I need some impartial third party advice.
I told my mom the other day that she clearly doesn’t love or care about me because of the way she voted. I don’t believe she can both love her trans daughter while simultaneously willingly inflicting as much suffering as possible.
I decided to block her for a few days.
My aunt, who also hated Trump, is someone I could previously confide in. She cold shouldered me after I sent her the text I had previously sent to my mom.
Finally my aunt was an adult and texted me back last night with this.
“Thought would not have any effect. Didn’t like text you sent your mom. U R on my naughty list was not nice, u owe her an apology. Election wasn’t close decisive across country broke blue wall. Like it or not will be our president next 4yrs be an adult accept & move on!! U take too personal & how it impacts you. We all have choices/decisions it’s about Respect can’t expect others to respect yours if you can’t extend the same courtesy to others. No idea what u r talking about lying never questioned or said you were on job search, good luck with that. I’m taking a long break, disappointed have my own health/medical issues to address so focusing on that & me now. Happy Thanksgiving”
Now this is a person who texted me constantly about what a “pig fucker” Trump is, then she went radio silent a week before the election. When I inquired about the post election results she said “the world isn’t ready for a woman president so I didn’t even vote.” I have a strong feeling she actually voted for Trump and couldn’t stomach telling me that to save face.
Anyways- so I did call my mom and try to apologize against my better judgement. She didn’t answer so I left a voicemail. Basically I said I’m sorry I reacted that way, and I’m under a lot of stress.
She hasn’t replied in text or called back continuing to cold shoulder me essentially throwing my apology in my face.
Now I’m furious. My sister cut my mom out for months because my parents wouldn’t send her money for college. The second she called them back they took her in with open arms as if nothing ever happened. They never treat me that way. Brittany is the golden child of my mom and my stepdad (her current husband). The standards are entirely different for my sister and I. I’ve always been treated worse.
Based on this limited view of my family what should I do? I’m thinking about rescinding my apology and just cutting them out forever. To me it seems clear they don’t actually care about me at all.
When I was hospitalized for three days from my bike accident my mom never came to see me. She’s a 9 hour drive away. When I had my highly invasive SRS she never called to check on me when I was recovering in the hospital. She actively hated the fact I was even doing it telling me “I’ll never look right.”
Pretty sure she’s an objectively awful human being.
You don’t seem to be getting anything positive out of interacting with your family, if you’re not financially dependent on them I would cut bait and live my best life. The text from your aunt is such passive aggressive bullshit, on her naughty list? Fuck outta here.
Don’t think that things like “rescinding your apology” are necessary - just be done. If you can support yourself, and have friends or other people you can emotionally rely on, I would just simply “stop” with your family. Why “rescind your apology”, that will just start another argument for the sake of trying to give yourself some sort of moral high ground, which it aounds like your mother will not acknowledge.
You don’t need to make a statement about it, you don’t need to announce to them some big decision, just move on. Live a happy life. Be you. Don’t include them in that process if they are not going to be a positive part of it.
Don’t think that things like “rescinding your apology” are necessary - just be done. If you can support yourself, and have friends or other people you can emotionally rely on, I would just simply “stop” with your family.
This so much. If you’ve already concluded that the people in your family have a poor opinion of you for illegitimate reasons, then why are you trying to change their opinions with the “rescinding”? Just decide that you’ve already said your last words and be done with them.
Move forward with your life and build a family of your choosing, not the one you were forced to be in because of birth.
I’d like to pile on. You don’t owe them an apology and you don’t owe them an unapology. You are done wasting your time on them and if they ever come around like "you know, I think I finally accept your apology " you can think to your self “oh my no, get fucked” and you can inform them with… Radio silence
Not helpful but your aunt needs to take a grammar/English class.
OP claims she may have voted for trump, but her grammar confirms she definitely voted for trump.
Sounds like a movie reading of a telegram. Just missing the STOP after every sentence.
If she’s still paying by the letter, OP should be thankful. It could have been long-winded.
The world isn’t ready for a woman president
…so I went back to the well and voted for a known rapist for president. Long history of that, so no worries!
the world isn’t ready for a woman president so I didn’t even vote.
Aren’t we like the only country that still hasn’t had a woman leading the nation? Maybe I’m not the best to get family advice from but my family hasn’t heard from me for almost 2 decades now and I think you’d be a lot happier if you could say the same.
Sadly Canada also has never elected a woman to that position. We had one via retirement/internal leadership ballot very briefly as often happens when things go in the shitter and no man wants to take the job because it’s a Kobayashi Maru. She and her party were then obliterated. Not because their policies were shit and Canada was tired of them, but because you can’t have a woman Prime Minister.
I am unsure how much or what part of that needs a ~s
About 8 years here, wonderfully quiet and it’s a marvel for my mental wellbeing.
Remember, you don’t owe your parents or family anything.
If it works, then good for you! If it doesn’t, then you are completely entitled to treat it like an ex friend/ex coworker/… and nothing more.
Economical freedom us also a hell of a nice drug, good luck 💓 !
I’m gay. My nephew knows this. We are the same generation so he is more like a little brother to me. When he told me he voted for Trump I was so angry. I have cut him off. He and I were just beginning to get closer these last couple of years. This election wasn’t about different fiscal priorities. It was about our very survival. I guess we couldn’t overcome the propaganda thrown at us. If you are not dependent on your family for anything, I would cut them off.
This election wasn’t about different fiscal priorities. It was about our very survival.
So your prediction is that you are going to die, now that Trump won?
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Your aunt may be a tween with her first phone. I lost brain cells reading that and I’m sorry you had to as well.
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Are you saying 9 hours is a long time or a short time? For reference, when I almost lost my arm, family an hour away didn’t come visit. This was before the iPhone, so no FaceTime either. It was okay.
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Live a life you can love. You only get 80-odd years on this planet without a lot of extra work, so be the happiest you that you can be.
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We can’t choose our blood, but we can choose our family. I’m sorry yours is being shitty to you.
If this is newish behavior, then you may want to consider distancing yourself from them, give them time to come to their senses.
If this is just more of the same-old, same-old from them, then it might be time to consider making your own family. By that I mean being selective about who you keep and who you cull.
You are not required to keep in contact with horrible people, just because you happen to be related. There are plenty of other people out there who are worthy of your time and respect.
Your mom and aunt don’t at all get that voting for someone that wants to harm you as much as possibly is extremely different from disagreements on tone or policy foreign and domestic. They at used to an easy world back when politics was largely insignificant to life changes. I’m facing ethnic clensing after Trump’s win. This isn’t a joke, he’s very open that he’s going to denaturalize Hispanics, you know, remove their legal status that can take up to 30 years to achieve, and deport them anyway. There’s a lot of families being torn apart by this election, my wife is furious with family that voted in favor of ethnicity clensing her spouse and kids, stopping women from having a right to medical treatment in exactly the high risk pregnancies she wouldn’t have survived if these laws were in place in that time. It’s sickening. They are voting for fascism, racism, sexism, and hate.
They don’t get it, they’ve never taken politics seriously. And they think nothing will happen to them because they’re white women who have never faced abuse they can’t get out of. If you need peace from them, do so. Protect yourself, and I hope you live in a blue state.
Just throwing it out there that you can easily tell if she’s lying to you by looking up her public voting records.
It’ll say if she voted or not, and thus whether she’s being weird or outright untrustworthy.
It sounds like you need to move on and forget the people who don’t care about you. Anyone that does care will maintain contact, and if that’s nobody then at least you get to start anew.
About 4 times in my life, I’ve made major changes and cut multiple people out of my life after deciding they were no longer good people &/or friends, and each aftermath was better than the years of trying to maintain “the good ol times”. One of those times left me completely alone… I mean literally zero friends for like a year. 5 years later I had a better group of friends than I’d ever had previously. That experience let me know I’d be fine on my own. I’m also fortunate to be an introvert and never really suffered depression or similar. The key to success is not dwelling on the loss and moving on with your life. YMMV.
Luckily I’ve never had to cut family off, but I’ve spent more time with the people I’ve cut off than a lot of family, so I wouldn’t think twice if I thought family were a negative influence in my life.
I told my mom the other day that she clearly doesn’t love or care about me because of the way she voted. I don’t believe she can both love her trans daughter while simultaneously willingly inflicting as much suffering as possible.
I have been in this exact situation and I advise - ditch her. She voted or rather, sentenced you and I to 4 years of a shitshow that’s going to affect millions because of one simple and careless choice. And I agree, you cannot say “I love you” to someone who’s trans and then go out to vote for a guy and a party that is going to outright wage a war against the community of which they’re representatives of.
The aunt, she can go too.
Listen, you are in a position of your life right now to be calling the shots for your own well-being. You should not chain yourself to people, at the expense of your well-being mentally or physically, that do not 100% respect you. They want it one way and it’s their way. That’s not how it’s going to work. They’ve placed you in a position now where you may have to cut them out anyways.
You need to respect yourself and find people that respect and love you for you without the two-face standard.
As everyone has clearly stated, you need to watch out for your personal health and safety (mental and physical).
That said, I just want to highlight the fact that you probably shouldn’t broadcast your feelings on it too bluntly (even if you are in the right) and should consider if a more middle-ground approach would be better for you compared to making a large announcement and cutting people off. To be clear, this should be primally about you and your well-being, though.
In particular, as other have stated, if you’re cutting them off anyway, its probably worth considering just ghosting them. That way you can avoid fights and drama, as well as likely having less records of you being trans if you’re worried about that.
If you still care about your family a lot, as it sounds like you do, it may also be worth considering trying to work out a plan for low-contact rather than completely cutting them off. For example, if you communicate mostly through social media, you might disconnect or switch to alts they don’t know. If its primarily through sms but not phone, prehaps block or hide their sms messages but allow them to call you. Maybe you just need to stop visiting them or allowing visits. Your family doesn’t need to know this plan or the reason for it, and probably shouldn’t. For example, you could just brush it off as wanting to disconnect from social media/technology or being busy. If you want to go this route, figure you what works for you - don’t do it out of obligation, but because you genuinely want to keep the connection and are confident you can do so with without putting yourself in danger. Also, be willing to re-evaluate this later, if your relationship or need change.
In the same vein, you can also start looking at moving to safer regions. I understand this is a big commitment, so I don’t expect it to be a reasonable answer, esspecially in the short term, but if may be worth starting to look at whats involved. It might be complete overkill (I pray to God it is) but if you don’t have significant roots, moving further away may help distance yourself from them, while also providing more security.
Ultimately, I don’t think you’re in the wrong, if you feel the need to resort to anything more extreme for your own well-being, don’t hesitate. At the same time, it can be hard on you to lose family, reguardless of how terrible, abusive, or stupid they may be, which is why I’m bringing up some more middle-ground options. Consider your needs, and decide what the best way to achive that is - you don’t need to consider their reaction or feeling when trying to figure out how to keep yourself safe and healthy.
Your parents don’t know what it’s like to be trans and they aren’t interested in learning. They are unwilling to do the mental work of imagining the suffering of a trans person. It’s selfish and lazy. You’ve gone out of your way to make them feel better, by apologizing, and I expect with tolerance towards their behavior when you could have just left. But they’re not willing to do the same thing for you. It’s one-sided.
I think you did the right thing with the voicemail, leave it at that and move on. You can’t fix everyone. Surround yourself with people who are thoughtful and supportive, and be the same for them.
I do think a lot of the people who swung right were not trying to hurt anyone, they were misinformed on purpose by targeted propaganda. But again - you are unlikely to be able to get through to them. I stop helping people when it becomes obvious that the help is not helpful. They may come around, they may not, but you cannot personally do anything to make that happen.
And the nonsense about the world not being ready for a woman president is utter twaddle, there have been plenty of them, just not here. Fucking Margaret Thatcher was elected in 1979! Your aunt is off her rocker.