Hi BlueCat,
Subject line keep nurturing the hate if that is what makes you feel "good"
I am sorry that you are so bitter and angry, but to be blunt it is looking more and more like you are protecting and nurturing your anger in an effort to keep it alive and thriving. First of all, no legitimate therapist would allow a patient to “journal” as long as you did. Three months, six month max, and then they have the patient MOVE ON to the recovery phase, part of which is DESTROYING THE JOURNAL and LEAVING THE PAST BEHIND.
I would argue that her accusation of projection is a projection. Ha!
If *anyone* sounds bitter and angry, it is her (certainly in this correspondence). And perhaps she cannot accept that she is bitter and angry, so she projects these feelings onto you. Now, in her mind, she's only reacting to your bitterness and anger. She washes her hands of these unacceptable (to her) feelings; but neither does she learn how to cope with these feelings in a healthy manner.
Who is she to say what a "legitimate therapist" would or would not allow a patient to do? If anything, I would guess that a therapist in her past has asked her to keep a journal in such a manner. If she has ever tried journaling for long in her past, she might come face to face with evidence of her disordered thinking. A person with BPD (pwBPD), if they keep a journal, would have direct evidence that how they feel about loved ones, and for that matter, their very own personality traits, are fluid and unstable.
A pwBPD's modus operandi is to run away from the past because they are unwilling or unable to come to terms with their past (i.e., abandonment trauma), and because of this their behavior is dominated by the past they choose not to face (i.e., disordered fear of abandonment).
To me, again, she sounds like she is projecting.
This isn’t about you bettering yourself, this is about you “punishing” people who you think hurt you. News flash, I could easily start “journaling” and come up with a few decades of (censor) you did to me. But spending time every day obsessing over the past isn’t healthy, and that isn’t who I want to be.
I would say, this e-mail isn't about you. It's about her. She is the one who punishes people she *thinks* have hurt her. That is the whole point of this e-mail. She suddenly feels hurt by you, for nothing you have done to her, and decided to write this e-mail in order to "punish" you.
News flash, she probably *has* journaled and came up with decades of things that she can not let go. She probably has spend days obsessing over the past which her therapist has told her it isn't healthy. It isn't who she wants to be. But the way she is dealing with it is by projecting all these thoughts and behaviors onto you. By dissociating like this, she is not dealing with it. But dealing with this is between her and her therapist.
And about all your obsessive journaling, and the fact that even last year, three decades after the event, you still complained to me about the fact that I broke your skull back in 1982. :)id you ever wonder for one second WHY I took the skull into school? Because I thought it was awesome, not just because it was a skull, but because you made it, and I was so freaking impressed with my big sister that I took it into school to show off to all my classmates what my sister MADE. Yeah, one of the asshats dropped it, but three decades later I still hear about it. (Censored) drop it already, or at least acknowledge the fact that I did it because I looked up to you and not because I was disrespecting you and your stuff. It is just like Grandma still being pissed at Aunt Mae for not giving her any candy when she worked at the candy store. LET IT GO.
You didn't complain. She complained. She has not been able to let this go. This is an example of what I mean by pwBPD being dominated by a past they cannot come to terms with. This is part of her disorder.
You see, pwBPD exhibit "splitting" behavior. That is, they either idealize or devalue people: see people as "all good" or "all bad" (e.g., black and white thinking). She is currently splitting you black, or devaluing you. This is why she is writing this scathing e-mail to you. I suspect that what started this incident of devaluation, was her own self-devaluation. She was the one who recalled this long past event. I imagine this was an upsetting occasion for her because she *knows* she was in the wrong when back in 1982, she took your plastic skull and broke it at school.
But because she exhibits "splitting" behavior, because of this past act, she splits herself black. She devalues herself even though this is a typical mistake that an adolescent might make. You've long past forgiven and forgotten that she ever did this. She still cannot forgive or forget herself. She still choose to project. She wrote "Yeah, one of the asshats dropped it... . " She still chooses not to own up to this mistake, and *forgive herself* for it. She doesn't need you to forgive her. She needs to learn to forgive herself. And if she does learn to do this, then she will have taken a big step away from her dysfunctional coping mechanisms.
On the bright side, that she is recalling these events might suggest that she is doing some emotional work, hopefully with a therapist she trusts. But it does sound like she still has a lot of work to do still.
Her writing this letter to you, is an example of her relying on her old dysfunctional coping mechanisms. She has taken a step back.
You don’t have to be nice to people you can’t stand, but at least act like a (censored) adult. When you were at my son’s party and all I did was nod hello, you stared through me like I wasn’t there. So here I am stuck with either having to invite you to more events and be treated this way, or not invite you and have you pretend that I am the one acting like a child. Even when I was not “talking” to (her husband's) parents I would still say “hello” or “the brie is nice” or some other inconsequential small talk on the few occasions I was stuck in the same room, and I would then run off and find someone else to talk to. It is called being an adult. But you aren’t even adult enough to do that.
The fear of "not existing" is a deep-seated anxiety/fear of pwBPD. This gets a bit technical, but pwBPD present a "false" personae most of the time when they interact with people. Their "true" personae is the part of their personality which got fragmented when they experienced their primary abandonment trauma. Some pwBPD describe themselves as "chameleons." They shape their personalities to suit whomever they are interacting with, but their actual personality develop is arrested. In a sense, so long as they continue unrecovered, their "true" personality isn't given the chance to develop. In a sense, their true personality doesn't exist.
I can see why she got upset at you for not seeing her. But instead of realizing that her anxiety is not normal, she is choosing to believe your action was a deliberate effort to trigger her fear and anxiety. Perhaps this is yet another example of projection. She cannot accept that her "reaction" is disordered, so she is choosing to "blame" you for triggering her feelings.
She accuses you of not "being an adult." Her reaction and behavior to the situation she writes of is evidence that she is the one who has an arrested emotional development. She is not "being an adult."
You are really starting to act more and more like Grandma C----- every day, and it (censored) scares me. Either change therapists, or please seriously consider adding medication to the mix. Your Soup Nazi act is no longer an act, and in the end you are only hurting yourself by locking yourself in such a bitter angry world where you surround yourself with only people who “yes” you to death.
Again, I don't think she's talking about you. She's talking about herself most likely.
She probably scared that she's acting more and more like Grandma C-----. Rationally she perceives this, but emotionally she cannot handle it. So she projects it all onto you, probably one of the last close family members she has left. If not only, then she also projects in this manner to whomever she can.
She is the one who is locking herself in a bitter angry world where she surrounds herself with "yes" people. Look to her social circle and familial circle to find the "yes" people she speaks of.
So yeah. Most of this is very much classic projecting. She is angry and bitter and can't let things go so she tells me that I'm angry and bitter and can't let things go. I am not like what she writes here. When I had my breakthrough crisis (with my mother) and when I finally cut my sister off last summer yes, I talked about this a lot (less with my sister, but still). I have a hard time at holidays where there are family parties (and yes, it's something I'm talking about now because of this email and the stalking) but other than that, literally months go by without me talking about this stuff to anyone.
Well good on you for realizing that most of this is classic projection.
You don't have to convince us (or yourself) that you are nothing like this. She is writing what she writes for her own purposes. It's because of venomous communication like these that some people choose to go "no contact" with their BPD loved ones. "No contact" doesn't just mean you don't make any effort to contact them, but also that you take measures to insure you do not receive contact from them.
But if you choose to remain in contact with her, I imagine that you cannot be forever devalued. There will be a time when she idealizes you as well. When it comes to family members with BPD, I've found that the best strategy to dealing with them (so long as you must deal with them) is to maintain as formal a relationship as possible. :)istance and formality are your best chaperones. And when they have one of their dysregulations, you don't have to be around to put up with any unreasonable behavior.
Best wishes, Schwing
