BPDFamily.com

I'm amazed at how quickly my mother can change from "witch": saying horrible and nasty things to "waif": being pitiful, begging me to help her, citing her "reasons" for having said what she said ( not her fault) to flattery, to acting as if nothing happened. It can be in minutes.

She can also be brutally cruel with her words. When my father was alive, she would get him to collaborate with her and punish me and also say mean things. I am not as attached to her as I was to my father, so her mean words didn't bother me. But I was attached to my father and my fear of his disapproval let my parents control me. Since Dad is gone, my mother has less control. So her new thing is to speak about my father and how disappointed he was in me. In the next sentence, tell me he loved me.

If my mother is aware of a way to emotionally get at me, she will do it. In the next sentence she is apologetic and waify. Then she will complement me and thank me and tell me how proud she is of me.

I've read about how people manipulate others and I think all of these are an act. If she can't get what she wants me to do by being mean and threatening, then she goes to something else. I don't blame her- being mean and threatening was how she got us to comply with her. We kids were scared of her. Now I am not, so her threats don't work.

My next boundary with her is to not discuss my father. Just not- hang up if she brings up the topic.

If any good comes out of these discussions is that it puts some of the things my parents said to me in perspective as an adult. I can't imagine saying these things to my child- at any age. If we complied, we were "good kids" and then in an instant, the most horrible , disappointing kids on the planet, " we don't have a daughter" "we will not forgive you" for the slightest thing. In context- ( no kid is perfect)- we got good grades, graduated from college, are employed- never committed a crime, or anything so terrible that would lead a parent to disown us. It is shocking to think that they think it is OK to say these things and then expect us to just act like they didn't.

I've been thinking about the nasty things my mother said to me about my being a disappointment to my father. She chose the one thing she could choose that could be hurtful- and that was her intent. She used him to punish me when he was alive and now she's trying to do that again.

There are times I have considered the possibility that she is a psychopath, devoid of empathy, because when she wants to say or do hurtful things, she does. Or she's just that disordered. Then the next second she is apologizing, saying she wants me to love her, help her.

She's been sending super sweet and flattering texts since her latest emotional "vomit" of mean things. I am just not engaging- and sending short messages " thank you" and then letting it go. What I want to do is call her and yell the heck at her, but I know that would just fan the drama flames and let her know she was able to push my emotional buttons.

Makes me sad to think how much power she had to influence my relationship with my father. No doubt she said all kinds of bad things about me to him when she was angry at me. It is also sad that he went along with it. I can't help but wonder why he did. He was a good person and I know he loved his kids, but he'd turn on us in an instant if she was upset with us.

I'm a mom now. I don't think there's a mom on the planet who hasn't been aggravated by her kids at least once, but we don't disown them when they do. I love my kids, and love being a mom. It makes it all the more obvious just how different my BPD mother is. I can't imagine saying to them what she said to me.

I think I understand my mother and her disorder pretty well. I see how she sees herself as a victim. It is harder trying to understand how she had such an influence on my father.

Hi Notwendy


I think this is a very good boundary |iiii She can say whatever she wants to say, you can't control that but you can control your own behavior and how you respond to her when she starts talking about your father and saying those cruel things.


In what ways did she use your father to punish you when he was alive? Or should I say, in what ways did your father allow himself to be used by your mother to punish you when he was alive?


Yeah I can definitely understand the urge to let her have it so to speak, but knowing what you know about her, not responding or using a BIFF response is probably a better option indeed.


The thing here I think is perhaps not so much how your mother had such an influence on your father, but more importantly why your father let himself be so influenced by your mother. He was an adult and despite of the love he felt for you kids, in certain ways he also emotionally and spiritually seemed abandoned you by behaving the way he did. Looking back at your memories of your father, can you identify any characteristics he had that could explain how he could let himself be so influenced by your mother and make the choices he made? No matter what your mother did or did not do, your father made his own choices. Him turning on you kids when your mother was upset with you, actually is 100% on him regardless of your mother's behavior.