Texting and boundaries

[koseligb]

A bit of a long story, so please bear with me. This past Friday, I got a text from my uBPD mother to let me know my dad had a freelance job about 1.5 hours away from where my sister and I live (we're usually a 5 hr drive from them). Said he was staying over 2 nights, no pressure but wanted to let us know in case we wanted to see him. I didn't respond - I texted with my sister a bit, annoyed that they waited until the night before to let us know this was happening. She and I already had plans - hers tentative, mine more firm. Later I thanked her for letting me know, and that we had some plans in place for the next day but would see if we could make something work.

I talked it over with my husband and decided I don't often get the opportunity to spend time alone with my dad (non-BPD), since maintaining the relationship with my mom has taken up so much more effort and energy over my lifetime, I've more or less taken my relationship with him for granted. So, I knew it would mean a lot to him if my sister and I took the time to go see him and spend some time with him. I wound up cancelling my plans, deciding I'd regret not seeing my dad more than a casual party I'd be missing. The three of us (me, Dad, sister) had lunch and he filled us in on some of what's been going on with my mom. She's been pushing for an early retirement because of job stress, but that would mean losing her insurance and my dad (who's recovering from cancer) would have to switch all his doctors when they'd move over to his work's insurance plan. It sounds like she's just been incredibly stressed out and emotional all the time; meanwhile my sister and I have been fairly distant with her - me especially, since the big blowup we had over Christmas with my husband. I have very mixed feelings about her taking an early retirement right now.

My dad also told me she gets very agitated if I don't respond to her texts right away. I'm so fortunate because he's been sticking up for me to her, saying that I have a lot of things in my life and I could be doing any number of things at the moment she texts me, but it still upsets her. He shared that with me just to let me know, but not to say I should respond right away, and I told him that's not a reasonable expectation. To put things in perspective, my mom was texting me DURING lunch with my dad and sister, and I refused to respond. So, then she proceeded to text both my dad and my sister about the fact that I wasn't responding to her. (drama triangle, anyone?)

After the day was over and I was back home, I get another text from her saying "I am sorry if you are upset with me, since you wait awhile to text me, I think this must be the case. I love you, I'm so happy for the fact that you have a new job [I got a recent promotion] and are happy. Please try to forgive me."

I haven't told her (or my dad) that I'm in individual therapy and marriage counseling because of the impact her - and my dad's - actions have had on my marriage. I've wanted to so many times out of spite, but I know it's not the right time. These types of texts from her are hard for me, because I want to accept her love and happiness for me, and I know that she cares deeply for my sister and I, but her rages and other issues get in the way. I eventually responded with "Thank you. I love you too and appreciate that you are happy for me. I am going through a lot of emotional things right now that I am not ready to share yet, and sometimes I need emotional space. Other times I am simply busy and cannot respond, and I need you to trust and respect that." She responded saying if she added to my pain and/or my husband's she's sorry and hopes we all help each other.

I'm comfortable with limiting my responses to her, though in my last response I'm hoping I didn't open some weird floodgates by sharing vaguely that I was going through an emotional time. I just felt like I couldn't act like everything was ok and say "I'm just busy", when sometimes I just really need a lot of space from her, and by telling her that, I hoped she'd at least kind of understand.

[Turkish]

Even if her response wasn't congruent with her there behaviors, at least it was respectful. It's confusing to deal with a compartmentalized personality. You see things holistically, from a 30k oot perspective, while she operates by her feelings of the moment, additionally unable to onnect past to present in a linear narrative.

She may be able to kind of understand, and this could flip when she triggers... .then could flip back. 

Despite the stress of their retirement issues, you aren't responsible for their decisions. Or do you feel responsibility to help guide them?

[HappyChappy]

Hi Koseligb

Sorry to hear about your family issues. I think this is one of the big frustrations we can have with a BPD, when we’re at a week point, it’s hard for them to understand as they lack empathy. Ironically, those with the warrior gean (i.e. personality disorder) are programmed to attack when we’re at a low point, as do all animals.

The last minute plans you mention are a classic sales technique, if you want to avoid any logical thinking you rush a decision (whilst stocks last). The agitation your mom gets from people not responding to her e-mails is a standard for BPD. But you’re right it’s frustrating. They are very impulsive.

I think you’re right not to tell her she’s cause difficulties in your marriage, as a BPD is unlikely to accept that, and it may encourage more bad behaviour in that respect. Your point about opening the flood gates by mentioning you’re going through emotional difficulties, it is hard to say things are fine when there not. But in my experience we’re best not revealing any weaknesses. A BPD will use these against us, and certainly can’t do empathy. But never forget, you don’t have to give a reason for low contact. You can be “Busy with work”. Also we don’t have to present physically, you can deal with texts/e-mails. It sounds like your marriage is more important that your BPD mom right now. So what would be best for you ? You talk about what’s best for your Dad and BPD mom (as many of us do on this forum), but in honesty it’s the parents that are supposed to look after the kids. So who’s looking after you ? Why not do what’s best for you ? What would that be ?  

[koseligb]

What's best for me right now is to just disengage from them as much as possible. My parents' job situation has just grown even more complicated since I posted, and I know there's nothing I can do to change it or how they eventually decide to handle it. The marriage counseling has been far more challenging for my husband and me - facing a lot of hard things that should have been addressed long ago, some to do with my family, some not. That's why I said that in a text to my mom - sometimes I'm so emotionally exhausted by trying to mend our marriage that I have nothing left in me to even try to deal with my parents' situation in any way.

Our therapist has recommended that we try to just focus on each other and partition off the relationship with my parents, but my husband isn't able to totally separate our relationship from my parents. I think he would prefer to just cut them off completely (or in a perfect world, we'd have a healthy relationship with them, though neither of us see how that's possible), but I'm not sure I'm quite there yet.

The horrible thing too is that, because I'm feeling extra vulnerable and sensitive lately with the therapy, I'm noticing behavioral patterns in me that drive me nuts about my mom.   For example, constantly apologizing about things (partially because I feel terrible about some things, partially for validation). I know that when I'm feeling insecure about my marriage, it brings up terrible fears of loneliness and abandonment that I *know* my mom probably experiences constantly, which brings up a whole host of other confusing emotions.

Is there a separate message board somewhere for people going through marriage therapy? 

[joinedtheclub]

Hi,

The texting and calls to my cell got so bad that I simply changed my number and didn't give her the new one.

Draconian: yes.  But the peace that came as a result was priceless.

I'm sorry that you're dealing with this situation.

Hang in there!

JTC