Feeling unsettled today

[qcarolr]

Have been lurking about the board today. My replies seem too melancholy, so have been deleting them and just reading posts. Need to share my concerns, but am hesitant for some reason. Maybe just sleep deprived.

Have seen DD27 a couple times a week since she moved to newer hotel close to her probation program. She likes the room - quiet, private, close to secure back entrance. We had to get dog when DD left her in room alone and she was barking. DD says she misses the dog. Yet, each time I meet her at her request there are new men 'friends' in her room. Always different guys. Most seem to be homeless. Trying to maintain a non-judgemental attitude and not worry. DD seems very much in control of the situation. Do I even want to know anything about this?

The other troubling thing is from Christmas Day. We had returned to the hotel parking lot - DD was walking the dog  with gd. Gd wanted to go to the bathroom and I asked DD to take her to the room. DD did not really want to. I persisted. Gd was a little unsettled because there was urine on the toilet seat from one of the guys in the room. I did not really think much of this at the time.

Then gd started into a PTSD meltdown over the next several days with ruminating, compulsive thoughts focused on sex, mating animals, etc.  Asking the same questions over and over, not able to tolerate commercials on TV (esp perfume commercials. with semi-naked people), and ended up hiding out in her room searching for 'having sex' vidoes. And live birth videos. She nearly attacked me with a knife when I took the computer away. Then she was begging me to destroy the computer.

I am still so shaken by all this. Searching for how I let her down as the primary parent.

The pdoc we saw on Monday was pretty calm about it all - IMHO anyway. Gd was there, so maybe he was being this way intentionally. He also started her on Adderall before school starts for her attention issues - she is more focused, almost OCD about whatever she is doing now.

And she is so hateful towards me. I am so sad. I do not want to go through all this again. What was I even thinking loving this child and becoming her guardian?

Gotta go let the neighbors dogs out. Gd is playing at a neighbors house - at least that is a good thing.

None of this is very clear for me tonight.

qcr

Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders

[pessim-optimist]

Oh, qcr, last week must have been so traumatic for both - you and gd... .

She is still very young to be exploring the idea of sex - that must be a terrifying topic to her at her age.

Now this meltdown must have been really scary;

I am trying to understand what happened:  did you try to connect with her, to comfort her?

Did she close up? How do you figure you have let her down?

What is her hate about?

[twojaybirds]

You do sound awfully sad today.  I am sorry abou this.

Love yourself.  You are caring and kind and giving.

[qcarolr]

Now this meltdown must have been really scary;

I am trying to understand what happened:  did you try to connect with her, to comfort her?

Did she close up? How do you figure you have let her down?

What is her hate about?

I feel like I let her down by not protecting her from two little girls that came to play who I believe have experienced some kind inappropriate sexual exposure or contact. DD was suspicious before I was, and I discounted her worries. These girls came into our lives about 2-3 years ago when they moved into the neighborhood. They moved away at the end of last summer. I did contact social services without names and the mom about some of the stories and games etc. I do not know of any changes that took place in the sister's lives. I felt really bad for their situation - with dad every other week in our neighborhood. DM was gd's best friend in 1st and 2nd grade. Gd really misses her still and has asked several times this week about her - that she will never see her again. They went to summer school together and played on the weeks they were at their dad's over the summer. Gd had one sleep over with them at their new house in city 35 miles away. I thought we had dealt with all of this. Gd had talked about this 18 months ago. I think there is much more than she was able to communicate before. Not sure if she feels safer with me somehow to share more (doesn't seem to fit the behaviors) or she is triggered by other things going on now. Pdoc thinks it is a PTSD episode.

So I feel I failed gd in not protecting her sooner with these friends. Not listening more carefully to DD's concerns. And being so depressed this past year over the violent situation with DD. And not protecting gd more from her mom's raging over past 3 years and the bf's in our home that were actually toxic. Always have felt this obligation to try and help build a r/s between gd and her mom. DD asks for contact, though her view of being a mom is very skewed and she cannot seem to put gd's needs first. Very much a part of DD's BPD and other issues. This is so very clear now with her having a place to live and rotating men through there daily. It is clear in my thinking over past 8 years at 3am this morning. So many times I allowed gd into negative situations with her mom. Always thinking next time would be OK - and there were some OK times. I needed to have always done supervised visits. I was tired - I needed some respite. Her mom was not the safe respite person. There are none I can find -- not babysitters or family or friends in past 6 years especially.

I interpret gd's hate as a deep level of shame that she does not know how to regulate. She has a belief that she is 'bad'. I see this in childish self-harm actions. She hits herself anytime she makes a mistake or is reprimanded. Calls herself stupid. If she hurts herself falling or playing she hits the bruise or cut or tummy that aches. Her mood shifts quickly from cooperative play to bullying -- I met with the mom next door about how her kids avoid DD. This is her reason for limiting gd play to outside. Gd used to be over there a lot. And her kids are not encouraged to play with gd if they do not want to. Gd plays with the almost 5 year-old well. Gd says "she is nice". The age 7 girl, that used to play often with gd, does a very passive aggressive style with gd. The age 9 boy looks guilty when he is out and avoiding gd. It is all very messed up. Also because of DD having her bf's at our house - unknown danger there to the neighbors. They were valid concerns that I was in denial about in my preoccupation of needing to help DD be "OK"... .

Perhaps this can be sorted out in therapy - for both gd and I. So far dh is refusing to participate in a very relationship/regulation focused family therapy I have been working with gd's T. Dh takes everything so personal -- gd's acting out as if she is premeditated in this just to get a reaction from him. I am trying really hard to be attuned to gd - to help her calm down - get soothed. Yet, I am often very angry and frustrated with her. I am a scary grandma sometimes. I feel like a bipolar momster sometimes.

Only can guess what is driving all this to the surface now. I have started Attachment-Based Family Therapy with gd's child/family T. Certainly I am struggling with my own attachment/childhood issues in this therapy. I have been seeing the child/family T weekly since August when I was at the bottom of my 2013 depression. I feel so inconsistent. There are times I am distressed and unavailable, or focused on helping DD with her needs and gd is home with dh. She seems to be getting on OK with dh. They do lots of fun garage projects. He lets her do stuff I am too nervous about.  Maybe gd misses me.

I could go on and on with all this speculation. Really will not lead to positive changes.

Yesterday gd was really wired from the Adderall. Today she was OK until time to get ready for bed. We had a lot of fun - I gave her my full attention for the evening, and told her this. That I got my work done today while she was at her 2 1/2 hour horse camp and then invited to play with the friends that have not been available for weeks. (Maybe my talk with the mom next door is having a positive impact - how distressing it has been for gd). After dinner - her choice tonight; pizza - we played GO FISH with the new mini-deck her mom sent home with me after grocery shopping Tuesday. Dd also got gd the wished for silver/crystal frog necklace and a really cute small stuffie frog. And some other trinkets. Dh and I gave DD some gift cards at Christmas which she used to shop for gd.  Gd favorite pet right now is a toadlet she found near our home mid-October. I let her rescue it from winter. She has created a very nice habitat for Tenkr Toad that she can carry everwhere with her. She says the sex stuff came up when she was searching for toad pictures with google last week. I thought was just the mating drawings that are part of the frog life cycle. She did frogs and toads for her 3rd grade research project in October and made me cut out the adult frogs at the start of the life cycle - before the eggs.

The point is gd is very focused and positive tonight. She created two toad board games with all kinds of hazards to avoid, even drawing the dots on one wood cube she found and numbers on the other. She is reading and reading on her own. She is doing the math of lots of things - figuring out how many chores she needs to go shop for another model horse ($8.50 is 17 points on her calendar). She has not been earning points for almost 3 months. And telling time, setting the stove timer, making charts to explain things. I am amazed. Do think it is the effects of Adderall. After the meltdown tonight when time to get ready for bed - which I did OK with tonight and Dh shut up with his invalidating and judgmental comments (only had to ask him, kindly, 3 times tonight). He so undoes what I am trying to do. Sure wish he would take the Attachment-based Family Therapy class with me starting at the end of Feb. So far he defiantly refuses.

So while gd designed her games I read a book on the kindle. And I read parts outloud to her. She asked questions and shared her own ideas and other things she must have been exposed to in the girls group this fall at school (for select 3rd graders on Mondays at lunch with school social worker). The book is about being a mindful parent; "Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting", Myla and Jon Kabat-Zinn. I sure need help with this. This was another awesome experience tonight. And dh was listening in the other room. I was reading the sections about Resonance and Attunement. It fits in with the other resources on relationship focused parenting I have been working with this past year by Heather Forbes, Daniel Hughes and Kim Golding. The parenting group will use Kim Golding's guide that is being released this year. Do not know exactly how the mental health center got the copies in the notebook they gave me. (I started the class in December, but too hard to get there and I was too tired).

Here is a quote that really helped me tonight from the Kabat-Zinn book.

"When we choose to honor our children's needs, there is also an honoring of our own unfulfilled childhood needs. When we choose to be kind rather than cruel, we get to experience kindness. It becomes real for us ... . If we were unprotected as children [my history], when we care for and protect our children, we may find ourselves experiencing feeling safer and more secure as well. [this is what tonight gave me -- and then I could cope with gd's violent resistance to going to bed with soothing, love and kindness]

In any moment, we can choose to set aside the armor that has protected us, and ally ourselves with our children, giving them the gift of a more open, compassionate, and understanding parent. In the process, we get a taste of the way it might have been in our own childhood, and more importantly, we get to share the intrinsic freedom and connectedness of this moment not only with our child but with ourself. In choosing to break out of a negative cycle, the magic of a love that is unconditional touches us as well. Each time we are able to do this, we take another step toward wholeness and our own liberation."

So I am much better tonight after all this. Time to go off to bed for some dh snuggle time. Gd when to sleep on time tonight and seemed more at peace. She so needs me to be an attuned parent connecting with her compassionately and unconditionally. AND setting the limits on the needed routines with kindness and firmness sandwiched in. Attunement -- Discipline -- Relationship Repair.    The discipline always creates an increase in the shame in the moment. Holding her, even when she does not think she needs it, leads to soothing her. Hope is that she is learning to sooth herself along the way.

This got to be really long. So many words. Thanks so much for letting me unload all this here. This helps.

qcr

[Gidget]

qcarolr,


  I am so sorry for all that is happening to you. Please stop beating yourself up for all of this. You are so loving to your gd. You want the best you want her to be happy for her to have a relationship with her Mom dealing with DD. I is not your fault. I don't think gd hates you at all she sounds like a scared little girl who is dealing with so much and trying to understand it all as a child. Something clicked in my head last night with my own situation. I thought it was all about her Father issues with abandonment couldn't imagine her thinking I would. Yet when she acted out at me and hated me when someone was in my life I took it as control. Then I was thinking of something she said that I didn't put together when she came home for a weekend from college. I didn't think you needed me anymore I was scared when you got married. Maybe gd daughter is so afraid that you to will go away. So she is pushing you away. This to started so young with my daughter when she was 7 when I had my first relationship after the divorce. Gd sounds so scared and maybe she feels you are the only one she feels safe acting out on. My DD told me that once I know you would always love me even after I did the things to you.

You sound like you are taking all the right steps to help her you to are a person you were tired at times and send her with DD you can't blame yourself. If I were near you I would give you respite we all need that support when going thru this stuff. I wish there was people you trust around you that could help give you a break. You need to take care of yourself to.

She will open up to you please take care of you to.

[Thursday]

So I feel I failed gd in not protecting her sooner with these friends. Not listening more carefully to DD's concerns. And being so depressed this past year over the violent situation with DD. And not protecting gd more from her mom's raging over past 3 years and the bf's in our home that were actually toxic. Always have felt this obligation to try and help build a r/s between gd and her mom. DD asks for contact, though her view of being a mom is very skewed and she cannot seem to put gd's needs first. Very much a part of DD's BPD and other issues. This is so very clear now with her having a place to live and rotating men through there daily. It is clear in my thinking over past 8 years at 3am this morning. So many times I allowed gd into negative situations with her mom. Always thinking next time would be OK - and there were some OK times. I needed to have always done supervised visits. I was tired - I needed some respite. Her mom was not the safe respite person. There are none I can find -- not babysitters or family or friends in past 6 years especially.

qcarolr-

It is indeed a shame that, in life, there are no do-overs. If hindsight were 20/20, I'm guessing you would have done things differently.

All of what your GD has gone through, will inform her, in some way. I can't tell you don't worry about it... . however, chances are, so long as the patterns in the paragraph I quote above are not repeated. I think you have learned a lot and in that learning, gd has a much better chance for a positive outcome.

There is so much push and pull in your role as grandmother who is mother, mother who is therapist, mother who has to keep it real about DD who is a mess in her mothering. Who would not feel conflicted in this complicated role of yours?

I encourage you to keep your head up, vision unfogged, to continue to see that the ways you try to help your DD can sometimes be detrimental to your gd. Gd is still a work in progress, a cleaner sheet of paper than the rest of the souls you hold in your heart and thus, hard as it is, she will need to be your first consideration in situations where she can be affected.

Can I soothe you by relating that MOST kids run up against some hard stuff when they are small and survive it. From here, it is a matter of not letting more hard stuff continue to hurt her, at least what you personally can avoid. You can't protect her against the world entire... . so do what you can.

All of us stumble as parents. None of us do a perfect job. You have had so much to stand in your way. It's not as if you've thrown in the towel. You have identified your mistakes. Have you learned from them? Will you make the same mistakes again?

Kids are resilient. I see so much resilience in your GD. She is not unaffected but she has her loving grandparents working overtime to help her with the hand she got dealt.

Sad as it is, your GD has a Mom who is not safe. You don't have a lot of options. There is something to remember though... . GD won't always need such keen supervision. Every day she takes a step closer to being grown up. It's hard now but it won't always be. Sorry you are so tired. Soon, you will get to rest. Not yet but soon.

You are able to endure this, Q.

Blink of an eye.

Soon.

Thursday

[Bracken]

Dear qcarolr

It is really good - encouraging - to hear of the wonderful evening you have shared with you gd. She sounds like a remarkably sensitive, creative and bright young person. (As you clearly are, too.) It is wonderful that she has this highly developed interest in frogs and toads - to engage her and help carry her through difficult times. It is also wonderful to hear that her mother, as well as you, recognize and honour this passion of you gd`s.

I am sorry that you have much difficulty, complication and pain in your life - and that your DD and gd do too -  but the positive experiences together, such as you have just described, sound really powerful.

You very movingly recently, in a thread about "inconsistency". About not getting mired in self-blame. About forgiving ourselves as well as others. There are NO perfect parents - even in more ``normal`` families. 

I`m wishing you more and more of the good times - frogs and toads and pizza - in this new year. 

[qcarolr]

gidget, thursday and bracken - your encouragement is so helpful. Amazes me how I forget my own good thinking sometimes!

Had a really good session with the family T today. Shared everything. She was startled about some of the stories with gd's friends, and that I had never mentioned these to her. Whether I avoided this consciously or unconsciously, she would have been required to make a report to social services. I also should have followed up with more specifics that gd eventually shared about a year ago with my case worker in kinship services program. Dh's first response when I got home was a discourged "you told her everything, didn't you". He does not want any outsiders looking into our life, or his life anyway. So much shame and teaching from families to keep our 'secrets' in the family. dh's family in a pretty direct way, mine in a more unconscious social culture focused way. As my mom said when I shared my memories of early childhood abuse at a neighbor's, "I don't know what I would have done if you told me. These things were just not talked about".  As a 4 year old I knew this unspoken rule somehow. This part of my story came to my mind at age 35, when dd was a preschooler. Dd triggered so many things in me that I struggled with at that time. I do not want to repeat history with gd.

I am trying diligently to become a new parent - one that is guided to break the generational habits of parenting that lead to this "I am bad" state of self. It is so deeply hidden from my mind, yet lives in my heart to poke at me unexpectedly. I sense this in dh's defiant resistance to participating in family therapy. I allowed his attitudes to limit my participation when DD was young, and have with gd as well. No more. We will bear whatever comes by putting gd's needs ahead or our own.

At least this is my intention. And yes, it is so hard to follow through and be consistent. This is why I have to be open, honest, vulnerable in therapy.  This T wants to include dh in the treatment plan. She will call him to offer this and explain why it is imperative, esp with the sexual abuse undertones.

Gd is doing much better still. Maybe she expressed enough for now, and got the validation of her pain enough, to move away from the triggered impacts for now. T asked her to bring the frog games to her session next week.

I am so very grateful for the medicaid that supports access to the mental health center, and having one of the best T's there. She is one that does the new trainings in family therapy, and then teaches other staff at the center. I have never had a T that 'gets it' so well. The complexity of my pain and my family configuration. And the need for dh to be a part of the process.

There is so much push and pull in your role as grandmother who is mother, mother who is therapist, mother who has to keep it real about DD who is a mess in her mothering. Who would not feel conflicted in this complicated role of yours?

I encourage you to keep your head up, vision unfogged, to continue to see that the ways you try to help your DD can sometimes be detrimental to your gd. Gd is still a work in progress, a cleaner sheet of paper than the rest of the souls you hold in your heart and thus, hard as it is, she will need to be your first consideration in situations where she can be affected.

Keeping my head up.

qcr

[pessim-optimist]

Keeping my head up.

 Baby steps, TLCs, and lots of love. Keep your eyes on Him (the great physician, the one who does not condemn you, and is on your side).

[Gidget]

qcarolr,

I am so glad that the T session went well. A sentence you wrote struck a core something I have been self reflecting on for months now. When dd was a preschooler and you were coming to gripes with your own issues at the age of 35.

So much of what I brought into how I was as a parent was from my own childhood. I was so afraid not to make the same mistakes as my parents I tried so hard to get it right I couldn't see how wrong I was getting it. I think now sometimes I actually wasn't a very good parent at all. My inconsistence came from my fear. Fear of not having my child feel about me the way I felt about what my parents did. I think sometimes I was looking for my child to give me what my parents didn't.

I had planned on writing my story on a new tread just haven't done it yet. Briefly my Father was pretty physically abusive my Mother pretty much allowed it to go on. My Mother on the other hand was pretty cold and  quite cruel to me emotionally. 6 siblings all pretty screwed up. Strange we also I think had a close relationship( this is what I am trying to figure out why) She could wipe you out of her life in a minute. Couldn't understand as a Mother someone could do that.

Being a young divorced Mother and had to move back home I was there reliving the same childhood but a parent at the same time. I vowed I would never hit my child and I vowed I would never alienate her no matter what and I never said one cruel thing to her. I didn't know how to parent my inconsistencies came from I think fear of getting wrong that she would hate me. I think I was actually looking for my needs to be met by my daughter of approval I should have gotten from my parents.

I actually never told my daughter what was done to me secrets just like the secret my Mother hid. I was the peacekeeper of the the family.

You now have the chance to get it right with gd and I with my dd.  You are doing a great job

[qcarolr]

Gidget

Mindfulness is the most important skill. And the hardest for me to hold onto. It can bring awareness and willingness to know that living the moment - the now - is really all I have to work with. The past can inform me about about this moment. This moment will inform the future -- I can do better in the next moment, even as I do the best I can right now.

I cannot do this alone. I tried that for such a long time. It is so easy to allow myself to be in isolation so none can know how badly I feel about myself and how I relate to others. Even when I keep hearing how strong I am, how wise this comment or that. I so often am not taking it inside to integrate into who I am. I don't trust it or believe. As I work through my attachment history with the T, I am becoming aware of these things and how they have impacted my responses to the relationships in my life.

About 2 years ago gd was invited to church with the neighbor kids. Of course I went along. And this put me back in touch with a faith that has been in hiding for a long time. As I gradually came to trust a few women there, reached out to them in a weekly bible study group, I have found a source of support that was missing.

I realized there was a support network waiting there for me. And as I let go of my needs to be in control, other relationships became more open and supportive. Especially in my marriage - becoming aware of what I needed with Dh and willing to ask him for help. I was able to be vulnerable more often.

I have found support here at bpdfamily for about 4 years. Maybe all the learning and sharing here prepared me to be open to this recovery focused faith community. Then I started in therapy for myself, and became more honest with gd's T.

I still struggle. And I have greater hope. I am tired and in both physical and emotional pain. My spirit is stronger. I have heard clearly the message that if I let go of my worries, one moment at a time, my needs will be met. I will have what I need when I need it. And this has turned out to be true. Letting go of my worries is the hardest part. I feel safe in my worries because I know how they feel. But I want to live my life in a new way.

I have also clearly heard that relationships are the key. Relationships are the only thing of value. All else is merely there to support finding and building interpersonal, reciprocal relationships. God asks for this; this site supports this in all the tools and skills, absolutely everything I have read in the past year supports this. And gives new ways to let go of the stuff and the need to feel in control.Tthe synergy of spirituality, biology, psychology, neurology, genetics... . is so powerful for me.

I am tired, fatigued. And I have great hope in the future regardless of the pain, violence, losses. I will come to know the future only when it is here, in the moment. Such hard work.

qcr

Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders