Perhaps you're sort of like me and you can tend to want to see the best in people, even forgiving them for terrible behaviour in the past and wanting to start anew with a clean slate.
This is all well and good unless you run into a perpetual narcissist with a nasty streak. There's that saying that goes, "When someone shows you who they really are, believe them the first time." I'm learning this the hard way with a member of my family. My father and I had been estranged again for over 2 years before he landed in hospital and I felt that the compassionate thing to do would be to contact him. He assured me that the past was the past and that he "wasn't a fool anymore," and I hoped for the best.
Well, the past didn't stay in the past very long before old toxic ways of relating to and treating people crept up again. When I was a child living through the trauma inflicted on me by him, I was stuck. I had no "out," no way of escape. This time, though, I am an adult and have agency to choose what I will and won't put up with.
And I'm pretty much done with his shit...again. It's so very sad when you realize, sometime for the hundredth time, that this is actually who he/she is and that there is likely never going to be a transformation. I have too much respect for myself and where I've been to live through much more maltreatment.
I think often we want so much to have healthy, even close relationships with our blood relatives, and it's a disappointment when that proves to be impossible. If you're in a similar situation, go easy on yourself and realize that you're worthy of being treated consistently with dignity and respect.
mark-andrew
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