Re: new, asking for feedback, tx.

August 7, 2010

lizzie,

I don't have suggestions for what to do or read next. But I did want to say

that is seems (from what I've been reading here over the past year) that you

are in the right place. I feel like much of what you bring up and are

dealing with has come up in one shape or form over time. So, welcome. And I

guess I just encourage you to keep reading and posting if you would like to.

My BP mother is still alive, but I definitely resonated with your comment

that you nada (BP mom) just wanted you to protect the " facade " . Boy do I see

that all over the place with my nada. The woman is dying of cancer and other

things, but it is still all about keeping up a facade that she still looks

good and has things together - all the while making sure her kids know how

miserable and lonely she is. And a million other relatively small ways and

places that it is all about the facade she wants to project and I think she

either does believe or at least wants very badly to be what is real.

Peace,

MY

On Wed, Aug 4, 2010 at 2:32 PM, Keyes wrote:

>

> Hello.

>

> Very new here. My BP mother passed away a while back. We were estranged for

> a

> long time. When I reunited with her and the family I saw that protecting

> the

> " facade " was what she wanted from me and all she was capable of, and I had

> to

> protect myself still to a great degree after trying so hard to reach some

> kind

> of level of communication. I feel like my life has been about carrying this

>

> enormous secret. And the secret was even part secret from me until now.

>

> I see myself overreacting in relationships and keep people arm's length

> very

> often. I have broached subject of BP in past with therapists who dismissed

> it

> in terms of me or my BP. I just read in two days the Lawson book and was

> dumbfounded and am dismayed after all my psychological digging I did not

> explore

> this until now. In a way, too, I feel a kind of peace and a validation for

> what

> I went through. Grief but also a relief to call it and label it and respect

> it,

> the depth of my struggle.

>

> Suddenly I seem to be identifying BP past behaviors in me, and applying BP

> behaviors to many others in my life past and now. Is that normal when one

> first

> takes off the blinders on this? I suspect a lot of people do have BP ... to

>

> varying degrees.

>

> I am not sure what is appropriate in emailing here as a newbie or is there

> a more appropriate forum for me as an older adult child of a BP who has

> passed

> on? What I have read, though, has helped me take this seriously even more

> than

> the book.

>

> Any suggestions on what next to read or do?

>

> Thanks. Best, lizzie

>

August 8, 2010

MY,

Thanks so much for the reachback. I am going through Understanding Borderline

Mother book for the second time. It will take time to process it and grieve it,

but for the first time in a long time I feel like I finally found a MAJOR MAJOR

MAJOR piece of the puzzle. I have hope after feeling serious despair lately.

All the struggling all these years to make sense of my profound fear and

anxiety. My trust and esteem issues. So severe though I fake bravado really

well. I have spent so much time recovering from the codepency re the alcoholic

family, but I knew the issues with my mother were especially profound. She was

the codepedent/enabler. And a lot of survivor guilt. Well, all 4 PTSD

symptoms: 1) falling into infant time when traumatized as an adult, helplessnes

and panic; 2) psychic numbing, 3) hypervigilance, 4) survivor guilt. I think

those are the ones I once looked up in a book.

A situation with me and a friend whose hubby has Alz.'s triggered such a strong

reaction from me. I realized I had embraced the old role with her and her

struggling husband as my BP and father surrogates, and when my friend punished

me for asserting some boundaries I freaked as did she right back at me. Which

of us or maybe both were pathologically and irrationally reactive? It whammied

me. I realize so many past relationships, as conflict happened, I left

prematurely, hopeless that mutual understanding could be achieved. " Learned

helplessness .... hopelessness. " Honesty brought punishment not reconciliation.

When I was three I told my mother at one point I hated her. (My brother threw a

tantrum every five minutes and there was no over-reaction. As the girl I had to

be compliant.) Anyway, after I told my mother I hated her she coldly and

deliberately went into my bedroom and began packing my clothes. I thought to

myself, " Doesn't she know I am too little to make it on my own? " She played

hardball with me. That was one of Dr. Phil's defining moments, a negative one,

for sure. And I couldn't understand the double standard with me and my

brother. The family over the years referred to it as the time she used

" psychology " on me. Not psychology I came to appreciate. Terror.

I think what really haunts me was the pain when I discovered my nada was

incapable of emotional intimacy with me, when I finally was strong enough to

acknowledge that along with pity and gratitude toward her for what she did and

tried to give, I had tremendous dependency on her and also FEAR, but then

asserting myself having those others in family network, whom I probably

" trained " to nurture and pity her, rush in to help her and regarded my standing

up for myself as so unnecessarily insensitive to her, with a lot of their

underground issues of fear and fight for denial probably triggered. And my

protectiveness of family secrets and her hypersensitivity to ANY perceived

disloyalty made me isolate and not take risks of trust and what would maybe have

been healthy exploratory disclosures. Loneliness. To lose my support network

and allow her need, and her irrational or manipulative account of our

conflict to pre-empt my dependency needs with my primary and secondary family.

I never dreamt the estrangement would go on so long.

My Dad was an alcoholic. A lot of physical trauma and frustration there. I was

told by my nada it was up to me to get him to stop drinking for years. I was to

have a future AFTER I helped THEM find happiness. It's the path of burnout and

loneliness. Three things required of me, stoicism, obedience, and

cheerfulness. I always felt I was on a tightrope without a net. I thought there

was something terribly wrong with me to consider I must walk on a tightrope but

when I finally challenged the tightrope walking in a modest way for my adult

age, all hell broke loose. A lot of self-blame that I wasn't strong enough to

rise above the conflict. But growing up, there was never hope of conflict

resolution when such a significant family member was not capable of trust. I was

a human doing not being and searched for my identity in her eyes, could only see

it reflected in her eyes from the reflections I made in other's eyes by trying

to people please. I did not feel that unconditional love which she did not have

for herself and did not receive either sadly. And which today I struggle to give

to myself. And the horror of being viewed from such a young age as a " stranger "

and " evil " suddenly. That " turn " description was so moving. The Medusa look

that chilled. And there was never followup remorse or reference to the chilling

and shame inspiring rage that came out. If I walked on the tightrope I could

keep the Medusa at bay I felt and there was a very vulnerable and sensitive

and sadly paranoid human being I struggled to bond with. Who did give me a lot

I do want to acknowledge, and had such stoicism herself and such strong

character in many ways but I felt like Persephone and also Sisyphus from

mythology.

I wanted my nada to acknowledge that she was wrong in her take on the reality of

a crisis with us, the one that triggered our dramatic separation, and she was

incapable of doing so. I thought she was unwilling. But it seems sadly and

tragically she was incapable. So much time I spent trying to make that happen

and trying to mourn that it couldn't.

Remember Ordinary People, that movie? Tyler character squares her

jaw and leaves. What armor.

Sorry to go on so much, but I know the truth does set us free.

You take care of your precious self and thanks again! Your story of your ailing

mother. Wanting to give to her, but the sadness of that " facade " . Must be

challenging. Being asked to give what one can't give.

I once read a really wonderful book, Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By

You. Two intentions in life and you can't follow both at the same time. The

intention to explore, the healthy one. The intention to protect, the isolating

one. When the intention to protect is so ferocious life contracts. When it

has been role modelled for us. When we have a fear we don't even know why, the

fear is anxiety because we don't even know what the heck the fear is really from

since it is second hand. And maybe it was fear passed on from their parents.

Ekhart Tolle in A New Earth speaks of the pain body and the EGO. That was

helpful reading, too. Okay, I have gone on a lot, but it is so cathartic!

Take care. Best, lizzie

________________________________

To: WTOAdultChildren1

Sent: Sat, August 7, 2010 11:10:32 PM

Subject: Re: new, asking for feedback, tx.