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Author Topic: BPD mom uses the language of therapy against me  (Read 482 times)
etown

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« on: January 31, 2023, 03:28:44 PM »

Hi folks,
Thank you all for your suggestions re going no contact again with my BPD mom. You were absolutely right and I'm getting back to that place as I write this.
The thing that's currently bothering me is how my waif BPD mom uses the language of therapy to dismiss her responsibilities for everything. Recently, she lashed out at me and my sibling online (I wrote about it here and you were all v helpful. Thank you.) And now she's doing this thing she does where she sends this meme about the unhealed parts of her hurting us and how it was only because she didn't love herself or whatever. I responded saying that wasn't an apology and the thing I'm currently mad at her for happened this month not when I was a kid. Then she responded with a list of her diagnoses and a statement about how I need to let go of my childhood as she did etc etc.
I find this deeply frustrating because she uses the language of therapy (including her actual BPD diagnosis) to dismiss her responsibility for real harmful behavior today. She does it in the same way she used her illnesses to manipulate me when I was a child. Basically, she's saying "how dare you hold me accountable, don't you know I'm mentally ill." But she's also saying, "none of your trauma matters, especially the stuff I caused because I'm mentally ill because of my trauma." She also pulls other people into these things by posting them online to make me look like a monster. This drives me around the bend.
Do your BPD family members do this? Do they ever pull out their various diagnoses as get out of jail free cards? How do you let go of these kinds of things?
Really, any thoughts would be appreciated.
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Notwendy
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« Reply #1 on: January 31, 2023, 03:45:26 PM »

My BPD mother doesn't consider that she even has a problem. As far as she's concerned, if there's any issues - it has to be the other person. So, If I bring up a recent situation, she then uses this language.

I also don't bring these things up as grievances over something in the past. They are current issues. Like if she asks me to come help her with the things in her house, and I remind her that the last time ( recent ) - I tried this, she got angry and accused me of hurting her, and nothing got done.

I am trying to make the connection between her behavior and why people don't want to come over to go though her belongings with her. She doesn't "get" that as she doesn't connect how people respond to her behavior, or it feels bad to do that.

So, the reply is to use this language with us. I feel like it's a bit of gaslighting. Convincing us that the action is on us- we have to do something about it, rather than for her to consider "maybe if I didn't get mad at them, they'd be more interested in helping me".

If she's dealing with a medical issue, she does mention that, and then we feel like horrible ogres for being considered responsible for upsetting her. We don't want to upset her.
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Couscous
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« Reply #2 on: January 31, 2023, 04:12:54 PM »

If she took responsibility she wouldn’t have BPD.  Smiling (click to insert in post)

In a way, expecting a pwBPD to take responsibility is like excepting a person with Tourette Syndrome to not swear at you.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2023, 04:26:07 PM by Couscous » Logged
Notwendy
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« Reply #3 on: January 31, 2023, 04:59:07 PM »

If she took responsibility she wouldn’t have BPD.  Smiling (click to insert in post)

In a way, expecting a pwBPD to take responsibility is like excepting a person with Tourette Syndrome to not swear at you.

Right, I guess what can vary is the different ways they don't take responsibility Smiling (click to insert in post)

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etown

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« Reply #4 on: January 31, 2023, 05:33:57 PM »

Yes, this is what I’m saying—it’s the usual dodge around taking responsibility for harmful behavior except she uses the language of therapy and her history of therapy to claim that she can treat people how she wants. It’s not so much the behavior that breaks my brain as the loops of logic she uses to explain it. Gaslighting definitely feels like the right term.
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Couscous
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« Reply #5 on: January 31, 2023, 09:38:35 PM »

Yes, this is what I’m saying—it’s the usual dodge around taking responsibility for harmful behavior except she uses the language of therapy and her history of therapy to claim that she can treat people how she wants. It’s not so much the behavior that breaks my brain as the loops of logic she uses to explain it. Gaslighting definitely feels like the right term.

And this is exactly why doing either an emotional cutoff (aka cordial contact or low contact) or permanent No Contact is almost always the only viable option, difficult as this may be.

Maybe it will help to begin thinking of her as a weird, older relative that you might drop in on very occasionally for a cup of tea and biscuits, while inquiring after her health and discussing the weather.
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Riv3rW0lf
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« Reply #6 on: February 01, 2023, 05:23:00 AM »

Hi etown  Welcome new member (click to insert in post)

Yes, my BPD mother does this as well. She used her trauma countless times to invalidate me, or to make how she treated us appear ok, or like we were the ungrateful ones for mentioning things she did that were abusive (and things she still does).

I do get a sense that she knows something is off with her, but since she doesn't have a formal diagnosis, she cannot use her BPD "against us". However, she has stopped drinking via AA, and a big part of the program was forgiving the past. So she will sometimes talk about how she "found herself" and "healed herself" and that she is not the same person she was back then so we have to forgive her... But like your mother, won't acknowledge the things she does in the present that are abusive.

She also will have no problem recognizing how her trauma led to her drinking and her poor relationship with her father/mother (she kept saying her mother didn't know who she was, that she didn't want to be like her, etc ), but she won't recognize and validate the fact that what she did, and the choices she made, led me to develop C-PTSD and traumas of my own. She thinks I ought to forgive her, while she gets to throw her own mother out of her house. And for the record, I did forgive her the past, it's the ongoing abuse that is the issue.

So yes, she uses various therapy and self-help conference she took to convince me I have to forgive her and walk with her, but doesn't seem to see the mismatch between what she actually still does and what she says. She basically uses the depression and alcoholism as free cards to validate her ongoing abusive behaviors.
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etown

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« Reply #7 on: February 01, 2023, 09:33:13 AM »

Thanks so much Riv3rW0lf. I really appreciate seeing your experience of this so much aligns with mine.

I think that distinction between things that happened in the past and things that are happening in the present is so important. I know my mom will never take responsibility for the past and a lot of the work I’ve done over the years is learning ways to accept that and support myself through healing (and therefore being less toxic myself).

But she keeps bringing up the past. On Facebook (I’ve blocked her there so I usually don’t see it), by email. She once even sent me a package that included a letter listing the ways I failed her as a child. I try not to respond to any of it because I know it will do nothing, but this time I did. And the response I got was—“stop living in the past.”

It’s mind-bending. Genuinely. And it really confirms that no contact is the right move for me.
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Riv3rW0lf
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« Reply #8 on: February 01, 2023, 11:30:10 AM »

Thanks so much Riv3rW0lf. I really appreciate seeing your experience of this so much aligns with mine.

I think that distinction between things that happened in the past and things that are happening in the present is so important. I know my mom will never take responsibility for the past and a lot of the work I’ve done over the years is learning ways to accept that and support myself through healing (and therefore being less toxic myself).

But she keeps bringing up the past. On Facebook (I’ve blocked her there so I usually don’t see it), by email. She once even sent me a package that included a letter listing the ways I failed her as a child. I try not to respond to any of it because I know it will do nothing, but this time I did. And the response I got was—“stop living in the past.”

It’s mind-bending. Genuinely. And it really confirms that no contact is the right move for me.

This is almost funny how I can see my own mother in your mother's behaviors ! They are all so different, yet the same on so many things like this.

My BPD mother also sent three long messages to me and my brothers a few months ago (while I was going no contact) in which she detailed her pasts, from the moment she left her FOO to now. In those messages, she kept pointing out all the amazing stuff she had done, how industrious she was, and that maybe she neglected us a bit (!) but it was ok because she was surviving and building something. And how, on the other end, I had so many issues young and hurt her in so many way, while she was just doing her best. There was so much blame on the child and teenager I was, while she was forgiving herself and painting herself as a hero surviving her own abuse.

But then, when I called her out on it, I was, like you, the one "stuck in the past" because she isn't this person anymore... Nevermind the fact that she still triangulates, wedges, guiltrips, manipulates and violates boundaries after boundaries, and will scream and throw tantrums like a 2 years old whenever she gets a no.

I am also no contact, and while I sometimes feel a bit of guilt about it at times, most days I am grateful for everything I was able to build during this no contact time.. it is as if... Being away from her freed so much of my energy, I was finally able to put it in places where it is actually useful : myself. I feel like someone new, but truly I merely met myself for the first time. And breaking no contact seems impossible for one main reason : I actually don't want her to see me and to critic or belittle what I have become. I know this would all be projections on her part, but I am still not interested in dealing with the jealousy and competition. I also don't want her using my achievement for her own narcissistic supply. I don't want her meeting the new me...

I hope no contact proves as healing for you as it was for me. Maybe someday we will be strong and healthy enough to report back and not be affected by their behaviors, but until then, I think it more than ok to give ourselves the love and compassion and time we deserve. Virtual hug (click to insert in post)
« Last Edit: February 01, 2023, 11:36:35 AM by Riv3rW0lf » Logged
Couscous
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« Reply #9 on: February 01, 2023, 04:30:21 PM »

This discussion reminded me of Harriet Lerner’s book, “Why Won’t You Apologize?” that has helped me so much. She also did a TED talk on the same subject: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5r6Y9uhmL6Y
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Riv3rW0lf
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« Reply #10 on: February 01, 2023, 07:50:48 PM »

This discussion reminded me of Harriet Lerner’s book, “Why Won’t You Apologize?” that has helped me so much. She also did a TED talk on the same subject: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5r6Y9uhmL6Y

Nice TEDtalk  Smiling (click to insert in post)

I am at a point where I am not looking for any apologies anymore on my mother's part. I don't need her to be sorry or to apologize to forgive her anymore. I thought I did, at some point, but I am past that. The last message I sent her was a few months ago, and I shared that I loved her, but couldn't come back toward her right now, and it was genuine. She wrote back a simple thank you for telling her I loved her. I now see the complexities of our relationship. Closeness is very hard with someone with BPD. And distance too, because distance lift the veil of FOG, and reveals all their pain and hurt. Yet, we still have to hold boundaries, because closeness with them breeds abuse, and round round the merry round it goes.

She will never apologize, but I don't need her to anymore to know how she feels and who she is. But this state was almost impossible to achieve when I was close with her. The FOG is simply too great, and the constant baits are hard to manage.
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Couscous
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« Reply #11 on: February 02, 2023, 05:21:56 PM »

Just thought I'd share this excellent piece about the dangers of seeking validation from the very people who have hurt us: https://blog.selfarcheology.com/2021/02/validation-self-destructive.html
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Sharpe267
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« Reply #12 on: February 09, 2023, 04:34:30 AM »

Hi! Just to say that my pwBPD does this all the time, and if I try to apply any tools I’ve learnt in my own therapy they recognize it straight away and turn it against me - “that’s right, go assert your boundary and leave me because I’m not coping how you want me to…”

My heart goes out to you, it’s so hard after begging them to seek treatment for so long.
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Couscous
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« Reply #13 on: February 09, 2023, 11:43:34 AM »

“that’s right, go assert your boundary and leave me because I’m not coping how you want me to…”

Oh boy, that’s a pretty sophisticated way of saying that you’re selfish for having boundaries. You’ve got a pretty savvy (and highly narcissistic) pwBPD on your hands there. My condolences to you.

Sadly, when people are this narcissistic it kind of rules out the possibility of any kind of relationship. Unless their therapist is addressing their extreme sense of entitlement and faulty belief that people are an extension of them and exist solely to meet their needs, I’m not sure there’s too much hope for them.



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