Just had this same revelation lately...they abandoned me. I just decided enough was enough and stopped sacrificing my peace for their comfort. The roads and phones run both ways ❤
1 week ago | 58
If they didn't genuinely care about you snd your well being when you were a child, they will continue to not genuinely care about you as an adult. We all crave love and connection but need to find it with people actually capable of love and connection. You can have a relationship with toxic parents but it will require armor and heavy boundaries. And realistic expectations of what they are capable of.
1 week ago | 62
I’m convinced most people have babies to fill a gap in their lives, or to get the approval of others. Our entire conception and birth, we were already abandoned because they were never really there. You were a prop, a house plant, a card to get them in somewhere, you were the token people respected them through because they ticked a box of societal expectations. You were never to be understood or genuinely seen. Those people couldn’t even see themselves.
1 week ago | 86
If a child ever abandons the parents, it's because the parents did not establish a bond and a connection of trust and unconditional love. There's only so much neglect a human being can tolerate
1 week ago | 15
My parents must have been counting on my forgetting my childhood once I became an adult; they HAD to have been.
1 week ago | 28
My mom literally said to me “Why do you keep hanging on what happened when you are small? Look forward and move on!” Yeah, I do look forward and move on.
1 week ago | 19
The big eye opener was having a child of my own and realizing it isn't normal to slap them if they try to hug you. Watching my folks tell my toddler to go away was quite hurtful. When I lost a child and saw their reactions, I went no contact. Truly evil people, I pray for their souls.
1 week ago | 34
It’s so so hard to finally accept that the only one who really cares about my well being in my family is me. My sister is unable to be there for me because she’s dealing with her own messed up stuff and needs to protect herself. My mom is limited by her need to accommodate my dad’s bullying and have a story that excuses his abuse as not that bad. She can’t care about my well being if it comes into conflict with protecting my dad’s needs. And my dad is unable and uninterested in connecting with others in any non transactional way. He has viewed me and my sister as competition for the attention of my mom my whole life. Now he has her all to himself and I’ve had to let everyone go. They simply can’t really be there for others all due to allowing my dad to run the whole show. His limitations became everyone’s limitations until finally I couldn’t take it any longer. But I still miss having a family.
1 week ago (edited) | 24
Believe it or not. my mother told me when I was in my thirties that I had always rejected her. Then she told me how at 6 months old I rejected people I was not familiar with; when they reached out to me to hold me. I would just stare at them. That is the normal reaction of a 6 month old who can recognize familiar faces from strangers. There's not much you can do with someone who truly believes that.
1 week ago | 17
The other thing is: so what if you abandoned them? You didn't consent to being born. You didn't consent to having them be your parents. You're under no obligation to continue a "relationship" with them. Let them paint you as the villain, it literally doesn't matter and your freedom is on the other side of folding to what others think about you. Oh, I abandoned them... okay? I'm not crying about it while I'm living my life over here. It's just another form of emotional blackmail they try to use to keep you in line and playing your assigned role(s) in the toxic family system. (Emotional Blackmail is when they use: fear, intimidation, obligation, duty, honor, loyalty, guilt, and shame for coercive control. Don't take the bait.)
1 week ago (edited) | 7
I truly appreciated this post. It brought back old childhood memories that I will be reflecting on with new insight. Only in the 12 Step rooms I’ve been able to find my tribe, and feel seen, heard and loved. Thank you for shedding light on the reality of dysfunctional families and childhoods.
1 week ago
| 4
They abandoned me. They used me. They neglected me. They did every single thing you listed.
1 week ago | 5
My folks are dead, and I'm just left with all the toxicity.
1 week ago | 13
not to forget: cutting of or going very low contact with toxic and or heavily avoidant siblings; in a way this can even be harder to accept, because you used to see y´all all as an alliance that suffered the same dirt.
1 week ago | 10
I've just realised I'm abandoning mySelf🥺 ... An early-ish memory (I was nearly 3 yrs old... Thanks to trauma I remember from very young) we were out as a family at Navy Days (born in Plymouth, Devon) & my father lifted me up high (& I was so happy bcoz he'd stopped this since my Ma used to get so angry & shout about it) & he put me over the barrier into the lost children's area. They walked off with my newborn baby bro in pram (the golden child) laughing & not even looking back. They did return after a little while & someone was asking who my parents were & didn't believe me when I said they'd put me there... Eesh All Love to you dear people - look after yourselves - love yourselves - be kind to yourselves.
1 week ago | 4
I was conditioned to abandoned myself. Currently chilling in my car listening to the radio (so I can enjoy my 🚬 bc it's cold out) working on stuff I can do online. Taking a little break. It's dark out. I'm in the country. It's peaceful. 1st time closet thing to peace. Enjoying what I can ☺
1 week ago | 2
You're an amazing writer Patrick. The way you put words together illuminates these concepts in a way that no one else can.
1 week ago | 2
Patrick Teahan
Who abandoned who?
For many childhood trauma survivors, cut-offs and setting boundaries with toxic parents can be excruciating because the inner child gets flooded with guilt and shame around letting the family down. ⠀
⠀
When I'm working with a client in that position, I know they're caught in a battle between their adult part, which knows to continue with the toxic parent means to be: ⠀
⠀
*used ⠀
*not seen
*shamed
*triangulated
*severely triggered
*guilted
*and again be put in their childhood family role (the resource, the scapegoat, the parent)
⠀
And the inner child is only focused on not wanting to be bad.
⠀
In connecting with our inner child, our adult part's job is to hold space for the pain and undo the brainwashing. However, inner children need a lot of help seeing who the toxic parents are and what is the truth about what happened in childhood.⠀
⠀
Two big inner child traits: ⠀
1) Inner children hold out hope that the family will "get it" until we are fully healed.⠀
2) Inner children have built-in forgetting about what happened to them.⠀
⠀
I'll ask a client who is struggling with their toxic parents in the present and ask, "Who abandoned who?"
⠀
Who didn't show up for you when you were bullied?
Who left you with the perpetrators?
Who modeled a one-way street?
Who let YOU be the parent?
Who left you to figure it out on your own without safety?
⠀
"Who abandoned who?"
1 week ago | [YT] | 2,111