My brother abused me — now our parents want us all together again!

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Cary’s classic column from Friday, May 23, 2008

I would like to help them celebrate their 50th anniversary, but I dread being in the same room with that man.


Dear Cary,

When I was a teenager, I was sexually abused by my older brother. I’ve been through three different therapists trying to work this out. Three must be a charm because through talking to the third one I found a way to confront my brother and come to peace with this issue by forgiving him. Forgiveness in the C.S. Lewis sense of wishing him well in the rest of his life but not feeling that pursuing a relationship with him is part of the deal. Consequently we haven’t spoken or had any contact for years. I don’t wish to see him or have him anywhere near my children. I don’t want to be near him. He lives on the other side of the country so it has been pretty easy to avoid him.

Here’s the catch. My parents’ 50th wedding anniversary is coming up. We were discussing what kind of a celebration my parents would like over dinner the other night with my parents and my other brother and his wife. My mom said that her wish would be for the whole family to be together and, in fact, if this couldn’t happen, that she would not want any sort of celebration at all. She knows what has happened between my brother and me and knows that I have no contact with him.

It really bothers me that she is trying manipulate me into spending time with him by threatening not to celebrate her 50th wedding anniversary unless we all get together. She has never handled this issue sensitively and wonders why I can’t just get over it so we can all be one happy family again. I feel that she is being selfish and inconsiderate by forcing the situation. I feel pulled in two directions. I want her and my dad to have a happy celebration. Getting to 50 years is no small feat in our world today. But I also want her to understand that it is important to me to not be expected to spend time with my brother. I know that it hurts her that her family is torn apart, but having us all show up together in the same room for a party isn’t going to magically create the perfect family that she so desires.

The biggest downer in all of this is that the responsibility for the family celebration and whether it will happen or not rests on my shoulders. I didn’t ask to be abused. It was no picnic coming to terms with the abuse and I don’t see why I should be the one who has to make the decision to make or break the party. I’m not the bad guy here. But if I don’t concede to spend time with my brother, it will look like I am. It won’t just be the two of us in the same room for the first time in eight years; it will be family pictures and forced hugs and conversations and … UGH!

So, do I stay true to what I want to do for my own sanity and personal emotional safety? Or do I give in and spend my parents’ 50th having one of the most hellish days of my life? How much does one need to sacrifice to honor and love one’s parents, or mother anyway?

Forgave but Did Not Forget

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Dear Forgave,

I cannot resist the idea that you might, by seeing your brother once more, finally extinguish the remaining embers of power he holds over you. For to know finally, with deep unshakable certainty, that the person who hurt you can never hurt you again — that would be a good thing, no? To know that you can be in his presence safely in any place, at any time of the day or night? And to know that you had a safe place to go and a way to extricate yourself should the trauma of contact prove too uncomfortable, this might make any such contact more bearable, might it not?

That he still renders pieces of the earth’s territory uninhabitable for you: Isn’t that a circumstance that should be finally laid to rest? Would you not like to be able to walk anywhere with impunity, even into his own house — not that you would want to, but simply that no place on earth ought to be walled off from you, since you have done nothing wrong?

You need to know in your very bones that he can never hurt you again. I may be wrong; it may be too much of a magic trick; but I am thinking that seeing him in the midst of the family, in a setting from which you have a pre-planned exit, having prepared adequately, might finally extinguish his hold on you forever.

When we still feel a person holds the power to hurt us, we live with residual fear, and our movements are restricted — through our own choice, we say to ourselves; we’d simply rather not see him. But a choice made in fear is not really a choice but coercion. If in fact this person can no longer hurt us, and yet we continue to live in fear of contact with him, then simply knowing is not enough; we need to experience, firsthand, that he has no power over us. We need to feel it vividly. In such a case, we may need to have contact with him even though the prospect fills us with cold fear.

I can see how it would bother you that by participating in this party you are fostering an illusion — that he never did what he did, or that it didn’t matter as much as it mattered. But this is not about the perceptions of others. It is about reinforcing a truth for you.

This must be said also: You do not have to do this. It is your choice. You are not living for other people. They can celebrate if they want to. They do not have to include you. It is not your fault if your mother persists in being rigid. She is trying to control you. You do not have to let her.

But if you can see it as a test of your own capacity for remaining in the flame and not flinching, if you can see it as a test of your humility and your distance, then perhaps you can take this event like a trophy. You can set it on your mantel. You can say quietly to yourself, I did this just to see if I could do it. And I could. So he no longer has any power over me. So if I can do this, what else can I do? How I must have expanded! I am so much stronger than I thought!

My reasoning is that the risk is worth it. If you find you can be in the same room with this person you will have acquired a new power. It won’t mean that you have a relationship. It will only mean that your sphere of free movement has expanded. It will mean that you need not fear this person any longer. It will mean that you can gaze upon him as upon a stranger.

Of course, this is a magic trick and there is no guarantee that you would perform it flawlessly. Dragons may sprout from his head and threaten to attack. Spirits, stinking, vile spirits may surround him. There may be a force field of evil around him such that you find yourself propelled out of the room into the yard. You may have to go to a hotel. But you will have tried it. You will have made an approach to the physical manifestation of this awful evil, this monster of the past. And for that you may count yourself the hero in this drama.

The choice is yours, but as I look at it, I feel you have more to gain by approaching the fire than by staying away. Just be sure that you have someplace safe to go, a hotel room that you control, and that you have someone to report to at a specified time. Make appointments to call, and to limit your exposure. If you will be there with a partner, have a signal with the partner so that you can excuse yourself if you want. Have that choice.

Because choice is what this is about, in a way. In being abused, you were deprived of choice. You were deprived of choice and personhood. It may be that in some small way you could now retrieve some of that choice and that personhood by standing in the fire and seeing it can no longer singe you.

That is what it is: It is a test of fire. But you will have a net. You will have a watch you can look at and say, I’m sorry but I must leave for an appointment. You will have a rental car to get in. You will have a hotel room to go to. You will have a plane to catch.

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10 comments

  • NO!

    Every now and then, Cary comes up with a real clinker. This was one of them. I certainly hope LW ignored him at the time.

  • I hope this letter writer found the healing she deserves. Abuse is a funky thing and I don’t mean as in Jazzy but as in foul and weird. Its fallout remains unpredictable and power has to be reclaimed over and over, perhaps for the rest of ones life. I think staying away is necessary but also drawing near sometimes to better stare the voodoo in the face. I think everyone’s response here is valid. That said, I don’t think the anniversary was a good opportunity to face the foulness. The mother’s insensitivity (get over it) and demand was very obviously abusive and it is no surprise; the brother didn’t become an abuser in a vacuum. Staying away is part of the healing. But evil also must be faced and then faced down if one wants to turn victimization into victory.

    • I just want to make clear that I would have suggested that she not attend the anniversary and, in fact, reject the notion categorically something along the lines of “How dare you disrespect me? If you want me in your life, you had better start respecting me now by recinding this ridiculous invitation and attempted blackmail.”

  • I would like to add my two cents as a survivor of sexual abuse. I really loved Cary’s advice, I think he is spot on. The fear that stays with us about the abuser sometimes can control our lives, the power of the abuser can almost seem supernatural at times, even decades later. It we can see them as a simple human being it can definitely help to erase the hold they have on us. That said one has to be prepared for such an undertaking. As Cary says it is a choice.

  • What. This is the worst advice you have ever given and I’ve been reading you for going on 15 years now. I respect your writing and even wrote to you once myself and was thoroughly and kindly answered, so I know you are capable of far better. But this is terrible.
    You didn’t even address any of LW’s underlying issues here. The mother refuses to acknowledge this abuse, asking LW to “just get over it.” The mother is in essence asking LW to go through one more in a lifetime of tests of fire wherein LW’s family of origin negates and downplays his/her traumatic experiences.
    But what’s worse is that you basically told LW to suck it up and get stronger, that she should give in to her family’s avoidant and abusive behavior around this abuse. What could LW possibly learn from showing up except that their feelings don’t matter, and that s/he should swallow the feelings of discomfort in order to please their family? This is actually LW’s stated question, and you have ignored it, just like his/her family.
    LW clearly said this would be a hellish experience for him/her. The only appropriate answer to any victim of abuse is to “stay true to what I want to do for my own sanity and personal emotional safety.” You should have supported LW in their effort to heal from this experience, not joined in to the CROWD of people around this poor person ignoring LW’s journey and needs.
    Shame on you, Cary. Shame on you.

    • I have to agree with Elle. The family is negating Forgave’s feelings, requiring that she be at a family function that is going to act as a terrible “trigger” for all the feelings the abuse created. Sometimes decisions about family dynamics get hard, and not everyone’s feelings are going to remain unscathed. I say Forgave should refuse to go to the party. She needs to take control of this situation, rather than having aging parents control and manipulate her.
      Oh, and never, ever, let that guy get within 2 miles of your kids.

  • I’m not so sure. I see the parents insistence as part and parcel of the environment that allowed the abuse to happen in the first place. Like its LW’s job to keep everyone happy, even at the cost of her (?) own body. I especially dislike the idea that the kids be dragged in. A 50th anniversary is awesome, but it’s no excuse for demanding human sacrifice.

  • No, no, no, no. This is really, really wrong here. I cannot emphasize how wrong this is. Wrong call, there is a lot more to ending abuse than mentally telling yourself your rapist can’t scare you. You are telling this woman to retraumatize herself for what purpose????? Why? Rule no. 1 is DO NOT go back to abusers. Even if they don’t abuse other people, they will return to abusing YOU. This will never change. She needs to stay away from these people— her mother is abusive too, btw.

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