Re: Nada's Near The End

[Guest guest]

Wow, you are really dealing with a lot here. My heart goes out to you.

I have to believe that as hard as things are for you now, they will

improve, you will someday find people who love you as you love them.

Loneliness is so hard. I don't know if you'll like it, but I found

this poem helpful when I was feeling lonely. It's by Pulitzer Prize

winner Oliver:

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

affectionately,

Letty

>

> My mom is rapidly going down hill. She doesn't look well at all. Was

> diagnosed with beginning of vascular dementia. She complains of not

> feeling well. From what I've read, they usually die within three or

> so years. Today, she looked so old. I have to admire my mother.

> Because, the things she's understood, she really has tried to

> improve on. Perhaps, that is why I'm not one who is completely NC.

> She tries. She is still severely borderline. But, I ask myself how

> I'd feel if I were her. And I'd hope that if I tried, someone would

> have compassion for my failures.

>

> It makes me sad to see her so old. I'm still not the one who will

> ever be able to be her complete " caretaker " emotionally I couldn't

> do it after all she has put me through. Yet, it occured to me that

> with dementia and being docile as she was appearing today, in that

> case, I might be able to help her more. Easier to deal with, in

> some ways, than BPD.

>

> I needed a supportive family. I've never had one. Most are

> narcissitic and my mother BPD. My father had a traumatic brain

> injury. I look at her and atleast she has children...who are helping

> her. Even my narc sister has said that she would always take care of

> her. Probably, because my mother was one of the few people who

> would put up with her narcissitic abuse and still love her as a child.

>

> I look at my life and I envy her in that I'll really have no one to

> lean on. Divorcing severely BPD husband, autistic child (can't help

> it-would be supportive, if he could)...etc. But, I've learned from

> this group that there are many who try to grasp on to a family that

> basically isn't thre. And eventually leave and go on to something

> new. And they survive. Some even thrive.

>

> I was reading articles on America and how we are mostly likely to

> sever ties with our parents. And I wondered why? Is there more

> mental illness in America?

>

> I'm rambling. But, thanks for the place to vent.

>