If you were from a family with a golden child and scapegoat, how did they turn out as adults?
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Anonymous
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I am realizing I have always been my mother and brother’s scapegoat. I didn't recognize this dynamic as a child and told myself they had much more in common. As an adult, it's heightened as my brother who was groomed to be highly successful hasn't lived up to my family’s expectations and has ramped up his cruelty, and a lot of times, it feels like my mom goes along with it to make him feel better. Ironically, I ended up doing better academically and financially as an adult and have some nice kids but it still feels like no matter what I'm still the difficult or crazy one.
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Anonymous
| What does it mean to be the scapegoat? |
Anonymous
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I’m the scapegoat. I generally hate most people especially favored people.
Idk about the other kid, lost contact years ago |
Anonymous
| We had a golden child and a dumb one. I'm the dumb one, who turned out to be very successful. Sadly my brother, who was in fact brilliant, died in his 30's. |
Anonymous
The scapegoat is the family member the rest of the family blames for everything that goes wrong. There can be a narcissistic parent involved who projects their perceived best traits on to the golden child and their perceived worst traits on to the scapegoat. One child gets the parent's best attention, the other child all the parent's worst attention. For decades. OP, there are videos on YouTube about being scapegoated, and what happens to the family scapegoat in adulthood. Often, this family member goes gray rock and then eventually no contact with their families who are unable to see them as anything different. But now they're almost 50, not 15, and they're done being treated badly. The scapegoat is usually the most emotional strong member of the family. That's why they can carry the weight of all of this, and come out the other side even stronger. They are often more successful than the golden child, too. |
Anonymous
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I am the scapegoat in my family, am relatively successful career wise and re: the family I created. I was fortunate to have a large extended family that did not buy into the scapegoat dynamics.
My golden child sib is very enmeshed with our narc parents and as an adult is an alcoholic with multiple marriages and estranged kids. It's sad. I have been either low or no contact as an adult. I have done a lot of therapy and recovery work through ACoA and I think that helped. |
Anonymous
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OP here. Thanks for the responses. As adults, what are your sibling relationships like if your family had this dynamic?
My brother continues always to be a victim and claims he's left out or ignored if my mother doesn't do everything for him or show any decency towards other siblings. He can't seem to see she's too old to continue like this and it's causing me to feel intensely angry at his selfishness. |
Anonymous
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My brother is the golden child. He was able to do very well in school, became a lawyer, is GC, has a mansion, has a rich wife who used to model, has two cute kids, always says the right thing, etc. Both my parents always take his side.
I'm the scapegoat. My mother never bragged about me. When she did talk about me, she'd lie and say what she wished I was. My father just never talks about me. Any time my brother has had one side of a story and I've had another, they've always believed him. It's easy to make me the scapegoat - I'm unimpressive in every sense of the word, at best. I'll never own a home, live in such a rundown apartment that I never have anyone over but am stuck with rent control so can't move, have a dead-end job but can't do anything else, etc. My brother and I mostly get along, but the way he talks to me or about me in front of his children really bothers me. He is teaching them to see me ignorant, dangerous, unknowledgeable, etc. Our relationship is unbalanced because he can afford to do a lot more than I can. |
Anonymous
| both lawyers. |
Anonymous
What is ACoA? |
Anonymous
Adult children of anarchists. Duh! |
Anonymous
| I am the scapegoat in our large family. I ended up in a loving marriage with successful kids. I am not wealthy but comfortable which is considered worthless. I have grandkids that are the love of my life. My mother and my siblings hate me. Like HATE me. Things did not end up the way they thought they would. They are miserable and, for whatever reason, that makes me sad. At the end of the day we are all victims of severe dysfunction. I don’t have a relationship with any of them but would engage with one of them after mother dies as she is the driving force. |
Anonymous
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I’m the scapegoat in my family.
The golden child gets everyone to pay her bills for her, has a sob story that dominates every family dinner, and only keeps in touch with people who give her what she wants. I don’t contribute and I say no when asked, but I was the scapegoat before I did this because I’m not as dramatic so it’s easier to blame me for things. I stopped attending and now they blame the problems that they are having that I don’t know about on me and tell me about it when I visit later without the Drama Golden Child. I just ignore it as much as I can and live my life. I have less, but I have enough. |
Anonymous
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I'm the golden child. I have an ok relationship with my sister, now, but her relationship with our parents is strained. I try not to play middleman or messenger but it happens sometimes.
I wouldn't say she is the scapegoat exactly, because it goes both ways: they each believe the worst of each other. It's not baseless - there was some classic favoritism, and she told some big lies in her teens - but none of them can forgive and forget, or communicate. |