uBPD mother's manipulation has no boundaries

[caughtnreleased]

I will try and make this very succinct.  My uBPD mother is from a country in Europe.  She left her family, and moved to the U.S. and has felt guilty for it her whole life. Now to the present: Her mother, still living in europe, is losing her memory, and her independence and has to be placed in a nursing home.  She is very old.  My mother is in Europe to look after her, but for the past few years, is always GUILTING me about not making enough efforts to go see my grandmother.  I have been to see her many many times, but at this point, it is highly expensive for me to visit, AND I have limited time off from work.  I cannot go more than once every two years.  I resent my mother for making feel guilty about this.  I recently wrote her an email that I could talk with her and my grandmother by skype.  She responds she wants me to talk at 8 am on SUNDAY (she knows I sleep in on weekends).  She also mentionned that my grandmother had recently said that she felt she had lost sight of me, something my mother said she found extremely saddening.

This email has infuriated me because:

1. my mother seems to be pulling me into her guilt ridden complex. Reality: I am neither more, nor less present in my grandmothers life.  I still make it to go see her every few years.  And yet, my mothers expectations (rather demands... .and now guilt - she has actually said: "your grandmother will die and never see you again if you don't go now." when I told her I didn't have enough money or time off) seem to be increasing with the years.  My grandmothers memory is failing, she doesn't know that nothing in the frequency of my visits has changed.  My mother is obviously not doing anything to correct my grandmothers false impressions.  THIS makes me angry, and I want so badly to lash out at my mother.

2. I offered to wake up early on a WEEKDAY, before going to work to speak with my grandmother. And my mother asks for an 8 AM call on my day of rest.  For my entire life, my mother has been like the child that won't let you sleep in.  When I was a teenager, she ran the vacuum cleaner early on weekend mornings rights outside my room, claiming it was time to get up anyway, at university and every other time, she would call me EARLY, EARLY on Saturday or Sundays.  Of course... .the phone is easy, I didn't answer.  She still doesn't get it.  I am sad about my grandmothers state.  My mother claims that my grandmothers face lights up at the mention of my name... .etc. It is a great deal of emotional manipulation and it makes me angry. 

I need to respond, and establish firm boundaries. But right now, I am very, very angry.  My grandmother is at the end of her life, and I feel like my mother is still playing games. She probably doesn't realize she is doing it, and I have no doubt is in distress about her mothers situation - who knows really. I don't want to add to the stress of a situation, and knowing my mothers incapacity for showing empathy, I feel sorry for my grandmother.   That being said, I am very very far away, I cannot disrupt my life to go take over my mothers role of being my grandmothers caregiver... .

Does anyone have advice on how to handle this type of situation?  Aside from venting, I need advice.

[Finding Courage]

Sorry to hear about your family situation.  My mother is totally capable of this kind of thing too.  My grandmother is also facing dementia and is a long way from where I live. 

For me though, I tried to take a step back and think about how I wanted to conduct my relationship with my grandma, just her and I.  I tried to ask myself, "What do I think she needs and wants from me- not what my mom thinks."  Seems like in your case this isn't about your grandma it is about your mom. Maybe that might help guide how you talk to your mom too.

Good luck!

[caughtnreleased]

You're right. I've thought about this a bit more. And it is all about my mother.

In fact, the past year I've established firm boundaries with her, and she stopped speaking to me.  She even visited my sister and her family in the city that my sister and I live in - and guess what? Didn't contact me. 

I'm a little bit tempted to throw this back in my mothers face. To tell her that the sense having lost sight of me is perhaps her own, and not her mothers, and that going to the extent of not contacting your own daughter when you visit the city she lives in, well, it can very well trigger feelings of having lost sight of her. 

In any case, I want to validate the feeling of "losing sight of" me - but not as it belonging to my grandmothers, but rather it being my mothers.   I also want to tell her that this feeling she has is not about me, but about her, and maybe she should try and better understand it.  I dunno.  I also realized that in the email, I described a bunch of really fun things I am doing in my life, which is very full right now.  She responded "It's interesting to know how you occupy your time." and asked if I had gotten around to another activity which I didn't mention in my email (because all the things I do are not enough).   I may be overly sensitive, but I also interpret the "how you occupy your time" as if my life is somehow futile and I'm filling it just to make it occupied, when in FACT this is EXACTLY what she is doing with her own life.  I'm actually doing things that I love and better understanding myself. She is "taking care" of others… read CONTROL CONTROL CONTROL.  Anyway… there goes another rant on this.  I am going to take my sweet time before answering.  I want to be in a place where her crap doesn't bother me anymore…so I can rise above her silly crap.  Every time I interact with this woman, she makes me feel like s--t.  Last time I saw her, she made disgusted faces at my apartment, told me it was disgusting, and how could I live like that? (it was clean, it's just a rental in a century old building that could use some upgrades.)   I felt dirty afterwards and had to go through a bunch of aromatherapy rituals to try and cleanse that feeling out.  Well… my 3 year old niece the other day, walked into my apartment, and totally unprompted, told me I had a very pretty apartment .  It's small… but I somehow feel so much better about the place I live in now.  As much as I know that my mother is a miserable person, it is difficult not to be affected by the poison that oozes out of her, despite herself.