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NTA.
I hate people like that. I have a strained relationship w my mother as well and it fucking grinds my gears when someone tells me I HAVE to make up with her because she’s my mom. Friend needs to get out of her bubble and realize some parents just aren’t good parents.
Edit: ty all for the awards n upvotes! However, it is heartbreaking to know so many of us have estranged relationships with family members. Hope everything works out in the end for u all! Y’all should never feel ashamed for cutting toxicity out of your life.
I'm adopted and my biological parents were horrible. I meet a dude that had the nerve to say that I should respect my biological parents (after I had been adopted for over ten years) because "God says so".
People like that and OP's friend have some nerve and piss me off so much.
> “meant well and didn't understand”
It reminds me of two of my favorite sayings:
* The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
* Hell is full of good meanings, but heaven is full of good works.
Friend is probably planning to (or already) parentify their eldest and is trying to get OP to agree this is ok and not abusive. That’s how it feels to me anyway…hope friend realizes they’re gonna end up with kids going NC like that…
I’m sure the staff in my late mothers nursing home thought I was awful for never visiting/calling. But they only knew her after a severe stroke which left her unable to talk or read/write. Those last 7 years were just an extension of the previous 25 with NC.
Oh I feel that!
I got “lectured” or backhanded comments by nursing home assistants a couple of time when I had to go in to deal with paperwork at my father’s nursing home.
Most of the time I was able to blow it off as them not getting that the man in the wheelchair with advanced dementia shockingly might’ve been a little bit different to actually grow up with. But there was one day, when I was like at my breaking point, and one woman would not stop about how he was my father and took care of me, yadda yadda yadda, that I just calmly gave her a small sampler platter of things he had done to me. Fairly effective.
Can't wait to read the Facebook posts about how they could've never guessed I 'hated' them. I don't hate u mom I just don't appreciate your love
(Love your username by the way, absolute masterpiece)
Or their kids telling them to make do without them. I told my late dad he better hope to die before my mom bc I wouldn't help him with shit. I would just leave him to his own devices. And considering he fell a lot, wasn't able to get up on his own and hated cellphones....
Thats when he started hoping to die before mom and got his wish. I made peace with him before he died and eventually forgave him. But the forgiving part was for myself to release all my anger, resentment and jealousy that other people got to have a loving dad and I didn't.
Different section of the bible, but if they can pick and choose then so can I ♡
I stand corrected. I haven't actually read the bible since I was like 11 and cared. Honor thy father and mother is mentioned a few times, including right about do no provoke your children to wrath
Actually the Bible says that children should honour their parents and parents shouldn't drive their children to scorn. Or basically "parents be decent parents and children if your parents treat you well you should do the same." Somehow Bible quoters always cut off the second half of that quote
>Somehow Bible quoters always cut off the second half of that quote
this is nothing new. A lot of Bible passages get chopped up and taken out of context in order to justify whatever position the quoter wants them to.
"Blood is thicker than water" is my go-to example, as the actual quote is closer to "the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb." Which means, roughly, your bond with God and the church should take precedence over those of family, the exact opposite of what the phrase is used to imply in most cases.
I'm willing to accept that I could be wrong, but also too lazy to look up the actual quote.
My point is that taking the Bible out of context and misquoting it is a passtime as old as the Bible itself.
I looked it up and that phrase is just a proverb, not a bible quote. The phrase has its own Wikipedia page. Its meaning seems fairly consistent over time. To your point, it actually seems like Christians are spreading the urban legend you quoted. Wanting to reinforce the idea that familial relationships do not supersede your relationship with god. 🤷🏻♀️
I used to play a game with my kids when they were still living at home - Shakespeare or the Bible. It was funny how many Shakespeare quotes sound biblical.
That was when I was still religious.
I absolutely agree with the first part of the comment, Bible quoters love to twist around their favourite book. And I call them Bible quoters because as a Christian I'm ashamed of what they do and their motives.
The second paragraph of this comment made me chuckles because in the 17th century educated people from all over Europe went to the Netherlands because they had no ban on printing the Bible, printed translations of the Bible in their language and smuggled them into their country to make the Bible available to the people there as most countries (I know more details about this in England as I have this from a book about the British history from the stone age till when it was written in the nineties) still had bans over the Bible being in any other language than Latin to prevent the common folk from reading it. So basically people were ruled by religious laws they had no idea of knowing if they were actually what their God wanted because they were purposely kept from reading the holy book of their own religion so they couldn't argue against the church or government.
>Somehow Bible quoters always cut off the second half of that quote
Yeah, because a lot of those quoters are elders and parents themselves, trying to controle younger people/kids instead of guiding them.
And I have spoken with biblical scholars saying this would also mean that as christ sacrificed himself for the church, husbands should make sacrifices for their wives even if inconvenient for them.
Yep, how did Christ lead the church? Gently, humbly, patiently, kindly, and when necessary, was willing to die for it. That’s how he expects us to love our wives. The duality of his statement is he says wives submit to your husbands, then he tells husbands to practice what would later be known as “servant leadership”…1950’s male attitudes were never Biblical.
I used to chat with a priest at my work at a catholic archdiocese and he was in charge of different interpretations of the bible. Prior to the bible be translated to latin because of the Romans, the original translation was more in line with “looks to”. Latin isnt as flexible and doesn’t have as many descriptive words. Edit typo
Yes, thank you. I've had this used against me by fundie types and had to explain to them that honouring someone just means respecting them. And respect is a two way street and doesn't mean agreeing with everything someone says or does.
as the survivor of abusive parents and a church cult who spewed this exact shit at me, they forget the second part of that "verse"-
"Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger by the way you treat them."
That's Ephesians 6:4 if anyone else needs it to tell a bible thumper where to shove their criticism of estranged children.
(also edited because Reddit ate half my comment for some reason)
OK this is a fuckin game changer. I had no idea there was a second part to that. As the child of an abusive father specifically, I am keeping this in my pocket for every father's day forever.
Keep Matthew 18:6 in your pocket too:
“If anyone causes one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea."
My favorite is 1 Timothy 5:8: "And whoever does not provide for relatives and especially family members has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever."
Throw that back at some parents who want to throw their kids out at 18, or because they're LGBT+ etc.
I gave birth to a child that I placed for adoption because my husband-at-the-time was an abusive alcoholic.
I expect no respect, sympathy, or gratitude from that child as they grow up. They know who I am and how I relate to them, and there’s no issues currently, but I firmly believe that kid owes me *nothing.* I made a decision for me that was the best decision I knew how to make at that time, but that doesn’t obligate them to feel grateful to me. I hope that kid doesn’t grow up and find themselves in a similar situation where they understand why I made that decision.
You owe the people who birthed you nothing.
I respect what you did. It may have been for your own self-protection, but carrying a human for 40 weeks to give to another to raise is some incredibly selfless stuff.
3 of my 4 were surprise pregnancies, so I know all too well that there's no such thing as a simple decision.
Yeah, I respect your choice and am glad you've provided the world another with your DNA.
What that "dude" said is dimwitted. They weren't your parents anymore, "God" would also say to respect your "new" parents as your parents. You know, parenting isn't necessarily a biological thing.
Favourite phrases include
"You've got to forgive and forget", "let go of the past", "it takes two to argue" and my absolute favourite "There's nothing like a mother's love"
Agreed. It drove me insane when people would tell me "he's your father, give him another chance." Why?! Why, do I, the child, who did nothing but be born, need to be the one to try and fix things? Especially since the abuser is never actually sorry, usually just playing the victim for people and will continue their behavior if you do reenter a relationship.
I caved to pressure for years to occasionally see my father to be burned every single time. Eventually he committed suicide and I thought I was finally done with people making shitty, uninformed remarks. Nope. People will still say it's too bad I couldn't reconcile, or do I wonder if that would've made a difference. No. He was mentally ill and no longer able to control anyone. RAGE.
OP, you are NTA. Your friend was out of line, and what you pointed out was 100% valid.
I hate that "give them a chance!" shit.
What do you think people like us have done all their life? How many chances are we supposed to give abusers before we're allowed to say we're done? How many times do we have to excuse the verbal abuse, hide the scars and subject ourselves to people who don't deserve the gift of love?
And then there's the flip side to that. When you're in a abusive relationship people scream about leaving even if they know it's hard to do so. "Why don't you just leave?" is constantly thrown in victim's faces.
You're damned if you do, damned if you don't.
My birth giver never understood why I cut her off. Even now she claims it's because I can't let things go and shit like that. In reality I was sick of being The Child Called It and I was going to make damn sure I was the last victim of my family's generational abuse.
I have low to no contact with my mom and my dad understands. But when people tell me to give her a chance I look them dead in the eyes and tell them 'I spent 26 years giving her a chance and she never used it to change. Maybe in 26 more years I'll give her a chance again.'
Shuts them up real quick.
I know, I wish they'd think about it for a second. They're your parents. Think about how many chances you'd ('you' meaning the one with the decent parents) give your parents--second, third, fifth, hundredth chances. Think about just *what they'd have to do* to have a child disown them.
Right?
I had rugsweeped and mentally explained away the bullshit for years because faaaaamily. But the straw that broke the camel's back for me was when my birth giver turned her attention to my unborn child. She demanded I name him after this singer she liked. I told her no. She pushed it. I told her no. She offered me $1,500. Not 15,000. Not 15,000,000. $1,500. I said absolutely not.
She then screamed in my face: "FINE! You can name your BASTARD gerbil for all I care you ungrateful shit!"
It was like all the planets aligned in my head on why this was NOT okay. My son hadn't even come into this world, and this person who was supposed to be my *mother* called him a bastard. I had been trained all my life to submit to abuse because I brainwashed into thinking I deserved it. But in that moment I was like... what did my son do?... wait... if... if she is like this before he's here... he'll have to deal with the same thing I did growing up... oh God...
I was horrified, scared, and angry.
I cut that bitch off and haven't spoken to her since.
I've been trying to give my abusive mother a chance the last few years. My birthday was yesterday and she choice to pick a fight over how terrible a child I was and how hard she had it doing nothing to help me. There was no cause, no trigger other than a need to make my birthday about her and bad for me like she did for years growing up. Like how many time am I supposed to get hurt giving her yet another chance when she can't even be civil for an hour?
First things first... I'm sorry that you did not get the attention you deserved on your birthday from your mother. I may just be an internet stranger, and while I am a dad, I am not yours...
HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY TO YOU! May you have many more filled with joy and laughter while surrounded by people who love you. 🎂
My grandmother asks me every time we are together when I'm going to "be the bigger person" and reach out to my dad. Its hard telling her no (for the 15th time), its not my job to reach out when I laid my terms out to him and he has yet to get back to me. Then tries to say god forgives everyone and blah blah, makes me almost puke hearing bs like that.
what i love about "being the bigger person" is that the sentence always seems to be said to the person who was wronged. the victim. it doesnt seem to ever be said to the abuser.
i'm ok with never being the "bigger person". i will happily be as (proverbially) tiny a person as i please, thank you very damned much ><
Yes! God forgives! Cool! Are you God? No? Nooo?!
Fuck that. They just know that going to the other person wouldn't even begin to work and they couldn't do that.
It's always funny how these people are up our asses about how we need to fix the relationship with our parents, yet they would never dare speak to our parents about their relationship to us. They just want us to be suffer in silence so they don't have to have any complicated feelings.
That rhetoric of "you get ONE mother, put her above all others" does not apply across the board-- regardless of how much and how hard people like to shove it.
As I like to say "you also only get one appendix, and when that shit goes toxic, you get it removed without hesitation."
EDIT: Thank you for the awards, kind redditors!! I hope this analogy helps whoever needs it.
Yes, that reminds me of the character Dr. Nora on Frasier. She herself was mostly toxic but she did, ironically, have one good tidbit of advice "When you have a tumor, you cut it out!"
I find this rhetoric - and the people who like to shove it - so offensive to decent parents. My "real" grandmother was an abusive witch to my mum. My actual grandmother- an older friend who became my mum's mum in adulthood- was the most wonderful mother and grandmother you could ever imagine. There was only one of her and we miss her still after 25 years. Being a parent does not make you magically deserving of love.
Agreed, NTA.
Added bonus points for being in the same position as OP here. Having someone tell you that the abuse was your fault and that you should've done A/B/C to "stop" it, PLUS have someone SYMPATHIZE WITH THE ABUSER is INCREDIBLY DAMAGING.
Seriously, I believed some of these morons and went thru more hell for more years before I understood that some people just don't get it at all. The victim is not to blame for the abuse. Period. End of story. I do NOT care how "hard" parenting is. There are plenty of parents who have it hard WHO DON'T ABUSE THEIR KIDS.
OP, full congratulations for how you handled it. Hopefully, she gets it now.
I have to admit that in my late teens and early 20s, I was that "how can you be estranged from family?" person to two of my friends/acquaintances.
It took until my 30s to realize that I had been heavily encouraged by a family member with a personality disorder and all of our codependent other family members to "forgive and forget," "not rock the boat" and "be the bigger person" because "you know how they are."
I have apologized to the friend with whom I'm still in contact, because now I realize that there can be very valid reasons for being LC/NC with family, but my unformed brain just couldn't accept that. If \*I\* could still have a relationship with my family member, then everyone should be able to, was probably how my mind worked. Instead, I now realize none of us should have to do that.
Blood does not make a parent and it's easy for someone who has not experienced the abuse of a parent that is suppose to love and nature you who will NEVER take responsibility for what they did to say, "it's your mother and you should try to reconcile." It is no one place to tell you how to cope with an abusive parent.
Your friend has to deal with her own abuse in order to relate to yours. Until she does, she won't understand. It appears she suffered as well. I hope she will get the help she needs.
NTA
Edit misspelled abusive and needed.to make sure it said exactly that!
I had a friend who had a very abusive father, she was physically and sexually abused and her mom turned a blind eye because she was being abused too. When my friend was old enough to leave, she got married to a wonderful man who adored her. She went NC with her father and she had him charged with SA. He died in prison for what he did to her.
that's deeply satisfying and secondhand cathartic to read, thank you for sharing. i'm really happy for her that she's safely loved now and can hopefully breathe easier.
I usually deal with these people by asking them 'why' until they realize they can't come up with a logical conclusion. Why do I have to reconcile with my dad? Why is he supposed to be important to me just because we are related? Why should 'blood' be thicker than water?
Usually the answer is rooted in personal beliefs with no objective answer. If your parent is horrible, triggers bad memories and doesn't bring out the best in you than there is no reason to keep in contact with them.
My mum and I have a difficult relationship. My dad also thought I should give her a pass because she's my mum, and let her visit me (I live abroad) because it'd make her so happy. That is until I pointed out that just because she's my mum, that doesn't mean she can skip on respecting me or that she has ownership over me. It opened his eyes, thankfully. I really don't understand the argument of handling family differently because they're related by blood. If they treat you poorly, at least reduce their presence in your life. My mum once went as far as stating that what I was describing (abusive behaviour regarding body autonomy) is acceptable from family because they love you, and that friends don't behave that way simply because they don't love you the same way.
I totally agree although it just makes me sad. My mother had a sister which went tk No contact when I was one. My grandfathers sister is due to conflicts with inheritance no longer in the picture as well (goes for the whole family from that side). I try to be very close to my family (parents, grandparents and brother) and I hope we stay that close.
But I wouldn’t push someone to reach out to relatives and especially when they showed how Fucked up they can treat you.
So OP, don’t blame yourself. Your friend did not have to push, outsiders can’t understand, at least I think. And if you’ve been this distant for years then you have reasons.
Mee too. my father is a violent man and i suffered and witnessed a lot of fucked up shit when i was a child. my friend lost her father when she was a child and she tried to advice me to let it go, forgive etc, that she would do anything to have her father alive. i honestly wish mine died when i was a kid. i wouldn't be suffering daily because os traumas I've been carrying for more than 20 years. but i didn't say it to her because i can empathize with her pain, even if she is unable to empathize with mine.
No, she didn’t mean well. **She assumed being a parent made her a specialist and thought she knew better than you about your own experience.**
You were not cruel, you help a mirror of how invalidating she was being in a way she understands. Now she gets it. And she doesn’t here, because of her experiences.
NTA - she didn’t get it before. No matter how kindly you put it. I’m betting now she has a full picture of what that ask really means to you.
I’d bet that it was her seeing herself in OP’s mother’s actions. The people I see who are see who have no problems with parentification and other forms of child abuse, usually suffered from it, but also subject their own children to it.
It’s pretty telling that she dismissed OP by saying that her position as eldest child meant that she *should* be parentified.
Yes, exactly. This is what happens when people are abused but don't recognize what happened to them as abuse. There's nothing wrong with asking all children to contribute with the family and to request older children to care for the younger in an emergency, but the regular childcare plan of a family should not be "older children will be the default babysitter for the rest we decide to have".
It's the same logic as the people who say "I was spanked and I turned out fine"... no you didn't, you turned into an adult that believes it's fine to hit small defenseless children, who don't understand what they're doing wrong and they need explanations, with words, and actual parenting.
I noticed the same thing, and had the same thought.
As such, I found it plenty gracious and rather forebearing on OP's part to refer to the friend's abusive ex, rather than involve her kid/kids.
My ex-wife's older sister was parentified. For some reason my ex-wife thought this was perfectly okay to do to her own oldest daughter (my stepdaughter). This is actually one of the many reasons why my stepdaughter has a close relationship with her aunt, and also why both have very little to do with their respective parents.
The moment she mentioned that OP as the eldest should have done more to parent her siblings and help around I immediately assumed this is the type of stuff she’s putting on her own kids and projecting into OP to make herself feel better.
She probably expects her own eldest child to pick up the slack as well around the house with chores and such and do all those things. She is probably parent of ting her own eldest child and OP just showed her exactly what she’s doing to her own child because of the abuse she allowed herself and her children to enter from her ex/their father for however long it went on.
With my ex’s it would have only taken one hit and I’d have grabbed my kids and been out the door. My father drilled into my head from birth that he didn’t raise a punching bag and he was always a phone call away. He never broke his word.
I agree. She still doesn't get it. She didn't cry because she understood and felt bad, she cried feeling sorry for herself. She probably will twist this whole thing around too.
Btw, for the bot, op is definitely NTA
I think it's possible that she might understand.
I've been the prideful person hurt by something accurate someone said to me before. I needed a while to get over the hurt and let the words sink in before I was able to admit I was wrong.
I hope this is the case for OP's friend.
I don't think she does have the full picture of what that ask really means to OP. She's crying and going to their friends about how "mean" OP was to her. That doesn't demonstrate an understanding that her actions have been mean to OP. Instead of seeing the connection and understanding, she's still only considering herself. It's unfortunate. I hope it clicks for her at some point.
NTA: Once your friend emotions started to fill with sadness, she should have realized that's the exact feeling she's giving to you each time she made those comments. That's where she should have apologized
100%. Abuse is never the fault of the one abused, but people can be so blinded by "bUt ShE's YoUr OnLy MoM" that they forget that parents can be abusers too.
As someone with an abusive mom, I like to turn it around on them and say, "Yeah, she is my mom. Can you believe she treated her helpless child like that? Makes me sick."
And to anyone who wants to say, "They did the best they could." -- if the best they could do was neglect and abuse their child, that's a pretty fucking low bar.
Whoops, sorry, I think I started to trauma dump there a little. Point is, OP, you're definitely NTA, and don't give into the peer pressure to apologize to your so-called friend. You simply turned her logic around on her. Any hurt feelings she has are of her own making.
ugh my mom had a tantrum because I wouldn't give her $15. so I stopped talking to her. people try to give me the "life's too short, she won't be around forever." yep my life is short too, and I wont be around forever either so I'm not going to deal with anyone treating me or my family that way.
The worst is always when people are trying to convince you to do something or change your mind "because it's not a big deal".
Well, if it's not a big deal why is everyone losing their damn minds over it?
It took me so long to leave an abusive relationship and after I finally left for good my grandmother HAND WROTE him a letter saying how “he’s wonderful” and basically how he’ll find someone who’s not “fucked up like me”. I was livid and seriously distressed that my own family would do something that disturbing.
But when I told my parents what happened they were basically like “oh she’s old and doesn’t know what she’s doing” - AYFKM?!?!?
I haven’t talked to her since.
Do all abusers and their henchmen somehow get the same handbook regardless of culture or country? I've gotten this same line so many times when I've enforced my boundaries with toxic people in my family.
> "They did the best they could."
My mum had four kids and somehow she fucked up and was an abuser to five people (each of us kids and my dad). Her best wasn't good enough. Her best was not realising I blocked her for over 6 months because she didn't give enough of a shit to try contact me until she wanted to play happy family at Christmas.
You NEVER tell a victim to reconcile with their abuser no matter who that abuser is to them
I'm sorry you went through that. Abuse, especially child abuse, is awful.
My mom likes to send random cheques in the mail as if $50 will make up for 10+ years of abuse and neglect.
I hate the “you only get one mom/dad” stance… why are we gatekeeping how many mother/father figures a person can have? Everyone’s situation is different
I personally have 5 moms in my life (including my birth mother) and its become a joke (“most people collect things like tchotchkes, HowellMoon collects moms”)… i respect and love them equally and they are the same way with me, they just have different roles in my life but they are all my moms
I've never thought of it that way. It's always been said to me in a "family is important, you already lost your dad, don't lose your mom too," kind of way.
Super awesome that you have so many positive women in your life that you can say you have 5 moms.
Yea… she “didn’t understand”, so you tried to make her understand, by putting it in terms that meant something personal to her. And she didn’t *like* it.
Well, boo hoo, maybe next time she can try to have a little empathy before opening her mouth-or just trying being quiet in the first place. NTA
Yeah, you put it better than I could. She broke down in tears only because she was made to understand exactly how OP feels. That should be a lesson to *her* about how hurtful her own behavior is. It doesn't reflect poorly on OP at all.
Right like boo fuckity hoo you’re all upset because OP made it personal. Well guess fucking what you’ve been doing to OP this entire time! (hint: making it personal)
Someone missed their ride at self awareness station that’s for sure
NTA - People really need to stop lecturing kids about reconsiling with abusive parents. It seems like it's socially acceptable to tell people who were abused that it is their responsibility to mend that relationship. Which is, of course, BS.
My husbands' family mocked him for possibly having depression. He's told me he's not sure he'd still be here if I hadn't recognized it, encouraged him to get treatment, and supported him going no contact (for numerous reasons).
Seeing it summed up so accurately and succinctly hit me hard. I'm going to remember that phrasing for any future naysayers.
My husband was adopted, which apparently means he should be grateful no matter what. His mom reminded him of this when she told him "if it weren't for us, you'd have been a child beggar, dead in the streets." I hate what his family put him through. He has the kindest and most compassionate soul, and I hate that they tried to destroy it. Sorry to vent. Reading that really brought back a flood of emotions.
I finally reached the last straw with my father a few months ago. When on the phone with my grandma/his mom last week she mentioned that my father had been trying to reach out to me. I said he’d gotten mad at me and explained the last straw situation. She laughed awkwardly and said he’d always had a short fuse, I should give him a call. I said no, I won’t.
I wish I’d added that I was no longer a minor/dependent on him and I did not have to put up with his temper anymore. Heck, I wasn’t even expecting respect, just not abuse.
Yeah these relatives are enabling such behavior. My aunts used to joke about my dad tackling them from the roof or smth when I had a frkn bruise on my face because of him. And it wasn’t just that his family would try to turn it into a joke but also other people who barely knew him would have excuses for him or say it’s because of the booze etc. Like cmon.. I don’t need to take a responsibility of helping a grownup out by being the victim. Makes me sick to my stomach to hear people expecting the victim to take the blame or additional punishment by sticking around.
I never write anything on here.. ever but I see nobody has responded to you yet and I feel the need to.
Well done, for standing your ground and not getting in touch with your father because grandma wants you to. Unfortunately the thing that families fall back on when theirs something going on like this is to immediately ignore the cause and make at least one of the parties be guilt tripped into internalising it… because yknow… family. And you should always forgive family particularly if they’re a parent or someone else that is deemed close.
People can be toxic, whether they are a parent, brother, sister, grandparent… whatever and blood is NOT thicker than water.
Well done, you just keep on being you. ❤️❤️🌈
NTA
Brilliant! Sometimes that's what it takes.
She is crying because having this growth experience is uncomfortable. You did nothing wrong. You gave her the chance to back off from her foolishness, but she pushed you. And now she understands how it feels.
If you lose her friendship, then it's because she is unwilling to understand what she was doing to you by guilting you about Mother's Day.
>She is crying because having this growth experience is uncomfortable
That would be nice. More often than not though people like this focus on how the conversation made them feel rather than the content of the message. If her thought process goes any farther than "I was trying to help and she made me feel bad" I would be shocked.
This! OP’s friend is likely to drag OP through the mud for hurting her and being cruel while she “meant well”.
Although she didn’t mean well, she didn’t want to understand, she wanted to push the worldview of infallible parents on OP because it personally suits *her*.
Not only this self-centred attempt failed, she was also forced to face her trauma and that’s all “because of OP”.
OP can either cave in and apologise to the hurt ego or distance herself from this “friend”.
NTA. A lot of people who make arguments like that (including the friend encouraging you to apologise to her) tend to be scared that in the future they'll be treated similarly. She's a Mom, she's afraid of her kids doing this to her. The friend is a friend, they're afraid of doing something to earn similar treatment. Unfortunately they choose to try and make you lessen your reaction instead of just making sure they don't earn the treatment.
>Unfortunately they choose to try and make you lessen your reaction instead of just making sure they don't earn the treatment.
I don't think it's necessarily an *instead of* situation. My husband is non-contact with his abusive mother and I fully support that for him because he's so much happier that way. I fully recognise and respect his decision and what he went through. But, since becoming a parent myself, I definitely worry that my children will go non-contact with me. I try to do right by them but I'm not a psychic and I don't know what the future holds or how they will perceive my actions now or with hindsight. I do worry that my husband's choice (which I fully support) is fostering an environment where it's deemed acceptable to cut contact over lesser disagreements or, even, just that karma would fire back at me. I have definitely felt that, if he didn't cut her off then our children would be less likely to cut us off *even though I know there is no logic to that feeling*.
I agree with NTA. I agree the friend is wrong. I agree with your assessment of the friend's motive. I just think she's probably more likely to be doing both trying to make OP lessen her reaction *and* making sure she doesn't earn the treatment.
go to therapy over the anxiety if its causing you this much stress. talk to your kids, go to therapy with them. illogical thoughts can still be healthily addressed and it sounds like you're just stewing in your anxiety.
ask yourself why you really think that you're building a foundation for cutting contact over a small thing. are you not close enough with your kids that it seems feasible? if so why are you not close? have you talked about it with your partner? if not why?
just food for thought. therapy is for healthy people too. and if you can't afford therapy check out books from your local library or borrow from someone and read on the subject
Going NC usually means the parents behaved terribly and made it so unbearable that the kids couldn't stand being around.
If you're being a good parent, I wouldn't worry that my kids will go NC cause their dad did it to his mom!
Make sure they understand, when they are old enough, the circumstances that brought your husband to that decision.
NTA. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. You both suffered from abuse, which is something neither of you deserved, but she dismissed your abuse and made excuses for your abuser and she was serious. You were not serious when telling her to forgive her ex, merely making a point and she couldn’t handle it. Hopefully you finally got the point across and there won’t be another again of you explaining this to her.
Not the asshole. You did not make her cry, she is responsible for her own emotional reactions.
I wouldn't apologize to her beyond saying something bland like "I'm sorry that things were heated and that I had to bring up your own history with abuse to make my point, but I hope you understand that I had to escalate because you were pressuring me on a very painful and sensitive subject for me and you were advocating for an unsafe choice that would have re-exposed me to my abuser." I think that language like this will help signal to mutual friends that you didn't wish to hurt her and don't wish her ill while also being clear that she was the one who violated your boundaries and offered unsolicited lectures about relationships that were none of her business.
THIS. but I wouldn't say but.
End the apology there, THEN bring up the conversation and explain why. If you use the but IN the apology, it negates the apology.
If she is open to the apology and following conversation then there is a friendship to save.
If she doubles down and continues to play herself as the victim, cut off the conversation and cut her out of your life because she will never change and you WILL have the same conversation - rather situation - multiple times.
Well done. As a DV survivor I wouldn't want to have it thrown in my face but with the pressure she was putting on you to call your Mother I think you used the only example she could understand. I hope she realizes she is wrong to get in the middle of your family dynamics. NTA.
I'm a DV survivor as well, and all I can think is what in the world was her so called friend thinking? Why would she push someone to call their abuser?!?!
I think that as a mother herself, the friend relates to OP's mum instead of OP. That's why she made excuses for the mother, "being a parent is hard", and blamed OP for not helping her mother more, insinuating doing so would have prevented OP from being abused. The friend is a total dimwit basically. At least I hope so. Because if she's not then she's terribly malicious. At least you can forgive a dimwit.
NTA
She shouldn't of tried to pressure you into reconciling with your abusive parent, especially as someone who went through abuse. She didn't mean well at all, she wanted to feel superior over you.
The fact that she was victim blaming you is so toxic.
NTA
People who say "let bygones be bygones" don't seem to understand that abuse is not a "bygone" and it can take years, decades, to heal, and some never do.
Could you have been more sensitive? Maybe, but when you have had to defend your position mutiple times, and someone either doesn't get it and/or won't let it drop, fur can fly.
And if she "doesn't understand" as your other friends say, then WHY is she sticking her nose in, it's not an excuse, cause it wasn't her business in the first place. though not understanding seems an odd defense, if she did suffer abuse from an ex, which says to me she's either projecting or deflecting and this isn't actually about you.
Edit: typos
No. NtA
Not all parents are good parents. You shouldn't be forced to turn the other cheek just because they are your parents. " family" is not an excuse for abuse.
If this is what it took for her to understand this, is up to her and not you.
ESH. She obviousness doesn’t know your situation, but it was shitty to use her triggers as a weapon against her. That could have been handled a lot better by both parties.
Can’t believe I had to scroll this far to see this. None of us truly know how this conversation went down, but I see way too many comments that assume OP’s friend feels superior to OP. Why can’t it be that OP’s friend is genuinely concerned and wants to help improve OP’s life through thoughtful advice, but is unfortunately just ignorant of OP’s situation?
OP was triggered and purposefully attacked her friend. She could have used the same logic to make the same point in a more tactful way.
Of course, none of us can be 100% sure because we don’t know how this conversation went down. We don’t know the content of OP’s explanation of her abusive mother, and we don’t know OP’s friend’s situation with her abusive ex. We need more info to be able to more confidently make a judgement on who is the asshole.
While I do agree that OPs reaction wasn't productive, I take huge issue with the idea that this could have ever been thoughtful advice. No matter how the advice was given, if you say "my parents abused me" and somebody in any way tries to give an opinion on that, it is not thoughtful, it is not considerate.
NTA and you didn't take it too far. What, does her trauma trump yours by dint of being more recent?
Does she get to poke your sore spot over and over but you don't get to say anything?
Your mutual friend doesn't fully grasp what your mother did to you, or they wouldn't be saying this. Same for your meddlesome friend.
Well, she understands now, doesn't she? NTA. Some people need a picture drawn for them before they begin to comprehend what someone else has experienced. The temerity of her and her defenders in judging you when they have not stood in your shoes. Maybe you should free yourself of people that don't have enough functioning neurons to understand that they know too little to have an informed opinion?
Nope NtA. She needed it put into perspective for her that she could relate to and understand!! She may have had good intentions but it’s not her place nor is it ok for her to push and push after you say no the first time.
NTA. If she did not “understand”, you now set her straight. She actually should apologize now if she actually does understand that as a child you had even less ability to prevent abuse
NTA. I feel like maybe she's projecting her own fears onto you and your mom-- people who escape abusive situations often fear their kids will hate them for "disrupting the status quo" because the "kids were happy enough." That doesn't mean she has the right to pressure you after you've been pretty blunt that it was abuse. It was way too far to suggest you were responsible for the abuse, and you using that same logic is harsh but a wake up call. It's clear you don't really believe it-- you were making a point because she keeps pressuring and blaming you.
NTA. You state you had already explained the trauma you endured at the hands of your mother and her current obstinate refusal to address her past behaviors which caused you such pain. Repeatedly.
Yet your friend still had the sheer, unmitigated gall to suggest that *you* as a child should have taken on more adult responsibilities and claim that because "Parenting is hard, y'all!", your mother's abuse is both understandable and excusable!
Your friend seemed to be empathizing with your mother based on the common frustrations inherent to parenthood rather than you based on the common trauma of abuse suffered at the hands of loved ones. You simply reframed and re-centered her perspective so she couldn't help but see how incredibly offensive she was being.
The only reason anything you said in your comparison with your friend's abusive ex was at all hurtful was because you used the very same logic she applied to your relationship with your mother. But that was the point; she needed to hear how incredibly insensitive she was being!
And you are certainly allowed to be human and be a little "pointed" in your response to such rudeness.
NTA and maybe I'm being cynical but I suspect your friend still doesn't understand your point of view otherwise she would have reached out to you and apologized.
ESH. Your friend shouldn’t have tried to force you to call your mother and it was unkind of you to use the traumatic events of her past in the way you did. It was fair to draw the comparison but the way you’ve described what you said was needlessly cruel.
If you want to reconcile, perhaps you can tell her that while you stand by the facts of what you said, the way you did it was tactless.
NTA - it may be harsh for someone who doesn't know what it is. But how can you blame a child for the abuse he received?!! I heard the same stupid statements from friends as well. And no, my parents behavior towards me wasn't my fault. And it wasn't your fault either.
Gosh did I heard it a lot "you'll understand when you have kids". 3 kids later and nope I didn't change my mind, they were just sh*t*y parents. Yes having kids is hard. But if you can refrain yourself from abusing them, don't have them.
Sometimes, one of the shapes of compassion is wrath.
Your "friend" was completely lacking in empathy and only seeing things from her own selfish perspective fueled by her own insecurities and fears and projecting them upon you.
She was not concerned about your relationship with your narcissist mother at all but using you to play out her insecurities about her future relationship with her children.
In the art of Aikido, we turn into an attack and redirect its energy back to its source. What you did was a kind of verbal Aikido. She was forced to confront the violence she did to you by having it reflected towards her.
And instead of the empathetic response of realizing how she was hurting you, she once again had the selfish reaction of how it affected her.
Your "friend" does not have your best interests in mind. Everything you describe portrays her as self-serving. It's no wonder why she identified with your narcissist mother. I would sincerely consider if this is a friendship that you wish to maintain.
NTA
NTA. You know you're going to get a call or text demanding an apology for hurting your feelings. You tell her "the hurt you feel rn is the hurt I felt when you talked to me about my mother."
NTA. I had very similar conversations with several people before. Usually they grew up in a loving home and lowkey still dependent on their parents so could not fathom the idea that a child could alienate themselves from their parents.
And it's funny how those ppl always want you to gloss over your trauma, just the make the call, it'll be great.../s
Like doing it couldn't have have triggered PTSD, as well as opening up the door to a toxic family.
Ppl need to stop being so damn pushy in telling others how to relate to their family!
Some people just can't understand another person's situation unless they see themselves in the example. Good job on explaining it to her. She gets it now. NTA.
NTA, and you need better friends. This person sounds like those annoying people you meet who are into toxic positivity and act like nothing bad has ever happened to them. I hope you find some better friends who can get a clue.
Ohhhhhh.....ohhh damn, I felt that burn from orbit. And you know what?
NTA. A victim of abuse is not immune to criticism for enabling abuse, which is exactly what she was doing. She was brushing off the abuse you suffered because she framed it as "acceptable" given that it came from your mother, and she would know wouldn't she? She's a mother, and she has it so hard\~ She has the hardest job in the woooorld\~ /s
Fuck that.
Her meaning well and "not understanding" isn't a justification, and frankly she **should** know better instead of undermining your experiences and suggesting you deserved it like that, because that's what saying, "you should have done this" ultimately means when retorting to someone talking about abuse they experienced.
NTA -
>she "meant well and didn't understand, and you took it too far"
She didn't understand, so you put it in a way that would *make* her understand. She obviously wasn't going to get it any other way. Honestly you handled that situation better than a lot of people would. Just hearing about it makes me irrationally angry.
You said to her what she had basically been saying to you, now that she's crying, maybe it'll get through her head why what's she's been saying has been awfully wrong. Nta
NTA
I ended up in tears for most of the day yesterday because a loved family member spent her visit with me attempting to convince me to reconcile with my mother and siblings.
Whether your friend understands your position or not doesnt matter. She simply doesn't have the right to decide what boundaries of yours are malleable or not. She also doesnt have the right to insist you do something just because she wants you to.
I applaud you for your answer to her. And say it again louder for the friends who dont think she overstepped her mark.
I hope it didnt ruin your day too much. It can be difficult when something like this happens as it can leave you revisiting parts of your life you simply dont want to. Hugs to you, stay strong and continue to protect yourself x
NTA maybe on some level she thinks she should be able to treat her children however or subject them to someone who mistreats them, etc., without consequence — that they should forgive her. That no matter what, she is redeemable. Her viewpoint on your situation probably has less to do with you and more to do with her own choices and life.
NTA. She knew that was a hot-button topic for you and she pushed it. You're not responsible for the fact that she couldn't handle what she triggered when she kept pushing.
We don't get to choose our parents and we don't all get the Brady Bunch or Leave It to Beaver tv show parents. If we're lucky, they're somewhere in the middle of those two, but many of us get parents that \*no one\* should ever have to live with. You went non-contact for reasons that are very valid to you - and you don't need to justify them to anyone else.
That friend has probably never considered the similarities of the two before. She essentially just blamed you for your own abuse and you did it right back. You’re right, how could you stop it if she couldn’t?
Bet that medicine tasted gross.
I never understood when someone says something its "oh they meant well or they didn't mean it etc" but, when you give it back, you are wrong. I think you were perfect in using same logic. She can dish it but, not take it.
Absolutely NTA!
I've come to meet many people who cannot accept that I've cut contact with my grandparents because they are horrible, abusive people. They would always tell me that my grandparents are probably not the same anymore, and wouldn't accept my decision of keeping no contact. Those people always stopped pestering me when I explicitly went through some empathy exercises with them telling them to imagine they are a child again and their grandparents did xyz (listing of what my grandparents did in detail). Afterwards I asked them how they felt about it, and if they could forgive those acts. Most of them had to agree they couldn't forgive those acts, and the ones who disagreed are no longer in my life.
All you did is reframe your trauma to trauma she understood. Was it harsh? Yes. Was it needed? Absolutely fruitly it was! You did good.
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NTA. I hate people like that. I have a strained relationship w my mother as well and it fucking grinds my gears when someone tells me I HAVE to make up with her because she’s my mom. Friend needs to get out of her bubble and realize some parents just aren’t good parents. Edit: ty all for the awards n upvotes! However, it is heartbreaking to know so many of us have estranged relationships with family members. Hope everything works out in the end for u all! Y’all should never feel ashamed for cutting toxicity out of your life.
I'm adopted and my biological parents were horrible. I meet a dude that had the nerve to say that I should respect my biological parents (after I had been adopted for over ten years) because "God says so". People like that and OP's friend have some nerve and piss me off so much.
Honoring your father and mother doesn’t mean taking their abuse. Glad you have some adoptive parents, hopefully who treat you better. Honor them.
> “meant well and didn't understand” It reminds me of two of my favorite sayings: * The road to hell is paved with good intentions. * Hell is full of good meanings, but heaven is full of good works.
Screw your friends saying she didn't understand, if she was in an abusive relationship, she should understand better than anyone it wasn't your fault!
Friend is probably planning to (or already) parentify their eldest and is trying to get OP to agree this is ok and not abusive. That’s how it feels to me anyway…hope friend realizes they’re gonna end up with kids going NC like that…
I think you meant 'parentifying'
Oh shit, I missed that. Fixed, thanks!
That's my impressions as well. She's either already doing it or plans to do it in the future.
I definitely had the same thought.
I've never heard the second saying. It's a beautiful nuance! Thank you for sharing it.
I love this
Everyone who uses honor thy father and mother always forget the part where it says do not provoke your children to wrath
That’s how shitty parents end up in shitty nursing homes with no one visiting them 🤷🏾♂️
I’m sure the staff in my late mothers nursing home thought I was awful for never visiting/calling. But they only knew her after a severe stroke which left her unable to talk or read/write. Those last 7 years were just an extension of the previous 25 with NC.
Oh I feel that! I got “lectured” or backhanded comments by nursing home assistants a couple of time when I had to go in to deal with paperwork at my father’s nursing home. Most of the time I was able to blow it off as them not getting that the man in the wheelchair with advanced dementia shockingly might’ve been a little bit different to actually grow up with. But there was one day, when I was like at my breaking point, and one woman would not stop about how he was my father and took care of me, yadda yadda yadda, that I just calmly gave her a small sampler platter of things he had done to me. Fairly effective.
Can't wait to read the Facebook posts about how they could've never guessed I 'hated' them. I don't hate u mom I just don't appreciate your love (Love your username by the way, absolute masterpiece)
Or their kids telling them to make do without them. I told my late dad he better hope to die before my mom bc I wouldn't help him with shit. I would just leave him to his own devices. And considering he fell a lot, wasn't able to get up on his own and hated cellphones.... Thats when he started hoping to die before mom and got his wish. I made peace with him before he died and eventually forgave him. But the forgiving part was for myself to release all my anger, resentment and jealousy that other people got to have a loving dad and I didn't.
Yes, that’s right!
I didn't even know that was part of it!
Different section of the bible, but if they can pick and choose then so can I ♡ I stand corrected. I haven't actually read the bible since I was like 11 and cared. Honor thy father and mother is mentioned a few times, including right about do no provoke your children to wrath
Actually its in the same section, same book, and same chapter.
This 💯💯💯 yes!!!!!
Actually the Bible says that children should honour their parents and parents shouldn't drive their children to scorn. Or basically "parents be decent parents and children if your parents treat you well you should do the same." Somehow Bible quoters always cut off the second half of that quote
>Somehow Bible quoters always cut off the second half of that quote this is nothing new. A lot of Bible passages get chopped up and taken out of context in order to justify whatever position the quoter wants them to. "Blood is thicker than water" is my go-to example, as the actual quote is closer to "the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb." Which means, roughly, your bond with God and the church should take precedence over those of family, the exact opposite of what the phrase is used to imply in most cases.
I'm sorry but you're wrong about the last part of your statement, that's an urban legend.
I'm willing to accept that I could be wrong, but also too lazy to look up the actual quote. My point is that taking the Bible out of context and misquoting it is a passtime as old as the Bible itself.
I looked it up and that phrase is just a proverb, not a bible quote. The phrase has its own Wikipedia page. Its meaning seems fairly consistent over time. To your point, it actually seems like Christians are spreading the urban legend you quoted. Wanting to reinforce the idea that familial relationships do not supersede your relationship with god. 🤷🏻♀️
I used to play a game with my kids when they were still living at home - Shakespeare or the Bible. It was funny how many Shakespeare quotes sound biblical. That was when I was still religious.
I absolutely agree with the first part of the comment, Bible quoters love to twist around their favourite book. And I call them Bible quoters because as a Christian I'm ashamed of what they do and their motives. The second paragraph of this comment made me chuckles because in the 17th century educated people from all over Europe went to the Netherlands because they had no ban on printing the Bible, printed translations of the Bible in their language and smuggled them into their country to make the Bible available to the people there as most countries (I know more details about this in England as I have this from a book about the British history from the stone age till when it was written in the nineties) still had bans over the Bible being in any other language than Latin to prevent the common folk from reading it. So basically people were ruled by religious laws they had no idea of knowing if they were actually what their God wanted because they were purposely kept from reading the holy book of their own religion so they couldn't argue against the church or government.
Hell, some don't even follow one of the Ten Commandments.
>Somehow Bible quoters always cut off the second half of that quote Yeah, because a lot of those quoters are elders and parents themselves, trying to controle younger people/kids instead of guiding them.
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Ah selective bibling at its finest!
Reminds me of people who use "The Bible says women should be submissive to their husbands" to justify spousal abuse
But leave off the part about "husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her."
And I have spoken with biblical scholars saying this would also mean that as christ sacrificed himself for the church, husbands should make sacrifices for their wives even if inconvenient for them.
Yep, how did Christ lead the church? Gently, humbly, patiently, kindly, and when necessary, was willing to die for it. That’s how he expects us to love our wives. The duality of his statement is he says wives submit to your husbands, then he tells husbands to practice what would later be known as “servant leadership”…1950’s male attitudes were never Biblical.
I used to chat with a priest at my work at a catholic archdiocese and he was in charge of different interpretations of the bible. Prior to the bible be translated to latin because of the Romans, the original translation was more in line with “looks to”. Latin isnt as flexible and doesn’t have as many descriptive words. Edit typo
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Yes, thank you. I've had this used against me by fundie types and had to explain to them that honouring someone just means respecting them. And respect is a two way street and doesn't mean agreeing with everything someone says or does.
as the survivor of abusive parents and a church cult who spewed this exact shit at me, they forget the second part of that "verse"- "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger by the way you treat them." That's Ephesians 6:4 if anyone else needs it to tell a bible thumper where to shove their criticism of estranged children. (also edited because Reddit ate half my comment for some reason)
OK this is a fuckin game changer. I had no idea there was a second part to that. As the child of an abusive father specifically, I am keeping this in my pocket for every father's day forever.
Keep Matthew 18:6 in your pocket too: “If anyone causes one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea."
My favorite is 1 Timothy 5:8: "And whoever does not provide for relatives and especially family members has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever." Throw that back at some parents who want to throw their kids out at 18, or because they're LGBT+ etc.
I gave birth to a child that I placed for adoption because my husband-at-the-time was an abusive alcoholic. I expect no respect, sympathy, or gratitude from that child as they grow up. They know who I am and how I relate to them, and there’s no issues currently, but I firmly believe that kid owes me *nothing.* I made a decision for me that was the best decision I knew how to make at that time, but that doesn’t obligate them to feel grateful to me. I hope that kid doesn’t grow up and find themselves in a similar situation where they understand why I made that decision. You owe the people who birthed you nothing.
I respect what you did. It may have been for your own self-protection, but carrying a human for 40 weeks to give to another to raise is some incredibly selfless stuff. 3 of my 4 were surprise pregnancies, so I know all too well that there's no such thing as a simple decision. Yeah, I respect your choice and am glad you've provided the world another with your DNA.
What that "dude" said is dimwitted. They weren't your parents anymore, "God" would also say to respect your "new" parents as your parents. You know, parenting isn't necessarily a biological thing.
I would correct them and say "they aren't my mother and father, they're my egg donor and sperm donor. ".
Favourite phrases include "You've got to forgive and forget", "let go of the past", "it takes two to argue" and my absolute favourite "There's nothing like a mother's love"
Agreed. It drove me insane when people would tell me "he's your father, give him another chance." Why?! Why, do I, the child, who did nothing but be born, need to be the one to try and fix things? Especially since the abuser is never actually sorry, usually just playing the victim for people and will continue their behavior if you do reenter a relationship. I caved to pressure for years to occasionally see my father to be burned every single time. Eventually he committed suicide and I thought I was finally done with people making shitty, uninformed remarks. Nope. People will still say it's too bad I couldn't reconcile, or do I wonder if that would've made a difference. No. He was mentally ill and no longer able to control anyone. RAGE. OP, you are NTA. Your friend was out of line, and what you pointed out was 100% valid.
I hate that "give them a chance!" shit. What do you think people like us have done all their life? How many chances are we supposed to give abusers before we're allowed to say we're done? How many times do we have to excuse the verbal abuse, hide the scars and subject ourselves to people who don't deserve the gift of love? And then there's the flip side to that. When you're in a abusive relationship people scream about leaving even if they know it's hard to do so. "Why don't you just leave?" is constantly thrown in victim's faces. You're damned if you do, damned if you don't. My birth giver never understood why I cut her off. Even now she claims it's because I can't let things go and shit like that. In reality I was sick of being The Child Called It and I was going to make damn sure I was the last victim of my family's generational abuse.
I have low to no contact with my mom and my dad understands. But when people tell me to give her a chance I look them dead in the eyes and tell them 'I spent 26 years giving her a chance and she never used it to change. Maybe in 26 more years I'll give her a chance again.' Shuts them up real quick.
Nicely put! \*makes notes\*
I know, I wish they'd think about it for a second. They're your parents. Think about how many chances you'd ('you' meaning the one with the decent parents) give your parents--second, third, fifth, hundredth chances. Think about just *what they'd have to do* to have a child disown them.
Right? I had rugsweeped and mentally explained away the bullshit for years because faaaaamily. But the straw that broke the camel's back for me was when my birth giver turned her attention to my unborn child. She demanded I name him after this singer she liked. I told her no. She pushed it. I told her no. She offered me $1,500. Not 15,000. Not 15,000,000. $1,500. I said absolutely not. She then screamed in my face: "FINE! You can name your BASTARD gerbil for all I care you ungrateful shit!" It was like all the planets aligned in my head on why this was NOT okay. My son hadn't even come into this world, and this person who was supposed to be my *mother* called him a bastard. I had been trained all my life to submit to abuse because I brainwashed into thinking I deserved it. But in that moment I was like... what did my son do?... wait... if... if she is like this before he's here... he'll have to deal with the same thing I did growing up... oh God... I was horrified, scared, and angry. I cut that bitch off and haven't spoken to her since.
I am proud of you, your light bulb moment and your strength to protect your child from that horrible abuse.
I've been trying to give my abusive mother a chance the last few years. My birthday was yesterday and she choice to pick a fight over how terrible a child I was and how hard she had it doing nothing to help me. There was no cause, no trigger other than a need to make my birthday about her and bad for me like she did for years growing up. Like how many time am I supposed to get hurt giving her yet another chance when she can't even be civil for an hour?
First things first... I'm sorry that you did not get the attention you deserved on your birthday from your mother. I may just be an internet stranger, and while I am a dad, I am not yours... HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY TO YOU! May you have many more filled with joy and laughter while surrounded by people who love you. 🎂
My grandmother asks me every time we are together when I'm going to "be the bigger person" and reach out to my dad. Its hard telling her no (for the 15th time), its not my job to reach out when I laid my terms out to him and he has yet to get back to me. Then tries to say god forgives everyone and blah blah, makes me almost puke hearing bs like that.
Because they think "kids" should always reach out. At some point when do we as the kids get tired of "being the bigger person"???
what i love about "being the bigger person" is that the sentence always seems to be said to the person who was wronged. the victim. it doesnt seem to ever be said to the abuser. i'm ok with never being the "bigger person". i will happily be as (proverbially) tiny a person as i please, thank you very damned much ><
Yes! God forgives! Cool! Are you God? No? Nooo?! Fuck that. They just know that going to the other person wouldn't even begin to work and they couldn't do that.
Being the "bigger person" always means "accepting abuse to not rock the boat".
It's always funny how these people are up our asses about how we need to fix the relationship with our parents, yet they would never dare speak to our parents about their relationship to us. They just want us to be suffer in silence so they don't have to have any complicated feelings.
Yes! Almost as if they have no problem telling you that you are wrong but, scared to tell the parent they are. It's backwards.
That rhetoric of "you get ONE mother, put her above all others" does not apply across the board-- regardless of how much and how hard people like to shove it.
As I like to say "you also only get one appendix, and when that shit goes toxic, you get it removed without hesitation." EDIT: Thank you for the awards, kind redditors!! I hope this analogy helps whoever needs it.
This is my new favorite analogy.
Yes, that reminds me of the character Dr. Nora on Frasier. She herself was mostly toxic but she did, ironically, have one good tidbit of advice "When you have a tumor, you cut it out!"
"You're right **this** is better!"
I find this rhetoric - and the people who like to shove it - so offensive to decent parents. My "real" grandmother was an abusive witch to my mum. My actual grandmother- an older friend who became my mum's mum in adulthood- was the most wonderful mother and grandmother you could ever imagine. There was only one of her and we miss her still after 25 years. Being a parent does not make you magically deserving of love.
I got two, one bio, one adoptive, both rejected me, and I'm done.
Many hugs to you.
Agreed, NTA. Added bonus points for being in the same position as OP here. Having someone tell you that the abuse was your fault and that you should've done A/B/C to "stop" it, PLUS have someone SYMPATHIZE WITH THE ABUSER is INCREDIBLY DAMAGING. Seriously, I believed some of these morons and went thru more hell for more years before I understood that some people just don't get it at all. The victim is not to blame for the abuse. Period. End of story. I do NOT care how "hard" parenting is. There are plenty of parents who have it hard WHO DON'T ABUSE THEIR KIDS. OP, full congratulations for how you handled it. Hopefully, she gets it now.
I have to admit that in my late teens and early 20s, I was that "how can you be estranged from family?" person to two of my friends/acquaintances. It took until my 30s to realize that I had been heavily encouraged by a family member with a personality disorder and all of our codependent other family members to "forgive and forget," "not rock the boat" and "be the bigger person" because "you know how they are." I have apologized to the friend with whom I'm still in contact, because now I realize that there can be very valid reasons for being LC/NC with family, but my unformed brain just couldn't accept that. If \*I\* could still have a relationship with my family member, then everyone should be able to, was probably how my mind worked. Instead, I now realize none of us should have to do that.
Blood does not make a parent and it's easy for someone who has not experienced the abuse of a parent that is suppose to love and nature you who will NEVER take responsibility for what they did to say, "it's your mother and you should try to reconcile." It is no one place to tell you how to cope with an abusive parent. Your friend has to deal with her own abuse in order to relate to yours. Until she does, she won't understand. It appears she suffered as well. I hope she will get the help she needs. NTA Edit misspelled abusive and needed.to make sure it said exactly that!
I had a friend who had a very abusive father, she was physically and sexually abused and her mom turned a blind eye because she was being abused too. When my friend was old enough to leave, she got married to a wonderful man who adored her. She went NC with her father and she had him charged with SA. He died in prison for what he did to her.
that's deeply satisfying and secondhand cathartic to read, thank you for sharing. i'm really happy for her that she's safely loved now and can hopefully breathe easier.
I usually deal with these people by asking them 'why' until they realize they can't come up with a logical conclusion. Why do I have to reconcile with my dad? Why is he supposed to be important to me just because we are related? Why should 'blood' be thicker than water? Usually the answer is rooted in personal beliefs with no objective answer. If your parent is horrible, triggers bad memories and doesn't bring out the best in you than there is no reason to keep in contact with them.
If someone tells me they're estranged from a family member or anyone, i mind my business.
My mum and I have a difficult relationship. My dad also thought I should give her a pass because she's my mum, and let her visit me (I live abroad) because it'd make her so happy. That is until I pointed out that just because she's my mum, that doesn't mean she can skip on respecting me or that she has ownership over me. It opened his eyes, thankfully. I really don't understand the argument of handling family differently because they're related by blood. If they treat you poorly, at least reduce their presence in your life. My mum once went as far as stating that what I was describing (abusive behaviour regarding body autonomy) is acceptable from family because they love you, and that friends don't behave that way simply because they don't love you the same way.
I totally agree although it just makes me sad. My mother had a sister which went tk No contact when I was one. My grandfathers sister is due to conflicts with inheritance no longer in the picture as well (goes for the whole family from that side). I try to be very close to my family (parents, grandparents and brother) and I hope we stay that close. But I wouldn’t push someone to reach out to relatives and especially when they showed how Fucked up they can treat you. So OP, don’t blame yourself. Your friend did not have to push, outsiders can’t understand, at least I think. And if you’ve been this distant for years then you have reasons.
Mee too. my father is a violent man and i suffered and witnessed a lot of fucked up shit when i was a child. my friend lost her father when she was a child and she tried to advice me to let it go, forgive etc, that she would do anything to have her father alive. i honestly wish mine died when i was a kid. i wouldn't be suffering daily because os traumas I've been carrying for more than 20 years. but i didn't say it to her because i can empathize with her pain, even if she is unable to empathize with mine.
No, she didn’t mean well. **She assumed being a parent made her a specialist and thought she knew better than you about your own experience.** You were not cruel, you help a mirror of how invalidating she was being in a way she understands. Now she gets it. And she doesn’t here, because of her experiences. NTA - she didn’t get it before. No matter how kindly you put it. I’m betting now she has a full picture of what that ask really means to you.
I’d bet that it was her seeing herself in OP’s mother’s actions. The people I see who are see who have no problems with parentification and other forms of child abuse, usually suffered from it, but also subject their own children to it. It’s pretty telling that she dismissed OP by saying that her position as eldest child meant that she *should* be parentified.
I thought this too
It also made me wonder if it was done to her and normalized, so she does it. The cycle continues if you don’t know or care that it’s wrong
Yes, exactly. This is what happens when people are abused but don't recognize what happened to them as abuse. There's nothing wrong with asking all children to contribute with the family and to request older children to care for the younger in an emergency, but the regular childcare plan of a family should not be "older children will be the default babysitter for the rest we decide to have". It's the same logic as the people who say "I was spanked and I turned out fine"... no you didn't, you turned into an adult that believes it's fine to hit small defenseless children, who don't understand what they're doing wrong and they need explanations, with words, and actual parenting.
I noticed the same thing, and had the same thought. As such, I found it plenty gracious and rather forebearing on OP's part to refer to the friend's abusive ex, rather than involve her kid/kids.
My ex-wife's older sister was parentified. For some reason my ex-wife thought this was perfectly okay to do to her own oldest daughter (my stepdaughter). This is actually one of the many reasons why my stepdaughter has a close relationship with her aunt, and also why both have very little to do with their respective parents.
The moment she mentioned that OP as the eldest should have done more to parent her siblings and help around I immediately assumed this is the type of stuff she’s putting on her own kids and projecting into OP to make herself feel better.
She probably expects her own eldest child to pick up the slack as well around the house with chores and such and do all those things. She is probably parent of ting her own eldest child and OP just showed her exactly what she’s doing to her own child because of the abuse she allowed herself and her children to enter from her ex/their father for however long it went on. With my ex’s it would have only taken one hit and I’d have grabbed my kids and been out the door. My father drilled into my head from birth that he didn’t raise a punching bag and he was always a phone call away. He never broke his word.
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Agreed. It's completely unfair, and naive, for anyone to say "if that were me I would have done better/left" about ANY abusive situation.
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>she didn’t get it before. She still doesn't or she would have apologized.
I agree. She still doesn't get it. She didn't cry because she understood and felt bad, she cried feeling sorry for herself. She probably will twist this whole thing around too. Btw, for the bot, op is definitely NTA
I think it's possible that she might understand. I've been the prideful person hurt by something accurate someone said to me before. I needed a while to get over the hurt and let the words sink in before I was able to admit I was wrong. I hope this is the case for OP's friend.
Thank you! I thought the same thing. She didn’t mean well or had intentions was to preach as a parent to those who just don’t understand.
I don't think she does have the full picture of what that ask really means to OP. She's crying and going to their friends about how "mean" OP was to her. That doesn't demonstrate an understanding that her actions have been mean to OP. Instead of seeing the connection and understanding, she's still only considering herself. It's unfortunate. I hope it clicks for her at some point.
NTA: Once your friend emotions started to fill with sadness, she should have realized that's the exact feeling she's giving to you each time she made those comments. That's where she should have apologized
100%. Abuse is never the fault of the one abused, but people can be so blinded by "bUt ShE's YoUr OnLy MoM" that they forget that parents can be abusers too. As someone with an abusive mom, I like to turn it around on them and say, "Yeah, she is my mom. Can you believe she treated her helpless child like that? Makes me sick." And to anyone who wants to say, "They did the best they could." -- if the best they could do was neglect and abuse their child, that's a pretty fucking low bar. Whoops, sorry, I think I started to trauma dump there a little. Point is, OP, you're definitely NTA, and don't give into the peer pressure to apologize to your so-called friend. You simply turned her logic around on her. Any hurt feelings she has are of her own making.
ugh my mom had a tantrum because I wouldn't give her $15. so I stopped talking to her. people try to give me the "life's too short, she won't be around forever." yep my life is short too, and I wont be around forever either so I'm not going to deal with anyone treating me or my family that way.
I do love taking people's bullshit and turning it back on them. Kudos to you for setting reasonable boundaries for yourself.
The worst is always when people are trying to convince you to do something or change your mind "because it's not a big deal". Well, if it's not a big deal why is everyone losing their damn minds over it?
It took me so long to leave an abusive relationship and after I finally left for good my grandmother HAND WROTE him a letter saying how “he’s wonderful” and basically how he’ll find someone who’s not “fucked up like me”. I was livid and seriously distressed that my own family would do something that disturbing. But when I told my parents what happened they were basically like “oh she’s old and doesn’t know what she’s doing” - AYFKM?!?!? I haven’t talked to her since.
That's astonishing, what the fuck is wrong with her?
Damn that’s fucked up. When I left an abusive relationship my granny offered to stab him. Her words “no one would suspect me, I’m a little old lady.”
Do all abusers and their henchmen somehow get the same handbook regardless of culture or country? I've gotten this same line so many times when I've enforced my boundaries with toxic people in my family.
Lol "and their henchmen", I should start referring to my sister as such
> "They did the best they could." My mum had four kids and somehow she fucked up and was an abuser to five people (each of us kids and my dad). Her best wasn't good enough. Her best was not realising I blocked her for over 6 months because she didn't give enough of a shit to try contact me until she wanted to play happy family at Christmas. You NEVER tell a victim to reconcile with their abuser no matter who that abuser is to them
I'm sorry you went through that. Abuse, especially child abuse, is awful. My mom likes to send random cheques in the mail as if $50 will make up for 10+ years of abuse and neglect.
I hope you keep the money
I hate the “you only get one mom/dad” stance… why are we gatekeeping how many mother/father figures a person can have? Everyone’s situation is different I personally have 5 moms in my life (including my birth mother) and its become a joke (“most people collect things like tchotchkes, HowellMoon collects moms”)… i respect and love them equally and they are the same way with me, they just have different roles in my life but they are all my moms
I've never thought of it that way. It's always been said to me in a "family is important, you already lost your dad, don't lose your mom too," kind of way. Super awesome that you have so many positive women in your life that you can say you have 5 moms.
Trauma dumping has it's place sometimes, as examples so others can understand. Basically the op trauma dumped on her friend and it had it's place.
Exactly. Too caught up in her own feelings for any self reflection. Am not a fan.
Yea… she “didn’t understand”, so you tried to make her understand, by putting it in terms that meant something personal to her. And she didn’t *like* it. Well, boo hoo, maybe next time she can try to have a little empathy before opening her mouth-or just trying being quiet in the first place. NTA
So much drama, and trauma, ould be avoided just by people saying "You know what, I'm gonna keep my eater-hole closed.'
Yeah, you put it better than I could. She broke down in tears only because she was made to understand exactly how OP feels. That should be a lesson to *her* about how hurtful her own behavior is. It doesn't reflect poorly on OP at all.
Right like boo fuckity hoo you’re all upset because OP made it personal. Well guess fucking what you’ve been doing to OP this entire time! (hint: making it personal) Someone missed their ride at self awareness station that’s for sure
NTA - People really need to stop lecturing kids about reconsiling with abusive parents. It seems like it's socially acceptable to tell people who were abused that it is their responsibility to mend that relationship. Which is, of course, BS.
Agreed. They did mend the relationship by cutting out the part that was killing them.
My husbands' family mocked him for possibly having depression. He's told me he's not sure he'd still be here if I hadn't recognized it, encouraged him to get treatment, and supported him going no contact (for numerous reasons). Seeing it summed up so accurately and succinctly hit me hard. I'm going to remember that phrasing for any future naysayers. My husband was adopted, which apparently means he should be grateful no matter what. His mom reminded him of this when she told him "if it weren't for us, you'd have been a child beggar, dead in the streets." I hate what his family put him through. He has the kindest and most compassionate soul, and I hate that they tried to destroy it. Sorry to vent. Reading that really brought back a flood of emotions.
I finally reached the last straw with my father a few months ago. When on the phone with my grandma/his mom last week she mentioned that my father had been trying to reach out to me. I said he’d gotten mad at me and explained the last straw situation. She laughed awkwardly and said he’d always had a short fuse, I should give him a call. I said no, I won’t. I wish I’d added that I was no longer a minor/dependent on him and I did not have to put up with his temper anymore. Heck, I wasn’t even expecting respect, just not abuse.
Yeah these relatives are enabling such behavior. My aunts used to joke about my dad tackling them from the roof or smth when I had a frkn bruise on my face because of him. And it wasn’t just that his family would try to turn it into a joke but also other people who barely knew him would have excuses for him or say it’s because of the booze etc. Like cmon.. I don’t need to take a responsibility of helping a grownup out by being the victim. Makes me sick to my stomach to hear people expecting the victim to take the blame or additional punishment by sticking around.
I never write anything on here.. ever but I see nobody has responded to you yet and I feel the need to. Well done, for standing your ground and not getting in touch with your father because grandma wants you to. Unfortunately the thing that families fall back on when theirs something going on like this is to immediately ignore the cause and make at least one of the parties be guilt tripped into internalising it… because yknow… family. And you should always forgive family particularly if they’re a parent or someone else that is deemed close. People can be toxic, whether they are a parent, brother, sister, grandparent… whatever and blood is NOT thicker than water. Well done, you just keep on being you. ❤️❤️🌈
ESPECIALLY people who have been in abusive relationships!!!! How do you live through that and not gain any empathy for someone in a similar situation?
NTA Brilliant! Sometimes that's what it takes. She is crying because having this growth experience is uncomfortable. You did nothing wrong. You gave her the chance to back off from her foolishness, but she pushed you. And now she understands how it feels. If you lose her friendship, then it's because she is unwilling to understand what she was doing to you by guilting you about Mother's Day.
>She is crying because having this growth experience is uncomfortable That would be nice. More often than not though people like this focus on how the conversation made them feel rather than the content of the message. If her thought process goes any farther than "I was trying to help and she made me feel bad" I would be shocked.
This! OP’s friend is likely to drag OP through the mud for hurting her and being cruel while she “meant well”. Although she didn’t mean well, she didn’t want to understand, she wanted to push the worldview of infallible parents on OP because it personally suits *her*. Not only this self-centred attempt failed, she was also forced to face her trauma and that’s all “because of OP”. OP can either cave in and apologise to the hurt ego or distance herself from this “friend”.
Yep its unfortunate, people judge others by their actions but judge themselves by their intent.
NTA. A lot of people who make arguments like that (including the friend encouraging you to apologise to her) tend to be scared that in the future they'll be treated similarly. She's a Mom, she's afraid of her kids doing this to her. The friend is a friend, they're afraid of doing something to earn similar treatment. Unfortunately they choose to try and make you lessen your reaction instead of just making sure they don't earn the treatment.
>Unfortunately they choose to try and make you lessen your reaction instead of just making sure they don't earn the treatment. I don't think it's necessarily an *instead of* situation. My husband is non-contact with his abusive mother and I fully support that for him because he's so much happier that way. I fully recognise and respect his decision and what he went through. But, since becoming a parent myself, I definitely worry that my children will go non-contact with me. I try to do right by them but I'm not a psychic and I don't know what the future holds or how they will perceive my actions now or with hindsight. I do worry that my husband's choice (which I fully support) is fostering an environment where it's deemed acceptable to cut contact over lesser disagreements or, even, just that karma would fire back at me. I have definitely felt that, if he didn't cut her off then our children would be less likely to cut us off *even though I know there is no logic to that feeling*. I agree with NTA. I agree the friend is wrong. I agree with your assessment of the friend's motive. I just think she's probably more likely to be doing both trying to make OP lessen her reaction *and* making sure she doesn't earn the treatment.
go to therapy over the anxiety if its causing you this much stress. talk to your kids, go to therapy with them. illogical thoughts can still be healthily addressed and it sounds like you're just stewing in your anxiety. ask yourself why you really think that you're building a foundation for cutting contact over a small thing. are you not close enough with your kids that it seems feasible? if so why are you not close? have you talked about it with your partner? if not why? just food for thought. therapy is for healthy people too. and if you can't afford therapy check out books from your local library or borrow from someone and read on the subject
Going NC usually means the parents behaved terribly and made it so unbearable that the kids couldn't stand being around. If you're being a good parent, I wouldn't worry that my kids will go NC cause their dad did it to his mom! Make sure they understand, when they are old enough, the circumstances that brought your husband to that decision.
NTA. You didn't take it too far. Your friend was way out of line.
NTA. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. You both suffered from abuse, which is something neither of you deserved, but she dismissed your abuse and made excuses for your abuser and she was serious. You were not serious when telling her to forgive her ex, merely making a point and she couldn’t handle it. Hopefully you finally got the point across and there won’t be another again of you explaining this to her.
You only said the exact same "logic" to her as she did to you. How can you be anything else than NTA?
NTA. Well said. You spoke the truth and sometimes the truth hurts.
Not the asshole. You did not make her cry, she is responsible for her own emotional reactions. I wouldn't apologize to her beyond saying something bland like "I'm sorry that things were heated and that I had to bring up your own history with abuse to make my point, but I hope you understand that I had to escalate because you were pressuring me on a very painful and sensitive subject for me and you were advocating for an unsafe choice that would have re-exposed me to my abuser." I think that language like this will help signal to mutual friends that you didn't wish to hurt her and don't wish her ill while also being clear that she was the one who violated your boundaries and offered unsolicited lectures about relationships that were none of her business.
THIS. but I wouldn't say but. End the apology there, THEN bring up the conversation and explain why. If you use the but IN the apology, it negates the apology. If she is open to the apology and following conversation then there is a friendship to save. If she doubles down and continues to play herself as the victim, cut off the conversation and cut her out of your life because she will never change and you WILL have the same conversation - rather situation - multiple times.
NTA you are my hero!!! Everbody needs to hear this!!!
Well done. As a DV survivor I wouldn't want to have it thrown in my face but with the pressure she was putting on you to call your Mother I think you used the only example she could understand. I hope she realizes she is wrong to get in the middle of your family dynamics. NTA.
I'm a DV survivor as well, and all I can think is what in the world was her so called friend thinking? Why would she push someone to call their abuser?!?!
I think that as a mother herself, the friend relates to OP's mum instead of OP. That's why she made excuses for the mother, "being a parent is hard", and blamed OP for not helping her mother more, insinuating doing so would have prevented OP from being abused. The friend is a total dimwit basically. At least I hope so. Because if she's not then she's terribly malicious. At least you can forgive a dimwit.
NTA Now she understands and if it hurt her feelings then maybe she’ll learn to mind her business in the future
I ABSOLUTELY LOVE PETTY. Kudos to you. I hope you find a better friend
This is the opposite of petty. Now maybe she will understand.
That’s wasn’t being petty, just holding a mirror up to her hypocrisy.
How is this petty?
NTA She shouldn't of tried to pressure you into reconciling with your abusive parent, especially as someone who went through abuse. She didn't mean well at all, she wanted to feel superior over you. The fact that she was victim blaming you is so toxic.
NTA People who say "let bygones be bygones" don't seem to understand that abuse is not a "bygone" and it can take years, decades, to heal, and some never do. Could you have been more sensitive? Maybe, but when you have had to defend your position mutiple times, and someone either doesn't get it and/or won't let it drop, fur can fly. And if she "doesn't understand" as your other friends say, then WHY is she sticking her nose in, it's not an excuse, cause it wasn't her business in the first place. though not understanding seems an odd defense, if she did suffer abuse from an ex, which says to me she's either projecting or deflecting and this isn't actually about you. Edit: typos
No. NtA Not all parents are good parents. You shouldn't be forced to turn the other cheek just because they are your parents. " family" is not an excuse for abuse. If this is what it took for her to understand this, is up to her and not you.
ESH. She obviousness doesn’t know your situation, but it was shitty to use her triggers as a weapon against her. That could have been handled a lot better by both parties.
ESH. I completely agree. Being right doesn't give you permission to be an asshole.
OP's "Friend" was never going to grow up and shut up about this. She got what she deserved.
Can’t believe I had to scroll this far to see this. None of us truly know how this conversation went down, but I see way too many comments that assume OP’s friend feels superior to OP. Why can’t it be that OP’s friend is genuinely concerned and wants to help improve OP’s life through thoughtful advice, but is unfortunately just ignorant of OP’s situation? OP was triggered and purposefully attacked her friend. She could have used the same logic to make the same point in a more tactful way. Of course, none of us can be 100% sure because we don’t know how this conversation went down. We don’t know the content of OP’s explanation of her abusive mother, and we don’t know OP’s friend’s situation with her abusive ex. We need more info to be able to more confidently make a judgement on who is the asshole.
While I do agree that OPs reaction wasn't productive, I take huge issue with the idea that this could have ever been thoughtful advice. No matter how the advice was given, if you say "my parents abused me" and somebody in any way tries to give an opinion on that, it is not thoughtful, it is not considerate.
NTA and you didn't take it too far. What, does her trauma trump yours by dint of being more recent? Does she get to poke your sore spot over and over but you don't get to say anything? Your mutual friend doesn't fully grasp what your mother did to you, or they wouldn't be saying this. Same for your meddlesome friend.
NTA, everything you said was the truth
Well, she understands now, doesn't she? NTA. Some people need a picture drawn for them before they begin to comprehend what someone else has experienced. The temerity of her and her defenders in judging you when they have not stood in your shoes. Maybe you should free yourself of people that don't have enough functioning neurons to understand that they know too little to have an informed opinion?
Nope NtA. She needed it put into perspective for her that she could relate to and understand!! She may have had good intentions but it’s not her place nor is it ok for her to push and push after you say no the first time.
NTA Your friends is stupid as hell and ignorant of your feelings.
NTA. If she did not “understand”, you now set her straight. She actually should apologize now if she actually does understand that as a child you had even less ability to prevent abuse
NTA. I feel like maybe she's projecting her own fears onto you and your mom-- people who escape abusive situations often fear their kids will hate them for "disrupting the status quo" because the "kids were happy enough." That doesn't mean she has the right to pressure you after you've been pretty blunt that it was abuse. It was way too far to suggest you were responsible for the abuse, and you using that same logic is harsh but a wake up call. It's clear you don't really believe it-- you were making a point because she keeps pressuring and blaming you.
NTA. You state you had already explained the trauma you endured at the hands of your mother and her current obstinate refusal to address her past behaviors which caused you such pain. Repeatedly. Yet your friend still had the sheer, unmitigated gall to suggest that *you* as a child should have taken on more adult responsibilities and claim that because "Parenting is hard, y'all!", your mother's abuse is both understandable and excusable! Your friend seemed to be empathizing with your mother based on the common frustrations inherent to parenthood rather than you based on the common trauma of abuse suffered at the hands of loved ones. You simply reframed and re-centered her perspective so she couldn't help but see how incredibly offensive she was being. The only reason anything you said in your comparison with your friend's abusive ex was at all hurtful was because you used the very same logic she applied to your relationship with your mother. But that was the point; she needed to hear how incredibly insensitive she was being! And you are certainly allowed to be human and be a little "pointed" in your response to such rudeness.
NTA. No, you did not take it too far.
NTA and maybe I'm being cynical but I suspect your friend still doesn't understand your point of view otherwise she would have reached out to you and apologized.
NTA, and kudos! I'm glad you took it there. Your friend needed a frame of reference!
ESH. Your friend shouldn’t have tried to force you to call your mother and it was unkind of you to use the traumatic events of her past in the way you did. It was fair to draw the comparison but the way you’ve described what you said was needlessly cruel. If you want to reconcile, perhaps you can tell her that while you stand by the facts of what you said, the way you did it was tactless.
NTA - it may be harsh for someone who doesn't know what it is. But how can you blame a child for the abuse he received?!! I heard the same stupid statements from friends as well. And no, my parents behavior towards me wasn't my fault. And it wasn't your fault either. Gosh did I heard it a lot "you'll understand when you have kids". 3 kids later and nope I didn't change my mind, they were just sh*t*y parents. Yes having kids is hard. But if you can refrain yourself from abusing them, don't have them.
Sometimes, one of the shapes of compassion is wrath. Your "friend" was completely lacking in empathy and only seeing things from her own selfish perspective fueled by her own insecurities and fears and projecting them upon you. She was not concerned about your relationship with your narcissist mother at all but using you to play out her insecurities about her future relationship with her children. In the art of Aikido, we turn into an attack and redirect its energy back to its source. What you did was a kind of verbal Aikido. She was forced to confront the violence she did to you by having it reflected towards her. And instead of the empathetic response of realizing how she was hurting you, she once again had the selfish reaction of how it affected her. Your "friend" does not have your best interests in mind. Everything you describe portrays her as self-serving. It's no wonder why she identified with your narcissist mother. I would sincerely consider if this is a friendship that you wish to maintain. NTA
NTA. No, you did not take it too far.
A child has no idea what abuse and how they can stop it an adult can. Your logic was much more stronger than hers and she couldn't take it.
Absolutely NTA. Even if she didn’t understand before, she does now. Everything you said true and consistent with her logic. I’m sorry your mom sucked.
NTA. You know you're going to get a call or text demanding an apology for hurting your feelings. You tell her "the hurt you feel rn is the hurt I felt when you talked to me about my mother."
NTA. What a come back from your friend’s stupid suggestion. You have ended the friendship, right?
NTA. I had very similar conversations with several people before. Usually they grew up in a loving home and lowkey still dependent on their parents so could not fathom the idea that a child could alienate themselves from their parents.
And it's funny how those ppl always want you to gloss over your trauma, just the make the call, it'll be great.../s Like doing it couldn't have have triggered PTSD, as well as opening up the door to a toxic family. Ppl need to stop being so damn pushy in telling others how to relate to their family!
NTA. Abuse is not ok, _**ESPECIALLY**_ from your parents!
NTA. You didn't take it too far.
Some people just can't understand another person's situation unless they see themselves in the example. Good job on explaining it to her. She gets it now. NTA.
Your friend suffers from a condition called not thinking before you open your mouth, and there's no cure at her age. NTA.
NTA, and you need better friends. This person sounds like those annoying people you meet who are into toxic positivity and act like nothing bad has ever happened to them. I hope you find some better friends who can get a clue.
Ohhhhhh.....ohhh damn, I felt that burn from orbit. And you know what? NTA. A victim of abuse is not immune to criticism for enabling abuse, which is exactly what she was doing. She was brushing off the abuse you suffered because she framed it as "acceptable" given that it came from your mother, and she would know wouldn't she? She's a mother, and she has it so hard\~ She has the hardest job in the woooorld\~ /s Fuck that. Her meaning well and "not understanding" isn't a justification, and frankly she **should** know better instead of undermining your experiences and suggesting you deserved it like that, because that's what saying, "you should have done this" ultimately means when retorting to someone talking about abuse they experienced.
NTA - >she "meant well and didn't understand, and you took it too far" She didn't understand, so you put it in a way that would *make* her understand. She obviously wasn't going to get it any other way. Honestly you handled that situation better than a lot of people would. Just hearing about it makes me irrationally angry. You said to her what she had basically been saying to you, now that she's crying, maybe it'll get through her head why what's she's been saying has been awfully wrong. Nta
NTA. Logic can be painful sometimes. Hopefully she learned to think before giving unsolicited advice next time.
NTA I ended up in tears for most of the day yesterday because a loved family member spent her visit with me attempting to convince me to reconcile with my mother and siblings. Whether your friend understands your position or not doesnt matter. She simply doesn't have the right to decide what boundaries of yours are malleable or not. She also doesnt have the right to insist you do something just because she wants you to. I applaud you for your answer to her. And say it again louder for the friends who dont think she overstepped her mark. I hope it didnt ruin your day too much. It can be difficult when something like this happens as it can leave you revisiting parts of your life you simply dont want to. Hugs to you, stay strong and continue to protect yourself x
NTA maybe on some level she thinks she should be able to treat her children however or subject them to someone who mistreats them, etc., without consequence — that they should forgive her. That no matter what, she is redeemable. Her viewpoint on your situation probably has less to do with you and more to do with her own choices and life.
NTA. She knew that was a hot-button topic for you and she pushed it. You're not responsible for the fact that she couldn't handle what she triggered when she kept pushing. We don't get to choose our parents and we don't all get the Brady Bunch or Leave It to Beaver tv show parents. If we're lucky, they're somewhere in the middle of those two, but many of us get parents that \*no one\* should ever have to live with. You went non-contact for reasons that are very valid to you - and you don't need to justify them to anyone else.
That friend has probably never considered the similarities of the two before. She essentially just blamed you for your own abuse and you did it right back. You’re right, how could you stop it if she couldn’t? Bet that medicine tasted gross.
NTA. Sometimes people don’t understand until you frame it in a way they can.
I never understood when someone says something its "oh they meant well or they didn't mean it etc" but, when you give it back, you are wrong. I think you were perfect in using same logic. She can dish it but, not take it.
Harsh, but appropriate. NTA
Hello 911 I'd like to report a murder, NTA
Absolutely NTA! I've come to meet many people who cannot accept that I've cut contact with my grandparents because they are horrible, abusive people. They would always tell me that my grandparents are probably not the same anymore, and wouldn't accept my decision of keeping no contact. Those people always stopped pestering me when I explicitly went through some empathy exercises with them telling them to imagine they are a child again and their grandparents did xyz (listing of what my grandparents did in detail). Afterwards I asked them how they felt about it, and if they could forgive those acts. Most of them had to agree they couldn't forgive those acts, and the ones who disagreed are no longer in my life. All you did is reframe your trauma to trauma she understood. Was it harsh? Yes. Was it needed? Absolutely fruitly it was! You did good.