feelings of indifference towards a BPD mother - is it normal?

[browns4]

I just joined this site yesterday and posted my story in the intro section of the message boards under the heading MY STORY: ROBBED OF MY CHILDHOOD.

I have been on a healing journey for over a decade, and slowly backed out of my mother's life so that I could be the person I am. My anger and frustration towards her has evolved into pity and sadness for her. I realize that she did not know how to love me in a healthy way, and that is why her "love" hurt so much. I feel released, free to live my life and chose to grow and improve myself to better the lives of the people around me.

When I was a child, I remember laying in bed wishing that my mother would die in her sleep that night. I remember trying to come up with a way to "help" her die (ie. to kill her) without actually doing it myself or being responsible for it. I never came up with a plan other than to pray to G-d to get me out of the hell I was living in.

Now that I'm older, I sometimes lay in bed thinking of what it would be like to get the phone call that she died. She will die one day, and there will be a funeral. I don't think I'll feel sad. I don't think I'll be happy either. She's the person who gave birth to me, but to me, she never earned the title of being my mother. I think because I have forgiven and moved on from her, I just don't feel anything towards her anymore. I don't love or hate. I just feel... .   nothing.

My question is, is that even possible? She's my mother! I have worked so hard to gain a strong sense of self-awareness and be in touch with myself within. It's so important to me that I am real with myself. Am I in denial and not realizing it?

[Kwamina]

I think I understand what you're going through. I've come to realize that my uBPD mother in many ways just can't be seen as a real person. Many building blocks of real persons are completely missing in her. Realizing this I noticed that my feelings towards her started changing. I'm still very angry about all the things she's done to me, but I find it hard to truly hate or love someone who just isn't real. The hurt she has caused is real of course, but she isn't, it's just like there is nothing inside of her. No stable core, in fact no core at all. I don't think it's possible to love someone who isn't a real person, but it's also nearly impossible to hate someone who isn't a real person.

[Cordelia]

I think it's normal.  My feelings towards my mother run the gamut from anger to wishing for reconciliation to determination to continue to live my life on my own terms and protect myself from her, but indifference is certainly strong, and getting stronger the longer I stay detached.  I always knew I wouldn't be sad when my mother died, and feared that made me a monster.  I think that feeling came from anger though.  And the confusion of encountering what you describe Kwamina, the strange detachment of being so close to someone who is so detached from themselves it's hard to know just who they are.  Because they themselves don't know.  It's hard to feel anything definite toward someone whose identity isn't stable.  What is there to love?  Or hate, for that matter?  I see my mother now as more of a human being than a monster, but someone who is so deeply wounded they are just not available in the same way a healthy person is to get to know.  Like trying to build a relationship with someone in a coma, or someone running from a tiger.  They're just not available at that moment.  I don't really know my mother, though I'm deeply connected to her.  I have my own ideas about what she is like, theories to explain her behavior, but I can't check with her to see if they're true because she's so in survival mode everything she says is meant to manipulate, it isn't based on her own real thoughts.  So I can't be sure that what I think of her is correct.  I don't know that indifference is how I would describe my stance towards her now.  It would have been closer to that when I was still denying how deeply I was hurt in the relationship with her.  My emotions are clearer to me now - they include a wish for love from her, sadness at how her disease has affected our relationship, pity for the amount of pain she is in, anger that she didn't do more to help herself, strong aversion and disgust towards her behavior, both clearly destructive behaviors and neutral behaviors that I simply associate with her, judgment of her and determination to avoid her fate through making better choices (even though I know that doesn't really make sense).  When she dies I suspect now that I'll feel some mixture of relief that she can no longer hurt me and sadness that this means that we will never reach the kind of loving understanding I hoped for so much.  But it won't include a true mourning for the person that was my mother, as a death would normally occasion, because I don't know anything about her really.  Only how she affected me. 

[Swampy]

Thanks folks for these posts.  I'm stumbling in the dark right now so these experiences in common that I latching on to and hoping to build a base with, in order to somehow, someway... .   shed some light on a brighter future.

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I tend to grieve for a Mother who, like you all have noted, never really existed.  Which makes me wonder what other feelings I have that aren't based in reality.

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I guess, sometimes you have to realize your faults in order to make progress.

[ScarletOlive]

Hey browns4,

It is tough when the feelings of guilt come up. I can honestly say that I have been where you are right now. I believed that either I would die and go to heaven, or I would somehow live to 18 and move forward. Remembering those times is tough too. It gets better. You took the healthy step back from your mother's life for your own health, safety, and happiness.

What you feel is real. Our society values mothers deeply. Still, those of us who have been abused by a parent know that our feelings are personal.  Feelings aren't good or bad, they just are. Please don't feel guilty about them. Perhaps with healing your feelings may change and perhaps they won't. What matters is our actions. By stepping back, you took care of yourself and may have helped your mother too. Reading through the Survivor's Guide on the sidebar may be of comfort to you.

Sending you much caring and support. 

[OnlyChild]

I used to play out in my mind what my life would have looked like had I been the child of my aunt and uncle.  They are fun/balanced people.  I fantasized about a lot of different living scenarios; especially when things were bad.   I think that is a tendency for people who grew up like we did.

I also think we all are grieving our lost childhoods, and coming to terms, empathetically, that our BPD parents cannot help themselves; they have an illness they cannot control.   

I've been spending some time lately contemplating the level of love my uBPD mom and I had.    I think she loved me in her own way.   I think that I learned to love her in a different way that children of non-BPD moms learn to love.   So that makes things odd, but it is what we have.

I am two weeks away from the one-year anniversary of my uBPD mom's death.   

Browns4 :  I can tell you the thoughts I went through.   I was with her when she died.  We shared lovely last words, and I do not think I would have wanted to be anywhere else at that time.  I admit that I was very well trained to put her needs way above my own.   So at the end, I did exactly that.   For a few months I felt loss, but not as extreme as I would have expected.   I went to a class on grief, and again did not feel like I was as sad as others in my group.   My mom did have physically maladies most of my life, and a couple of near-death calls previously so I wrote off my lack-of-full grief to that.  I thought I had grieved her so much with her health troubles that I got over the real thing quickly.   

About a month ago, I started to become aware that I was really happy.  I felt free.  I felt the freedom of having no responsibility to her happiness.   Then I got angry... .   angry for all that I missed out on because of her uBPD issues.   However, the anger did not last long.  Mostly now it's the sense of relief, and grief for what I lost of myself.   That sounds so selfish, but after 44 years of being her everything, I think it's ok to make a few comments like that.   

So I think my best advise to you in planning for the death of your parent is to continue to develop yourself.   You'll need something to define yourself other than your parent.  That will get you a  long way.  I also think that if you do not feel grief that's ok.  I cried for a couple days before she passed, and have had only two crying meltdowns since.   There are good things about our parents and it's ok to miss those good things.   I also think it is ok to feel the way we feel. 

[cleotokos]

browns4, there is a lot of pressure in society to "appreciate" all your mother has allegedly done for you. It is an assumption that mothers are wonderful, selfless people - seemingly with no expectation to earn that respect and position in society. Children whose mothers don't fit the stereotype feel the pressure of guilt upon their shoulders as everything seems to tell us it is not possible that our mothers didn't do everything they could to raise us in the best way they could.

I know just how you feel. I alternate between hate, indifference, and pity for my mother, and boy do I feel guilty about it. Nevermind that she treated me with disdain, disrespect, contempt, and attempted to control me most of my childhood. That's your mother and you are told to appreciate what she did for you. I saw one therapist - only one - who told me that parents must earn your respect just like everyone else, it is not simply given just because they had children. But it is still a struggle for me.

[coyotafiera]

I've been there, too.

I looked after my mother (thankfully, it was mostly from afar) for 20 years.  I was the only one who could maintain boundaries with her, and so I was the "bat-poop" manager to the mother who kicked me out of the house at age 11.  When I was a little girl, I actually called the police and asked them to put me in foster care.   

A little over a year ago, I got the call saying she had passed.  I was sad for the tragedy of her life (all that potential lost), but not her death.  There was not a wet eye in the house at her memorial, and I kept having a surreal experience when people offered me condolences.  I kept waiting for it to hit me, but it simply did not. 

I seem to have front-loaded my grief.  I discovered her BPD in my early 20s.  She was never officially diagnosed, but everyone knew she was not quite right.  By the time she died (about 20 years later), I had already shaken my tiny fist at the universe, mourned my childhood, and accepted the fact that the this world didn't set aside a loving mother for me.  (Not having a loving mother still beats growing up on a trash heap in Calcutta.)  I had even forgiven her and found ways to maintain boundaries while still showing compassion for her.  (Nobody would choose BPD.  It must be absolute heck from the inside.)  Still, a year after her death, no grief. 

One thing stayed with me from the time following my mother's death.  A very good friend was with me when I picked up my mother's ashes.  The lady at the Cremation Society had also recently had a loss.  My friend saw me shed tears over the lady's loss before slinging the bag with my mother's ashes carelessly over my shoulder and plopping it in the trunk of the car.  He commented on this when we were on the road.  He said, "y'know, I was worried about you until I saw how concerned you were for that lady's mom.  I get it now.  You're just done with your mom.  You're going to be just fine."  (We then went to Michael's to find a suitable receptacle for her ashes that didn't cost $700.  Yeesh.  We almost put her in a can of her favorite coffee or a really big Easter egg.) 

I wish the rest of society wouldn't expect everyone to grieve the same way.  While I know there's some pressure in this realm, it's important to feel whatever you feel.  It's when we try to shove away our emotions or deny them that we jump into deep, shark-infested water. 

Hang in there!  You'll be great.

[Cordelia]

browns4, there is a lot of pressure in society to "appreciate" all your mother has allegedly done for you. It is an assumption that mothers are wonderful, selfless people - seemingly with no expectation to earn that respect and position in society. Children whose mothers don't fit the stereotype feel the pressure of guilt upon their shoulders as everything seems to tell us it is not possible that our mothers didn't do everything they could to raise us in the best way they could.

Without meaning to get off topic, as a mother to be, this stereotype is damaging to mothers too in my opinion.  The expectation that to have kids is to be a martyr to their needs, to put aside your own interests and desire for self-fulfillment and devote yourself to every aspect of the life and development of small people whose capacity for understanding and empathy is only slowly developing and to find that spiritually uplifting and more rewarding than any interest or expertise you may have developed previously... .   ugh.  It leads women (again IMHO) to give up activities and interests that really contributed to the world, making them miserable and distorting their parenting (making them overinvested, competitive mothers who channel their own ambition through their children rather than pursuing their own interests and fulfilling themselves and letting their children be who they are and develop at their own rate).  Of course having children is a big commitment, and mothers as well as fathers should take it seriously, just like any other big responsibility, but this rhetoric of martyrdom doesn't do anyone any favors.  

Of course my uBPDm loved this rhetoric, loved being seen as a saintly victim of her own choices.  It echoed how she saw her whole life. 

[Kwamina]

Without meaning to get off topic, as a mother to be, this stereotype is damaging to mothers too in my opinion.  The expectation that to have kids is to be a martyr to their needs, to put aside your own interests and desire for self-fulfillment and devote yourself to every aspect of the life and development of small people whose capacity for understanding and empathy is only slowly developing and to find that spiritually uplifting and more rewarding than any interest or expertise you may have developed previously... .   ugh.  It leads women (again IMHO) to give up activities and interests that really contributed to the world, making them miserable and distorting their parenting (making them overinvested, competitive mothers who channel their own ambition through their children rather than pursuing their own interests and fulfilling themselves and letting their children be who they are and develop at their own rate).  Of course having children is a big commitment, and mothers as well as fathers should take it seriously, just like any other big responsibility, but this rhetoric of martyrdom doesn't do anyone any favors.  

Hi Cordelia,

I believe you're absolutely right, there should be a balance. Parents do have a certain responsibility because their kids didn’t ask to be brought into this world, but the situation you’re describing here is the extreme at the other end of the spectrum and that isn’t a good thing either. It can’t be all about the mother but it also can’t be all about the kids. When it’s all about the kids this often leads to a lot of problems too, like the ‘spoiled brat syndrome’

[Demeter]

Now that I'm older, I sometimes lay in bed thinking of what it would be like to get the phone call that she died. She will die one day, and there will be a funeral. I don't think I'll feel sad. I don't think I'll be happy either. She's the person who gave birth to me, but to me, she never earned the title of being my mother. I think because I have forgiven and moved on from her, I just don't feel anything towards her anymore. I don't love or hate. I just feel... .   nothing.

Hello! I haven't logged on in quite awhile, and I admit I was lurking tonight. Lots of things have been going on in my brother's life (he is the keeper of mom... . I cringe saying that word) and I needed to remember why I went NC for my kids. Your post compelled me to log in. I was horrified at the beginning of NC when I began fantasizing about her death after her suicide attempt.

My grandparents and I are very close, and they are close to my children. I worry now what will happen when they pass, will my children get to mourn properly without the drama. I find myself wondering when she will die. How much easier it will be if she goes before them. Does this mean I am as sick as she is? I wonder if I won't feel anything. I have been through the mourning process of the mother I never had. What will differ when I mourn the one I did have? I have accepted her "way" of loving me... .  and then my children. Like you said, I feel nothing for her; no love, no hate, no pity. My energies are best spent on the ones I love and the ones who love me.

I am grateful that I am not the only one, but as I find often on this site, I am also saddened that others have similar feelings and experience. Thanks for listening through my rambling. Thanks for validating my thoughts and feelings. Good luck to you. 

[cleotokos]

Cordelia, I couldn't agree more. This stereotype does nobody any favours at all, and pushes people who shouldn't be having children at all into parenthood - whether for the glory of being seen as a self-sacrificing martyr, or because we've been taught that all women really want to be mothers (and if you don't, there's certainly something very wrong with you!).

My mother loved this stereotype as well, for different reasons. More like, "hey I can be a totally crappy mom, kids always love and worship their mothers right?" Like a licence to behave poorly. Then she would moan and cry about how "society" judged mothers so much and gave them a hard time (because some stranger told her she shouldn't scream at her children in the supermarket).

Good luck to you in your new motherhood, it sounds like you're very level-headed about the whole thing!

[starlily20]

Thank God I am not the only one who has fantasizing about their mother dying. I dream about it and the relief that it would cause.

My mother is uBPD and even though I am trained in DBT I still find it so difficult to deal with her. Since completing DBT, I have been able to step back and not engage in the nasty yelling arguments and using key words such as "I feel" and not "but". It sucks majorly when she gets mad with me for having friends and having found an entirely new family. I live with her now due to financial reasons but I am moving out at the end of June. I know that I will have to seperate myself much more from her than I already have and part of me still gets sad but I know thats what is best for me.

PS my bestie's mom is also uBPD so we understand alot. Thanks and hang in there YOU ARE NOT ALONE!

[Desire]

Hi Browns4,

The sentiment feels very familiar. When I was younger I used to pray that my mom should die all the time. Then I'd feel guilty and pray she should get better. Then I felt stupid because I didn't even know what that means. She doesn't know how to be better. She just is.

I never really hated her just pitied her so much. What mother can have so many healthy, beautiful,intelligent children and think of them/ treat them like the scum of the earth? She ruined the one thing in her life that could've given her so much joy.

Now that I don't live with her and don't see her very often I feel just like you do, indifferent.

She texts sometimes all these mushy,loving texts and I just look at it and laugh. I know that someone who doesn't understand would think I'm a monster, but I've been through this before and am not planning to get sucked in again.

She just doesn't matter to me and never did anything to deserve my interest... .

So yeah,  I think it's very normal  You seem like a strong person... . Good Luck~