Hi Lady Crown

It would be interesting to find out about your parents methods of parenting three very different children and whether they had any behavioural issues themselves. If you keep posting with things that have happened with your siblings over the years it gives a fuller picture and helps you see objectively what you are dealing with. You can also compare your experiences with other people on the forum.

Have you looked at the checklist which can help you understand the various aspects of the psychopathy spectrum? It’s quite a daunting task but when you go through the lists of characteristics and you can relate to obvious ones it’s almost comforting to know that it’s a recognised condition.

I think one of the worst things is not knowing or understanding what you are dealing with when people around you present you with such huge problems, it feels out of your control.

I know you said your mother needs your support but is there any way you can avoid your siblings? We all try to solve the problems that are hindering our lives but with true psychopaths it’s not possible and the best course of action is total avoidance and no contact whatsoever. Do you have contact with your siblings because you think they might change or for your mother’s sake to keep the peace?
It’s bizarre when you are in the physical presence of someone you are having no contact with and it goes against all our instincts but it is possible-believe me I’ve done it. It was the only way I kept sane and when the Psychopath realises they have no hold over you they move on to another source of supply.

You mentioned your sister had friends as a child but were these true friends or just people she used? A true Psychopath doesn’t have real friends because they put themselves first and are emotional parasites so only use people for what they can get out of them.

The more you can learn about the aspects of psychopathy the more confident you will feel to be able to make decisions of how to deal with your siblings.

Please ask any questions, however odd they may sound, there must be so many things you want to know. It will help you sort out in your own mind how to deal with your situation.

I find Amazon a great way to get books quickly and cheaply as they sell used copies of most books and the ones I've had don't look used.

Regards
Jan

Hi Lady Crown!

From your description, it sounds like your sister really is a psycho, not sure about your brother, though. He certainly seems dysfunctional, because it is first of all not normal that he cannot marry and that he takes women for "mothers".

This is my opinion, but, of course, I could be wrong.
I was and still am the victim of a Psychopath, I know how it feels.

Yes, getting a good book from a specialist can sure help you. But if those people are really that bad and proove to be Psychopath's, maintaining any relationship with them will drain your soul.

Be Strong, you'll make it!

James

Hi James and Lady Crown

I think I would be investigating Narcissistic Personality Disorder from the description of the brother. I can see the similarity with the person I know with NPD. It's exactly the same scenario. Never married, still lives with mother, in his fifties, controlling, loathes his sibling, etc.

NPD is part of the spectrum of psychopathy.

Jan

Hi, everyone, esp. Jan, and thanks for all your input. I'm have no reason to believe they will change; why should they, when it works for them? but my mother is elderly and could not bear to face what I see, and at her age, there is no point in forcing her. So I am around them as little as possible and always when she is there. Yes, this does keep it going, as they are less overt in her presence, so it does add to me looking like the crazy one, but if I have to choose between being believed and shortening my mother's life, I have to pick my mother's life. It hurts like hell, and I know I am incurring damage to myself, but I can't bring myself to be necessarily cruel to her at her age. No, she never disciplined or stopped them, she let them get away with every scrap of it, but she was a good mother to me and did what she could to make it up to me. Granted, I lost a great deal of sanity over it, because I always came out as the bad one (like I threw the metal things at myself in front of a window, hah!), and I was the one driven from the house, while they got to remain, but I'm trying to get that sanity back and I lack the necessary cruelty to force her to face what she obviously never could.

Mom had a mother who was one step short of a criminal and abandoned the family when Mom was four, and I always wondered if my sister reminds her of her, and that's why she won't call her on anything. Ever seen "the Bad Seed"? It's like Bessie Denker and Rhoda all over again!

The pain of always being blamed and punished and critized for every problem is agonizing. I don't think it will ever leave. It is so hard to relearn that I have the right to look into a mirror more than once, etc., and that being emotionally honest was not the real crime; it was the issues of cruelty that were. Unfortunately I was the one who objected to it, and therefore I was blamed and treated as the troublemaker.

Dad had a family who neglected him and he once told me that my sister was just like his monstrous brother. What is the deal here with these two adults who can't discipline a child who reminds them of their worst family members?

I was the one who came in for all the dislike and abuse and blame. Now I am refusing to be around them as often as possible and when I have to, I make sure I am protected and always have an out.

I hope this makes some sense to you...please write me back, it is such a relief to be able to discuss this...thanks again for all the input and opinions, they are really valuable to me.

Well, I managed to make it thru T'giving but now another brother is coming into town and the red carpet is already out. I'll guess I'll just be a servant for a few weeks. I'm trying to minimize the time around them, but the enforced "Family dinners" are planned, unless I come down with plague or something. I still can't get the Hare book, it's on hold, so I'm winging it for now. I am so unhappy and anxious about everyone being in town and together, it makes me sick. Plus the bubbling resentment doesn't help.

Is there anyway to minimize the comments and abuses so they don't hurt so much and cause me so much damage?

Here's an example which I admit is petty... I've always been made to have short hair and I finally grew it out. Now it is long and blonde and ripply/wavy. I think it's pretty, or at least I hope so. Everytime my Psychopathic sister sees me, she waits a while and then says, "when are you going to cut that?" Never a compliment or anything but an implied slur, and it hurts so much. I try so hard to get ready and feel like I look nice and in one second, it's all destroyed. No matter what I wear or how I felt at home, now I feel ugly and stupid and horrible. If I ask why she cares or something, she just blows it off, but the pain remains. I know this is minor compared to the physical abuse she's dealt me, but it hurts so much. Everything conspires to make me more and more invisible to avoid the abuse, and I can't bear that anymore.

Does anyone else have these people trying to make you feel ugly? TIA.

Hi Lady Crown

I’m pleased to see you are back. Everyone on this forum has something to offer to support others going through the trauma of dealing with a Psychopath but as we all have different experiences so we find others we can relate to who have similar circumstances.

I related to the hurt you feel when someone is critical of you especially when you feel good about yourself or when you have done something for someone only to be told you did it for your own ends. If you feel good about your hair do then it’s great, only someone evil would want to bring you down. Even your best friend wouldn’t tell you if it wasn’t good because they would hate to hurt your feeling. Not so with the Psychopath-that’s exactly what they want to do. Trust me there will be nothing wrong with your hair it’s just a jealous person who wants to make you feel bad so don’t let them. Or at least don’t let them see you are hurt as that feeds their problem.

What I feel when I’m hurt is that awful sensation of being thumped in the stomach and it’s difficult to take a deep breath. Try not to let someone worthless make you feel like that.

Keep talking with the people on this forum and it will give you some comfort to know how many others like yourself are tolerating situations so similar and how they have found ways of dealing with it.

I’ll write more tomorrow-I explained on another post that I’ve just got back from a long boring meeting and it’s getting late. It’s not that I don’t want to spend time talking to you but I think I need to get some sleep so I make sense.

Regards
Jan

Hee girly girl...

( I love that expression!!!!And will keep using it,if thats oke by you....)

I read your story....Took my time because I could mirror your story and it brought me back a long,long time ago....
More and more I realize my parents both probably where ps....
In my twenties I got a friend..My first one...She was pregnant while my son was just a new born. This is indeed the same friend who laughed at me when I said I didn't want to be a woman and showed me my clothes...

The same thing that happens to you now, happend to me then...
I too started to observe people and was shocked...Luckely I had this friend...She had a normal childhood but could emphesize with me. I felt save with her and could asked anything .Even feeling stupid wouldn't stop me from asking.I knew I had to know the normal way to interact with people and I had to find a way to do that...
You say..I didn't know...And you don't !!...You don't know how to behave in a normal way anymore...Don't know how to intruduce yourself when meeting new people..What do you say..what don't you say... Ashamed of being so very ugly... not knowing how to interact and behave in a normal way makes very insecure.
Please find a way to heal... I promise you there is a way.I did it.....And help other people to do the same thing....
Keep going, don't give up!!!

I found I could do it all... it took me a long time.I also found I wasn't ugly at all.And I dicovered that I was a very creative person..Both with my hands and with my mind...

Believe in your own abillities and find everything is possible...Go girl!!!!

Am I very impolite to ask you your age?

Hi Segaya

You are lucky to have such a good friend who will give the best advice for you. I would urge you very strongly to ask her opinion on your son getting guardianship of the children, she will know both you and him intimately. She will also see the consequences and what could happen to those children. If he is a Psychopath he has no capacity for love so why would he want to have the children? It's about control, the insatiable greed Ps have-they want anything they can get. They pick on weak and vulnearble victims, please don't let your grandchildren be his victims.

Your son has made his choices but those poor kids cannot and how would you live with the guilt if he harmed them in any way either physically or mentally? He has hurt animals in the past and who knows what next. I may seem very harsh but evil people practice their skills, they gain experience by committing acts that go undetected and perfect those skills over time. How many times have you read about criminals who evetually get caught then their history of crimes is exposed and they started out doing minor things that can build up to murder.

Why would the children's mother give them up and do you think he may just be threatening to go for guardianship to frighten you? Would it be bad for anyone if he DIDN'T get them? Maybe you should make a list of pros and cons. Can you think of anything good if he has them? He may even take them far away from you and then you wouldn't have any contact with them.

You are such a strong person I wonder why this situation is causing you such a problem, I don't know what other people on this forum think but I definitely think he has to be stopped from getting the children. The courts in the UK might even only allow a parent to have supervised access if their is any doubt as to the chilrens' well-being. The children come first.

I think in your heart you know what you need to do and I'm sure everyone here would give you their full support to do the right thing. You have lost a son - you don't want to loose your grandchildren too.

I wish you all the strength you can muster to do what's right. Please keep your friend close to help you.

Regards
Jan

Hi Lady Crown

I apologise for not writing to you, I have just read your post again and I hope you are seeing things a bit more clearly. There are plenty of good people who deserve your attention, you just don't need any rotten ones in your life.

It's so hard but you need to put up a mental wall around yourself to keep your sister out of your mind. Hopefully you will get to the point when everything she does or says will hit the wall and bounce off. When you get to that stage you just won't care. It's the no contact rule! If you can't physically avoid having contact with her then this is the only way. The more you respond to a Psychopath the more they will try to manipulate you.

I managed to live under the same roof as the FP in my life but he could have been on another planet as I put such a huge mental distance between us. The longer you do it the easier it becomes until it becomes a way of life. They cease to exist as a real person in your life. Now he has gone back to his mother I rarely think about him.

Regards
Jan