BPDFamily.com

No matter what I say, it's wrong. No matter what I do, it's wrong. I'm told to follow rules. But not to take the rules literally. I'm told not to walk on eggshells, but if I make one wrong move I'm in trouble. She is married, pregnant and lives 12 hours away. The rules are as follows... .
1. Do not call me every week. Once a month is enough. Oh, and if I don't answer your call or return your call, don't take it personally.
2. Don't text me more than 1 or 2 times a week. Again, if I don't answer your text, don't take it personally.
3. Don't ask me a question more than once. If I don't want to answer, I don't have to. So don't ask more than once.
4. Don't have high expectations in our relationship.

Okay... .So I have called her 2 times in the past year. Because she never answers my calls and I got tired of trying to call her. So the second phone call was about 4 months after the first. She did not answer the first, but she surprisingly answered the 2nd. We talked for 10 minutes. The baby is due a few days. At the time of the call, it was about 2 weeks from due date. Before I hung up with her, I asked, can I call you next week to check in. Oh, and I asked this horrible question more than once... ."Can your Z (her husband) call me or text me to tell me when you are in labor.

The next day I got a book long text message. Telling me that she didn't want me calling her every week. That she felt I was being pushy about wanting to know when she goes into labor. I was told I was obsessing. I was told my expectations with our relationship was too high. When I said I didn't have high expectations, I was told I was only saying that because I couldn't have the relationship I wanted.

When I tried to defend myself, I'm told I'm being too defensive.
When I try to explain myself, I'm told I'm defending my bad behavoir! ?
When I give her what she wants, I'm told I'm going to extremes.

I am so exhausted!

hi MomofEDR and *welcome*

its hard to get it right, huh? when do we ever win 

im glad that you reached out to us, and i hope youll make yourself at home as part of the family here. we know just what you mean.


it was life changing for me when i learned not to JADE. have you heard about JADEing?

I have not heard of Jading. I have just started reading Walking On Eggshells. I'm a newby and trying to learn. I will look up Jading though. Thank you for your comment. I thought I was a horrible mother and now I have to figure this all out.

I hadn't heard of that either... .It looks like it stands for JADE. Justify. Argue. Defend. Explain. Which are all things to avoid.

That makes sense.

Hi  :hi:

Here you go 2.02 | Dont' "JADE" (justify, explain, argue, defend, explain)  (https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=139972.0)

Have a read everyone and let's discuss and share our experiences, what can we learn here to improve out situations.

MomofEDR welcome to the family, I'm sorry, it is exhausting and frustrating. I can imagine pregnancy for some with BPD is a challenging time emotionally. How long has this been going on? Is your daughter diagnosed, in treatment? Can her husband text you when she goes into labour?

You are not a horrible mother, though I totally get you, the behaviours makes us feel so, until we makes changes for us. Your daughter has BPD, gaining a better understanding of BPD and other co-morbid diagnoses can help us regain our self esteem, our lives.

We'll help you figure this all out.

I'm glad you've joined us.

WDx

Hi WD,

Thank you for linking to that post. I am definitely guilty of that.  Particularly when my DD started to say things like "you don't care about me," which makes me insane (which she knows) because nothing could have been further from the truth.

The other one that I did try to validate rather than argue was "you're trying to disntace yourself from me." I told her that I could see how she felt that way, and that it's hard when people change the way they relate to you. That one never went away though because boundaries to her = distance, and she was never ok with it.

It doesn't help that I grew up doing debate club!