First post; just saying hello

[Pdawgy13]

Hey all,

Discovered this forum after a bit of digging online.  I am the adult child of a mother with BPD.  I have clinical depression, anxiety disorder with panic attacks, and several other diagnoses in my bag of goodies.  Been in therapy and on medication for years, but just now (at 40!) finally beginning to explore the impacts that my mother’s BPD has had on me and how it has shaped my relationship with her and with others.  The more I research the more it makes sense why I am the way I am.  Fierce independence, fear of feeling trapped or losing choice/control, difficultly with truly close/intimate relationships... you know the drill.  Hoping to eventually come to terms, understand myself better, and be better able to manage my relationship with my mother without feeling so damn angry and resentful all the time.

[Turkish]

Hi Pdawgy13,

I'm fiercely independent, too. Why do you think you have that personality trait? Also, what is the contact situation with your mother?

[Pdawgy13]

Hi Turkish!

Current contact situation is we are texting but not speaking.  This has been going on for about a month and I guess we are in a sort of stalemate on who picks up the phone first.  Prior to that we were speaking weekly on the phone.  In person contact is very limited by my choice (once a year or two).  The independence question is a good one.  If you asked me a year ago I would say that as a single mother she raised me to be fiercely independent.  That might be true, but only partially.  What is under the surface is that growing up in the house with just her and I she was intensely controlling, suffocating, and emotionally needy. I felt trapped.   As an adult, I think my subconscious is so triggered by the possibility of feeling that way again, that the independence is a defense mechanism.

[Turkish]

Interesting. I'm the only child of a single mother.  I was a latchkey kid for the most part.

What do you think is the source of your anger and resentment? Maybe being cast into a role of Caretaker?

[Pdawgy13]

I don’t feel like I fit the typical definition for Caretaker.  While I often felt like I served as her everything (mother, husband, daughter, friend), there was a point that I rebelled against her behavior, and it was very early on.  This led to a very unstable home life, where she tried to cast me in the Caretaker role, I fought it, and we warred.  Just constant conflict.  And the more we warred, the more she tried to control me,  and the worst it got.  I think the resentment is me not letting go of that tumultuous childhood.  I left at 17, as I would rather live with my  alcoholic dad than her.

[soprano1]

Hi Pdawgy13
I was the everything to my mom too (daughter, only friend, confidant to info that no kid should know regarding finances and my parents marriage).  She made me think that I was unlikable to other people so that I would feel I only had her.  I believed her and didn't fight back.  I know better now but she still fights to maintain that dynamic and because that's no longer acceptable to me, we are now no-contact. Resentment is a toxic emotion that poisons us, not our abusers.  I'm working on forgiving her.  Forgiving her is for my mental health, not for her benefit.

[Pdawgy13]

Yes, I want to let go and forgive her (for me); I just let myself get so triggered by her.  I’ve tried no-contact a few times (one time for over a year) but I ended up feeling worse, because it doesn’t fit my mental model of what a “good person” or a “good daughter” would do.  I also was hanging on to a lot of anger during the no-contact periods and it felt like it took more energy out of me and made me more unhappy than when we were talking.  So here we are.  Ultimately, I need to get to the point where I can view her as sick, unhappy, and in pain, instead of as selfish, inappropriate, gaslighting, and clingy.  It’s a shift I will need to work on over time, after which my hope is that I can then let her words and actions roll off my back.  Does the guilt ever stop?

[Turkish]

"Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children."

Society also seems to see it this way. The guilt isn't entirely internal. I'm the only son of a single mother, but I imagine that the guilting would be worse if I were a daughter. I was even cussed at by my mom's female neighbor for not fixing the situation with my mother (as if being her child granted me magical powers to fix everything). "But she's your mom! I can't believe I'm  hearing this!" Notwithstanding I'd gotten adult protective services involved who told me I did the right thing, a female social worker.

I saw the train wreck coming 20 years ago, yet felt helpless while I watched and helped (which may have been enabling, but she was my mom and had no one else).

None of this is easy.  Sometimes the hardest thing is giving ourselves some grace.

[Pdawgy13]

I hear you.  People outside the situation just don’t get it.  They can’t.  I remember as a child feeling desperate to convince others that there was something wrong with my mother, and the extreme relief on the rare occasion someone got close enough to us to see and validated that she was “not right.”  Gosh, I can feel it right there under the surface, so raw like it was yesterday.  The desperation, the frustration.  The “She’s your mother, it’s the only one you’ve got” or “You need to respect your mother” of “Its just the two of you, you’ve only got each other.”  And how she seemed to bring out the absolute worst in me (and still does).  Like this fire breathing monster that I didn’t even recognize as myself.

[soprano1]

 I’ve tried no-contact a few times (one time for over a year) but I ended up feeling worse, because it doesn’t fit my mental model of what a “good person” or a “good daughter” would do.

My mother always uses the Biblical commandment to "Honor thy father and mother" to keep me in line.  She knows that I take my faith very seriously and this has been a very effective tool in her kit. Over the years I've been told that I will go to hell if I don't honor her (read: submit totally to her)  simply for being my mother.   Also, our household was always about how we looked to people.  The appearance of being  a perfect family with absolutely no problems was to be maintained at all costs.  My sister and I were threatened with severe punishment if we embarrassed the family in any way.   So I always needed to be the best, the most perfect, to go above and beyond to appear superior.  Being the "good daughter" kept me safe from the dragon. So I too have struggled with my concept of what a good daughter would do and how that is keeping me in bondage to her moods and anger.  I've felt like I didn't have a right to live without the rock in my chest--that constant anxiety of never knowing when the next attack was coming.  What I'm starting to realize is that no one is paying any attention to me, to us.  A few of her friends may think I'm in the wrong but what should I care about that?  They are not MY friends or family.  My friends and family know she's nuts and difficult.  They are applauding me standing up for myself.  That's really all I need.