of an estranged family member who is not your own. They aren't listening and you will get nothing out of it.

As the saying goes: not your circus, not your monkeys.

Smileless, the site is chapterised but here are probably the most relevant pages in response to your question.

www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/why-estranged-parents-forums.html

www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/summary.html

www.issendai.com/psychology/estrangement/missing-missing-reasons.html

Your second post sonofanarc clearly explains the content of your first.

Without going into detail of either, your first which I found both disturbing and rather distasteful attacks the OP, putting all the responsibility of her estrangement onto her. Your second puts all the responsibility for your own, it must be said very sad estrangement, onto your mother.

You attack the OP for taking no responsibility for the failed relationship with her daughter and take no responsibility for your failed relationship with your mother.

nina has contributed to several threads on GN over a period of time and many living with estrangement have found her contributions informative as well as comforting.

You stated that you've read "almost every single piece of literature, personal and academic accounts". If that's the case you would have come across nina's research in the past. Of course she wouldn't have published under the name nina but I'd have thought you'd have recognised her style and content. That's what she does, she researches the effects that being cut out has on parents and GP's.

So what you mean is that you've "read almost every single piece of literature, personal and academic accounts" on estrangement from the perspective of the AC cutting out their parents. That's understandable, as an estranged parent and GP I've read plenty on the subject from the perspective of those who've been cut out. I've read plenty, but wouldn't say 'almost every single' thing that's been written.

If you have read almost everything, that comes across to me as an obsessive, perhaps someone who needs to constantly reassure themselves that they are right, who themselves requires validation that they've done the right thing.

"Most people who have truly been through it, have a deep instinct for spotting these fakes and we all know them by their finger print". I agree and my instinct kicked in when I read both of your posts.

I was wondering agnurse if you could expand on how Issandei distinguishes between estranged parents and estranged parents who go on estranged parents forums.

Hi agnurse.

I've spent 10 years uncovering my inner problems because of what occurred in my childhood, teens and adulthood (Dad had cancer).

I was clueless and the whole time saw myself as the biggest failure and thought i was at fault for so many of my issues. But the conflict would never go away.

In the end i went on a spree of trying to find out why i was feeling the way i was and that was when i uncovered what would essentially lead me to realise the almighty truth to my mothers narcissism, my fathers narcissism and my whole family dynamic of thoroughbred personality disordered siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins.
I have read almost every single piece of literature, academic and personal accounts, compared notes and testimony with thousands of men and women and have now at 37, come to the truth that 99% of why my life is the way it is, why my head is the way it is not of my own doing.
The amount i have come to uncover, cannot be under-estimated like reading a self-help book and riding that wave. It's one thing to just read something and try and piece things, but an entirely different one altogether when you fracture yourself into a million pieces in order to get tat the myriad of things locked away which trigger constant attacks without you knowing why or how, but unconsciously recognise from an earlier time in life but cannot articulate it.
Only now, have i realised how badly i want to sever all contact from my mother and family. I have now come to the conclusion beyond all doubt that i was destroyed because of who i am in my own nature and that i am so very different from everyone else. And for that to happen pathologically for 30 years, is incomprehensible to me and i no longer want to be part of a family who could do that and have no remorse for it after what i have been put through.
It was who i was naturally that prompted the abuse and the complete destruction to my life. I have dissected my mother & family like a science class dissects a frog. I opened her insecurity with a verbal crowbar and challenged everything i grabbed from by locked memory of traumas. She hates me even more now but i don't care one little bit. In order to know who i am i had to know who she was so all the things in me causing so many ills could be identified as being caused by her and belonging to her and could be gotten rid of forever. It was at this point, which last over 4 years, that i saw the true woman i know as my mother behind the clever but wicked facade. The emotionally immature manipulator, the emotional blackmailer, the pathological liar, the user, the insecure abuser. I saw the hatred, the envy, the vindictive ways she would gain attention, the glee in watching things go bad for me, the swapping from one child to the next to make the other trigger rejection and abandonment, the inconsistent punishments, the passivity towards the worst behaved adult children, the echoing, mirroring, the sabotaging, the dependency on her adult children, the gameplay, the denial and invalidation of your memory and past (gaslighting), the neglect and rejection of the adult child who she has left alone to deal with trauma and depression, the expectation of having a child care for her and remain inservitude to her my duty without giving a single thing back, the proxy abuse, triangulation, the total deadness of feeling, absence of emotion, absence of compassion. The reactive, revengeful ways she deals with people who pop the bubble she lives under.
I saw the woman Nine1959 behind the words because the way they think has a print, and that print is a beacon of narcissistic identity.
For 30 years of my life i have been single-handedly destroyed by my mother and she has successfully created 3 stooges as her comrades because they are all reckless and irresponsible, but because most emotionally immature narcissistic parents want broken children, they will target the most gifted children to gain pleasure in wiping their dreams/aspirations of the face of the Earth with physcial and emotional abuse or create self-destructive externalising parasites as children, even if its an only child, because their whole role-self is to be 'rescue parent', making sure their child never grows up as a fully fledged, competent, mature, confident, happy child with healthy self-esteem and those who show the ability to do so, are sabotaged in the childhood phase because of parental control. Those things will be redirected towards the mother for her needs for self-esteem, to form a best-friend from her daughter or a worthless object son to mold into a co-dependent salve ruled by his morals of decency and integrity and the weakness of guilt, so now, she does not have to be the sole provider of emotional support and life support for her child, but vice versa.
Just by looking at Nina1959's comment, i could see straight away why her daughter went No Contact. In the way she scribed her post, she is already well versed in concocting the victim story for maximum coverage and maximum effect. Living with that everytime you want to make better with your life becomes tormentuous and every son or duaghter who has had to endure that, will tell you what it does to them deep down in their psyche and why they sever contact.
These Narcissist parents are pathological and the first sign of a child breaking the rule book of indentured servitude, is met with all out, vitriolic attack, hatred and abuse and for those who are foreign to this world, they cannot even bring themselves to fathom the sheer depths of the depravity. It is enough to drive people to strong anti-depression medication and even suicide. They are monsters even though they will always describe their children as monsters.
I have watched my mother do this for years. I know the methods they use, why they use them and just how far they will go to enact the ultimate vengeance on their own child, because they are mentally unstable childish cowards and because their long-term battering ram for their hate and abuse has been taken from them now with no way to find their target, she's going down this route.

The truth is, her daughter isn't estranged. She has worded it like she has chosen to call her daughter 'estranged daughter'. This is why people need to study how they write what they write, because it comes from the same colluded world of manipulation they use in verbal assaults. The word salad in order to reverse everything.

It is the mother who has been estranged by the daughter. Therefore, it is the estranged mother. But this mother cannot say that, because it would be a direct dig at her own insecure ego, so she needs to give it the opposite terminology to make it seem like she is still in control.

But the whole comment is a desperate attempt at maintaining a false sense of control. It makes people like that feel empowered that they are using slanderous defamation and accusation etc. in a way which the daughter is not privy to. Yet, look at how many people come to aid of the mother and reiterate how 'terrible' these children are to their parents and the further attack on them for turning away from their parents.

Each and every one of them are the type who run people into the ground without knowledge of what the other has to say, no sense to think in order to have a rational answer nor conscience to think 'ok why is this happening' so instead condemn with derogatory judgment without a jolt of guilt.

There are people out there trying to jump on the narcissist abuse bandwagon, but you can always tell the genuine ones because they have a backstory that the plastic charlatans simply do not have. In the same way, you can tell any other charlatan; it's in their experience, knowledge and how they articulate themselves on the subject. Most people who have truly been through it, have a deep instinct for spotting these fakes and we all know them by their finger print.

Thanks

I think you raise some valuable points sonofanarc. I agree it's not impossible for abusive parents to have abusive children. One site I really like for explaining estrangement from a logical perspective is Issendai. If you Google Issendai Down the Rabbit Hole you can find information about estranged parents' forums. Note that Issendai distinguishes between estranged parents and estranged parents who are members of estranged parents' forums. The reason has to do with what Issendai found on estranged parents' forums. Issendai is not an estranged child and uses many examples to back up the explanations provided on the site.

Having read through this comment by Nina1959 and the subsequent replies supporting and agreeing with her, i decided to burst this bubble and the facade she's painting to people here.
The thing with Narcissist people is they think they're very clever at making themselves look like victims.
But in the process of doing so, to the learned observer aka ME, reveal far more about themselves than they truly know.
Several red flags popped up over the whole comment by this woman, aswell as several contradictions which prove that this woman's daughter, is 'going no contact' and actually maintaining that because she is happier with that life, whereas the Mother here, isn't.
So much so, that she feels the need to come onto a website forum and vilify her own daughter as being 'estranged', mentally ill, selfish, weak, irresponsible, cruel, manipulative etc.

Without saying those exact words, she uses alternative ways to attack her daughter under inadvertent synonyms. Already, straight off the bat, she is belittling and assaulting her daughter as though she has abandoned her mother and hated her mother, and must retrieve as much self-pity from this place as possible.
According to Nina1959, her daughter and everyone else like her are thin-skinned, pathetic, fickle nerved cry-babies who are blaming their parents for so many meaningless problems derived from their 'own' failings.
But these parents have to portray this false reality of faultless parenting and self-damaged children, because not only do they think the children they've emotionally abused and messed up are trying to find baseless fault in their parents for how they can't cope or fail in life, but refuse to accept that these reactions from their children are a direct result of failed parenting and crucially, emotional abuse because their parents have severe emotional immaturity. They are clueless and lacking of all feeling and compassion for the fact that it isn't just what they DID do, but what they DIDN'T do. They always saw their own child as an object which can be controlled by a command and set the way the parent wants and needs, and not a human being with feelings and emotions which needed to be built with healthy reassurances, nurturing their independence, gifts, dreams, identity, confidence, coping skills and responsibility to know who and what they are to become as adults in this world.
This failing by the parents does enormous damage, and when you get a child who finds no other way but severing all contact, then it cannot be seen as anything but the most courageous thing they can do, because they have been emotionally and physically abused to the point where they cannot cope without the parent. This girl, has severed this and found her feet and ultimately, her own life.
This mother shows zero happiness for her child’s independence, her freedom and her happiness. She can only show resentment and attack her for it. This speaks volumes!

I would love for this woman's daughter to come here and speak her mind because it would tear the fabric of this woman's lies to pieces.

The way this mother goes about her condescending attack on being seen as a failed parent crucifies her egocentric nature and drives a stake into her insecurity. She is the dependent parent on the child, make no mistake, who is far more emotionally mature, responsible, strong and wise than her own mother which is why Nina1959 feels so betrayed and abandoned and hateful of now being on her own without the child she has always needed, enough to steal her daughters own life and mind away from her, without a jolt to her conscience. She cannot accept it, and it reveals how she has always been so intolerant of the prospect of her own daughter acquiring her own life away from her.

This is the habitual mind-set of a Narcissistic mother. The cunning underhanded methods used to berate her daughter and leave herself utterly blameless as a mother like her daughter does not have any right to just go no contact and stop all communication.
The corruption method of a Narcissist is to give their own false, lying and manipulative version to people where they cannot possibly receive the daughter's point of view. This is why such people cause problems in families so they can shift from one ear to another, spreading their toxic lies and abuse knowing the victim of their abuse will never hear of it.
This is the cowardly methodology you've seen here with this mother.

The things people here need to ask themselves is, what would actually drive a daughter to completely severe all contact with her own mother? If this girl was so excellently brought up, why would this 'no contact' even occur? What has to be so appalling and so traumatic that a daughter would find a complete severance from her Mother the best and ONLY option to lead a peaceful life?
THINK about it!
Sons or daughters who are the kind of kids this woman is trying to paint as her own daughter who is selfish, mentally unstable, reckless and irresponsible etc, are more dependent on their parents than any other child. They are unrelenting repeat offenders in their own self-destruction. They are the kind who cannot break from the umbilical cord.
Yet this woman's daughter has done the total opposite. No mention of her daughter being this type of person. Which again, is very revealing.

This, is the reason why the mother needs her daughter and I’m 99% certain she has sabotaged her daughters successes with constant triggering of past emotional abuses that mess with her girls’ self-esteem, because she is not still attached at the hip and her leading life free from her mothers, is proof and testament to her long-term will to live the independent life she wants. And one her mother cannot accept.

Thus, here in her post lives deep jealousy and the hate she has always harboured for her daughter. So, she has to project ALL blame onto every other Tom, Dick and Sally like her daughter was not of her own sane mind to have made this decision off her own back. In these words, she reveals how she sees her daughter as a stupid, naive and gullible little girl who cannot make mature and wise decisions by herself, who has been brainwashed by an alleged internet cult to hate her as a mother. The well-used underhanded implication that she has never given her daughter a single ounce of credit as a self-responsible, smart and rational human being.

Do any of you really think for one second that a human being, a son or daughter, spouse or other, would just go on the internet and by random chance find a video on 'Going No Contact' and take that on from nowhere?
How stupid must anyone be to believe that?
No, this woman's daughter found those videos BECAUSE SHE WAS LOOKING FOR THEM ON PURPOSE WITHOUT HER MOTHER KNOWING ANYTHING ABOUT IT!
People who know, innately, how bad things are but do not know how to articulate their feelings, emotions, inner torment and depression (AND I WILL GUARANTEE YOU HER DAUGHTER HAS BEEN DEPRESSED, ANXIOUS, SAD AND LONELY ETC FOR A VERY VERY LONG TIME), begin the process of trying to find out why because it cripples you like PTSD. This woman's daughter didn't just go NC from watching some random videos without an already long existing predisposition to do so.
No, she would have spent years, i repeat YEARS, sifting through every single one of her inner torments plaguing her as a woman and her life. No-one starts off knowing what it is they're looking for, they start to find what it is they feel in themselves and like an enormous puzzle, start piecing things together. They find an online family who have gone through the same things, and help unconditionally. They are kind, caring, and empathetic and learned in this subject who want to help people suffering to find their true lives and find peace and happiness away from abuse.

All this woman talks about is the subject of 'Going No Contact'. She wants you all to look directly at this part of the problem because it's the only thing she has looked at because in typical fashion, compartmentalises the truth to see one thing as the total problem instead of the entirety of Narcissism and how to deal with the abuses which go with it, in order to redirect you all from the truth that 'Going No Contact' is the LAST resort for someone who has tried to build a relationship with their narcissistic parent but never ever receives anything but more atrociously controlling, intrusive, manipulative emotional abuse. Going NC is the final way forward. If her daughter has severed contact, then she has decided beyond all else that her life is 1000 times better being free from her mother’s abuse.

People think that Narcissism is one-dimensional like it is the kind of thing you see from overtly domineering people i.e Men!
Women Narcissists are Covert and thus, pathological. Mothers are experts at covert narcissism because of the mother dynamic. No one expects to believe a mother can abuse her child, but Narcissistic mothers are the prime creators of the worst long-term emotional deficiencies and psychological traumas in their children. Their abuse has always been subterranean and always behind closed doors.
Their social method is to convince everyone else that they are the perfect mother, have the perfect home life and everything they do is faultless. It is the purposeful manipulation to secure this externalised perception, so if the child should ever speak out, the false air of grace created by the narcissist mother over-rules the child's screams of abuse.
They incessantly alter other people’s perceptions to portray the facade but do so with people who either do not know them whatsoever or friends/acquaintances who she keeps at arm's length. No one can come too close otherwise the facade fails.
This is why she has come here, on a forum with people she does not know because no-one can offer a true view of who she is as a mother so she can manipulate everyone here with the ruse that her daughter is a cruel, cold girl who has lost her marbles and gone into a cult to purposely punish her mother, because as usual, Mother makes it all about herself and her daughter must be determined as being wicked, abusive and 'toxic'.
If it's the other way around as she claims, why has the daughter left the mother and not the other way round?
If this daughter is the problem, why has she left and permanently stayed away from this mother?
If this daughter was anything like what her mother here is trying to portray, she wouldn't last 5 minutes on her own. But what you're seeing in truth, is the daughter has gone and stayed gone maintaining her 'No Contact' without a problem and it is the mother who cannot cope.
She is trying to reverse everything to make herself appear like she is the one being abused, but because of the lack of truth in her lies, they leak the real truth.
Yet how can this claim of hers be the case, if her daughter is not present and her mother is continuing on her vitriolic sermons? Why is she coming onto a forum complaining to people she doesn't know instead of those she does?
That tells you that she doesn't have anyone to do that to because of 2 possibilities.
1. She does not have anyone because in true Narcissist form she cannot make friends; people i.e family, know what she is and what she's done. She has more than likely formed so many lies to attack the daughter that it has now run it's course by the daughters severed communication and people having realised now that the mother is the abusive one and the daughter the victim. Revenge becomes an out of control pursuit when No Contact occurs because the power has been snatched from her grasp. This forum post of hers is a sign of that.
2. The reason the daughter has suffered for so long was because this mother forced the abusive, co-dependent 'best friend' indentured servant relationship and stopped her daughter from living her own life with her own independence, because this mother had already decided that her child would not leave her side.

When someone decides to completely sever all contact, means this is the ONLY way they can actually achieve the freedom, independence and contentment in life. People who go no contact become happier, peaceful and finally after years of toxic shame and guilt laid on by these abusive emotionally immature parents, able to lead a better life. And i will lay my life on it that this daughter is now thriving and this Mother, isn't! And since the victims of a Narcissistic parent have seen their abusive parents repeat the abuse on their own children, it is the responsibility to protect their children from the abusive grandparent because it's a new supply and a new target to abuse their own children through the grandchild.

For example. Where in her comment do you see a single, positive word about her daughter? Nowhere. This is an all-out resentful assault on her daughter and the groups of people like her daughter who helped her gain the courage, knowledge and strength to finally detach from her abusive mother and strive to attain the life she deserves.

This woman needs to whip you all into the illusion of 'victimised mother' who has been so terribly hard done by and needs to bring her daughter into this arena in order to abuse her further by proxy and get all of you who know nothing about Narcissistic abuse to become her own little mob of flying monkeys to boost her ego and help abuse her daughter even further because she can no longer achieve that anymore on a personal level with her daughter.

One of the things 'No contact' achieves, is it stops any further possibility of being attacked, falsely accused, blamed, bullied and even physically assaulted by other people who've swallowed the mothers lies.
The nasty lies and manipulative abuse concocted by this mother drove her daughter to seek this last chance at a life of her own. She cannot invent lies and cause trouble when the daughter is no longer in communication so the triangulation to make herself look like a victim to all those around her and all those who know her daughter, now fails and this mother no longer has her scapegoat target.
So she now resorts to coming on a forum to vent her resentful victimisation in order to find an outlet to abuse the daughter who she now hates for finding the life she deserves away from this truly toxic and manipulative mother.

Thanks Smileless2012, but I am so sad that so many people are suffering this dreadful situation, which is cheered along by these sites spouting their poison. If a D/S is already suffering depression or anxiety then they are more vulnerable to these posts. I have found great comfort from others in the same situation, but to think that it is encouraged is so cruel. Glad you are feeling happier now and although everyone is different,it is your S's loss and he must think of it every day, that is part of life, they may decide NC but it is as difficult to keep up with as not contacting & cannot be far from their thoughts!!

linz. For us, no contact with our S and only GC for more than 5 years. I'm glad you now feel quite vindicated and a lot happier; we do too.

Well, I have not been on GN for a while. I decided that whilst we were in the the unenviable position of D turned against us and no contact with GC (4 years now) after reading the above post and the No Contact on mumsnet, all my questions have been answered. Narcissist is the key new word and all the comments/advice onMN has been well and truly turned on us! So my deluded D has followed it chapter and verse & I feel quite vindicated and a lot happier.
DH & I had already decided that our lives would not be ruined by selfish acts even though it hurt so so much at the time, my advice is live your lives to the full and let the sad relative who wants to hurt you so much not be the winner!!!

I'm truly sorry poakie that you have had such a negative relationship with your m.i.l. but I have not seen one post that "pokes fun at people that may be truly going through something".

There are numerous posts on this thread from parents and GP's who find themselves estranged from their AC and GC through no fault of their own. As parents, they did the best that they could for their children, often being blessed with a close and loving relationship with their AC which only changed when they married.

"It's the abuser that wants CONSTANT contact to continue the abuse". No. Our ES and his wife are our abusers and their weapon of choice is their deafening silence and their refusal to allow their children to know their paternal GP's and us to know them.

Perhaps you should extend the hand of empathy and belief that you wish to receive as the d.i.l. of an abusive m.i.l. to those parents who have lost their AC and GC due to the abuse they've received from their AC and their AC's partner.

I guess we can each have our own perspective. But I do not read the first post or some of the post that follow that way. The entire tone pokes fun at people that may truly be going through something.

This thread was the first one to pop on a google search seeking some sort of solace from yet another ruined holiday from MIL and it felt like the same tired advice that you have to keep engaging with an abusive parent or grand parent because they are the grandparents and you are ruining lives!!

The entire first post would be the way my MIL would attack any behavior that doesn't fit what she wanted us to do.

"If their parents disagreed with them or made them do something that they didn't like or whacked their fresh asses when they talked back or refused to follow rules, they add this to their pile of justification. "

"The groups talk a lot about setting boundaries, but what they call setting boundaries is just rude dictating"

"I suggested that even if they were "toxic" that a few minutes for the "toxic" person in a neutral place like a park would be beneficial. " --- Yes keep re-engaging with an abuser.

"Where adult children have grown up in highly dysfunctional and abusive situations, then NC is their only option and as far as I can see, it's a last resort after many attempts at trying to fix things."

"If you can snub, ignore, ostracise, dish out the silent treatment on an ongoing basis, sulk and then act as though you are the victim, it's you that's the narcissist, not your parents.
If your parents loved you and did their best yet you can deal with knowing all these things above and yet still continue to hurt your them in this way, the problem isn't them." --- This is same projecting argument the my MIL will use to say EVERYONE else is the problem. It's the abuser that wants CONSTANT contact to continue the abuse.

I don't recall reading a post on this or any other thread on GN that has attempted to "diminish that children are often victims of their parents" poakie.

The tragic reality we all need to accept is that some parents are abusive as are some adult children.

@ LaoCha... I agree with much of this. Many abusers project their own issues onto others and blame the victims with their own poor behaviour.

I am also sure there are many abusers out there using the internet established Narcissism criteria to justify there abuse or control against parent of adult children.

I am also dealing with Narcissistic MIL. Many of the things that she does in a vacuum does seem like much the kind of thing you just have to learn to get along with. But the totality of it all is impossible to comprehend until you experience it. There are people I do not get along with or agree with, but I know that this is as much my problem as it is theirs.

Dealing with a emotionally abusive parent who thinks they are owed something for raising you and that respect should only flows one way is a drain that many people cannot meet.

Parents have as much responsibility maintaining a loving and respectful relationship as their adult children.

I feel truly sorry for the loving grandparents that have been victimizing by other abusers, but this DOES NOT diminish that children are often victims of their parents.

The original post sounds like it could be from a narcicistic abuser seeking sympathy and validation. Thinking in psychology evolves as we students human psyche. During WWII in England maybe everyone did keep mum with a a stiff upper lip no matter how they were treated. Not all discipline of children is abuse. But some people are very covertly abusive and tend towards sociopathy. Like any vocabulary, some will abuse and misuse it. But for others, it could be a genuine lifeline that allows them a way out of a relationship that has hindered their own development and happiness at the expense of others. You've got to be clever to know who has a legitimate complaint and who is jumping on the bandwagon. Some here protest, because they have victimized and our now playing the victim. Just watch wee donny trump. "They're saying very mean things about us." That from the mouth that has said Some of the meanest things in recent history. Don't be fooled by those here seeking validation for their abusive ways. Yhisnos the internet, after all. To me, this sounds like a forum for abusers who don't understand why they have "mean things said" about them.

Violet floss?How weird of your m i law!

I think things went badly wrong after my little Gra daughter was born but I can no longer keep analysing it

It is what it is
One day I pray I can See ed again I still love her.
However like yogagirl not sure him up there likes me.

OH Rosy so very sad, you were exceptional, in how you handled it, how unkind of your d.i.l to knock your hand away when you were singing a little lalabye to your dear new granddaughter The image of you singing to your baby GD is so lovely, one day, maybe soon now, she can be told that story, albeit edited.

I too thought I got on good with my s.i.l, as I've said before, when he came round to me, during the 'big argument' and my D was staying with me, he came in, gave me a big hug and said ^ I don't want to fall out with you D^ But I now realize he was trying to pull me over to his side against my own D, which would never happen and then when they got back together, after my mediation, he showed me what he really thought of me
All through their 'big argument' I was bigging him up, saying he was a good husband & dad. How wrong was I, sucked in to his charade, make-believe world! After my D was allowed back into her home and see her C again, she began to enlighten me as regards to what her H was really like!

My MIL changed when I got pregnant. This is when it all started really then escalated when I gave birth.

And before anyone says anything, she was included in everything, she had copies of both scans, she met her the day she was born, we didn't ask her to buy anything etc etc.

She just changed. She didn't like me, we knew that but Jesus she really upped her game after DD was born.

Sorry am tired typos worse than normal!

Hope you got the gist,

Rocknrolemm belated hollow from me!

So sorry to read your story.

Please don't think it's always d i laws

In my case it's my daughter and s i law,

I have come to crept after 9 years that the cruelty will never end.
Like Smilelss and others my dh and I have rebuilt our lives,

We are lucky my twin let's me share his grandkids and their mum is wonderful it helps.

There are no real answers are there?

How someone can turn like Rosy d i law ?For you Rosy

It's so hard.

And the worst bit is in my case leaving me so vulnerable although I have wonderful genuine friends my oldest friend xxx godmother has just ended our friendship after 46 years and it brings back all feelings of rejection,

Obviously not in same league as our daughter as it was ourmfirst grandchild and we were beyond excited and thrilled she has tried to destroy us with her cruelty.
The first few ears were worst,

Eventually you accept that there is nothing you can do if someone wants to hurt you you can only control how you react,

X

There must be a script somewhere that these daughters/sons in law follow. For five years I too was as close to my own daughter-in-law as I could be, given the 200 odd miles between us. Once she became pregnant it was as if I ceased to exist, although it took me a while to realise this was happening, especially as I was paying for all the things she asked for, for the baby. I had just come home after a three month stay in hospital, and she had gone to her parents for the two months before and after the birth, so I was unaware of her changed attitude right away. Until she came just once with my granddaughter, the one and only time I have seen her. I was totally bewildered with how she behaved towards me. I asked if I could hold the little one and my son took her and put her in my arms. The rest of the time she stayed in the bedroom with her. While they were getting ready to leave I rocked the buggy and was singing quietly to her. When she heard me, her mother charged down the stairs, knocked my hand away and told me not to touch the buggy again. I haven’t seen her or my granddaughter since.

I am lucky that I still have my son who stood up to her initially. However when he tried to bring the little one to see me, the fall out was unbelievably vicious. As a result I told him to leave things. I don’t want the child to associate rows and worse, with coming to my home. I truly believe that you can’t win with this type of person. All you can do is refuse to play the game....which is what I’ve done.

To those who say it must be our fault, we must know what we’ve done, do they not see the exact same examples of the treatment towards us from each and every one of us.....complete strangers all telling the same story....Rosy.x.

thanks smileless too...since my mum and brother have died my sister in law doesn't even send xmas card..nothing from neice and nephews either. Unfortunatley my mother left my brother a large inheritance and now it is all hers ... and she has cut herslf and family off completely...it is gobsmacking.