Setting Boundaries or Cutting Ties?

[Guest guest]

Cutting ties --- is that what you all call going NC?

Anyway, I don't know if this is really a question or just an idea I'd like to

kick around with others ... I've been worrying about and caring for my waiflike

Nada for 20 years now, and after her constant verbal abuse, wild stories and

dark, depressing view of the world, I just feel so exhausted and done with her.

She calls, and I don't pick up the phone. Even the sound of her voice freaks me

out.

Here's the deal: I need to make a decision. Am I going to go NC or set some real

boundaries? I saw a therapist yesterday for the first time in years, and she

suggested that I figure out what I'm going to do to help alieviate some of this

horrible guilt and anxiety I'm carrying around. Either cut ties totally or send

NADA a letter stating precisely which days of the year I'm willing to have

contact.

Not sure which I'll do. She's getting to be pretty old and she doesn't take good

physical care of herself. If she were to fall and break her hip tomorrow I'm

sure I'd go visit her in the hospital. Just seeing her at Christmas and her

birthday seems like a depressingly artificial construct --- what's the point of

us even getting together on the designated days if I'm just going to dread them

terribly?

Thoughts? Ideas? How do others deal with boundaries? I'd love to go NC, but ...

there are some real complications in doing so.