Bullies

[julie]

...in my personal life just now i am living with some pretty costly long term side-effects of myself and my children being systematically bullied.

...on reflection of many threads/posts on here, i recognise that i am not alone in this experiencing. i want to share a link to a website that has helped me get a handle on just how skillful bullies can be... and so recognise more quickly when myself, or people i care about are being manipulated or even doing the manipulating in this insidious way.

http://www.bullyonline.org/related/family.htm

love Julie x

[Solomon]

thank you very much for that link Julie

to be honest it was like reading a previous employer's MO. lol!

he's recently been axed.... like last week.... flex said it was the only time she's seen me get off of work with a smile that big....

[flexuality]

Julie,

After reading quite a bit of that site, well...I had to stop actually! lol!

That was my mother and my ex.......I have dealt with a lot of that stuff, and they still continue at every opportunity to try to keep on doing that....I just don't give them opportunity at all if I can help it...I have had to take some pretty drastic measures along the way too....

I don't know what kind of things you're dealing with, but if you want to PM, email, post here...I'm around quite a bit...

[julie]

...well all that stuff is pretty near the knuckle for me....and my children.

I'm glad you both found the link helpful... it has certainly helped me to recognise where much of mine and my childrens guilt, confusion and pain stems from...

even though knowing all this doesn't stop the power imbalance, financial insecurity and dehumanising behaviour, at least i know now that my ex-husband and birth father to my kids is a serial bully with psychopathic tendances.

This knowledge empowers me n my kids in recognising the manipulation and behaviour patterns we have to live with.... it also reminds them and me that although he plays innocent victim who is completely misunderstood whenever he cant wriggle out of the truth we can see that this is just another of his games.

This also means that our bully radar is very effective and we all very quickly recognise when a bully is about or someone is being bullied... its the covert, out of awareness stuff that screams abuse.

Thanks for responding Flex and Sol

love Julie x

[Solomon]

it was a very informative link

one challenge that i have with it though... and i find this challenge in almost everything that attempts to describe the behaviour patterns of abusive cycles... is that what criteria? like it's fairly obvious to me that anyone could be included in that list at certain times, and alot of people can have a 'sense' about what constitutes the bullying

but one of the therapists that i've worked with once asked me that question in terms of my own history... as to what sets the criteria for it being an instantly recognizable cycle?

i realize that they're just hitting the tip of the iceburg so to speak in understanding the dynamics of the cycle... but in almost everything i've come across in trying to understand these cycles still is lacking that firmness of being able to distinguish between cyclic behaviour and coincedental expressions of time to time....

of course one thing that is very notable is that it's hardly likely that the perpetrators could be forced into a clinical setting and studied for any length of time lol

and the behaviours aren't provable, yet they are very real.... and even asking the victims after the being exposed to the behaviours is too much hear-say

like with my own experiences there's no way that i'm able to record each and every little telling nuance, or body language, or voice inflection.... and VERY often in these cases as noted in the links you've provided, these people KNOW what they're doing with sending the intended message and still keep it unspoken

on the other hand one thing that i am very grateful for is that awareness of the mentality and the dysfunctionality in itself is definately on the rise... that gives me a great deal of confidence in believing that at some point there will be a definate set of criteria to be able to help everyone involved

another challenge that i have is with the current solution..... the current solutions need to be alot more balanced

like it's great that they can pinpoint a problem within a family or business dynamic, but the cycle tends to create ripples of effect throughout the entire family or business that simply should never be ignored

i'm not sure i can agree with the concept that it's almost always with one person within the group, because with my own experiences the ripples that were created were based on the thinking, and i believe that the old saying of 'birds of a feather flock together' definately applies

so if we can accept that, then now there's an entire family or business that needs help with elevating their thinking to move on beyond the 'blame game' mentality...

[Solomon]

btw, just to be clear, i'm not trying in any way to minimize what you're experiencing right now... and i certainly validate that once these cycles are found to be true then there must be some corrective actions taken

[julie]

..Thanks Sol,

..no I don't feel my experiencing is minimised by your comments.

.. I agree that there are degrees of any behaviour. The reason this profile struck such a resounding chord with me was that the profile of a psychopathic bully was and remains, so very much in tune with the personality of my ex-husband and biological father to my three children.

Even more relevantly, the extreme symptoms of psychological injury and complex post traumatic stress breakdown for the victims of psychopathic bullying are textbook to my own symptoms when i finally broke down just over four years ago now.

http://www.bullyonline.org/stress/ptsd.htm

Recently, one of my children has been mirroring the bullying behaviour of 'the father' ..... this has caused deep distress for all of us and the child in question has moved in with a family friend to give us all time out whilst we reflect on the best way forward to deal with this.

I have found the website extremely helpful. Whilst i recognise that my ex husband in all probability seems to fit ALL the categories that describe someone living with a psychopathic personality disorder... my offending child does not. I can perceive that much of my child's behaviour is indeed learned from this parent as an outlet for displaced rage at our family situation. I believe it stems from despair of my childrens loving spirit.... rather than the pure hatred and evil which appears to underpin the fathers actions.

Julie.

[Solomon]

flex an i definately can relate to the emotional roller coaster ride.... it's just not a pleasant journey by any stretch

but we believe you'll get through the gettin through (((((((((((((((Julie))))))))))))

and our hearts an prayers are with ya :cool:

[julie]

....i guessed you may relate to a lot of this stuff.

many thanks to both of you for your kind empathic words

love julie x

[flexuality]

Been reading more on that website...it really does have some good info...it's hard to read sometimes though...it can be triggering, so I have to stop every so often and go play with glitter graphics or something..hehe!

Complex PTSD.....been there, done that. Yeah, my ex fits that profile too (and my mother)....one of the hardest things I had to deal with while living in that hell, was that no one believed me that he was like that. He was a friggen MASTER of the "charm" game. He still pulls that crap with the kids...two of them bought into it...and a third one sorta did......that's a subject I don't like to talk about much....not yet....hurts too much.....out of 5 kids, 2 live with me and Sol.

Kids....well, hardly...4 of'em are adults actually....

Been through the "mirroring the bullying behaviour of 'the father' " with 2 of the kids (the ones that ended up buying into his lies)...it was a nightmare going through that and we had to finally say "no more"...they live elsewhere now. They still behave like he did.....

One of the things I am almost at my wit's end with now though, is that my autistic daughter mirrors that behaviour too....though without the intent behind it (it is rote to her), but still with the intensity to it. It's like hearing her father and her sisters all over again...day after day after day....it never stops....and being autistic, she can't just be reasoned with or change this behaviour easily (if at all....unlearning is damn near impossible for autisitcs) I get "attacked" by her constantly.....it's wearing me out....

Have you noticed that when you live in that kind of situation, that after a while you don't notice it and you don't realize the effect it's having on you sometimes? Then all of a sudden, something happens and it hits you.....

***the following is really just 'processing' - me getting this shit out***

I left my ex in 1999 (or rather finally got him to LEAVE...I had 5 kids...where was I gonna go?) after being held prisoner by him (literally) for 9 months...he cut my access to a car, money...everything....tapped the phone (I found that one out later...)...I couldn't even buy my own sanitary pads. I lived with a $20 dollar bill, 1 quarter and my kids birth certificates on my person 24 hours a day, my mother living downstairs and on his side after being my "best friend" all my life, writing up her affidavit against me for him to use in court....then having a court order presented to me saying that he had custody of all the kids (the same kids he hated until he found out that I wanted out of the marriage).....

The day that court order showed up was a day from hell. I became like a mother grizzly protecting her cubs...I think I scared him and my mother that day too! lol! They, in turn, started telling the kids all kinds of bullshit about me...blackening my name big time...it was awful....

I managed to intercept the mail the next day (he even changed his work hours so that he could be home when the mail arrived and took cheques made out to me) and got hold of a large cheque (God works in mysterious ways...) and used it as my bargaining chip to get that court order removed (he even lied to get that order, saying that he had no idea where I was)

And that was just a tiny part of what I lived with.......

[flexuality]

speaking of glitter....hehe!!

http://pic.piczo.com/img/i116209739_52778.gif

[julie]

....I hear you loud and clear Flex and my heart truly goes out to you, Sol and all your children.

.... I cant begin to imagine the pain you must experience with your autistic daughter, no surprises that you are at your wits end with her. I hope and pray that you can find some respite, somehow from this seemingly hopeless cycle of learned behaviour from her....

....what we have gone through and continue to go through is truly vile.

....few people can really grasp just how evil and far reaching this shit is....

....I always feel like I'm being a drama queen when it all gets too much and I'm trying to explain why I feel so fucking wretched and suicidal. The fact that only you you and Sol have felt able to respond to this thread shows just how heavy this stuff is.... folk don't want to go there, who can blame them eh?

....You two responding to this thread has made such a difference to my dealing with this current crisis you know... i think its because i no longer feel alone in this.... although that in itself is a double-edged sword as i feel sickened that you two also have to go through this shit... which is something i wouldn't wish on anybody.....

....With much love to both of you

....Julie x

[flexuality]

far reaching.....yeah, that one was an eye-opener for me....I thought that just getting out of that bad environment would be the end of it....like I said I left that in 1999.....and in 2001-2002 I realized that it was still affecting me big time...and the kids....

Went through about 2 years of counciling with a really great therapist...that helped immensly, but it still lingers......

What I have found is that I had to get myself out of "victim mentality" and stop blaming everything on my ex and my mother....yeah they did a lot of awful things and they are responsible for that, but when I kept "blaming" them in my mind, I was giving up responsibility for my own emotions...that was a hard thing to swallow, but it has been worth it.

I came across a saying somewhere...."When you blame, you give up your right to change." I have found that to be so true....

I still hold them responsible for what they did. I do my best tho, to avoid blame......don't know if that makes any sense....

Oh, and I know what you mean by feeling like a drama queen...

Hugs to ya!

[julie]

...Yup the victim mentality is a tough one to give up!

...Once I find myself on the 'poor me' road, blaming everything on my mother and ex too (snap, spooky eh?), I know I'm on a slippery slope giving my power away in bucketloads....

... of course, I tend not to notice I'm doing it until I spot one of my kids playing the 'blame game' then I think 'damn' it's me who has started this again!

... good therapy is amazing though.... i know i would never have survived this without such quality support together with my own training. This helps me act on 'physician heal thyself' knowledge when i really know it's just me and God against the world.

....everything you have said here makes perfect sense to me Flex.

love Julie x

[flexuality]

Ya ever have something trip a trigger...and ya start feeling abused or betrayed ( that connection between abuse and betrayal pointed out on that site really struck something in me.....) and you know that you're *not* being abused or betrayed, but ya still FEEL it? and then ya spend all this energy and time trying to remind yourself that it's NOT happening now, and that somehow the feelings are not appropriate...and all ya end up doing is invalidating your own feelings....

It's a hard thing to learn to let the feelings BE THERE even if they seem absurd sometimes....it's very confusing....especially when the triggering thing *could* be seen as betraying or abusive......it's so bloody hard to deal with that part....and yet I find that the worse thing to do is to deny those feelings...and just to make it even more 'fun', they usually set off the 'fight or flight' reponse, so thinking goes out the window...thus the drama queen lol

Another nugget I picked up...."You have to feel it to heal it"

I do appreciate being able to 'talk' about this though....it really does help to have someone know what I'm talking about...so thanks for that.