military trauma?

[Our abuse recovery guide]

I keep writing a novel (that resembles the plot of Full Metal Jacket) and deleting it. This topic obviously freaks me out.

So my father was on the ground in some really brutal combat, as were several of my uncles. Some were badly wounded.

My parents almost went out of their way to traumatize us about this. My BPD mother used this as a favorite scapegoat for herself. Any family dysfunction was just "PTSD, not my fault." There were a lot of bloody details brought up in argument, as proof that it wasn't her fault, proof that she wasn't the one who needed to change, or needed therapy. I overheard a lot graphic death stories at inappropriate ages. There was a constant, daily reminder of The War as a way to escalate drama. It was an instant win for her during custody disputes. It was a way to deliver thinly veiled threats from her against me, particularly ":)on't bring dates home, your father will literally murder them, he's crazy from The War." (That was all obviously her; they weren't even talking at that time). It was a horrendous way of splitting me, mentioning awful combat things the family had done, then immediately accusing me of being just like them, just part of that half of the family. That was inexcusable.

He was actually not the problem, and he was never violent. He had an almost total lack of emotion, which ironically made him the most stable one in the household at times. Probably the worst partner for someone with BPD though, as he was absolutely unresponsive to drama. He did fail to intervene in her crazy antics towards me, so I never quite trusted him either. He'd just reach a limit and leave.

The whole thing made me sick and alienated me from my peers. I was always the kid a generation off from my classmates with a disgustingly brutal family history no one else seemed to understand.

I just want to bleach my ears for some of the things I've heard out of my family. 

[XL]

I keep writing a novel (that resembles the plot of Full Metal Jacket) and deleting it. This topic obviously freaks me out.

So my father was on the ground in some really brutal combat, as were several of my uncles. Some were badly wounded.

My parents almost went out of their way to traumatize us about this. My BPD mother used this as a favorite scapegoat for herself. Any family dysfunction was just "PTSD, not my fault." There were a lot of bloody details brought up in argument, as proof that it wasn't her fault, proof that she wasn't the one who needed to change, or needed therapy. I overheard a lot graphic death stories at inappropriate ages. There was a constant, daily reminder of The War as a way to escalate drama. It was an instant win for her during custody disputes. It was a way to deliver thinly veiled threats from her against me, particularly ":)on't bring dates home, your father will literally murder them, he's crazy from The War." (That was all obviously her; they weren't even talking at that time). It was a horrendous way of splitting me, mentioning awful combat things the family had done, then immediately accusing me of being just like them, just part of that half of the family. That was inexcusable.

He was actually not the problem, and he was never violent. He had an almost total lack of emotion, which ironically made him the most stable one in the household at times. Probably the worst partner for someone with BPD though, as he was absolutely unresponsive to drama. He did fail to intervene in her crazy antics towards me, so I never quite trusted him either. He'd just reach a limit and leave.

The whole thing made me sick and alienated me from my peers. I was always the kid a generation off from my classmates with a disgustingly brutal family history no one else seemed to understand.

I just want to bleach my ears for some of the things I've heard out of my family. 

[XL]

I'm sorry if no one else can relate. I had a moment of insight;

BPD people look for a reason to vilify people. They make up stuff (alcoholism, false abuse claims, etc). Reasons why the other person is insane, and not them. When they have to reach for a defect to smear a good person, it becomes silly and obvious. And it quickly becomes clear that they're the insane one for inventing something so horrible. My mother HAD the perfect "defect" handed to her on a platter against her husband and her inlaws. And it was a horrible defect. And they weren't all good people, and my uncles were occasionally insane, so it was believable.

It was just tragedy theatrics for her own attention. I find it hard to believe that a war that ended 20 years prior was the sole reason why every vacation we took ended in her screaming, why she never found a job, why she gave up on college, why I was never allowed to date boys, etc. It was just such a sickening cop out.

Weird dad is 95% cool. He did recently tell me that the last time he met someone who looked like my partner they were shooting at each other. I did not appreciate that. That was maybe the final moment of "Screw you all, never hosting a wedding". I don't know why I became the family target for thinly veiled, militant threats against my boyfriends. It was a type of bullying hostility that the male siblings never experienced.    :'(

[Kwamina]

BPD people look for a reason to vilify people. They make up stuff (alcoholism, false abuse claims, etc). Reasons why the other person is insane, and not them. When they have to reach for a defect to smear a good person, it becomes silly and obvious. And it quickly becomes clear that they're the insane one for inventing something so horrible. My mother HAD the perfect "defect" handed to her on a platter against her husband and her inlaws. And it was a horrible defect. And they weren't all good people, and my uncles were occasionally insane, so it was believable.

I know what cha mean! My mother lies a lot, but she makes her lies sound believable by telling half truths. This makes it much more difficult to tell when she's lying. I know that she's lying but other people often tend to believe her.

[chriskell]

My experience with the military stuff is not the same as yours, but I relate to some of what you said. My uBPDm also used the military to vilify my father. She told me that he did crazy stuff in the war he was in and that when he came home he did crazy stuff like say that my brother born shortly before he left to war was not his son, etc. She mostly accused him of unethical behavior in the military. When I got older and started to doubt all the stuff she told me I asked her once why my father was able to stay in the military so long and kept advancing if he had done all these awful things in the war. Without hesitation she explained that when he visited the Pentagon once, he requested a review of his file and stole the offending records from it and put them in his pocket when nobody was looking. This is my very first memory of when I began to see that I could not believe everything my mom was telling me. I find her stories usually have an element of truth in them, but she always takes them just a little too far in fairy tale land.

One thing I found interesting is that when I was about 40, I was visiting my father and he opened up about the war to me and showed me some pieces of a missile that were pulled from his plane after it was shot at and some other mementos. He got emotional when he talked about the friends he lost in the war. I realized that while my mom was telling me all these crazy stories, my dad was choosing to NOT talk to his young children about war matters and the scary and traumatic experiences he had there.

Even if your father did have PTSD, that would not be an excuse for your mom's behavior. And even if my father had done all the terrible things my mom has accused him of, it still would not justify the way she has treated her children.

[XL]

I'm glad someone can relate. It's a whole other level of drama.

I realized that while my mom was telling me all these crazy stories, my dad was choosing to NOT talk to his young children about war matters and the scary and traumatic experiences he had there.

Even if your father did have PTSD, that would not be an excuse for your mom's behavior. And even if my father had done all the terrible things my mom has accused him of, it still would not justify the way she has treated her children.

Ditto. I've heard very, very little from him directly. He showed us like, 4 pictures of his friends. It's all come second hand from my mother, grandparents or uncles. The grandparents were senile and said, "It was a good learning experience" to me in private, which made my skin crawl. For some reason the uncles started using me as a confessional; they'll tell me stories about the family when it's just us at the airport of something. One uncle definitely did have PTSD. My father just had a kind of defiant attitude towards authority. (Again, not the best match for the BPD type). I don't even know if he was actually diagnosed. I think she diagnosed him herself when all of that become a pop psychology thing in the 80s. And then got on it like a broken record when anything went wrong. She was always just "reacting to his PTSD behavior". It wasn't until he left completely and she kept reacting towards me, her bosses, her friends, that I started realizing the problem was her.

He was really dark and had a really low threshold for annoying kid stuff, like chirpy toys and movies. But he always held down a job, wasn't violent, and never had any visible breaks with reality, or drug problems. I never quite knew which one of my parents to trust.  I do remember instances as a toddler where I grudgingly started shadowing him when my mom was flipping out.

[ScarletOlive]

XL, I just want to say I can relate in a different way. For me, my mom brought up past and present abuse.   I'm so sorry you went through this. It can be traumatizing to a kid to hear such awful details. Your father may have had PTSD (numbness is a common symptom), but that doesn't excuse abusive behavior by your mother.