Recent blog world events have been quite nasty – and left some of us reeling with shock. I know I find it hard to get my head around somebody going out of their way to hurt a kind, sweet lady who has done nothing but been kind to everyone she meets.
But then, I remember my own older sister. The most evil, vile, and terrifying person I have ever met, and probably ever will meet.
There is a blogger in the ED blogging community I am part of, who reminds me of my older sister all the time. The nastiness, the manipulation, the utter lack of compassion or empathy or kindness (despite declaring herself a model of each) and her complete absence of conscience.
My older sister is a sociopath, through and through. From the outside, she’s quite strikingly handsome, very tall, curvy, and many men seem to think she is God’s gift to men – she attracts them like bees to honey. (I hesitate to call her beautiful, because to me, she is ‘good looking’ but there is only darkness in her heart – nothing truly beautiful there.) She is very aware of her seductive power and does not hesitate to use it – never has.
Behind the mask, she is cruel, cold, callous. She does not blink an eyelid at killing animals – our pets growing up, or whatever animals she ‘sacrifices’ now to make little ‘presents’ like the one she left on my doorstep during the night before 23rd December 2006. She doesn’t have friends – only acquaintances. People are tolerated if they are useful, then discarded.
With the nastiness happening in the blog world at the moment, many find it difficult to believe that someone could do this kind of thing. Remembering what my sister did to me in my teens, and the shock and betrayal I experienced about that – I can say, YES, absolutely people who are sociopathic in nature definitely do this sort of thing with absolutely no hesitation or regrets.
This is my story.
I was attending the dance school, being bullied, being abused at home – so very depressed, and completely worn out from the 12- hour days 6 days a week, four of which were travel – then home to the violence and crap and hard work there. My depression began to be noticeable again – as was my inability to eat enough to keep my weight up, and my difficulty in focussing on my studies.
I don’t know what was happening – a lot of the lead up to realising what my sister was doing to me is conjecture – pieced together from what I know now. But my mother started leaving newspaper articles for me to find with passages about drug use and the dangers highlighted. This made me furious – and I would tell her definitely that I had never used drugs of any kind, and had no desire ever to do so. I didn’t know why she would suddenly be thinking that – I did start to feel that it was probably due to my depression meaning I wasn’t the same person I used to be, and her nervousness about letting me, so controlled by her, out of the house for so much of the time.
My sister then started bringing things home to Mum. Not any old things, things that belonged to Mum already. She had her first Job in the Valley as a MahJong reader (similar to Tarot) a few years before this, and now was studying at a college there to become a Naturopath. (She was always into black magic and stuff like that, and my opinion on the Naturopathy is that it’s a socially acceptable way for her to indulge her fascination in potions and stuff… today she is a rather well known Naturopath.)
According to my sister, she had been looking around in all the pawn shops in the Valley and she had seen my mother’s things on display there. (I don’t even know, to this day, what these ‘things’ were – the best I could get out of them were that they were ‘old books, trophies, and valuable items.’ Oh, and throw in some of my sister’s cheap and tacky costume jewellery too.
So my sister’s tale had her ‘buying back’ these ‘things’, and bringing them home to return them to Mum.
Can you spot the problem here? I was 15, 16 years old when this happened. And the only form of ID I had ever held in my grubby little hand was my library card/school card. Later – long after I had left that hellhole – I learnt that to pawn goods, you must supply 100 points of ID – that is the LAW – AND you must be over 18 years of age – also the LAW. The goods that you pawn are NOT displayed out in the store, either, but kept in a back room, and if you want to redeem them, you must present a ticket.
Not only that, but I asked what happened to the goods that are sold. The shops all replied that they do not put them out in the store at all – instead they are taken back to a more central part of the chain and auctioned or redistributed.
Most of these stores also do not buy cheap costume jewellery or even loan on it, nor do they buy or sell books or most trophies.
My sister however, WAS over 18. She knew exactly where out of all the shops in an area that has many of them to find my mother’s ‘things’ – and they would not have been on display for her to look for. She also would have possessed tickets to reclaim those ‘things’ to bring them home – if those ‘things’ had ever even been out of the house in the first place.
Nevertheless, my Mum ate my sister’s story right up. Which wasn’t surprising – my sister had always been ‘God’ in my Mum’s eyes. My sister even had more power over the family as a disciplinarian than our own Mum did.
I was utterly hurt, betrayed and horrified, and I angrily protested my innocence. My sister’s story had been that I must have been stealing these items – she told Mum that it was ME! – and that because my school had me going close to the Valley (but at that stage, I hadn’t been there and was totally unfamiliar with the place) it could only have been me. Furthermore, she informed my Mum that I must have needed the money for drugs. My own mood changes and depression, and the fact that adolescents and drug use were big media stories at the time because of Anna Wood’s death from Ecstasy – were a perfect setting for her lies.
(Bear in mind that I was a sick-making goody-goody two shoes! Always obedient, I wouldn’t dare to even think of trying drugs. On being offered a cigarette at school, I shrugged, and turned it down. My friends (before I went to the ballet school) sometimes smoked – it had no influence on me. I didn’t drink either. Even when I was helping out at an evening do for the state ballet company (several students were invited to act as servers that night) the other students got plastered nicking wine and throwing it back in the dressing rooms. I didn’t have a drop. I was mildly interested, but terrified of my mother smelling it on my breath, or even smelling the smoke from other’s cigarettes on me – that was enough to make her go OFF. My mother was highly controlling – even climbing (because the gates were always padlocked and heavily chained) over the fence of our yard at home, to retrieve something that was outside it, like the paper, without permission – was absolutely on pain of death VERBOTEN and merited harsh punishment. And that punishment, let’s say, nothing was worth it. Nothing. )
So the story about me doing drugs, and stealing things to fund those drugs – was not only so unlikely that if this hadn’t been a serious thing, it would have been funny – but highly offensive to me that my mother even believed it and refused to see the reality.
Not only that – she thought that I was addicted to Ecstasy. (again, because of Anna Wood’s death being in the news) Back then, from what I’d read in those articles she left for me, I had learnt that ecstasy wasn’t (at that time known as) a drug people got addicted to in that ‘regular’ way, so much that it was a party drug. Besides, I never went to parties. Who would have invited me? And Mum would never have let me go if I was.
(In fact, she DID let me go to a party near the end of our second year at the dance school. I think she allowed me, because she knew that I did not want to go. I begged her NOT to go. The other girl had invited the rest of the class (our school was made up of 2 classes of less than 20 people in each, mostly girls) to her birthday party – except for me, the hated, ‘dirty’ girl who wore yucky clothes, broken shoes etc. Her mother insisted that she not leave anyone out and forced her to invite me. My own mother found the invite (I didn’t even consider going) and rang to make sure it would be appropriately chaperoned (In my mother’s view – NO alcohol or smoking and never out of the sight of adults, in the other mother’s view, champagne at dinner, blind eye to friends smoking, dancing, and teenage fun LOL), and her call earned me even more disgust from the other girls. Knowing (probably hearing from the other mother) that I actually wasn’t wanted at the party, she forced me to go. Without anything decent to wear. Without money to buy a present and no way of getting any. And it was a sleepover. Not only that, but I found my shoes soaking with cat pee that day and nothing else to wear… it was a nightmare.)
Fast forward to a year after I walked out of that hell of a ‘not-home’. The hostel I’d found to live in was shut over the Christmas period, and I had searched and searched for accomodation elsewhere that I could afford, finding none. I faced being on the streets again – unless I asked if I could stay with my family at home over the Christmas holidays. They hadn’t been that bad, surely? A year had taken the harshness from the memories and left me doubting myself. I was in shock that a lot of what happened at that place even happened – the violence, the incest and abuse, the other stuff. It was all so completely CRAZY. Surely it wasn’t really that awful? Or they had changed?
BIG mistake. The moment I entered that place, with all my belongings (again, enough to take home myself on public transport) my mother declared that I was now her employee – we had agreed that I would pay board (comparable to the amount I’d been charged at the hostel – which was actually very expensive and included all meals, cleaners, linen etc), and I bought most of my own food. But in order to ‘earn my keep’ I would also have to do ALL the housework AND make the house presentable to someone who might be able to come in and fix up the water problems (my mother was still letting the water run endlessly for my father to be slugged with penalty rates, but the situation for hot water was still the same as when I’d lived there before – none, we boiled water for baths and washing up, and we brought water in from outside because the taps were either stuck on, or stuck off.)
Making this house presentable was actually an impossible task. My mother is a hoarder extroadinaire – and the house was never finished. It’s an illegal dwelling, because my mother bullied my father into straying far from the approved plans because she wanted more than they were allowed to build. They’d split long before it was finished. Inside, the walls were sheets of gyprock, or were exposed beams. Plants often grew inside the walls due to lack of sealing. Our ceilings were exposed beams, wires and pipes too. Vermin were abundant – millions of cockroaches, rats, who often were to be found dead and maggoty in an unused drawer or in the walls, even snakes, and in summer, so many flies. I still gag remembering the fly papers hanging from the ceiling, covered in so many flies that you couldn’t find room for more.
The floors were rough concrete – not smooth, rough. This meant that when you tried to sweep or mop, the dirt would be trapped and mops were simply ripped to bits. The fact that it was always a muddy swamp outside meant that cleaning it was pretty futile anyway, it just got tracked straight in, and various hoses and pipes snaked in and out of doors and windows for our plumbing. When you mopped it (as you HAD to do) you ended up with a mud slick indoors, too. And then factor in 20-30 ducks and geese, at least 2 dogs, up to 4 cats, assorted birds, guinea pigs, etc, and the rest of the family being utterly slobbish and almost going out of their way to make things dirtier. It was a totally impossible task.
I actually stood my ground against Mum’s demands, insisting that I be able to go to the gym nearby every day, and look for work – and we had a huge fight about it – but it was a step forward for me to stand my ground against them. In the end, I still paid, AND worked, and took a few hours in the morning to go to the gym and do my stuff – but the rest of the time I was her ‘employee’.
That holiday was hell. I literally crossed off the days until the hostel reopened. My brother was STILL violent, and now my bed was in his part of our shared bedspace – as a bunk bed as it was originally, and because it was sagging, it meant I slept with this huge monstrous man-child’s bed about a centimetre from my face and always threatening to to collapse on me. He would throw things under at me, and even cut through his mattress to push a pipe through to pour water (hopefully only water..) on me. He was still sexually inappropriate and was constantly flashing me. His temper tantrums were as scary as they used to be resulting in my finally fleeing this house in the first place.
Finally, the holidays came to an end, and I packed up my bags ready to catch the bus, train and bus back to the hostel. I was set to go, when I was stopped by Mum and my older sister. They refused to let me go without going through all my belongings searching for stuff that I might have stolen. This was the first I had heard of it the entire time I had been there – but apparently I had been stealing LOTS of money from Mum, from my older sister too, jewellery (she still wore tacky costume stuff which I turned my nose up at anyway) and various ‘things’ which again, I never actually knew of. And it was my sister, who again had done this. I was told that they had gone into my brother’s room because my sister wanted to point out the curtains to Mum (as if they didn’t know that they were hanging in ribbons, shredded by my brother in his rages, plainly visible from the door and from outside and very old news). Apparently when they had been in there, my sister had seen stuff in the bunk bed I slept in – pushed down the side of it. I think she must have X-ray vision, but also, ESP. In reality, she’d put whatever ‘things’ she had taken down there and then taken my mother in to find them in front of her, thereby concreting ‘evidence’ that I had stolen them.
I begged Mum to believe that I had not done it – but she was completely in my sister’s thrall. The betrayal was so acute that it truly did hurt like someone stabbing me – I completely understand where the saying ‘stabbed in the back’ comes from. I even began to search my own mind, my own memories, for any gaps. Wondered if I had some split personality where a part of me I wasn’t aware of was doing all these horrible things. There were absolutely no gaps in my memories – indeed my time there had been packed full of hard endless work in the house. But it’s a horrible feeling to be doubting your own self.
As I’d missed the bus, my mother actually drove me to the hostel (actually, because of my mother’s stinginess with things like that for me). On the way, she told me that she had a will, and that I should be very careful how I behaved if I wanted to benefit from that will.
I said “I don’t want anything of yours. I don’t care about your will. All I want from you, is for you to actually love me. And you don’t, you don’t love me enough to see when you are being taken for a fool by [sister] to make you believe I’ve done those things.”
Now, that house stands abandoned, and I am completely cut off from those people. For more than a decade, I tried and tried and tried to forge good relations with all of them, despite everything that had happened. It was rebuffed at every turn, with only more upset and hurt caused towards myself. My mother became more and more toxic towards me (towards everyone - these days she’s pretty much a loner, living amongst her junk, living out her fantasies in her marshmallow world, having alienated everyone who ever cared for her.) My brother seemed to have turned a corner, but too soon his true colours showed. My older sister never stopped trying to hurt me at every opportunity.
And so the decision to ‘vanish’ from their lives was made, action taken, and here I am. I think about it all the time – have pangs about having ‘abandoned’ my family – but the truth is that they abandoned me a long time ago – abandoned me as a sister and daughter and only kept me around as a punching bag and scapegoat.
Irony does exist. I do know my sister does still communicate with my mother. I have a feeling she’s waiting to relieve her of all her worldly belongings as soon as she gets a chance – the way I watched my mother relieve older relatives, and older neighbours, of theirs. The vulture becoming the prey picked over by a new vulture. Life has it’s natural cycles that do tend to play out like this.
This is why I fully believe that people CAN be utterly cruel and remorseless towards others, to even act in ways that can potentially incriminate themselves because they know that they have the power to turn it around to make themselves look as white as snow, and they know that they are more powerful than anyone around them and if people suspect them, they will never say it out of pure fear.
And it’s why I have been watching this whole blogging community drama over the past few months with interest – to have ‘met’ another person so much like my evil older sister has been quite an eye-opener for me. On one hand, I’m watching with the knowledge from my experiences, on the other hand, I’m learning more about creatures like these through observation now. God forbid I ever run into yet another person this horrid – but if I do, I will have a full weaponry of knowledge with which to protect myself.
Dear Fiona,
you don’t know me for I have never commented on your blog before (even though I still read it – all of it).
I just want to finally tell you, that you never cease to move me with your unique story. There are parts of this story that I can identify with (albeit small and rather insignificant in comparison) and that occasionally move me to tears.
I admire your strength, your persistence and your ability to do what’s best for yourself even if it hurts.
“Abandoning” (after all you wrote about on this blog concerning your past, it can hardly be called that) your family must have been really hard.
I strive to get myself into a mindset that will allow me to do something similar one day – hopefully without being hunted by – undeserved – guilt for the rest of my existence (don’t think this is possible though).
Anyway (I’m rambling, sorry!): I hope you won’t let yourself be affected by what’s going on in this (sometimes cruel, I did notice that) blogging world, for I really enjoy reading your blog and hope for many kind and inspiring entries to come!
All the best, Favo
Dear Favo, it’s been really nice to see your comment here – thank you for reading. I don’t mind that people read and not comment – it is good that my own experiences might be helping others out there in any way – even to not feel so alone. I’m so sorry you are going through the same sort of thing – it really is a horrible experience with no easy answers. These are your ‘people’ and we all need family – they can be all we have, we face being truly alone without them. I’m lucky that I’ve met some really lovely people who have enabled me to trust in them and to reach out to others – I think the most important thing is to build up a support network of friends apart from your family so that when the time comes to break off with the family, you fall into the arms of those people instead. It IS hard. But I truly believe you too will get to that point someday – and it will be a huge freedom as much as we do have those pangs about leaving them behind. Unfortunately for those of us with these families, NO CONTACT ever again – is often the only way we ever get a chance to heal and have some semblance of peace in our lives. And even then we have a lot of work to do on healing our own fractured selves afterwards. But at least there is the peacefulness in which to do that healing and not be shattered again and again.
xx
It takes time to get there – just be patient and kind with yourself, okay?
I’m heartbroken for Greta, and I hope she doesn’t let this stop her blogging either – but I know she would want me to continue too, and I will.
Thank you again for your comment, for your readership – nice to meet you, Favo
Thank you for your nice words. A stable network of friends and people who care is indeed essential. And I am so blessed to have found exactly that. It’s not a huge network, but it consists of people who will stand by my side no matter what.
And I still do have some family left for it’s really only one person I need to break away from.
I, too hate what happened to Greta since her blog has long been in that ever-growing list of blogs I really enjoy reading. She’s always so honest and brave in her writing, which makes it even more horrible to think that someone made use of exactly that: The vulnerability she brought upon herself by reaching out and sharing her story with others…
Hi again Favo,
I’m so happy that you do have some really good friends who are there for you no matter what. I think that’s wonderful – because it was friends like that that helped me to begin to heal, too. Experiencing what it’s like to have people love you unconditionally – for being YOU – instead of having to try and change yourself to suit your family – it’s very healing indeed.
I think it could be harder to try and break away from just one person – because you don’t want to break away from the good people, but because you are all family, being in contact with them inevitably means contact with the not so good person.. so that’s a tricky one. Hopefully they will support you in not wanting to speak to or be spoken of to that person?
Greta is a gentle and kind person, who is also talented and a very good writer – people relate to her. She also is honest and frank. So she’s a target for people who are jealous because they can never be like her or have those qualities themselves, I guess. I think it’s sad that the gentle good people in life always seem to end up targets for the not good people. I hope that things only get better and that we all learn ways to protect ourselves from the nastier people in this world xxx
Fiona you didn’t deserve any of the abuse you suffered, and i’m glad you’ve cut yourself off from the people who hurt you. It’s difficult to imagine people who don’t have the capacity to feel emotion, very strange. But unfortunately it’s possible and i’m glad that you’re prepared for meeting people like this.
It makes it easier for me not to care when you know that person doesn’t care. I’m talking about bloggers, but it must be incredibly difficult to feel the same way about family. Thank you for writing this, hopefully people will understand a bit better now
xx
Dear Hayley, it’s so true it does make it a bit easier not to care about these nasty people because they can’t feel those emotions – to realise they aren’t hurting about people loathing them. Because I did have a lot of pangs when I first distanced myself from this person because of her nastiness – that I was betraying a friend, that I should have stuck it out and tried to ‘help’ her, even after I’d tried and tried and tried to be there for her and only gotten crap in return, as well as seen her escalating attacks on our mutual friends!
I guess knowledge is power. I wish that there were only good people in the world though – wouldn’t that be lovely?
*hugs* lots of love to you my friend xoxox
I just read this, and I don’t have a great deal to say, I’m more struck with speechlessness than anything, for I feel whatever I say is going to be quite ineffectual. But I will say that even though I know that your family and others out there are real-true-to-life Monsters, every time I read your blog about this stuff, I am engulfed with renewed horror at what they are capable of and what you have survived…and my admiration for your strength deepens.
I love you very very much darling.
XOXOXOXOO
Ange.
Dear Ange, I’m sorry I struck you silent! I’m really grateful that you read. And that you understand, and for all the support you have given me – constant and unfailing support and love. Thank you.
I’m really sorry that I horrify you with what I write – sad that people do have to learn that evil does exist. And I wish that it didn’t. I do hope that because you are reading about people like this, you yourself will be more aware of why some people are this way and how to recognise them because you have yourself been hurt enough in life and I never want anything like that to happen to you again either – knowledge is power.
We are both survivors of our own pasts.. and we must remember that every time things get hard in our right nows – that we have already survived the worst of that, and if we can get through that, we can get through now.
Love you dearly too – so blessed to have you in my life, little sis! xoxoxox
Oh wow. I had no idea about this blog nastiness and I almost wish I hadn’t followed the link. How could anybody be so cruel and sadistic? I hope there’s a silver lining for her too – it’s because of my blog, after all, that I was offered the opportunity to become a media volunteer.
It was very brave of you to share so much of yourself in this blog post, Fiona. Please know that you always have my support. x
I’m glad you haven’t been caught up in the nasty stuff! Because it’s just not nice. Basically this person has ruined the internet for a lot of people. Very selfish. She’s also hurt a lot of people deeply. She’s cruel and sadistic because she’s a psychopath through and through – I can only hope Karma bites her bum in time.
The blogs do have silver linings – mine has been the wonderful friends I have made, and how healing it is to be able to put my stuff out there. Talking about it is very freeing and very healing for me. Thank you so much for your support – and I hope you have been okay. xx
As a Wiccan, I very much believe in the Threefold Rule: Whatever you do will come back to you three times over, so this woman is seriously going to be in trouble when Karma catches up with her. Also, jealousy is such an ugly thing, isn’t it? This whole “I’m miserable so I’ll go and find some feelings to hurt” thing is really awful. Good people have good lives, bad people become bitter and lonely. No matter what a good person may have to deal with in life they are never alone and are always loved – even when they may not know it.
Jealousy is close to the ugliest thing in the world, I think! And I really do hope Karma catches up with her threefold. I really do. I feel bad for wishing that – because it’s wishing bad on someone, but this person does deserve it, and it looks like it might be the only way they ever take a good long hard look at themselves too.
As I have often said, beauty comes from within. The most gorgeous-looking person can be the meanest, ugliest creature you’ve ever meet. Inner beauty is what matters the most, because you never lose it!
Some people *do* deserve bad things to happen to them, so don’t worry about thinking that way!
It’s really important to tell your story and speak your truth. I believe. You are doing the work. People who love you are listening. That’s what we are here for, the way to be here for each other.
I read your post and it’s a lot to digest. I don’t have a lot to say. I don’t feel that I’m here to advise and you didn’t ask for that so I’m here to be loving and supportive. I see your power rising up to protect yourself and this seems strong.
For myself I see that I try to sidestep what looks like attackers as I don’t want to get caught up in making enemies and being a warrior. Maybe that is weakness on my part. I’m still trying to grapple with this stuff.
Dear Gel, it means a lot to me that you read, and I know you have been through a lot yourself so I know you understand. It does help me a LOT to tell my story – it frees me from a prison where only I know what’s happened to me (apart from my family – who will always deny anything that makes them look less than snowy pure). Validation is important too. I don’t understand exactly why so many of us are encouraged NOT to talk about these things – which only drives us to feel shame and guilt and lie it’s our fault that someone hurt us.
It’s not our fault. And we should not have to live with the feeling that it’s our fault.
I do think you sidestep the crazy people on here very well – keeping a low profile. I like the sense of gentleness and calmness that I get from your emails and reading your blog – I wish more people were like you! I get that feeling from Greta too. It’s not a weakness on your part at all. It’s a strength. Picking your battles – and knowing which matter and which are time wasters. This blog stuff has been major time wasting and energy wasting stuff for all of us involved. We have far more important battles we should have spent that time and energy on – like the battle for our very LIVES.
xxx
I’m so sorry for all you’ve been through. I am speechless/ wordless. I think I’m one of these people who want to believe that people are inherently good, and for you to say otherwise and give your reasons… well I don’t know what to say.
All I can say is I’m sorry you went through all that. No one deserves that kind of treatment, especially from the people who are supposed to love and care for them. Turning your back on them must have been so hard.
The blog stuff has been really upsetting (even though I’m only viewing from the sidelines.) This person really does not deserve all the cruelty thrown at her, when she’s done nothing but be lovely and supportive to a lot of people (including me.) I just hope it all passes, gets resolved.
xxx
Hi Aggy, thank you so much for reading and for commenting. I have always wanted to believe people are inherently good too – that’s the way I am, too. Sadly there are bad people in this world. And I guess that’s something I’ve had to come to accept. Learning how to better know when someone isn’t the person they pretend to be and when they present a real danger to your wellbeing is a very important skill for us, especially those of us who are already vulnerable with our own problems.
It is really hard to turn your back on your family. Really hard.
It has been really upsetting for all of us. This is where we have come to share support – this is the last place we need to have crap like this, especially from those who themselves have the same struggles with ed.
I hope things go better for Greta, too. She has supported me and been there for me for a while now and I’ll always be grateful that I’ve met her. The other blogger – I used to be great friends with her, and now I see it was all a lie and that’s sad. I hope so much that she comes to recognise that she’s really unwell and unstable and that she really could use some help, and reaches out for that. It can’t be a nice way to live.
I do hope we can all move past this and move on.
Thank you for commenting, Aggy xx
the strength it has taken you to survive all this is amazing. my heart aches for you and the way they treated you. i am so glad they are no longer in your life. it is so true the feeling of abandoning our family when in reality they have abandoned us. it’s so hard when they are blood there is always an ache or longing despite what they have done to us.
lots of love xo
You yourself, have been through so much – and it means a lot to me when you say that I’m strong to have survived – I think you are too! It is so hard… all we can do is make sure we have built up a new family – a family that love us, care about us, and wouldn’t dream of treating us the way the old one did. I think it’s instinct to yearn to keep ties with blood family – but to us, it’s a dangerous instinct to listen to.
Lots of love to you too, thinking of you and I’m sorry I’ve not been commenting much lately! Life is overwhelming! xxx
lots of love to you too! yes it sadly is dangerous for us. no apology necessary! look after you. xo
Hi Fiona,
I’ve been a reader for sometime now and this is my first time commenting. I’ve always wanted to comment here but most times, I just don’t know what to say. Your stories are incredible, captivating, sometimes hard to believe. I’m happy that you are no longer living in that environment, but sad that your past still affects you.
Really love your writing. And I love that you always have a lot to say; you’ve been silenced far too long and it’s nice to see that you have found your voice.
Dear B, thank you so much for this comment! I’m glad that reading my blog is helpful to you and I’m really flattered that you like my writing. I’ve always loved to write and it’s wonderful to be able to do it again – I was cognitively unable to for a few years.
I think that writing is helping me a lot – I do get validation from the people who read here that I’m not a horrible monster who needs to shut up and that what happened to me was my fault – that’s the way that this stuff made me feel, so it’s healing to have a reality check when I put it out there.
And I hope I never lose my voice again.
Thank you so much for popping up here, hopefully I will get to know you in time and hear about you, too xx
Thank you for sharing, Fiona.
Yours is a beautiful, tortured soul that deserves true happiness/
Be well.
It means so much for you to comment and say this, Hook. You see every type of human being in your work – from the best of them to the worst of them and the WTF! too. Thank you for your kind words.
it is a very grey area with personal expression and work. I do not have my employers on my fb nor have I ever mentioned which supermarket chain I work for as we recieved a notice at work that by posting who we are employed by should we post anything they deem inappropriate that we can actually be disciplined at work as we will be seen to be representing the company, it is sad that someone could be so spiteful as to try to ruin a great job for someone and i hope your friend finds a bablance where she does not feel she has to sacrifice any aspect of her creativity to satisfy some jealous troll
It really is sad. You are right – I do know who the troll is, and she has always been jealous of Greta. I’m really sad and sorry that it all happened and that we can’t all just share Greta’s good news. You are right there are fine lines with talking about certain subjects online and when it comes to work, I think my lesson from all this is the less said the better.
It is only ‘pure evil’ that pervades your sister and mother…There is no other word for it. For you to have never known what it was to be in a real family just breaks my heart. It is only right that you cut yourself off from any contact with them as it would only trouble your soul and your mind …and most certainly hinder or stop the progress that you have made. It is too bad that you are bothered by this ‘other’ person that seems to have the same characteristics…I’m sure you try to have no contact with them as well. Try and keep your mind and heart on the present and the things you have going for you now…”a future’ better than you have ever known in your life…Diane
Sometimes I think some of us seem to attract these people, almost like magnets for them, Diane. I think I’m learning, gradually – hopefully next time one of them enters my life, I’ll spot him or her immediately and not get involved at all.
It took me a long time to even start talking about what happened at home – it’s actually only been in recent years. I found it easier to talk about the man who raped and stalked me than the family stuff – because people just assume that family are the ‘good’ people in your life, it’s taboo to say bad stuff about them and even more so to call them evil. But evil they are, and I realised that when I read M Scott Peck’s People Of The Lie. It’s an old book, but it’s a good one. Lots of ‘aha’ moments in there for many of us.
My future is looking a lot brighter, now, because I’m free, Diane. Thank you for your kind words and support xx
Hi Fiona,
I am a first-time commenter but have been reading your blog for a time. I also know of the other blogger of which you speak. She has been horrible to you and to others. There is no changing that type of person. She feeds on drama and attention. Just ignore her. That is your best revenge and to keep getting well. Her actions speak loudly her dark heart. Forward!
Hi Linda! Thank you so much for your support. Your advice is very wise indeed!
Every time another reader pops up for the first time, it reminds me of how far our words and actions can reach online. And that what is important to me is to reach out to those who find my blog – to either share with them something they relate to, to remind them they are not alone, to enable greater understanding of the issues I write about, and hopefully even to spur someone who hasn’t reached out yet to ask for help and get that help they greatly need. I’ve been thinking about what’s been happening and realising that it’s distracting us all from what’s important. And it’s hard to send a message of being gentle with oneself when we are taking potshots at each other!
My big dilemma is that now this blogger is hurting a good friend – and I hate to stand by and watch it happen… so I don’t know what to do – and am actually quite powerless to do anything more than I’ve done, which is to advise.
Thank you for reminding me what really is important and to not get caught up and sink into the blackness. Living well really is the best revenge!
Good god! This is so heart breaking to read! I do believe that you are on a mission in this world, Fi. Having no fundamental how to love, be kind, tell the truth, care and trust – you’ve found it in yourself. Love is what we are born with. Fear is what we learn. Your amazing journey from the house of horror is the unlearning of fear and prejudices and the acceptance of love back in your heart. Love is the essential reality and our purpose on earth, IMO. You are LOVE and I can read God in you. Embrace it, hun and never look back. I’m so sorry my story has evoked so many sad memories. But you are not that girl anymore. You are perfect today.
Dear Greta, you are so right about love being something we are born with and fear learned! I wonder then, if it’s possible to UNlearn fear? Maybe not… but I’m sure it’s possible to learn to live despite it.
LOVE IS ESSENTIAL. I really do think we just cannot thrive without it. Like flowers with no sunshine or water. You can have everything in the world – but without love, you die.
I’m honoured that you can see God in me. I’ve seen Him in my friends – like you. You mirror His kindness, His acceptance, His unfailing love and patience. It was seeing Him in friendly eyes that enabled me to trust that He was there again.
It’s all in the past now, this stuff. And no, it will never happen to me again. I just hope I can comfort someone else in that position or help them to avoid it.
Thank you for being such a special and dear friend <3 xxx
Fiona, I’ve read this post twice and still don’t know the words to express what I want to say.
I can’t even begin to imagine what it must have been like to have a childhood so lacking in love and support, and so full of violence and manipulation. It’s such a tremendous achievement that you’ve managed to become an enthusiastic, spirited, loving and caring person after having to endure all that. You are extraordinary.
I loved Greta’s comment above. So true!
Hi Veera, I just want to say thank you for saying anything at all – thank you for reading. I have copped a lot of criticism, and what saddens me about that is that the people don’t seem to have even bothered really to listen – they just assume. So I’m hugely thankful when anyone takes the time and effort to read my words. You give me my voice. People have said that I have my voice now, and I’ll never be silent again – but it’s the very people who read my words and listen when I speak who allow me that voice – thank you for being one of them.
xx
One of the best gifts this childhood has given me is appreciation – we can’t truly grasp the value of something if we don’t have a concept of being without it, I believe.
Thank you again – sorry for rambling, I’m just really touched at your comment
Hey sweetie, I am staggered by this post for a couple reasons. Firstly I don’t know what happened online but this person does NOT sounds nice.
Secondly, I’ve only known you for 24hrs and I can not begin to believe how similar our stories are. I also have an older perp brother, an older bitch face sister and a mother who is a hoarder and who i refuse to actually call mother. The sister thing – maybe they were separated at birth c my sister has done some pretty nasty stuff to me too.
Im so so proud of you for fighting back and not letting them win. And in voicing it all in ur blog, you are beating them back even further.
Thank you sweetness xoxoxoxoxox
Hello again – this person is the one I mentioned in the group. Yeah, they are not nice, good thing to stay out of it all!
I’m really sorry that you have a similar story. I definitely can’t wait to read more of your blog now.. sorry.. that sounds insensitive.. but you know, when you relate to someone so much, you want to know more? Because someone gets it.
It can be hard for people who haven’t been through it to understand how someone in our own families especially can be so horrible to us.. how families can be so awful.
I’m proud of YOU, because it’s obvious you are fighting your own fight – you are still here, you have not let them beat you, and you ARE going to make it out of this.
Thank YOU. Keep on holding on. You know where to find me any time you need to message – my inbox is always open to you xxx
On the internet, people can only take the power you give them (?). Or at least, so I’m guessing. You always have an off-switch. But I suppose that’s not the case if they’re part of your actual social circle. I hope you recover from all this anyway – best wishes!
You are right about that – nobody can take our power without our permission. We still can choose to turn it off, to click away etc. But then, it’s not quite that simple. Knowing that someone is spreading vicious lies about you, even if you have clicked away, is very difficult. You know that online, thousands, perhaps millions if the lies are left up there for years – of people will read those lies about you. People who know the story know they aren’t true – but do you really want something horrible to potentially wreck your life later on when maybe an employer googles your name or something like that? It’s a minefield. And yes, it’s hard when you have friends who think the abusive person is just fine – seems blind to the reality.
But yes, the main thing is that we have power over our lives – the power to above all, do our best to live in the least selfish and hurtful and hopefully benefits us and everyone around us as much as possible. We choose what legacy we leave and the effect we have on those around us. It brings me back to – changing what we can change, accepting what we can’t, and having the wisdom to know the difference!!
Thank you for your wishes and your kindness xx