I'm afraid to be independent - anyone else?

[Depression = 72% of members]

A pattern I discovered during therapy, was that my BPD mother has always conditioned me to fear being independent.

Growing up as a kid, the more I tried to develop my own identity and the more independence I achieved, the more my mother rejected me.

By the time I was a teenager, it had morphed into a bizarre lose-lose situation. I was parentified and responsible for caring for and protecting my younger brother, yet I was also scornfully rejected for it at the same time. My mother would also put me in the role of her personal therapist, but then also judged me when my grades slipped at school - but sometimes I was up until 4AM the night before school being her therapist. Lose-lose all the time.

When I graduated from high school, it was like a massive war broke out, because I had a career goal and dream, and my mother couldn't stand it. She wanted to pick out my entire life for me. I was supposed to 'fake' independence while secretly doing everything she wanted me to do and still act like a young child to her. When I didn't do this, she became very angry and rejecting towards me. I attempted to hold a job and put myself through my own education, and she sabotaged it by kicking me out before I had been able to save up even for a vehicle. I had to abandon my career dream to just try to financially survive.

When I (heaven forbid) formed a serious relationship, she did not want to speak to me for almost two years. She would not help me with any leaving the nest stuff at all. It was a situation where she did not want me around, but she did not want to help me leave the nest. I flailed terribly.

Eventually I decided to move to another state. My mother was not interested in helping me at all. She would not even hug me goodbye on the day of my flight. She never emailed me or called me the whole time I was living in another state, and I was also struggling with unmedicated bipolar disorder because I had no health insurance. I felt like she was hoping I would fail and would have to come crawling back.

Well that is exactly what happened. Those above are some of the main examples, but basically she has always shown anger and scorn towards me for trying to be independent, yet also implies heavily that she wants me to completely support myself.

Right now I am often very nervous to the point of feeling ill, because she has been in "nice mode" for the past few months helping me get back up on my feet again - yet she has also made several efforts to thwart that process. I found a psychiatrist in spite of her, not because of her, as an example.

Basically I am starting to do well again. I am stable on medication and job hunting, and mood-wise I am doing so much better. And it scares me in a way because I am waiting for the other shoe to drop now. I am waiting for her to pull the plug on being nice and to be dark of mind towards me because I am doing too well.

Does anyone else with a BPD parent get this complex? I want to make the leaps to independence, but I am also gut-anxious that at any moment, it could trigger rejection and anger.

[Klo]

A pattern I discovered during therapy, was that my BPD mother has always conditioned me to fear being independent.

Growing up as a kid, the more I tried to develop my own identity and the more independence I achieved, the more my mother rejected me.

By the time I was a teenager, it had morphed into a bizarre lose-lose situation. I was parentified and responsible for caring for and protecting my younger brother, yet I was also scornfully rejected for it at the same time. My mother would also put me in the role of her personal therapist, but then also judged me when my grades slipped at school - but sometimes I was up until 4AM the night before school being her therapist. Lose-lose all the time.

When I graduated from high school, it was like a massive war broke out, because I had a career goal and dream, and my mother couldn't stand it. She wanted to pick out my entire life for me. I was supposed to 'fake' independence while secretly doing everything she wanted me to do and still act like a young child to her. When I didn't do this, she became very angry and rejecting towards me. I attempted to hold a job and put myself through my own education, and she sabotaged it by kicking me out before I had been able to save up even for a vehicle. I had to abandon my career dream to just try to financially survive.

When I (heaven forbid) formed a serious relationship, she did not want to speak to me for almost two years. She would not help me with any leaving the nest stuff at all. It was a situation where she did not want me around, but she did not want to help me leave the nest. I flailed terribly.

Eventually I decided to move to another state. My mother was not interested in helping me at all. She would not even hug me goodbye on the day of my flight. She never emailed me or called me the whole time I was living in another state, and I was also struggling with unmedicated bipolar disorder because I had no health insurance. I felt like she was hoping I would fail and would have to come crawling back.

Well that is exactly what happened. Those above are some of the main examples, but basically she has always shown anger and scorn towards me for trying to be independent, yet also implies heavily that she wants me to completely support myself.

Right now I am often very nervous to the point of feeling ill, because she has been in "nice mode" for the past few months helping me get back up on my feet again - yet she has also made several efforts to thwart that process. I found a psychiatrist in spite of her, not because of her, as an example.

Basically I am starting to do well again. I am stable on medication and job hunting, and mood-wise I am doing so much better. And it scares me in a way because I am waiting for the other shoe to drop now. I am waiting for her to pull the plug on being nice and to be dark of mind towards me because I am doing too well.

Does anyone else with a BPD parent get this complex? I want to make the leaps to independence, but I am also gut-anxious that at any moment, it could trigger rejection and anger.

[Turkish]

I didn't have quite the same struggle since I didn't have siblngs. I graduated high school at 17, and didn't turn 18 until late the following October. Longest. Summer. Ever.

Her little waif-child was leaving. She was in a mental break-down. I lived there, but spent a lot of nights with a friend. I worked 4 days a week, so I had some freedom.  Her T put her on Prozac to start. It was a disaster. She came to me at one point in tears to hide the pills.

Come Fall, I started a community college 60 miles away (all the while getting grief why I didn't enroll at the state school... .nevermind that my mom was no help, and it was only due to the prodding of a couple of teachers and my BFF's mom that pushed me to enroll at the CC on my own, with my own money).

I wanted to room with a friend from his near the college. The hour plus commute one way was kikking me, especially since the c current technical program required after hours lab time. My mom said, "you're not an adult yet. You have to stay here." Technically, she was right, but we could have worked around that. On my 18th birthday, I moved out, despite being n crutches from a horrible motorcycle accident earlier in the month.

She contributed a $100/mo to my education, to help with rent. Sometimes she missed, and i had to borrow money to eat sometimes. However, she continually told me to apply for financial aid. I told her again and again, that she claiming me as a dependent  meant I couldn't apply for finanicial aid. It wasn't as easy money as it is these days. If so, I probably could have gotten my BS or BA to make her proud if it were like now.

So how does that relate? It was easier my moving 60 miles away... .then 120... .then 700 for three years, until I moved back to our state, keeping a steady 120 for 15 years now. I'm not teponsiboe for my mother's feelings (identity), as you aren't for yours. I struggled with a form of social anxiety for a decade and a half after I emancipated myself. Fleas from a BPD mother, in combination with some other things. I felt like it took me until my mid 30s to embrace the "real me," and then I ended up with my uBPDx, which is what initially brought me here. Now I'm in middle age, processing again who I am, and who I'm supposed to be. Not for others, but for myself.

As for you, to be succinct, what keeps you stuck?

[Leaving]

"Growing up as a kid, the more I tried to develop my own identity and the more independence I achieved, the more my mother rejected me.

By the time I was a teenager, it had morphed into a bizarre lose-lose situation. I was parentified and responsible for caring for and protecting my younger brother, yet I was also scornfully rejected for it at the same time. My mother would also put me in the role of her personal therapist, but then also judged me when my grades slipped at school - but sometimes I was up until 4AM the night before school being her therapist. Lose-lose all the time.

When I graduated from high school, it was like a massive war broke out, because I had a career goal and dream, and my mother couldn't stand it. She wanted to pick out my entire life for me. I was supposed to 'fake' independence while secretly doing everything she wanted me to do and still act like a young child to her. When I didn't do this, she became very angry and rejecting towards me. I attempted to hold a job and put myself through my own education, and she sabotaged it by kicking me out before I had been able to save up even for a vehicle. I had to abandon my career dream to just try to financially survive."

Well Klo, I could have written all that myself.  My mother is a diagnosed narcissist with borderline which encompasses a lot of other destructive behaviors like passive-aggression ( sabotaging my success, covert manipulations and abuse).

You are not a failure.  You are just trapped in your mother's web or rather, mirror,  like I was in my mother's.  I'm 54 now and FINALLY free of her web but there isn't a day that goes by that I am not reminded of how she influenced my life.  

There are a couple of books that I hope you will take time to listen to or read.  

" The Wizard of Oz and other Narcissists" is my Bible.  Whether your mother is a narcissist or not , this book will help you learn how to become strong and set healthy boundaries.  This book saved my life and I refer to it often when I need encouragement to hold my boundaries with manipulative people.  You can listen to the entire book for free on Youtube.

" Mother's Who Can't Love" by Susan Forward

Klo, we are not the sick ones.  They are.  I took meds, I went to therapy for years and one day it dawned on me that I was the only one in my family feeling any emotional discomfort and trying to fix myself in order to tolerate them!  My therapy didn't help them in any way and my medication never produced any better behavior from them either!  It really ticked me off that once again I was the one paying the price for their dysfunctional behavior.  I went NC and that's been the only way I could live a reasonably sane life.