Sad things I wrote as a kid

[Depression = 72% of members]

When my father passed away, my BPD mother would not let me have anything of his. I am not proud of this- but I took some things. I was desperate to have something to remember him by. I grabbed some of his personal papers. I couldn't take the time to look at them first- and then couldn't look at them for a while.

I found some things I wrote as a young teen. I don't know how he got them, but he saved them. I had documented thing like my mother nagging him, or complaining about something.  There was one about money being tight and Dad being in a bad mood, and the saddest part- "I wish he knew we wanted love the most".

My father made a good living,  but went into debt over my mother's spending. We learned not to ask him for much.

I wonder what he must have thought when he saw these. They must have meant something to him if he kept them but I don't know. He didn't say anything about them to me. I didn't know he had them.

I can't imagine how I'd feel if I saw my own kids writing this.

[Notwendy]

When my father passed away, my BPD mother would not let me have anything of his. I am not proud of this- but I took some things. I was desperate to have something to remember him by. I grabbed some of his personal papers. I couldn't take the time to look at them first- and then couldn't look at them for a while.

I found some things I wrote as a young teen. I don't know how he got them, but he saved them. I had documented thing like my mother nagging him, or complaining about something.  There was one about money being tight and Dad being in a bad mood, and the saddest part- "I wish he knew we wanted love the most".

My father made a good living,  but went into debt over my mother's spending. We learned not to ask him for much.

I wonder what he must have thought when he saw these. They must have meant something to him if he kept them but I don't know. He didn't say anything about them to me. I didn't know he had them.

I can't imagine how I'd feel if I saw my own kids writing this.

[Harri]

Hi Notwendy.  I think taking something that belonged to your father is normal.  What was wrong and worthy of feeling bad is that your mother tried to keep you from having something tangible to remember your Dad.

His keeping your writings I think definitely means they meant something to him.  I can't say what they meant to him, but the fact that he kept a part of you for that long?  Perhaps it was his way of having a bit of the uncensored you to hold on to in a situation where, unfortunately, he could only have with you in private.

How bittersweet that must feel if true.

[Notwendy]

Thank you Harri. My mother holds on to my father's things because she knows we want them. She would use them as bargaining chips- "come see what you want" and then if we visited, she would "change her mind". I finally just had to let go of the idea. I've told her to do what she wants with them- and she's furious when I say that to her.

But I did manage to "take" some things

It was considered a "crime" to speak about my mother's issues, but children see and hear what they see and somehow I managed to write down some things. I was pretty outspoken with my father when I was able to speak to him alone. However, once I left for college, I was not aware of what went on at the home, but growing up it was pretty wild as you know.

It is interesting that he kept these notes.

[Harri]

What does it mean to you that he kept those writings?

I think it is pretty amazing that you had the clarity to write stuff down, that you knew there were problems.  So many of us don't figure it out until much later on.  As much as I hate the phrase "He did the best he could" I think it applies to your Dad.  I often think of how he knew enough to hire babysitters for you kids and to send you for summers with his family and stuff like that.  I think back then those things might have been all a man could do short of divorcing and risking never seeing the kids.

I admire the little/younger you who was able to see and put into words some pretty complex dynamics.  Smart and insightful of you and brave too to risk putting stuff in writing. 

[Notwendy]

I agree that he did the best he could.

I also am grateful he hired sitters and sent us to stay with his family. I think this added a lot to our resilience.

One of his concerns if he left my mother was that, she is so severely BPD there is no telling what she would have done. She has attempted suicide, destroyed things in the house. I know he felt responsible both for us and her. I imagine he was concerned about custody but with her psychiatric history I don't think she would have gotten it- even in the era when most mothers did.

I don't know what it means to me that he kept the writings. It felt sad to read them. I think he was overwhelmed with his marriage, and the responsibility of supporting us. Aside from the help he had from sitters and his family, he was the main parent. I am grateful- and also sad for what it must have been like for him.

It is odd- we are on this board to help deal with having a BPD parent, and yet, it seems harder for me to deal with how she treated my father than how she treated me. Not much was known about BPD at the time and I am sure it was a puzzling situation to see my mother switch from charming to dysregulated.

[Harri]

Hi again.  I am sorry,  I forgot about her psychiatric history.   

It is odd- we are on this board to help deal with having a BPD parent, and yet, it seems harder for me to deal with how she treated my father than how she treated me. Not much was known about BPD at the time and I am sure it was a puzzling situation to see my mother switch from charming to dysregulated.

  Why do you think that is?  Do you mean you feel more compassion for you father than you do for you and the child you were?

I am reminded of what I said in T a couple of weeks ago.  My T called me on minimizing my history and my accomplishments.  We discovered that I can sympathize with my brother and admire the choices he made in his life but can not do the same for myself.  I don't know if that is similar to the way you feel with your father.  For me, it allows me to remain distant from the feelings and to avoid thinking positively about myself which I struggle with.  Do you think something like that fits with your feelings for your Dad?  Just throwing it out there.  I think you know I like to analyze!

Imagine how confusing scary and possibly terrifying it was for you as a kid.  Again, forgive me for taking liberty and projecting but here I go again.  A few times I have said in therapy "Poor little fruit loop" regarding my mother and my T has brought me up short by saying "NO!  Poor you!"    

Thoughts? 

[Notwendy]

That's a great point Harri- and I agree- we tend to minimize the abuse.

I think there are several factors that account for my feelings about how she treated my father. What I am mostly referring to is how she treated him when he was at the end of his life.  Not that she was any different than she ever was-but that I saw it from the adult perspective and realized that my perspective about her was real.

As a child, her behavior was a family secret. It was denied and not spoken about. From the writings I did- it's clear that I saw it, but my perspective was invalidated. She blamed me for her behavior. Also, my father did provide for us- so nobody would have ever guessed what went on behind closed doors. We went to school, had friends, made good grades. Our parents did a lot of good things for us. Nobody would have imagined.

As an adult - there was no way this could be explained or denied. As a younger man, my father was strong and able. Now, he was frail and ill and she was emotionally and verbally abusing him. It was a horror to see. I even called social services about it, but he continued to deny it. They said they could not intervene as he was in sound mind and not incompetent. I could see the extent of my mother's condition from the adult perspective.

It was one thing to be abusive to a grown adult who could take care of himself- but now, he was frail and needed care- like a child would. She seemed oblivious to his state of dependency. I knew then that she was capable of child abuse. Yet, this was a person who supported her for decades and she felt no obligation to treat him kindly? It was chilling to see this side of her.

 

[madeline7]

Hi Not Wendy,
Again, so many similarities to my life stories. A year before my Dad passed, he found a Father's Day card I made for him when I was around 10 years old. It was a 3 page card with adorable drawings of flowers and family... .until you looked more closely. First page was a drawing of a boy and Mom, my caption read "I am glad you did not turn out to be my brother, I am glad you did not turn out to be my Mother". On page 2 was a drawing of 2 Dads and the caption read "I am glad you turned out to be my Dad!" First Dad had a 2nd place ribbon and then a large arrow pointing to MY DAD with a first place ribbon. Last page had flowers and Happy Fathers Day to the Best Dad. I did not see at first, then my DH pointed out that the brother and both Dad's were smiling and the Mom had a frown. Very telling. When my Dad passed away recently, I was also unable to have any of his things. But on 2 occasions, when I was asked to search the boxes for a misplaced item, I did find 2 suicide notes she wrote and he had saved. My emotions were all over the place. I was so sad he held on to those, so gut wrenchingly sorry he had chosen to live with a pwBPD, so angry he enabled her and didn't protect her, so sorry for myself that this was my family legacy... .and so on. And that brings us to today, where she has chosen to paint me black, and this time it was not because I set limits, it was just because she is who she is, and my FOO is continuing to enable her, leaving me out in the cold. I am desperately trying to figure out a way to be LC, but she seems to be intent on black and white with me.  I do think it is ok that you took something from your Dad, I believe that he would want you to have a piece of him. And how difficult it must have been to see her treat him the way she did when he was in a fragile state of health. You sound like a person who is strong and insightful, so it is not a surprise that you had that perspective when you were young.

[Notwendy]

Madeline- we do have some similarities. That picture you drew is very telling.

I felt the same way about my father. He was my Dad. Emotionally for me, he was my only parent. I don't relate to my mother emotionally as a parent. I don't think we have a typical mother- child bond. I am sure it was apparent to her that I preferred my father.

I too felt sad for him. Of course I am glad he married my mother and had us kids, but sad for the way she treated him. As a child, I used to see him as her victim, but as I also worked on co-dependency I also saw how he enabled her. I also became an enabler and understood this better. It's hard to work on ourselves, but I really wanted to stop this behavior.

My mother's FOO enables her too and maintains that she is wonderful. We've been close to estranged since my father passed away. I have seen/spoken to them a few times since, but I am just polite when we speak and then keep to myself. There is some sadness about this- I would wish for a better relationship but I don't know how to do it with my mother painting me black to them. I would rather not be involved in that situation.  I don't know how to clear up what she says to them about me if they refuse to consider that perhaps what she says isn't accurate.

[Harri]

Hi Notwendy.  No doubt your mother treated your father poorly both when he was younger and when he was so sick and frail.  It really is heartbreaking and speaks to the extent of her illness and his enmeshment (I assume). 

The confirmation that you received that your perspective about her was correct must, I imagine, have hurt immensely and been at least a bit of a relief.  Any other feelings there that I am missing and you want to explore?

During your healing have you been able to have the same amount of compassion and grief for you as a little kid?  Have you truly mourned your childhood? 

Sorry if I am missing something here.  I keep wanting to bring this back to you and yet it seems you prefer to talk about your Dad.  Sorry if I am taking this is the wrong direction for you.

Madeline, that card sounds adorable and sad.  I imagine your father treasured it.

[Notwendy]

As soon as I got to college, I went to student health counseling to begin trying to deal with what I grew up with. I didn't have the name "BPD" for many years.

Perhaps I didn't grieve my childhood completely, but it is hard to mourn something that also included so many good things- my education, we traveled, and being cared for by my father's FOO. Also the fact that my father was able to hire caretakers. I was cared for- but not by my biological mother. We also had a great support network of friends.

It is a very odd mourning- we were the kids with nice clothing, braces on our teeth and school was my happy place. Yet, you also don't know what you don't have. I don't know what motherly love feels like. I look at Mother's Day cards that say such nice things about mothers and none of it resonates with me.

I think the best we can do is nurture the inner child.

One thing that has been very healing and gratifying is raising my children. I know that they have a loving and caring mother. It is almost as if I get to "experience" a mother in reverse. This may not make sense, but I treasure the relationship I have with them. I have also managed to indulge my inner child with them. Taking them to see cartoons and kid movies- I think I have had as much fun as they have. And their crushes on teen idols. Of course "adult me" has no interest but my inner child can pretend to be a pre-teen too- just for a moment. I think that inner child grew up with my children, if that makes any sense.

Perhaps one of the reasons my focus is on my father is that I brought the dysfunction I grew up in into my marriage. Thank goodness my husband isn't like my mother- she is very severely affected, but the early years of my marriage were difficult. He didn't treat me well and I was unhappy. I didn't know how to stand up for myself- I was not allowed to and it wasn't modeled for me. I didn't expect to be treated well or cared for by someone I loved- I learned not to expect it. Although I thankfully didn't experience what my father experienced to the extent he did, I did see things from his perspective. We had children- and I wanted them to have an intact family if possible. It was tough. However, I also realized that I can not continue to take on the role of enabler and emotional caretaker and I don't. Fortunately my husband has the sanity to have adjusted to that. It is still a work in progress.

[Fie]

Of course "adult me" has no interest but my inner child can pretend to be a pre-teen too- just for a moment. I think that inner child grew up with my children, if that makes any sense.

That's very interesting, thanks for bringing that up. I think I might have that too   

[Notwendy]

Fie- Looking at the number of mothers sitting with their pre-teens in the Twilight movies, I don't think we are alone 

[Fie]

@Notwendy, sometimes I feel like I am making up for my childhood. I look at my child, see how happy she is, and I feel like it hasn't been for nothing. If I would have been a happy kid, maybe she would have been worse off. I don't know.  I like your way of looking at it, growing with your kids  
Good way to look at things when I feel nostalgic because she's growing so fast and 'soon' she'll be independent and leave ...

[Woolspinner2000]

I think that as a mom chosing to parent differently from our uBPDms, we have made the effort to be a better mom to our children.  I've been discovering that as I interact with my grandchildren, specifically my first one who is now 4 years old, I am feeling the same things that several of you have mentioned.

My inner kids are being nurtured in an unimaginable way. I see what my grandchildren experience  in a healthy home environment, and sometimes it makes me want to cry. Some of the feelings are sadness, because I am opening up the understanding of what I (we) missed. Other times my  feelings are the window to discovering healing for the wounded ones inside of me. Yet other times I immensely relish the freedom to play with them and have fun without fear of consequences (except perhaps for the occassional look from my daughter who attempts to be stern with me. She tries to hide the smile as she watches me play with her children).

While I made different choices, good ones, to be a better mom, I was not as able to see that I was doing well because I wasn't aware of the depth of the impact of my childhood upon me until they were grown. It sounds like several of you are discovering this much earlier and that is to be commended!   

The ability to take in the positive for me is hard, just as it is for you guys. My T has a name for it when he says kind things to me: he is being positively mean. He is mean to tell me nice positive things, but really he is not at all mean. I just struggle greatly to believe them about myself. Apparently none of us are alone in this battle.

It is good NotWendy, that you are taking the time to look at your dad.  I had to look at mine too and ask myself how he contributed to the family dynamics between he and my uBPDm, and also in the DV against our mom and us kids. I favored him above my mom, but he was also abusive and there came a day when I needed to look at him and grieve as well. Who he was had a great impact on myself and my siblings. It was largely enablement.

So I can relate and understand much of what you shared.

 
Wools

[madeline7]

Not Wendy and Harri and anyone else who read through my description of the Father's Day card:
the interesting thing is that I looked at the card but did not "see" the  frown on my Mom, and I would like to think my Dad also did not see it, but rather focused on the sweet message and drawings. It was only after we got in the car to drive home that my husband told me to really look at the card and that is when I saw it. Wondering if that is a pure form of denial, we see what we want. And as children, we may know on some level but we see what we need to see in order to survive.

[Notwendy]

There are parts of my childhood that I have forgotten. It is interesting because I have a sibling who remembers some events in detail that I seem to have no memory of. I think children do this to cope. I know that I tend to tune things out- and I probably learned to do this to cope with what was going on.

Madeline- you may also not have noticed the frown as it was a "normal" for you. I'm pretty sure our sense of "normal" was different.

It is interesting as I reconnected with a high school classmate who disclosed that she had an abusive mother. Neither of us had a clue in high school that other kids may have troubled homes. We both came to class with a smile on our faces, and did well in school. It wasn't being false- school was my happy place- a place where we did get to be regular kids- see friends, learn things, interact with stable adults.

[Harri]

Hi Notwendy and everyone!  Bit of a delay responding here.  Hope it is okay to bump this.

Notwendy, you made a lightbulb go off for me when you explained that your relationship and role in your marriage mirrored (somewhat) that of your father.  It makes sense that you would think of and relate your experiences to those of your father.  I wasn't seeing that perhaps because I have had my father so blocked for so long.  He really was over shadowed by my mother.  I think too that my very long ago ended relationship was similar:  I was very passive to my ex who was, in retrospect, verbally and emotionally abusive (as was I in return)  The thing is, just like my mother, my ex had me convinced I was the very disordered one who was all wrong and he was nothing more than a poor innocent victim who was only trying to help.  Heh, that is probably why I used to find it so difficult to read at the improving and romantic boards (I have not had that difficulty for years though... .I'm just reflecting).

Errrm... .I hope that made sense.  anyhoo, thanks for being so open Notwendy. 

[Notwendy]

Harri, it isn't unusual to be in a similar pattern to our FOO's in a relationship. I have read this idea in at least one marriage/relationship book ( I don't recall the exact books- it was a long time ago that I read them). In general, what I recall is that we don't marry someone exactly the same, but the patterns are similar.

My H is very different from my mother- and yet, we tended to both reenact the patterns I observed in my parents- albeit in a milder way by comparison, but enough to be in a difficult situation. My H blamed me, and I accepted the blame. That was a reenactment of my role in my FOO. My mother blamed me for the issues in the family and having no idea that she was the disordered one, I assumed she had a point. I tried for a long time to "fix" my marriage by being more co-dependent- that's the model I was raised with.

At the time, I didn't know about BPD. I knew something was wrong with my mother, but didn't have a name. I read a lot of marriage books, looking for answers and advice. A lot of it was helpful, but the patterns of behavior and drama remained and I didn't know why. I then learned about my mother having BPD. It still didn't fit my H- and doesn't entirely fit. But later I found a book on men with BPD and how that presented a bit differently from women, and realized that there were enough traits to match my own co-dependency. I don't know if either of us would fit a full label of either, but that didn't matter as much as the pieces of the puzzle fitting between us. We each had enough of a "match" to create drama and dysfunction in our marriage. I see aspects of the relationship board that fit us and parts that don't. That is probably true for many people. But what is most helpful to me is seeing the patterns between us and working on my part in that to make changes.

Another very interesting thing that I read is that if we end a relationship without working on our own part in it- we tend to repeat the pattern with someone else in the next relationship. This attraction between two people isn't a conscious one. It has to do with boundaries, and our own emotional make up-  but it is also something we can work on. Boundaries are key here. I didn't get to that point- my marriage is basically functional and with many positives. Yet, in the books I read, I finished the chapters on dating after a relationship out of curiosity and it made sense. My FOO influenced who I am attracted to and who is attracted to me- but we aren't destined to repeat that, in the relationship we stay in, or another one, if we are aware of this and work at better relationship skills. Sometimes making a change in the relationship leads to it ending, if the other partner can not grow with the new relationship patterns.

Some of the relationships on the romantic board are hard to read, but the ones with the females with BPD have given me some insight into my father's situation as well as my own tendencies towards co-dependency. If they help you understand your former relationship, and your FOO- I think it is possible to use this understanding to understand yourself- and then move forward. The idea that we can make changes in our relationships is pretty hopeful