Slowly lifting the veil

[Family Court Strategies: When Your Partner Has BPD OR NPD Traits.]

I haven't been on here in quite some time & I'm not even sure what I have to say.  I can tell you right away I'm going to head straight on over to that Successful Shared Parenting resource to the right hand side over there!  That wasn't here last time I logged in & of course it looks great.  This site is such a life-saver.

My 4 yr old son's undiagnosed BPD dad (trying to remember how we talk about these things again - I think that's the terminology) is here for his routine visit.  I lay on serious guilt every couple of months so he eventually comes and visits for a long weekend. 

These visits are sometimes okay.  They are sometimes hell.  They are almost always a blurry mix of the two.  I let my son go with dad alone (they're away now while I study for school).  I am sitting here with such a stomach ache.  Worried.  I know they're okay but damn.  It's supposed to be time for me to focus on school so I can better our lives.  I SO SO SO need to get a good job. 

Anyway, the point here is that his dad moved out 4 years ago.  I moved away to another state 3 years ago.  These visits have been going on for that long, and it is only FINALLY NOW starting to click in my brain that this man is not going to change.  EVER.  He is going to die a crazy as f'ing bat s*it man & will never ever change even a little itsy tiny @ss bit.  EVER.  Not even for the heart of a child.  His child. 

I can also see the effect I've let him have on me.  I see the game I have let him play with me.  I see how he has used me, lied to me, and manipulated me.  I am starting to see how he makes me sick in the stomach, and feel crazy and discombobulated in the head.  I have to defend my child's well-being, defend against personal attacks, sexual advances, listen to his boo-hooing.  He acts like a child. 

I just can't BELIEVE - 100% BELIEVE a person can live the way he lives.  He actually comes here with sob stories wanting my pity.  Wanting to use that pity to get me to have sex with him.  It's all so sick.  He resents our son, resents spending time with him, and my son just loves him.  He just wants his daddy.  He can't understand why dad is mean.  He is 4! And my son deserves a loving man in his life (or no man at all) - but he needs a daddy.  All children do. 

I have tried dating over the years and realize I'm having a hard time understanding appropriate boundaries these days, and believing I can have good things.  Believing I am worth more.  I am working every minute to advance and better myself, but I can feel it.  Inside.  The resistance. 

How can a 42 year old man have the mind of a 6 yr old boy and not even care to change it?  Just excuse, after excuse, after lame excuse.  I feel so responsible to my little boy.  I feel so sorry for him.     

[tcevans78]

I haven't been on here in quite some time & I'm not even sure what I have to say.  I can tell you right away I'm going to head straight on over to that Successful Shared Parenting resource to the right hand side over there!  That wasn't here last time I logged in & of course it looks great.  This site is such a life-saver.

My 4 yr old son's undiagnosed BPD dad (trying to remember how we talk about these things again - I think that's the terminology) is here for his routine visit.  I lay on serious guilt every couple of months so he eventually comes and visits for a long weekend. 

These visits are sometimes okay.  They are sometimes hell.  They are almost always a blurry mix of the two.  I let my son go with dad alone (they're away now while I study for school).  I am sitting here with such a stomach ache.  Worried.  I know they're okay but damn.  It's supposed to be time for me to focus on school so I can better our lives.  I SO SO SO need to get a good job. 

Anyway, the point here is that his dad moved out 4 years ago.  I moved away to another state 3 years ago.  These visits have been going on for that long, and it is only FINALLY NOW starting to click in my brain that this man is not going to change.  EVER.  He is going to die a crazy as f'ing bat s*it man & will never ever change even a little itsy tiny @ss bit.  EVER.  Not even for the heart of a child.  His child. 

I can also see the effect I've let him have on me.  I see the game I have let him play with me.  I see how he has used me, lied to me, and manipulated me.  I am starting to see how he makes me sick in the stomach, and feel crazy and discombobulated in the head.  I have to defend my child's well-being, defend against personal attacks, sexual advances, listen to his boo-hooing.  He acts like a child. 

I just can't BELIEVE - 100% BELIEVE a person can live the way he lives.  He actually comes here with sob stories wanting my pity.  Wanting to use that pity to get me to have sex with him.  It's all so sick.  He resents our son, resents spending time with him, and my son just loves him.  He just wants his daddy.  He can't understand why dad is mean.  He is 4! And my son deserves a loving man in his life (or no man at all) - but he needs a daddy.  All children do. 

I have tried dating over the years and realize I'm having a hard time understanding appropriate boundaries these days, and believing I can have good things.  Believing I am worth more.  I am working every minute to advance and better myself, but I can feel it.  Inside.  The resistance. 

How can a 42 year old man have the mind of a 6 yr old boy and not even care to change it?  Just excuse, after excuse, after lame excuse.  I feel so responsible to my little boy.  I feel so sorry for him.     

[livednlearned]

Hiya tcevans78! I remember you   welcome back and yes, the resources are all tidied up and organized in one handy place. My personal favorites are Lesson 5 and 6. And 1 and 2 and 3 and 4. 

Understanding appropriate boundaries and then asserting them is a good goal! I think I picked up most of my skills with this (still in progress) trying to figure it out with my son. He is such an instant feedback loop, whereas with pwBPD the learning curve can be steeper. And I started to see the effect that my issues with boundaries was having on S13. That's the thing about kids getting older. All the stuff starts to manifest   It's great that you're learning this now and not later when it's a much bigger ship and trickier to turn around.

Check out the validating questions section in this link: https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=272638.msg12585648#msg12585648

You get to work on validation AND boundaries in one go. POW. It somehow helped me understand this for myself, watching it have an impact on S13.

Good to have ya back!

[tcevans78]

Hi Livedandleanred.  Thank you for the reply.  I'm surprised someone remembers me! I will do as you recommended.  I am curious, though, what folks think about this:

I raise my son, although yes he is 4 so some may disagree, and I'm ok to hear those thoughts, not a biggie, that I treat him the way I expect to be treated.  That means, if I don't want him yelling at me, or using a mean voice with me, I don't use one with him.  If I don't want to be threatened, or bribed, I don't do it to him.    Because I am still learning alternative ways to get him to cooperate I sometimes do use these methods & I always reap the rewards (a kid who does them to me in return).  When I call him out on the behavior, telling him "that's not nice, etc" he says, "but you just did that to me!".  So - all that said I allow my son to call me out on bad behavior.   I apologize and try to fix it where I can.  I'm not perfect and I don't expect him to be perfect.  I allow him to apologize and try to fix bad behavior as well, and try to avoid punishment.  

SO!  :)ad has no problem being mean.  I have a very open dialogue w my son about what is good behavior and what isn't so when he comes to me and says Dad has been mean I speak the truth.  I say, "I'm sorry dad was mean to you.  How can I help right now?"  I have often times stepped in and removed dad from the situation telling him I'll take over - in order to protect my son's feelings.  This, obviously, has huge consequences (ie Dad becomes enraged  & the fighting begins).  I encourage my son to speak up and tell people NO! when they are hurting his body or doing something he doesn't like.  I encourage him to be vocal vs physical.  However, this doesn't work with dad.  :)ad won't respect his requests for him to stop hurting or annoying him, or requests to treat him nicely.  And I see my son's heart BREAK. Tears fill his eyes and he looks at me with zero understanding.  

I have decided to stop getting angry at dad, and to stop correcting dad.  I've decided to let the cards fall, and continue to acknowledge my son's responses & apologize & offer to help.  I think that eventually he will decide to stop spending so much time with someone who is ugly.  

However.  I'm also worried my son will do the opposite.  That in order to protect having time with his dad (which I have never ever threatened) he will begin to defend dad in his mind.  Or in order to rectify what is happening, he will decide that his mistreatment is a form of love.  An acceptable form of love.  despite my efforts.  

I know everyone is different, and I know that you guys aren't therapists, etc.  BUT

would you handle it the way I'm handling it?

Quick & easy example: my son hates getting his hair washed because he hates water in his eyes.  I am very careful not to get water into his eyes because I know it is painful, and simply out of respect because he asked me not to.  However, dad will intentionally pour water into his eyes as he screams, telling him "it's no big deal quit crying like a baby".  Normally I can walk in and take over, but by then my son's feeling awful.  :)ad is angry with me for not "respecting the way he parents".  And one time dad was so angry he shoved me out of the bathroom and wouldn't let me near my son during bath.  Yeah.  It's like that.  Obviously I can always try to control everything and be the one to do bath, etc, and I do make the effort.  

Thanks.  

[tcevans78]

So last night, Dad and I were having dinner w son at a restaurant and we had a few drinks.  He decided to open up (as he often does) and make jokes about how he just isn't a good father, and how he has just accepted it as "oh well".  He is tired of taking care of other people, and right now he just takes care of himself.  And knowing I'm doing a good job of raising him is good enough for him.  Then he starts to slide in painful insults to me, etc of course... .about how when he was first born I didn't even want to feed him or something -and how he was actually the better parent - which is absolutely and utterly absurd btw.

This morning he decides it would be nice to chuckle about how he doesn't remember our son at all as a baby, and how he must have just blocked all those memories out of his mind, because it was all just so awful.  He will allude to not feeling attached to his son at all.  And when he is here visiting he just watches tv the whole time - he rarely speaks to our son period, much less actually interacting with him. 

I don't like this man. 

But.  I don't have to.  I'm just here to let my son have what he deserves - his dad. 

Anyway.  all this is to say that I'm starting to realize that this guy is just seriously mentally ill.  Just wack-a-doodle.  Straight up.  I don't know why it's so hard for me to believe.  Why is it so hard for me to see what is real?  Who laughs about such things?  Who thinks this is all okay?

Yes, I've already asked myself the REALLY important questions like, "who breeds with a mentally ill man?" and stuff like that.  I have realized that in relationships i have a hard time seeing what is right in front of me vs seeing what I want to see.  It's like I pretend things are different in my mind.  My mother does the same thing w her crappy @ss boyfriend.  When I first realized what I do while breaking up with my last (short term) boyfriend - I felt free and clear-headed (this was around xmas time), so it's a new realization for me. 

   

[Panda39]

Hi tcevans78

I have decided to stop getting angry at dad, and to stop correcting dad.  I've decided to let the cards fall, and continue to acknowledge my son's responses & apologize & offer to help.  I think that eventually he will decide to stop spending so much time with someone who is ugly.

I'm not sure about a 4 year old there is a lot of growing and developing to do (do you see a therapist you could ask?)

However, my SO has an uBPDxw and 2 daughters (D14 & D18) and above is exactly what he started to do about a year ago and over the last 6 months D14 has gone LC talks/texts her mom and see's her sporadically on her own terms when she wants to.  D18 has gone VLC occasionally communicates via email and has seen her twice in 6 months.  Both girls decided not to spend Mother's Day with their mom this year.

My SO will step in if uBPDxw becomes abusive or neglectful but otherwise he supports his girls with validation of their feelings and open safe discussion about issues surrounding their mom.  It's ironic that their mom tried mercilessly to alienate dad from his daughters lives and almost 5 years later has successfully alienated herself.

[tcevans78]

I hadn't really considered seeking out counseling services for my son, or at least to discuss things on his behalf.  I will do that.  Thanks for the suggestion. 

[livednlearned]

I treat him the way I expect to be treated.  That means, if I don't want him yelling at me, or using a mean voice with me, I don't use one with him.  If I don't want to be threatened, or bribed, I don't do it to him.    Because I am still learning alternative ways to get him to cooperate I sometimes do use these methods & I always reap the rewards (a kid who does them to me in return).  When I call him out on the behavior, telling him "that's not nice, etc" he says, "but you just did that to me!".  So - all that said I allow my son to call me out on bad behavior.   I apologize and try to fix it where I can.  I'm not perfect and I don't expect him to be perfect.  I allow him to apologize and try to fix bad behavior as well, and try to avoid punishment.

This sounds like the basis of a secure attachment style bond to me. You model the behavior you expect your son to have. And when you make a mistake, you acknowledge it. He gets to do the same.

when he comes to me and says Dad has been mean I speak the truth.  I say, "I'm sorry dad was mean to you.  How can I help right now?"  I have often times stepped in and removed dad from the situation telling him I'll take over - in order to protect my son's feelings.

 

This sounds like you are intuitively asking your son validating questions. That means you recognize his feelings as real. You do not invalidate what he's experiencing, and then you ask him how he wants to handle it, which helps him learn to problem-solve. It tells him you have confidence that his ideas are good ones. This is really important for kids who have a BPD parent.

This, obviously, has huge consequences (ie Dad becomes enraged  & the fighting begins).  I encourage my son to speak up and tell people NO! when they are hurting his body or doing something he doesn't like.  I encourage him to be vocal vs physical.  However, this doesn't work with dad.  :)ad won't respect his requests for him to stop hurting or annoying him, or requests to treat him nicely.  And I see my son's heart BREAK. Tears fill his eyes and he looks at me with zero understanding.  

I think he has 100 percent understanding in that moment. This guy is being mean to me. Period. I only yelled at my ex one time in our 10 years of marriage, and felt awful about it (S13 was 8 at the time, and I felt so awful that he heard me do that). My T said it was great that I stood up for myself, and that S13 needed to see me do that more. Since standing up to N/BPDx, and now no longer needing training wheels, I've become comfortably assertive. And slowly I see S13 doing the same thing. He needs to ruminate a bit and figure out a plan, he's not one to act in the moment these days. But he eventually gets there. And I know it's because I modeled that for him. You're going to help your son get through middle school, too, by the way. A big part of surviving that shark tank is learning how to assert yourself, and avoid being a target.

I have decided to stop getting angry at dad, and to stop correcting dad.  I've decided to let the cards fall, and continue to acknowledge my son's responses & apologize & offer to help.  I think that eventually he will decide to stop spending so much time with someone who is ugly.  

This all sounds good. Although, you can probably drop the apologizing. Maybe try, "It feels bad when people are mean to us. I don't know why he said that. It would hurt my feelings too."

However.  I'm also worried my son will do the opposite.  That in order to protect having time with his dad (which I have never ever threatened) he will begin to defend dad in his mind.  Or in order to rectify what is happening, he will decide that his mistreatment is a form of love.  An acceptable form of love.  despite my efforts.  

You can't control how your son feels about his dad. And it's going to be a lifelong challenge for him, learning to cope with the hurts and disappointments. It's good to let the cards fall where they will -- doing otherwise just messes kids up. When you say, "Your dad loves you" after dad ripped him a new you-know-what, that's confusing.

My son is, on the surface, ambivalent about his dad, who is no longer (by court order) in S13's life. I know it hurts deep deep deep, and I think S13 believes the pain is recent, whereas I know his dad has never been a real dad, all the way back to infancy. It's a huge hole our kids will have to grieve in its entirety at some point in their lives when they're ready. Our job is to give them the emotional tools to help them learn they are resilient and will recover even from the greatest hurts.

[tcevans78]

thank you.  just thank you.