[granite1]

i dont know what to say about this because i feel bad about the way i am feeling .i dont want to tell my T because she will think im a selfish and uncaring brat . maybe i am and people here will say the same thing but i am obsessing about it and need to get it out .
i wanted to talk to my T about the difference between my brother and i .why was it me who she chose to beat and so on .and why not my brother. and how can a parent o that . we got into the usual discussion .she said i already answered this question she is crazy .so i said ok she is crazy but there has to be a reason she choose me and not my brother . she never id anything to my brother . she told me my brother didnt have it good either . i said the mother never beat him or did anything to him. she asked me then why did he kill himself. i felt stabbed with a knife but i didnt show it .she knows how i feel about that . i just steeled my back up and said he killed himself because i was the one who ruined his life but you wont accept that . she said she wont an never will . she then thank god didnt continue on with that argument but went on to tell me all about how it was for him . she was not mean or anything when she said this but she asked me if i thought it was easy for him to have to come to my room and empty my piss pot for me . i hate that i feel this way and this is why im writing here. i wanted to scream what was so damn bad . i had to be locked in that room for days .i had to go to the bathroom in that pot. i was beat at least every other day for one reason or other . not him .my T would say is was probably hard for him to see and not be able to help. but imagine how hard it was to be the one being hit or having your face flushed down the toilet by the mother .or to be ridiculed, laughed at ,and made fun of. geez he had to watch . most times he just went on doing what he was up to .like everyone else he did nothing . but it was hard for him . i know im feeling sorry for myself and ill get over it but right now i am just so hurt. so much everyone was so concerned about everyone else in my life .it seems even my T . and now i feel horrible for what my brother went through. if i was not alive he would not have been through any of this . that is all i got out of what she had to say . it is ok if you all feel im horrible .i probibly am but i just needed to get this out of me

You're not horrible.

I did not like it when people like my partner defended one of my brother's.

[Pennster]

Oh granite, I am so sorry you went through what you did. You suffered terribly. I don't think anyone thinks you are horrible. Your mother sounds like a very warped woman to have put you through what she made you endure.

Could you say what you did here to your therapist? you deserve to be understood.

[cinnamon_roll]

I hear you. Whenever my therapist takes sides with my partner or one of my siblings I feel deeply rejected, not seen/heard, not taken seriously. At all. It is as if the connection to my T that I felt 2 mins earlier is completely gone. Annihilated.

Do try and tell your T how this makes you feel. I've had some really good conversations with my T coming out of those issues. The main thing being (for me) that it in my world things seem to be very black/white. T is either on my side or completely against me. Whereas she would say she is just trying for a moment to help me to imagine how the other side might feel. Which doesn't deny that she is there with me and wants to help me...

It's not that I can't see that. But whenever I try to put myself in someone else's shoes, my own perception is completely gone, eradicated. It feels as if I cease to exist. And my T seems like the aggressor. Some weird stuff going on there. But for the moment I try to accept that my T *still* is on my side, no matter what.

PS. I'm with Pennster: you are not horrible!

You are not horrible.

Your T was responding to how you take on the responsibility of your brother's suicide as your fault; she disagrees with that. I suspect most of us here disagree with that also. She wasn't measuring what you went through against what your brother went through. Rather, she was looking at each of you as two kids who grew up in a very abusive home; for each of you it was your own private hell. You had your experience and he had his. It isn't a contest and your T isn't measuring one against the other; instead, she is saying your brother, as the individual he was, was affected in his own way by his own experience.

Talk to your T about this. I wonder how much of what you deal with is survivor's guilt. You survived that hell hole; your brother did not. That isn't your fault; that is the fault of the adults who inflicted that hell upon the children living in that house, but you've taken in on as your own. This seems to perhaps be the root of what you need to work through. It is difficult stuff.

Let me tell you a story. My husband grew up as the youngest of 5 male siblings in a home very similar to your own. He was the chosen target of most of the physical abuse in the home. But not one of those brothers came out of that experience unscathed. One brother is an alcoholic. One has turned into an abusive husband. One developed schizophrenia. One still would choose to be emotionally abusive to my husband if we gave him the ability to have contact. Remarkably enough, my husband, the one who received the worst physical abuse, may be the one who has come out of that childhood most intact because he went through therapy, he created his own family, he separated completely from that family as an adult because every contact created more pain and problems. But he didn't get there right away. He's 53 and I'd say he has only come to some level of peace with his upbringing in the last few years. His brothers suffered and still suffer in their own ways, much in part to witnessing what happened to each other perhaps even moreso than what actually happened to them personally. At their root, they loved each others as siblings, and their parents failed them and created an environment that has irreparably taken away that bond for them as adults.

Your parents, due to their actions, took away your brother from your life permanently. That IS THEIR fault.

It's hard to separate ourselves from our siblings and realize they experienced the exact same family history in their own way, as a separate experience from our own.

Your therapist wasn't comparing your two experiences; she was saying you each had your own experience and it affected you each individually and differently.

Hugs granite. You're not horrible and you did not cause any of this. Your parents did, it is THEIR fault as lolagrace said. I hope you can talk with your t more about this. I think what lola said is spot on.

You not wanting to hear "how about the brother?" deserve to be respected, in my opinion

[nottrustin]

Granite you are not horrible. Both you and your brother where young children who lived in a horrific household. I dont think your T thinks you ate horrible just somebody who is in pain. Somebody who is trying to make sense of something that makes no sense. It sounds like where she disagrees with you is that you are in any way responsible for the abuse or your brothers death. You are alive because you are a survivor....a survivor with lots of pain..but a survivor non the less. Be easy on youself.

[velcro003]

Originally Posted by lolagrace

You are not horrible.

Your T was responding to how you take on the responsibility of your brother's suicide as your fault; she disagrees with that. I suspect most of us here disagree with that also. She wasn't measuring what you went through against what your brother went through. Rather, she was looking at each of you as two kids who grew up in a very abusive home; for each of you it was your own private hell. You had your experience and he had his. It isn't a contest and your T isn't measuring one against the other; instead, she is saying your brother, as the individual he was, was affected in his own way by his own experience.

Talk to your T about this. I wonder how much of what you deal with is survivor's guilt. You survived that hell hole; your brother did not. That isn't your fault; that is the fault of the adults who inflicted that hell upon the children living in that house, but you've taken in on as your own. This seems to perhaps be the root of what you need to work through. It is difficult stuff.

Your parents, due to their actions, took away your brother from your life permanently. That IS THEIR fault.

It's hard to separate ourselves from our siblings and realize they experienced the exact same family history in their own way, as a separate experience from our own.

Your therapist wasn't comparing your two experiences; she was saying you each had your own experience and it affected you each individually and differently.

Granite, you know I don't think you are horrible, nor does your T. I agree 100% with Lola.

I think she is trying to show you that it is NOT YOUR FAULT for your brother's suicide. It is that awful hell hole you lived in. I agree about the survivor's guilt as well.

[growlycat]

I could never feel horrible about you granite. I am just so sorry you had to endure all of that. It is inexcusable that a parent would act this way.

[BonnieJean]

(Granite) I'm glad you wrote about it here. You've got support here. What the mother did to you as a child was horrible. I in no way see you as horrible. Your doing great work! Eventho it sucks to do work tbru it.

[unaluna]

Granite, there were many times i heard the exact opposite of what my t said. Aside from devastating me at the moment, i have to wonder about it, now that it is also happening to you.

Its like the statements they make can be taken either way.

The mothers did that too, though. Only they only ever meant it the bad way. To think they meant it a good way would have been a flash of light that hardly lasted a second long, then disappointment again.

Now we are living in hope with our ts, and afraid to step and stay in the light.

[kecanoe]

Granite, I think t was trying to say that the mother was horrible to you and horrible to your brother. That means the mother was horrible.

I wonder if she was trying to say that you are not the horrible one, with the other two being not horrible. It sounds like you sometimes think that. Instead of you being horrible and the other two decent, she is trying to say that the mother was the horrible one. That you and your brother both suffered at her horrible hands. The fact that your brother suffered does not mean you didn't suffer, nor that his suffering was your fault.

Hang in there Granite. Talk to t about what t meant. I am completely positive that t was not saying that you are horrible.

[awkwardlyyours]

granite -- the language you've used ('stood up for') is significant. You had no one to stand up for you ever and here comes along this person -- T -- who offers hope of righting those childhood wrongs.

The wish that she'll be the good adult / parent who'll stand up for you and take your side can be overwhelming.

To give and fulfill (to a 'good enough' extent) that hope is part of what a good T (especially one extensively trained in dealing with childhood trauma stuff) does and often times, it can be the most significant part of what the T does i.e., before any other work can take place.

The next part though is usually helping you make sense of all that happened by using your more cognitive faculties.

From what you've described, it sounds like your T may have misjudged where you are and jumped ahead a bit from the supportive / validating / wish-fulfilling stage to the more cognitive making-sense stage.

I know it feels like raking up those old wounds all over again but if there's any way you can tell her -- at a calmer time perhaps -- as to how you felt, it might help her figure out where you are at.

I also sincerely hope that your T is trained in dealing with trauma -- a lot of this (especially when you've been working so long with her) is something she should be able to pick up from your body language, other non-verbal and verbal cues etc.

[satsuma]

My T has said that he doesn't think I'm a bad person, and that the way some people in my life behaved is in his words "awful". But I need him to be very explicit and to say it over and over again, because I was told so much that I was bad, and that bad things that happened were my fault.
Sometimes, my T is speaking about these things, and I think he assumes I know things like "your mother did something very bad" , "it wasn't your fault", and things like that. Even though he's a T, I think he underestimates how often I need him to say that very clearly, so that I can be sure. Otherwise, if we speak about one of those things, it's so easy for me to interpret that he thinks it was not so bad really, or that I'm exaggerating. (Which is NOT what he thinks at all, but he forgets sometimes to spell it out).
I wonder if it's a similar thing here Granite. You really need, perhaps, for your T to say very clearly and explicitly that what happened to you was absolutely awful, inexcusable behaviour from the mother, and nothing to do with you being bad, you were an innocent victim. Sometimes Ts don't realise how clear they need to be, and how often it's important to refresh these points. I'm sure that is what T thinks.

[ruh roh]

Granite, what lola said about survivor guilt was what I was thinking as well, except that it's not just you that has it, but your brother too. If you consider that he had survivor guilt over witnessing what you went through, unable to do anything to prevent it (and forced to be part of it in a way), then your therapist wasn't minimizing your abuse--she was validating it by saying that it was so bad, your brother was struggling as a witness to it. I know you feel strongly about other things related to your brother, but seeing your mother's abuse against you, abuse he escaped, is pretty significant. I see that as very validating of your experience.

[velcro003]

Originally Posted by ruh roh

Granite, what lola said about survivor guilt was what I was thinking as well, except that it's not just you that has it, but your brother too. If you consider that he had survivor guilt over witnessing what you went through, unable to do anything to prevent it (and forced to be part of it in a way), then your therapist wasn't minimizing your abuse--she was validating it by saying that it was so bad, your brother was struggling as a witness to it. I know you feel strongly about other things related to your brother, but seeing your mother's abuse against you, abuse he escaped, is pretty significant. I see that as very validating of your experience.

[CantExplain]

((Granite))

The mother was cruel and crazy and you have suffered horribly. You were locked up and humiliated
It is a different kind of suffering for your brother to have to watch this and not be able to do anything about it.

I wonder what the mother said to your brother when you were not there.

It was part of her cruelty​ to treat you two differently. If she had treated you the same, you would have drawn strength from each other and she didn't want that.

If you want to know why she was more obviously cruel to you, it is simply because you were the oldest. When your brother was born, she already had a victim and didn't need another one in the same way. So she made your brother an unwilling witness, an unwilling accomplice. She hoped that you would grow to hate each other as she hated you. Because hate is what she was.