On more than one occasion, friends and loved ones have shared with me the following definition of insanity:
Insanity is the process of doing the same thing, over and over, while hoping for a different result.
Personally, I think that’s a fine definition of insanity, so I’ve been looking at my recent debacle with my cousin Ralph and trying to decide whether my behavior meets the criteria. Certainly, after countless disastrous interactions with my original family members, my willingness to toddle over to my father’s side of the gene pool, hoping for a civil and productive conversation, might seem a little, well, nuts. But was it?
I don’t think so. I’ve begun looking at the disaster with cousin Ralph in a more spiritual way, using the Jewish idea of teshuva, which means “return.” Generally, we talk about doing teshuva when we’ve done something wrong; we acknowledge the wrong, we make amends, and we pledge not to repeat the mistake when the same situation arises again. If we can do those things, then we have returned, both to our original pure selves and to a state of harmony with others.
So I’ve been thinking: Why was I creating another cycle of return to the same place with my original family? What had I done wrong before, and what was I trying to do right in this interaction with Ralph?
My last less-than-ideal contact with a family member had taken place about three years ago. I contacted my uncle Sylvia (not his real name), hoping to reconnect. I was unsure of how or when to bring up the abuse, but I figured I’d find an appropriate moment. Unfortunately, as soon as Sylvia got my first email, he did an Internet search on my name and found a post I’d written about being an abuse survivor. As a result, the proverbial shit had hit the proverbial fan before we’d even begun.
At first, Sylvia questioned the idea that my parents could ever, ever have abused me, but a short time later told me that I had taken revenge on them by breaking contact. Revenge for what? I asked. For stuff that didn’t happen? No matter how many times I told him that I was interested only in my own survival, and that revenge had never been part of the equation, he couldn’t hear it. With each iteration, he got nastier. By the end, I pretty much broke down in a mass of tears and self-hatred, waved a white flag, and ended the interaction feeling like a victim. Again.
This time around, with cousin Ralph, a similar dynamic occurred, although to her credit, cousin Ralph did not get nasty with me in the way that uncle Sylvia had. However, the same mind-boggling question-the-abuse/acknowledge-the-abuse contradiction was there, expressed in emails containing such statements as “I have no basis on which to believe you” and “I had no idea you came from such a dysfunctional family.”
Excuse me for a moment while my head stops spinning.
There was also quite a bit of, shall we say, lying regarding the family photos. In one of her first emails, cousin Ralph had said that she had “many more” photos to send after the initial batch. In one of her last emails, however, she said that she’d just “scoured” the family albums and, well, gosh darn it, she just couldn’t find any more photos. Sorry! So sorry!
I hate it when people lie. I’d rather they just said, “Get the fuck out of my face.” That I could understand. Lying perplexes me. My Aspie brain just can’t quite believe that it’s happening. Why lie when you can just come out and say something? (That was a rhetorical question.)
Anyway, at some point in the interaction with cousin Ralph, I finally realized that I had to give up on having an extended family. I mean, I really, really had to give it up. And so, my friends, I must inform you that, during the past week, I made the difficult decision to remove from life support my brain-dead hope of ever having an extended family of people who share my DNA. (Services were private; in lieu of flowers, please make a donation to the charity of your choice.) After the cremation and scattering of the ashes, I was feeling very sad, so Bob wrote me the following beautiful email while he was in New York:
Hi love — Thinking more about Ralph’s e-mail, it seems to me that your decision to move on with your life as if there is no family is the right one. No matter what Ralph may or may not be willing to do in terms of a potential relationship with you, her email is simply another “missed opportunity” for people in your family to reach out to you in a loving, compassionate, understanding way. Whatever her reasons were for responding in the limited way that she did are her reasons, and have little if nothing to do with you. And hasn’t this been the problem all along? That no one has considered how you must feel about any and all of this?
And to me, that’s the real tragedy, and the source of the sadness I’ve been feeling lately about the absence of real family in your life. It underscores what you’ve been saying for all these years — that you’re a good person, that you’ve done nothing wrong, and that you deserve better from your family.
Sad to say, those are all good reasons to say goodbye to them. To close the door and move on down the road. The line from a Mary Black song goes something like, “We’ll never see what lies ahead if we’re always looking back.”
As I re-read these words last night, it came to me: I must end the interaction with Ralph with dignity. I cannot end it feeling powerless and screwed over. If I do, I’m just a victim again, just as I was in my interaction with uncle Sylvia, and just as I was in childhood. I must stay out of the victim place.
Sometimes, that’s hard for Aspies, because the world can feel like such a hurtful and incomprehensible place. But I can’t be a victim in this world. My innocence, my trustworthiness, and my truth-telling are some of my best qualities, and just because people occasionally take advantage of them doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with me. So, with all these thoughts in mind, I gathered myself together and wrote the following email:
Dear Ralph,
A few days ago, I wrote that if you believed what I said about my childhood, you should write to me, but that if you didn’t, you should continue your silence. When you responded by saying that you didn’t have any basis for believing me or not, I should have stopped our communication right there.
I don’t have any physical evidence that proves anything I say, so if evidence is what you need, I’m afraid I can’t offer any. I have no medical records or reliable witnesses, no police reports or other testimony. All I have is my own truth, my own integrity, and an abundance of other people who believe me. Some of these people have never met me in person, and some haven’t seen me in over 30 years, and yet, they still believe me, and they still express compassion and support for me. And why not? What do they have to lose? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
That’s what I need in my life. That’s what I’ve been trying to say.
Let’s end our communication here and wish each other well.
All the best,
Rachel
Now to me, that’s teshuva. I’ve gone through another cycle of the family craziness, and this time, I’ve come out sane. I’ve returned to my true self—not a victim, and not even a survivor, but simply a whole, decent, self-respecting human being.
© 2010 by Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg
well done.
That was a really dignified way to end the contact. I can’t imagine a better way! Well done!
Rachel, that is so good to read. A real closure for you and in a beautiful, dignified manner. Yes, we all would like to have a family, sometimes this is not possible without loosing the sense of self. So better to keep your dignity and live with your lovely immediate family! Not blaming you for trying, just shows what a loving and trusting person you are.
I want to play devil’s advocate for just a minute. I want to truely understand your words. I am an NT so I tend to infer and Aspie’s mean what they say. I’ve been understanding your side all the way to the end and then I hit a stand still. Are you asking Ralph to believe you or just be open minded to the idea that your story might be true? And if Ralph flat out told you she didn’t believe you but wanted to continue a relationship with you would you be accepting?
I get the feeling you aren’t trying to make people agree with you. I understand it as you to want people to understand your point of view and hold it in the same regard as anyone else. If it helps, my NT brain didn’t want to ask you the above questions for the sake of being polite but . . I really want to know the answer. The tool to understanding an Aspie is the Aspie themself so I’m going straight to the source. =)
Jennifer, I know that you didn’t ask me, but I can’t understand your comments. You’ve somehow missed the point entirely, imho. Otherwise you wouldn’t have asked some really weird questions. I think that you need to approach the situation as less of an intellectual exercise and more in an empathic way.
For example you wrote: “Are you asking Ralph to believe you or just be open minded to the idea that your story might be true? And if Ralph flat out told you she didn’t believe you but wanted to continue a relationship with you would you be accepting?”
Rachel was quite clear. Reply ONLY if you believe me. However Ralph ignored Rachels instructions; Ralph replied in order to tell Rachel that Ralph didn’t actually believe Rachel.
If you use deductive logic, Rachel said that believing Rachel is necessary for a continuing relationship.
Is that reasonable of Rachel? Of course. Anything else is pure crazy!
Jennifer, would you want a relationship/friendship with someone who thought that that you made up serious allegations against members of your own family?
It’s absurd to consider that someone would welcome or ecourage contact on that basis. There would be no basis of trust, would there?
How do we know that YOU are NT and able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes easier than an Aspie would? Or that you are not someone who doesn’t even have a husband?
We internet people can only go on what we experience. It’s a question of trust. That’s what Rachel was merely trying to illustrate in her letter.
Rachel has been a good friend to me, she’s given me so much support in difficult times . In my experience she is consistently sane, respectful, insightful and balanced in her approach. That’s why I never had a doubt in my mind that she told the truth.
Jennifer pretty much summed up my feelings. All I can add is the following:
When someone tells me that he or she was abused, my immediate response is empathy. I do not ask for access to therapy records or wring my hands about how I just don’t know the real truth. I offer comfort and a listening ear. What does that cost me? Nothing. What harm does it do? None. In fact, it gives me something. It allows me to exercise compassion.
Any abuse survivor wants to be believed, especially when disclosing to family members. I would never knowingly enter into any relationship with someone who didn’t believe me.
Rachel, There is something here that you may not have considered. It’s quite possible that your father learned this abusive behavior within his immediate family and that some of his adult siblings may be trying to deny complicity by claiming surprise at his behavior. Your female cousins may be in the position of not having broken free and having been abused likewise, which would make them very uncomfortable having any contact with someone who is aware of the parts of their past with which they may not have dealt or acknowledged even to themselves. It is a healthy thing to have confronted them, as painful as their rejection is. I believe you will feel more free of fear and anxiety having broken the cycle of abuse and that their response was more an indication of what perhaps remains hidden than their lack of compassion.
Thank you for your insights, eaucoin. It seems highly unlikely that I would be the only survivor in the family. My therapist concurs and suggested things very similar to what you’ve written here.
It’s possible that your father learned this pattern of abusive behavior within his own family. If so, any of his siblings might want to discourage you from speaking about it as a way of denying complicity rather than as a judgment against you. As well, there may be female cousins on your father’s side who have experienced similar abuse and not been able to escape as you did. If they have not acknowledged such suffering even to themselves, they would be uncomfortable with your revelations. I hope you will feel free of fear now that you have confronted them. Just remember that their response to you may be more of an indication of what still remains hidden (a Pandora’s box still unopened within the rest of your father’s family) rather than a rejection of you personally.
it’s courageous.