BPD mother missing all my life milestones

[Depression = 72% of members]

Hi team,

I have come to a difficult period in my life with my uBPD mother. I accept she has a mental illness, and have learned to find independence and happiness and my life. It has taken me years of work and years of therapy to come to a place where I can value myself independently of my family's opinions of me. It's still a work in progress.

My mother is someone who needs to be needed. As is typical for BPD, she also splits. I have one older sister that also has some severe personality disorder (I suspect also BPD) and really "needs" my mom to pick up the pieces of her constantly crumbling emotional state. I have worked really hard for my independence, and since my mom feels I don't "need" her, she has taken this as rejection and, in return, I have become a sort of scapegoat. On top of that, last year I put my foot down when it came to my sister's emotional abuse (I was always her punching bag, and expected to also be the appeaser). I have cut ties with her, and my mother has taken my sister's side saying that I rejected the family and "tore the family apart, when everything was so beautiful."

I have a hard time coming to grips with how life w my family has turned out. My parents are both doctors, and after so many years of hoping one of their kids wound choose their careers, I graduated from medical school last year. My mom was sour the entire day because my sister wasn't there. She missed my very emotional Match Day, where I matched into my #1 choice residency program, partially because she can't stand seeing my husband, who has always supported me through all this family drama. On my wedding day my mother was bitter and snarky because my sister didn't come (she was invited but I wouldn't let her control the event so she threw a tantrum and chose not to come). My parents are immigrants and I will be the first person my generation to travel back to their country EVER, 50 years after immigration, to reestablish ties with family still there. I called my mom to tell her today, hoping she would be excited and proud that I want to reconnect with my cultural roots. All she could talk about was that she was "amazed that I make such efforts to connect with distant family, but so easily reject the immediate family."

I'm so tired of the obsessively redundant conversation about how I rejected the family a.k.a. made my own life. I can't reason with her no matter what I say. She just wants me to grovel and admit that I was wrong - but I wasn't! I have the best life of anyone in my family, mostly because I decided not to stay so enmeshed. But it's still so unbelievably painful to be blamed for the family "falling apart." To be blamed for everyone else's behavior. It cuts deep to try to be a good person and have all my efforts misinterpreted as rejection and hate, when I just want to be happy and to not play into unhealthy family dynamics.

I know I'm a good person. I have patients tell me all the time that they can sense I really CARE. My husband loves me because he sees I'm a passionate person who wants to do good things. My friends are supportive of my life and appreciate what I can offer in a friendship. I don't know why I need to say these things - perhaps because deep down, I fear that my mom's belief that I'm worthless might be true? I don't know. I just want to be happy, and I always wished my mom could be by my side, celebrating my life. Instead I feel like she's waiting for me to fail so she can enjoy seeing me crawling back to her. It makes me hate her. And that makes me feel guilty. What a cluster!

Any advice or observation is appreciated

[GreenGlit]

Hi team,

I have come to a difficult period in my life with my uBPD mother. I accept she has a mental illness, and have learned to find independence and happiness and my life. It has taken me years of work and years of therapy to come to a place where I can value myself independently of my family's opinions of me. It's still a work in progress.

My mother is someone who needs to be needed. As is typical for BPD, she also splits. I have one older sister that also has some severe personality disorder (I suspect also BPD) and really "needs" my mom to pick up the pieces of her constantly crumbling emotional state. I have worked really hard for my independence, and since my mom feels I don't "need" her, she has taken this as rejection and, in return, I have become a sort of scapegoat. On top of that, last year I put my foot down when it came to my sister's emotional abuse (I was always her punching bag, and expected to also be the appeaser). I have cut ties with her, and my mother has taken my sister's side saying that I rejected the family and "tore the family apart, when everything was so beautiful."

I have a hard time coming to grips with how life w my family has turned out. My parents are both doctors, and after so many years of hoping one of their kids wound choose their careers, I graduated from medical school last year. My mom was sour the entire day because my sister wasn't there. She missed my very emotional Match Day, where I matched into my #1 choice residency program, partially because she can't stand seeing my husband, who has always supported me through all this family drama. On my wedding day my mother was bitter and snarky because my sister didn't come (she was invited but I wouldn't let her control the event so she threw a tantrum and chose not to come). My parents are immigrants and I will be the first person my generation to travel back to their country EVER, 50 years after immigration, to reestablish ties with family still there. I called my mom to tell her today, hoping she would be excited and proud that I want to reconnect with my cultural roots. All she could talk about was that she was "amazed that I make such efforts to connect with distant family, but so easily reject the immediate family."

I'm so tired of the obsessively redundant conversation about how I rejected the family a.k.a. made my own life. I can't reason with her no matter what I say. She just wants me to grovel and admit that I was wrong - but I wasn't! I have the best life of anyone in my family, mostly because I decided not to stay so enmeshed. But it's still so unbelievably painful to be blamed for the family "falling apart." To be blamed for everyone else's behavior. It cuts deep to try to be a good person and have all my efforts misinterpreted as rejection and hate, when I just want to be happy and to not play into unhealthy family dynamics.

I know I'm a good person. I have patients tell me all the time that they can sense I really CARE. My husband loves me because he sees I'm a passionate person who wants to do good things. My friends are supportive of my life and appreciate what I can offer in a friendship. I don't know why I need to say these things - perhaps because deep down, I fear that my mom's belief that I'm worthless might be true? I don't know. I just want to be happy, and I always wished my mom could be by my side, celebrating my life. Instead I feel like she's waiting for me to fail so she can enjoy seeing me crawling back to her. It makes me hate her. And that makes me feel guilty. What a cluster!

Any advice or observation is appreciated

[Panda39]

Hi GreenGlit,

I don't have a BPDmom, I'm here because my SO (significant other) has an uBPDxw (undiagnosed BPD ex-wife) but I have a critical and controlling mother too.  I know how hurtful those insensitive comments can feel.  It took me a long time but I finally figured out that those comments were more about her and her issues than they were about me.  She wanted someone that would be the perfect reflection of her ideal child.  She and I view what that ideal child is in very different ways.

Getting to that place came with the realization that I am a good person, a smart person, a competent person, a caring person and yes a sensitive person.  I have many people in my life that like/love me just the way I am.  I don't have to be the way my mother wants me to be in order to be a good person or to be loved.  I've realized that I have a mother that reacts first (and often not well) and then thinks later, as well as a mother that is not a sensitive as I am so her approach can feel heavy handed. 

So I now don't tell her about everything, I keep conversations more general and don't let her in on the stuff closest to me.  When she does criticize I just let it roll off and think to myself "This is about her (her opinion, her idea of what's right or wrong, her need to be seen as perfect etc... .) and this is not about me and who I am.  My mom will never be the mom I want her to be and I will never be the daughter that she wants me to be.  I have accepted that and work with her within that perspective.

I'm sorry your mom can't share in your proud moments it's disappointing to say the least but it is about her and her issues and not about you at all. You are doing amazing things and should be very proud even if she isn't capable of it.   I want to remind you of the FOG (Fear, Obligation and guilt) because she is blowing FOG your way... .particularly "Guilt" she's beating you over the head with it.  Recognize it for what it is... .part of her dysfunction and not about anything you have or haven't done.

Live your life your way and surround yourself with those people in your life that support and nurture you.

Panda39

[Notwendy]

Hi GreenGlit,

Congratulations on getting your first choice match, and graduating medical school. You know what an accomplishment that is!

If you consider that pwBPD have difficulty managing their own feelings, which can overwhelm and dysregulate them, that they would lack awareness of how other people are feeling. This includes both happy and sad emotions. They also tend to want to be the focus of people's attention and feel victimized when the attention is focused elsewhere.

If I look back at the various milestones in my family, my mother has often dysregulated at them. I am not even sure that my parents "knew" me or if I was just the sum of my mother's projections ( which she shared with my father). Some of the things my mother has said to me about me makes me wonder who she is talking about.

She showed little interest in my activities. As a kid and teen, I was into sports and drama, but I don't recall her being present for sporting events or school shows. Events about me were of little interest to her, unless she could take center stage. She took center stage at my wedding.  At my graduations, she tended to get into arguments with my father. I recall him stomping off during a graduation event. My friends' parents were there for them. Mine argued and stomped off and I was in tears.
 
GreenGlit, I think the problem is that you resent your mother for not being the mother you want her to be- the supportive, loving mother who attends your wedding/match day/graduation events. But your mother is who she is- and it has nothing to do with you. . Her inability to support your accomplishments is because of her. If you resent her for not being what you want her to be- you are taking something personally that isn't personal at all- and this is making you unhappy. But you don't have to be invested in this idea- because it isn't true.

In fact, had she been there, like mine, it could have been more of a problem. I spent one of my graduations crying alone while my parents were off arguing with each other.


Your mother takes nothing away from the amazing accomplishments you have done or your marriage. I hope that you can truly enjoy these milestones. They are yours to celebrate!

[GreenGlit]

Thanks for the replies. I know both of you all right that my mom's behavior does not necessarily have to do with me. I think the difficulty is that she absolutely blames me for how things have turned out in the family. She absolutely blames me for her behavior.  And it's not just now, this has been going on my whole life. I have been trained to feel that I am ultimately responsible for everyone's feelings and behaviors. That somehow her erratic and irrational behavior was inspired by something that I did. I remember being a child and being so confused by this, tying desperately to find patterns and nonsensical behaviors so I  could better predict outcomes and prevent my mothers tantrums. It's very hard to undo that teaching. I am hardwired for it and it is painful to detach from even if I know it is right.

 I do feel like in a sense I have indeed torn the family part. Before I made the decision to live my life, I was  somewhat aware of the dysfunction but chose to continue to participate for the sake of the family, because that was what I was told my role is.  When I detached, there was no peacemaker anymore. There was nobody to take the hits. There was nobody to keep things together by sacrificing themselves. At the end of the day, I also wonder if my mother ever knew me. I grew up with a nanny that is like a mom to me, in many ways an emotional mother, and she knows me better than my mother ever did.  She knows the kind of person I am, my motivations, and understands me, and it's so weird to experience this with a non-biological relative because it makes it so obvious that my mother may have never actually known me, and like you said Notwendy,  perhaps I was always just a sum of projections of my mothers expectations of me. How sad that our parents miss out on us. I think one of the most beautiful things about having children is seeing how unique they can grow up to be despite their genetics and your efforts. But they are still there on people in the world. Sigh.

[Notwendy]

My parents accused me of "tearing the family apart" when I put boundaries on mom. It was very hurtful, but think about this- it could go two ways- what about the way my mother treated me ( and my father going along with that- why was that not a cause of tearing the family apart.

I realized that, my parents had a more stable bond when they could join together and blame someone or something else for things that led to their discomfort rather than look at each other or their own behavior.

Many families have a scapegoat. When I set boundaries I put my mother's mental health issues into the light. If you consider the drama triangle that put me in persecutor position, mom as victim and dad stepped into rescue her.

My father once said " I wish we could be a happy family again". Well, who was happy? They were - when I was there as the peacemaker, caretaker for mom's feelings, scapegoat and doormat. Of course they wanted that situation back. But nowhere did anyone ever consider if I was happy. If all they saw about me was their own projections, well then, I guess if they were happy- then I was happy. But I wasn't happy.

Unfortunately, each person playing their own role in the family dynamics tends to keep a family stable. Think: homeostasis. Us moving out of the system rocked that boat. By becoming more independent and interacting differently- we may have indeed broken the balance.

But it may have been for the best for us.