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Healing from a Toxic Grandparent

I love my grandma to death, but sometimes she is suffocating.

By Heather WilkinsPublished 6 years ago 8 min read
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I was raised by my grandma for 11 years. She never called me beautiful.

My grandma has raised me for nearly 11 years, which is almost my whole life. But the one thing she did for years that I finally confessed to my mother was lead me down the path of hating myself. Every day, I struggle with finding happiness within my own skin and many of the beauties behind the flaws in my own body.

Both women, my mother and my grandmother, never had healthy opinions of themselves as I was growing up. My mother was having a hard time adjusting to the added weight after having my sister and my grandma was the only one who watched us when mom and dad came to pick us up near seven. She would teach me to read and write and tried to do the same with my sister, but gave up after the second attempt.

It got worse as I got older, especially when I was developing in certain areas of my body to show I was a woman. The bullying at school would come from standing up to my friend's bullies to basic body shaming by girls my own age. I had no one to help me and no one to tell me that I was beautiful and loved. When I was bullied at school, it was because I was being ugly and not being the submissive little girl that I was supposed to be.

When girls were mistreating me, it was my grandmother who didn't say they were jealous; she said it was because I wasn't being nice. My mom was the only one who knew how hard it was to get along with other girls and she knew what it was like to be bullied. My grandma got along with every girl in high school when she was a teenager. She told me about the time she was a member of the Pink Ladies back in the day and she was the most popular girl in school.

It seemed that all the most confident women in my family were popular. I didn't have confidence and was a squib compared to those women. It made me feel like I was adopted and not a biological member of the family. I could never hold my head high and I still can't carry a candle to being truly happy with myself. I guess confidence and happiness skips a generation. It just seems for years I was a mere shadow of everyone's existence, like a chain was being tugged around my neck tighter and tighter until I died of suffocation and was transformed into a mere doll.

For 11 years all I did was submit, keep my mouth shut, or rat out other people so that I wouldn't take the blame. It led me down some bad choices like abusive relationships or dating junkies. But it was the only way I think my grandma could ever love me. All I did was agree and depend on her for guidance; my mother was left abandoned as my grandma was able to hold a smile to her face and shove all the attention I gave her as a smug reminder of the inability to bond with me as a small infant. My mom feels guilty to this day that she couldn't help me and that I could never tell her because I was afraid of her. I just didn't want her to know because Mom had enough on her plate with her rotating door of bosses, each one being nastier than the last.

My college acceptance letter came in the mail and I was excited to find out I was accepted into Florida International University. I was going to Miami for four months out of the year to pursue a degree and my grandma didn't have a say in it. She kept begging and pleading that I transfer colleges. She was afraid of me getting raped by Black men on the campus and I told her it was nothing to worry about because most of the people were in their own cliques. I was an outsider and I was happy to know I didn't belong.

I dated a guy who was also in the outsider category when it came to college. We clicked even though I was with someone else. But once I broke up with the guy I was dating, my parents were happy to see the transformation I was undergoing with this new boy. My mom had tears in her eyes after the dinner date with them ended.

When she met my boyfriend two years after dating him, she tried to get me to see someone else because he is no good, when my parents absolutely adored him. My parents were a bit offended he was an atheist, but they knew he came from a good family and not a broken home. He also liked everything my dad enjoyed which made bonding and getting along with my parents much easier. It made it harder for my grandma to like him. "I liked your other boyfriend before him. He was a sweet kid," she said in the Starbucks coffee shop near my house. Of course the abuser was the charmer because he kept me obedient, something she liked a lot.

My relationship with her was never toxic until I grew up and started looking like a young woman, as becoming pubescent to adulthood type growing up. Yet when it came to being around my sister, she despised her like some piece of garbage genetics. Sometimes when I wanted to be nice, my grandma would separate us because she didn't want me tainted with being an ugly woman growing up. But here I am several years later and I am the most ugliest person on the planet. I am intimidating to some people and it affects how I get a job or keep one for that matter.

No matter what, my grandma always had a way to kick me down. She would call me ugly and fat anytime she offered me fast food as a treat after school. It was her way of trying to get me to stop eating sweet things altogether. She even made my meal sizes smaller because she said that I need to look like my aunt, who is no longer a skinny stick like she was in high school and it gives my grandma great pleasure in calling her fat and making nasty looks behind her back.

I think when I finally told my mom what she was doing after I reached puberty, she was shocked. She had no idea that her own mother would be so cruel and toxic. I'm trying to learn now how to have a good image of myself, but being at my grandmother's house for 11 years just seemed to never shake the fact that I hate myself every day I get up to everyday I go to bed. My mother insisted that I try to speak up about what I want to do. I remember so many times I tried, it made my grandma mad and she would hush me with the phrase you're being a very ugly girl right now. That is all I ever was to her was ugly, every voice of my opinion, every disagreement I made, every childhood tantrum I could throw, I was the ugly one and it was that word that has been burned into my head.

By the time I was in college, my grandma always found a way to tell me I was fat. Freshman year I lost 14 pounds and was skin and bones. I was in aches and pains all day sometimes and it had a worse effect on my periods. By the time I was able to drink, I gained most of that back and then some. But she always found a way to call me fat. Even if I was trying to eat healthy, cut back on fast food, trying to exercise and lose some weight it didn't matter, I was the fat and ugly grandchild.

Now I just don't bother hanging out with her unless it is the holidays. My mom knows that I am enjoying my space, but she knows that her mom won't be around much longer. I'm also not hanging out with her because we have noticed some of the signs of memory loss that were more apparent in Grandma B as her dementia progressed. I can't bear to be with her and she won't remember me in ten or fifteen minutes later while I am still with her. I know she is my grandma, but she is dependent on me and since my sister is still in college, I want her to be able to spend the same amount of time that she did with me. She ignored my sister for 11 years, I want to be able to provide some bonding between them before my grandma goes.

I will always love my grandma, but I also know that I need to prepare myself for when she is no longer in my life or near me. I know she won't be around much longer, but I know she has been in my life enough to dictate who I should be. Now that I know I can't be what she wants, I am trying to be myself and what I want. All I can say is that it feels good and scary all at the same time.

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About the Creator

Heather Wilkins

Born in South Carolina, raised in Florida. I enjoy writing for therapy or stress release. Enjoy my ramblings or any updates on cities where I live.

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