<p>When someone you care about, says or does something extremely hurtful to you, how is it possible to forgive them?</p>
<p>I understand the concept of “forgiveness,” in that it is something you do for yourself so you can move on with your life. </p>
<p>But in real life, how do you have a relationship with someone who (intentionally) hurts you to your core with statements that are obviously their true feelings, then apologizes and says they love you?</p>
<p>[To put this in context, I am thinking of a personal experience with a sibling.]</p>
<p>What is the context? A fight? People say things they mean in the heat of the moment, but they don’t really mean. At least the person apologized. If this is recent, it will take time, probably. And you will need time to figure out whether or not this has changed the relationship. Maybe it has. Forgiveness does not always mean going back 100% to the way things were. Maybe some adjustments will have to be made. It is always worse when these things come from someone you care about – you are in a much more vulnerable state. It helps me to remember that everyone has flaws. Everyone.</p>
<p>This may sound callous and unchristian - but I don’t do forgiveness. If I am truly hurt by somebody I love - I move on and don’t look back. I personally can never feel the same about that person again (And I have personal experiences with a sibling in which this is the case). To me the relationship cannot be repaired. This is me, I assume others feel differently.</p>
<p>I never say anything I don’t mean.
Now- dont get me wrong, I have said things i wish I hadn’t said, but I don’t say things that I don’t think are true.
This makes things difficult, when dealing with other people, who claim to say things they don’t mean, in order for a bigger reaction.</p>
<p>I try and focus on the bigger picture.
What is my objective? Do I want a closer and honest relationship with this person?
Then, I may have to get thicker skin, in order to hear what they really think.</p>
<p>But if I don’t want to spend the time and energy to work on what could be a high demand relationship, ( like with my inlaws), I tone down everything when I am around them, and when they say something careless or rude, I remind myself they are not responding to the " real" me, but to the EK that I trot out for their visits.</p>
<p>This is good advice, and something I have been focussing on when trying to figure out what to do about the relationship.</p>
<p>I learned a long time ago that you should never say things you might regret in the heat of a moment. I also know this is hard not to do.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, the worst things said to me were done by multiple emails, by a highly-educated middle-aged sibling, who really had no excuse not to know better. The apology took more than a year, and was phrased as “I regret what I said (not “I am sorry”), and I was frustrated at the time.”</p>
<p>I’ve been stewing over this for a long time, because prior to the exchange, this was an important relationship to me. I just don’t see how I can trust this person again, or consider her a friend. Perhaps, as you said, it will just take more time. Or as kiddie noted, I will never feel the same about this person and the relationship will never be repaired.</p>
<p>It feels like such a shame for family to disintegrate this way, but I cannot seem to get over it.</p>
<p>There is a difference between forgiving and forgetting. One may choose to forgive, but that does not mean that one forgets. One will always be aware that the full measure of trust with this person cannot be given.</p>
<p>Maya Angelou said something like “the first time someone shows you who they are, believe them.” Meaning, I think, that if someone acts a certain way in certain situations, it makes sense to try to avoid those situations. If it was done by e-mail, that is a little bit harder to overlook than a heat of the moment fight, IMO. And e-mails are hard,too, because all the evidence is right there! You can’t sort of alter it in your brain, and think well, maybe they really didn’t say this or that, because when you go back and read the e-mail, there it is in black and white. People really should not send e-mails like that without running them by another (detached) set of eyes. They do too much damage. I know, I got a horrible e-mail from someone once. It hurt deeply. And it was from someone that I thought was a good friend, even though things had gotten strained. After some years passed, I was able to forgive this person, and to ask for their forgiveness, which from their perspective, I needed to do. It was good to get that point, but it took a lot of time and reading a lot of books about forgiveness and spirituality, and just a lot of processing on my part. I will never be close to this person again, but now I could spend time with this person, without any ill will, and I am at peace. If you can get to such a place, it would be good, IMO. I am not one to ever close a door on a relationship. I have learned that that is not the way I operate. But I can set boundaries. Also, in my case, I tend to be more forgiving if the behavior was out of character, (although if the behaviour were typical, I would never have allowed myself to get that close, I guess) and if the person is a woman of a certain age (peri-menopausal). My kids think that is ridiculous, that you can’t blame stuff on menopause. But, I think you can . . . you did say the sibling was middle aged?</p>
<p>There was a huge family conflict between my older sister and everybody else when she was a very young adult, which was so severe it resulted in her basically being dead to everyone she knew until she was in her late 20s. I won’t go into the whole long story, but I’ve mentioned it a few time here before-- it was a complicated situation. About five years ago she sent my parents a letter “apologizing” … but translated it was basically “I won’t take responsibility for what I did and I still think I was right, but I really want to be let back into the family.” Our dynamic today is very odd. She’s included in family events, we all do genuinely love her the way we’re supposed to… but we don’t trust her and honestly don’t like her very much a lot of the time. She’s a loving person with a lot of good and admirable traits, and a hell of a lot of fun to be around, but she is not trustworthy and sometimes does some pretty horrible things that cannot be forgotten.</p>
<p>But even with that awkward rift between us, I do value the relationship we have… even though it is damaged. To me, that is still forgiveness, even if it is not absolute. I can love her and enjoy the relationship we do have even if it isn’t the relationship we might have had had this incident not occurred. I don’t think forgiveness means we have to go back to the way things were. I think it just means we need to find the best way possible to move on and accept it for what it is.</p>
<p>Forgiving is not for them though, it is for you. I have had to forgive people that I have never gotten an apology from. This was a long process for me, but finally the forgiveness came. It came from me knowing the truth, knowing I could do nothing to repair what had been done, it couldn’t be fixed and if they couldn’t admit they were hurtful, then I had to forgive them for not knowing the truth and not knowing better. (Of course, I didn’t tell this to them, because I don’t think it’s something that would have went over well and not be a productive statement.)</p>
<p>Having said that, I NEVER forget. There are some people that I tolerate, some I avoid and some that know just made a mistake. </p>
<p>On the other hand, there have been times when I have had to be forgiven and I know what it took for me to apologize and how bad I felt. Sincerety is not something that can be easily faked, and I did my best to let them know that I was truely sorry. That is how I know some others weren’t sorry to me too.</p>
<p>“But in real life, how do you have a relationship with someone who (intentionally) hurts you to your core with statements that are obviously their true feelings, then apologizes and says they love you?”</p>
<p>Sounds like a later-in-life issue to me. Might be menopause … might not. Reading between the lines it appears the relationship was stable for decades. Clearly there’s been some sort of change.</p>
<p>There are people in your life who’ve come and gone
They let you down, you know they hurt your pride
You better put it all behind you baby; cause’ life goes on
If you keep carryin’ that anger, it’ll eat you up inside, baby
I’ve been trying to get down
To the heart of the matter
But my will gets weak
And my thoughts seem to scatter
But I think it’s about forgiveness
Forgiveness</p>
<p>This is true, in that there were quite a few changes (she moving closer, death of a parent, her new relationship) over the couple of years just prior to the hurtful exchange. The things that were stated related to obviously pent-up judgmental feelings that had been held for quite some time, however. That was what was so shocking - I had thought we had a close, supportive relationship prior to hearing all of it. Her statements made me believe she never really cared much for me or my spouse.</p>
<p>Then she apologizes and says “I love you.” What do I do with that?</p>
<p>Here’s my take, with the assumption this is brother or sister issues. This is just my take and there’s no way to fill all the additional assumptions I’m making without taking 1000 words minimum. So, I’m betting you already knew what he or she was thinking. Or at least sort of knew because it’s a brother or sister. So it’s more that he or she said stuff, not that he or she thought stuff. That’s how you get past it: the little games we play with ourselves about what should and should not be said can crumble with siblings because they’re siblings. The question then is not the same as with an acquaintance or old friend because those social walls are different. Siblings get away with stuff. </p>
<p>That said, there are a million variations. If you were genuinely surprised. If you thought the remarks were right but didn’t want to hear them. If you think the sibling actually wants to hurt you. Beats me how it actually goes in this case. </p>
<p>Let’s assume the remarks are a version of the truth, that they aren’t nuts, off the wall wrong. That’s something you let a sibling get away with. It can even be a positive because that’s done and can’t be done again: you heard it, can’t hurt you with it again.</p>
<p>Just because you forgive someone does not mean that it would be healthy to keep them in your life. You can forgive someone and recognize that it’s healthier to part ways. I’m not saying you need to part ways with this person, just that forgiveness does not mean anything more than that you have forgiven something. Forgiveness is not the same thing as saying a relationship has been healed.</p>
<p>For me, forgiveness is a process. It requires that the people involved make amends and heal the rift. Of course, that’s not always possible and so I have something else I do instead; I let go of the anger and hurt. It’s a gift I give myself.</p>
<p>For example, I was disowned by a close family member. It was shocking and deeply hurtful. After a few years of no direct communication, she made a gesture of peace. I had to think really hard, and in fact when into therapy about it because I did not trust her enough to truly work through it. I decided to accept the peace offering and we do have a relationship today.</p>
<p>I keep strong, healthy boundaries in place at all times. Our relationship is simply not, and will never be, what it was before the fracture but it is a good relationship now. I appreciate what our relationship is and no longer mourn what it was. A few years ago I would not have believe it possible to describe our relationship as “good” but, as I said, it really was a gift to myself to let go of the negativity. That doesn’t mean we achieved true forgiveness or that what happened was ok. Rather, it’s a question of staying in the present and moving forward.</p>
<p>Sounds like the rug was pulled out from under you. Some wounds take a while to heal. If you want to forgive, you will, in time. You may need time to figure out what the relationship is now, though, that things have changed. Part of forgiving, I think, is being able to accept that things are different than they were before. It is good that she loves you. I hope she is sincere. Her loving you doesn’t mean that you can erase what has happened. But, with time, you will be able to discern what place what happened should have in your life. You will be able to put it in perspective, neither making it bigger than it should be, nor smaller. You will be able to move on. I think one way of thinking of forgiveness is that it is something that enables you to stop being stuck, and to move on.</p>
<p>One of the HUGE problems with e-mail is that when someone writes it, they cannot see your facial expression nor can you ask for immediate clarification. Had you been in the same room, perhaps she would not have said as much. This does not mean that she did not mean what she said or that she ( did I read she?) does not feel a certain way, only that it may not have gone as far.</p>
<p>I have a hard time forgetting, but I do seem to be able to forgive. Once I am hurt, I try really hard to not put myself in a position to be hurt again even if it means taking a step back. </p>
<p>Twenty years ago, my husband was lying in a hospital unconscious with bacterial meningitis. His father and his wife drove within 30 miles of our house on their way to Florida for a little vacation, but did not stop. My father-in-law died some years ago, but our relationship never recovered completely. </p>
<p>So, forgive if you can. It does take less energy to forgive than to worry.</p>
<p>I really do not like my sibling. I would never have any contact with her again if she weren’t my sister. I do like her children, and have contact with them. That is probably the only thing that will preserve any kind of relationship after our mother is gone.</p>
<p>THIS SHOULD BE POST #20 WITH BAY’S POST AS #1</p>
<p>Excellent timing of this topic for me. I’ve been in deep discussion with a couple of people this week regarding a very similar situation that happened to me over three years ago with a sibling. It was a very hurtful email, accusing me of all kinds of things that I never did. I know people always say there’s another side to every story, but truly, after I got the email, I sat down with my husband, read it to him, and he was absolutely baffled at some of the things we were accused of doing - there’s just no way these things happened - for instance, we were accused of not being grateful when this sibling ‘opened up their home’ when we had no place to live! HUH??? Don’t you think we’d remember if, at any time in our lives, we’d been homeless? And the list went on and on.</p>
<p>I never responded to this email because this sibling obviously has his mind made up that I’m an entitled little brat who cares nothing about anyone else. So why respond was my initial reaction, and I never did. However, in looking at some of my unhealthy behaviors, one of my issues is feeling inferior to three much older siblings to the point that it seemed like I never spoke up on my own behalf… many times. I need to work on this, and accept that my reactions, feelings, thoughts, etc., have just as much validity as theirs do. So I have made strides with two of my siblings in speaking up and not silently recoiling into the corner when someone says something I might disagree with, or know to be wrong. But this third brother, I basically wrote him off - I wouldn’t let a friend treat me that way, why is he any different?</p>
<p>But now after so much time, I am starting to think that his email deserves a response from me, not necessarily because I want or expect him to change his mind about me, but because my silence suggests that I agree with his perspective that somehow I am inferior to him, that I am colluding with him in negating my own right to speak up.</p>
<p>Yes, I know about the option of writing a letter that is never sent; but this one needs to be sent; I need to take responsibility and stand up for myself despite the fact it will unlikely change his attitude about me. I do have a couple of people who I would have review it before I sent it.</p>
<p>I thought I had forgiven him a while back but perhaps I haven’t, or I need to do it again. I do believe we can forgive people but set very rigid boundaries so that we are not hurt again, even if that means no longer having any sort of connection with them. I seriously doubt I will ever get an apology from my sibling, much less an “I love you.” I can see how that would really complicate the situation.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>How is it that CC’s membership is so largely full of middle-aged women, and yet we have no ongoing thread for women struggling with this??? This is a rhetorical question, well, sort of. But very good observation!</p>
<p>No real advice, but I do think it’s possible to love someone without liking them, or at least on liking major parts of them, or finding some things about them so irritating that you vent more than you should. I’m not as good at letting go things that have made me angry as I’d like to be, but I’m pretty good at living in the moment and appreciating the good parts of my siblings (and their spouses who are often more the issue!) One thing I’ve found is that it’s okay to give a relationship a bit of a rest for a while and then take it up again when whatever is bothering you is less of an issue.</p>