Emotional Abuse and Ambiguity

On one level I am pretty sure I have been subject to emotional abuse by my mother. On another level I can't REALLY believe I suffered real abuse or that anyone in my family could be "really" abusive. My therapist has said that some of the things said to me were definitely abusive but I keep vacillating on the matter. I do seem to suffer from the kind of emotional flashbacks that Pete Walker describes as central to CPTSD. But I don't fully believe that the original incidents were genuinely traumatic in an objective sense.

Here is one example. As a child and teenager we would sometimes visit family on special occasions. Because they were 'occasions' we would dress up. As a preteen and a teen I had few friends and was convinced I was monstrously unattractive. My cousin, however, was the opposite - she was obviously extremely popular and fashionable as well as confident, self-possessed and bubbly. It goes without saying that I was envious. When we left this extended family to go home my mother used to say to me: you know you are far better looking than cousin X. It's just that cousin X knows how to make the best of herself. You have much more going for you. You are tall, and (I don't even remember what else).If you just made more of yourself....

So, on the face of it it would seem like she was trying to be positive and give me good advice. But when I think back to this I get all the symptoms of flashback - I feel dark and freezing cold and I am sure my emotional brain shuts down the rest. Part of the shame I feel has/had to do with not being able to appreciate my mother trying to point me in the right direction, or feel the 'compliments' in any real way. That was laid over the shame of comparing so badly in the first place.

Thinking about it it seems quite a cruel thing to say to a teenager because it confirms that the way she actually is is unacceptable. Even if this is true, though, would my mother have been aware of what she was doing to me? Could this really be called abuse?

It doesn't sound abusive. Perhaps if yu told your mother how her comments make/made you feel....your feelings all of them....are valid.

Thanks for your opinion Nicoleflynn. I'm not sure why such awful feelings are attached... Perhaps in the context of other things that were said? Sometimes that I looked like a 'farmer' because I didn't wear as much makeup as a friend. Constant remarks about my weight. If I was in tears there would be no mention of it - and once I was mocked for 'looking like I was in pain'.

Or perhaps there was a subtext to that particular statement which I feel emotionally but can't quite work out I was frequently contrasted negatively with other people and the 'positive' remarks felt pretty hollow and superficial.

Feel really shaky today, like maybe I've come to all the wrong conclusions. How many definite examples of emotional abuse establishes the fact that one has been emotionally abused. With regards to effect I most identify with CPTSD, though I'v been treated for 16 years for anxiety and depression. But having CPTSD does not establish how one actually got it.

Sadly, there will always be people to say negative things about you. That says NOTHING about you and everything about them.
No one has the right to define who and what you are....YOU get to do that...people are cruel; all you can do is TELL them what they are saying and doing is hurting you. If they mock or ignore you.......they are being cruel.

Thanks Nicole, that is true. I've also realised something in the last few days. The truth is that I am ugly (in the perception of most people, and according to the principles that guide our perception of beauty; symmetry etc) I think Iv spent a lot of time going over the mean things my mother has said to me over the years. But compared to the emotional abuse suffered by others, it is actually not that bad. I think ugly people, especially those innately sensitive, do suffer quite a bit.

I went through extreme physical and sexual abuse in childhood but what hurt more than that were all the things my Mom did,and didn't say to me.

I don't really think it matters whether what you experienced is labeled as abuse or not,it has still really impacted you,and that's what's important.

I have to disagree with some previous comments. It is hard to tell from just the one example, but that conversation could most certainly be a part of a larger pattern of emotional abuse. It was a passive aggressive and manipulative way to criticize who you were and tell you that not only were you not good enough, but that it was entirely because you chose not to be good enough.

Did you mom often criticize you? Particularly in such a passive aggressive way?

By the way, if your family made it a habit of comparing you two and making it a competition, probably that was the TRUE source of the resentment toward your cousin rather then it being a problem between you and her.

Thanks RubyRae - this makes sense since one does not experience physical pain when one remembers it, but emotional pain always accompanies the memory of the event. I'm sorry for everything you went for and sending you love.

Hi Mimsies, yes, I think it was a larger pattern. There were things that were openly cutting but many that were upsetting for reasons I could not fathom at the time. Certainly if my mother had made the remark while commenting on some interesting remark I had made at the dinner, or connecting with me on some other less superficial issue, it would have not had the same crushing effect. It was the total absence of authentic connection together with the criticism of appearance - all disguised under 'supposed sympathy' for my feelings of inadequacy.

I don't think I did resent my cousin, exactly. I just felt pained at my own relative inferiority. In fact I had many traits that were not 'inferior', but these were not mirrored back to me. Family, generally did not openly compare us.

Looking back I think the greatest difference of all was her confidence and self possession, versus my unrecognized depression and anxiety. And of course some of this was due to the close and supportive relationship she had with her (almost) doting mother and the one I had with my narcissistic, disengaged and manipulative one.

I completely understand where you are coming from. I had some an experience in this. It sound like there are some abuse I supposed depending on how the individual is looking at the situation to what they defined as abuse. Perhaps your mom didn't realized that what she is saying to you might make a person feel like she is playing favoritism. It will get better I promised you big hugs.

Hard to tell from the one comment, but certainly sounds like it could be part of a larger pattern. The fact that she was comparing your physical attributes to your cousin in a supposedly positive manner is already a flag — it’s reemphasizing that appearances are important and insulting your cousin in the process. The comment also discredits how you are feeling to an extent and then blames you for your own misery. Someone who lacks confidence isn’t going to get better by hearing their lack of confidence is the problem.