uBPDm is taunting her child

[Before you can make things better, you have to stop making them worse...]

SD6 told me that when in her moms care that mom throws it in SD6's face and taunts her about loving bravhart more and "you want bravhart to be your mom, why doesn't she just come pick you up so you can be with her instead of me".

I know BPDm is troubled and clearly feeling afraid of losing her daughters affection but I am seriously worried about this as I think that six years old is too little to be bullied and taunted by a parent like this. The poor kid is really a mess. She is suffering major guilt about her relationship with me and has admitted she feels bad about wishing bravhart was her mom instead of her own mom.

I do my best to explain that while it's ok to love me and feel safe with me, that I can never be her mom, she will only have one mom, and that her mom is just feeling some mixed up stuff that we are trying to get her help for, and that it will pass.  :'(

But I can see how conflicted SD6 is and how much stress she feels. It certainly now makes sense of things like when we are having a good time together and then suddenly SD6 becomes hostile out of the blue, she must be feeling guilty. My heart is breaking watching BPDm make her own child hurt so much. This woman really does not have a single grain of empathy for anyone but herself.

Is this a type of alienation too?

[bravhart1]

SD6 told me that when in her moms care that mom throws it in SD6's face and taunts her about loving bravhart more and "you want bravhart to be your mom, why doesn't she just come pick you up so you can be with her instead of me".

I know BPDm is troubled and clearly feeling afraid of losing her daughters affection but I am seriously worried about this as I think that six years old is too little to be bullied and taunted by a parent like this. The poor kid is really a mess. She is suffering major guilt about her relationship with me and has admitted she feels bad about wishing bravhart was her mom instead of her own mom.

I do my best to explain that while it's ok to love me and feel safe with me, that I can never be her mom, she will only have one mom, and that her mom is just feeling some mixed up stuff that we are trying to get her help for, and that it will pass.  :'(

But I can see how conflicted SD6 is and how much stress she feels. It certainly now makes sense of things like when we are having a good time together and then suddenly SD6 becomes hostile out of the blue, she must be feeling guilty. My heart is breaking watching BPDm make her own child hurt so much. This woman really does not have a single grain of empathy for anyone but herself.

Is this a type of alienation too?

[Sunfl0wer]

I just finished watching the whole series by Craig  Childress on PA, another poster recommended his almost 2hr video, I went ahead and watched that and all of his videos.  It really helped me greatly to understand exactly what happened with my own SD and it validated so much for me!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ezBJ3954mKw

That is exactly what it is.  It is the child wanting to bond to you, but begins to hold back due to guilt and fear of hurting their bond with the alienating parent.

Children are wired to bond with both parents.  While you are SM, it appears that this child was bonded to you but is now afraid to continue that bond.

His solution is to find a way, set up circumstances, for the child to feel safe bonding again with the alienating parent.  You can likely use this info to help you know what to do.

I think for me, I was likely to withdraw when SD withdrew, thinking I need to respect her feelings, listening more to her behavior.  Now, looking back, I see that her withdrawal was a false representation of SD, not her true self, but the uBPDmoms superimposed self.  I think knowing this then, I would have done more to facilitate her feeling safe to bond with me and dad again vs backing off.  (Not that I would in anyway be pushy, but I would understand her true need was NOT space, but in fact to feel safe to bond and this would have subtly affected my behavior)

(Another video from another poster is "welcome back Pluto" I cannot seem to find it quickly.  I think tho it is more appropriate for above 7, 8 or 9yrs old... .not sure, you look and decide.  It is a video explaining alienation to the kid for the kid to watch.)

[Sunfl0wer]

I do my best to explain that while it's ok to love me and feel safe with me, that I can never be her mom, she will only have one mom, and that her mom is just feeling some mixed up stuff that we are trying to get her help for, and that it will pass. 

This is pretty much the approach I took with SD10-15. 

If you watch the videos you will decide for yourself, however, I see how what I did may have unintentionally assisted with the alienation process at times.

For example:

If child is sad and looks stressed that she is breaking her bond with mom by bonding with me.

Before watching video, I say: I will never replace your mom, your mom is the most important and I acknowledge that she is very special to you and nothing will change that.  (This really is what I would say, thinking the child would feel less stress with me and me being a good SM would eventually win over her mom's approach, by not stressing her)

Looking back, after watching the video:  I now think that I was allowing the child to reinforce her need to uphold the alienation with those words. Because it focuses on the child's fear.  And actually accidentally validates the child's need to uphold the disordered parents bond as primary and more important, which may lend to accidentally feeding the alienation.

(Now in all honesty, the videos don't explicitly give you detailed responses like this, so understand, this is coming from me and my interpretation.)

My New response after videos:  I honestly don't know, I haven't gotten to practice as the r/s ended.  However, I know the new message I would want to communicate would be:

1. Mom is safe and capable of caring for herself when you are not there, and will be the same mom when you return, she will not fall apart, she will be ok, and when we see her at drop off, look, she is still the same, always there for you no matter what (even if you bonded with us) (my thought with this is it puts the child back into the child role vs mom's caretaker.  Idk if it works... .but it is what I came up with)

2. You are safe and ok to love us.  I will always be loving and allow you to approach us for bonding and be open to it.  All children want to bond to both of their parents, that is just what all kids do and feel, that is ok to feel.  That is how I feel about my parents, and how bobby is etc.

I think the idea of the child being afraid that SM is replacing mom, is more a fear of the typical experience of a child not in BPD dynamic.  I think when a child is having this experience where they have communicated to the child that the child should hate us... .that we are addressing the wrong primary issue for the child and incorrectly treating this issue as if "it is normal" and actually unintentionally "minimizing and invalidating."  But that is my current opinion after only recently watching the videos and adding my own understanding to it all.  I'm just throwing my thoughts out there  in case you watch the videos and leave with different thoughts about it all... .and to openly dialogue both for and against an approach, as I never had the opportunity to get that far and would like to have my thoughts clearer around this.

[livednlearned]

That's so sad  :'(

Is there a way to depersonalize things for her? She is likely associating safety/kindness/stability with you. She is likely associating turbulence/bullying/fear with bio mom.

Right now, she believes that she's bad for having a preference for a person, instead of having a preference for certain feelings.

That might also help her learn that she is not taking sides, or caught in a loyalty bind. Instead, she is demonstrating a preference for situations that make her feel ok the way she is.

It's complicated when they're developmentally struggling with some of the same challenges (black/white thinking, all good/all bad) as the BPD parent. Not that the kids are BPD, just that they are beginning to learn how two opposites can be true at the same time, and be able to navigate the ambiguity.

The fact SD6 has a strong bond with you is a good sign! I find it remarkable how resilient my son has become, and while he's  still working through some things with his dad, he saw the alienation for what it was. He just didn't have the skills to handle his dad in the moment, which is not surprising -- I found it difficult as an adult, so a kid is going to have it even harder. You are doing something very right if SD6 is willing to bond with you despite her mom's tactics.

[bravhart1]

Well thank you for that. I do have kids of my own and have been doing this mom thing for a while now, .

Sadly all I do for SD6 is be a consistent,  responsible, adult. She clearly doesn't get that from BPDm.

Her mom builds and stresses a lot of fears in her, from getting ear infections, stranger danger to not getting enough love. I stress that she is fine, and all is well, and that if any thing needs to be worried about, then as the parent/adult I will worry about it for her.

My fear is that SD6's therapist may be trying to find a way to get out if this situation. She has said on more than one occasion that she hasn't seen anyone this long, and that since mom has basically bad mouthed her to SD6 that her efforts aren't working. I'm not sure another therapist will get through either as BPDm will just paint the new therapist black eventually and at least this one knows who mom is, and that took a while for T to see as BPDm is pretty good at portraying herself as a victim.

I think SD6 needs the stability of the adults she has in her life to stick around and show that we won't let bio mom run us off with her bullying behavior.