K.S.
What's the worst that could happen: They yell at you, say horrible things to you, there's wailing and shouting, and they threaten to never speak to you, again.
Um, considering that they're giving baby bottles to a four-year-old, I'm wondering why they're allowed within ten feet of your children.
But okay, back to the freak show, already in progress: They're yelling, wailing, gnashing teeth, or they're dissecting you alive, telling you it's for your own good because you don't know what you're doing -- whatever it is that they do -- so that when you walk out of their presence, you have to reorient yourself: Okay, THIS is up, the sky IS blue, the earth IS round.
So what do you do about it? Well, first, I would make the disclosure low-key, without fan-fare, over the phone. "Well, dear, I have to go -- the movers are here." Second, if they appear at your doorstep, yelling and screaming or dissecting, you step around them, box in hand, because you have a moving van to pack. If they get ugly, tell them to leave.
(Right now someone is saying: WHAT?? They're your parents!! How can you do that to them! You never abandon family!)
That's right. You tell them to get out. Or if you're with them at a restaurant, you get up and leave. You're not going to their house because they don't know how to treat you. You're not leaving your children alone with them because by doing so, you're saying that what they're doing to your children is okay. You're not saying it out loud, but you are saying it, nevertheless.
Because you've grown up in this kind of family, you might not even be sure what kind of treatment you deserve. My suggestion is that when you get to Maryland, you find a good therapist and you and your husband get into therapy. Not because you're bad, but because living close to a dysfunctional family is kind of like being slowly brainwashed, and you will need some help to become unbrainwashed.
If you can't do it for yourself, do it for your kids.
Here's a poem that to me absolutely captures what it's like to be from a dysfunctional family:
Your Mother Knows Wendy Cope. (2006) Poetry 187(5).
Your mother knows the earth’s a plane
And, challenged, sheds a martyr’s tear.
God give her strength to bear this pain –
A child who says the world’s a sphere!
Challenged, she sheds a martyr’s tear.
It’s bad to make your mother cry
By telling her the world’s a sphere.
It’s very bad to tell a lie.
It’s bad to make your mother cry.
It’s bad to think your mother odd.
It’s very bad to tell a lie.
All this has been ordained by God.
It’s bad to think your mother odd.
The world is round. That’s also true.
All this has been ordained by God.
It’s hard to see what you can do.
The world is round. That must be true.
She’s praying, hoping you will change.
It’s hard to see what you can do.
Already people find you strange.
She’s praying, hoping you will change.
You’re difficult. You don’t fit in.
Already people find you strange.
You know your anger is a sin.
You’re difficult. You don’t fit in.
God give her strength to bear this pain.
You know your anger is a sin.
Your mother knows the earth’s a plane.
************
Stop trying to convince your parents that the world is round. All that matters is that YOU know that the world is round, and you live accordingly. And that you don't need their permission to walk around in the world without worrying if you'll fall off the edge.
Your special needs children may still have their difficulties when all is said and done, but by living-by-example for them, and showing them that you're too valuable to be subjected to dysfunctional treatment, you're showing them that they are valuable too.
Good luck.
