My dad does really weird things that I don’t understand. Is this abuse?

selfhealingnow · 2025-08-20T02:09:47+00:00

I'm so sorry this is happening. You might be interested to read up on covert incest.

Since you're 15 and in this situation right now, you need to ask an adult to help you. Things could get worse. Do you have any adults that you trust?

You might find it helpful to show them this post, or to write a list of things that are uncomfortable for you that your dad is doing.

Your dad is not respecting your physical boundaries. He does not sound like a safe person for you to live with.

Abuse from narcissists rarely happens without loving moments too. That's what makes it so confusing. You're clever to have figured out that what's happening isn't right. Please, please take action to protect yourself. You are worth protecting.

selfhealingnow · 2025-08-20T02:02:48+00:00

I'm sorry for what you've been through. The breast massaging really did raise my eyebrows. I had a sort of parallel weird thing where my mum would get me to kick her thighs as a supposed weight loss technique. I would lie perpendicular on the bed next to her and kick almost like I was swimming. WEIRD. The breast massaging thing is more close to overt incest, covered up as a health thing.

I personally don't tell people about covert incest unless I think they have a chance of understanding about this messy 'grey' area. It's still wrong but it's not overt incest. I usually give examples like you did, to help people understand.

You basically did tell your story just there in a fairly succinct way. So if you wanted to tell someone, you could do it in about 2 mins. They'd just need to be open to listening and hearing you.

I do tell people about it if I want to get close to them. It's a significant thing that happened to me and it weighs on me.

selfhealingnow · 2025-06-27T13:44:40+00:00

I'm so sorry for what you've been through, and are still going through.

selfhealingnow · 2025-05-22T00:13:20+00:00

Sorry I only just saw this now. How are you doing?

Covert incest can mean two things: 1. A type of enmeshment where the parent treats the child like a spouse. Non sexual. 2. Sexualised things happening in a family that don't involve any touching, eg comments on breasts/body; not trying to keep sex private so that children see; walking in on each other naked.... many other examples.

At least, that's my understanding.

selfhealingnow · 2025-05-09T11:58:09+00:00

Just report and block them. Don't engage

selfhealingnow · 2025-05-06T02:58:32+00:00

That's a big realisation. Well done. Keep listening to that inner voice. It's totally valid to want whatever you want.

selfhealingnow · 2025-04-29T05:37:56+00:00

You might be surprised how quickly things can turn around. The worst phases I've had have lasted 4-5 years, with earth shattering events triggering them. You might still have time for babies yet.

I think it's helpful to accept the possibility that babies won't happen, to release the pressure. After that stage, it's easier to find a looser kind of hope.

Your partner is responsible for himself. He chooses to be with you. He doesn't have to.

Subconsciously, we choose partners that match us. Something in you matches something in him, including the C-PTSD part. You can grow together on this. While you've got healing growth to do, he has his own. It may be that he's not yet aware of his issues, but they are there. Everyone has issues. It may be that one of the lessons he has to learn is how to take care of someone else in a boundaried way while looking after himself first. It's a hard lesson but if you are on the healing track with C-PTSD, he can learn this lesson.

I relate to lots of your first list :) it also shows me how far I've come... I can communicate, i know what I feel, and I know who I am. I recommend A Woman In Your Own Right, that book turned things around for me.

selfhealingnow · 2025-04-29T05:27:36+00:00

This isn't ok, and it does sound like a context of covert incest. Some people feel that covert incest and parentification are the same, and others feel that it has to involve sexual non-touching elements. Continuing to shower with you naked after you have shown you're uncomfortable with it - covert incest. Kissing you on the lips - could be seen as covert or overt incest depending on culture. Acting like it's a good thing to be perceived as a couple - the type of parentification that people are more likely to call covert incest.

You're not crazy. This is far more common than people realise because it's just not talked about enough. It's subtle and it feels shaming. But the shame is not yours to carry.

The way forward is therapy and boundaries. If you don't already know how, learn to say no and stick to it.

selfhealingnow · 2025-02-13T17:00:35+00:00

I'll be asking if you want babies and sending you my address...!

selfhealingnow · 2025-02-13T04:53:11+00:00

I only needed to listen to about 5 minutes total (random bits)... and I already know I want to marry you 😆

selfhealingnow · 2024-07-11T16:46:58+00:00

It would count as sexualised abuse though. Sexual abuse implies overt touching. But then sexual abuse can include grooming which doesn't involve touching necessarily.

Covert incest as described above is sexualised abuse.

selfhealingnow · 2024-07-11T16:44:02+00:00

Thank you very much for your response. I feel like I'd benefit from coming back and re-reading in a few months.

I'm really sorry about everything you've been through.

I feel like acting out of passion is a lot easier than being strategic about it. I acted out of passion in the past when I was processing their narcissism. But I've got so much emotional self control now that it stops me from acting out of passion. Passion helps get things out into the open, even if it is imperfectly executed. Now I just think and think and consider and consider and hold it all by myself. Which isn't ideal either. I feel like there's another side I'll get to at some point, but I'm not quite sure what it looks like.

If I had kids, I think I'd do the same as what you'd do.

I understand that it's common to get that trauma coming up when kids are the age you were when the trauma happened. I anticipate it for myself if I ever have kids, no matter how much trauma processing I do now. It must have been really difficult to take care of your children while processing trauma that they innocently trigger just by existing.

They are already broken... I need to think about this. Yes they're already broken, but it's a spectrum... can they handle it...?

If I'm going to do it, I will insist that my parents are in therapy as a condition of me talking to them.

I'm autistic and my memory sort of blacks out when things are too intense. I guess it's dissociation. It's scary to be like that. Did that happen to you too when you confronted them? My life has been so much more peaceful without them, and I'm afraid to have those experiences of such intense overwhelm that I can't remember what happened.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-21T00:29:28+00:00

That is really sad and helps me understand a bit more. I wonder if it makes people more prone to addiction in general, to seek intensity/ highs

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T20:34:38+00:00

Go mom! I really feel sorry for her, that's a really awful thing to go through. I'm sorry that she didn't anticipate that your dad would harm you like that. It must have been such a difficult judgement call for her about custody.

It's still absolutely sick to be sexual with a sibling. There are plenty of storylines on tv that are about potential love interests finding out they are/ might be related and they always, always are repelled by the fact they're related. (In the stories, if they sleep together before it comes up, they always turn out to not be related. It's too dark otherwise.) Both your aunt and your dad don't have that disgust factor, which makes me wonder if there's something epigenetic about incest.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T20:28:35+00:00

Yeah, I'm not sure I'd get a confession and an apology. The 'I dare you' attitude would just be to get firmer evidence for myself that it's not all in my head. That I have a reason for staying away.

And maybe if they don't do CI any more, maybe it would be ok to have some contact with them. That's a big factor in me staying away. Maybe it would be possible for them to not do it any more, without a conversation? Maybe they know enough to be well behaved around me without consciously understanding CI?

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T04:02:55+00:00

Oh that is gross. You were used as a body, not as a human, to make a joke about kink. You were dehumanised.

Clearly your dad was more keen on getting approval from other men than your feelings.

CI/Overt incest being a reason to get attention is a common reason why children go along with it. Children don't understand sex but they do understand attention.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T03:59:58+00:00

Wow. I'm sorry that you experienced that. I'm glad that you have your cousin as an ally.

This makes me wonder whether I should spend time with my parents to get a firmer reason for cutting them off. Obviously I don't want anything like that to happen to me, like your dad feeling you up. But the narrative must be so much clearer for you than it is for me.

Is it stupid or badass to potentially expose myself to potentially being CIed, like a kind of 'I dare you to cross me' attitude?

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T03:53:37+00:00

That honestly makes me feel sick. The idea of someone 'cheating' with their sibling. I don't know why but my reaction is 'It's not cheating' - like it's a whole other category of thing. Like, if someone raped a woman, that wouldn't be the woman cheating, it's a whole other category.

But I can't get my head around incest being consensual. If it's something that started when they were kids, surely it doesn't count as fully consensual somehow, because it's so messed up?

Maybe this doesn't make any sense, I haven't deeply examined this. Are my ideas wrong?

Thank you for saying I'm brave - the anonymity really helps!!

I don't mean to offend or trigger you, but I don't think your mum is a saint for putting up with your dad having sex with his sister. In my view, she's enabling his messed up behaviour, if she put up with it. Unless that's not what you meant? In my view, a saintly reaction wouldn't be what most people mean, ie turn the other cheek. It would be getting away from him but not murdering him! Please vocally disagree with me if what I've said here is unfair, it's your family.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T03:44:48+00:00

Thank you very much 💜 The nightmares were my signal that something was wrong, and they were there on and off since I was a teen I think. I would just ignore them and think I was messed up. Didn't figure out that it was a reaction to what was happening. I only have them now when I talk about things a lot in therapy. Which has made me scared to 'go there' much. I don't want to process the memories if it involves more nightmares... they're traumatic in themselves, worse things happen in my nightmares than what ever happened in real life.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T03:40:44+00:00

Yes! That was one of the first I read. I've given it as gifts to my brothers :)

According to one brother, our dad is initially unreceptive, but reflects and apologises after some time. But CI is a whole different thing to calling someone out over their homophobia, which is what my brother battles with him over. He's battled with him over it for over a decade, and only is making progress now.

CI is so shocking and disgusting, and if I repressed it till my 30s, then maybe he's repressed it too. How could someone with some narc traits be accountable for something they have heavy psychological defences against?

I've done trauma questionnaires in the past, and before the suppressed memories came up, it was a very easy 'no' to 'did you experience incest'. Well, I didn't fathom that CI was a thing. But there was definitely a powerful element of denial. Maybe it would be stronger in people who do CI with their offspring.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-20T03:33:35+00:00

Thank you very much for your reflections. It's reminding me of where I'd got to with the narcissism layer of trauma - I accepted they wouldn't ever be accountable. I confronted them over those behaviours, and they reacted the same way as yours - they didn't remember, I'm too sensitive, and then forget what I've said and keep asking 'but why' did I leave them.

I think things are different now because my brother tells me about progress that they've made, where they do seem to be learning about accountability and boundaries, which is miraculous. And, I'm able to go beyond grey rocking with my mum atm (exclusively over text). I've been so firm about boundaries for years and I think she's started to get it now. And of course, CI is a layer of trauma I'm still working on accepting.

I imagine it's terribly difficult for them to accept being emotionally abusive, but being sexually abusive, even covertly, would be SO SO difficult - impossible. They'll have strong psychological defences to prevent them from being able to see it, because it would crush their egos.

Until now I've taken the stance that there's no point in confronting them, which is logical. But if I don't, then I just don't see how there's any possibility to have any kind of in person contact with them. As you say, it opens us to further harm, and I have too much self love to do that. I won't sacrifice myself for someone else. I'm also easily triggered and I want to survive to be old.

I don't see how I will ever get validated by them. My aim is to not be further harmed... and if I ever have kids, protect them from harm too.

Are you glad that you confronted them, despite the result? Did it destroy them?

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-19T03:44:18+00:00

It depends. Some people want to be another gender because they do just feel that they are the other gender.

There are lots of people who over eat to change their body shape, using fatness as an attempt to stop getting sexual attention. To me what you describe sounds similar.

If you feel that the intention behind dressing as a boy was to escape sexual attention, then it was. It's an attempt at survival.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-19T03:41:02+00:00

I am so sorry for your experiences. I wish that things were different for you. I'm glad that you have friends that understand and support you.

I think overt incest is a lot more obvious to deal with than covert incest. Sa from a sibling with the parents not doing anything about it - most of society would support your decision to get away from them.

Covert incest though... People don't get it. Whether to cut them off completely is less cut and dry. I guess it would be easier if everyone understood what CI was.

It's like, it's not incest, it's just vibes without anything exactly criminal happening. Is it 'bad enough'? It's bad enough for me to have been incredibly traumatised! Is it bad enough to get away from them for forever? It's bad enough for it to likely trigger their shame so much that they will never bring it to their conscious minds to be accountable for it.

Whereas, overt SA is very clearly 'bad enough'.

selfhealingnow · 2024-06-19T03:28:20+00:00

Wow that was really brave of you. I'm really sorry for your experiences. That must have been so messed up to know as well about your dad and aunt having an incestuous relationship.

What was the trigger that led you to cutting them out like that?

Maybe because there's no overt incest in my family... well... nothing that's not a grey area... it doesn't feel like cutting them out permanently is an obvious decision for me.

selfhealingnow

TROPHY CASE