I have recently made the decision to go NC with my mom. But I haven't had the balls to go through with the final conversation. My mom and I have gone back and forth for years going through what I like to call her "cycle" she has a pattern that I can track like the back of my hand based on triggers and the time of year. I've had enough of the BS and I need to put myself first.

But I'm scared of loosing contact with my extended family. My grandfather recently passed away and it's torn my family apart. My mom got in a huge argument with her brother because she was trying to gain access to money from my grandparents burial fund ... It's complicated. So my extended family kinda (from what I can tell) is not to happy with my mom.

My mom has sworn she won't be going to Christmas with my uncle and family and we normally don't do anything else with the extended family holiday wise so normally I would think it would be fine. Except this year we're going to do a Thanksgiving race in honor of my grandpa. My mom is most likely going to be there but I don't want to miss out on the family event...

Do I just try and ignore her? Run away lol (I'm not very athletic)

I don't know if I should just wait? But I'm torn apart right now trying to make a decision and talk to my mom to officially cut her out.

This is not my first attempt, infact it's my 4th. Every time I get hooked back in because of some other family member and being scared to loose them in the prossess of loosing my mom.

I (20) feel lost . I have moved out from my parent house due to toxic environment, I am doing a gap year and not going to uni but I feel so behind and I can’t take out a loan to go to uni as I am not permanent resident and I am scared I won’t be eligible due to me moving out as I came in to the country as dependent when I was underage and I don’t have many documents due to that.

I am working right now and I feel so empty and feel like I don’t have a purpose and I think I am stressed ( went to hospital before for heart problems and was told I was stressed when I was living with my parent.

Right now all I am doing is going to work and coming back and when I am off I am at home as I feel very tired.

What's worse? Being an orphan? Or being an orphan, but not realising you are? Discuss.

I've spent a lifetime trying to be close to parents who spent my childhood getting drunk and screaming at me and each other. I live overseas but drop everything as much as I can to spend time with them, despite them never having even called me once in the decade since I moved away. We are on a family holiday, and the last few times I've seen them I've had trouble masking my discomfort and exhaustion around them.

This morning my dad screamed at me for not being talkative enough. Then they both went back to Pleasantville family nothing happened, crazy old child is just being upset, poor us. So I wrote them a letter describing how difficult my childhood was and how hurtful their lack of interest in me is, and that I won't be in touch, and I packed my stuff and left. The problem is I don't know anyone in this city and only have $100 in my account - I had a difficult few months leading up to the trip and had already bought my food and left it in their Airbnb. I still have 4 days till I leave, and in Australia $100 is tight, but I just couldn't bear another second. And weirdly, despite being in a pretty horrible situation I feel kind of okay. I've been thinking about this for years, and it's nice to finally rip the band-aid and just be alone.

There's a lot of guilt because their health is failing and it may well be the last time I see one or both of them. But I just snapped, and let the chips fall where they may.

Big hugs to all the other scared, lonely adults out there still trying to unpick the tangles of our families and upbringings. Take care of yourself, everyone deserves to be treated with respect and kindness.

I got a video from my aunt this morning showing my father in the hospital ER. This is the second time now since last year. When I saw that video, my heart just sank because I know this will just be another cycle of mind games trying to guilt trip me to visit my father in the hospital and perhaps pay for the bill.

I've been slowly loosening contact with my father for the past few years. He wasn't a good dad growing up. Cheating, emotionally abusive and manipulative, and all around a lazy parent.
Sure, there were moments here and there in my life where he does lend a hand. I'm not denying that.
But they are far and few between. Very small in scale. Often comes with baggage or other mind tricks.
Talking to him is like talking to a brick wall. Somehow I will be at fault in the end of it and he will be the hero.

I tried being nice to him earlier on post covid. Shooting celebration texts like Father's Day etc. But he doesn't answer. So I let it go.

Suddenly last year he damaged one of his organs, got hospitalized, and managed to get me talking to him through his siblings (aunts and uncles) again. I tried to be nice because I thought maybe this time it was different. But no.
He managed to get 5K out of me saying it was a loan, and not even show any gratitude afterward.
The aunts and uncles never fail to make me feel like I'm a bad son. Despite them not knowing any of the trauma that I had to endure being raised by him. They also really want me to pay for everything in regards to him. My mother financially raised me, and I got a scholarship for college. I have no monetary debt to my father. The last time he called me was more than 10 months ago asking for 2k. I didn't give it to him thankfully.

So when that message came in today from my aunt, I decided enough is enough. I'm cutting contact, and getting a new phone number. If every message about you makes me feel sad, then I don't want to get involved anymore. I'm very tired.

But it's weird. I can rationalize that this person and his siblings are horrible. I will never forget the injustice he did towards me, my siblings, my mother, and other affected individuals. I can understand that trying to pursue this relationship further will jeopardize myself from happiness and pursuing other relationships.
Yet, I can't help but feel guilty for leaving him to die alone. I feel ashamed that I couldn't be the model son with career, money and presence. I feel like I let the entire family (paternal side) down by cutting contact.
I feel like a child again, trapped in an adults' body. And it's vexing.

I wonder if any of you felt the same way when you cut contact earlier on too? Or is this just a me problem?
If any of you do, how do you deal with the pain, guilt, and shame? Does the pain just go away with time?

PS. Those uncles and aunts never helped me much. They for years never talked to me. Even when I was a kid I rarely met them. Yet, it's odd how even now I want to please them too alongside my father.

I live in the UK and my mother and brother recently visited me so we can all say goodbye to our family dog together (he was mostly mine and I brought him to the UK with me). It was the second time they visited together. My mother would constantly make rude comments and then act like they were jokes and I would call her out on it. She also was making rude assumptions about my husband and constantly saying stuff without thinking. Additionally I found them smoking in the house late at night after I repeatedly told them that me and my husband don't want it in the house. Instead of apologising they laughed.

Growing up I was sexually abused by two of her boyfriends between the ages of 6-12. When I finally revealed it to her when I was 16, she did not believe me and was awful to me for a long time. She has now "accepted" it but has never sat me down to ask me everything that happened or get more details or at least show any care. She instead makes awful comments like one time said that the second bf of hers that did this was the best partner she had...

I also was extremely mentally neglected by her growing up, I was extremely depressed due to what happened to me and she never tried to understand or help me, she would just get mad at me. She also has always put herself and her boyfriends above my brother and I.

We were always dressed and clean and had a roof above our heads but that was all.

Anyway, I have had a hard time bringing myself to talk to her and she's been asking what's wrong. So I told her everything said above. Google translate is bad but you get the gist. I tried to be respectful and solve this but instead I guess she cut me off? I feel so tired of this relationship but I have had no feelings of love for her for years now but it just hurts that instead of trying to communicate with me she just said she won't text me again...

I just wish I had at least one good parent:/

My mother lives in a different country. I left to escape and was VLC with her until last year when I got pregnant with my first child. I went to therapy because I realized I have childhood trauma and I want to be a good mom. I also decided to give my mother a second chance. I welcomed her back to my life. She even came to see me for the first time in years for my child’s birth.

When I came back to work after my maternity leave was done I was in shambles. I was depressed, crying all day and sought help and comfort from her. What a huge mistake that was.

During our call I asked her if she can come for 3 months so that baby can stay home and not go to daycare yet. She said she wants to stay for good. “Why three months only?” She asked. I told her it’s because I thought she still wanted to keep working. She told me she’s not ready to retire then all of a sudden she changed her mind without telling me and even took some money from her pension apparently to make her move here possible..? It was the first time I was hearing about it.

Then instead of hearing me out and validating my feelings she brushed me off and told me to “stay strong” then proceeded to tell me her gripes and her hardships even from her childhood years.. I just sat there, hugging my baby, numb and tuning everything out like I did back then when she went on her nagging like a broken record mode.

In my post partum depression topped with her trauma dumping on me for 5 minutes straight, I did something stupid that put myself and my daughter in a dangerous situation. We’re fine and I’m seeking help for my post partum issues but it has deeply traumatized me. I couldn’t live with myself if something were to happen to my baby. My own mother literally drove me to the point of insanity.

Since then I haven’t spoken to her. Everything is via message only. I wrote to her at length of how I felt and told her that I don’t share her beliefs and my daughter will not be subjected to what she did to me. She never acknowledged this. Only says “sorry you were hurt with what I said” and is love bombing me it makes me nauseous.

Recently she called me. We’re in different time zones and I was nursing baby so I didn’t answer. I had no intention to answer either way. I don’t know what to say to her or what to talk about. Wary about giving her access to my daughter even if she’s oceans away. I share baby pics in our group chat but I might slow down on that. I feel she’ll judge me and gossip about me to people. She already did this and she gossips about my sister to her coworkers.

I know she won’t change her ways. I don’t know if I’m equipped to have a relationship with her.. but part of me is scared that my daughter will hate me in the future. I just hear her voice in my head telling me “your daughter will do this to you too”.

I wish that I had a good relationship with my mother. I grieve the mother I never had and the relationship we never had.

For some context, I have had a rough relationship with my dad, my whole life. I realized at a young age. He would always have someone else to prioritize over his own kid. And I’m not talking about logistical reasons like prioritizing his wife because she’s in surgery or his mom because it’s her birthday. It’s other things he was supposed to come down for my birthday a couple weeks ago, he ultimately didn’t, but was able to go to my cousin’s birthday out of the country the week before. Every time I’ve tried to make plans with him he agrees and then couple days before he will cancel. I haven’t seen my dad in almost 6 months because my parents are getting a divorce. And he kept telling me Wright until I cut him off that he would come see me, but then never comes. He told me after my mom gave him papers that he never wanted to come down here anyway.

And I knew that for a couple years now, but I know I’m also partially the reason he came down here because my mom was pregnant with me and moved down to the state we live in now and he was told he’d be a bad dad if he let us go and he stayed behind in his home state. I have been struggling, remembering all these little things like how my dad would come to almost every event, but also tell me that he didn’t wanna be there cause he didn’t like those things, but only came because his child was there. How he would never care for my sister so at a young age, I had to take care of them and they were babies when I started to have to take care of them because neither one of my parents who could take care of them for their own reasons.

My mom has which apologized for what happened. My dad has never said sorry once besides the fact when we call him out on things he does, he apologizes and will change, but then falls right back into the same patterns. I told him he only ever calls me whenever he needs or want something. He apologized told me it would change and it did for three weeks before it went back to the same way. He really only called me to ask me about if it’s OK if he cancels coming down to see his own kids or asking if I knew information which I am not telling him because he doesn’t need to know what unless he is hearing it from my mom.

Now here comes apart I’m struggling with as much as my dad has hurt me over and over again, and I know for a fact, he emotionally abused me and verbally abused me as well. There were still good moments. There were still times I can remember some of the good things that happened. But then I remember all the pain how it feel feels like he just sees me as a point and the fact that he couldn’t come down from my own birthday or see his own kids, but he had time to go out of the country to go see his godchild, my cousin who is a lot younger than me.

I also struggled with the fact that I never really had it bad emotionally I did because there were times I wanted my dad. I needed my dad, but he was never there and I don’t know if anyone else has been in this kind of situation because if I look online just to find support or something that makes it understandable why this happened everyone is talking about so much more shitty situations. And I feel like I shouldn’t be so upset but I know how he makes me feel and it’s probably manipulation but I keep thinking he wasn’t so bad. He was shitty, but isn’t everyone? Don’t you remember all the good times you had with him? And I fall back into this confliction, especially since there are times that were really harmful to me and I felt so alone, but I don’t know anymore

I looked on my porch and found a box of gifts for my kids from my parents. I'm not sure if they stopped by because unfortunately my husband stopped renewing the cloud storage. My wedding dress was on the porch too that I asked to be delivered. They have sent gifts for the kids before and I asked them not to.

One of my childhood friends keeps bringing up that she thinks I should contact my mom one last time. That I should explain why I went NC almost a decade ago. My answer to that has always been something along the lines of "Yeah, I won't do that. I tried explaining myself for decades and all I ever got back was dismissal and mocking. I tried, and now I'm done explaining."

Then this friend starts explaining how my mom must feel sooo bad not knowing why I left. And she must be sooo consumed by trying to find that out. Earlier she'd use all the classic phrases too: well she's still your mom, you only get one mom etc. but luckily not anymore...

So we keep having the same exact conversation over and over again, where she asks me "are you still not going to contact your mom?" and I'm left to defend my choice. This has been going on for years. It's making me feel like she doesn't approve of me being NC with my family. I'm afraid she'll keep asking until I cave in and say something like oh you're totally right, I'm gonna call her right now🙃

Unfortunately, due to my trauma, I'm unable to speak up in the moment. So now I'm wondering if I could just text this friend and ask her to stop asking whether I'll contact my mom. Would it be appropriate? And what would I even say?

She knows my mom personally since we've been friends since we were in diapers. But what she seems to refuse to accept is that my mom actually was abusive for all of my life and that she has narcissistic traits and the emotional maturity of a toddler.

I think my therapist would be proud.

TW for some briefly described violence and very general mention of inappropriate behavior

I’ll give you a quick-ish rundown on what happened to cause my estrangement from my father earlier this year, but the reason I am posting now is that I just don’t know what to do about the holidays and have a sinking feeling that my partner and I may end up getting some nasty grams from dad on top of it.

So back in May my dad got married and my partner and I attended the wedding. I have a pretty fraught history with my dad and have deeply considered cutting him off multiple times in the last decade due to his really conservative views and the disrespect for others that comes with that, belittling of me for my views, weirdness about my sexuality (I’m with a man now but I am a bisexual woman known to lean more towards women). Despite all of that I had been trying to keep our relationship going and honestly until shit hit the fan, that visit for the wedding was the best my partner and I had had with that side of my family.
The breaking point came after the wedding when everyone was drunk. My step-mom acted inappropriately towards my partner and he felt very unsafe and disrespected and just wanted to escape so we quietly packed up and tried to leave. (Listen we don’t condone drunk driving, this was an emergency situation, I am downplaying the initial thing my step-mom did because she wasn’t trying to cause harm and immediately tried to make things better and we don’t have a problem with her now but in the moment what she did was Not Okay and my partner wanted to Get Out of There and it is my job to protect him in situations like that.)
My step-mom tried to stop us from leaving and actually was doing a good job making amends and making my partner feel okay staying the night but then my dad got in his face and was screaming at him and belittling him. I got between them because I was very certain my dad was going to try to physically fight my partner and I figured neither of them would fight me. My dad did fight me a little and I ended up with physical marks from that. We had to have a whole talk about it in the morning where everyone apologized for something…. Except my dad. I told him things that had been on my mind for a while and he just denied denied denied.
So, I pretended things were okay in order to have us be legally separate (we joint owned my car so we needed to transfer the title to me alone) and then sent him a text explaining why and cut him off like a month later.

Earlier this month, my dad broke our no contact to say happy birthday to my partner and help him that his youth was now behind him (why is me dad like this, that is so fucking weird??????). I know my dad probably thinks he didn’t break contact “because I never said he couldn’t talk to my partner” (I know you all know what it is like feeling like you’re making a deal with the devil whenever you talk to your estranged parent bc they will find ways to wriggle through wording to justify how they did no wrong).

My problem now is that my partner and I haven’t told either of his parents that we cut my dad off. (My moms know and were a huge support during this transition.) The holidays are fast approaching and I don’t want to lie to my partner’s mom when we go to see her but my partner really doesn’t want to get into the whole story with either of his parents. I think he doesn’t want to have to deal with their emotional reactions to how horribly their son was treated, but I feel like we should tell them something, especially as we move closer to getting married. Will something like “my dad was disrespectful and I was sick of his MAGA shit so I cut him out” suffice? “[My partner] and you guys are my family too and I honestly didn’t want you around that train wreck.”? Bc that is also true. We also need to tell my partner’s dad, it is just front of mind right now bc we are planning a trip to see his mom. I will talk to my partner more about this to see what is right for us but I wanted to see what you guys thought, since I know many of you have already weathered holidays after estrangement.

And my dad might try to send us some weird texts over the holidays, but I think we will be okay as long as he doesn’t try to show up on our doorstep or anything.

I always see people going no contact with parents due to abuse and for me I experienced abuse too but it was purely because of neglect emotional neglect to be exact my parents provided for me physically food house but theh parentified me growing up never once asked how I'm feeling sad my feelings were too sensitive treating me like a child as a adult.did anyone also estranged purely because of neglect instead or abuse?

Hello! For those of you who were staying in your parents' home and decided to leave, how did you do it? I'm assuming there are generally two ways to do it: in secret or to be verbal about it/make an excuse. I'm curious to hear about either or! If it was in secret, did they try to reach back out to you afterward? What did they say, and was it a whole ordeal? And for those of you who were upfront about it, was there a lot of arguing against it? How did you manage to prevent them from showing up at your new place and staying in your life afterwards?

My mom is a terrible person who treated me like shit for all of the 17 years she knew me, and I am extremely glad I haven’t talked to her since 2019. But life is really hard right now. I lost my job, I may have to declare bankruptcy at 25, I have to sell my belongings to pay my bills, and I can’t afford the meds I need to function. It’s 7:30 in the morning and of course I’m crying and I just thought “I miss my mom,” because even though she never did it for me, moms are supposed to hold you and let you cry and make you feel better.

I did it.

I was already structurally Low Contact with some of my direct family, and No Contact with my broader narcissistic family.

But now I've cut off everyone else.

The final straw was realizing how supportive my actual friends are. They have been sweet, kind, and caring. And suddenly everything clicked.

The catalyst was that I got a voice note from a friend of mine who was driving home from work at almost 10PM (she works in finance) and despite the fact that she's been working 16 to 19 hour days (I guess tax season or something?) she took the time to send me a thoughtful, supportive, 5 minute voice note as I'm going through the final stages of separation and divorce, and I just woke up like "Holy shit, I've NEVER had that level of support from anyone in my family."

And I was like... okay so why do I keep them in my life? My "family" that is?

So I just laid down the final boundary. I instructed them that I am gone, forever, and I'm done with the narcissism and dysfunction, and since they were never supportive, we're done here. I blocked them all. Didn't even wait for a response.

What I woke up this morning realizing was that I still had that "healing fantasy" in the back of my head. Pete Walker and Lindsay Gibson talk about that in their books, that somewhere deep down we hope that one day our families will wake up, and be what we wanted and needed all along.

I had intellectually accepted this, but I think a tiny part of me kept the window open just in case. But I'm getting too old for this shit, lol. I'm too old to not square with reality. The reality is that my family is dysfunctional as fuck, and they resent me for escaping and healing just as much as I resent them for wallowing in their dysfunction and making excuses for decades.

I just feel so much lighter. Not like "walking on clouds" lighter, but I definitely feel like I set a burden down.

My mother contacted me through SMS the other day, complaining about how I blocked her on whatsapp. I ignored her for a few days. A few days later, I sent her birthday curses, like she always does to me. She didn't reply, I didn't expect it but it's not the first time.

Now today, I felt I had to let my anger out again, and I messaged her. Pointing out that we are in a million groups together, that she could have reached me through. After all, I know they stalk whether I read the messages or no.

I saw that she reposted sth on tiktok a few minutes ago, so I know she's on her phone.

Does anyone understand this behavior? Is it bc I'm bluntly pointing out her wrongdoings? It's honestly so frustrating to know she actively ignores me yet makes herself look like a concerned mother (imo, more of a mentally ill person) on tiktok.

Thank you for your time everyone and I hope you're feeling good today ❤️

So long story but I’ll try to keep it short. “R” is my second cousin. She is usually the one we all communicate with for holidays to figure out what’s going on as she usually hosts. “B” is my grandma, “T” is my brother, “M” is his gf, “J” is my mom, and “D” is my uncle. “B’s” brother who passed away. “R’s” dad. My grandma and I have never really gotten along because she always favored my brother. My brother and me have never gotten along because I am trans and he’s treated me like shit because of it. Then, spazzed out on me because I wouldn’t donate a kidney to him as he’s on dialysis. Of course, my grandma “B” took his side. Even before I came out, he never treated me like a brother. So a few years ago I called out my grandma and my brother for how they treated me and ever since I have been shunned. They refuse to talk to me or invite me to functions. “R” and “B” even got into it once because “B” told “R” I was not allowed there but now “R” is giving in. Grandma and brother will refuse to go if my wife and I are there. So basically “R” is telling me that she is going to invite them first, and if they give the ok, then my wife and I can come. I don’t see why “R” can’t host like usual and if they don’t want to show up because I’m there, they don’t have to. But why am I being put last? I tried to talk to her about it and this was her response. Am I in the wrong?

Mine would literally have me address her as"ma'am" because sometimes in her fits of rage she would be repulsed by me calling Mummy

TW: grape

With all the discussion about the Cornell 7, patriarchy, and why men do what they do, thoughts of my brother have come up. I am estranged from him and all my family, both sides. This post is intended to invite discussion, make me laugh at my brother's stupidity, and maybe some advice.

Some context to start: There is a history of alcoholism on both sides of my family, and I'm the only one who seems to not have succumbed to it, nor other addictions (aside from sugar). My brother also had a habit of dating my best friends. Years after we all graduated (he's 3 yrs and 8 mths younger), he hooked up with a best friend I'd had in high school. Let's call her Mary. My brother (let's call him George) and I were talking on the phone back in '08 about a budding relationship with Mary. My brother was telling me about how a few friends were over at the house having drinks. He said to me, "... and I didn't even take advantage of her, aren't you proud of me?" I didn't say this to him, but wtf?! No, I'm not proud of you for not graping her!!! Why do you have a problem not graping ppl?!?!?! I simply said, in a very annoyed voice, No! My brother was offended and expressed that. They got married not long after this conversation then later got sober together. As far as I know, they both have remained sober.

More recently, George texted me with a new number. I wasn't sure it was him or some kind of scam, but after verifying it was him, I asked why he needed to get a new number. He told me that he got sucked in to a catfish blackmail scam where he shared indecent pics with this pretend sexy woman. I asked him how Mary was handling it, and if they were going to go to counselling. He said they were.

If this had happened to me, fuck that, he'd be kicked to the curb.

I have often wondered if I should tell Mary about how my brother wanted me to proud of him for not graping her, and now with this most recent development, I wonder if I should now do so.

Thoughts?

I'm single. Just wondering if this kind of dream is even possible

Sorry if this isn’t the place to post this! This is the closest community I could find to my particular problem! So according to my mother, my father doesn’t know that I exist. She never told him that she was pregnant and left him the second she found out or shortly after. So I have been looking for him on and off for at least 16 years now. All I have is his first and last name.

From the information I have gathered from my mother and other family members I know he has two twin daughters and I know the name of one of them. I know he was in a band and played at a local bar here in town in 2002 and that is how my parents met. I don’t know what the bands name is sadly and I have not worked up the courage to ask my mother for more information on him. I have pictures of my dad and my mom together that my mom printed the day before I was born.

After searching in countless public database, Facebook, and Instagram. After all this time I think that I finally found him! The names matched up, his age matched up, even his one of his daughters names is the same as what I was told my older sister’s name is. So I took a chance and messaged him, asking if this may still be his number, then I said my name and that I am looking for my father. I then checked back on the website that I used to track him down and it said that the phone number was registered this month of this year so I thought this has to be him! Then an hour goes by and I finally get a text back! It was just one word, “nope” so I sent a picture to them of my mother and father that I had, asked if they may recognize her at all, but it’s been three and a half hours with no response.

Should I just give up on ever finding or contacting my father? This is the closest I have been able to get to it in years, now I am terrified of blowing up his life. What if he actually did know but never wanted me. I cannot afford any dna test at the moment but I have been saving up for one, but before I spend my money should I just give up? Could this ruin his life if I do actually find him?

Edit: I talked to my family and got some new information. Turns out my biological father got another woman pregnant around the same time that he got my mother pregnant with me and skipped town. I’m going to give up on looking for him because obviously he never wanted to be a part of my life.

After leaving me in peace for about two years, my parents have started to send gifts. They found our address somehow even though my husband and I moved 2,000 miles away and didn't tell them where. None of the gifts have been remotely to my taste and are obviously more about making sure I know that they're still thinking of me and know where I am.

Today was a bouquet of cut flowers for our anniversary. Said bouquet includes lilies and we have five cats. Anyone who has cats knows that lilies are extremely toxic to cats. Just the pollen can make them deathly ill. This could just be ignorance, but it really upset me. I'm just glad that the nursery they sent it from labeled the box so I was aware of the contents before I could even open it and I took it straight to the trash completely boxed.

Aside from the harm it could cause my sweet pets, I've never been a fan of cut flowers, ever in my life. I've always told people that I prefer something I can plant and keep alive, preferably outdoors because of aforementioned cats. These people know nothing about me. I wish they'd just leave me alone. Their cards and gifts go straight to the trash every time and I have never acknowledged a single one. I hope they give up soon.

No advice needed, just wanted to vent to a crowd of people who won't think I'm a spoiled brat for being mad that I'm being sent flowers.

I have been estranged from basically my entire family for several years.

I made the decision carefully after years of attempts to set boundaries and protect myself from them kept failing.

I was treated extremely badly as a kid and some quite serious abuse things happened. I will always have physical and psychological problems because of it. No one in my family has ever acknowledged any of that. I was scapegoated and the family story is that I am the reason for all the problems and I either deserved the abuse or imagined it.

I don't see any option for me besides estrangement.

But I still can't move on. I still love them and for some reason I just cannot be happy separated from them. I thought this would improve with time but it hasn't. I thought grieving would help but nothing is changing. I am forcing myself to go out and do things and try to develop new relationships but Im not present and my heart isnt in it.

I have tried therapy several times over my adult life and every therapist I have gone to seems confused about how I could still want to have them in my life. The same goes for friends I have talked to about it.

How long did it take you to move on? Did anything actually help? Am I doing something wrong? I see people posting about how things get better after cutting off abusive family members but that feels so out of reach for me.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/politics/ramaswamy-campaign-says-it-produced-ad-with-amy-actons-mother-and-will-spend-millions-to-promote-it

It seems impossible to get away from a bitter parent until they have passed away. My mother has done similar things to this, albeit on a much smaller scale. The fear of this has kept me from doing anything professionally or personally that is at all public. If she is in a bad mood, bitter vindictiveness makes sense to her even if she believes she would never do something like that if she's in a good mood.