Resentment

[ammabear]

I have been reading as much as I can on this site. One thing I struggle with is resentment, maybe I am overthinking it but there it is. 
Since I was a child I rarely ever saw my own father be happy, he was a grump and an alcoholic. When times were good however he was on cloud nine and loved everyone. When they were bad according to him they were bad, and everyone was bad.
In my later years I grew to resent the man, and all the crazy making he made for my enabling mom and myself. I needed his protection and guidance and instead I got his onslaughts of verbal abuse. While I also had an emotionally absent mom. Parentification of my younger self was also something they did, wherein I had to help raise my 3 much younger sisters. While they worked and scraped by to put food on the table while any money we had my father would put it to his needs, alcohol.

As I got older and my sister’s grew, the oldest of the 3 was mentally hard on me. One minute she was my biggest little fan and the next she would literally tell me she hated me. She would purposely destroy my jewelry, make up, or take my things.
My reactions were always the issue not the reason why I would be upset.
One time I was visiting my parents and sisters and we were having a nice conversation, when this sister looks at me with coal black eyes and tells me she hates me over and over in front of everyone. I will never forget this because immediately I was looked at like I had done something to her in secret.
At the time I was shocked but I down played it and acted like it wasn’t a big deal, but I was so hurt.
This is the first time I realized how much hatred one person can have for another in a real almost wicked way. Fast forward, I don’t have a relationship with this sister at all. She left her 4 children and husband to be with another woman and essentially cut us all out of her life. My father’s dying wish was for us all to be reunited, but how can we if she was the one who left us.
I told my mom I refuse to take responsibility in any way for her decisions. In my poor mom’s mind I have Obligation and should have Guilt, why can’t I just be nice, why can’t I be the good parent sister I was before?


Having a son that is hot and cold, up and down with his own emotional dysregulation and becomes unhinged on me has left me feeling resentful. I feel like all I want is peace and calm and these people who I am supposed to love unconditionally and I do, do nothing but take and beat everyone up mentally with how hard they are.
I am not as quick to forgive anymore, I don’t move on as quick and I don’t want to get past the garbage they pile on me. When I do forgive, especially with my son I am left feeling with the fact that I don’t want an active relationship with him. Just like I came to the conclusion with my own sister whom I raised and loved dearly. I don’t want it.
My own unBPDson reminds me so much of my sister in many ways. Sadly.

This past year, I found myself either stonewalling him or grey rocking because I don’t want to walk on eggshells and I don’t want to be treated like I deserve less than just because they split and they can’t help it. 
Last July I didn’t talk to my son for over a month. When I was in another state on a trip I got a long message of how sorry he was for having talked to me the way he did. I did not respond and it took me a whole week after to have the calmness I needed to even talk to him. He was sincere in his apology at the time and said he would be better...not only did that not happen it has gotten progressively worse.

After his past weekend crashout, that we had to get police involved I feel the same way and worse, I don’t want to be even in the same house as my son anymore. I can love people from afar and I do love myself enough to not engage in his rage baiting or his accusations.
But, how does one get to the point of absolute indifference to the BPD abuse and everything that comes along with it?

People with this condition suffer from extreme emotions and unrealistic demands of relationships. For some unknown reason I have been the point of contention for these people with cluster b like issues. Which is almost inhumane and devastating to our own nervous system.
Having to process their abuse my conclusion stands as is, I don’t want it.
Not from my son, or anyone.
I am not a victim of anyone’s if I choose not to be, but I do have a keen sense of awareness of my own fragility and short comings. One being I can be a resentful person and I don’t even want to have that in my head anymore. I don’t like carrying that in my heart or act out of that headspace of being resentful.

If you have any resources send them my way.

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

[Pook075]

But, how does one get to the point of absolute indifference to the BPD abuse and everything that comes along with it?

Abuse is abuse, and the only people who reach indifference to it are clear victims.  As you said, you're not interested in being a victim so that's not your path forward.

Forgiveness, on the other hand, is one of the hardest things to do and one of the easiest at the same time.  I too carried grudges from bad treatment from my BPD kid, and it got so bad at one point that I'd almost obsess over it.  Can you believe what she said?  What type of person does that to someone else?  It was always in the back of my mind as I tried to solve the equation that we call Borderline Personality Disorder.

My breakthrough came similar to yours where my daughter apologized sincerely around 23 years of age.  It shocked me at first because an apology takes the realization that you're doing something wrong.  And over the next few days, it sort of ate at me- why was I always so mad at my kid when she's clearly sick?  Eventually, I was able to accept the apology and literally let all that frustration go.

Today, I don't have an active role in my daughter's life.  If she needs me, she can call anytime and I'll do what I can to help.  But at the same time, I'm not caught up in her drama or sucked into that daily cycle of abusive comments and blame.  For me personally, it's the best of both worlds and I no longer carry any kind of ill-will towards her.  She's sick and doing exactly what mentally ill people with BPD do.  I don't let that bother me anymore, even when I do occasionally get told off on a call.

[Notwendy]

I talk about 12 steps a lot but it's really helped me. Sitting in meetings is an important part of it but if that is all someone does, it's like glossing over the program. What helped me a lot was going over the steps, one on one with a sponsor- one who turned the mirror on me, and helped me to do the hard work of self reflection.

One of the steps involves a worksheet that includes resentment. My sponsor asked me to go home and write down all the people who I felt resentful of, and why. I came back with my list and we went over each of them, and it showed me what my personal cost for holding on to them- letting these people "live rent free" in my thoughts was, and that it didn't really have an effect on them at all. Once I could see that, I could also see that it wasn't really worth having them.

Some people don't feel they can relate to the spiritual aspect of 12 steps but I have met people in my groups from many different religions, and atheists. Each person decides for themselves on what they call their "higher power". An aspect of this is to recognize that we aren't in control of everything, and other people, and not feel so responsible for other people's behavior and decisions. Another one is expectations. Sometimes we resent people because they don't meet our expectations of who we think they should be, but they are who they are.

The best fit program for me was ACA and I think it would be for you also. It goes into our childhood experiences, not to blame or resent, but to gain understanding. I didn't have a "method" for letting go of resentment but this program showed me one. It makes absolute sense that you have these feelings towards your father, as you wished he could be the father you saw when he was sober. Also your sister. I had a list too.

This doesn't mean being indifferent to BPD abuse or abuse from any one. We are not expected to tolerate that. It helps to let go of resentments from things that happened in the past, and refocus on the present and also to examine new feelings.