Adult Children of Abusive Parents

Adults Abused as Children

Adult children of abusive parents can be one of the hardest things to face. As adults we look back at our lives and we notice that things are different for us then for our friends and even siblings.

Our parents spoke to us harder than they did to our sisters and brothers. We were grounded and spanked for things we did not do.

Our siblings got away with things we never could even conceive of doing. Yet when we copied our siblings in wrong doings we were punished and they were not.

We always were being screamed at and treated like Cinderella.

Many victims of abuse don’t learn they were abused until later in life, they may have noticed certain things that seem to point to it but have never really dealt with it.

As adults we see that we are still treated with contempt and mistreated and misunderstood. Many times adult children of abusive parents realize that they are still blamed for things that aren’t their fault or are left out of family issues (the last to know what is going on in the family).

We always assumed that this is the life God gave us, or never noticed until recently what is going on. We may see that our lives didn’t turn out as wonderful as we thought it could.

Maybe you noticed that you struggle a lot more than anyone else to has to, and all you have are some minuscule crumbs to show for all your hard work.

Have you noticed that family gatherings and holidays are extremely stressful and you suffer great anxiety before attending them? Do you find everyone getting mad at you or just not talking to you?

Do they treat you like you have leprosy? Do they make it appoint not to respond to your conversation or dodge you to avoid you? Does it feel like you are always under attack?

But those same people who treat us so terribly talk to everyone else with love and respect.

Many women don’t even realize how horribly they are treated until they see other families treating them with love and respect.

One woman I was working with came to my house for a family get together; my whole family doted all over her and loved talking to her. She started crying.

We all stopped and looked at her, and I put my arm on her and asked her what was wrong. I asked her if we hurt her or said something to offend her.

The more I talked the louder she cried.

Once she pulled herself together she said, “I have never felt anyone love me like you all did. You all cared about me and were interested in what I had to say.

I talked and you listened. I bore my soul and you wept with me. I never experienced that before. No one in my family gave me the time of day and now all of you actually care about me. I am overwhelmed.”

Jackie, that day, had experienced for the first time what a real family is like. She experienced what it was like to sit with people who treated her with love and respect. That was the day she realized how horribly her family really was.

It’s painful to discover you are adult children of abusive parents, no doubt about it – especially when we have done nothing wrong.

Unfortunately when we have abusive parents who abused us, our siblings in turn treat us the same way. And no matter how much we try to appease them, there is no hope.

Learning you are adult children of abusive parents suddenly opens up a knowledge why you struggled over the years, why others treated you so horribly, why you never got your needs met from anyone in your family.

Although this can be like a ton of bricks that fall on you, for some women they feel like that weight has been lifted off.

What acknowledging it does is giving it a “name,” it helps you see that it’s not you, it’s them. What has happened over your entire life is not because of what you did wrong but what someone did against you (also known as, “being sinned against”).