Feeling sad that I can't have an honest relationship with my elderly mom

[PicaBug]

 
I always dread the holidays. I'm the eldest child and only daughter of a mom with BPD. She is emotionally erratic this time of year, expects me to do a lot of the holiday prep for family gatherings while she rages and complains. She is in her mid-80s. I'm in my 60s. Her weakness and mobility issues mean I feel obligated to help. I'm sad that holidays are times of dread instead of joy.

[zachira]

You are not alone in having an elderly mother with BPD who makes it difficult to enjoy the holidays. It is especially difficult to be the only daughter of a mother with BPD. You will soon hear from others on this site who are very familiar with a situation like yours. My mother with BPD is deceased.

[Notwendy]

You aren't alone with this. This is a common longing. My BPD mother is also deceased.

BPD behaviors can increase during stressful times. Holiday prep can be stressful even to people without a personality disorder. If we were having company, my BPD mother was very stressed and her behaviors increased.

It was common for her to delegate tasks to other people to do for her and for me, that also included food prep. But due to her projecting her emotions and distress- she would be critical and rage over even small errors. Even if all went well, she'd act as if something wasn't right.

One thing I needed to learn is that this is her projecting her own stress and emotions and not personal to me. It also helped to anticipate the situation. Self care is important in these situations. Think of ways you can take some care for yourself during these times. Can you take a short walk during a break, do some food prep ahead of time at your house alone, delegate a task by ordering some of the sides (many restaurants do family style take out during the holidays- it may be worth the extra cost to ease the task on you)

[Winterlobelia]

Hi, I related to your post, especially to the feeling of responsibility and feeling trapped.
I'm also the oldest and only daughter of a mother who I suspect has bpd - she fits the profile, and my dad fits the enabler profile perfectly.
Christmas was always a huge deal at our lavishly decorated home. There was a strict hierarchy of Christmas tree ornaments from 'good' to 'not so good' (the ones we kids made), and we knew exactly where they were supposed to be hung on the tree (homemade ones on the back, near the bottom). This unspoken rule was only obvious to me when a college boyfriend came to help decorate the tree - he was insulted that my Mom moved all the ornaments he placed to their 'correct' position - he told me he'd never heard of ranking ornaments! I thought it was perfectly sensible and everyone did it!
Every Christmas Eve there would be a breakdown: "No one in this family helps me do a thing!" "How did I get to have such lazy kids!" "Christmas is CANCELLED!!!" We would ask what to do and she'd yell "JUST HELP!"
I remember wising up in college and asking for specific instructions - that got vitriol thrown at me, too, but going forward, with my own kids, I try to be very specific about what I need help with, and to watch my stress levels - so much of learning about parenting for me has been 'what not to do'.
Strangely -- I don't need that much help! I have one less child than my Mom; also, my standards for food and decorations are not as high as hers!
I moved overseas in my early twenties. I was able to come back to the USA a few times for Christmas. My kids protected me from a lot of 'the wrath' and it's probably fair anyways to expect some stress and yelling when a family of five descends on your house for two weeks over the holidays - although babies were not welcome - the decorations were too breakable and "they have to learn "NO"- don't touch!"
I asked my parents to spend Christmas with us overseas a few times, but Mom explained, "Christmas means too much to me to spend anywhere else but in my own home."
Now my kids are also grown up, and I haven't been back to the USA for Christmas for over twenty years.
I have two brothers that live locally to my parents and have always spent Christmas with them. This year, one brother is taking a holiday with his family beginning Dec. 23, and the other brother has to work on Christmas Day.
My parents are in their late 80s and (relatively) hale and hearty but this is going to be hard for them -- of course, because of the rigid thinking of having to do things ON CHRISTMAS - not the week before, or after. There is incredible longevity in our family, so I'm not necessarily thinking, "This is their last Christmas!" but it does feel bold (?) of my brothers to make other plans for the first time ever. I am watching at a distance... my own kids are coming to our house for Christmas so I won't be flying to the US although it feels like I should.
Don't know exactly how this is a reply to the original post, just 'dread' and 'holidays' resonated with me... I have purposely tried to be flexible in celebrating the holidays, inviting different constellations of people, being guests some years, hosting others - my husband and I even spent Christmas on our own in another country one year! A lot of what I do is in reaction to what my Mom prizes  - unwavering tradition and rituals -
I'm waiting for the PLEASE READ to really hit the fan when her family Christmas does not resemble all the previous years'- my parens have many friends and relatives, they will be invited everywhere, but I feel scared about the inevitable crying phone call, "What did I do to deserve this, I only ever tried to make Christmas nice for you kids and this is how I'm repaid."

[Notwendy]

What your mother thinks is a nice Christmas sounds like a nightmare. This reminds me of an email my father sent me when I began having boundaries with BPD mother ( and she wasn't pleased). "I just want us to be a happy family again" -which I think meant appeasing mother and not having boundaries. (my parents seemed to have a similar relationship as yours).

I also get not wanting our parents to be unhappy with our decisions, especially in their elder years. Holidays are stressful in general and so BPD behaviors did increase during these times. My BPD mother often didn't do much for holidays but when she did, it was similar- her dysreguating if something wasn't done perfectly. If my mother did entertain guests, it had to be perfect.

I wonder if by having Christmas be spectacular- that one day somehow makes up for the rest of the behaviors? That's just a guess but for one day, the family appears picture perfect to her?

Holiday celebrations may change as the family grows. Sometimes the kids go to the in laws. Travel gets more complicated with small children. Young families want to have their own traditions. I can understand feeling sad over these changes but I think it's an adjustment many families make over time.

Unfortunately, it seems as if your mother will react to the changes and be upset. One aspect of her celebration is being the one who is the center, that she achieves a noteworthy celebration and feels affirmed by it. One idea is to send her a nice gift- but with the exception would she throw it away or destroy it out of anger. My BPD mother would do that. The gift I chose to send was flowers- she usually liked that. So it's something you might want to do to still make her feel appreciated on this day.

[Winterlobelia]

Thank you, NotWendy, I think you are right that she wants to project the image of a picture-perfect family - I have always sensed that the image was more important than the actual people - but I never before thought of it as a way of trying to make up for other things. That is a more generous and kind view of the situation, and I will try to remember to include more compassion in my memories of Christmas with her.

[zachira]

My mother with BPD loved Christmas and planned months ahead the perfect Christmas celebration. At some point during Christmas, she always blew up at her children for not helping her yet she would not allow her children to help that much. The last Christmas my brother with cancer was alive, we siblings decided we would sit around the dinner table to enjoy our last Christmas with our brother and let mom clean up because she could not wait to have the dishes washed for an additional hour while we siblings all enjoyed each other for the last time at Christmas. That same Christmas, our cousin was upset with my sister and I on Christmas Eve, because we would not immediately start washing the dishes while all the guests were still there, and mom was doing the dishes. Mom just could not enjoy the moment, without getting upset that her house was a mess, and often focused on immediately getting everything cleaned up, like all the presents put away right after unwrapping them. She went after her grandchildren for leaving their computers lying around, and eventually they no longer came for Christmas. Two months after Christmas, she was furious when she found a soda can underneath a chair in a room where the grandchildren had been watching tv. They had obvious picked up after themselves, and just missed the one can.

[Winterlobelia]

When we visited the US for Christmas, my mother would take pride in buying identical fancy, sparkly holiday dresses for her granddaughters, who then had to pose in different ways all around the tree. The photos are adorable ... some of the granddaughters were more accepting of this ritual than others (there's a four year age span). One Christmas, my mother took me aside in the garage and explained that she had managed to source identical dolls for almost all the granddaughters, but was short just one - she had a doll, but it was significantly different than the others. "I thought I would give this to XXX (my daughter) because she won't make a fuss about it being different." 
I was pleased my mother recognised the maturity of my daughter (she wasn't the oldest, she was right in the middle in age) so I agreed that it would be perfectly fine.
Cue many more photos with the girls holding their dolls - my daughter in the middle with a different one.
Many years later, my daughter told me that she was really hurt that her doll was different (at the time she said nothing - she was about six years old). She already felt less included as 'not American' and 'not native English speaking' and this underlined it to her, made her feel more of an outsider.
I felt terrible that I allowed my daughter to be singled out that way. I had been hoodwinked into believing 'parentification' was flattery. I realised there was a pattern there, of expecting more of me, and consequently more of my daughter. Obviously, given my Mom's volatility about Christmas, I wasn't going to make things harder for her at the time by insisting she go out and source an identical doll for my daughter, although I'm not sure she tried that hard anyways. Her words, "We looked EVERYWHERE, but Costco didn't have it."

[Notwendy]

Oh no- that is so sad. I think on the part of your mother- it was oversight- not being malicious but insensitive and not aware. That your mother assumed your middle daughter wouldn't mind may have been her projection, not being in tune with the child's feelings.

With my BPD mother, it seems there were incidents of where she was insensitive, not in tune, with the impact of her behavior. While one could not call this outright abusive or mean- it's still noticeable.

Don't blame yourself for what you didn't know at the time. Some of these actions can be very subtle. When we grow up with these dynamics- these are the only "normal" we know. One difference is that your children have you as their mother and also- your daughter can express her feelings to you and feel safe and validated. I found that my BPD mother's behavior didn't have the same impact on my children that it had on me- she was not their mother. I was still protective of them and had boundaries.

I understand wanting to protect your daughter from feeling any discrimination if this is the situation with your BPD mother.

[Notwendy]

Although BPD mother didn't do a lot for holidays, she occasionally would have parties. While she struggled with some tasks, she was good at planning events. In general, these were good ones, and we have good memories and pictures from them. What I discovered is that they had to be a certain way.

BPD mother was planning one during the time my aging father was ill and it became apparent, this would be too much of a strain for him. At the time, we kids were not aware of the dynamics with BPD, and the Karpman triangle dynamics which prevailed in our family. We naively stepped in to "rescue" Dad and scale down the party- smaller and more manageable for him.

You would have thought we had committed a heinous crime. BPD mother was angry. We kids took care of the food and details while BPD mother raged. She remained angry the whole time. We realized that our attempt to make things easier seemed to make things worse.

My BPD mother had a large emotional need to be in control- and this may be an aspect of why when it comes to celebrations, our mothers with BPD are so insistent on things being a certain way and why changes lead to extreme reactions.