Parents Pose a Pretty Potent Problem

Here's the deal. Ever since I've been a toddler. My parents have been spent on creating problems for me -- finding problems in me. Medical problems. First it was enuresis (bed-wetting) which was an assault of 5-6 docotrs. Next it was food allergies, which was extensive testing and a barrage of doctors. Then it was a variety of psychological disorders ranging from panic attacks, to bipolar, to anxiety disorder (which was handfuls of psychiatrists).

Now unlike hypochondriacs who willingingly choose to go see doctors and don't really have a disorder, I was forced by parents to go see all these doctors who simply manufactured that I have a problem, when I don't. The only problem I have is a financial one, but they love trying to take care of emotional, psychological, or physical problems, but I don't have any of those. I'm quite sure that they have a variety of psychological issues that they project onto me -- their oldest son.

It's their way of feeling intimate and as though they can care about their child. I'm 23 now and realize how abusive it's been. They really couldn't have parented any worse. Atleast if they physically abused me (beat me), I would have been aware of the abuse, but this was worse because it was so destructive

You can make the case that these are out of "concern" and "caring", but doing so would be a fallacious error because this is abuse.

I'm curious if anyone can relate to this. I'm still financially dependent on the bastards, but if I wasn't, because they so blindly try to create problems for me, I would be long gone.

Again, I'm posting to see if any has had similar experiences to hear their thoughts and how they dealt.

I can't say I've ever experienced any of this, but to me--and I'm no doctor--it sounds like Munchausen by Proxy. (You can get more info about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munchausen_by_proxy )

The basic gist of it is that, in order to play a martyr role, parents fabricate or cause illnesses in their children, thereby gaining sympathy, etc. I think there's a forum here for it, under factitious disorders--maybe you could check it out, and someone there would be better able to help you.

Hope that helps a little.

chiyo_no_saru wrote:I can't say I've ever experienced any of this, but to me--and I'm no doctor--it sounds like Munchausen by Proxy. (You can get more info about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munchausen_by_proxy )

The basic gist of it is that, in order to play a martyr role, parents fabricate or cause illnesses in their children, thereby gaining sympathy, etc. I think there's a forum here for it, under factitious disorders--maybe you could check it out, and someone there would be better able to help you.

Hope that helps a little.

Yes, chiyo, thank you VERY Much for the response. You didn't provide a lot of new information (I am aware of MBPS, my parent's condition and the similarity to it, the presence of a MBPS forum, and the like), but your attempt to help is much appreciated. You did provide a single fact of new information: "in order to play a martyr role?" Don't understand that. Martyrdom is dying for a cause, who's being the martyr? the parents in mbps? that confused me. I definitely understand how they fabricate or create illnesses to gain sympathy, but whom do they gain sympathy from? Other parents, sympathy from? Other parents? Sympathy from the child?

My parents don't "cause illness" but they fabricate them so strongly and viciously that you practically end up believing you have it which is perceptively, identical to actually having it.

If I've been tangled up in MBPS, it would be helpful to learn about answers to the questions I just posted and more, and most importantly the safest way out of the quagmire -- fast and effectively!!

The remark about the martyr role brought to mind the travails of my Aunt and her 2nd daughter. When my Aunt was 17 she had her first daughter, Bonnie, then two years later had Betsy. When Betsy was 6 years old she got very ill will equine encephelitis, had a high fever that lasted for weeks, and was in a coma. My Aunt had to pack her in ice and hand feed her liquids with a straw. This was in 1938 in the country, rural farm community, so there was no money for medical care of any sort. When my cousin Betsy came out of the coma she was mentally damaged, and for the rest of her life had the intellectual capacities of a slow 6 year old. My Aunt cared for her until her own death at age 63. (Now Betsy lives in a group home for retarded adults.) All during these years my Mother, her sister, called her a martyr for sacrificing her life to care for this damaged child, at the expense of the healthy child Bonnie, who grew up emotionally neglected, and ran off and got pregnant at 18 to escape the unhappy home life.
I have never come to any judgements about this myself one way or the other. I could see my Aunt's devotion to her crippled child being a labor of love, but also a little obsessive. she did the best she could with a terrible situation. Bonnie went on to have four sons and a full life, living to 73 as a happy mother and grandmother.
This is in no way like Munchausen's syndrome. My Aunt would have loved nothing more than for Betsy to have had a full and healthy life, like her sister Bonnie. They just got dealt a bad hand. So I don't think my Aunt was being a martyr, even though my Mother had little patience with her, being as she felt sorry for Bonnie.
My family history is full of mundane tragedies, such as mental illness, PTSD from wars, poverty, and ignorance. I have studied my recent ancestors to gain insight into why they were the way they were. My grandmother was schizophrenic, her father was a pedeophile, we have some murderers and some murder victims in our family tree. It may help you to look at your parent's histories to see how the big picture has unfolded, and your role in it. What made your parents the people they became? They were once little children, who came from people who were once little children, and so forth down through time. Look at history to understand your little corner of humanity.
A closing note: never take money from those you hate.

No better a bleeding heart than a suffering child. Definitely whoring for sympathy.

Yeah, I can relate here.

I never thought anything was wrong with me as a child until people would always point out to me that there probably is. I'd always be happy off in my own little world then people would eventually come along to try and tear it down. My parents especially would always point out my so called 'flaws', and then one day I questioned if maybe I was flawed. But, now that I'm older (24) I can see that there is no right or wrong as to how someone should think or behave. Yeah, I might think and act differently from others, but so does everyone else, but yet I don't considered everyone else flawed for it; that's the difference between me and everyone else

Leave me alone, I'll leave you alone... where's the problem? There is none, because I don't create problems for myself.

This is very much like my Dad and his partner, with my Step Sister.

Ever since she was born, 6 years ago, 7 almost, I have felt like everything from then until now is my fault, why ??? because I was abused by my Aunty's Boyfriend, when I was younger and my Dad was never around to save me, you could say.

Between when he found out about the abuse and when my Step Sister was born, a part of him changed and he became very angry, depressed, withdrawn, even more so and clingy.

Now Dad was never around me longer than 7 hours at a time and for me to go from Dad being like that to me, to Dad being all smothering of my Step Sister and constantly being around my Step Sister, a part from work and sleep, it's left me in a pretty fragile state of mind whenever I'm in the presence of my Step Sister because I feel she is better than me, she's 6 and I'm 21.

I mean what 2 different extremes and I am the one most affected.