I'm 19 f, and came to know of something really disturbing . I belong from an extremely orthodox family, where even holding hands could garner criticism. I have an five year older brother and my parents are what one would call externally a sweet couple but a lot is dysfunctional within.

My father is heavily dependent on his mum (our grandmother) who could be termed as extremely attention seeking, to an extent it could almost be called mentally incestuous. She controls if my dad can sleep next to my mum or not post her surgery recovery. She controlled when she could have children and when she couldn't leading to multiple abortions. My father gets easily manipulated and doesn't understand right vs wrong. He took a lot of impulsive decisions that really affected my brother , me but especially my mother. He isn't a bad father, he's not absent or ignorant. He just has some bugs in his head that ticks off and he just hates us sometimes. Eventually we both shifted for higher education, but my mother here is stuck with the after math.

My father now suspects that my mother cheated on him. Baseless accusation and this infact was laid out by my grandmother.
I asked my mother to join some zumba classes to get some me time. Its an all women club and she loves the environment.
One time she sprained her leg, so a lady dropped her home, my father started to assume that she was infact going to meet a guy, which isnt true.

They had an argument where he completely denied everything. I am back home after months and the way my father approached me, I thought he wanted to talk to me about the incident, well he doesn't know or sure that I know.
So I answer it as vaguely as I could, without raising suspicion. When I tell my only source of support my older brother, he freaks out even more than I already have and basically I end up having to calm him down. I really don't know what to do, they wont talk to me directly, they won't go for couples therapy and I've no-one to talk to...

Question

I'm 19 f, and came to know of something really disturbing . I belong from an extremely orthodox family, where even holding hands could garner criticism. I have an five year older brother and my parents are what one would call externally a sweet couple but a lot is dysfunctional within.

My father is heavily dependent on his mum (our grandmother) who could be termed as extremely attention seeking, to an extent it could almost be called mentally incestuous. She controls if my dad can sleep next to my mum or not post her surgery recovery. She controlled when she could have children and when she couldn't leading to multiple abortions. My father gets easily manipulated and doesn't understand right vs wrong. He took a lot of impulsive decisions that really affected my brother , me but especially my mother. He isn't a bad father, he's not absent or ignorant. He just has some bugs in his head that ticks off and he just hates us sometimes. Eventually we both shifted for higher education, but my mother here is stuck with the after math.

My father now suspects that my mother cheated on him. Baseless accusation and this infact was laid out by my grandmother.
I asked my mother to join some zumba classes to get some me time. Its an all women club and she loves the environment.
One time she sprained her leg, so a lady dropped her home, my father started to assume that she was infact going to meet a guy, which isnt true.

They had an argument where he completely denied everything. I am back home after months and the way my father approached me, I thought he wanted to talk to me about the incident, well he doesn't know or sure that I know.
So I answer it as vaguely as I could, without raising suspicion. When I tell my only source of support my older brother, he freaks out even more than I already have and basically I end up having to calm him down. I really don't know what to do, they wont talk to me directly, they won't go for couples therapy and I've no-one to talk to...

Anonymous Practitioner · Accepted Answer

I'm 20 f, and what you're going through sounds horrible... Aa a child it can be hard to take in parents side of problems. i don't have any solutions for you I'm sorry. But I'll hope that everything works out for you and your mom. I wish you well.