Between a Rock and a Hard Place

The relationship that I share with my family has never been that great. I’m the oldest of four by almost three years and from the age of eight the responsibility of maintaining the household was mine, as both of my parents worked long hours. I never had a normal childhood because of this, and a close sibling relationship never developed because I was seen as more of an authority figure than a brother.

When I was younger, my father had an affair which produced another child. My mother found out about this and attempted suicide after a legal separation. I was old enough to understand the situation in part, but never knew the truth. Eventually my parents worked their relationship out and renewed their wedding vows.

Growing up, I can remember that there was a distinct lack of emotional and affectionate expression within the family. Anger was the one emotion shown freely and though instances of physical abuse occurred near the time of my incarceration, verbal and emotional abuse was a constant occurrence in my life. For some reason, my siblings were almost never the focus of it; I drew the brunt of it all.

When I was 14, I discovered the details about my half-sister for the first time. I instantly resented the years of deception by my parents and my relationship with them, however twisted it may have been, was shattered. From that point on, I chose to do whatever I wanted to, and often times did things to instigate trouble. In combination with other aspects of my life, things quickly spiraled out of control.

Today, our relationship remains toxic. Because of the things that were done just prior to my incarceration, my family places the sole blame for every problem in their individual lives on me and, admittedly, I deserve some of the blame. There exists a great amount of anger, resentment, and fear within the individual members of my family that is directed toward me.

The trouble is that my family is completely blind to the issues that we face as a family. I am constantly reminded of the part I played in our issues, and the effects that has had on the family. I am also made a scapegoat for their own unresolved feelings and issues. It is as if resolving my personal issues will also resolve theirs.

This leaves me with a troubling problem. More than anything else in this world, I want my family to be healed and to be a part of my life. As things stand now, that cannot happen. Though my own issues are no longer an obstacle to healing, theirs are still in the way. I realize that I can do nothing about this and that, because they continue to deny the reality of the situation, things will probably never be resolved.

Because my family has such a negative effect on my life, I can now clearly see that in order to continue my own progress and have a chance at succeeding in life, I must cut them from it.
Only it’s not that simple. First of all, I love my family, no matter how dysfunctional it is. Love is what makes any decision regarding my family important and hard to make.

Also, I’m extremely stubborn. I know that my family is bad for me, and cutting them from my life is the right thing to do at this point, yet do I want to do it?

I know that I cannot heal my family on my own. I can do nothing to resolve their issues. I cannot change things. Yet I don’t want to give up. Even though I know that the issue is not mine anymore, I see my family the way it is as a failure of mine and I never let a failure go unresolved.

I must choose between three options. The first is to cut my family from my life and move on. No doubt this will cause me a great deal of pain and guilt added to that which I already feel. It will also hurt them and leave them with unanswered questions. I do not know if I have the strength to spare for the weight it will place on my already overloaded conscience.

The second option is to let my family know exactly where I stand and let them choose to either acknowledge and resolve their issues or continue with their lives without me. This could completely backfire on me by allowing them to the opportunity to deceive me as they have in the past.

However, it could open their eyes to reality and be the first real step in achieving my goal of repairing my broken family. What I need to say to them though, will definitely stir the pot of already volatile emotions, and make it fairly easy for them to blame me for shattering the fragile relationship that is currently in existence.

My third choice is to accept things as they are and continue the charade that suggests that things will eventually get better. If I do this, my family’s toxicity threatens my very life. The constant negativity that exists in my family has caused me to break in my past; twice leading to violent encounters that have resulted in incarceration, and once in an attempted suicide. It is almost certain that if things continue as they are, such an event may occur again--either by my own actions or the emotion-driven actions of another family member.

Coming up on parole, the need to make decisions such as these are instrumental to my chances of success in life. My issues run far deeper than criminality, incarceration, and the need to learn how to live an adult life. My family issues further complicate an already complicated life, and the decisions I must make regarding them are far from easy.

Whatever decision I make, I can be sure that its consequences will affect the course of my life.

I only wish that I didn’t have to choose.