M
mmacari
Guest
So, I’m in need of some advice; however, this is a pretty long story.
I was sexually abused by my older brother from the ages of 5 to 13. Now, I am 25, married and my and I are self-sufficient and have been for our entire marriage. In January 2013, I started seeing a therapist to resolve the trauma that I had suffered as a child, and to work through my explosive anger problems. I started to make a lot of progress and was digging deeply into my past to resolve the issues, which did not sit well with my mother and my brother. I broke off all contact with my brother in November 2011, and rarely interacted within him except when we were at family functions.
After I told my mother about the abuse, she said that (1) it was the Devil trying to destroy our family and (2) that I could under no circumstances tell my Dad or anyone else about it. This also happened to be while my mother was having an affair with a woman, and preparing to leave my father and file for divorce. My mother has been in counseling several times for pathological lying, and a few other issues that I don’t know the complete story on.
In March 2013, I broke off contact with my mother, because she was hurting my relationship with my wife, and was impeding my progress in therapy. My marriage had been in tatters through much of the three years we have been married due to my inability to handle my emotions in a healthy manner. My wife and I were getting through our own issues, and I was beginning to work through mine, so our marriage quickly improving in early 2013. After breaking off contact with my mother, my progress in therapy accelerated, my marriage improved and is now the best it has ever been.
In May, my wife became pregnant with our first child. At some point, my mother discovered we were expecting a child, and began telling her siblings she was ‘heartbroken and distraught’ over not having being in my life, and several times her sister asked me why I was so adamantly opposed to having my mother in my life. I was always very vague with my aunt, and when into details rarely, because I didn’t feel that it was her business.
About a week ago, I received an email from my mother saying that she wanted to reconnect. In the email, she proposed a plan (which made it sound like she had been going through therapy and resolving her issues for a while), and that she would bear the entire cost of the re-connection process. I was optimistic from the email that my mother had worked through and resolved her issues, and was ready to reconcile, which looking back on the information above makes me think that the notion was rather naive. I sent her an email back and gave her the contact information for my therapist stating that I was open to the process, and would like our counselors to touch basis to ensure they had an open line of communication. I also made it clear that I wanted to delay any meetings until April, because my baby is due on January 25th.
Late this past week, my mother calls my therapist leaving her a voice-mail asking my therapist to call her back to discuss billing. My therapist calls my mother back, and throughout the conversation my mother changes her statement on what percentage of the cost she will bear several times, ultimately getting frustrated and saying that, “[My son] wants this as much as I do, so he should have to bear half the cost.” My therapist politely (I am told by her) ended the conversation at that point. On Friday evening, my therapist and her counselor had a prolonged phone conversation, where it was made clear that (1) my mother lied about the reason why I had broken off contact, (2) lied about the significance of the abuse, even going so far as to say that it was my word against my brother’s word and that it was innocent curiosity and (3) lead her counselor to believe that the issues were minor and wouldn’t take but a few (less than 4) sessions to resolve.
Now, after learning all of this from my therapist over the weekend, I have decided to cut all ties with my mother, and shut her out of my life completely without the chance of her being let back in easily. I was willing to believe that she had changed, and that she was willing to work through her own issues to allow us to have a healthy relationship. However, her latest round of lies and manipulations proved that she is unwilling to change.
I know the commandment to honor thy father and mother, but how do you honor someone and have a relationship with them when they do this? Does honoring her require that I have a relationship with her, and thus to what extent? Or can you honor someone by allowing them to sail off on a path of self-destruction and pray for them? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
I was sexually abused by my older brother from the ages of 5 to 13. Now, I am 25, married and my and I are self-sufficient and have been for our entire marriage. In January 2013, I started seeing a therapist to resolve the trauma that I had suffered as a child, and to work through my explosive anger problems. I started to make a lot of progress and was digging deeply into my past to resolve the issues, which did not sit well with my mother and my brother. I broke off all contact with my brother in November 2011, and rarely interacted within him except when we were at family functions.
After I told my mother about the abuse, she said that (1) it was the Devil trying to destroy our family and (2) that I could under no circumstances tell my Dad or anyone else about it. This also happened to be while my mother was having an affair with a woman, and preparing to leave my father and file for divorce. My mother has been in counseling several times for pathological lying, and a few other issues that I don’t know the complete story on.
In March 2013, I broke off contact with my mother, because she was hurting my relationship with my wife, and was impeding my progress in therapy. My marriage had been in tatters through much of the three years we have been married due to my inability to handle my emotions in a healthy manner. My wife and I were getting through our own issues, and I was beginning to work through mine, so our marriage quickly improving in early 2013. After breaking off contact with my mother, my progress in therapy accelerated, my marriage improved and is now the best it has ever been.
In May, my wife became pregnant with our first child. At some point, my mother discovered we were expecting a child, and began telling her siblings she was ‘heartbroken and distraught’ over not having being in my life, and several times her sister asked me why I was so adamantly opposed to having my mother in my life. I was always very vague with my aunt, and when into details rarely, because I didn’t feel that it was her business.
About a week ago, I received an email from my mother saying that she wanted to reconnect. In the email, she proposed a plan (which made it sound like she had been going through therapy and resolving her issues for a while), and that she would bear the entire cost of the re-connection process. I was optimistic from the email that my mother had worked through and resolved her issues, and was ready to reconcile, which looking back on the information above makes me think that the notion was rather naive. I sent her an email back and gave her the contact information for my therapist stating that I was open to the process, and would like our counselors to touch basis to ensure they had an open line of communication. I also made it clear that I wanted to delay any meetings until April, because my baby is due on January 25th.
Late this past week, my mother calls my therapist leaving her a voice-mail asking my therapist to call her back to discuss billing. My therapist calls my mother back, and throughout the conversation my mother changes her statement on what percentage of the cost she will bear several times, ultimately getting frustrated and saying that, “[My son] wants this as much as I do, so he should have to bear half the cost.” My therapist politely (I am told by her) ended the conversation at that point. On Friday evening, my therapist and her counselor had a prolonged phone conversation, where it was made clear that (1) my mother lied about the reason why I had broken off contact, (2) lied about the significance of the abuse, even going so far as to say that it was my word against my brother’s word and that it was innocent curiosity and (3) lead her counselor to believe that the issues were minor and wouldn’t take but a few (less than 4) sessions to resolve.
Now, after learning all of this from my therapist over the weekend, I have decided to cut all ties with my mother, and shut her out of my life completely without the chance of her being let back in easily. I was willing to believe that she had changed, and that she was willing to work through her own issues to allow us to have a healthy relationship. However, her latest round of lies and manipulations proved that she is unwilling to change.
I know the commandment to honor thy father and mother, but how do you honor someone and have a relationship with them when they do this? Does honoring her require that I have a relationship with her, and thus to what extent? Or can you honor someone by allowing them to sail off on a path of self-destruction and pray for them? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
