Needing More Distance from Lying, Coldhearted BPD Mother

[Depression = 72% of members]

I am new to this forum but not new to dealing with a BPD mother.  I have been in therapy for five years, and my journey began when my daughter was born.  I've gone from being an enmeshed, anxious, co-dependent Golden Child to a dejected, anxious, less-co-dependent Scapegoat as I have set boundaries and eventually moved out of state away from my mother.

I am Low Contact with her right now, at least compared to how things used to be.  I call her and we talk on the phone every two weeks or so, she visits us for one weekend twice a year (staying at a hotel), and we visit her for half a day twice a year (staying at a hotel and visiting other family as well during our trip).

I am stronger than ever and proud of the person I have become, I am more authentic and have built a life for myself in our new state.  I consider myself to be a good mother and I am trying so hard to break the cycle for my children.

Here is the situation I am struggling with right now, it's complicated so bear with me and hopefully you will be able to follow along.

When I was 4 years old, my dad announced to my mom that he was having an affair and his mistress was 9 months pregnant and due any day.  My parents divorced, and then remarried a year later.  Unbeknownst to my mom, my dad continued the affair with his mistress for another 4 years before breaking it off for good.

He would sneak money to his mistress and visit his other daughter.  When his mistress would ask for money my mom would freak out and refused to let him help.

Finally when I was 9 years old, his mistress requested child support and my mom demanded a paternity test, which resulted in the mistress being awarded child support.  My dad was interested in pursuing visitation with his now-five-year-old daughter but my mom refused and he went along with her, telling his former mistress that he had to live with his wife and didn't want to argue all the time with her.

I did not know about my half-sister until I was 17 years old, and after my mom told me about her she began to confide in me about the situation, complaining about child support and about the mistress, and what a financial burden my half-sister was.

When I was in my mid-twenties my half-sister found me on Facebook and added me as a friend.  I accepted her request and emailed my parents to let them know about it.  Neither parent replied, and then one day my mom called me to say my half-sister sent her a friend request on Facebook and she wasn't sure if she should accept it.

I told her to do whatever she wanted to do, and soon after I saw they were Facebook friends. 

As I got to know my half-sister better, she told me that my mom had been messaging her and they had been talking a lot.  This scared me a I was going through a very difficult time with my mom, being inundated with outrageous demands on my time and with my daughter and subjected to long silent treatments and emotional withdrawals whenever I set boundaries or said no to her requests to see my daughter.  I pulled back from my relationship with my half-sister for a year or two.

Finally about 9 months ago I messaged my half-sister and revealed the truth of what I knew about the whole situation - a cousin informed me that my mom had given my dad an ultimatum and that he was forced to choose between seeing my half-sister, or being married to my mom.  My mother played a significant role in my half-sister being abandoned by my father and having no memories of spending time with him.

This opened a really wonderful discussion between my half-sister and myself, and we have become very close since then.  Still, all this time my mother has continued pursuing a relationship with my half-sister, sending her text messages and emails regularly.

She sends my half-sister pictures of her and my dad, and invited her to participate in a virtual book club.  She texted her after a concert and said that she just loves my dad so much and that the two of them are soul mates.

My sister has been responsive to these communications from my mom, hoping that my mom is coming to accept her and is helping her connect with our dad whom she's only seen twice in her teen/adult life and spoken to on a limited basis via Facebook message and text message.

My therapist thinks my mom has been trying to hurt my dad's mistress, hoping that by talking to her daughter the mistress will become upset, and hoping that my sister will share messages like the one about my parents being soul mates with her mom and ultimately upset her.

I have been very open with my sister about all this, and she has proceeded with caution in her relationship with my mom.

I have slowly revealed to my mom that my sister and I have been talking more lately, that I told my kids about her and they know she is their aunt, and the latest news being that I decided to make her my son's godmother.

In response to this information, my mom has said she thinks it is wonderful and that she and my dad are happy.  But this has led to a confrontation phone call with my mom.

She asked me why I didn't tell her my sister was going to be the godmother (I told her the day before the baptism... .to which they were not invited as we live out of state and did not want everyone to visit all weekend for the baptism).  She kept asking if I was afraid to tell her, and finally I said that I just want to keep my relationship with my sister between her and me (this is what my therapist told me to say in the event of my mom confronting me).

My mom said she understood and then proceeded to say she doesn't talk to my sister very much, that she is letting my sister take the lead in the relationship. I knew this was a lie because my mom has been the one very heavily pursuing the relationship, and so I said, "I'm confused about your intentions for pursing a relationship with my half-sister."  This is what my therapist suggested I say if I was feeling brave enough.

My mom then proceeded to say that my half-sister was actually the one who reached out to her first - which I knew for a fact was a LIE!  My mom had LIED to me about my sister sending her a Facebook friend request.  In reality my mom had sent the friend request and was also the first one to message my sister... .then she called me and pretended she received a request from my sister.

So I said, "YOU reached out to her first, Mom" to which my mom was taken aback and replied, "No I mean back in the beginning when she sent me a Facebook request."  I said, "YOU sent her the Facebook request."

She was very taken aback, and after a moment of silence followed by stuttering she persisted in saying that my sister sent the request and said there must be some confusion. I was so mad that she continued lying and just said, "I do NOT want to talk about my sister with you."  My mom said she understood, kept explaining her lies, and then we hung up.

Now she texts me like none of this happened and I haven't responded.  I am so tired of her mistreatment of me and her lies.

The atmosphere of our relationship is this, and has been for the last several years:  My mom is very nice to my kids though not always very good with them, she is nice to my husband, and cold towards me.  She avoids eye contact, distracts herself with my kids and talks to me very little, acts disinterested in my life, never compliments me or says nice things about me.

I have grown accustomed to her demeanor, but when I sit and think about it I feel sad knowing my mom treats me with so little regard or care.  Throw in the lying and manipulations and I become furious, questioning why I have a relationship with her at all!

I don't know what I'm looking for in writing this all out on a support forum. I have therapy Tuesday and will see what my therapist says - she was expecting something to happen even though my mom has been making declarations of support regarding my sister being the godmother.

I feel like my options are:

A. Confront my mom on her lies, point out to her that I am aware of how much she has been contacting my sister and that I question her intentions and sincerity - particularly when she denies it and tries to hide her behavior, tell her I think she is troubled and suggest therapy (no skin off my back either way, and not holding hope, but throw it out there).  This would at least feel more REAL and authentic, like I am standing up for myself and not taking her lies and manipulations anymore, and not pretending everything is ok.

B.  Go along and continue the superficial relationship.  Respond to her latest text pretending everything is fine and the phone call didn't happen, and continue to be pleasant-but-distant.  This would minimize the drama and prevent the most punishments, continuing our status quo of mom being cold and withholding and me being superficially pleasant.

C.  Become even more distant and low contact.  Call less often and take longer to respond.  Return her cold nature with my own coldness and avoid her while distracting myself with other things to avoid talking to her as much while we're all visiting.  Share even less about my life and act less interested in hers.  This would more accurately reflect the reality of the situation, demonstrate my disapproval of her most recent escapade, and give me even more space to try to heal from all this and build a good healthy life for myself away from my relationship with her.

I am so sad to think of how I have been treated and how much thought and care I have put into my relationship with my mother despite her total disregard for me and my feelings, and how much pain has been felt by all of us involved in this love triangle between our three parents.

[TiredBones]

I am new to this forum but not new to dealing with a BPD mother.  I have been in therapy for five years, and my journey began when my daughter was born.  I've gone from being an enmeshed, anxious, co-dependent Golden Child to a dejected, anxious, less-co-dependent Scapegoat as I have set boundaries and eventually moved out of state away from my mother.

I am Low Contact with her right now, at least compared to how things used to be.  I call her and we talk on the phone every two weeks or so, she visits us for one weekend twice a year (staying at a hotel), and we visit her for half a day twice a year (staying at a hotel and visiting other family as well during our trip).

I am stronger than ever and proud of the person I have become, I am more authentic and have built a life for myself in our new state.  I consider myself to be a good mother and I am trying so hard to break the cycle for my children.

Here is the situation I am struggling with right now, it's complicated so bear with me and hopefully you will be able to follow along.

When I was 4 years old, my dad announced to my mom that he was having an affair and his mistress was 9 months pregnant and due any day.  My parents divorced, and then remarried a year later.  Unbeknownst to my mom, my dad continued the affair with his mistress for another 4 years before breaking it off for good.

He would sneak money to his mistress and visit his other daughter.  When his mistress would ask for money my mom would freak out and refused to let him help.

Finally when I was 9 years old, his mistress requested child support and my mom demanded a paternity test, which resulted in the mistress being awarded child support.  My dad was interested in pursuing visitation with his now-five-year-old daughter but my mom refused and he went along with her, telling his former mistress that he had to live with his wife and didn't want to argue all the time with her.

I did not know about my half-sister until I was 17 years old, and after my mom told me about her she began to confide in me about the situation, complaining about child support and about the mistress, and what a financial burden my half-sister was.

When I was in my mid-twenties my half-sister found me on Facebook and added me as a friend.  I accepted her request and emailed my parents to let them know about it.  Neither parent replied, and then one day my mom called me to say my half-sister sent her a friend request on Facebook and she wasn't sure if she should accept it.

I told her to do whatever she wanted to do, and soon after I saw they were Facebook friends. 

As I got to know my half-sister better, she told me that my mom had been messaging her and they had been talking a lot.  This scared me a I was going through a very difficult time with my mom, being inundated with outrageous demands on my time and with my daughter and subjected to long silent treatments and emotional withdrawals whenever I set boundaries or said no to her requests to see my daughter.  I pulled back from my relationship with my half-sister for a year or two.

Finally about 9 months ago I messaged my half-sister and revealed the truth of what I knew about the whole situation - a cousin informed me that my mom had given my dad an ultimatum and that he was forced to choose between seeing my half-sister, or being married to my mom.  My mother played a significant role in my half-sister being abandoned by my father and having no memories of spending time with him.

This opened a really wonderful discussion between my half-sister and myself, and we have become very close since then.  Still, all this time my mother has continued pursuing a relationship with my half-sister, sending her text messages and emails regularly.

She sends my half-sister pictures of her and my dad, and invited her to participate in a virtual book club.  She texted her after a concert and said that she just loves my dad so much and that the two of them are soul mates.

My sister has been responsive to these communications from my mom, hoping that my mom is coming to accept her and is helping her connect with our dad whom she's only seen twice in her teen/adult life and spoken to on a limited basis via Facebook message and text message.

My therapist thinks my mom has been trying to hurt my dad's mistress, hoping that by talking to her daughter the mistress will become upset, and hoping that my sister will share messages like the one about my parents being soul mates with her mom and ultimately upset her.

I have been very open with my sister about all this, and she has proceeded with caution in her relationship with my mom.

I have slowly revealed to my mom that my sister and I have been talking more lately, that I told my kids about her and they know she is their aunt, and the latest news being that I decided to make her my son's godmother.

In response to this information, my mom has said she thinks it is wonderful and that she and my dad are happy.  But this has led to a confrontation phone call with my mom.

She asked me why I didn't tell her my sister was going to be the godmother (I told her the day before the baptism... .to which they were not invited as we live out of state and did not want everyone to visit all weekend for the baptism).  She kept asking if I was afraid to tell her, and finally I said that I just want to keep my relationship with my sister between her and me (this is what my therapist told me to say in the event of my mom confronting me).

My mom said she understood and then proceeded to say she doesn't talk to my sister very much, that she is letting my sister take the lead in the relationship. I knew this was a lie because my mom has been the one very heavily pursuing the relationship, and so I said, "I'm confused about your intentions for pursing a relationship with my half-sister."  This is what my therapist suggested I say if I was feeling brave enough.

My mom then proceeded to say that my half-sister was actually the one who reached out to her first - which I knew for a fact was a LIE!  My mom had LIED to me about my sister sending her a Facebook friend request.  In reality my mom had sent the friend request and was also the first one to message my sister... .then she called me and pretended she received a request from my sister.

So I said, "YOU reached out to her first, Mom" to which my mom was taken aback and replied, "No I mean back in the beginning when she sent me a Facebook request."  I said, "YOU sent her the Facebook request."

She was very taken aback, and after a moment of silence followed by stuttering she persisted in saying that my sister sent the request and said there must be some confusion. I was so mad that she continued lying and just said, "I do NOT want to talk about my sister with you."  My mom said she understood, kept explaining her lies, and then we hung up.

Now she texts me like none of this happened and I haven't responded.  I am so tired of her mistreatment of me and her lies.

The atmosphere of our relationship is this, and has been for the last several years:  My mom is very nice to my kids though not always very good with them, she is nice to my husband, and cold towards me.  She avoids eye contact, distracts herself with my kids and talks to me very little, acts disinterested in my life, never compliments me or says nice things about me.

I have grown accustomed to her demeanor, but when I sit and think about it I feel sad knowing my mom treats me with so little regard or care.  Throw in the lying and manipulations and I become furious, questioning why I have a relationship with her at all!

I don't know what I'm looking for in writing this all out on a support forum. I have therapy Tuesday and will see what my therapist says - she was expecting something to happen even though my mom has been making declarations of support regarding my sister being the godmother.

I feel like my options are:

A. Confront my mom on her lies, point out to her that I am aware of how much she has been contacting my sister and that I question her intentions and sincerity - particularly when she denies it and tries to hide her behavior, tell her I think she is troubled and suggest therapy (no skin off my back either way, and not holding hope, but throw it out there).  This would at least feel more REAL and authentic, like I am standing up for myself and not taking her lies and manipulations anymore, and not pretending everything is ok.

B.  Go along and continue the superficial relationship.  Respond to her latest text pretending everything is fine and the phone call didn't happen, and continue to be pleasant-but-distant.  This would minimize the drama and prevent the most punishments, continuing our status quo of mom being cold and withholding and me being superficially pleasant.

C.  Become even more distant and low contact.  Call less often and take longer to respond.  Return her cold nature with my own coldness and avoid her while distracting myself with other things to avoid talking to her as much while we're all visiting.  Share even less about my life and act less interested in hers.  This would more accurately reflect the reality of the situation, demonstrate my disapproval of her most recent escapade, and give me even more space to try to heal from all this and build a good healthy life for myself away from my relationship with her.

I am so sad to think of how I have been treated and how much thought and care I have put into my relationship with my mother despite her total disregard for me and my feelings, and how much pain has been felt by all of us involved in this love triangle between our three parents.

[fleurhart]

Hi

I haven't been here for years, but this message board is always at the back of my mind, because I know there are people out there who really understand.

I am so sorry to hear that your mother has been cold towards you for years, that's just so mean. It's deliberately hurtful, and I'm not sure she wants to change.

Personally, I would go further down the LC path, unless I could see a way that she was going to become loving in some way.

I like the way you confronted her about her lies about your sister. In my experience with my mother, however, she doesn't really seem to be aware that she is lying. Reality is pretty flexible in her case.

I'm also wondering what is your father's role in all of this?

Anyway, sorry again to hear about your mistreatment.



xxxx

[Linda Maria]

Hi Tiredbones!  Sorry to hear about your situation here - can very much empathise.  I have a uBPDsister, and my situation is not so difficult as yours, but I would agree with Fleurhart, based on my own experience, I was only able to start letting the anger, the obsessing, the ruminating, the catastrophising etc about what would happen if I did this, or said that etc. - I was only able to start letting all that go, and start to feel like a normal human being again when I made the decision to go NC as far as possible.  It has worked to a large extent, because if you just don't respond there is nowhere they can go with it.  I am fortunate, that all the nasty lies my sister tells are to people who I am not that close to, they are her friends more than mine, and they don't matter to me.  The only close friends I care about that we have in common totally see it for what it is, they are upset for both of us, but have accepted that there is nothing they can do.  Because uBPDsis knows they still have some contact with me, though they continue to send her messages of support, she has split them black as well, and sent their children weird messages.  My experience has been that my uBPDsis will always find new audiences to target for all her horrible stories about me, about what a victim she is etc. etc.  Now and then something flares up that I have to deal with, and my anger and stress comes back for a while.  The hardest part for me was I didn't want to be seen as the bad guy, I was horrified that anyone would maybe believe all the stories, and for a long time I was trying to justify and explain myself to people.  But because it was all so mad, I realised I sounded mad as well!  If you haven't experienced it you can't understand it - because their behaviour makes no sense at all.  Gradually I realised that other than on this forum, and with a couple of really good friends who totally got it, talking about it to other people actually made me feel worse.  It is a negative, horrible thing to have in your life, and until you can live with the idea that you have to cut it out in order to have some sort of life yourself, it will keep spoiling your life.  It is still hard, but the other thing is that even if I had gone along with it all, pretended to admit I had done all these terrible things and was a bad person, I realised, even that wouldn't have helped her - it would just have gone on and on.   Making myself ill wasn't going to make her better.  So - your situation is more complicated, but I would recommend very limited, or no contact and give yourself a break.  Best wishes.

[TiredBones]

Thank you both for the encouraging replies.  Linda I am sorry to read of the troubles with your sister, thank you for sharing your experience and what you have been through with her.  I know exactly what you mean when you say that you sound crazy trying to defend against the terrible things the BPD person says about you - I have found myself sounding crazy trying to explain why I do not want to spend time with a mother who gives the appearance of wanting nothing more than to be kind and loving towards me and my children.

At this point I have decided that I need to back away from the relationship, becoming very low contact with her.  I will see what my therapist says tomorrow but for now this is what feels right for me.

In the text messages my sister showed me, my mother was so nice to her.  She would compliment my sister, say she was so glad to see how happy and beautiful my sister was and how successful and fulfilled her life was.  She would say how much she enjoyed talking to her, and thank her for being a part of my mom's life.

The text messages really and truly illustrated to me just how withholding my mother has chosen to be with me.  She has completely rejected me, which started the moment I began setting boundaries with her and becoming my own person.

My therapist has pointed out repeatedly that my mom's behavior in my presence indicates that she is very very mad at me, pretty much for being a separate person that she cannot control.  It is only now that I truly realize the implications of this.

My mom has chosen to abandon me.  I may be 30 years old and have three children, but darn if it doesn't hurt.

She let me go a long time ago, but I tried to keep holding on.  I read something once that said if a mother turns her back on her daughter, the daughter will turn away.  Then each person will continue moving away from one another until one of them turns around, and most often in these cases it is the daughter who turns around.

I tried this a year ago.  I turned around.  I confronted her on her behavior, mainly her passive aggressive silent treatments and general hostility towards me.  I revealed I had been in therapy, emphasized I wanted to maintain a positive relationship with her but was no longer willing to tolerate her inappropriate behavior.

It didn't work.  She tried to pretend to be nicer, but over time she has reverted back to the withdrawn, standoffish, manipulative person she has been to me for many years now.  She turned away.

She turned away and I have been holding on, unwilling to see the truth.  I envision myself as a little girl clinging to her mother's dress as her mother tugs and pulls away from her.

It is time for me to let go.  At this point, as I scale back my initiation of contact (phone calls, emails, sending pictures of the kids, invitations to have skype calls with the kids), I anticipate my mother will continue to behave in a distancing manner and we will just move further and further away from one another.

But that is where BPD makes things insane - she hates me and has rejected me, but she does not want me to leave her.  She has already sent me two text messages acting nice and pretending nothing happened, neither of which I replied to.  She is looking for reassurance that I am still here, still ready to take and accept whatever insanity she throws at me.  But I'm not.

I will keep the most distant and superficial relationship with her that I can manage.  No contact is not right for me at this point, but Very Low Contact is an absolute necessity.

She moved on a long time ago.  It is time for me to do the same.

I have gone through feelings of grief over my mother many times in my past, but I really feel like she is dead now, and it hurts.

[cobwebfaery]

i hear you

[Notwendy]

I have a similar relationship with my mother. She's rather cold to me but I am useful to her.

She actually disowned me when my father died. At this point, I had a choice to walk away but it didn't feel like the right thing to do. She was an elderly widow. Also the "disownment" was her being angry in the moment and eventually she took it back. It wasn't about material things- I am not interested in what she owns- it was an emotional thing- am I her daughter or not, but she treats me more like a servant.

Regardless, the biggest impact on our relationship is that she constantly lies to me- on purpose. It's her way of keeping control and manipulating people. She even admits doing it to others and has a smirk on her face when she realizes she has convinced them. I can't tell if she's telling me the truth or not.

For me, how I relate to her has to come from my own choices, because how she treats me can change according to her moods. She can be nice and act loving one minute, disown me the next minute. I chose to be LC with her. The main reason is that I can't have a trusting relationship with someone who lies to me. I recall the shock when I first realized she had lied, but confronting her only leads to more lies. It's her choice to lie, and I can't change that.

I think it helps if you make the choice of how close you want to be with your mother and not base it on her moods. I can't trust someone who lies to me.