Need to bring my A game tonight

[formflier]

OK...had a good talk with P today.  She reminded me of my wife's "core issues"...and we worked through ways I can communicate "no" without it becoming so much of a battle.

I need to remember my wife both desires and doesn't know how to handle autonomy. 

I also need to remember to not make it about my wife being good or bad...or right and wrong..it's about what's best for our daughter..

Hopefully all with the minimum of drama..conflict and whatnot.

So..the initial idea was to try to communicate with doctor through a chat system.  Turns out this doctor isn't part of the "online portal"...so that didn't work.  Basically the thought was that I could communicate concerns/ideas and invite my wife to put ideas out there about what activities she should do.  Rather than me doing it all and then cramming it down my wife's throat.

So...then the phone rings and it was..the doctor!  So...I quickly turned on my recorder and had a chat.  She talked through standard protocol for concussion and I was thinking hard how I could bring up the school trip without throwing my wife under the bus...causing shame..all that.

Here's what I did...fingers crossed.

I said "Hey...so I was kinda the bad guy today and I wanted to run the idea by you.  D13 was interested in going down to FFw school for a couple hours to help out in the classroom.  I disappointed her pretty badly by saying no."

"What do you think of that idea?"

doc said  "No...she needs to stay home.  She can walk around the block if she wants.  Here is the thing, if she over does it now she risks prolonging her recovery...or worse."

Then there are some more admin details and a heads up that at this coming Monday's appointment we shouldn't be surprised if she refers us to a neurologist.

Anyway...I hope I can be on top of my game when my wife gets home, validate and all that.

I'm thinking about offering to take her out for a quick burger or something.

Of course...there are other matters flying around in addition to  D13.

One thing to clarify.  The "fluid on the brain" was a misunderstanding on my part.  She has fluid in her "mastoid" which was an incidental finding, most likely not related to the head trauma.

The fluid was unchanged between the CT scans on Sat night and Mon afternoon.

Wish me luck tonight.

FF

[Bnonymous]

Wow, that was a near award-winning level of diplomacy there - impressive stuff!

You don't need luck - it's clear you've got this. 

I'm glad the fluid on the brain thing was just a misunderstanding.

[formflier]

Thanks...my wife will be home in 15 min or so.  I tried to offer to grab her a sandwhich or something, she was already in the drive through.

I didn't go overboard...but tried to build a bridge toward her..let her know I was interested.

FF

[AskingWhy]

I am late to this thread, but FF, I want you to know I am praying for your D and her recovery.

pwBPD just don't seem to "get it."  Due to their lack of empathy, they cannot put themselves in others' shoes for the life of them.  (Unless, of course, they are children of the BPD.  Children of BPDs are seen as extensions of themselves and received a lion's share of what empathy they can manage.  Because of this, there is no end of empathy my H has for his children, and his ability to easily accept the most eggregious of their behaviour: DUIs, continued use of drugs, promiscuity, reckless spending, perpetrating work place bullying, countless other things.)

Your D needs a full clearance from her doctors before even contemplating returning to her normal activities.

Your W clearly has no grasp of her own Ds reality, and the gravity of her injury.

[AskingWhy]

Note:  This empathy for one's own children does not seem like the case your W, FF.

It appears BPDs split on the way they see their children.  They either are horribly enmeshed with their children where they are no boundaries (as in the case with my H), or see children as objects to be manipulated like inanimate objects.  

[Notwendy]

In my FOO, my BPD mother is enmeshed with one child, the golden child, but I have observed that she has difficulty with empathy for anyone who is feeling poorly.

I attribute this to the triangle and the tendency to take victim mode. If she's in victim mode, then it's hard for her to perceive someone else as hurting.

I wonder if she sees the 16 year old son as "rescuer" expecting him to "help her out " with the driving. When my kids were older ,my BPD mother would enlist them to do things for her- in rescuer mode.

I don't think FFW intended to be harmful. I think the need is purely emotional- to be rescued, to have him help her- and that emotion over rides judgement. If in the moment, feeling equaled facts, then the emotion in the moment took over.

I think how pwBPD cope with their feelings makes it hard for them to learn from consequences. Projection/denial/ and the tendency to rewrite history may make it hard for your wife to acknowledge what happened.

However, the bottom line is that this kind of thinking placed children in danger. Now that you know this, there needs to be some intervention. No matter what the thinking is, the children need to be safe.

[formflier]

In no particular order.

Things were much calmer this morning getting to school.  The biggest drama was D5 not wanting to put on her boots because "the heal hurt".  (no blisters were apparent so..some sock adjustment..some distraction and I'll investigate later this evening)

Notwendy...thanks for the sheet about concussions.  I was able to use it as something to reference and to give an idea of what ideas are ok.  So...from that last night I played hangman and some UNO with D13.  She had basically slept all day so she was perky for a bit.

We talked about the list and she thought about it some and said it would seem like baking in the kitchen is an OK activity, so at some point today she wants to bake something.  I'm not going to prompt her again today but I'm ready to help if she wants.

I'm guessing the "rescuer" thing with sending D16 to do the girl pickup is accurate. 

I'd have to think about who might be the "golden child".  I certainly know that the "focus" is D8 because she has been behind on almost all the tests at school for 1st and most of 2nd grade.  Recently the "big news" has been that she is testing "on level" for reading and for math.

OH..my wife dropped all pretense of taking D13 anywhere.  Her only focus now is being at the appointment on Monday morning to "see for herself". 

FF

[Bnonymous]

I think you're handling all this absolutely amazingly, FF.

I hope I get to the place where you are (I don't mean in this now-finished relationship, I mean in myself).

You are handling this with sensitivity, diplomacy, compassion, and also pragmatism and common sense. You really couldn't possibly be doing better than you are.

[empath]

I agree with consequences being difficult for pwBPD to learn from. I also think that it's likely that FFw wants everything to get back to 'normal' so she isn't faced with the consequences of her decision and the harm that happened to the kids. It's hard to think of someone who is a "good mom" doing something like that.

Kudos for diplomacy and tact and keeping the goal of doing what's best for the kids

OH..my wife dropped all pretense of taking D13 anywhere.  Her only focus now is being at the appointment on Monday morning to "see for herself". 

Lol. Sounds about right. Hope she can make that appointment.

[formflier]

I'm guessing 50/50 that she will be there.

Maybe a little more likely than not.   I'm fine either way, I doubt I'm going to push for it either way.

FF

[Notwendy]

I'm glad you are protecting your daughter and hope she feels better soon.

[formflier]

I was just upset because I seem to he under scrutiny and nothing I do seem right

My wife was upset this morning...couldn't find keys for rental car...they were in her purse according to S16 (who I called trying to track down keys)

So...my wife dumps the contents of her purse in the driveway and says "see..they aren't there"

I reached into the pile..got the keys...got car started and helped get rest of kiddos ready to go.

She picked up "most" of what was dumped in driveway.  (I'm assuming I just leave the rest..right?  It doesn't appear important)

Anyway...she is saying she feels under scrutiny at work..I bet it's really more see feels like she is screwing up parenting.

FF

[GaGrl]

Hmmm... Could be both work and parenting. That could feel like walls closing on multiple sides.

[formflier]

Yeah..I would guess it's easier to complain about work as a proxy.

Frustrating to sometimes listen to her about work.  You would think she is inches away from being fired, when in reality the "central office" is asking for her input about how her test scores were so much higher than the average teacher.

It's not the absolute high scores but somehow they create and "expected growth" number for a kid...she consistently is several standard deviations above the norm.

My guess is there is a lot of "jealously" and "catty" behavior from other teachers that are envious.

Sigh..

FF

[I Am Redeemed]

FF,

Do you think maybe she feels that she is being judged on her parenting abilities from all sides? I imagine that being a teacher would cause some people to have higher expectations of someone's parenting capabilities. Maybe she thinks that people at work know about the accident and are judging her.

I know that for me, it has been a lot harder to let go of guilt/shame related to choices I made that affected my kids. I can only imagine that it would be much harder for someone with BPD to process those feelings.

[boatingwoman]

Is it possible she is teaching for the test?