About to spend week with GC sister

[todayistheday]

It's mom who's uBPD.  I did not even realize until a few years ago that GC sister sees Mom for who she is. GC sister moved in next door to Mom and Mom took care of her kids when they were growing up. 

If I'd had kids, Mom would have NEVER had my kids unsupervised after the pain of my childhood.  The reason I never had kids was because I did not understand BPD when I was young enough and I was afraid of causing them the kind of pain that I suffered throughout my childhood.

I realized recently that Sister does know, some.  She knows how badly Mom treats Dad anyway. She calls me when things get really bad between them. She does not go take care of them when they need help,  I end up doing that.  When I was there during a post-op for one of them, sister said "I don't know how you can stand it over there."    I don't understand why she left her kids there.  Her kids know how Mom treats my Dad.

Sister is golden.  There is also a golden grandchild, of course.

There have been some rifts between sister and Mom too.  Sister was golden because she was somewhat enmeshed. But the times that there have been rifts between them have been the times that Mom was unable to control sister.  I suppose in the long run that is why sister is golden and I'm not.    I have always been very independent.  Which is the biggest trigger for Borderlines.  She equated that to being disobedient and told me what a bad person I am.  When my Mom does not approve of something that sister does, sister hears about it and then they don't speak for a while.

Now sister and I are spending a week together (vacation).  We have done this sevearl times previous.  I always get nervous right before it. (it start tonight)  I don't know why.  Sister and I get along fine as adults.  We even commiserate about Mom sometimes.  I'd really rather not even think about Mom.  I don't know if she will bring Mom up during the week or if/how it will trigger me if she brings Mom up.  I don't plan to start any conversations about Mom.

[Methuen]

Hi todayistheday,

I hope your week vacation with your sister turns out to be a good one.
Reading your post, I recognized anxiety, which I think we all suffer from.  

I think we all sometimes ruminate on old baggage, and what could go wrong.  This has always been one of my big problems, but is something I'm currently working on.  I can see now, how unhelpful it is when I "worry" about things that might or might not happen in the future.  Anxiety is so negative and unhealthy-feeling.  It sounds like that is what is happening, since your vacation starts tonight.

It sounds like you don't want to talk about your mom.  It sounds like you aren't sure if it would feel supportive, or be triggering.  The truth is probably that it could be either or both.

I think if you know in advance that you don't want to talk about it, you can gently say so.  On the other hand, if you are confident that talking about it could be mutually supportive, then could you maybe limit how much time you spend on the topic...?  Sometimes these conversations start out ok, but then they can either go on forever, or take a detour to the darker side.  Maybe that would be the time to change the topic or the activity.  Of course triggers can happen at any time and unexpectedly.  

I think you have options.  Just trust your gut todayistheday.  If it feels right (supportive) to talk about it, and you want to talk about it, then do so, but watch out for when it starts to feel like your emotions are amping up, and switch it up by doing a fun vacation activity.  If on the other hand, you already know you don't want to talk about, then don't.  It's a vacation, so maybe you just want to do "happy" things.  

My T told me that worrying about the future brings anxiety, and thinking about the past brings depression.  So it's better to live in the moment.  That helped me a lot to hear it put like that.  I don't know if it's as meaningful for others, but I thought I would mention it.

I hope you have a really great vacation.    It sounds like they have been good in the past, so cheering you on to have another good one!  Enjoy!