indifferent family

People say they love you so that they can maintain their self-image as a loving person. The thing to watch, though, is what they actually do. It's tough when you grow up in a family where there are constant contradictions between what people claim to feel toward you versus what they actually demonstrate with their behavior. You learn to distrust your own perceptions - you become very confused by the constant cognitive dissonance. It's a form of gaslighting, a kind of constant and insidious bullshit that can become such an ingrained part of the fabric of your life that you can no longer perceive it, kind of like the water the fish swims in - she pretty much takes it for granted.

My brother, for example. I think he likes the idea of himself as a magnanimous, generous guy. And successful - that's important too. Because one of the ways people measure their success is by their ability to give away money.

"See? I've got so much money, I can afford to give some away! Look at me, aren't I great?" Puffed chest, broad grin, like the little boy's first time riding a bicycle.

Thing is, they have no awareness whatsoever of the people or person they're 'helping' - it's all about them, as usual. All about maintaining their self-esteem, their sense of self-worth.

It's not about you at all, is it? It's really about them, and them feeling good about themselves. They really couldn't care less if what they do actually helps you - it's like the parent who says, "You'll take what you get and like it," and then the very same parent wonders why, when they're trapped in old age in the old folks home, no one comes to visit them. Selfish jerks.

The trouble is, when your family sometimes does nice things, it keeps you off guard. There's even a name for it: Stockholm syndrome. You're always waiting for that tiny crumb, that little scrap that keeps you trapped there, hoping against hope that all the other times that they were mean, selfish, careless, thoughtless, inconsiderate, rude, unkind - were just blips on the radar. Despite the massive evidence against such hope, it's what keeps us alive, keeps us from jumping off the nearest bridge.

We take that single speck of apparent kindness - such as a superficially friendly word - and weigh it against all the mountains of evidence that say, This person doesn't really care about me, and then we put our thumb on the scales so that we can't see the reality of the imbalance.

Denial is our favorite coping mechanism, or so it seems to me. Those of us who are suicidal, I think we get there because the mountain of evidence against believing that people are inherently kind finally becomes so huge that we can no longer ignore it, no longer avoid the truth. When reality piles up to the point that it completely obscures everything else, it's kind of hard to miss.

Or, as Lily Tomlin put it, "Reality is the leading cause of stress among those in touch with it."