Cutting contact is really hard.

My sister is contacting me. I was looking around at checklists of behaviors found in abusive relationships. The bolded ones are the ones that have been pretty consistent from my mother and/or sister.

General Characteristics of Emotionally Abusive Mothers

Making the child/teen feel responsible for the mother’s feelings.

Threatening them in general.

Threatening them specifically with rejection or abandonment.

Threatening them with vague, unstated consequences.

Using force upon them.

Invalidating their feelings.

Laying undeserved guilt on them.

Placing undeserved blame on them.

Dominating the conversations.

Refusing to apologize.

Always needing to have the last word.

Judging or rejecting their friends.

Sending them to their rooms for crying.

Locking them out of the house.

Using punishments and rewards to manipulate and control them.

Invading their privacy.

Under-estimating them.

Failing to show trust in them.

Labeling them.

Criticizing them.

Giving them the silent treatment.

Failing to give them real explanations.

Giving non-explanations such as “because it is wrong” or “because it is inappropriate” or “because it is a sin”

Slapping

9 thoughts on “Cutting contact is really hard.

  1. labelleizzy

    yup. that’s quite a list.

    I didn’t remember you’d said you were cutting contact with your sister.

    do you have any conditions under which you’d consider re-enrolling her in your filters?

    Reply
  2. jenny_sellinger

    Both of them? All those things?

    Y’know what I conclude from that list? You never brought your friends home or talked about them at home and you had your own key.

    Reply
    1. Krissy Gibbs Post author

      To be fair, my mom doesn’t dominate conversations much. But my sister does Constantly.

      By the time I was old enough to be kicked out I was paying rent. I don’t think my mom had the cajones to try and throw me out under those circumstances.

      For some reason they just never commented much on my friends. I think because I mostly didn’t interact with my friends in front of them.

      Reply

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