fake apology: "I'm sorry you're such a failure in life"

[Boat Babe]

Good grief Seven. Your story left me gobsmacked.  Utterly toxic behaviour from a parent. Unreal.

[blacksheep7]

Pseudonym,
So not only was I in the wrong for leaving ex2 because it was obviously my fault he hit me to begging with, but I was also wrong because I didn't leave after the first time he hit me.

This woman also had the gall to invite him and his new girlfriend to her place for dinner.

 

Wow, nice M!!!

Mine would always ask about my ex's even though they were abusive to me.????? 
Just before nc I told my NM that we didn't have a good role model, NF and his moods/rages, no love expressed or demonstrated in order for us to choose a good  partner.

She answered «well, your're the one who chose them». Darvo.
Today I certainly would tell her about her choice in a husband. 

[Psuedonym]

Seven and blacksheep,

Yeesh!  To both of you!

[nanotech]

Pseudonym,
So not only was I in the wrong for leaving ex2 because it was obviously my fault he hit me to begging with, but I was also wrong because I didn't leave after the first time he hit me.

This woman also had the gall to invite him and his new girlfriend to her place for dinner.

 

Wow, nice M!!!

Mine would always ask about my ex's even though they were abusive to me.????? 
Just before nc I told my NM that we didn't have a good role model, NF and his moods/rages, no love expressed or demonstrated in order for us to choose a good  partner.

She answered «well, your're the one who chose them». Darvo.
Today I certainly would tell her about her choice in a husband. 

Oh my Lord
I got the Darvo too

I asked my mum to stop saying how sorry she was for my ( abusive) ex boyfriend. She said his in front of my young children. It was at least 10 years later. Then my Nsis joined in with the sympathy.
My kids were toddlers running round. This guy abused me and assaulted me. The last attack he made on me got him arrested, which I reckon saved my life that night.
And there's my mum saying ' awww I still feel really sorry for him!'
And my sister,
'Yes, me too!'
Then when I told them I didn't want him to be discussed any more, because he ruined my teenage years, mum said, ' Well, you brought him home.'
DARVO
At the time I didn't know what to say to that. I should have got up and left my mum's house and never gone back.
Instead I sat there and took the blame for my own abuse.
Then I put the kettle on like a good daughter and we all had tea. 
#I wasstillinthefog

Seven you wrote,

'This woman also had the gall to invite him and his new girlfriend to her place for dinner.'

My mum gave my ex abuser a lift in the car and used to answer nightime calls from him!  This is following his conviction for assault on me.
She had also told me when we were dating
( the abuse had begun) that if I finished with him that he would still be invited for lunch. I was 15.
The appalling nature of this treatment is only just becoming fully clear to me now.I'm 61.
I can't believe I didn't have it out with her, ever.

[frogjumpsout]

Nano, I'm so sorry and angry about this story! Really disgusting behavior from NMom and Sis -- that sickly sweetness towards people who hurt you -- could have killed you!! Jeezus.

[Lillith65]

They see us being loved unconditionally, being loved as we are, being respected and being treated as an equal by someone outside the family. It's an outsider who wants to come in,and who threatens the skewed dynamics, by raising us up.
They find this so difficult to deal with. Unacceptable really.
This someone then loves us the most, and will always love us more, than anyone else in the FOO(of course!). And any children we might have, will also be loved unconditionally by this person for being just as they are.

This is born out by the fact that my UBPDmum adored my first boyfriend (who was an abuser). He learned and played the family system, putting my mum first and just fawning all over her. He was sweetness and light to my mum,  quite flirty really I think, though I didn't see it at the time. In contrast,  I had two years of hell.

Years later, she still made excuses for his behaviour, and expressed sympathy for him. My UNPD sister chimed in. My children were playing in the room at the time,

The penny has dropped reading your post regarding why my parents dislike my second husband so much but my mother fawned over and would ask about my first, physically abusive husband in a very fond tone. She also invited him to stay with them and told him that he 'would always be welcome''. This is the man who repeatedly assaulted me, including when I was pregnant and finally put me in hospital, lied about that assault in court (by claiming that I had faked my injuries. He was found guilty), fought me for custody of our son by claiming that I was an unfit mother and stole my diaries to 'prove' it. He also tried to starve me out of the home by only providing food for my son rather than the maintenance he should have payed. Then he told my son on visits that I preferred my horses to him.

My mum still loves him and loathes my caring, wonderful second husband.

Thank you so much for clarifying this and helping me see it anew.

And OMG Mathilde! I thought mine was bad for bringing home a man of 34 ( who she fancied and I ended up married to out of a combination of bullying from her and a sense of being worthless/no one else would want me) At the time I was barely 17. He started picking me up late at night (after 10pm) and taking me to his house for the night and my parents didn't say a word.

  For all of us who have suffered similar abuse.

[Adrianna]

These stories are truly horrific! I'm so sorry to all went through this.

Years ago my husband left me for someone else, someone he barely knew. My grandmother implied it was my fault.

My father offered no advice except get a good lawyer. My mother had nothing to say about it.

It's really sinking in that not one person in that family had my back. Not one.

[Lillith65]

It is such a horrible feeling Adrianna when you realise that your family, who most assume will be your strongest supporters, are so undermining and actively abusive.

I am sorry that you have gone through this too.

[nanotech]

Nano, I'm so sorry and angry about this story! Really disgusting behavior from NMom and Sis -- that sickly sweetness towards people who hurt you -- could have killed you!! Jeezus.

Thanks for that frogjumpsout
It seems like many on this thread have an abusive ex that our mothers still seem to adore, long after their demise!
Thry even try to keep them under our roof.
Did they want us to continue to be abused? Makes me wonder.
What on Earth.

It seems unreal sometimes that she was like that. At other times she was so normal and nice.
Nobody would have thought there was any sort of dysfunction.

Adrianna too has suffered in a very similar way! OMG.

I felt unprotected too, and I was allowed to be out late at night with him at his flat.
When my own daughter reached the age of 14/15 I started to realise just how clueless I had been.
I was very watchful with both my daughters.
I also told them what had happened to me. I didn't want it to happen to them.

[frogjumpsout]

This thread is helping me remember that some similar things, but lesser in extent, happened to me, too -- first with an abusive stalker ex-boyfriend from college with whom my mother kept in touch for 20 years. She may actually still be in touch with him, but I asked her not to talk to me about it anymore, after she forwarded a threatening message from him to me on my last day of a vacation abroad.

The last conversation NM and I had about this topic went like this:
FROG: I just don't want to hear about his messages anymore, because as I've said, he stalked me in college and afterwards.
NM: (sudden onset of high, innocent child-voice) Could it be...that he's...mentally ill? I just thought it was all so romantic!

Also, she liked to go on about how much she missed and loved my ex-husband, an overt N, after he'd left me. Oh yeah, and she pushed me to try to win ex-h back after I was already with my current partner. When I balked, she screamed "F U!" and hung up the phone.

Thanks giving me a chance to remember and vent about all this!

[GettingOOTF]

My family also kept/keep in touch with my abusive ex. While we were married they wanted nothing to do with him.

I got a really big promotion at work and my father said “is that a real promotion or just a [my industry] thing?” 

When I was taking my driving test he said “your sister had to take hers 3 times” as a “don’t get your hopes up” dig. When I passed the first time he said “well the test here is much harder”.  He has no idea what the test in the county I live in is like.

I have hundreds of examples like these. My family can’t stand it when good things happen to people and they hate it most when I’m the person good things are happening for.

[nanotech]

Frogjumpsout and GettingOOTF. I'm sending hugs. 
Chilling, the way they want to minimise our achievements.
Devastating the way they seem to love our abusers, rather than protect us against those memories.
They enjoy speaking with and about our past abusers. This continues the abuse for us.

My mother used to take these late phone calls from my abusive ex. The next day I would be blamed and shamed for the call having 'disturbed' her. They went on for months afterwards.
It's only now that I realise- I feel there must have been a part of her that enjoyed these calls and felt somehow flattered by them.
She told me when he rang he would list all the things that were wrong with me. I think the calls got so abusive that she eventually did start ending them.
Yet for months this abuser rang my mum to denigrate me, and she listened.
I never heard the phone ring in the night.
Why did she listen to him? Why didn't she put the phone down at first sound of his voice? Why were the police never involved?
I used to suggest to her to leave the phone off the hook at night, at least for a time.
She would say very dramatically, and weirdly offended, that she couldn't do that in case her mother was suddenly taken ill.

I then asked her to wake me, and I would deal with it, and then she could sleep.
I was an abused 16 year old. trying to recover, but I couldn't cry to my mum. At no
point could I. My mum cried to me instead. 

FYI- Her mother, my grandma, lived three hours drive away and she wasn't alone, living with my aunt. If she were taken ill mum wouldn't have had to go there in the middle of the night. Grandma had support.

My ex was fostered by a family whom my mother stayed in touch with until her death. 
They fostered him until he started stealing from them.
My mum said he was just misunderstood.   

Hugs to every single poster on here.   
This thread has been so cathartic for me.
I've felt/ spoken myself into knowing, into having a deeper awareness of what happened.
Reading your experiences, though I wish it hadn't happened to you, yet it's empowering for me that you share it, and I don't feel alone any more. I used to feel so bleak at times.  This thread has helped clear the self- blame I was unaware that I was still carrying around.

[Adrianna]

Nano I feel the same. There's a lot of healing going on lately in this forum as we all put the pieces together and listen to the similar stories of others.

No one outside of someone with a pd parent or caregiver could possibly ever understand. Without the internet and the knowledge of this, I can't imagine where I'd be. I'd probably still be blaming myself and would have continued to have no boundaries or self worth.

Grateful for this forum!

[Lillith65]

I feel the same way. It is a revelation that the way my parents, and in particular my mother, behaved is part of a pattern.
For many decades - I am in my 50s - I felt ashamed and responsible for so much of what happened. I could not understand what was so wrong with me that my mother would behave like that.

It is very healing to know that others have endured similar things and that it is not us. It is them.

As Adrianna says, thank god for this site.

[Adrianna]

Lilith65 I'm glad you found the forum! I agree it's been a blessing. Thank God for the knowledge!

[Cassandra T]

Mine virtually never gives a real apology. It's always something like "I'm sorry but you..." and she would say what I did or said that made her do whatever she's supposedly apologizing for. The other day, she said "I'm sorry for asking questions." I guess she wanted me to tell her how it was okay to ask questions, and she didn't need to apologize, she didn't do anything wrong. But it wasn't the questions she was asking me, it was the critical way she was doing it, what she was obviously implying with them and being all in an uproar about it. If she had simply asked me the questions, it would have been no problem. But she got loud, angry and accusatory.

She also acts like she can't stand my husband sometimes, although she doesn't openly insult him, even just to me. She didn't want me to marry him, and kept saying "I'm just not so sure it's God's will for you to marry him." It wasn't her place to decide what God's will for my life is, and two people told me it sounded like she was more worried about "Diane's will."

After my dad, her husband, died my husband called her "Mama" one day, as a term of endearment, trying to be affectionate toward her. She turned and stared straight ahead and actually shuddered. She literally shuddered as if it was the most horrible thing she had ever heard.

One day she told me my brother had said I was lucky to have my husband. Then she looked at me as if she was trying to tell me "but we know the truth, don't we." The same look she would get sometimes when someone complimented me. Actually, it sounded like a compliment but it was really kind of insulting, as if I was "lucky" to have anyone, and it wasn't the result of my own decision-making and prayer. Anyway, a few minutes later she was yelling at me (long story, totally undeserved) in my dad's hospital room, and when I called my husband to see what time he was going to arrive, she said "Why do you have to have {insert husband's name, said dripping with disgust} when something like this happens?

Anyway, I am quite sure you are NOT a 'failure.' But you don't need validation from me or anybody else. You already know this, and can tell yourself this anytime. The only reason whatsoever that there's any question over the matter is because your mother has serious issues that she is projecting onto you. If she wasn't like that, the concept wouldn't even have crossed your mind, because it doesn't need to.

[frogjumpsout]

Thank you, Cassandra! These stories sound all too familiar.

[frogjumpsout]

Also, I really appreciate your final paragraph:

Anyway, I am quite sure you are NOT a 'failure.' But you don't need validation from me or anybody else. You already know this, and can tell yourself this anytime. The only reason whatsoever that there's any question over the matter is because your mother has serious issues that she is projecting onto you. If she wasn't like that, the concept wouldn't even have crossed your mind, because it doesn't need to.

[BuzzyBee]

This is horrible... I'm so sorry..

Although my children are very young,  I cannot imagine ever saying something like this to them! Unacceptable!!!

And my mom did the whole "you'll never know xyz until you have your own children" or the "I'm the adult and know xyz so much more than you because I have the experience."

Let me tell you,  I got married, had children, and she still finds something to one up me on no matter what... then after the children comes comparing them to so and so's child and it just never ends.  Or your husband is inadequate even though he does everything for you and your family, has a good job, a good heart.

It just never ends. You deserve respect and love from her but she is so miserable she tries to tear you apart just because she knows she can... I'm so sorry hugs to you.  Don't listen to her, you are doing wonderful otherwise she wouldn't be trying to tear you down.

[desertpine]

My favorite fake apology was from my uNPD sister after I told her how hurt I felt that she stonewalled for months and I had no idea why she was upset. Her apology was something like she understand that I felt hurt and if it hurt anything like it hurt her when I didn't go to church with her years ago when I was visiting from out of town, then it really must be painful. And for causing me that much pain, she was sorry but since I had offended her 6 months earlier when I told her I felt scared when she raged, she decided she didn't want anything to do with me ever again. 

I was like - wow--- that is the worst apology I've ever heard.