family conflict (not spoken to brother in years and years)

LegacyUser

When I was in school I was a bullies wet dream. Quiet, thick glasses, zero self confidence, yeah I took abuse I did my best and got over it.

My younger brother was some little **** though. Quick witted, strong, fit, popular with the ladies, everything I wasn't. And turned half the village against me.

I'd be 17 on the school bus and get conkers and abuse from gangs of 15 and 16 years old. Said nothing, I'd get laughed at for doing nothing.

Left school, worked in a local factory for a year, they'd see me in pubs and nightclubs with my friends and throw abuse. The odd night I'd be leaving and walking home and get a bottle across my head. What can I do? Go home and say my younger brother and friends are bullying me??? Asked my dad, he told me to man up in so many words

Sure some nights I'd arrange to meet some girl in a bar and I was afraid to walk in on my own as I feared they'd be there and see me on my own waiting, oh no friends.....social reject. Or embarrass me in front of a girl. I've never set foot in the local pub in our local village and I'm in my twenties. I lived in the local town in a houseshare and I'd time my shopping to avoid the lunch breaks of the secondary schools, how timid is that! Or arrange to go out on Fridays as I knew those lads used to go out on Fridays. Yes, I was timid

Went to college worked in the local hotel as barman part time. Him and his little friends there the odd night giving me hassle. Grabbing my tie while I was out collecting glasses on the floor. Or the brother would be driving, I'd be strolling down the street and I'd get the finger and a roar of abuse. Why? Not spoken to him in months.....

Finished college, got a good graduate job away and moved away. Parents ask me why I never visit home and I never say why and truth is I can't face confrontation. If I went home and reacted or threw a punch I'd be labelled as being in the wrong.
I'm the kind of person who takes hassle for ages and ages then one day I explode and get labelled as overreacting!


When I lived at home I never set foot in the same room as my brother. I'd eat dinner then leave and then he'd enter. Or other way around. My mother saw the conflict but thought we were equally to blame. "Sure you're worse to be minding him and letting it get to you"
I'd watch TV in the sitting room and he would not come in and vice versa.
If I got married I would not invite him, if he died I would not go to his funeral, am I bitter?
But with bullying, yes I had serious suicidal thoughts in the past.

It's like I've been scared all my life. I took **** from his friends and I don't even know their names and they don't know me but whatever the brother tells them and they saw me at 17-23 as quiet and unconfident and roar abuse at me. I'd be driving down the street and they give my the finger, why?? I'd walk down the street to a pub with friends and they'd roar abuses at me across the street, why??? I've not spoken to them in years. They do not even know me

It's like I'm scared all my life and I was an easy target. And I reckon I brought this on myself, it's my fault I'm look a victim or easy target and possibly deserve it.
Would like to visit home some day and be closer to parents. They must think I'm cold and don't even care to go home. The opposite is the case.

Some say bullies are insecure cowards. I don't realy agree, my brother has tenfold of the confidence, looks, fitness, girlfriends, friends and popularity I ever had. I think it's too much confidence and picking on a weak target if anything

Beruthiel

scaredalltime wrote: »

My mother saw the conflict but thought we were equally to blame. "Sure you're worse to be minding him and letting it get to you"

She was the adult, the parent, she should have come up with better help than that. She could have at least attempted to sort it out.

You can choose your friends, not your family.
Your brother is a grade A asshole and it's time to take back the power you gave him over you.

You're now a grown adult, with a good job and a life of your own.
Hold your head up high and know that he can no longer treat you like a piece of sh!t, because you will no longer allow it.

His effect on you still exists in your head, I'd suggest a professional to help you realise that this should no longer be the case.
Time to get help so you can get past how he treated you.

If you wish to see your parents, why not invite them to your home?

Taltos

Beruthiel wrote: »

If you wish to see your parents, why not invite them to your home?

But make it clear only they are welcome...

LegacyUser

OP here, thanks all
Yes, in some ways I used it as a motivation and worked damn hard to succed.
Worked damn hard at my leaving cert and college and got a good graduate job at after a few years earned 50k plus while the brother was on the dole with the cronies or some in Australia. Nothing wrong with Australia of course. Traveling is good but these lot, most have no leaving cert and sorry, but the age of top wages for building site labourers is over.
I look down on nobody, I was a hotel barman and porter in college

Sorry, in now way am I running down the unemployed, I could be there tomorrow but what I'm saying is I was the first in my family to finish college and worked damn hard to get a 50k plus salary.

Beruthiel wrote: »

You can choose your friends, not your family.

This quote got me though. I somehow view if I got married and my brother was not there it was somewhat of a scandal. Now I do not care.

The best revenge is living well and I've a good job, girlfriend I care about and some interest like marathon running.
I'll never invite my brother to a future wedding and the family would erupt and call me bitter but sorry, bullying stay with me for life.

And I will never forget the hell I went through at 17 and I was damn close to suicide.

You know there was a study once and it was found the worst thing to happen a child in school was not losing their parents and becoming an orphan. It was bullying, and I believe it!

BEST REVENGE IS LIVING WELL!

Beruthiel

SCAREDalltime wrote: »

I somehow view if I got married and my brother was not there it was somewhat of a scandal.

I wouldn't view it that way.
On one of the best days of your life, you have the right to only have people you care about there. End of.

I do think you need to talk to a professional about him though.
Clearly he still has a strong effect on you and you won't ever be truly free of him till you can get past that.

CorkMan

My Dad has a similar brother. When my Dad was small he beat up a boy of a similar age in a fight, but the boy's older brother gave my Dad a big punch. My Dad's brother was friends with this guy but he only gave my Dad a punch and said for him to be quiet. My Aunt was a superb swimmer when she was a teenager, she won many competitions and got very far in it, she was even on TV for the Olympic qualifiers. But My Dad's brother only put her down, calling her a monkey and a big ape. Sure one time she came back from London with her 2 boys and the brother came down the stairs and beat her up because she was a bit late.

The same man doesn't even show up at the families weddings, 21's, christenings. But before he thought he was very macho, acting all hard and that. He used to hit my Dad sometimes when he was 12, 13 and was Dad was 5 and 6. But when my Dad was 16 and the brother was 23 the heads clashed and my Dad beat him up, that was the end of the brother acting all macho. The brother is 60 today and still at home, my grandparents have passed away and he sleeps in the house alone, naked on the couch. The brother worked in some factory down the country for years, and got his compo. I think he bet it all away in a couple of months.

LegacyUser

OP I went through a very similar childhood, except with me it was my older brother whom I idolised. Think I was about 6 when I finally figured out following him around and copying everything he did just made him mad and I'd get a punch. Fair enough he was only 4 years older, would probably have been really annoying to a 10 year old. However it didn't stop there, continued as we got older even though I had my own friends, interests etc. Would ridicule all my friends, and if they called over would be all friendly with them and try to humiliate me of front of them to embarrassed and polite laughter from them, same with girlfriends he would put down, she's a dog, is that the best you can do etc etc, would be really good to my two younger brothers, invite them along to any event and say no if I tried to come as well, always tried to involve them in whatever his latest humiliation would be when they were too young to understand there was genuine maliciousness behind it.

Like you I was told there was the two of us in it, if I retaliated in any way it would invariably be my fault and what's worse my father always took his side no matter the bruises, latest bloody nose I would be sporting as he was the mystical first born.

Seemed to be never ending, morning, noon and night, punched in the back walking up to bed, waking in the middle of the night pinned to my bed with him spitting in my face, leaving the room laughing and telling me I was worthless, punched in the back of the head as I brushed my teeth in the morning.

Decided by the age of 17 I'd had enough, was so tired of it, at this stage I had become a complete insomniac and could only truly sleep when I stayed on my own with my grandparents. That stopped when my grandmother came to live with us after my granddad died.

Looking back find it hard to believe at the age of 17 it was possible to feel that numb, tired of life and just wanting all the pain to end, but I did, so I did what I would never even contemplate now and tried to end it. Wasn't a cry for help as I didn't believe there was any.

Was caught in the nick of time by my best mate and after a week in intensive care I was home again where my older brother on my first night home punched me in the face as he wanted to use the toaster and I had selfishly already started using it. That was the night I ran away from home but after calling my Mam the second night after sleeping rough the first agreed to come home as she was so upset.

That was the last time my brother overtly bullied me without consequence. Not because of me being in hospital, and definitely not because of me running away (he whispered when I got home that he'd hoped I wouldn't be back). No it was because I decided the heart break my Mam had gone through in the hospital when she'd thought she'd lost me not to mention me running out into the night in the middle of winter without even a jacket on was enough. I couldn't let him continue.

Last memory I have of physical or mental abuse stopped two mornings later when as he passed me at the breakfast table he kindly spat in my cereal. I stood up, he looked at me with a sneer which lasted all of one second before he was lying on the floor dazed with a broken nose. I then emptied my cereal bowl into the sink and left it there, picked up his untouched cereal, sat back down and ate without talking. He left the room in shock and that was the end of it. I can still remember clearly thinking "wonder what he'll do next" and then realising I just didn't care, it was never going to get to me again. Think he realised it because that apart from the usual intermittent sibling stuff was the end of it.

OP sorry if I seemed to go off on a ramble there but there was a point to it. I just wanted to get some context behind what I'm going to say next.

The above is only the tip of the iceberg of what in the end adversely affected me for years, more so as despite me best efforts I could not let go of the resentment I felt for the years and years of constant bullying, and the way in later years it would be lightly talked about on family occasions and unintentionally glossed over with jokes about how bad kids can be to each other with no understanding of how much it had hurt.

Mostly I just wanted to ask why? Why had he treated me like that for years and yet been so good to my younger brothers? And to stop feeling bitter whenever we met, to try and let go and just get on with my life and love my brother the same way I loved my other brothers.

In the end I did manage to let it go. Took one of my other brothers to open my eyes and show me that he was no longer the nasty kid/teenager/young adult that he had been. That he was now a really nice guy, a wonderful father and husband and the kind of brother I had wished for all those years ago. Never realised until I saw him as he is now and has been for a long time just what a weight I'd carried, and cannot describe the relief to finally let go of all the bad memories and put it to rest.

So OP, all I'm saying (and taking a long time saying it), try to let it go. Doesn't mean you have to be best mates with him, doesn't even mean you have to be mates with him. As was already said, you can choose your friends but not your family. He will more than likely be there for the rest of your life. That's a long time. Try to look at the person you see before you now, and not to see him through the eyes of a sad and tortured 17 year old. You might be surprised, I was.