Venting I despise how my family justifies their neglect

[Gaga786]

They have and always are trying to deflect blame by bringing forward the arguments that I was a sensitive child or remind me of all the good things they have done in the past.
if you choose to procreate then its your duty to care for the child. You didn't do some act from heaven just by nurturing the child and providing a safe environment. Then the typical response" neglect occurred because your sister needed to get married". Then why have me in the first place. I sometimes feel like I was a piece to them– they have stated multiple times how they wanted a life companion who would take care of them later on as they decay from old age. I would have no problem doing that only if I had a good childhood and was able to take care of myself.

 

[Pluto]

This is a very challenging situation to deal with because we are conditioned to normalise their behaviour even though we know something is wrong. There's a saying along the lines of 'parents know how to push our buttons because they installed them.'

Something I found very helpful was going through the Wikipedia article about family dysfunction. It was only then that I realised my family was severely dysfunctional. Up to that point I had difficulty finding the vocabulary to describe why I was feeling distress. Of course, they will never admit to being wrong and will always put it on you, but at least from a self-help perspective, or for the purposes of working with a therapist, we can have a clearer idea of the truth.

 

[howl pendragon]

They have and always are trying to deflect blame by bringing forward the arguments that I was a sensitive child or remind me of all the good things they have done in the past.

I am so sorry that you had to go through this kind of situation, and that you had to grow up with a family that caused you this pain. I know well how painful it is to be vulnerable in an environment that invalidates your pain, that puts the blame on you, when in fact the ineptitude of the people who brought you into the world is the real culprit for the pain you feel.

This part of your story gives me a very strong impression that you have been suffering from something called Gaslighting, which can be explained as a form of "self-defense" by people unable to recognize or take responsibility for the pain they caused, people unable to deal with and respect their way of perceiving the world, and the emotional immaturity of these people.

Unfortunately, this is all too common. Adults often see children as objects rather than other human beings. There is no respect for emotions, for pain, for the will of a child. It's even pathetic to think that the same adults who try to teach the meaning of the word "no" seem incapable of respecting the limits that a child can have...

And yes, these people were responsible for taking care of you. They were responsible for offering you a safe space to grow and develop. So what if you were a sensitive child? Is this necessarily a bad thing? I'm not saying that was the case, of course, but does that negate the fact that the child was emotionally scarred by an experience?

If we talk about sun-sensitive skin, is the role of a parent to blame your skin after you get sunburned? Or to offer sunscreen, suitable clothing, and teach you that the sun can hurt you?

What I mean by that is that your experience is valid, and I'm very sorry that they didn't help you protect yourself from the "sun"... which was themselves in the end.