Sister possible DV

[Sojourner17]

On Sunday I received a text from my mom saying my youngest sister could use my support right now and things haven't been going well.  I answered casually as I had communicated with my sis two days earlier.  Mom preceded to text that in the night the police were called, my parents were called to take my sis kids, my sis partner was out of the house and my sis had marks on her. 
I texted that was unfortunate. 

Mom sent one more text about my sis eldest child as it was her bday.  I didn't respond. 

I had video messaged my sis that day about the birthday and also texted her about something unrelated with no response.  I had received moms texts already but wanted to test the waters with my sis to see if she would open up on her own and say something. (I hate the bind I get put in when I get texts about my sisters,  I'd rather hear it from them if they want to tell me.)

I'm feeling a lot of FOG at the moment.  Obligation and guilt for sure.  I've always been put in the role of support for family.  I'm trying to step out of that as it's usually come with strings tied to it as well as strong imposition of obligation and a strong dose of guilt inducing language if I don't tow the line. 

Have any of you dealt with something similar?  I'm trying to just sit with these feelings and pray through it.  It's very uncomfortable. 

[wisingup]

Hi Soujourner - I'm sorry, what a tough situation.  In my opinion, parents should not be involved in the relationships between their adult children - it's likely to sow distrust & potentially ruin the relationship.  My updm once involved me in confronting my brother that she thought his fiance drank too much.  I was roped into basically coming along & sitting there while she said her piece.  My poor brother was blind-sided & probably felt ganged up on.   There was no need to involve me - I was in my early twenties at the time & completely clueless and I'm not sure what she hoped to gain by my presence. 

Anyway, it sounds like you reached out more than once to your sister & got no response.  Your sister knows you're there & can reach out if she decides to.  Your mom should have no part in orchestrating this interaction.  I hope your sister is OK!

[GettingOOTF]

My sister is in a very abusive marriage. For years there was a lot of chaos around it. I was deeply codependent and tried countless times to fix her situation.

In the end I had to step away. I let her know that if she ever wanted to leave I’d pay her airfare, help her get set up somewhere etc. She actually did leave once. A friend gave her a place to stay, some money and helped her get a job. She flew back to him in under a week and it all started again.

I myself was in an abusive relationship. People do not leave until they are ready. Nothing you say or do will help her to make any decision other than the one she wants.

There is nothing wrong with you setting boundaries and stepping away. You can tell your mother that you’ve offered help and are doing all you can and then change the subject or simply tell her not o involve you.

I came to see that my sisters and I chose the relationships we did due to our upbringing and that the entire family system was dysfunctional. For us it thrived on drama. There was only attention and help for negative situations and the “fixers” used those situations to get their own needs for supply met.

I do feel terrible for my sister. I am currently NC with her for a few reasons, her marriage being one of them. As sorry as I feel it was having too much of a negative impact on my own life and was triggering all kinds of stress and unhealthy coping mechanisms that I thought I’d overcome. I chose to lovingly walk away.

[Hepatica]

This is so scary and hard Sojourner17. I'm sorry you're experiencing this.

However you decide to manage, self-care first always. Choose to take care of your safety around it emotionally, but if you do feel compelled to help in a small way, perhaps offering a helpline to your sister? If you need to completely disengage, that is okay as well.

For anyone experiencing DV here is the info. https://www.thehotline.org/

The only thing that I understand is that this information must be kept hidden from the partner who is abusive.

(Anyone else out there experiencing this, keep your escape plan ultra secret from the abuser and make plans for pets as well.)

This always seems to escalate at holiday time. It's so sad and scary.

I'm sorry this shadow has affected you at this time Soujourner17.

[Blueberry Pancakes]

Your response to this recent event sounds fine to me. You responded with what I perceive as gray rock "that is unfortunate" but did not jump in to rescue. You say you have been put in the role of support for family and I have felt similar. Yes, it does always seem to come with strings attached and if you are like me you notice when or if you do get involved, your sister's situation does not get better but you however feel so much worse for having been part of it. 
       
My sister is in a DV marriage for 25 years. She will not leave, and outwardly they present a good image and nobody would get it. As others posted here, they do not leave based on anything we do. It can take over your entire life and wellbeing if you attempt to take this on. I do not believe this is a burden you need to carry. I feel like your sister is the one who must own this and be the one to take those steps. I know it is difficult to be on the sidelines when you know what is happening. Take care of yourself because this situation can take a toll. I think sitting with it as you mention you are doing is good and I will be wishing you peace and clarity.     
         

[Sojourner17]

I came to see that my sisters and I chose the relationships we did due to our upbringing and that the entire family system was dysfunctional. For us it thrived on drama. There was only attention and help for negative situations and the "fixers" used those situations to get their own needs for supply met

This is my family to a t.  I don't want to be/nor can I be a fixer.  It's just a constant loop and it can get draining.  4 years ago I was accosted by my unpdm when I told her I would not counsel this same sister.  It's the same stuff just a different year I'm affraid.  It probably sounds harsh to write it in those terms but it's the only way I can think of in the moment that helps me gain the emotional space needed. 
I care about my sister.  She is struggling because of choices she has made.  Yet at the same time she gets set up to fail due to unpdm's words and actions. 

Thank you all for the reminder that I don't need to carry this burden.  I can pray for my sister and about the situation and can offer kindness and support (if she asks for it) but I'm not obligated to get involved in the drama/crazy making train. 

Yes,  it is hard.  I don't want my sister and nieces to be hurt.  At the same time I know that both she and her boyfriend are young (21) and without great coping skills plus they both have unsupportive and dysfunctional extended families.  It's a hard road for sure. 

[sandpiper]

Yes. Been there.
I made a decision that I was going to step back from trying to persuade people to leave their DV situations. I did it for a lot of years when I was younger & one thing I found was that after they'd left & changed their lives, the DV friends didn't want me around any more. The friendships faded as they built new and healthier lives and my T helped me to understand that while they appreciated my support, my presence in their life was also a reminder of where they'd been and quite possibly a trigger. I have one very close friend now who I befriended in her early days of when she escaped & I think part of our bond is that I wasn't a memory of her captivity but I'm one of the symbols of her freedom.
My uBPDsister became utterly enraged when I tried to talk about her situation with her friends. All that mattered to her was the mask and even now that her husband is dead, the keeping up appearances thing is still all-important. We grew up in a family that did a lot of damage by instilling those values so my feeling is that this helped to reinforce my sister's choices.
If people push you to interfere, I think you're wise to grey-rock by saying 'you're quite right, that doesn't sound good,' but something I learned to late was to say 'I've found that sis just pushes me away if I try to press her. I think it's far more important to let her decide when she's ready to talk and obviously if she or the kids are in danger, we just have to call the police.'
Ultimately it's up to your sister, the choices that she makes.
Someone else recommended the book 'Codependent no more' on another thread recently - I read that when I was feeling emotionally torn by my sister's situation and my Nsister's steady enabling of UBPDsis's behaviour - and it was the beginning for me, of learning the tools I needed to step back.
My counsellor had a meditation and goal setting exercise she made my group do.
It was basically a relaxation exercise that involved imagining you are in a storm tossed sea and you have to keep putting people in lifeboats and throwing unnecessary cargo overboard, with the mantra 'they will be safe in the lifeboats, stop thinking about their journey and focus on what you need to do to get your own ship through the storm and safely into port.'
She finished the exercise by saying to us 'If the person in your life with all these problems that take up your time was to wake up tomorrow and all their problems were fixed, what would you be doing with your life?'
Sometimes you have to consider how all the energy you expend worrying about the PD could be invested & start focusing on those things. Otherwise they can steal a huge chunk of your time and your life and it's like throwing money into the furnace and love into a void.

[blacksheep7]

My sister is in a very abusive marriage. For years there was a lot of chaos around it. I was deeply codependent and tried countless times to fix her situation.

I understand your feelings as I've been there also, dysfunctional partners, drugs and/or alcohol.

I'm sorry for the news.  I think like you that it should be your sister contacting you, your mother staying out of it.  But where we come from, dysfunction/co-dependent background, there are no boundaries and who ever is the closest or more available has to be ready to somehow try and fix the problem. 

I heard gcb 66 yrs old was visiting NM and he had a health problem that needed immediate attention, they called my sil instead of an ambulance.  Not the first time either.

It is  time consuming and energy that tires us, to no end. Your sister is the only one who has to recover from her abusive relationship.  It take acceptness of the situation and a strong will to change her life and to look at herself,  the part she played in it.

Unfortunately we often learn the hard way. 

I now understand that you don't want to be a fixer.  I also stepped away from that, there is always drama of some sort.

[nanotech]

I've been dragged into so many family dramas that I've lost count.
My family too, thrived on it, would only be present for drama.
Unpdsis would gain attention from our parents by procuring such drama. I was often volunteered by them to fix whatever it was- her marriage, her tempestuous relationships post -divorce, her crazy finances, her  teenage children's problems, etc etc etc.

Where were all of these family members in my day to day life? Nowhere. Ordinary, happy life is  just not interesting enough for PDs. They were only supportive when they needed me, either to feed or 'fix' one of their dramas.

I took a massive step back when I realised there was nothing normal about this stuff. I'm now distanced. I wish I'd seen it years ago. I've wasted years and years over- functioning for them. At times I neglected my family of choice to please FOO. This nearly cost me my marriage.

When I needed support ( once) with a genuine difficulty, they rallied round making  lots of noise, taking over and giving commands. Actual objective help was not given. Instead, my situation was used to feed their internal drama wolves.
When the drama faded, so did they.
Keep grey rocking. Works for me.  And low to no reactivity.

[sandpiper]

Yes, what nanotech said. If I did try to share something with FOO they'd become incredibly patronising. What I asked for was them to respect my boundaries - I can solve my own problems but invariably they just acted like I was incompetent and I needed them to micromanage my life for me.
Any of you older ones who've known me over the decades will know exactly how ridiculous that is.
Over time I realised that this was just part of the narcissist dynamic. They needed to try to make me feel incompetent and 'less-than' in order to feel good about themselves.There was never going to be any of the kind of connection and light-bulb moments that I've had with people on these pages. PDs don't work on themselves - they just gild the lily.

[nanotech]

Yes, what nanotech said. If I did try to share something with FOO they'd become incredibly patronising. What I asked for was them to respect my boundaries - I can solve my own problems but invariably they just acted like I was incompetent and I needed them to micromanage my life for me.
Any of you older ones who've known me over the decades will know exactly how ridiculous that is.
Over time I realised that this was just part of the narcissist dynamic. They needed to try to make me feel incompetent and 'less-than' in order to feel good about themselves.There was never going to be any of the kind of connection and light-bulb moments that I've had with people on these pages. PDs don't work on themselves - they just gild the lily.

This is so true sandpiper- yes it's 'help' from a position of assumed superiority, and it's in order to feel better about themselves.
When we are struggling and we let them know, they wax lyrical with their sympathy, they enjoy the drama, and their self esteem rises.
Then there's the shaming. We are victim -shamed for events that happened  years back. It suits them to do it. What they are really saying is ' You are less than, because THAT happened to you.'
I've had that happen with a PD in the middle of a discussion about something else entirely.
Also, I think that PDs view our victimhood as casting shame on the whole family. My FOO  has passed toxic shame on through the generations. It made them sensitive to any kind of shame that might befall the family. I was brought up not to dare make any mistakes, nor to become a victim of any events. 

[sandpiper]

Nanotech. Yep. It's a weird dynamic.
Sometimes I have to remind myself that if I hadn't made the effort to go to T and work hard on insight and creating change, I'd probably still be acting just like they do. Three decades after getting help, revisiting that is like being an alien in a strange land.
Healthy people just offer empathy. And they ask you what you need.
My FOO would tell you what you've done wrong and then do something that you haven't asked for, didn't want, and more than likely, don't need.