Hi Hop,
I also am so sorry to hear what angst you are going through. You ARE such a sweet and supportive person. I have seen that in so many of your posts!
I read through most of this thread. What I wish most is that you would stop punishing yourself by feeling guilty -- so I did a web search and put together some excerpts (written by Vaknin) about why you should not feel guilty. I hope it helps!
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The abuser is GUILTY. He could have PREVENTED the abuse. He KNOWINGLY did what he did. He is CULPABLE. You hate him JUSTLY.
Hating yourself is a way of assuming the abuser's guilt. The abused child thinks: A parent can never be guilty. Parents are perfect, above reproach, above vile thoughts. It is prohibited to think badly about a parent. It must be I who is wrong and guilty and corrupt in hating my parents. I should be ashamed of myself.
It is a conflict. It is the confusion that you are experiencing. Especially since you have always been an extension of the parent and hating yourself is, therefore, no real solution.
Very often we feel that perhaps we collaborated with the abusing parent, seduced or tempted or angered or provoked him or her.
This is the crux of your problem. Your inability to distinguish the child that the abuser once was (deserving of pity and empathy) - from the monstrous adult that the abuser became, which is deserving of condemnation, contempt, hate, punishment, repulsion, and reticence. As long as you do not cease confusing these two - you will be immersed in conflict, confusion, and pain. You HAVE to sacrifice the image of your parent if you want to get better. You have to let go. You must hate in order to be able to love again. You must place guilt, blame, rage, contempt where they belong.
You cannot prevent PAST bad things from happening by feeling in the PRESENT.
Understanding, loving, compassion, empathy - must be directed at the deserving. Not to love an Hitler - is NOT EQUAL to fostering a world without feelings. One can HATE and detest Hitler passionately, vehemently, wholeheartedly - and still be loving, compassionate, full of emotions and beauty. Actually I think that hating Hitler is a PRECONDITION to experiencing true feelings. If you do not hate an Hitler something is very wrong with your emotional equipment. If you do not despise a monster - you are INCAPABLE of adult feelings, your emotional intelligence is infantile and immature. Hating an abuser - is a sign of emotional maturity, not of emotional retardation.
It is wrong to UNIVERSALIZE your feelings. Can't you SEGREGATE them? For instance: can't you love your spouse WHILE hating your abusive parent? Must you love EVERYONE, all the time? Are you so terrified of being rejected?
You love monsters. You try to understand abusers. You make excuses for the inexcusable. You mitigate your private holocaust. You legitimize abhorrent crimes. You lie to yourself. You are immorally not in touch with your real emotions. And, this way, you perpetuate your own abuse, your own torture, you collaborate with the terrorists that are and were your family.
I am an Israeli. When we encounter a terrorist with hostages, we kill him first, we ask questions later. NOTHING can justify, mitigate, explain, account for, ameliorate, or alleviate what your parent did to you. I judiciously refrain from using the phrase "what WAS DONE to you". Instead, I repeat the sentence: "What HE DID to you". It was pre-meditated.
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I don't know if that helps, but I hope there is something in there to support you!
I worry very much about you allowing yourself to feel guilt. I know that someone who was very close to me who has tried to dissociate herself from an N ex-spouse who abused her for over a decade feels so much guilt for the OUT AND OUT HATRED she felt toward him at the end of their marriage. She had never hated anyone before -- much less hated anyone so MUCH -- and now she seems to be trying to appease her guilt with a sense of obligation to her abuser. That guilt is a real stickler -- as in sticking it to you!!! Rather than looking at what you did or felt that makes you feel so guilty, how about looking on the YEARS and YEARS of abuse you have sustained? You SHOULD feel angry. I like what Vaknin has to say about how important it is to go through this phase. Please don't hijack it with guilt which could deprive of you finally feeling truly FREED.
Also, from what I understand about N's, I wonder if perhaps your mother is doing this bit with your brother more for N supply than anything else -- kind of like, "Well, I'm not getting enough, I need more, so I'll call him!" Because really, to N's, NOTHING is about YOU -- it's all about THEM. I kind of wonder if she calls your brother so much to manipulate you as she does to get her N supply. Because for N's, it's all about THEM and it's all about SUPPLY -- and really nothing is much ever about anything else.
My best friend has an N mother who her T has told her is very toxic to her, and I once jokingly told her, "Well, maybe you could fake some N supply, and do it like an actress -- while inside just allow yourself to be detached and calm." I don't know if it would be a good way to go, and apologize if this is a bad idea, but when I imagine myself having to be in your shoes I think I might very well take that route -- i.e., use my understanding of the N psychology to some advantage just to get some peace.
Look. This might all be crazy talk. What do I know? Not much! But in case it stimulates any good ideas I'll just throw out these ideas. From what I understand, N supply comes basically in two forms that they love to eat up -- preferably adulation, admiration, etc., but when they can't get that they feed off FEAR. If they can't get you to adore them, then getting you to fear them is "better than nothing." Perhaps giving her some "acted out" (but fake) praise and adoring N supply would deflate her interest in frightening you. Perhaps she has caught on that you are somewhat frightened by your brother, and that would mean that she knows she can frighten you with every phone call to him. But she loves admiration and adoration more, so maybe if you pretend the admiration then she will prefer that so much more that she won't want to cause fear.
Also, since what she WANTS is you to fear her, then more play-acting might be very nice to use when she really DOES cause fear in you -- play-acting feeling INDIFFERENT and giving such acts ZERO attention, which might make her feel that she does not want to use those tactics which cause indifference in you.
Last, I wanted to throw out another idea that I know I would want if I were you, which is my own private space -- away from the house. Maybe in your town there is cooperative housing which would be cheap, or even just rooms for rent in people's homes. Once you have just a little money to do it with, you could start building your dreams of your life away from her (and your brother) during visits there. And go there to pray, etc., in an environment where you can really feel SAFE and AUTONOMOUS and INDEPENDENT -- and just "away from all that." It could be your secret place that she and your brother don't even know about.
Well, that's all of my wild advice for now... Sorry if it's not very helpful. I just wish I could find some way to help. You are so deserving of help and you know lots of us hear are really rooting for you!! (Any Australians reading this -- no, I didn't mean it that way! -- rooting meaning something quite else over in Oz.)
BIG GIANT HUGS........!
pink
