Re: A Mother with BPD

[Guest guest]

Hi and welcome,

Everything you wrote...that's my life. Completely. Down to the father wanting

you to make up for HIS sake, not yours.

I'm 42. ALL my life has been about my mother. Totally, completely about her.

When I got married and left the house, she would call about 3 times a day. If I

didn't answer or call back, it would escalate and she'd blame my husband and

talk trash about us to my father.

It's been hard for me to stand up to her, but I've gotten TONS better, from

being on this board and from therapy.

I think standing up to her was hard, mostly b/c she had my father backing her up

and I was very frightened of him. Now he's gone, it's weird, now I'm afraid of

hurting her...but when I was talking to my therapist about this, I realized it's

not that I 'm afraid of hurting her, it's all the histrionics and drama I'm

trying to avoid.

I, like yourself, usually just avoid, avoid, avoid. I don't tell her anything

she doesn't need to know, I don't share much (not that she lets me get much in

when she's talking). I really resent the drama at just about every family

event.

And, like you, it took me blowing up to finally say it all to her. I had kept it

all in, fake smiling my way through it, eating my way through it, gaining 50

pounds of anger, resentment, and sadness.

I finally blew up at her, but I said it. It ALL came out. After that day, we

went from her calling me constantly/daily to me calling her once a day for,

literally, a 30-second phone call. And that's it. She didn't like it but that's

all she's getting and I'd like it to go to a 30 second WEEKLY call. If she

criticizes my husband or crossed boundaries I've set, she can expect me to

withdraw even more or go no contact for 1 to 3 weeks. My brother jokes about it,

and it used to bother me, but now I let him laugh all he wants. I'm the one

enjoying the peace and quiet! He gets HER!

I get physically sick from being with her. I know to people outside this board,

that sounds cruel. But my mother is an incredibly anxious, fearful, phobic,

critical person and when I leave her house after just an hour, I feel like I

need a shower. It's horrid. So I limit face to face time, too.

This is your chance to rewrite the rules of your relationship. You probably

don't want it to go back to the way it was, so right now is a good time to

change the way things are done. As another of the members here (Doug)

encouraged me to say to my mother, " Welcome to my sandbox! Here are the rules! "

I love that.

Definitely do it for your daughter's sake. Put HER first, not your mother. My

older daughter is realizing how " strange " Grandma can be, too! It's very, very

hard, I soooo know this. My family is very enmeshed and undifferentiated. And

the decisions I've made have isolated me from them, but I had to choose my

health and my family over her. Enough is enough.

Fiona

>

> I just found out through a co-worker whose mother-in-law has BPD that this is

an actual disorder and that my mother suffers from this as well. I have been

reading books on this for a couple of weeks now and it has really helped me to

understand why she behaves like she does and why I feel as if I'm going crazy

from being around her. I'm 49 years old and feel like I have wasted a lot of

years worrying and stressing over things. I don't know why it has taken me so

long. She has had so much control over my life and I have been allowing this to

happen. It is so hard for me to stand up to my mother. It is such a huge

ordeal if I say something to offend her and then I have to put up with so much

drama that I found it easier to hold everything in. Some days I feel like I

could just blow up. I had a foot surgery and was on pain medication and she

came over and pushed every last button I had. I still couldn't say anything.

When she had a chance to get home, I called her and started yelling that she was

driving me crazy. I had never done that before and it took being on pain

medication for it to be released. Of course, she hung up on me. When I called

her several weeks later and I asked her if I had to explain why I got upset, she

said I guess your hormones are going crazy. I know it is useless to try to

explain things to her because she is never at fault. This is the way it has

always been. I have always spoken with my mother on the phone frequently and

done things with her a couple of times each week. I am usually miserable from

the many rude things she says and does. I don't understand why I let myself be

tortured like that. For the last several months I have cut way back. It has

been a slow process, but this has been really good for me emotionally. She has

been " paying me back " by not calling, but this has been a really good thing for

me too. I am finally understanding that this has needed to happen for a long

time, but I was never strong enough to do it. When she finally realized it had

been two weeks since we had spoken, she called and left a sad message that she

wanted me to have lunch with her and my father. I just couldn't call her back,

because I knew I couldn't do that and I didn't want to try to explain it to her.

I knew she would cry and I would cave in and go with them to lunch. My Dad

called the other day and told me Mom is getting lonely. I told him for now I

wasn't able to be around her. I wasn't mad or doing this to be mean, I just had

to do it for my own sanity. I told him that I didn't like myself when I was

around her. I feel bullied and disrespected. I asked him if he would like to

read the book that explains about her disorder and he said he would. I just

gave it to him tonight. She treats him horribly and he knows that there is

something wrong with her, but he has always stood by her and protected her. He

said that he is able to deal with it. I don't think I can take it anymore. My

daughter has a birthday coming up soon and we usually have dinner with my

parents but my mother always creates some kind of drama. I am so tired of

everything being about her. What should I do about the birthday dinner? How long

should I give myself before I start talking with her again? I am emotionally

exhausted from years of dealing with her behavior. What should I do?

>

[Guest guest]

I'm sorry your mom added to the difficulties in you recovering from your

surgery.

I had surgery recently also. I had to make a really hard decision that

didn't go over well with my mom but I told her the night before that I was

having surgery knowing that it would make it really difficult for her to be

able to be present at the hospital with less notice. And when she pushed to

go, I told her that we couldn't pick her up at 4am easily. Then she pushed

harder and said, " my husband has requested that you not be there because he

needs to be available to his daughters that day (my oldest daughter quite

likely has BPD as well so he had his hands full). And this was is what would

be good for me as well since we have been having a rough time lately (her &

I). " She was FURIOUS. But it's my right. It was my first big step in

taking back control with something this big and so I let her down easily.

All things I told her that day were true but I was hoping to spare her

becuase I didn't want to be outright mean. My kids didn't want her there

too, I decided NOT to tell her that because that would've crushed her.

But she did proceed to make our life difficult for the next few weeks of my

recovery. Good thing I had caller ID.

I go to a NAMI group that is there for people who have family members who

are mentally ill. One of the gals there told me that surgeries and medical

problems like this make it really hard on mentally ill people for a lot of

reasons. It's upssts their jenga puzzle. In addition to that, with BPD, it

takes the focus off of them being the center of the universe and they fight

like crazy to get that position back.

BPDingNoMore

On Mon, Aug 23, 2010 at 10:58 PM, bradleykim18 wrote:

>

>

> I just found out through a co-worker whose mother-in-law has BPD that this

> is an actual disorder and that my mother suffers from this as well. I have

> been reading books on this for a couple of weeks now and it has really

> helped me to understand why she behaves like she does and why I feel as if

> I'm going crazy from being around her. I'm 49 years old and feel like I have

> wasted a lot of years worrying and stressing over things. I don't know why

> it has taken me so long. She has had so much control over my life and I have

> been allowing this to happen. It is so hard for me to stand up to my mother.

> It is such a huge ordeal if I say something to offend her and then I have to

> put up with so much drama that I found it easier to hold everything in. Some

> days I feel like I could just blow up. I had a foot surgery and was on pain

> medication and she came over and pushed every last button I had. I still

> couldn't say anything. When she had a chance to get home, I called her and

> started yelling that she was driving me crazy. I had never done that before

> and it took being on pain medication for it to be released. Of course, she

> hung up on me. When I called her several weeks later and I asked her if I

> had to explain why I got upset, she said I guess your hormones are going

> crazy. I know it is useless to try to explain things to her because she is

> never at fault. This is the way it has always been. I have always spoken

> with my mother on the phone frequently and done things with her a couple of

> times each week. I am usually miserable from the many rude things she says

> and does. I don't understand why I let myself be tortured like that. For the

> last several months I have cut way back. It has been a slow process, but

> this has been really good for me emotionally. She has been " paying me back "

> by not calling, but this has been a really good thing for me too. I am

> finally understanding that this has needed to happen for a long time, but I

> was never strong enough to do it. When she finally realized it had been two

> weeks since we had spoken, she called and left a sad message that she wanted

> me to have lunch with her and my father. I just couldn't call her back,

> because I knew I couldn't do that and I didn't want to try to explain it to

> her. I knew she would cry and I would cave in and go with them to lunch. My

> Dad called the other day and told me Mom is getting lonely. I told him for

> now I wasn't able to be around her. I wasn't mad or doing this to be mean, I

> just had to do it for my own sanity. I told him that I didn't like myself

> when I was around her. I feel bullied and disrespected. I asked him if he

> would like to read the book that explains about her disorder and he said he

> would. I just gave it to him tonight. She treats him horribly and he knows

> that there is something wrong with her, but he has always stood by her and

> protected her. He said that he is able to deal with it. I don't think I can

> take it anymore. My daughter has a birthday coming up soon and we usually

> have dinner with my parents but my mother always creates some kind of drama.

> I am so tired of everything being about her. What should I do about the

> birthday dinner? How long should I give myself before I start talking with

> her again? I am emotionally exhausted from years of dealing with her

> behavior. What should I do?

>

>

>