Going NC with Grandparent of Non-Binary Grandchild

[kale]

Hello All,

I feel I am attempting to express the jumble of emotions I have at the moment.

I'm a 43[M] single parent (cPTSD in recovery, avoidant tendencies, avoidant personality disorder spectrum, freeze/fawn hybrid) with a 13[non-binary] teen who has been living alternatively/mobile for two years. My childhood was a fucktangle of all the trauma's except sexual. My mother is a OCD/perfectionist flight type while my father is a sociopathic narcissist fight type (NFather) now 79. My kiddo has been on supervised visits only with my Nfather and his wife for years.

As my kiddo has gotten more bold in asserting herself as they question and explore and discover themselves in this world they have challenged my Nfather's worldview. He is highly conservative, fond of fox news, and has a very binary worldview politically and personally. When he became aware of my kiddo's non-conforming chosen pronouns he was openly upset. I sat down and had a video chat with him and his wife. He attempted to scapegoat and blame some invisible fantasy party that was influencing my kid. He attempted to argue and intimidate my stated perspective of unconditional love regardless of how they express. Then he tried to justify their expression with 'kids these days'. I set a firm expectation/boundary that my Nfather love my kid however they choose to express. . . and he just says the things he is supposed to say without any weight of feeling or authenticity behind them.

My kid will be ok. I'm going non-contact. What I'm writing here is for me.

I'm 43. My healing journey has been lifelong, and really took off when I was 39, almost five years ago.

I had a second conversation with Nfather yesterday to feel him out a couple weeks after the first conversation. The best I got was, 'I'll do the thing you want me to do because I know I should say that', before going into a rant about why gender non-conformity doesn't make sense to him and relating my kiddo's experience now with his 'rebellion' of bleaching out his hair in the late 50's, early 60's.

What really bugs me is that it took me being a mama bear for my kid to go NC. That I couldn't do it for myself. . . as I have felt conflicted about our relationship for years.

Realization
I have an expectation that my father love me in a way he is incapable of, which I am working on releasing. That I love my father despite the many and varied ways he has hurt me. That this boundaryless love for him has caused me a great deal of hurt and pain. That I can love him while having nothing to do with him. That my wiring for love looks more like stockholm syndrome than healthy human love in relationship.

The Dark Side
There is so much inadequacy coming up around this break. That I didn't do it sooner. That I couldn't do it for me. That my Nfather, author of many of my childhood traumas and core wounds, is still someone I have hope and love for despite actions that demonstrate his lack of care and compassion. I am just an accessory to his self image. I am a thing to be used, manipulated and cast off when convenient. That I am just an actor in a play staring him, and he is the puppet master in all he touches.

That it took not just having a kid, but having a kid that chooses to express in a non-conforming manner. . . to be their true self in a moment. . . and I'm sitting here stumped, juggling all of the varied voices in my head from my father's narrative, my mother's equally bastardized narrative, my inner and outer critics are all going fucking nuts at the moment.

And I know that there is joy in unpacking all of this. So much of this healing work seems like a deep fog of unknowing. Yet when a major decision is made I'm able to (before too long) release, realize clarity, and move forward on my healing journey.

I feel pulled apart at the moment. Like the part of me that chooses to suffer my father out of obligation is at odds with the part of myself that knows he is free of all of the family bullshit. I know I need to write and commit to memory a new narrative, one spoken with clarity and perspective. The time and space to write that will come, it just hasn't arrived just yet.

I am free, I am free, I am free

of the gaslighting
of the scapegoating
of the heartstrings that bind me to my history
of the father that presupposes to love me

I call to me the self compassion, perspective and love that I require to take my next step in healing
I call to me chosen family that I can trust
I call to me my inner voice that my parents tried to beat out of me

these cords bind me no more

I am free, I am free, I am free

[treesgrowslowly]

Hi Kale,

Welcome.

Sometimes, having our children make life-affirming moves in their own life, brings us to a new path in our own life. I believe this is how healing happens for a lot of us. The courageous acts of the youngest generation, remind us to follow the call to freedom that we hear as well. Young people are the future, as the saying goes. They can show us older folks, what needs more healing / repair.

Much peace to you and your kiddo,

Trees

[moglow]

Kale - you won my heart with the use of "fucktangle" If ever there was a better word!

A good bit of what you wrote regarding dad and the "relationship" with him, I've written about my mother. They truly don't get that they don't HAVE to believe in "it" [whatever it is they disagree with] - just accept your child and grandchild as they are, love them however they show up or eventually they won't show up at all. The parents we speak of don't understand that, they see it as a given that they must be loved/respected/obeyed no matter how they treat those very children. It's not acceptable for us to question or have/voice difference of opinion or make any choices of which they may disapprove. They think we must conform and somehow earn their approval.

Look at that dark side and find acceptance with it - you won't be able to change anything about him/them but you can always help yourself. It'll take time and work, and you'll probably dip off where you don't want to be here and there, but breathe through it and understand that stuff is well and truly in your past. There's a lot more comfort and peace in that than I realized, the power of No is real!

I'm a big believer that you can love someone and still know they're not good for you. You can love and not like them. You can have agape love, same as you have for all creatures, and still choose to not have a relationship with them. I believe we can even forgive whatever ignorance, pride or lack of decency made them do what they did to us, and also choose no relationship going forward. It helps release us from that sense of obligation and their beliefs that we're somehow wrong.

Have a great day!

[Starboard Song]

Kale - you won my heart with the use of "fucktangle"

We are all swooning over that.

Kale,

Welcome.

We went NC with the grandparent class 7 years ago. We too were inspired not by our own issues, but by their attempts to bully someone else. I think we all get pretty used to accomodating toxic people, and it is probably pretty common to get shocked out of that by our sympathy for others.

Our NC crisis began when they held us in Contempt of PD for not helping them to control an older woman making end of life decisions. If it had been our own lives we'd have no doubt caved in again and made nice and commenced Operation Rug-Sweep v23.1. We'd come close to crisis before, and it again involved another party. Once, when the object was our toddler, we'd held firm and have effectively NC conditions for about 4 months. Even there we caved in largely, while securing agreements -- soon broken -- about our son. But when end-of-life decisions were in play we had enough and couldn't play along or accomodate.

So you are probably in good company. I wish you so much good peace and strength.