BPDFamily.com

This problem is showing its head again.  The other day uBPDw went shopping and gave S12 and D9 schoolwork to do in her absence.  D9 knocked hers right out.  I went in for a snack and to check on them and my son was at the table crying over his math.  That really hurts to see that again.  I sat and we chatted, or tried to.  Despite my staying perfectly calm and assuring him he had done nothing wrong, he was overwhelmed and couldn't articulate his issue other than "I can't concentrate".  It was impossible to find out if he feared repercussions from his mother, truly couldn't do the work, or what.  I told him to take a breather, assured him that I was only there to offer help and left him to it.  Another check and he was still a mess.  The next check after that he was fine and working through everything.  By the time uBPDw got home he was totally over it and she likely never knew.  No point in bringing it up with her.  Still, a tiny bit of work took him forever.  He can't keep going through life like that.  If it's dyscalculia or something like that, it needs to get nipped or everything going forward is going to be unnecessarily difficult.

That set me to finding help.  There's not much around this rural area, but I think I found someone with excellent credentials that runs an operation from her home catering to these types of issues.  A call with a message yesterday and another call today has gone unanswered.  It's a holiday weekend, so perhaps they have taken off.  I'll try again next week.

I've decided that I'm going to make the arrangements and not say anything to uBPDw until a day or two before just to get it on the calendar.  I will take him alone and she is not welcome to come.  If she goes, it will just turn into the uBPDw Show rather than what is best for my son.  She has had every opportunity and urging to handle this herself (and she is a degreed teacher -- I cannot believe her training endorses turning a blind eye to learning difficulties).  If she insists, will simply tell her no.  This one-way door of her cutting me out of the involvement in these things is over.

 

After multiple calls, this afternoon I finally got a response out of the educational therapist I contacted last week.  She made assumptions like because of my area code I was not close by -- area codes mean nothing these days.  Also, I mentioned an issue with math, but math is not her thing.  However, some of the testimonies on her site mention math.

Once I got through to her that I don't need someone to teach my son math -- I need someone to tell me what this hiccup in his comprehension is -- she was intrigued.  Like I thought from reading what was available on her, oddball problems are her specialty.  Once I had her attention, I laid out the issues related to uBPDw and homeschooling and being the hurdle to getting my son help.  I figured if it was going to scare her off, she needed to know up front, but also figured she's experienced enough that she has seen her share of disordered parents.

It didn't scare her, but it will affect how we proceed.  I am to covertly round up information for her about his curriculum while she digests the all of the individual issues. I feel really good about her.  It is clear that problems like this are her passion.  Very curious to see where this goes.  It pains me to see my son break down over his schoolwork.  I would love to see him unburdened of whatever is causing this.

Sad but true that giving the EdT a heads up about the, um, "real" hurdle in your situation, had to be done. This is exactly the sort of thing that the kids' mom would also try to sabotage and/or turn into "you get back in your place, I'm the real caring parent, so I'm taking them to ed T, but with one that I pick".

In our situation I think the SPED team for SD14 wasn't clued in to the level of covert conflict going on, so when ALL 4 adults were on the Zoom call, and they asked "could anything else going on be contributing to SD14's difficulties", neither DH nor I felt comfortable saying "you know what, this isn't a copacetic coparenting situation". So I'm glad that with the private EdT you can be really straightforward. OK, yes, there could be some "organic" stuff going on with your son's brain, but also there's the home situation and those stressors.


How is that going so far? Will you meet with her in person at some point before your son meets with her?

What do you think you will do if your W finds out? What do you think she would try to do?

Hi Kells.  Thanks for chiming in.  

My phone call with her was less than 24 hours ago, so it's a bit too early to say yet.  She wanted to take a couple of days to digest it.  However, buy the end of the call it was very clear that she was intensely interested.  I think these are the kinds of problems she lives to solve (the cognitive problem, maybe not to much the uBPDw problem!).

My guess would be that I meet with her alone before taking my son.  That is what I would think is logical but that wasn't discussed one way or the other.

What I will do if uBPDw finds out? -- I will bulldoze her out of the way and proceed.  If she objects, than her personal feelings be damned.  I will not have my son going through life like this.  If she plays like she wants to be involved -- no.  Just like my recent trip, I don't want her coming anywhere close to this because I believe her goal would be to corrupt the relationship, not do what is best for our son.

I believe she will have to find out when the time comes.  I'm not going to be able to take him away unless I lie outright about where I am going.  It is only fair to my son to prepare him before the visit and, either before or after, it wouldn't be fair for me to burden him with keeping a secret from his mother.

I'm all ears if you see it differently but, so far as her feelings are concerned, she can go pound sand.  She'd rather see her son continue suffering than she herself suffer some imagined indignity related to her teaching ability?  If she tries to corrupt this, it will make it that much easier to pay the attorney's retainer.  I think divorced I would have more rights in this matter than I do married.
    
(edit to add: Last night I did get photos of his math workbook and also compiled for her some of my journal entries related to all of this and emailed all of that to her this morning.  The ball is in her court.)

Yes, that all makes sense.


In terms of your W's feelings, we're on the same page. However she feels about the situation is hers to manage.

I hear you not wanting to put the burden of a secret on your son. That's the right way to go.

Do you think, though, that she might manipulate him into "not wanting to go"? Or scheduling something he loves to do... at the same time? Basically making him choose, or bulldozing him into picking her thing?

I ask because I'm curious whether she's more the type who, when "losing face", blows up/sulks/overreacts herself, without directly involving the kids, or the type to undermine/discredit/sabotage through psychologically manipulating the kids.

Does that make sense?

DH's kids' mom is all about psychologically manipulating the kids/"persuading"  :( them/"convincing" them to "see it her way" and "adopt her view" and then rewards them as "wise" and "independent thinkers".

You'll have to remind me if your W has gone that direction -- basically punishing you for "stepping out of line" by "taking her role as the best parent" by "convincing" the kids they don't want to do something, then maybe rewarding them with positive attention, flattery, etc. If the kids haven't gotten a lot of positive attention from Mom, then get it if they do what she wants (which, they may not know, is undermining you trying to help the kids)... that's tough for a kid.

It may help to game plan here for that possibility.

Glad you're making progress on getting the info to the EdT! Looking forward to more updates about how that goes.

That's a good question and one to which I do not have an answer.  This particular type of conflict is uncharted territory for me.  I could see her manipulating him, sure.  I don't think she would schedule something else and make him choose.  I could see where she might schedule something else and tell me that it takes priority.

For those reasons, I would not give her any more of a heads-up than necessary, like maybe a day or two. 

I've seen your recent thread about your situation and I don't know if she would manipulate him to that extent.  What I could see her doing is trying to get out ahead of it by manipulating her friends (including her mother) within her homeschool circle and turn them against me.  Circling the wagons by starting a whispering campaign seems to be her specialty.  I think her first tactic would be to keep it a secret from all of them, but once she figures out that she can't (namely because all it would take is for my son to talk) I could see her ginning-up the narrative that I'm only doing this to make her look bad / create conflict / that she only wants the best but I deliberately didn't include her (and that I think her mom-friends within the co-op are incompetent)... when for years my suggestion of doing this has always been shot down followed by a bunch of FoG created to derail the issue. 

What I would be most curious to know is what his own math instructor at the homeschool group would think if I were to tell her directly about what has been going on and what my concerns are.  I only learned last night who this person is and if you really want to go down the rabbit hole, I'll come back and explain this complicated relationship.  If I didn't cover some of it in this very thread, I think I have elsewhere in past posts that I wouldn't expect anyone here to remember.  Right now I have to go put away some stuff.  There is a storm coming.

That's a good thing to think about. Sometimes when we can "go to the source" to give or get info, it takes away power that the pwBPD tries to have (of being the sole source and gatekeeper of information, which to some can be power).

If you're up for giving the backstory I'd be interested to hear it. You're in good company with "complicated" relationships. Recall our MC used to be the MC for both DH & his kids' mom, and ALSO for DH's former best friend's first marriage. Former best friend is currently married to DH's xW. And, when the kids were in the homeschool co-op, older SD's teacher was both DH's sister's husband's cousin, AND daughter of our church's main teacher, with whom Former Best Friend had something of a public falling out. Yes... it's complicated. Bring it on.

Once I hear the backstory, again if only you're up for it, that'll help me know whether some of my inklings -- that it could be positive to have Son's math teacher "in the loop" -- will be helpful/correct or not.

Hope you get stuff battened down OK for the storm.

Storm is here -- time to catch up.

I may have to read your second paragraph a few more times and after a bottle of Excedrin!  Having a lexicon might also help!

I remembered that I did post about the incident last year, so I'll just provide a link rather than retype it.  The unnamed woman in this thread (the one that did the awkward-good deed) is the math teacher:

https://bpdfamily.com/message_board/index.php?topic=350912.msg13156249#msg13156249

An update to this.  The educational therapist and I have been batting things around for the last couple of weeks.  She was on her way to retirement and in her mind had given up this stuff when her work dropped off, but she is intrigued by this problem and wants to take it on.  For that I am very grateful.

I provided her with lots of information and she thinks she has identified the right program for him and it's one that focuses on teaching concentration.  I think she realizes there is an environmental / mom component to the problem here.  She said until this is resolved, there is no point in tackling the "number sense" issue and depending on what that particular issue is, he may always have it, but he should be able to have it and not meltdown like he does now (he can meltdown over subjects other than math, too, just not so often).

The other night I sat down an laid all this out for uBPDw and I guess all as part of her new "serenity now" stuff she's doing, she didn't raise an objection, but I also sensed that she was not on board.  I also just plain don't trust her.  Too many times I have seen her agree only to go into something with the intent to sabotage.  After feeling things out, I told her I thought it was best that I take him alone starting out.  I don't need a repeat of the dentist office visit from last year. 

After a bit she started going off on "I don't understand" tangents and I got sucked into some retorts I probably shouldn't have entertained, but none of it went off the charts.  I also reminded her that to date, whenever this topic came up, she came unglued, cast aspersions on me, and did not pursue what was in the best interest of our son despite having every opportunity and being encouraged to do so.  I made it clear to her that I would see to it that the program is administered as prescribed and I would not tolerate her derailing it.   

Her demons still lurk because she started throwing some of the same old disordered trash at me, albeit in a more polished way.  Rewriting narratives, rehashing things that would have been water under the bridge for any normal person, and otherwise grasping at straws to get in a dig.  Aside from some missteps from getting sucked in, I'd just tell her that's not what I came down there to talk about.

I think she knows changes are looming on the horizon.  She started making comments about how "this is no way to live" and I agreed, but I don't have to tell you that she and I have different solutions in mind.  During this exchange, I called her out dead to rights on some of her past behavior (screaming at the kids, out of control, coming unglued over schoolwork) and she didn't argue against it, but she didn't apologize or show any remorse, either, so whatever this "counseling" is has not given her an ounce of introspection.

At any rate, that's where we are.  I have high hopes that this educational therapist can help my son.  It will probably be the week after next before I can get him out there to be tested and get a program set up, but that gives me time to get him acclimated to the idea.       

I started with alternate weekends during separation and divorce but came out with equal time.  Within a few years I gained full custody due to my ex's obstructions and some "not credible" testimony.  He was already in therapy with a quasi-county therapy agency.  I decided to take our child to a recommended counselor for an assessment.  Of course, I was told a child should not have two counselors.  Made sense, might be some conflicting advice.  But when I asked her, trying to be too-fair despite already having full custody, whether she wanted my ex to bring him too, she got this shocked look on her face, "Oh, no!"

That's my thought.  You're qualified s parent to bring in your son for an assessment.  I ex doesn't join, so much the better.  Invitations may come later but beware of our too-fair qualities that can just make things more complicated.

That is always looming in the back of my mind largely thanks to the things I have learned here. 

People in this position, particularly full-time school teachers such as this one, must see these conflicts on a regular basis.  She was pretty insistent about including uBPDw and at one point to be more blunt with her (despite having described the situation here) in an email I asked, "What do you do in a case where the parents are divorced or one is just plain uncooperative?" but it either got overlooked or she didn't want to answer it.

Maybe it's just me being biased based on the things I have read here, but I got the sense that if the tables were turned and it was a mother showing up for help, the father never would have been asked about.  They'd just be doing business as usual.  In fact, I think every story about past students she relayed to me was student / mother.

Doesn't matter now.  It's time to pick a day and that day is near. 

We're going out for evaluation on Monday.  She sent some questionnaires to answer in advance.  She wanted me to include uBPDw but at the same time he message also indicated that she may not be able to do them or perhaps I could look over them with her for answers without her knowing the intent, so she must understand something.

I can't see a way to do that so I just filled them out myself.  I can't trust uBPDw to put down honest answers, anyway.

This morning my son got up and went straight to doing a math test.  I guess she told him to do that the night before.  We both woke up at 5:30.  It took him two hours to finish the first page and four hours to finish all three.  The last page was light.  The is agonizing to watch.  uBPDw was apparently up before 8:00 milling around, picking things in the garden, just allowing this to persist like it's normal. 

It only occurred to me this morning that I never see my daughter doing these tests, so I went and had a chat with her.  She's a couple of grades behind him, but now doing the same work he was having the same trouble with back then.  From what I can tell, I think she just blows right through it and goes on her way.

In getting him ready for Monday, I tried to find a gentle way to explain to him that this is the kind of thing that I want to get him help with.  That if he were in a regular structured class that was an hour, that would probably be as long as he had to do all three pages and that's where I'd like to help get him so he can have more fun and not have to spend all morning suffering through these things.  He said, "Then I'm glad I'm not in a school like that because I would flunk" and I explained to him that's not the goal -- that the goal is to help him become more productive so there is more time for fun.  I wish I had done something on my own sooner.  I hate that this has been allowed to persist.  Things like this make me wish he was in a regular school.  Of course, if I was married to a partner instead of a petulant child, something would have been done when I first started expressing my concern about this a few years ago.

From what I can tell, he has been working steady.  First on his bed when he got up and later when he came down to the kitchen.  He was at it for four hours straight.  He hasn't broken away to go play Legos.  He's not staring off into space.  He's not melting down.  Whenever I see him, he seems to be working diligently.  In this case, I can't tell why it is taking so damn long.  However, taking too long is the common thread that I think feeds the peripheral issues.

Is he the safest from criticism by Mom if he is doing schoolwork?

I.e., is that the place where she is most likely to leave him alone -- if it looks like he is working diligently and with focus?

I wonder if in a subconscious way, he is keeping himself safe.

Let me know if this rings true or if it seems off base. I'm definitely not discounting a "learning challenge" as an "and also" instead of an "either or".

That's an interesting insight.  I don't really know.  I wouldn't discount it outright but I also don't know what else he could be doing with all of that time if he's faking it just to make it take longer. 

Today, for instance, he was up at 5:30 and I don't think she was up until a bit before 8:00.  I could see what you're saying being applicable if he didn't start until she woke up or if she was going to be on his case about something once he was finished with the test and this was a way for him to get her to leave him alone.

Given her past flare-ups, though, it could be that he equates taking longer to looking more diligent.  I shudder when I think about the damage her abuse as done and the mess that I have brought these two little people into.

Makes sense that the "taking a long time" isn't an "either or" but could be a lot of things rolled into one. Again, I'm not an expert, so it'll be interesting to learn what the Ed evaluator thinks of all the factors. It could certainly be coincidental that he both has a learning challenge, and it looks like he's being a people pleaser for Mom. Kids do just have their own "thing" no matter whether a parent is disordered or not.

Glad you're taking him in -- it's so, so helpful to get outside professionals shining light on your family situation.

I added your "people pleaser" comment to my list of questions for her.  I couldn't think how to put it into words on my own.

When I shut my eyes and think about every past instance of petitioning with her to get him help, all I can see is her flying into a disordered rage.  If I tried to explain that and later they met her and she's peaches and cream, then I'll get labeled as the crazy one.  I wish this period of time in my life was over. 

There may be a way to work with that and have it be a "win win" for you.

Think about it this way.

Your W has done some crazy, disruptive stuff at home in the past.

Wouldn't it be a miracle if somehow, she was pleasant and cooperative with the EdT, and followed the plan for your son at home? That would be good for your son, right? Even if W stayed crazy about everything else at home, if just in that area, she was compliant, wouldn't that be the best it could get?

So, one way to talk about it with the EdT would be something like "we've had some challenges and disagreements about ed support for the kids in the past. My hope is that there would be agreement to follow your plan for Son. Please let each of us know specific "homework" for each of us adults for how we can support Son".

Here is the win-win:

Either: your W wants to present as "amazing, competent, supportive, not the problem", so she complies with the EdT's plan and supports Son in it, but stays crazy about everything else. This means your son gets help and she isn't interfering. So, win for son.

Or: your W decompensates when presented with "HW" and balks at "following the plan". She starts painting EdT black and refuses to participate. EdT then sees through W's behaviors where the problem is, and works with you and Son accordingly. So, win for truth.

That is how I might see it.

As usual, you are right about all of it.  I guess I'm just tired of having to think about what is coming down the pike next.  It shouldn't be this way.

It's exhausting. We will never have one of those "mom's house, dad's house" setups where "everyone gets together at Thanksgiving for the kids". It's sad that the covert and overt conflict has continued. It is relentless and I agree with you that it is not right for it to be this way.

I hope you have some moments in life where you can relax and take a break from it all. I have stayed in "hypervigilant, conflict could happen at any moment" mode for ~10 years now and it is taking a toll.

I do, but a lot of times after I do then it comes with the regret of having to go back.  Or in the middle of it, a text rings in from uBPDw and the bubble bursts.  Almost like I would be better off if I were ignorant that another world exists. 

Earlier this week, S12 and I had our visit to the educational therapist.  He did really well while being examined.  I waited outside, but could hear a good bit through the door, and he was so good with her and her with him.  He went through about two hours of testing.  Still, I would say that she seemed a bit exhausted afterward.   

The testing confirmed serious problems with different aspects of his reading.  His comprehension was very good, but memory was exceptionally poor (0.1 percentile) and other aspects places him at 2 - 3 years / grades (depending on each test's system) behind where he should be.  He scores really high on things that are visual.  She is easing into retirement and wasn't taking on new work, but she said she has agreed to take him because she finds his case to be unusually interesting.

I was impressed with her handling of the whole thing.  She is suggesting a music therapy option and sent us home with materials to start.  It's new to me, but she says she has helped a lot of children by going this route and showed me records she kept reflecting that.  She was very specific about what options she picked.  S12 is not wild about it.  He has to listen for 30 minutes each morning, but he hasn't resisted and has been obedient with it.  The idea is that it reorders your brain to help with concentration and then once that starts to happen you can build out in other directions.

It was an interesting day.  We were there about five hours all total.  That was good because she got to see a lot of him in different situations.  Toward the end he was going out of his mind, bored to the point that he couldn't just sit and sketch in his notebook like he will sometimes do.

Because having taught my kids to read is uBPDw's big "thing" with homeschooling, and the test were principally reading-based, I knew reviewing the results with her wouldn't go well.  She did not meltdown and rage as I would have expected in the recent past, but she was not happy about it.  Dismissive of what was done, etc.  I just kept telling her that there's an obvious problem and the test results support the observation of those problems and it's not something that I will allow to persist.  Despite the face she put on, there is no telling what's going on in the background.

The ET wants to meet her and I'm thinking about allowing it.  I think she wants to see how uBPDw factors into this whole thing.  I'm thinking it's best to send her out there without me.  I've had enough time with the ET now and we really hit it off well.  If uBPDw goes out there all on her own, maybe she'll drop whatever act she puts on with me present and the ET can deal with the real her.  Who knows.  My being there would create a triangle, right?  My absence would prevent her from blaming anything that happens in the moment on me.  The ET said she has one more test she can give him (not essential) and I'm thinking of sending her out there with S12 and letting it rip.  I think it's more for the ET to learn about her than it is to learn more about him. 

   

That's pretty interesting stuff, Couper. Fascinating that music will help. It sounds like the ET knows how to help. It's good that you got your son evaluated.


I heard a statement yesterday that I thought very astute:

You can't speak truth to someone who has a false sense of self.

Wools

Thank you for giving me something else to add to the quote list that I keep!    :hi:

My advice is to let your wife take your son to the next assessment. The person working with your son needs to know the full picture.

I agree.  That's where I'm headed with it.  Do you also agree that she should go without me?

I think so. Does your presence have a modifying effect on her when around others? My thought is to let the educational psychologist ( is that the specialist) see your wife's full presentation -- questioning and challenging, how she interacts with your son, how he responds to his mother should she instigate conflict, etc.

For clarification, she's an "educational therapist", not a psychologist.

I think she would behave differently if I were there than without, but given whatever this newfound zen'like behavior is, I'm at a loss to predict how she would act under these circumstances.  I feel like she has learned how to be a more polished passive-aggressive.  I know in the past that, when I 'm am not present, she has been ready and willing to throw me under the bus to create strife between myself and someone else.  Particularly if she is jealous of this person having a good relationship with me.  All I know to do here is try it and see. 

My son had an "in camera" interview with the magistrate and his lawyer, the Guardian ad Litem.  The decision stated simply he was less comfortable when his mother was discussed and more relaxed when I was discussed.

I'm fairly sure the ET will be watching for your son's subtle behavioral changes with her as compared to when you were there.

No doubt that you are right.  I could tell that she was doing a lot more than just paperwork.  I didn't know what to expect with him myself that day and left happy that he was a model son -- polite, obedient, generally happy.  If there's any shift, I'm sure she will notice it.   

Similar situation here and I finally transitioned my kids (D11 and D13) to public school.  Upon diagnosis, D13 has dyslexia.  Highly creative, good with math but stumbles on the reading portions and is behind grade.  It killed my uBPDw to transition, but I put my foot down as a matter of principle of “they need to live in the real world.”  She is credentialed primary and not middle.  So after a year of meltdowns, huge explosions, threats, and many other scary situations she acknowledges it was the right thing.  Went through some huge identity crisis for her during the last year - so be prepared when that time comes.  Getting help for the D13 now and it is working and reading is improving.  D13 and she were enmeshed and it was hard for both of them, but worth it.

A minor, slightly off-topic, note that one of the "usual" books has a brief section specifically dealing with maternal BPD and its desire but inability to homeschool. I'm not opposed to homeschooling, having been homeschooled myself as a child - so I don't share the common societal "omg kids need to get out of homeschooling asap!" bias...but at the same time, BPD is a particular beast and it's not "likely" a good idea to give it largely unchecked power over multiple facets of everyday life. The fact you're trying to rein it in right now to ensure your son's not burdened is great, but remember it won't be an easy long-term solution...as the guy earlier in this thread suggested, the constant vigilance is ultimately going to take a huge toll on you and him.

Thank you for sharing your story.  I can't even imagine how I would execute such a thing here without some kind of third-party examination and legal intervention.  When my uBPDw isn't going to do something, she just isn't going to do it.  The word "compromise" is not in her vocabulary.  Still, I don't think I'm at that point yet, but your input is well-taken.

Thank you for this.  I agree with your "unchecked power" comment.  Like everything to do with BPD, if only I had a crystal ball, I wouldn't be here at all right now. 

What is your suggestion for avoiding the huge toll?  Or is the huge toll the unavoidable price I've yet to pay for unknowingly having made a stupid decision 14 years ago? 

Hi Couper,

Just curious if your uBPDw met with the educational therapist yet? Was wondering how things went.

Wools

Hi Wools.  Thanks for checking.  Yes, she went on Friday.  I have no clue how it went.  On the first day she didn't volunteer anything.  On the second day I asked her directly what questions she asked the ET (in the days prior when she said she had questions for the ET, I asked her what they were and she wouldn't tell me).  She kept on with what she was doing and wouldn't discuss, just saying there was a sheet in the folder I started and she had the questions written down there (she didn't know I had already seen the sheet).  The I asked her what the answers to those questions were and she's "too busy and would have to tell later".  It's like having an uncooperative witness on the witness stand.  I tired of it and haven't followed up again.

I suspect when with the ET she was a model citizen.  I've debated calling the ET to ask how it went, but it's like that crazy woman with the unicorn thing -- if the ET saw something different than what I've described witnessing at home, I'll probably get labeled the crazy one.  I guess I should have put a wire on my son before they went out there.   *)

She was sent back with new materials.  There was a card game the ET wanted him to start playing (I had already started the online version with him) and uBPDw was playing it with him that night.  He also has new discs to schedule and listen to and apparently she has set him up with that, but despite me being the one that got the ball rolling with this, she has shown no interest in telling me what the next steps are and is doing something with it on her own.

It's just like everything else.  I don't have a partner to work with so I'm kind of in the dark.

Hi there.  I am new on these boards and really don't have much business chiming in, but I read your posts and am moved because my son had terrible dyslexia and a dd had dyscalculia.  Both of them were diagnosed pretty early in primary school, mostly because their dad has dyslexia as well and we were on heightened alert.  They both received a lot of educational support, but dyscalculia is not as common so support was harder to find.  What I wanted to share was this:  math anxiety is real.   When people are anxious, it shuts down a lot of their ability to do higher order thinking, and this is particularly apparent in math.    With dd, half the battle was getting her to calm down. If your ds is upset and saying he can't do something, even if he just did three problems of that very skill--it's true, he can't do it because his brain has shut down.  Their psychological state really does impact their learning and performance.  This is true even for neurotypical kids.

You are a good dad for getting your so the help he needs.

Thank you for the kind words.  I wish I would have gotten him help sooner.  Years of his mother melting down on him surely did not help the situation.

You have every right to chime in and I'm glad that you did.  Just because you are new here does not mean you cannot make a valuable contribution.  Hearing from someone with real-world experience helps immensely.  What you describe about being able to do the work, and then not being able to finish the same work they already started, is exactly some of what I have seen here.

Are your kids grown up now and, if so, how are they faring in the real world with respect to this learning issue?   

So for dd with dyscalculia, she is what brought me to these boards.  She was diagnosed with dyscalculia in second grade.  It is not that common but she had a very clear cut case.  No number sense meaning not understanding the concept that adding one to nine gets you to ten. She had a number line taped to her desk through fifth grade.  Learning the multiplication tables was a nightmare but she is musical and they invented songs.  We were fortunate to find a fantastic tutor who specialized in math learning disabilities.  Then on through middle school and high school and it was still a struggle but she had a diagnosis so she had accommodations and extra time which helped a lot.  A lot of her math LD was remediated--some of it will always be there, but she can do the work.  Two aspects of dyscalculia to also mention are a lack of spatial awareness--for years there wasn't a dinnertime when a glass wasn't knocked over.  Also following instructions.  I still remember the call I got the day the fifth grade did the origami project.  She did very well with the rest of her academics and was even able to do well in her high school math classes, albeit with a lot of support.  The things that hold her back now are all of her other issues, not the math. 

My son, who is a little older, was also diagnosed around second grade when he couldn't remember how to pronounce "the" for the hundredth time.  He wound up going to a special grade school for dyslexic kids and a regular high school.  He was never a good student in his academic classes but he excelled in his art classes.  He is studying art in college now.  However, that was just him, and there were plenty of other kids he went to grade school with who went on to study academic subjects.  One of his friends just started business school and the other graduated college with a degree in English literature.  These are kids who would use pdf readers and the whispersync features on audible books to get through their college reading.  So it can be done if there is an interest and desire.

But back to dd.  Around the time she was diagnosed with the dyscalculia, she began to exhibit really uncontrollable behavior.  Horrible tantrums, head butting, etc and also tremendous anxiety.  It is so hard to tell if all of the anxiety of having the learning disability brought this on--because kids made fun of her--or if it was just her separate biology starting to come out.  My son clearly had adhd and some clinicians thought she might too but the meds didn't agree with her at all.  Since if she had adhd it would be more the inattention type, the child psychiatrist we saw thought it might be anxiety and not actually ADD so it would be best to treat it with an anti-anxiety medication, and the one approved for children was zoloft.  So she was on zoloft for years and years and I really can't say whether it did anything for her or not.  A few years ago she was at a place that ran one of those genomic studies that showed she lacked the receptor that would make zoloft effective.  I don't know what to make of the medical rigor of the test except that it sort of validated our sense that the drugs have never really helped her.  Now she's on a different cocktail of medications and while I think they might help her not have debilitating depression, they aren't fixing the problem that she feels empty, isolated and unloved.  I could write a very long list of her wonderful traits and qualities and it would all be true, but she is also a difficult person who exhibits most of the classic bpd symptoms.  She actually diagnosed herself two years ago with bpd but there was some reluctance by her doctor at the time because she doesn't have the trauma usually associated with it, but other than that it fits perfectly.

So back to your son.  Maybe it is a full blown LD or maybe it is a little glitch easily smoothed over plus some stress/anxiety.  Simply the fact that you are addressing it is probably a huge relief for him.

Thank you for sharing all about yours.  You have certainly had your hands full and it provided me with some useful insight.  I don't think my son is full blown, nor easily smoothed over, based on the ET's evaluation.  It will take work, regardless.  The aggravating part is all these things take more work with the BPD influence factored in. 

I finally got her to talk about the new program last night.  In the days since I first asked, she hasn't offered on her own.  She read off the definitions of all the stuff related to it (that I've already been through with the ET) and I just let her talk.  Ask her again if she was on board with it, and she'd define more terms.  Ask her again if she was on board with it, "I already said that I was".  No, she didn't, but whatever.  Asked her if she was going to stick with implementing the schedule and she said that she would.

So, I guess now she's on board with it.  Time will tell.  It doesn't make me love her for it.  It's impossible for me to unsee all the rage and disorder and blame shifting that happened over the years every time I suggested that S12 needed outside help.

It was a pretty awful morning, but not for the reasons most would call such a morning awful.  A few weeks ago my uBPDw came to me and said, "We need x-$$$$ to pay the homeschool curriculum and it's due at the end of the week".  I kept it toned down as best I could but still pointed out here it something she knew about for months and now I get a big bill dumped in my lap and have to find an answer and told her I can only do what I can do with no warning and there was the usual round of excuses on her part.  I couldn't meet that deadline and the new her doesn't bring it up and I just let it ride until I could find a solution and I didn't have one.  Three days ago she proposes using PayPal and putting it on a credit card and I said fine, do whatever, but no matter what, she is always going to do whatever.

Just like with everything, I'm going back out to work at 10pm last night after I came in for water and she dumps a new problem in my lap that there is going to be a fee for using the credit card and now at the last minute she's coming to me for a solution.  I told her I don't have a solution for a problem that was just handed to me and that it's not fair to do this at the end of a night, hours before it is due, when I'm working when it could have been sorted out of the proceeding days.  So, I dumped it back in her lap and told her she can fix it, just like she dumps it in my lap to do and walked out.  

This morning she has $500 cash on the table.  She did part of it on the card and raided our kids savings to pay with cash to try and save 1/4 of the fee.  Didn't consult me.  Now the kids are aware which is embarrassing.  I'd rather she just paid the extra fee and kept them out of it but I guess I did dump it back in her lap.  In the past she'll take a situation like this to tell the world that we can't pay our bills and I mentioned that I don't want her telling the moms that (poor victim her) had to raid her kids savings.  It's a private money matter.  She didn't have to, but she'll use the opportunity to get victim points.  Well, I failed at being the better person by even bringing this up and probably shouldn't have because, again, she'll just say whatever she wants to whomever she wants regardless of anything she agrees to.  This set her off pretty good and down the rabbit hole we went of past grievances getting brought up.  Lots of projection, her even telling me that I changed this narrative and that narrative and so on and so forth.  I won't go into the details of every instance, called me a liar, but in doing so, tripped up over her own lies.

In a way it feels kind of good because my hope is that her head will just explode and I can move on from all of this.  What bothers me is it wasn't particularly loud, but my little girl was upstairs and heard ten minutes or whatever of this.  It never occurred to me that if she was in her room distracted that she would have caught any of it.  Of course, all of this made my wife late.  She's always late  because victims bask in the glory of always running in the door late, but knew she had to leave early to do something with the homeschool group at 9am and didn't wind up leaving until 9am.  She got so sucked into it that litigating this was more important than fulfilling her responsibilities.  When we parted, I went downstairs just to cool off and wait for my kids to come to the main floor to see them before they left, then I came back up.  My little girl came down all red faced and crying about how she doesn't like us fighting (this is a first for her so far as I know.  The fights are actually rare and usually I go above and beyond to make sure nobody is around).    Son was nowhere to be found until she called downstairs for him and he magically came up from where I just was.  He was collecting toys to take and apparently was hiding (play hiding from me when he heard me come down like he often does) in the laundry room.  No doubt when I was down there I was mumbling and venting to myself about what just took place and now I don't know what he heard and I can't remember what I said, and some of it was likely pretty awful.

On top of that, when they get back here in a bit they are taking off to her parent's until Sunday.  My son seemed unaffected, but I sure hope my daughter has bounced back because I really don't want to see her off under these circumstances.  Not to mention, I'm sure I just unwittingly gave her plenty of ammo for circling the wagons at this homeschool thing this morning. Just a week ago we took a daddy-daughter trip (that went from one day to three after having car trouble out of town) and our whole time together was fantastic.  Now she's taking them both for even more days and to her parents where her mother will lick all her wounds and provide more enabling.

Well, just heard the car pull up the drive.  I better go see what kind of nightmare I'm facing because for once she's probably going to pack at record speed and go.  I was looking forward to having a few days along and now this is a cloud hanging over it and it's all of my own doing.  I should have just kept my damned mouth shut, again, for the hundred-thousandth time.            

Well, thanks goodness.  They are both like nothing ever happened.  I know that doesn't mean some damage wasn't done and I know somewhere it still put a little cut in their hearts, but I'm grateful for not having to see them off for four days in the condition they were in several hours ago.  Kids are so resilient.

It is hard to see parental conflict impact your kids. Of course you don't want them around that.

The sense I'm getting is that you are in "survive until separation" mode? Is that accurate -- it's a matter of when, not if?

If so, what is the timeline?

It may be important to have a goal for yourself of how to make things the "least worst possible" for your kids until that point, and to problemsolve here how to make that happen (tools, skills, phrases, tactics, etc). Otherwise there is the real potential that "with the end in sight" (and I suspect your W can feel things shift, too) the adults have less energy and/or incentive to "play nice". Things like budget conflicts then balloon into bigger fights that impact your kids.


As obvious as it is, and I know you know that, the only party you have control over is you. So you can work with your end of things to make "your side" the least worst possible. It may be worth it to come back around to your son at some point and apologize. Something like: "Even though I felt upset, it wasn't right for me to say XYZ about your mom where you could hear. It's wrong for parents to say that kind of stuff about each other around the kids and I'm sorry. Next time I will [journal about my feelings, tell a friend privately, go on a bike ride, etc -- whatever you would want him to do if he's upset]"

This models to your kids that (a) everyone messes up, (b) it's OK to feel upset, (c) it is wrong for parents to put each other down in front of the kids, and (d) you're the kind of person who will try to learn and change.

...

This is tricky territory when you're still living together but not in the marriage. I'd strongly encourage you to get a timeline for wrapping things up, and/or find ways to keep conflicts either at a simmer/back burner vs big and in front of the kids... or find ways to not engage in issues that have the potential to turn into conflicts. This really isn't great for them, even though yes, they can bounce back in ways.

...

I'm saying all this pretty straightforwardly because I think you can hear it.

I also want to recognize that you did come here to post/vent, and that might be a good move going forward when you feel torqued out -- instead of doing the "basement mumbling" that your kids can hear, to get it out on paper here. Better for them long run.

Will wrap up with -- others here may have better specific ideas for handling budget issues when the marriage is pre-separation but not there yet. Also, member B2 is in a similar position right now too, so you can check out her posts to see where she's at.

Hi Kells,

Everything you said is right and constructive.

I think "when, not if" is a fair description.  There's not so much a timeline as there is a process.  I'm dead in the water until I get this property sold that the lawyer said I need to sell before he will move forward.  That's a difficult thing to do for a number of reasons, but I've been working on it every day.  It's not a cookie-cutter on a 1/4 acre lot kind of thing.  

I'm not even sure if my son heard anything at all and I don't know how to find out if he did.  I also don't want to raise the issue and make him aware of something he may not even know anything about.  When my daughter was playing later when they got home, she ran into the basement to hide and I found her in the hamper!  She was being really silly and happy, but I had gone down there hunting for her and saying funny things and when I did finally find her (didn't expect her to be in there) I asked her what she heard me say and she didn't hear any of it.  Since she did that, I now have a feeling her brother was in the hamper too and that's where she got  the idea.

My intention was good.  I went down there to cool off while waiting on my kids to leave and thought I was alone.  Also because I would be able to hear them coming down the steps because I thought both of them were two floors above me.

I spend all day, every day, trying to avoid conflict and am largely successful at it.  Today I failed.

Even the stuff I tried to exercise that I learned from here, it doesn't work with her.  It just escalates things because she won't let go.  No answer is ever good enough.  Like she tried to corner me with the common, "You won't acknowledge that the things you do hurt me" and I said, "I believe that you are feeling hurt", repeated each time, but that's not good enough because she wants to hear me say that I am intentionally doing things to hurt her and no other answer will satisfy her and, quite frankly, if I gave her that answer, that wouldn't satisfy her either.

The only thing that bothered me about any of it was the stuff with my kids.  As to the words we exchanged, it verified a lot of what I have been thinking -- with this "counseling" and the stacks of new self-help books (which she actually referenced herself) all she is doing is broadcasting to the outside world that she is fixed, but deep down inside she is still a nasty piece of work.  All she has done is found a band of enablers that are reinforcing all her own notions and supporting her belief that I am the boogey man.

If anything, I made it clear again that I'm not going to capitulate and let her reel me back in and maybe enough of it will get through her thick head that when papers are served, it won't be the absolute meltdown shock that it would be if I were faking it.    

Thanks again for your candid observations and input.

Hi Couper,

I'm so sorry to hear about the conflict. I know it's discoraging and that you're trying to hang on and get your property with the loose ends tied up so you can move forward.

Kids are resilient. That being said, they're probably more aware of the discord than you know. I tried to keep certain things from my kids so that they wouldn't be aware of the conflict, but they told me things after the divorce that showed they were far more observant than I realized. Because of the example I saw with my uBPDm and dad, I was really careful to not share things with my kids like my mom did with us. Her sharing was far too much for a child to hear. That was the BPD side of her. Sounds like you're doing a good job of trying to love and enjoy your children and not burden them down. They so need that.  |iiii

I'm glad you posted what happened with us here. Kells shared some helpful thoughts about not being afraid to share with your kids that it's okay to have feelings, both the happy ones and the sad or angry ones if and when the opportunity arises. Just like your uBPDw doesn't want to hear your feelings, your kids may also not feel comfortable in acknowledging what they're feeling (they may have already learned this from her), so I think it's really good that your D shared how she was feeling sad. A parent with BPD doesn't encourage the kids to share what they feel, so you being the safe parent is doubly important.

Keep hanging in there, one day at a time.
Wools

Hi again!

Yes, I certainly don't want to expose the kids to any more than necessary.  As she got more intense and was lobbing grenades at me, she asked me, "Do the kids ask you why you sleep on the couch, why we don't smoochy kiss? (a phrase from one of their t.v. shows), because they see it."  I told her flat out no, neither one of them ever have.  I have often wondered if they do and I find it really odd that they haven't asked me, but given her history, I also wouldn't be surprised if it's something she made up to throw another dagger at me.  In a situation like that, there's simply no way for me to know if she is telling the truth or not.

When my daughter came down crying, I picked her up (I was really afraid she wouldn't let me, so it was a relief when that's what she wanted) and she said she didn't like hearing us fight and I apologized and told her that adult relationships aren't like kid relationships and sometimes things happen but that it was absolutely nothing to do with her and that seemed to help.  uBPDw had gone upstairs (to her bathroom-sanctuary where she spends so much time on the phone) and come down I think without even talking to her and she had to know she was upset.  She was probably expecting her daughter to console her as I 've seen similar such expectations in the past.  uBPDw is incapable of putting others first.

There may be some truth about how my kids acknowledge feelings related to observing their mother.  My daughter (the younger of the two) doesn't seem affected by this, but I think it explains some of my son's behavior.  I try to be very careful about looking for places to assign blame for everything that happens in life, because that's exactly what she does, and sometimes things just happen because it's a fallen world, but I have started to wonder if she's the reason for his learning and processing issues.  Knowing what I know now about when he was much younger and I wasn't working from home and he was alone with her a lot every day -- in her own words from journal entries, when I wasn't around, she was taking out her anger on him (not physically, but he was getting undeserved flack) and now that leaves me wondering.  I feel so awful that I've brought two children into the world with this monster as their mother.

However, yes, I do encourage them to share with me and often tell them that they can always come to me and they won't be persecuted for whatever they are feeling.  You don't get punished for feelings.

Interestingly enough.  They did not come back yesterday.  The calendar was not marked with Sunday as one of their days away.  Maybe that's a mistake, maybe she extended, but now part of me wonders if this is some of her passive-aggressive b.s.  When they arrived she texted that she got there safe and I acknowledged it.  Saturday night she sends me a picture from some little fair of my daughter holding up something she won and I acknowledged it.  Then silence after that.  When I took my daughter on that short trip recently, it was intended to be one night, but I had major car trouble when we were leaving and we were stuck there for two more nights.  Past experience tells me that she may be saying, "then I will keep them away for two more nights, too" but maybe it's a big nothing-burger.  That's the nightmare of living with someone whose default function is not to behave as a civil adult.  If I don't inquire, I'll be at fault.  If I do inquire, she'll disparage me for whatever she can cook up.  There is no point.

As to the budget thing Kells mentioned that I missed before -- I have the bill paying as under control as I can have it because a few months ago I took back everything to do with that and told her it is not her problem anymore because she was once again uncooperative about it.  However, I can't pay things I don't know about.  Every year this homeschool group has a new "leader" and the leader decides how tuition is paid.  Past years it has been credited out of their paychecks or some other thing that spreads it out over time.  This year they wanted 100% up front and she dumps it in my lap without warning.  I have to believe she had some warning, though, and I'm thinking this was another way for her to exercise control because since I took over paying the bills (which frees her up 100% to go argue with more people on the internet -- wouldn't most wives be happy to have a husband doing all the work?), she's often telling me how I'm doing all of that wrong (yet, everything is paid on time now and I know what the balances are in both accounts!).  Having kids with a partner is life was supposed to be a fun exercise.  Instead, she has to be an angry adversary in everything.  I suspect she did that to show me she still has some control, though it's another job she went out of her way to show she was incapable of doing well (more self-victimization).

Sorry for another rant.  Another hour of my life in the hopper on account of this lunatic.

After this post, she texted that they are heading back soon, so who knows what the real reason is and I don't really care to ask knowing that no matter how gingerly I do it, I have already been convicted of a crime that I didn't know I committed.

This...this is so common and heartbreaking to hear. My mom was this way. A pwBPD cannot soothe themselves like healthy people do, and they expect their kids to be the parent and soothe them. It's called parentification if you haven't heard the term. I'm glad that you're there to do what you can to balance your kids, Couper. They very much need you for this. Keep walking that be-as-healthy-as-I-can road for their sake and yours.

 :hug:
Wools

Bill Eddy once wrote that these are not just difficult relationships, they are the most difficult.

Knowing you are biding time until pulling the rip cord is probably taking a toll.

It's clear in your posts that you have tremendous contempt and disdain for her. It's hard to imagine validation working with her, so that particular skill probably won't work given how you feel about her.

I'm wondering if you could switch the focus to you and modeling healthy behaviors for your kids. Things like giving yourself a time out when someone gets under your skin. Or taking a mindfulness minute, a sort of vagal break for the nervous system.

Bill Eddy wrote Splitting about divorcing a BPD/NPD spouse, and many people here are familiar with that book. But he also wrote a book called Don't Alienate the Kids, which, while it's partly about coparenting after divorce, also focuses on what we, the not-disordered parents, can do to help our kids learn ways to be resilient.

A painful realization for me post-divorce is recognizing my own deficits. They were dwarfed by the issues my son's father brought to the table, but they are still things that affected my son's emotional well-being. I can't say enough about Eddy's book for giving me a positive guide forward on that front.

It made me realize how my response to n/BPDx's issues was just as important as the conflict itself.

If nothing else, it also gave me a focus on something I actually had control over.

Yes, I would say this is a fair and accurate assessment.  Given the access I've had to factual information that proves her to be conscious of her lying and manipulation, I find it hard not to.  I know all of these relationships are unique and the standard default here is to say that BPD's believe the lies they tell, but I suspect if more of them kept the repository that mine did, they would find that not to be the case.  It's like marrying someone that has had her legs amputated below the waist, but successfully hid it, and not finding out until your wedding night that they are a double-amputee.  She knew it and she hid it, but then wants to say "you took vows" -- you can only vow to what you know and intentionally withholding information is its own violation of vows.  

I've tried validation in the past and it doesn't work.  She can invent so much negativity out of thin air that there is always a comeback.  Even with any genuinely kind and altruistic act I've tried to bestow upon her in the past before I reached this point, her standard response was to cast aspersions and generally dump all over it.  I have my limit and I've reached it.  She can go vaporize so far as I'm concerned.  The good part is that at least I'm not "trauma bonded", or whatever the phrase is that I see bandied about!    



I strive to do this most all the time.  The above-cited instance is one where I failed (albeit, I didn't know they were witnesses and, if I did, I would have walked away -- big house, lots of floors, didn't know).
  


Thanks.  I'll look into it.

Her parents are coming this weekend.  My daughter's birthday is Monday.  That also means some of the moms she has recently trashed me to and now snub me (on my own property) are coming.  I have come to believe that her mother has BPD traits but is not BPD.  She can be a nasty piece of work for no apparent reason.  Her father is a combination of weakling, but also highly self-absorbed, or maybe oblivious is more accurate.  When I was at my wits end with my son's learning problems last year (covered in the start of this thread that a moderator split in two for some reason unknown to me) I made the mistake last year of trying to get her mother to intervene, but all she did was throw gasoline on the fire by immediately running to her and repeating a bunch of privately said stuff.  It's funny because the issues I raised are all things that I now know she herself used to call out her own daughter for years before I was ever a blip on the radar screen, but now she has locked arms with her so no help there.  I wish I had understood how screwed up all these people are.  Various types of disorder seem to be infested in different layers of her family.  I didn't grow up around all this garbage and, quite frankly, I think the world would be better off if they were all marked with big scarlet letters.

      

Now is the time to prep yourself.  Surely at some point during the visit you will be cast negatively, perhaps more than once.  Maybe subtle slights, maybe innuendos, how will you respond, if you respond at all?  Ponder that beforehand.  One lesson I learned with my ex, there will be little advance notice of a jab or nasty remark.  And too often it caught me off guard and unprepared, even unsure, how to respond.

Rarely did I came back with an adequate response.  And sometimes there is no great response, or a great response is not allowed.  This was with my ex's lawyer, alas, not in my ex's presence:

That's good advice from FD.

I remember in a youtube video with Dr. Craig Childress he talked about the power of laughter. He was talking specifically about parental alienation but it can apply to any situation in which someone says something absurd. It's probably one of the more profound things I've learned these last ten years, trying to find skillful ways to deal with nuttery.

My son once read aloud a text his dad wrote him that more or less disparaged me. I felt this genuine bubble of laughter about the sheer ridiculousness of the charges. I remember catching a glimpse of my son's face. He had a look of ease and relief, and there was a smile on his face. Laughter neutralized what was supposed to be an intrusive text that sucked my son and I into dumb conflict.

Granted, you still live with your wife and have a lot of chess pieces to move before you can exit. It may not be possible to find levity in the situation. Maybe there is a way to get somewhere in your mind that allows you to feel almost ... vindicated (not sure that's the right word) when your in-laws and wife set up for conflict. Study them like you're an anthropologist learning about their customs. A therapist once told me to do that with my family (although I wasn't living with them at the time, so it was a bit easier to do, I imagine).

It can be very freeing to see what roles people expect you to play, and then to surreptitiously change that role in a way that removes you from the game.

Thanks FD and LnL.  These are all good points to review.  It's not my first rodeo, though.  This has been going on for years.  It would all depend on the situation.  As I said, my f.i.l. is a wimpy loser type.  He rarely starts anything face-to-face.  Back in the safety of his home, he'll whine about what a victim he is.  My m.i.l. is either passive-aggressive (thinking she's being clever, but she's not that smart) or she will go back to her hometown (half of which is their family) and badmouth me within her own circle.  Quite frankly, I think many of those people saw all of the disorder from years before I came along and don't put much stock in them (seems they don't get all the invitations they used to).  Some years ago I found out that she went around doing this and also did it with who was then my uBPDw's best friend from childhood (she doesn't confide in her anymore because she's too fair and objective and has told her she won't take sides because she hasn't seen it).  My m.i.l. was bragging to people about how she was passive-aggressively undermining me in my own home after my son was born and the friend told her, "That doesn't work on him.  You cannot intimidate him and you're just going to make things harder on yourself.  He can see through what you're doing."  That was a great compliment!

If there are bunch of kids around during the party and she pulls something, obviously I'll just keep my mouth shut, but under any other circumstances, I have no problem chopping her off at the knees.  Or dismissing her outright.  Or whatever the situation calls for to render her irrelevant, and like you said you can never really know how to go about it until the opportunity presents itself.

What will be more interesting is one mother will be the one my uBPDw started trashing me to only in the last year and this person is the one that hooked her up with the kook "counselor" that isn't a counselor.  Prior to this, we got along very well.  Last year she was here and gave me the cold shoulder under my own roof just like I was married to her and I knew something was up.  I've had my suspicions that they were two peas in a pod (I have witnessed her being very inwardly focused and she may be BPD herself) and I'm wondering if I'll still get the silent treatment.  The temptation to say , "Gee, have I done something to offend you?" might be too great to resist.  Maybe you'll tell me I shouldn't.  It's pretty poor form to hang out in someone else's home and treat them like that whether you like them or not.