- Leigh-Ann
- Sep 18
- 3 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
A year before Covid I took a step away from family. It’s not something I’ve shared directly because it was painful and most people don’t understand it.
I had a family member who was periodically unkind to me throughout the years but more often they were unkind to my partner. My partner was frequently centred out and was often left feeling deeply embarrassed by things this family member said in front of others. When I tried to discuss how to handle this happening with one of my other family members I was told “it was just their big personality I had a problem with”. It was treated like a “me” problem even though this family member over the years had mocked my spouse for working with the disabled, brought up things in front of groups of people that were told to them in the confidence of private counselling, invited my partner to events only to centre him out and embarrass him, and then make him feel bad for even attending the event he was invited to. My family did not take this ongoing behaviour seriously, they have not taken the bullying seriously. There have been attempts to apologize sort of, but no real attempt to acknowledge the behaviour that caused the pain or allow us space to voice our hurt. It was more brushed under the rug. In my family the only feelings that seemed to be allowed were happy feelings, and the only way to handle painful feelings was to make jokes. My family has shown me several times they are not safe to grieve with or share uncomfortable feelings with.
Early on I was angry about not being heard or valued, and then I grieved the reality of having to walk away from relationships I had deeply valued my entire life
Walking away was difficult, it still hurts. I put my heart into people, I love connecting one on one and building deep relationships, I will and do go out of my way to connect with people I love. We would pack up 5 kids and drive several hours just to connect with family for a day, they will never understand how difficult it was to make those trips with 5 kids, it was EXTREMELY stressful and expensive for us on one income. We always made the effort because connecting with family was important to me. I wanted my kids to know my family, so WE made the effort to show up. We were never met with the same energy in return, there was no one going out of their way to visit us.
I’m sure some believe it was my mental illness that caused me to respond by walking away, but that is very far from reality, it was years of family being unkind and unsafe and not addressing these things but normalizing it by treating it as humour. They weren’t unsafe all the time but often enough I began experiencing severe anxiety about going to see them. It is not bipolar that made me walk away but their inability to be consistently safe and loving.
Family should be safe, family should create space for grief, family should consider you as much as you consider them, family should be kind in real life not just project kindness to outsiders, and family should make space for everyone’s feelings. I should be safe to share my feelings and challenges with family and feel supported because that is what family is suppose to be.
Walking away is difficult, but not as difficult as being in a crowd of people who don’t see you and don’t care to. Walking away is lonely but not as lonely as people only seeing you as a projection of themselves and not really seeing you as an individual unlike themselves.
It’s ok to choose safe people over unsafe family, it is ok to choose to stay home instead of going to places you can’t be yourself in. It is ok to protect your and your loved ones peace.
