Thanks CC!  It is very similar, except that he "overly cares" about the kids when it suites him, in a very strange way where he thinks he is protecting the kids but in reality he is controlling them to "be on his side" as he has done with my stepdaughter.  I have set up everything so that I don't need to rely on him, I literally have a back up to everything I "depend" on him for and the back up has nothing to do with him.  I only ask him, as I believe he should be involved, but know the chances of that happening are slim most weeks.  But he will do everything he can to ruin that when in this mood.  Take the last 24 hours...my son has issues with school and my daughter gets hurt.  I do the practical thing, call the school to get things fixed and bring our daughter to the dentist for an emergency appointment.  He is too busy taking care of himself (he is so afraid that he will gain hundreds of pounds if he doesn't do his walks and gym time one day...he is over the top...then eats an entire pantry that night since he is up all night) to actually be there for our daughter and would rather blame me than actually see the reality, it takes the focus off him not being there if "its my fault".  While I am actually taking care of things, he is blaming me and causing more damage as he does, wanting to make it look like he cares as the blame obviously has to be on me, as things just can't be what they are.  He often switches things on the kids which makes them upset, but then pretends all is ok because he buys them something.  Same as when he yells at them and when they are hurt by him yelling at them, he tickles them...and he does the same at bed time, I put the kids to bed and he then lays next to them and starts tickling them but gets upset when they then want to play and not sleep.  He does ask the kids what they did at school, but often forgets that he already asked them because he actually isn't listening and then will ask again.  I don't think he is actually truly present when in this mode, he has hit his car on the side of the garage twice this year pulling out of the garage cause he isn't present (and I'm supposed to be ok with him having my young kids alone!).  He stated to me less than 24 hours ago that he will not be at our house with the kids, yet has been there twice, but made them sleep at his house because it makes me and the kids upset, but if I were to plan something different, he would derail that plan and physically come be with the kids, "protecting" them from my evil plan and in turn creating an unsafe environment for all.  He has stated that he can't pick the kids up from school any longer as he has to work, but goes to the gym every day and when I checked the camera he came to our house this morning and is still there for when the babysitter gets there, but why tell anyone that he is there...I let the babysitter know otherwise it would have scared the crap out of the her.  He also switched the presentation time for our son without telling me to a time that I can do it, but I would have never known if the teacher hadn't confirmed the time change with me instead of him.  He is literally doing everything he can to get under my skin!  I am holding steady with not responding, but struggling inside! 

Hearing everyone's feedback is so helpful and welcomed! The members here understand what is is like to be abused and the challenges of the road to recovery.

Yesterday I had a big "aha" moment. I ran into a long time friend with whom I often have long intimate discussions. I did not talk to him about my neighbor yet I felt seen and heard. Since then I have been feeling so content.

I realize that I need to cultivate more close rewarding relationships and spend more time with the people I value. Then I won't be so likely to seek out relationships with people who in the long run can only hurt me and when people are abusive I won't be so affected so deeply or for as long. I am vulnerable to being love bombed, then hurt when the person who love bombed me suddenly gets abusive. As this same long time friend told me in one of our past discussions not the most recent one: I am way too nice and vulnerable to being groomed. I recognize I do need to take the time to get to know people and be careful how much I share about myself until I know that the person I am with is someone I can trust.

As for my neighbor, in the beginning she was out of the ordinary nice to me. She was literally preparing me to be controlled and abused by her. Now it is time to permanently limit contact with her and to stop the JADING. By trying to explain my points of view to her, I just set myself up for more abuse and feelings of despair like I feel with so many family members who have made me one of the permanent family scapegoats.

As far as doing anything legal or calling the police. It has been several years since she replaced the door on my house without my permission. The areas around my house are HOA property. In the past, I have worked behind the scenes to limit her power and control. For example, at one point she was determined to have the property painted by her expensive contractor, would not allow my contractor to be vetted, and demanded we have all the buildings painted the colors she wanted. I went to the HOA and eventually got it so the other contractor was vetted and chosen for the job. I formed a paint committee with some other owners so there was a vote on the colors. The neighbor refused to be part of the paint committee, did not get her colors chosen or the contractor she demanded. She made the contractor's life hell and luckily he finished the job. All the owners got over a thousand dollars back from the original assessment which was for the neighbor's more expensive contractor. I do have options and power which is all about working with the other owners while having as little contact as possible with the abusive neighbor.

Hi there,

What you describe echoes how my undiagnosed NPD brother-in-law acts.  I couldn't point to one or two incidents that illustrate his behavior; it's more about a general pattern of manipulation, meanness, self-centeredness and control.  If I tried to write it out, it might sound like I'm crazy.  But here are some of the patterns I've noticed:

*His own interests come before the children's.  An example might be, he'll be upset if the kids don't seem interested in him or what he's doing . . . and yet he'll basically show zero interest in what the kids are doing.  Another example might be, all the conversations revolve around his interests, and yet he won't show interest in the children, not even as banal as asking, How was school today?

*He makes scheduling and logistics absolutely impossible.  He's chronically late, typically by more than 45 minutes, and yet he blows his top if others make him wait for three minutes, even if for a valid reason (like sickness, an accident).  He demands that you write out logistical details, sometimes multiple times, and he needs constant reminders and explanations (e.g. for directions) . . . He expects you to maintain the calendar of activities and do all of the execution, according to HIS schedule, and yet he can't be relied upon to do his part, let alone even show up.  Why?  He thinks he's exempt from doing his part.  It almost seems like he ENJOYS barking at someone else to update him, to get his approval and await his slow reply.  It's like he wants to have a say on every detail, even if he's not involved.  I think it's a power move--he's controlling and yet not contributing.  He wields his veto power with gusto.

*He expects others to over-function for him.  One small example is that he expects his spouse or kids to wake him up.  He's too "important" to set his own alarm.  And yet his spouse and kids don't want to have to wake him up, because he's a total grump when awakened; he'll shout that he wasn't awakened "properly" and will hurl insults.

*He has a million excuses for non-performance.  His go-to excuses are his own ailments:  a sore knee, a sore toe, an upset stomach.  He frequently visits urgent care, often when his kids are in his care.  Yet if the kids have a health issue (one is particularly prone to stomach upset and vomiting), he ignores it, or chastises her for throwing up.   

*He does whatever he wants whenever he wants, with seemingly zero consideration for other people, even his own children.  An example might be, he'll binge-watch TV and binge-eat at night, and so by morning, he wants to sleep in late.  The kids will awaken at their normal time and want breakfast, and yet there's no food the kids like at his place--the fridge is empty.  He'll insist on sleeping until the afternoon, at which time he'll order brunch or something.  Meanwhile, the kids are starving.  They might be good and quiet for two or three hours, but as the morning progresses, they get hungrier and crankier, and they start to make some noise and act out.  Then he'll scream at the kids for waking him up.  And this is his visitation time.  Basically he wants to SLEEP during visitation and not feed or interact with the kids, not until HE is ready.  It would be one thing if he were working a night shift.  But he's unemployed of course.

*He doesn't contribute economically as he should.  With my BIL, he's remained unemployed long-term.  Sure, he'll "pretend" to look for work.  He'll talk about it, too.  But the record shows he hasn't worked a day since 2019.  Once he blamed his children for not being able to go to Washington to work on the DOGE project--he made it seem like he would have been chosen because he's a self-proclaimed "genius," but he couldn't go because he had to stay near the kids?  Anyway, he is providing absolutely the minimum child support he can get away with, and every payment is late.  He has his kids living at poverty-level support, while he spends marital assets on himself, buying all sorts of things online that he never even bothers to open.  I'm pretty sure he orders all of his meals with DoorDash.

Sound familiar?

If it does, one thing you might try is to put a limit on his power over logistics.  One way to do this is not to rely on him to do anything--that way, you and the kids won't be disappointed by non-performance, but if he does show up, then that's gravy. Another way is to limit his veto rights, by how you frame logistics.  Rather than ask permission, you can say that a nil response is tacit consent.  That might look like:  "Son has a special school event to attend on Thursday at 4 PM.  Unless I hear from you otherwise by tomorrow night, I'm signing his permission slip and will take him."  A non-repsonse means he's OK with it.  Just give him at least 24 hours to object or propose an alternative.  Chances are he won't reply because it's too much "work" for him.

Thank you all for these posts. It means a lot. I will definitely try to do things that will make my life have more purpose and activity in it. I’m also hoping that grad school will help in that respect as well once it starts.

 I just wish it wasn’t the way it was with her, but obviously it is. I just always think of what could have been. Like I said before everything felt perfect in that time with her, not just her but everything. Other things in my life were in the perfect area as well so now it kinda feels like I’m rebuilding and starting all over from zero. There are lyrics from a song called, “Fear,” by NF, “ Make all my hopes and my dreams come to life just to lay them to rest.”

I guess I just have to keep moving and put one foot in front of the other.

Update...I am at work and I check the security camera at the front door to make sure that both of my older kids have left for school and I see that the door was opened at the usual times and that it was opened about 10 minutes after as well.  I watch the camera to see what happened and my H came to the house with his work stuff and is apparently working at the house!  WTF!  He literally just refused to be at the house, etc last night, accusing me of all sorts of things and now he shows up when it is known that no one is home with his work bag...meaning he had to pack his bag with all of his work stuff!  Certifiably crazy, like I have no other words!

Thanks Mutt, I really appreciate the thoughtful reply.  Its not always easy to see all that you are doing when in the middle of the chaos.  Unfortunately, the "crap" has continued.  Holidays have always been very important to my side of the family and I have done my best to keep that tradition with my family/children.  I assume that is not the case for my uBPDh's family, as he never understands why we are doing anything special for them.  Easter weekend rolls around.  I have a weekend full of kid's sports, but organize an egg coloring and dinner gathering at our house for the kids and my sister's family.  I invite both my H and my SD14.  My H stops by after church.  He does his ring the bell, then walk in the house thing that he has become accustomed to, and then stands in front of the tv and barely interacts with anyone, except my nephew to tell him that he is wrong as to who will win March Madness.  He barely acknowledges that the kids are all doing Easter stuff and just stares at the tv, then goes upstairs and "packs" some of his clothes to bring to his other place.  This is his new thing, to "pack" clothes that he hasn't worn in years to make it look like he is "moving more of his stuff out".  My sister's family leaves around 9 pm and my H grabs his bag of clothes and does the same.  We were all a little thrown off as we (the kids and I) thought he was staying over for Easter morning.  The next day, I do all of Easter, then send him pictures and say that we missed him participating with us.  He thanked me for always making holidays so nice for the kids.  Monday morning rolls around, our S8 doesn't want to go to school but I get him out the door and excited to ride the bus, which is his favorite part of the day.  Unfortunately, long story short, they now have assigned seats on the bus and my S8 is a wreck over the change and crying so I bring him home and after lots of tears agree to let him stay home for today only. (I spent a good part of the day contacting the school to get this issue figured out, to which my H is calling after me to make sure that I am not talking about him!) During this, our D5 trips on her shoe and does a face plant and is bleeding from her mouth.  I attempt to get everyone under control and my oldest out the house for school and to let my H know what is going on.  His response is of course blaming me for the bus, that he never acts this way with him (of course because he is afraid of you which he has told me) and he is fine to not ride the bus with him, etc.  I tell him that I am not doing this with him that I have to deal with our D5 who fell.  He asks to talk to her.  So she calls him, I am laying with her as she is in a lot of pain and he tells me that I need to move away from her, that she is tough and doesn't need me while she is talking to him!  She is balling and he just keeps saying "your tough, let me see your muscles, what can I buy for you, etc."  He then says that he is going to go on a walk, then do a little work then come over to see her.  She finally hangs up and I looks some stuff up and I decide that I should take her to the dentist.  I schedule an appointment, then ask him if that time works with his schedule.  He doesn't respond, after 10+ minutes, my daughter is pleading me to leave for the dentist, so I tell him that we are leaving.  He finally responds "cool".  I update him with our every move, he then tells me that he won't make it to the appointment...clearly his walk is more important...he did the same thing when I had to take our then 2 year old daughter to the ER with RSV, he showed up maybe 30+ minutes late cause he had to finish his workout.  Thankfully everything is fine.  We get home and a little while later my H shows up with smoothies and decides to work at the house, every once in a while coming out to check on what we are doing and give the kids a "high five" and me an eye roll and strange laugh.  I ignore and continue to play with my kids.  I had to leave to pick my oldest up from school and his office door was closed as he was on a meeting, so I text him to let him know.  His response was that my SD14 had strep so he was visiting her and then to let me know what the plan was for the kids for bringing the kids to school this week when I work as he still is refusing to stay over the house...yet he was just at the house for several hours without my asking him.  I ask our S8 what he wanted to do.  He started crying that he hates sleeping at dad's house, dad is mean and all he does is interrogate him about me and try to tell him things about me that he knows are not right.  I told him to tell dad he wants to call me and he told me that he has before and dad won't let him use his phone and when he brought his iwatch so he could call me, he refused to give him the password to the wifi, so he couldn't.  He tells me its not comfortable and he only wants to be with me.  We (meaning the kids and I, which I invited him on but did not buy him a ticket, etc as he has switched into his not nice mode and i won't have that on our trip) have a vacation coming up and I have a feeling that if I don't let the kids stay over 1 night, then he will attempt to mess with that.  So I told my son that we just have to do this 1 day, then I will figure out something for the other day that I work.  He refused for awhile and our D5 refused if her brother wasn't going.  I finally talked them into it as long as it was for today.  So I text my H to let him know the plan, saying that the reason why the kids would not be there the second day was because riding the bus was very important to him.  I then check my email and see that he has sent me an email entitled "negative talk in emails only"! LOL That pretty much states that he will not respond to any of my negative talk through text any longer as our kids can read the emails and he will ignore them and only respond through email.  Manipulation at its finest, as all  negative texts come from him and my response every time is that I am not doing this with him!  I laughed, forwarded it to my therapist (whose response was "holy manipulation!") and ignored it.  I then noticed that my H had scheduled a school thing for our S8 without clearing the time with me first and it is scheduled at a time that I can't be there...and he knew that.  So I sent him a text, asking him to please clear things with me as I do with him...to which he responded that I didn't let him know when the kids were doing their easter egg hunt, etc...what! (Everything in me wants to change the time to one I can attend, without telling him...but I won't)  They do it first thing in the morning every year, I can't even keep them upstairs, they were asking to go downstairs at 5 am this year!  He then switched to his email chain and said I lied, etc, which I didn't respond to.  He then started in on how he was going to convince our S8 to stay with him for the next time I work as his place is his house too.  I tried to explain what is important to him right now being a cool 2nd grader (friends) and my H flipped out (he derails anything having to do with him spending time with friends), sending an email "stating HIS "facts"" that his son doesn't spend enough time with him..., how many times have I offered for him to pick the kids up from school, take the kids to their practices, take the kids out to do something, be at the house to hangout with the kids before 9 pm, etc and I get told that he will not be my errand boy, he has to go to the gym, he has to work, etc...the excuses pile on!  This is the millionth time we have gone through this.  I can ignore the crap he throws at me...but I can't ignore the way the kids are feeling, which is my focus right now.  Honestly, I have a lot on my H and have saved him so many times, yet he doesn't care.  All he cares about is himself!  And I am tired!     

It's amazing, isn't it?  I think of it like being inside a tornado...all you can see is the debris swirling all around you.  Yet once you step out of the storm, there's a whole world out there that the tornado hid with its wind field.

Hi Zachira
Human relationships are complicated by default and sometimes they can be extremely difficult. Even with our nearest and dearest, disordered or not.
This is the human condition. Please don't let this discourage you from trusting and opening up to people you know well and see where this gets you. You can protect yourself from the toxic and abusive individuals by distancing yourself and let them live their sad lives. It's not your problem.
I can relate to how you feel as I am a very private person myself with few friends and a difficult family life, but I try to keep things in perspective and not fuss over the unimportant situations.
Keep your cool always.
Regards.

I have unexpectedly been in NC with my ubpd sibling for a couple of weeks and I’m amazed at the increasing clarity I have. I didn’t ask for this and (right now) hope it won’t last forever. My emotions change over the course of a day. BUT it has been interesting to see those feelings of fear, obligation and guilt lessen bit by bit over time. I can already see more clearly that I didn’t cause this and am not responsible for it and that I have put up with abusive behavior to a destructive degree.

Hello everyone,

I am working through the patterns I participated in with my partner wBpD. Things are going well enough, outbursts are cyclical which I tell myself I won’t stay through another one, and yet I seem to always stay. What has me ruminating is the consistency of my own reaction. I see the signs. I feel the anger coming on. I try to manage it. And inevitably the situation explodes and I say I won’t be part of this any more, but the calm returns as if they are a savior and I stay when everything in my bones tells me to go.

The last time this happened was two weeks ago. I had an important leadership talk to a group of women coming up. My partner was in the email thread confirming the date and time. While we were discussing it about 5 days prior to the event, I mixed up the date in our discussion. I figured it out and apologized profusely for getting it wrong, but that wasn’t enough. She exploded. Sent text after text to me while I was working. Kept yelling at me saying I was Chao’s and didn’t know how to respect her time. Compared my mix up with her calling me a F-ing c over and over again. Said she wasn’t coming to the talk and hoped I would be embarrassed because of it. That I would have to explain my stupidity to the organizers.

I said ok and agreed that her not going was for the best because it was my error. That I would handle everything. I also said that the way she was speaking to me - calling me names, and sending repeated messages to my office and yelling at me for three days was wrong. That she couldn’t speak to me that way.

Here’s the kicker - she shows up to the talk and says I should be grateful. Says someone had to save this relationship and it had to be her. I was angry with her. Had to pull myself together and give this talk. And then per my usual pattern, I apologize. I thank her for coming. But every time I do this, I feel like I am losing more and more of myself. I feel weak and I retreat from her. I am present but not at the same time. I don’t share my feelings for fear of her using them against me, and I don’t love the way I want to knowing this will all happen again.

I don’t want to keep doing this. I also don’t want to see her hurting. I think this is a me problem.