Dear Happizer:

You asked for suggestion on how to end your relationship with your sister. First congratulations for having arrived at what appears to me the right/ healthy decision for you. (Saiisha above wrote: “if cutting off ties is what you want to do”- this annoys me, Saiisha, because it makes me wonder if you did not read in Happizer’s post that she is not asking IF she should cut her sister off her life, but HOW- and it makes me wonder, Saiisha, if you are suggesting by your wording that Happizer should re-consider?)

You wrote: “My gut wants me to write her a letter and be clear that I forgive her, but that I cannot be a part of her life.” Your sister thinks, as I understand that YOU are the wrong doer, so you should ask for her forgiveness, according to her, isn’t it so? In her world then, when you tell her that you forgive her… what does it mean to her? Is it that you think that she knows that she had hurt you?

I have learned from cutting off all contact with my own mother and wanting along the way, again and again to write another letter to her… rehearsing endless communications with her… I learned that all that thinking on my part were based on my still existing desire to positively connect with my mother, to make her understand that she hurt me so very much. I kept wanting her to SEE me, to love me.

Now, in my healing journey, two years after ending contact, I realize that there is a GAP as long and as far as teh universe between me and my mother, and it doesn’t matter what I do, what I ever wrote to her…. nothing could make her see me and love me. The attachment and longing to her have been very intense even when I didn’t realize it was so. The urge to reach out to her still has been intense. Even as I was cutting contact, way after I cut contact… so my suggestion is- just stop all communication with no efforts to communicate with her anything at all, and not only with her- but as you cut contact with her, my suggestion is not to communicate about her and your decision with any family member. Need not defend your position, ask for forgiveness or gi8ve forgiveness. Just make it END.

You see, my mother did not SEE my love for her in my face when I was a little girl, looking up to her, dependent on her, being 100% committed to love and be loved by her- she didn’t see my love for her then when I was five. She wouldn’t see my love for her now as I am 54. I believed I could MAKE her love me= I believed she can love me. She can not or will not. End of story. Finally.

anita

Dear Saiisha:

Thank you for your response to me- I greatly appreciate it. I did feel annoyed when I wrote the comment to you yesterday. I wanted to cut off contact with my mother for decades before I finally did and was angry at anyone who suggested I should not “because she is your MOTHER.” and so forth. Hency that anger was triggered. As I read your note, it gives me your point of view, your perspective. It gives me information on where you are coming from. You did not state that you think a daughter is wrong or bad for cutting contact with her mother (the message I heard) but that you believe that there is past life information, that is that I lived before I was born THIS TIME, in another body, another place, another life and that my relationship with my mother carries information, a lesson to be learned about that past life, a lesson that can help me in my next life. Is it what you meant? Did I understand you correctly?

And thank you for welcoming me being annoyed- ah, to be accepted when annoyed and angry (while not abusive)- what a gift, what a relief.

anita

Dear Happizer:

You wrote to me: “Even slight nuances that bring you back to the thought of having to return to a very hard part of your life… is terrifying. And the defenses come up. Perhaps this may be the case?” Yes, this as you stated here is indeed the case. Thank you for your insight. It is very much so. It is the threat that part of me is feeling, the threat of going back because someone, anyone has just (maybe) suggested I am a “bad girl” for… abandoning my own poor mother…

You wrote: “A lot of my wanting to include her in my happy-seeking life, like Anita suggests, is based on societal suggestions along the lines of ‘you can’t choose your family members’. I too suffered a LOT from the societal attitude about family and mothers, in particular. If you check history, I read that it used to be perfectly legal or at least not illegal, for parents to kill their children for whatever reason they had. No explanation needed. Society evolved some and now it is illegal to do so. But we as a society are not evolved enough because lots and lots of people, some even psychotherapists, believe that you should always remain in contact with a parent no matter what that parent did. Some will give you a pass to not have contact if they still physically abuse you, but not if they ‘only” abuse you otherwise.

Very easily people and psychotherapists will give you the advice of leaving an abusive boyfriend/ husband, even it is “only” verbal or emotional abuse. But if it is the mother who does the same abuse, or worse, the advice is: set limits, try to change your perception so it doesn’t hurt that much. Why the difference? Why not give an abused woman the advice: just set limits with your abusive boyfriend.

It is not that you or I are doing something wrong cutting contact with a mother/ sister, it is that society, a whole lot of society is wrong… a bit less … wrong maybe than allowing murder of children by parents, but still very wrong.

Regarding narcisstic abuse: my mother was a combination of what appears in the DSM of narcissitc, histrionic and borderline personality disorders, a potent combination.

You wrote: “What do you think – with the letter, I was just trying to give her the perfect reason, the most understanding reason for an out.” I think it doesn’t matter whatsoever what is in the letter. It may be a good exercise for you writing it. But regarding anticipating her reading it and what it would mean to her- might as well give her a blank paper, a paper with a jumble of letters and words, a letter in some other language she cannot understand. It is like you trying to communicate with… a tree, writing and reading a letter to the tree. You can IMAGINE the tree is hearing you. you can even (falsely) believe the tree is hearing, understanding and even agreeing to your letter… but it would be … all in your head. How do you feel about writing a letter to a tree? Giving the letter a lot of thought, trying to be very clear and perfectly express yourself … to the tree? The tree will only take water from you, or in your sister’s case, she will only take your blood, your soul. She has no use for your letter.

l didn’t understand the part about your mother, if you are saying she is against you cutting contact with your sister?

About “you can’t choose your family members”- true, you can’t choose who you are born to but you can choose who you are in contact with and who you are not in contact with. You can choose to cut contact with any abusive person, no matter their relation to you. If it is your sister that sticks a knife into your heart, does it bleed less than if a total stranger does the same? Do you die… less when she pulls the knife out of your ruptured heart…?

anita

After nearly three decades of emotional tormenting from my own sister, I’m now at the point that I, too, need to sever ties. Do you have suggestions?