really letting go of guilt

January 11, 2011

Hello Everyone,

This is my first post, so I apologize if I'm not doing this correctly. I grew

up with a BPD mother who always treated me very well but I knew that her

" unconditional love " would go away the second I was less than perfect or

disobeyed her in any way. Only when I got married and moved 350 miles away from

my mother (2 years after my father passed away) did she explode and the rage

fully manifest against me - it was always there, but in a lesser degree. As an

example of her full blown rage, she's accused me of spitting on my father's

grave, threatened to not attend my wedding, to prevent my wedding, and to revoke

financial support of my wedding (2 weeks prior to it). I'm coming to terms with

her good and bad as someone who has an illness, but I get depressed that 1.

we'll never have a " normal " relationship that I've always strived for (in trying

to please her unreasonable expectations) and 2. I still partially feel like I

should be able to fix this and if I was more generous with my time (she doesn't

accept boundaries) I could have a good relationship with her, (which I know is

not true or healthy). Over Christmas while visiting her, I tried to set a

boundary that she didn't like, she wound up picking a fight stemming back to

issues she had surrounding my marriage and my choice to " disobey " her in one

area and we had a fight (the first time in my 27 years that I yelled at her).

Since then I've reached out to her and said that I'm here if she wants to move

forward. She decided that I was being passive aggressive and she's " punishing

me " by saying she no longer wants a relationship with me. There's so much

detail I've left out, but it feels good to just share this with people other

than friends or my husband who really get where I'm coming from rather than

people who just support me because they're friends. My mom splits, has no

respect for boundaries, uses guilt, money, and rage to try to pull me closer to

her but also to punish me (and ultimately push me away). I guess I just get

depressed thinking that although I now know it's not me it's her, she has

friends who will forever support her position and will never get help (she

thinks it's me who has the problem and not her.) She's very manipulative and

like a roller coaster to deal with. I know there are some BPD people who seek

treatment and " improve " I just don't feel my mom will ever be one of those

people and I do miss her and love her despite her issues. I want to have a

relationship with her, but I don't know how I can do that at this point. It

just seems like such a waste as I've lost my father and am an only child and

would love to have a relationship with my mother like my girlfriends have that

seems so simple. It's not simple, it's anything but normal.

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