Re: How Do You Answer Nada When She Accuses You Outright of Somethin

[Guest guest]

I always several hours delayed on emails due to digest, but I wanted to share

that I was nodding my head in response to what Mozz and Annie said.

What I learned from the book I read on button-pushers (and nadas are supreme

button pushers) is that it is OK to stop reacting to their stuff. One of my

biggest ah-ha moments was to realize I can (and need to) stop asking for anyone

else's " permission " to do what is right for ME.

Much of what my nada accuses me of is pretty off the wall, too. I could easily

keep trying to reason my way through it, the way I would with any REASONABLE

person. My next ah-ha moment, was realizing that I was expecting the impossible

of nada---that she would be reasonable and reliable. If she were going to be

reasonable, she would have shown consistent signs of that looongg ago.

Many of us are here on WTO, because we have been MORE than frustrated with our

BPD family member, and are deciding how to throw in the towel and get on with

our lives. (It took ME a good while to accept this, and love myself anyway, so

that I could go about throwing in that towel, with less guilt. I would have

loved to take nada along in healing our relationship, but that is not possible.

I've had my own moments of being brought to my senses by others on this journey,

here.)

I think it really helped me to decide that I must love myself first, and

validate myself. I can trust myself. So can you, romantic libra.

And guess what, you don't have to be " right " , just happy. Happy in spite of what

rubbish your nada comes up with. Happy even if you cannot refute her crap or

shut her up. And happy because YOU will learn to take care of yourself on the

telephone, just as I am learning to do. One day you will hang up the phone and

be happy with yourself, really happy, for taking care of YOU.

I now know that I've spent years teaching nada how I will be treated. Ouch. I

don't feel regret, I just feel enlightened. It really is impossible to untrain

nada. But I have more than a snowball's chance in hell of retraining ME. So I

don't expect her to change, again because she has been doing her business on me

a LONNNG time, and is more stubborn than I. OK, let her be stubborn and cut her

nose off to spite her face. My practice is to leave her in God's hands. In

every conversation I do my best to accept the reality of the situation, but

limit my exposure to unsolvable problems with nada. Today I know it is my job

to learn how treat myself as well as possible in each situation with her. It is

a step by step process, where I take back my power.

That means, for me, that I ask myself what is acceptable to me well before a

conversation ever occurs. This I think is where you were heading by bringing up

the issue with us at WTO.

I'll give you an example of where my mom is right now, with the changes I am

wreaking on her: I called my nada last week, thinking maybe she had gotten

over her issues; she had her machine on, and I left a kind neutral message. My

nada called me BACK to say, " Don't hang up the phone and don't be calling

me. " What a Catch-22! And then SHE raced to hang up the phone before me. I think

she puts on an act in front of my dad, making it look like I just hang up for no

reason.

This evening I had a phone call with my nada, where she was calling me back...

to ask me if it was something important I had called about. I took it, with a

tiny modicum of hope, but no expectations. Just curiousity. Actually, I HAD

wanted a bonding moment. I wanted to talk to my nada about how it was for her

when I was in middle school. I wanted to compare notes about some things that

are going on with my son and kvetch a bit. (Roll your eyes, it is OK: I wanted

a moment with a mother; I have friends that do this with their moms, and I have

a natural longing for this occasionally myself).

Instead, I ended up hanging up the phone the instant after I shared the general

topic with her. I could tell from nada's talking that she felt entitled to hurt

me because what I wanted to talk about was unimportant to her. She said she

wanted to talk another time.... but she did not seem to really want to stop

talking.... it seemed like she was wanting to justify rejecting talking to me,

and it was painful for me. I was not going to show her my pain, in order to get

her attention, so I said " Be good now mom, bye. " It had actually felt like she

was getting ready to unload on me... in the same way she told me I was boring,

a few weeks back. I ended that conversation very quickly, too. " Mom, if I am

boring to you then it is time for me to go. "

I no longer feel I am a wimp when I fold my cards as soon as things are

unmanageable. When I do speak up, which is whenever I feel up to it (not

tonight) I keep what I say as low energy as possible and as neutral (but true)

as I can, so it is unarguable. I quit as soon as I feel myself get painted into

a corner by her. In your case I might say, " It's not feasible for me to defend

myself from this, so I must go now. "

I don't give up easily as you can see. I give nada chances, but I no longer let

her get in close enough to hit me. I " Let her go to God. " Why? Because I finally

accept that I cannot do this job of changing anyone but me. The part I need to

change about me, is loving myself more fully, and not letting myself be

mistreated for any reason. And one thing I am more aware of, is that treating

myself well means not expecting what is not possible to receive. Reason,

forgiveness, kindness... those are the gifts I have to give myself. I do my best

to be kind to nada, and when that does not work, I get busy being kind to ME. I

am kind to me, when I maintain my standards for my behavior. And to do that

right, I have to get off the phone before nada pushes buttons that have not yet

been de-activated!

Best,