Seeing Nada from where I am at now

[Guest guest]

My husband and I decided to take my eldest to Futsal (indoor soccer) for a night

away from Nada. When we got there my Dad was there....with his girlfriend.

Background:

Dad has been NC from Nada for 18 months and about 6 weeks ago spilt the beans

that he had a G/F to Nada and all hell broke loose. By the by Dad was well and

truly faithful the r/ship was new at that point . My eldest who is 5.5 years old

was present during the exchange and I told my parents that it was not

appropriate to argue about this in front of her. Nada acted like a waif and ran

off and Dad was profusely apologising to me and I told him to STOP.

I said I am happy for you as long as you are happy. You deserve happiness,

kindness and affection these things you were expected to give to Nada but you

never received it from her and due to her example I didn't dare give it because

I would of been ridiculed for it. So we had a cry and we made up as we had been

estranged due to my enmeshment with Nada and allowed her to move in with me when

they had the BIG fight that ended a 40 year relationship. Dad went home to his

G/F and that left me with Nada to contend with.

Mind you at this point I had had 6 sessions with my psychologist and was

learning assertiveness and boundaries and such. Nada then commenced a verbal

assault lasting 4 hours where she was the super witch queen that she mostly was

when I was a child. The basic message I took from it was that those 40years were

for nothing and that he was her territory and she was royally pissed about it.

It didn't matter what I said I was wrong about our families history especially

in relation to my father who was my security blanket as a child. I said to her I

love you, I love Dad and I love you both and I am not choosing...Anyway I

digress.

Back to the point:

When my husband (who incidently is my security blanket and I was alone . Nada

decided to tell me of an incident involving my eldest child that occured today

(I was on a morning shift and she cares for them when I am work...Yes I know I'm

working on changing that). Apparently " Noni " had said to Nada that she had met

Poppy's girlfriend to which Nada had responded with " So what? "

To which Noni allegedly had said " Don't ask me questions if you don't like the

answers "

Nada told me that her response was " I don't care what your Poppy does and he can

go jump. Don't you talk to adults like that. If your mother (meaning me)heard

that she would slap you and if you say anything like that to me again I will

slap you " Then she told me she ignored Noni the rest of the day.

I was quite dumbfounded and stated " No I would not of slapped her at all. She

is a child and she doesn't understand what she is saying " Which started a RANT A

THON by Nada that swung between Waif, Queen and Witch.

I found myself intellectualising what she was saying I wasn't taking it in. I

was labelling each part of the RANT with " Waif " , ooh thats a Queenly comment,

yep Witch now back to Waif poor baby...I listened however I didn't feed each

affective state.

I then decided to go into a parallel version of seeing if I could get my Nada to

reflect on her feelings, attitudes and behaviours and tried to describe why Dad

didn't fight but Disassociated when there were arguements and it was probably

due to his childhood experiences with a wifebeating, gambling, alcoholic father

probably found it was best to tune out and listen to The Who in his room. (Dad,

when I was older and more independent got stuck into the world of warcraft and

such to escape NADA, I learnt tuning out from him). I said those behaviours

learnt in childhood are probably why he is what he is today. She just didn't GET

IT. So I stopped with that tangent because it didn't apply to her it wasn't

important. Typical of a BPD.

The only thing she kept repeating was crude comments such as the only thing he

loves is his dick, and that he lost her when he wrote a letter saying that he

was having sex with his new girlfriend which I did challenge her with because I

have read this same letter and Dad never mentioned the word " sex " . What he did

write " was that he stilled cared and loved her but not in a sexual way " . Even

something that is in black and white she still read between the lines and came

out with BS.

So I moved onto her childhood which was equally shitty.

My Grandnada was a LBPD that was in and out of mental institutions and hospitals

during Nada's formative years. Nada's FADA was a NPD and preferred her brother

who has NPD too as the good child and Nada as the bad child. Nada was forced to

stay with various relatives until she moved in with her Grandmother who I

believe taught NADA her queenly and witchy ways and pretty much used Nada as a

child slave cleaning, cooking, shopping and such. Nada did not finish school and

was told to get a money paying job at 14 because her Fada was not going to have

a child of his not paying their way.

Needless to say of that review she still didn't get it and it was then that I

had my second BREAKTHROUGH I am never gonna be able to get her to see or gain

insight because she lacks the tools to recognise. I knew there and then that I

am definately not her and the parent who did make me who I am today is my Dad.

Not her. From her influence I received a diagnosis of Major depression, low self

esteem, intimacy issues and an attachment disorder and anger issues.

Funny thing is I'm not angry as I type this , I'm not mourning the loss of my

childhood. Instead I find that I am now looking at this all in a detached way(

and a wry sense of humour) and I'm making connections with all my behaviours and

attitudes and because of the connections I am making positive changes. I have

finally found myself through acknowledging these things. 3 generations have been

effected in different ways bought on by these patterns of insecure attachement

issues and it is going to stop with me. I have enrolled myself into parenting

classes and I'm going to discus the correlations of child abuse and BPD,

Insecure attachment issues in the Non BPD offspring of BPD parents with my

psychologist. I think I know the answers I just want validation from him.

When she finally went to bed I just waved my hand in a gesture of " that's BPD

for ya " . And No she didn't see it.

Lou

[Guest guest]

Sorry to hear about the behavior that transpired, but it is good you are

becoming more aware. You will never get her to see things rationally, and it

doesn't really help anyone for you to step in and try to be her therapist.

Why does someone who yells at and threatens to slap your child allowed to stay

in your home? Why do you listen to her talk about your father's dick? There are

some very inappropriate things going on that would not be tolerated by me. She

may need an outlet for all her emotions and feelings, she may need someone to

talk to, but it definitely does not have to be you.

I think it is a really positive step that you want to learn new skills.

Parenting classes and therapy are both really great ways to learn the tools we

were never given as KOs. I wish you the very best with those things. I'm also

glad you are looking into other options for child care.

Sveta

[Guest guest]

Hi Sveta. I ask myself the same thing all the time why. Im new to this

realisation that its normal. She does it because she has groomed me from an

early age to be her confidant and her carer since I was 6. I know on an

intellectual level that this is not appropiate and Im not doing it to my own

child. Im not permitting her actions, I actually do challenge her in an

assertive way and use multiple examples mostly involving her own childhood to

drive home the message that her behaviout is wrong. It works maybe 80% of the

time. It also makes her quiet too for a while.

------------------------------

>Sorry to hear about the behavior that transpired, but it is good you are

becoming more aware. You will never get her to see things rationally, and it

doesn't really help anyone for you to step in and try to be her therapist.

>

>Why does someone who yells at and threatens to slap your child allowed to stay

in your home? Why do you listen to her talk about your father's dick? There are

some very inappropriate things going on that would not be tolerated by me. She

may need an outlet for all her emotions and feelings, she may need someone to

talk to, but it definitely does not have to be you.

>

>I think it is a really positive step that you want to learn new skills.

Parenting classes and therapy are both really great ways to learn the tools we

were never given as KOs. I wish you the very best with those things. I'm also

glad you are looking into other options for child care.

>

>Sveta

>