One thing that many victims of sibling emotional abuse experience is denial.
A large contributing factor to the perpetuation of sibling abuse is that the parents are in denial there's a problem. For parents, there are few things harder to bear than the fact that there's a serious problem in their family. It is far easier to bury their heads in the sand than to confront the fact that something is very wrong. After all, the abuse isn't happening to them. When they see one of their children bullying the other, they can tell themselves that the teasing is not a big deal. In fact, it's totally harmless. Even if the victim goes straight to the parents and tells them directly that their sibling is walking all over them, these complaints often fall on deaf ears. Parents who are in denial will often talk the victim out of their feelings, trying to force their own inward script into the mind of the victim.
We all know that emotional abuse is a very big deal. This is apparent in the consequences of abuse. "Long-Term Effects of Sibling Abuse" is my most popular post so far, by far. Many people who have been abused emotionally experience serious long-term effects like low self-esteem, depression, rage, and learned helplessness.
But let's forget about long-term effects for a minute. Something even simpler than psychological research waves a big red flag in my face that bullying is a very big deal. Have you ever noticed that it's always a big deal when the abuse is happening to the abuser? In many families where the victim has grown up to give the abuser a taste of their own medicine, they'll often find that the abuser is feeling the exact same way they did when they were the victim. In one family I know of, where the abused younger sister grew up to dish right back to her sister what had been done to her for years, I found an interesting reaction in the older one. During one of these incidents, the older sister threw back at the younger one, "You're so mean to me! You verbally abuse me!" Hmmmm I thought to myself. You didn't think it was that big a deal when you were doing the same to her.
And it's also always a big deal when the abuse happens to the parents. One time, I remember my sibling saying something relatively minor to my mom. It was something along the lines of "Oh, great!" and then her going to her room and slamming the door. My mom didn't take it, asked my sister to come out, and told her not to speak to her disrespectfully.
It was devastating to me that my parents would stand up for themselves, but not for me. While abuse is devastating to the victim, denial has just as much of an impact. Denial may not be done out of malicious intentions, but it is malicious in its effects. Denial leads parents to not protect their children from harm. And similarly to abuse, denial leads to a lack of trust from child to parent.
Someone once told me that, contrary to popular belief, it is not impossible to change others. But to change others you must change yourself. Parents who want to end the abuse in their families must first change themselves. Get out of denial. It's too dangerous in there.
In life, many relationships come and go. You get new classmates, meet new neighbors, make new friends, break off relationships with boyfriends or girlfriends and find new lovers. But there is one relationship that we're told is always constant, that lasts forever, that can never be severed. That is the family relationship. No matter the changes we go through in life, we are tied to our families forever. We are told that the love for one's family is unconditional. Even through their disagreements, "deep down" families will always love each other. Just like The Birth Order Bias, this belief is also bullshit.
Pretty recently, I cut off a relationship with one of my siblings. I've gone through estrangements from her before, but this one seems even more serious and long-lasting. I don't know if I'll ever be close with her again, or if I even want to. She has brought immense amounts of pain to my life, and getting rid of her has been akin to cutting out a tumor. I'm glad she's gone and I don't want her back.
I have a memory from when I was little of me lying on the floor of my bedroom, crying about something my siblings had done to me. My parents were there, sitting above me, trying to calm me down. What my mother said that night is something I'll never forget. She looked down at me and said, "They say that family you can always kick around, because they won't leave you like other people will." I find that interesting. Is it really admirable or healthy to assume we will never leave our families?
Cutting off my sister has been one of the best things I've done so far in my personal war on sibling abuse. Since I last saw her, I've seen a change. She looks at me nervously, and is careful with her words when she speaks to me. She's scared. She knows that I am this.close. to leaving her. And she knows it's because of how she's treated me.
I know many other people who have similarly estranged themselves from siblings who were abusive. For many of them, ending their relationship with their abusers has been nothing but beneficial. Many of these people found an immense sense of peace after cutting ties with ones who treated them with senseless cruelty.
There is a stigma attached to leaving one's family. Because of the sacredness associated with family, to cut off that attachment is one of the biggest sins one can commit in our society. I would argue that not only is it not always a bad thing to leave one's family behind; it is also sometimes necessary and admirable.
To cut ties with an abuser is to protect love. It is NOT loving to consistently treat someone cruelly. If one were to continue a relationship with someone who consistently treats them disrespectfully, that person would be rewarding unloving behavior. Abusers need to be taught that they are not loved when they are being unlovable. Conditional love has its place, even in the family!
Love is resilient, and can withstand humans who act imperfectly. But a human being who willfully mistreats another does not deserve love.
