Secrets?

[todayistheday]

This is about a family dynamic when the "ruler" of the family is uBPD Mom.

It seems that in my family secrets abound.  Not secrets like surprises or skeletons.  But people don't tell other family members things under the guise of not hurting one's feelings, when the fact it that the act of keeping the secret is more hurtful.  Especially when the thing that the secret is being kept is about something that's initially meaningless.

How many times have I heard "don't let xyz person find out about this."

When my Grandma was sick for  my Mom was given medical information that my Grandma was not even given - one piece of information that my Grandma later told me that she would have made a different decision on if the decision had been given to her to make and not to my Mom.  I am not sure why the Dr. gave the info to my Mom and not to my Grandma, but it happened that way.  Grandma was old, but 100% cognitive and able to make decisions for herself.  Select family members were given it and others were not and were made to keep it secret.   

Here's the situation now.  I gave my nephew an electric guitar for his birthday 1.5 years ago. Now he's ready to get an upgrade, knowing the musicians I know, including me, an additional one.  I was on Facebook a few days ago and a friend of mine said "Hey, I didn't know <nephew name> was a metal head".  I answered him how did he get that info.  From a facebook posting from my sister asking for advice about buying a certain guitar brand.  Did tell him that I couldn't see the posting but maybe she only posted it to guitar people.  I told him that nephew had said that the one he had didn't have enough frets and could be used for alternate tunings. 

Here's the kicker. The next day I got a note from friend paniced, telling me that I wasn't supposed to know about the new guitar.  He didn't know why but thought it was because my feelings would be hurt about the one I gave him.  I told friend that she was being stupid, that I'd gotten him the one he asked for and if he wanted to upgrade, why should I have a problem with it.  He said that he'd told her sort of the same thing and how he'd had multiple guitars, etc.  He said cover would be blown soon anyway as sister is coming to my city to buy it.  But that wouldn't blow cover, she comes here lots without me ever knowing.

I already knew he was thinking about it anyway.  He'd told me and I'd heard sister talking about it with nephew or Mom or somebody.

Family dynamic - sister is golden child and totally enmeshed.  Lives next door to Mom and can't survive without Mom. I was the scapegoat.  The enmeshment serves me well because it keep them pretty much out hair.

Is a family culture of keeping strange secrets (thus having to keep track) normal in a "normal family" or is something that happens more in disfunctional families, headed by a uBPD Mom.

[zubizou87]

Yes secrets are like currency in my family, the more loyal you are to someone the more things you get to hear about other people. If I do what my UBPD mother wants or behave like the daughter she confides in me and I get 'rewarded' with a juicy secret about somebody else. It's quite sad really because some of the things I was wayyyy too young to know about were clearly told to her in confidence and she was trusted only to go blabbing to everyone because it excited her.

I like being out of the circle too because it frees up space in your brain for things outside of your dysfunctional family which can get a little gossipy and incestuous. I can really see with the enmeshed family members that they are obsessed with their family and think of little else apart from keeping off of the black list.

[ScarletOlive]

todayistheday,

Well, secrets are important when it's something worth keeping secret. But, when it's trivial and you have to keep track of who knows what, then it gets a bit ridiculous, haha. It's similar to how dysfunctional families don't really talk openly about their feelings. It's much better to just be honest with people.

For instance, I told a friend I'd be able to hang out with her all day. Suddenly, I got offered tickets to a really huge event that evening. I was worried to tell my friend because I didn't want her to think I was ditching her. So, I called, told her, and explained what had happened, and of course she was totally cool with it and encouraged me to do it. I guess it's just being comfortable with our friends and knowing them.

[skinny13]

todayistheday, secrets were definitely the norm in my family growing up with an uBPD/NPDm and enDad. The thing is the secret was sometimes strange, like you said - they seemed to be moving targets, what you could or could not talk about. But sometimes when I unknowingly talked about something my uBPDm thought should not be talked about, I'd get the silent treatment for a few days and not even know why I was being punished.

It's related to triangulation too in my opinion, and the love that some BPDs have of pitting family members against each other.  They'll tell one sibling one thing and tell them not to tell the other sibling and vice versa. My uBPDm constantly said things about my brothers/sisters-in-law that she didn't want me to tell them, and I know she did the same with them.

Yes secrets are like currency in my family, the more loyal you are to someone the more things you get to hear about other people. If I do what my UBPD mother wants or behave like the daughter she confides in me and I get 'rewarded' with a juicy secret about somebody else.

zubizou87, exactly! I always knew when I was in uBPDm's good graces because she'd start gossiping and trying to talk trash about people to me.

We also had to keep secrets about anything that might indicate that our family wasn't keeping up with the Joneses. E.g., money problems. But that seems pretty normal to me actually - most people don't want that type of information to get around.

The internally created drama is so draining and unnecessary... . and it all feeds into their need for people to be off balance around them, so they can be in control.