I was never taught how to be a daughter, my mother unable to understand how to be a mother herself, my path grew from here into one where any role I had, became impossible to navigate.
I failed as a daughter, I failed as a sibling…. I grew up without them around me like a normal family, my sister limited to a set amount of times per year, for a set amount of hours. My brother forced into a boarding school, I didn’t understand just knew he would be back home occasionally then gone again.
It was normal for me, but I never learned how to be a sibling, how to be with relationships
I never knew how the failing of these two would impact me for the future, and its only through C.A.T therapy (Cognitive Analytic Therapy), that I know now how connected all this is.
As I grew friendships became impossible, social interactions a strange thing, My reactions and actions though, I assumed normal, as a young child with no other role model, this was normal right… to be angry at everyone, to be constantly negative, to shout and scream just because, to lash out verbally and physically at your child because they were under your feet, to allow them to feel unloved and wanted, to feel scared of walking through the house unsure what would be around the corner. Growing up hearing constantly how the world was about to end. Growing up watching your own parent preferring the company of others, growing up hearing talk that one shouldn’t be hearing at that age.
To be brought up in a world where other people were always the problem, yet the reality was completely the opposite.

As a teenager, growing into hormones, growing into a young women, her body violated in many ways, for me that was normal, when professionals turned a blind eye,
As a teenager rebelling at school silently screaming out for help yet ignored, this was normal too right?
Friends? What where they? I would make one, didn’t know how to treat them so they would walk away, this was normal too right?
Loneliness her own company, one she learned fast to thrive in, relationships where safer if avoided.

As a adult, starting to see the world differently, when holding your first born in your arms, the first time ever feeling unconditional love, but it wasn’t too last, as her past caught up, unknown trauma meaning failure soon landed down hard. Snatched, taken, stolen, the baby no longer in my arms.
The pattern repeated itself , Pain hitting in hard, no true understanding, just the constant feeling of failure, rejection, no true understanding.

As a adult, seeing the world, friends out enjoying each others company, shopping, meals, movies, just company that you knew was safe and beautiful, I craved this, but it wasn’t too be, Learnt behaviour from the past, friendships never flowed, and I would end up creating problems, ending the friendships, because I simply didn’t know how to maintain them to a standard, I failed over and over and over.
A pattern I understand now through CAT, that there was no escape route that I could use safely, as I simply didn’t understand what I was going through as it was all just normal.

I never learned how to exist within relationships. No matter what they were Friendships became impossible. Social interactions felt unfamiliar, almost unnatural.
But my reactions? My behaviour?
That all felt normal. Because when you’re raised without a healthy reference point, chaos doesn’t feel like chaos, it feels like home.

Standing today, I realise I have failed once again, as I see that somewhere along the way, those patterns didn’t just disappear. I think for a long time I convinced myself they had. Or maybe I just didn’t look too closely, because looking too closely would have meant admitting that despite everything I thought I’d changed… something in me was still responding in the same ways.
Tolerating thing things I shouldn’t. The way I question yourself before you question someone else. The way I instinctively take responsibility for how things feel, even when I didnt fully understand why.
I know now that I dont just carry memories of my childhood, but what was learned within it. The parts that sometimes its easier to take full blame, because its normal, that its normal too accept unacceptable behaviour towards yourself, that my normal, isn’t normal.

Patterns can be changed, through help and support, but its so easy to slip back into those places without even realise you are doing it. Not because you want too but because its familiar. Anything to avoid failing again, but I even failed at that!!!

All I ever wanted was a normal life. A normal family. A normal home. Something steady, something safe, something I didn’t have to question.
Instead I live a life I question every single day, unsure where I stand, whether I truly am wanted, questioning my next move, am I just a moment until something better comes along, as I have failed on everything in their life too for them, my failures falling into their path, loosing them their future, their hope, their plans.

Ive failed as a daughter failed as a sister failed as a mother now failed as a wife..

I question over and over, when will all this stop?
Or will it only be when I finally take my last breath?