Hate Them!!!

I'm Kai, grateful alcoholic.

Neither of my parents ever drank. My mother's father (died 4 yrs before I was born, so don't call him granpa), was an alcoholic. So, technically, I am the adult child, of an adult child, of an alcoholic. When mother got pitiful (often) she would cry about her father being an alcoholic. Even as young as 15, I knew that things weren't right at home. I had only heard mention of AA in movies or TV and had never heard of Al Anon, but I had heard a little about ACoA, even found a book once. She was apalled at the implication that her father's alcoholism had any affect on her. I wasn't trying to judge her, just help. Sure there may have been some selfishness in it, cause if she could get happier, maybe we could all get a little happier. But, I sincerely, only desired her to be a little less miserable.

So, now I'm all growed up. I have 2 1/2 yrs sober, the husband God created and brought to me, a growing, healing relationship with my children. I have found the promises in my life, am happy, joyous, and free in most all respects. Have managed to forgive for things like - domestic abuse, childhood sexual abuse, rape, even a drug rape by a 'close friend'. But not my parents, can't let them go.

My father is a rage-aholic, mother is a misery-aholic, hate-aholic, she's just plain mean (evil). Like I said, neither of them ever drank, but mine was an alcoholic family if there ever was one. My father was a pastor, county deputy, was and still is a highly respected man in his community. The public image is perfectly intact.

Two and a half years sober, I HATE them. Want them to hurt in the way I have hurt. I used to gather strength from that hate, I thrived on it. Today, it feels like the poison that it is. It feels sick.

How do I let go of the past and never tell them how I feel, what they have done that has hurt me? I have the RIGHT. That's just sick.

Kai

[free2bunme]

Hey Kai, thank you so much for sharing. You are helping me as well. I really identify, especially with this, for I have very similar parents:

My father is a rage-aholic, mother is a misery-aholic, hate-aholic, she's just plain mean. Like I said, neither of them ever drank, but mine was an alcoholic family if there ever was one. My father was a pastor, county deputy, was and still is a highly respected man in his community. The public image is perfectly intact.

Two and a half years sober, I HATE them. Want them to hurt in the way I have hurt. I used to gather strength from that hate, I thrived on it. Today, it feels like the poison that it is. It feels sick.

I try my best to forgive my parents for being how they are not for them, but for me. Because you are right, if i choose to hold on to that resentment is poision and it makes me sick sick sick. Today I know that I deserve better than that, I deserve not to let other people take away my freedom.

I also know that I cannot do this on my own, by sheer willpower, because the hurt feelings run so deep into a shattered part of my ego. So that's where asking my HP for help in letting go of the resentment comes in. And praying for them. It has helped me tremendously to do this consistently over a period of time. My resentment, though it flares up every now and again, is no longer constant and does not keep me in bondage the way that I used to. And that is a huge blessing, for ME!

Keeping you in my prayers on this one.

With much love,
Frannie

[peajaye]

My experience at a year or two was the same. Full of resentment of my mother especially. Like yours mine has a "mean streak" and will tell you so. She dominated my father and everything else. She was a control freak and had been sexually abused by her father and never addressed those issues. She also was a rage-aholic.

I needed therapy to help me work through that resentment. I had to learn to re-parent myself because she certainly did not teach me what I needed to know to be a mature, grown up woman. I found a wonderful therapist who loved and nurtured me the way a mother would. Healthy boundaries, of course. I used to say, "What are you if your own mother doesn't love you?"

I did at one point confront my mother, but it was after many years sobriety. Today she and I have the best relationship we can and that is because I've changed and she has softened with age. I came to understand she was operating from the same unparented place I found myself in.

When I had my daughter I found I was repeating the pattern and STOPPED. That is what precipitated my getting sober. Took parenting classes and became the best parent I could be. She has told me now that she is grown that she never felt that she was a "priority" so I've instilled issues in her as well.

Bottom line, there are no perfect parents and some are better than others. Without therapy, I would not enjoy the relationships that are in my life today. Even now, when I go through troubles that are too big for me to handle on my own, I use my therapist...I call her my "life coach" I'll walk in, have an agenda to work on and when I've found she has helped me to find my way out of whatever it is, I'm done until the next time.

I have a mental illness which is bipolar as well as ptsd. I am stable today. I can't stress enough the power in good therapy. I'm not ashamed of needing outside help. Sobriety is great, but it was not enough for me to become emotionally mature.

Thanks for letting me share.

[Doraine]

You can do a lot to get rid of the hate by doing a 4th step. It's there you write all your resentments and take responsibility for your part. We alcoholics don't have the luxury of holding onto resentments which could cause us to drink.

[fibiray]

Hi there, this is just my two bobs worth, I too had to have some outside counselling too in relation to my parents. Dad was the alcoholic and I guess when I came into aa myself all was pretty much forgiven as I came to understand him through my own drinking. But my mother was evil to the bone. They say that the spouse of the alcoholic os often worse than the alcoholic themselves. I too saw behavioural patterns begin to repeat themselves with my own parenting and realised that my mother also came from a dysfunctional home life. I read somewhere that in relation to all the manipulations, games, abuse and so forth not to take it personally because they are only reacting to their own pain and expressing their own suffering as opposed to there being something unlovable or unlikeable about us. I had to cutt my mother out of my life for the sake of my sanity and once I got sober this pose a bigger threat to her as she knew deep down that I would see things for how they really were than through bleary eyes. Often she used my drinking as a means of justifying her own sick behaviour and once I got sober she could not use it anymore. anyhow hope this helps and thanks for sharing.

[Peggyannvt]

I was able to use 'I feel" statements with my monther towards her end. I said that I felt that I could do nothing right at any time in our relationship. I expected a tornado to erupt from her, but instead she said she was sorry I felt that way.

It was amazing, the more Al-anon I had, the more mother complimented me. I realized that there was little in our relationship which I could hear without my ears which were damaged, figuratively, by dysfunction.

I know that Mother did the best she could with the tools she had. She was never held by her mother. She was "spanked" with a braid which had been cut off her own head when she was eight years old.

I see my daughter with values which must have come from bring raised in a dysfunctional home. I see my son, also adopted, effected by the drinking of his birth mom, prior to his birth.

I can pray for the family, and love them.

Now, since her death, I can feel my mother's support and love.

I just can't get over the 'want' to confront them. Not even needing them to apologize, just to be heard. But, I know that they do not hear. They are both "constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselve". I was blessed to have become an alcoholic, to have crash landed in AA, to have discovered that I don't have to live that way anymore. Had it not been for my disease, I could have died in my "ism" and never known peace or happiness or love.

As I said, I've found so much healing, and grown so much, in all the other peices of my life. But buried deep in my heart, is a little girl who wants nothing more than to be loved and accepted by her mom and dad.

They were on my first fourth step, and I was as thorough and honest as I was able at the time. Now that more has been revealed, it is time to do a fourth step (work all the steps really) just on my relationship with my parents. I haven't managed it without getting angry. I will start with the sincere motivation to get MY anger, resentment, and fear written down; take responsibility for my part; and move on. But in no time, my squirel wheel gets going and it takes days to get wound down.

Where is my part in my mother hating and resenting her daughters for not being sons, from the very begining of our lives. (She apologize to my father on her way out of the recovery room for having a second daughter, my sister). Where is my part in my father having SO little value in his children (even the long awaited son) that he can poke them, choke them, push them, shove them down the stairs, throw things at them, make horrible threats to do inhumane things to them. Where is my part?

My second husband was an abusive a**. He was very violent! But I was a cocky, mouthy b*tch. I played a very big part in the demise of our relationship and I don't mind owning that. I have even prayed that God put us in a safe place where I can some day make amends to him.

I've been a text book screw up. Bad wife, bad mother, bad sister, bad employee and, yes even a bad daughter. But where was my part in their abuse? I was a child. They're still very abusive. Like they are consumed with the need to crush me again and again. As I have stopped letting them get to me and 'taken away the buttons', they have started targeting my children, friends, husband to get to me. They won't even just write me off as a lost cause.

Where do I find the healing? How do I learn to love the person who they hate so much?

Kai

[peajaye]

Just one thing your last post triggered for me is this:

I was the 2nd of 3 daughters. We all knew what our "boy" names would have been. 6 weeks after my younger sister was born, dad brought home a foster son he found in a rescue mission. He was one year younger than me. Years later, mother had a son and this adopted brother was the brunt of much of her rage. It was emotionally abusive to have to watch the things that happened to him. Today he is mostly estranged from the family, but does stay in touch.

I learned in therapy that announcing to a girl that you wanted her to be a boy is a form of brutal rejection. It is the beginning of rejecting yourself.

[fibiray]

I can only suggest what bill w would have suggested and that is to be careful when airing your feelings whether that be in person or by writing. I tend to agree with this because nothing that you say or do is going to change them. For change to occur you need to change you. I can so relate to the anger and it is interesting that you view yourself as a bad mother, bad wife, bad daughter and so forth. I too have struggled to compliment myself with positive self talk and this stems directly from being mentally, emotionally and pysically abused. First and for most I feel that a change in your self talk must occur for no other reason than you deserve this. You deserve to think highly of yourself. If your parents couldn't value or appreciate you then that is their loss, by negative self talk you are only empowering what they have taught you to be true. Often we alcohlics and acoa percieve things in the role of victim and by doing this we stay a victim therefore we stay resentful and angry (whether the anger is justified or not). Recovery from our parents is a process and a long one at that so try not to take it all on at once.

God bless

[clean42day]

They are sick people, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually sick. I was taught that i can have all my feelings, all my anger, and all my woundedness. What I cannot do....is confront others with all the ways I still choose to hang on to those feelings. I don't get to do harm to others today even if they do derseve it in my mind. I don't get to hurt them with my truth like they hurt me with thier dysfunction and abuse.

Playing the tape all the way through.....you would probably not even get the result you want. it is not thier job to be aware....it is your responsibility to heal in spite of thier lack of awareness.

we are accountable and responsible for re-parenting ourselves in the ways we were not parented. Through God's love....

you can get closure without confrontation.

I never got the chance to confront the man who sexually abused me at the age of 5 and changed my life forever. But once I came to realize how damaging and wounding that experience was....it became my responsibility to heal from the experience and quite repeating the abuse myself. I also identified all the ways in which that experience taught me to abuse and dishonor myself. so my healing was as much from him...as it was from me and my false self.

I wrote, I journaled, a talked, i did therapy....for years until I was able to finally place accountability for the origional event where it belonged....take my power back....and stop replaying and reapeating the abuse in my own life. I wrote him letters that I never sent. his acknowledement was no longer important to me.....mine was. When i came full circle....there was nothing left to do...but to forgive him and give his actions, his behavior, and his sickness back to God.

The same thing with a truck driver who tortured me for 6 hours and tried to kill me. They never caught him. I had all my feelings, my thoughts of revenge, my desires to make him accountable, my victimhood, and desires for him to be brought to justice. But at a certain point all those feelings and thoughts were no longer serving me. They were harming me long after the event happened. again....I was responsible and accountable for all the ways I continued to hang on to the power he had over me for 6 hours. He no longer was in my life....but I allowed his power to control and distort my life and perceptions for 8 years.
when I finally made the decsion to confront his power in my life, to heal all the fears and traumas....his power began to diminish. I also wrote him letters of anger, letters of the impact he left behind in me, letters of woundedness, and finally took responsibility to let go and move forward and give him, his actions, his behavior, and his sickness back to Gods perfect justice. It was no longer my business how he paid for his actions. what was my business...was my own self love, my own healing, and my own development to grow past and beyond that issue.

When we make our serenity dependent on others acknowledgement, thier ability to be accountable or responsible?....we give our serentiy away to others and put an obsticle in our path that is dependent on others moving it - quite honestly that may never happen. I choose not to take the risk that it never would. I make my serenity dependent on only one thing....me and my relationship with God. He has never let me down yet.

There is only one thing worse than the origional abuse....and that is the ways we continue to hang on to it, let it shape our lives, keep replaying it and repeating in our heads, and continue to establish patterns of self - abuse and self-defeat in the ways were were abused.

Where is my part in my mother hating and resenting her daughters for not being sons, from the very begining of our lives. (She apologize to my father on her way out of the recovery room for having a second daughter, my sister). Where is my part in my father having SO little value in his children (even the long awaited son) that he can poke them, choke them, push them, shove them down the stairs, throw things at them, make horrible threats to do inhumane things to them. Where is my part?

your part is no longer back there in the past.....it is here in today, in the ways you continue to think of yourself, the ways you contine to treat yourself, talk to yourself, the ways you continue to abuse yourself. your power and responsibility resides in the here and now - Today....in the awareness to re-parent that little girl WITHIN YOU TODAY.

I just can't get over the 'want' to confront them.

Can't is a very powerful word Kai....tell yourself the truth.
Can't is just another word for: I am not willing to at this time, or I haven't learned how yet. but Can't is definetly a choice. as long as you keep telling yourself you can't...you won't. as many times as this issue pops up....you have to keep working at addressing it. Writting about it...not necessarily in a fourth step either. There is no hard fast rule that says we have to do formal steps on this stuff....we purge the poison from the past, emotionally, in tears, on paper, in talking and sharing with others, as many times and as much as we need to in order to work through it and finally become willing to let it go for good. sometimes it takes work on a daily basis.

I asked God daily to remove the impact of the traumas from my life....but he cannot do it without my consent or my willingness to work through it.

I didn't wait for it to pop up and sabatage me again....I wrote about it when I felt perfectly fine and resonable too. I just keep at it....until I had spent all the energy and power out of it.

But buried deep in my heart, is a little girl who wants nothing more than to be loved and accepted by her mom and dad.

Did you know that you have a spiritual parent that represents the love and acceptance that is sooooo much more profound than that of any human being. God wants to give you the love and acceptance that you crave....but your little girl insists on getting it from the one place she cannot. You Kai; must transfer her dependencies from where she is looking onto you and your relationship with God. You CAN teach her a new way to be in the world. You CAN give her the love and acceptance she seeks until she really feels it and finally trusts YOU to give it to her....to give her what she needs. she will eventually learn to look no father than you and your relationship with her. Love her....like God loves you. Comfort her when she is afraid, hold her when she cries, encourage her when she has doubts, .... open up a dialogue with your little girl...and talk to her. let her tell you how she feels...accept and acknowledge her feelings....validate them. and then love her through it....no matter what "it" is. do not emotionally abandone her, abuse her, shame her, and judge her for her dependencies and needs like your parents did to you. Do the opposite of what they did to you in your actions with your own little girl inside of you. show her that your love for her is not conditional....that you are willing to accept her...right where she is at....she cannot do better until she learns better and you ARE her teacher. it is no longer your parents responsibility to teach her....it is yours. show her that she is worth your effort.

This is the work that everyone and anyone who has a wounded child within them has to do if they want the results of freedom that you seek. I myself have experienced the self sabatage of my little girl inside me too. just when I think I have finally made it over a hump so to speak....she gets my attention in negative ways that I have somehow left her on the other side. I have to be very careful that I include her in my self-development and self improvement today....or she will stay at the stage of her woundedness and pull me back. if nothing else but to just remind me that she has the power to do so. (wink)

I hope this has helped you....in the meantime keep coming here to talk about it....we all do. sometimes this work takes years....a lifetime....but it is worth it becuase you are worth it.

light and love


Gail