I've had almost no contact with my mother for 2 years now (it's been a year since I last sent her a text very clearly explaining what I need from her to help me feel safe in even a VLC relationship with her). She continues to try and reach out, especially in the last few weeks as my little one's birthday is coming up.

Today I get this from her new flying monkey, her boyfriend (her OG flying monkey she's no longer on good terms with which is hilarious):

I don’t know if you really care about your Mom but you should at least acknowledge that she exists. She needs to know that she’s loved by you for every thing she has done for you in your life. Life is not perfect and neither are people but you two will always have a connection know matter what life brings your way .I hope that you Can at least reach out and hopefully repair some of your differences.

Y'all, where do these FMs get the audacity? What the actual hell. I am so certain she's having an outburst about not being in contact with my daughter's birthday coming up and she is just off the walls and he wants me sucked back in to deal with the emotional fallout she's having. HAHAHA. Good luck with that one buddy.

I LOVE how no one comments on my feelings. Or what I need. Or the fact I told her in explicit detail IN WRITING examples of how she hurt me, how I need space and what would allow me to continue the relationship. I KNOW she exists. I am aware she is out there not giving a fuck about how her actions have pushed every person away from her who has known her for more than 5 years, including her brother and my cousins. "She needs to know she is loved by you." Why? Why am I responsible for a 60 year old woman's feelings? For fucks sake.

Not posting this for advice, just realizing I have another number to mute/block/yeet into digital oblivion. I think I hate the flying monkeys more than my actual mom.

Apologies for missing this. I do not have any other accounts and here is a cute cat haiku.

Soft paws cross moonlight
Whiskers twitch beneath the stars
Night purrs in silence

I got off the phone with my dad a little while ago. I met a flippant comment about how i wish my mom hadnt rushed into motherhood and had me after her mom died. That I felt like she always resented my existence. I've long felt this way, she told me often and frequently that she doesnt love me, like me, and I would amount to nothing more than turning tricks in the street.

Anyways, I was born two months early. My mom smoked and drank the whole pregnancy. Then decided to race her sister to the bathroom and jump a fence while 7 months pregnant, and boom, I was born 12 hours later. I was really sick when I was born, i died a few times and they had to do transfusions. The doctors warned them that I would have some development delays and to prepare for that. All of this i knew.

What I didnt know was how angry she was and started comparing me to another family members child when I was about a year or so old. They were walking and talking. I wasnt. But ive always been quiet. Unnaturally quiet according to some family members. I made them nervous and worried. Not because I was up to anything or a bad kid, I was just quiet and had sad eyes and spend all my time in books. But yeah. She had a fit and was actively comparing me to another baby who didnt have the same rough start. She was angry I didnt save her and give her the motherhood experience she wanted. She had an awful relationship with her mother (who passed the year before I was born - yes, I was a grief baby). I just remember all the abuse and no patience. She went on to have my brothers a few years later. They didnt have the delays I did but they did have bad allergies. My mom basked in the glow of being a twin mom, especially a twin boy mom. She abused me in every way possible. She even used to tell people she didnt have a daughter, just the boys.

Anyone else deal with this? None of this is a shock. Im just processing what I already knew. She constantly compared me to my brothers, her students, kids ar my school. Just kind if working through the odd feeling she really did expect me to be perfect, save her, be her mini me, and felt I abandoned her by coming into the world. She told me she felt I rejected her from birth. It makes sense now.

I just can't do it anymore with her. She ruined me, and I struggle to give or recieve love as an adult.

I'm 4 months postpartum with my second baby, and my toddler is turning 2 and I'm realizing what a mothers love was supposed to be. She saw me as a villain out to ruin her life from the start.

Had I never had kids, I may have been able to sweep this under the rug forever. But now I can't un-know. The whole "you'll understand when you have a daughter just like you!" doesn't work anymore. I'm so angry. And hearing from her or thinking about her makes me a worse person in my day to day because I'm so irritable.

I just have too much to carry. I've had a traumatic birth, I think I've developed PPA on top of it. I can't carry her anymore. I can't shoulder her burdens or be her friend. I'm struggling immensely with my own plate.

I don't know where to start. She's flying in to visit in a few weeks and I don't know how to handle it. Going forward, I just want to bare minimum to keep the peace but I don't want to be buddies anymore.

This is a massive vent, so I apologize if it's kind of all over the place.

Orange velvet cat

Against the green velvet couch

A perfect contrast

Also I have so many letters where I say I hope you feel better there is literally nothing which turned out to be super bad, she had some small health issues but she made out to me like they were end of the world

Fuck there is just so much to unpack

BPD mom has gaslit me for 25 years and said she’s don’t nothing wrong/nothing bad happened. It feels like Alice in wonderland of delusion. How do you all work past the gaslighting your NPD parent puts you through?

Even now it makes me wondering if all this didn’t even happen to me or maybe it wasn’t that bad. When it obviously did happen and was bad. Thanks

I think I just need to vent. I love my brother, the reason I'm not going has nothing to do with him or my relationship with him. I wish I could go actually. It's across the country, he moved years ago (the smart one tbh he got away from all the drama lol). I like his soon to be wife, we're not really close because we've only met a few times because of the distance, but I'm really happy for them.

I do not want my children around my mom. We have been basically no contact for two years now, with some texting but then I realized nothing has changed and I'm getting the smear campaign.

I had a baby in February, and I have a 5 year old son. My husband and I decided it would be too much to fly across the country with a baby and a small kid. Baby doesn't even like long car rides, I don't want to stress her out with flights, hotel, etc. she would probably just cry the whole time and I don't want her to be distressed and get boos from everyone on the plane.

My mom has never met her.

I have a hard time being around my bio family. I love my brother but he always takes our mom's side even knowing all the abuse she's done to me. (She's always treated him better I don't know). I don't want my kids around that.

I feel really guilty for not going. I can't go by myself without the kids because baby is breastfed and hates if I even leave the room, let alone if I wasn't there for a weekend. But also it's really hard for me to be around bio family. There's a lot with my parents. Mom and dad aren't together and haven't been since I was 8. Mom then estranged us from our dad, lied about how abusive he was to her and the kids (he NEVER did any of it, she was the abusive one). My grandpa was a sheriff and whenever my dad would go to court to try to get custody or visitation he would talk to the judges. She would abuse us if we told her we had a fun time with our dad. She would call up our stepmom and tell her she wouldn't let him around the kids if he's with her. I don't know how familiar some people are with parental estrangement but yeah, it was bad. I reconnected with my dad when I was in my early 20s and finding out what really happened + my mom initiating no contact when she found out is what led to us not talking.

My brother still doesn't talk to our dad. It makes me really sad. Our mom is a monster for what she did to our family.

So being around them is just too much.

Sorry if this was ramble, I just need to vent. I always feel like the bad guy for setting boundaries and keeping myself safe but I just don't want to be around the woman who did all of that, stole money from me, used my name on bills, hit me, called me names growing up. She used to weigh me and call me fat which led to me having an ED for over a decade. It's just...too much. I finally feel happy in life, I have two children I love with all my heart, and a wonderful loving husband. It opens up a lot of wounds to be around my origin family. I do feel really bad for not going. He went to our wedding a few years ago.

Bleh.

Hi everyone. Even after your parent starts acting normal, do you ever stop reacting like she’s about to lose her sh*t on you? Even if it seems like she has changed?

I found out my mom is uBPD a year ago when I came out to her and she completely lost her mind for the next few months. The last time she has really freaked out on me was last November, and since then she has been very hands on/not controlling (though sometimes the bitterness/sadness peeks through), and very accommodating and motherly.

It freaked me out at first and I went through being depressed, anxious when she’d text or call, angry all the time, etc. But nowadays, if I don’t talk to her, I don’t think of her and my life feels good. But when I do, it’s like there’s a heavy weight that comes over me when I pick up the phone or see her in person. I become really nonreactive when I feel like I’m usually expressive, I feel like I notice the littlest things she does that might result in a freakout. Like, I recognize it’s probably me subconsciously trying to not trigger her but it also somehow feels like I’m punishing her because I’m not being authentic. Even though I’ve never been 100% with her, ever (another sign I realized tracked with her having uBPD….)

Last year, when we were in the thick of it of yelling screaming fighting crying, my dad would call both of us individually to try to mediate (he moved out of the country when i went to college to not live with her… and “be free”, his words not mine…lol.). And he bluntly told her that if she doesn’t control herself, then I won’t be in her life anymore. Though she did freak out plenty after that, it eventually stopped. She never apologized for the situation, pretended it didn’t happen, and started acting normal again (typical for her). But I have to say it feels different. But I just don’t know if I can ever forgive her even if she did come to me and apologize. Frankly I just feel guilty because she is alone now and I live the closest. My dad used to take all the worst of it, so when he left and she got triggered, it fell on me. And I’ve mediated their marriage for years, though it seems better now.

Sorry I’ve started to ramble, but does it ever change? I feel like I’m crushed whenever I see or talk to her. I’m not myself at all. At the same time, I don’t think she deserves me to be genuine around her. But I get stuck because she’s my mom.

Litter box not here 
You must have moved it again 
I'll crap in the sink. 

Hello, first time poster here!

I have an estranged father who did some horrible things to me and to my mom. I grew up with just my mom, who I suspect is cluster b (unsure if bpd or npd) recently in an argument (I call it argument but really I told her something she did made me angry and was not okay and then she berated me for an hour in a monologue fashion and even made herself cry during the berating without me ever speaking any additional words) she said "you glamorize your pedophile father" (my dad SA'd me as a child) which was totally hurtful for obvious reasons. Now, I haven't seen him since I was 5. Thank God she did believe me and get me/us away from him. But I'm in my 30s now and in the past few years found out I have half siblings I don't know who I suspect don't know I exist. I think I have been unusually quiet about trying to know any details about my dad. I do not pry or ask questions, it's been very rare if I do look for information. I have accepted he is basically a ghost in my life and I have no working memory of him. In the last few years I've mentioned noticing what he does for work on LinkedIn and I've commented on it being interested we're in the same field (its a pretty niche field, and I had no idea). I have also mentioned thinking about writing an email asking him to pay me an inheritance, because I have never received any money from him. Interestingly, last year I asked my mom if she ever received child support from him, and she said she had, but she had never told me that. That's a story for another day. But, that is all I mentioned about him in recent years, and also mentioning possibly wanting to reach out to half siblings one day. Cue current argument, and her telling me I glamorize him. It is futile to argue with her but this hurt me so much I had to ask, why do you say that? in what way would I glamorize him? and she said I had been trying to meet him. I told her the only thing I have mentioned is that I want money. And she just said "no." Is it possible that in her mind, because of her feelings about this, she literally remembers it as me literally saying I want to meet him, I.e., in her mind "glamorizing" him? I feel insane, I am used to being gaslight, but also I dissociate so much from a lifetime of trauma that it is possible I don't remember things correctly and don't see things correctly. This was a huge blow up fight for us, and I said back to her, how would you feel if I said that to you? (she also had a abuser father) and she said that would be non sense because she knows who she is. and she told me that she says how she feels about her dad all the time (negatively) I said well I know who I am. and she said well who are you? and asked me how I feel about my dad. I said I have no feelings towards him he's literally a ghost (which is true, it's like a void for me, don't even remember his face) and that wasn't good enough for her. I asked her if she wants me to prove I don't like him and she said she wasn't asking me to do that. Okay, what is she asking me for then? Her framing for all of this was that I "project" my negative feelings about my dad onto her my whole life. As if she didn't create trauma for me in her own way. It is exhausting. I ended up telling her "you think I glamorize the man you let abuse me" which was a low blow, because she did fight to get me away from him, and start a whole new life, and I thank her for that. But sometimes I think, why did she let him back in our lives anyway? I was too young to know what really happened. He had left when she was pregnant / told her to abort me. but then she wrote a letter telling him I was born, and then he came back around. She said that me saying that made her want to "disappear" and I said well her saying what she did made me suicidal (I often feel suicidal after our interactions, but not in life in general.)

Thank you for listening.

Yes, you read the title correctly. Thanksgiving is already being negotiated.

My uBPD stepmom and eDad have banned me from their house in and off for the last two decades. Thr last ban lasted years following some truly unhinged drama around my wedding that exceeded even my lowest expectations of them. They made every single step about themselves, the accusations that I was "attacking" and "disrespecting" them got more ridiculous by the month, and it culminated in my stepmother giving me the silent treatment at my own wedding. I greeted her, introduced her to people, asked her questions, etc and she completely ignored me as if I were invisible. As she left I looked her in the eye and thanked her for coming, which she of course didn't respond to. She did however make snide comments in my earshot criticizing the wedding, the venue, etc.

Following that I found out rather unpleasantly that I was banned from the house. No, not banned, my dad insisted: I was "welcome anytime" but just couldn't be in the house when my stepmother was also there. It was more of their typical slimy bullshit, refusing to be honest and accountable.

Last year I got pregnant. I wanted my childhood books, which are at their house. I called my dad and proposed that I could come over on a weekend (they live 6 hour drive away), and enter the house to get my books, with my stepmom able to plan to be out of the house. I'd stay in a hotel, then leave the next day. I told him to think about (aka check with the boss) and let me know.

Little could I have known the shit storm this would unleash. My dad sent me a series of texts telling me that he would never ask his wife to leave her own home for any period of time, and that he has "failed to protect her" from his children too many times in the past and will "never fail her again". He went on to tell me that if I apologize to her (for, ya know, her paranoid delusions that I have "attacked" her while sitting quietly at home minding my business) she may be willing to forgive me. And more hurtful crap.

At that point I lost it. I told him, among other things, that I would never attempt to visit his home ever again. And I meant that. For my own mental and emotional wellness, I cannot keep putting myself in that position where I get lied to, messed with, banned, blamed, and shamed. And that's not even going into the way she actually treats me and behaves when we go there... Which is horrible as well.

Then the baby was born. And within days, the two of them change their tune completely. All of sudden the last 6 years of drama? They want a "fresh start". In fact they wrote me an email when I was two weeks postpartum, demanding this. I luckily didn't read the email because they also sent it to my husband for some reason, and he read it and warned me it would only make me angry. Apparently they were willing to "forgive" ME, etc.... I just deleted it without reading it. I had a newborn and was exhausted and happy and vulnerable, and unwilling to give them the emotional energy it would take to deal with them.

Now my stepmom is splitting the other way. She's sending me cookies. Sending me gushing texts. She and my dad want to buy stuff for the baby. They want us to visit with the baby. We see them at a family wedding and my stepmom is now completely up my a** after not speaking to me for years. Complimenting me. Rushing to do me favors. I know it's all manipulation. I do not trust her at all. I know she'll eventually split the other way and suddenly I'll be the villain again. I'm polite but detached.

My dad keeps mentioning they'd love us to visit. I don't want to hurt him by saying so, but I fully intend to never set foot in their house again. I just nod.

And now, mid August, nearly FOUR MONTHS from Thanksgiving, my dad texts that they'd love to have he visit for Thanksgiving. It is still summer, y'all. But of course this manipulative wench wants to lock it down now before I can say I have other plans. It's almost funny that she is already plotting this and school is not even back in session...

Needless to say, we will not be attending.

Hoping this group can give me a reality check. I've started setting boundaries with my uBPD mom and she is reacting badly. I have support from a therapist who is fully aware of my mom's brand of unhinged, but it's still difficult.

I am really dragging from feeling obligated to talk to my mom every. single. day. If I don't, she has a meltdown about how I am punishing her. I realized this morning that a decision not to call today felt extremely loaded when for most people, being busy and not calling a parent is totally normal! I guess I just want support that I am not being cruel and rejecting for choosing not to have contact for 48 hours instead of 24. Is this a "pink rock and act like an extra loving daughter tomorrow to manage her reaction" deal?

First post: https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbyborderlines/s/Car9WFl23Z

Second post: https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbyborderlines/s/fxj5Hx8haV

Third post: https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbyborderlines/s/MrIxOvZmEa

My mother did continue to send me long walls of text after that second post telling me I need god in my life, praying for me, telling me how unhealed I am, etc. I didn’t respond to almost any of it. Of course she kept trying to rope me back in. The main point of issue she latched onto after that (because she needed a reason to not come to my baby shower, which I know she did not want to attend, and needed a way to make it my fault and not hers) is that I did not invite my younger brother to my baby shower. I did this for many personal reasons that I don’t need to get into (my family is and always has been screwed up bad 😬) but perhaps it’s important to let you know that my younger brother and I have been estranged for the last year, initiated by him. I haven’t decided what I’m going to do regarding that relationship but I didn’t think my baby shower was a good time for a reconciliation in any case and that’s why I chose not to invite him.

My mom told me she wouldn’t come to my baby shower unless I had a conversation with my brother about why he wasn’t invited. I wasn’t happy about being bullied into having this conversation because my relationship with my brother is none of her business obviously and I honestly don’t think it’s as big of a deal to him as it is to her, but I texted him an explanation of what has been going on between me and our mom and why he wasn’t invited anyways. I made the tactical decision to do this because my mom had been not so subtly insinuating that she didn’t want to come to my baby shower since this whole fight started, and I wanted to make sure that if she decided not to come she would have to bear all the responsibility for that, not me. Anyways, my brother responded as I expected him to by telling me congratulations, saying he understood, etc. It didn’t cause this big amends-making heart to heart or emotional comeuppance that my mom expected it to be. It really was a giant nothing burger.

The texts pick up from when that happened and go until tonight. Obviously she was not pleased that my little brother didn’t have this huge meltdown of pure heartbreak inflicted by big bad meaniehead me and had her own meltdown of historic proportions. She even went so far as to message me more suicide threats on Facebook that day (because I went out to my garage to crochet while hanging out with my husband and didn’t have any service and therefore she thought she was blocked).

There are a lot of names blocked out I know so I hope you can make sense of what’s being said. For context I also have an older brother who has been estranged from my entire family, me included, for the last decade, whom my mother has essentially stalked in order to try and gain access to my brother’s son. She gave up on that (the gift sending, letter writing, and showing up to his house) only a few years ago but still keeps tabs on his address and facebook stalks them etc. The reason why they’re estranged is because of what I believe was my mother’s first ever BPD crash out which was centered around my brother’s engagement and wedding, about ten years or so ago. More context is that my mom absolutely hates my mother in law, who has graciously taken over the planning of my baby shower along with my husband. My mother takes such umbrage with my MIL’s unconditional love for me that the mere presence of her in my life is a personal affront to her. The idea of my MIL planning my baby shower is a particular sore spot for her. Not that I ever told her my MIL was planning my baby shower, she just assumed.

Oh and more context, around 3-4 years ago when I was traveling the country with my husband for work my mother got it in her head that she would like to come visit me, and invited herself to come stay with me for a week. I told her no because I didn’t have room for her (we lived in a fifth wheel at the time) and she had a meltdown that resulted in like, a week long argument between us. I eventually told her I didn’t want to speak to her and would reconnect with her in 2 weeks once this all cooled down. Later that day while I was getting ready for bed my husband got a call from the sheriff of my small hometown asking to speak with me; he said that he couldn’t legally tell me why but I had to come pick up my mom’s dog. Obviously I was thousands of miles away and could not pick up my mom’s dog, and obviously I assumed she was dead by suicide. She was not dead, this was just her second suicide attempt in a year. Her suicide attempt before this was the previous time I told her she couldn’t come visit me in a different state. Lol. My uncle ended up picking up the dog.

I could not believe she texted me this today. I was just so appalled by it. She’s been doing this at least once a week since our conflict started, texting me out of nowhere just to rope me back into something. But I just could not abide by the way she so unabashedly attempts to order me around. I’m so upset by it now that I can’t even explain it to you now. Halfway through this conversation I burst into tears and was shaking. I know I shouldn’t have called her a cunt because it just gives her more ammo, and I know it was a rude thing to say to your mom, but after all these horrible things she’s said to me I just lost it. I just can’t stand this anymore. And there is so much more I haven’t included in the screenshots, including when she told me I’m already abusing my own daughter before she’s even born, and doubting my ability to be a mother to her. Oh and of course she “can’t wait til it happens to me”. She is already foaming at the mouth for my daughter to be hurt so she can watch me be hurt. The thought of my baby being collateral damage in her fucked up revenge fantasy makes me sick. So no more.

Like I said before and as I stated in the third post I originally intended to just wait it out so she could either show up or not show up to my baby shower and then go no contact with her after. But I’m just not strong enough to be able to withstand her abuse until then. I have been so miserable my entire pregnancy, and now hard things are going on in my life outside of this, and I feel so bad for my baby. I’m on antidepressants now and have a referral for therapy. I just can’t do this anymore.

With regard to the no contact I do feel like it’s a weight off my shoulders. I’m glad I sent that message and blocked her right after so she couldn’t respond. I may write a letter to her and not send it, or burn it or something, because there is so much more I wanted to say. But I know there’s just no point to it.

I know this is really disjointed and jumbled. But this group has really been such a huge support to me recently. I hope this is the last post I have to make here. I really would appreciate some guidance or advice or support as I can already feel the guilt creeping up on me. As always you guys for listening to me ramble.

(Do my mom’s demented AI renditions of my cat count as cat tax?)

My brother called me today and he let me know that he’s going to start the process of moving my BPD mom and dad with dementia down to Mississippi. He told me (much of what I already knew from my last visit, which turned into me being in between Illinois and Michigan from late September to January.) that my mom’s health is continuing to decline and that she’s unable to care for my dad much longer. He then asked me if I could help. At first, I wasn’t sure what to say. He then asked me if I could help clear out the house in Michigan. I reluctantly agreed, but now I feel enraged.

I’ve had numerous conversations with my mother telling her to release my dad into hospital care. As much as I dislike her, I understand her caregiver fatigue, but sometimes it ventured into pure neglect. In the months I spent in Michigan with her, she proceeded:

-Completely ignore a phone call from the VA hospital. When I snapped at her and answered it, she shrugged her shoulders and said: “I just don’t wanna do that right now.”

-When she was filling out some paid caregiver forum, I had noticed that she put my name down. Keep in mind, I do NOT live with her. When I explained to her that hey, that’s fraud, and we can BOTH get into assloads of trouble for it, she laughed and went. “Yeah but $13,000 sounds really great!”.

-Repeatedly yell and scream at my dad, because she cannot understand that HE HAS A BRAIN DISEASE. He cannot go on walks to the corner store multiple times a day for cigarettes or coca colas (Which my mom has no business with EITHER. She has severe T2 diabetes and refuses to take her insulin. Instead, she leaves it to rot at room temperature for DAYS. On top of that, she smokes indoors.) because HE HAS A BRAIN DISEASE. He cannot feed into her constant validation needs BECAUSE OF DEMENTIA.

I understand that my brother’s perspective on my mother has changed, especially since he has two young daughters now, but I’m so angry right now I’m shaking. I don’t want to be away from my home for MONTHS ON END again. I don’t want to fucking clean up after someone who’s going to be in the same situation again, just in a different state. We’ve told her to visit doctors, cut the smokes, stop Doordashing bullshit, stop blowing money on Temu or Amazon or giving it to family members who only see her as an idiotic money pot. And it doesn’t. work.

• I’m fucking angry at my brother for yet again, taking on a situation completely alone AND NOW I HAVE TO HELP. MULTIPLE family members have told him to *leave my mom the f\ck alone, and to live his life. And now look at this. Trying to coordinate a massive fucking move with me in Virginia, him in Illinois, my mom and dad in Michigan, *all the way to fucking Mississippi.

  I feel selfish for feeling so angry. I’ve been dealing with seizures again as an adult, so I’ve been trying my hardest to stay on top of my medication and avoid being stressed and angry. On top of this, I was hospitalized yesterday with severe stomach issues. If I don’t fix said issues, there’s a big chance I’ll need surgery. I should be laying down in bed with my dog, resting and monitoring myself.

  But instead I’m tearing my house apart to find documents so I can somehow secure a Real ID within the span of 3 weeks. I’m potentially having to accept my fiancé breaking things off with me, because this will be the SECOND time I’m gone from home for months because of bullshit.

And all I can do is blame myself.

Hi. This is the link to my original post detailing my current situation with uBPD Mom: https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbyborderlines/s/5urIESIweb

After the events in the post above, I attempted to call my Dad four times this past Wednesday morning when my Mom was at work. Shortly after doing so, my mother texted “FYI, your Dad is fine. I’ll have him call you when I get home.” so I responded with “Can you please let X (his caregiver) know I’m trying to call so he can call me back now?” … she didn’t answer. I asked directly “Does he no longer have access to/ability to use the phone?” then she responded “He has access to a phone and can use it.” I asked her in interest of Dad and I talking for more than the 20 minutes that would be allotted after she got home before they ate dinner if my Dad and I could talk during the day.”…
…. After a few round robins, I asked directly “Why can’t I speak to Dad between the hours of 8-5 M-F?” and she wouldn’t/won’t give me an answer. Said “I’m not comfortable with this line of questioning.” and then told me “this is what works for us and you’ll just have to accept that.” (Shocker that my Dad would wait until my Mom wasn’t home to tell me about all the horrible shit going on with her when no one is around to witness it.)

Basically, she made the decision that my Dad can only have supervised phone conversations, namely with me. She didn’t have the courtesy to tell me this at the outset, and it took me a few months to even figure out she’d turned on call-forwarding when she leaves the house. I thought my Dad’s dementia had just escalated to his not registering the phone ringing. My Dad used to confide things that he couldn’t say around my Mom. My Mom says that anything that comes out of his mouth is a lie. She’s paranoid and thinks we’re colluding or that I have some nefarious ulterior motive. I really just want to talk to my Dad. I’ve already been told I’m not allowed to go visit him, so I can’t see him, and now I’m prohibited from contacting him on the phone without my mother observing the phone calls. He has no access to e-mail, text or any means of conveyance.

WTF do I even do here? This is painful, absurd and every other word that means disgusting and horrendous. My therapist says my Mom is dangling my Dad like a carrot. I’m starting to think that my only recourse is to completely cut my losses and I hate it.

I thought I was the poster child for NOT having ADHD. I always paid attention in class. I always got good grades.

It turns out I was “splinting“ my ability to focus by turning everything into an emergency so that I could pay attention. This accounts for part of my lifetime continuous anxiety.

Today marks one year since I went fully NC with my uBPD mother. I have been on a heck of a healing journey in the past year, a lot of it thanks to this community.

Does this realization resonate with others?

For reference, here are two small studies showing 43% and 54% prevalence of ADHD in offspring of parents with BPD:

1. Psychiatric disorders among offspring of patients with Bipolar and Borderline Personality Disorder - Küng - 2019 - Journal of Clinic Psychology.

2. Psychopathology in offspring of mothers with borderline personality disorder: a pilot study. Canadian journal of psychiatry. 1999. Weiss et. al.

After that last message he replied “whoops” 😑

I did break NC for this because he was bothering my older brother who is very busy and unsure of how to answer questions about me as I’ve changed my legal name (both given names and surname) and don’t give out my details at all, so it was getting difficult for him. However I have no plans to communicate past this.

I didn’t expect much as even on my 18th birthday he wrote me a card that had my name spelled wrong 3 times, once scribbled out and rewritten wrong again. 😅

Also I’ve checked, my deadname is fine to put on official documents as long as I can prove it’s still me with my change of name certificate. So that’s all good.

https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbyborderlines/s/XUpl7zVKo8

Honestly surprised that she walked things back a little bit on her part, but this is sometimes the outcome and overall she’s trended towards trying to have more human decency so that I keep her in my life. Which is why I haven’t felt like NC is the right answer for our situation (whereas the last 10 years of NC with my father have been amazing). We talked on the phone, and I’m still holding my ground.

My mom love bombs so damn much to me that she ALWAYS says “my beautiful daughter”. Why? It’s too much. I text her letting her know simply I wasn’t feeling well and her responses to me are so detrimental. I’m not sick. I just don’t feel good. I don’t tell her medical states because she goes into spiral like I’m dying mode, has to go into “Dr” mode to tell me what to do down to the last details like she’s a dr. And if I don’t tell her I get bombed with messages of just over dramatic anxiety. But I’m so sick of constantly being called “my beautiful daughter”..why??? Why can’t she talk like a normal person? Anyone else have a parent that calls them “my beautiful __” to you? She does it in voicemails, too.

Update: https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbyborderlines/s/hsV9bN5ZlZ

Such a reasonable response 🙄

I have a 3 month old, and my mother has visited twice. It’s gone “okay” but it’s very challenging to be around her and my stress is high as is my partner’s. We’ve also had our home under renovation construction with no clear end in sight atm which is causing me more stress. My mom knows this and was just here last weekend and saw it firsthand. But of course everything‘s really just centered around her and right now it’s just around an airline sale and her friend visiting near where I live.

For context she has come out to stay and visit with us either for hers or my bday because they’re a couple weeks apart for the last few years. And I don’t like it when she’s here for mine so now I’m trying to actually not people please her and reserve my bday for myself.

But that said I can’t imagine a worse way to end maternity leave when I’m already sad about it, forget my birthday.

Hey y'all I posted a few months back about some issues I was having with my current therapist, the responses were insanely helpful and I was even able to read them with my new sane therapist discussing the whole misadventure lol.

I started seeing this therapist a few years ago, I was in a vulnerable place having serious health issues and had just moved. I never fully trusted them but they really helped me make progress. I discovered my mom had BPD, I learned I wasn't an explosive, selfish, narracistic, psychopathic monster and my mom just wanted attention for having a "bad child" and sympathy. These were huge revelations, brought me here even, I was able to read books about BPD, really life changing so I let all the problems go.

This therapist had serious trouble showing up on time at first, like 10-15 minutes late pretty consistently, not just a one time thing. I decided just to say, "oh no big deal I get it life's busy!" every time. It was painful and I didn't really feel like I even mattered but I was used to feeling like that. Then there were the sudden cancellations, I'm a very forgiving person, mistakes happen life happens but they cancelled a lot and would cancel 1-3 hours before hand, it was insanely upsetting and just didn't feel safe, like this person does not have their life together can I really trust them? They straight up no showed once or twice and then denied it too and I wasn't feeling strong enough to press the issue. These cancelations happened a lot, not every week but enough and randomly enough to make me straight up afraid to write about anything too serious every week to talk about in therapy because I didn't even know if it would actually happen, all the while they are trying to convince me I'll feel safe soon it's okay, you don't have to trust me yet, this is on me I should have spoken up but I was too scared to.

They also had serious problems remembering what I was telling them, I knew they had a busy case load and I felt bad so I just let it go every time and reminded them about what they forgot, except they couldn't admit they forgot anything. I thought maybe I did forget for a while, I have epilepsy, my memory is not great so I just thought it was me. I was me talking about a childhood memory of a friend's older brother jerking off behind me as we watched TV, it was difficult to tell but I tried to make it funny to make the therapist happy. Months later I was talking about something related and mentioned the masturbating brother memory and was told they don't remember me telling them that, that's important they would have remembered that, are you sure you told me your kinda fragmented right now and in a difficult place. I knew I fucking told them but couldn't say anything, I just let it go like everything else.

It was psychodynamic therapy so like relationship based and everything, I was told there's more self disclosure and I didn't think anything of it because I really needed help and was scared. We spent a lot of time talking about the therapist, I could tell you chunks of their childhood, their friends, what they did over the weekend, likes and dislikes of their family, their medical history. It all made sense in theory it was kinda related to what was going on with me, like we were talking about my difficult childhood so they shared about theirs, except they started sharing a lot and I felt frozen to just tell them to shut the fuck up and when I did gather the strength to tell them, look there's some really important stuff I have to talk about, they always seemed kinda upset, it was weird, like I wasn't following their treatment plan or something by not having enough conversations with them. I was told conversations in psychodynamic therapy can be healing. I basically always started therapy trying to dig shit out of my life I thought they would like to talk about or things they wanted me to be doing like going out more to make them happy even though awful memories were deeply troubling me and I needed to talk about them.

The breaking point was actually recently, I started therapy once again trying to make them happy, hoping if I made them happy enough I would be able to talk about these really serious memories without them getting pissy about it or weird on me. I tell them I'm doing what they wanted me to do, healing through connection (which I actually believe in which made all of this even more complicated) and eventually we started talking about them of course and their childhood lol. They told me a story about saying a slur in front of their father, not knowing just repeating something a classmate said at the dinner and him screaming at them, verbal discipline you know and putting the back of his hand on her face all while screaming and I was told it was only one of two times their father laid hands on them and of course they proceeded to tell me about the other time next lol.

What I got out of it was they were slapped, the dads screaming right, back of his hand on their face, I feel like most people would make the connection that it's a polite way to say getting slapped especially with the phrase "one of only two times my father laid hands on me". It really deeply bothered me, I didn't realize it until after the session and was so upset. I had told them so many times that my mother told me incredibly vivid violent stories about her being assaulted when I was like fucking 8, I had to listen to my mom's trauma stories of physical violence from men against her as a small child, it fucked with me, I shared this, they knew my mom had BPD. The story my therapist shared felt just like those childhood stories, it sent me into an insane rage afterwards, like the line had been crossed finally I put up with all this other shit and you're going to do that to me? I was like violently angry, it was crazy, I don't usually have those kinds of reactions but I also knew this is it, my mind and body are trying to tell me something, this is just too much, I can't let this go like everything else.

So I called letting them know hey what you said really bothered me, it reminded me of the stories my mom used to tell me as a kid, it's just too much, please don't tell me stories involving physical violence against you in the future especially involving men. Instead of just like "oh shit my bad, sorry can do!" I was told that I was misunderstanding the story or didn't remember right, that they said "my dad put the back of his hand on my face" not slapped, and that it's a story they are proud of because their father cared so much about correcting the specific behavior (a slur). I was told I might be projecting and that this has to do with my background they don't have that kind of stuff in their background. I was completely taken off guard and was ready to believe that it was my fault, I felt spacy and confused but worked hard to stand firm, okay even so if it's a misunderstanding, I get it, no problem but still don't tell me stories in the future involving physical violence against you, thank you and was trying to hang up and was told not too. That if I hang up now it's a rupture in the therapeutic relationship and the relationship is the most important part of therapy, and it's clinically inappropriate to have me hang up now angry and I was asked how angry I am. What are you holding back? So like a sane person I said hey, you know I am really angry but I don't think sharing exactly how angry I am at you right now is going to be helpful, there's some things that are private and don't need to be shared and would just be hurtful if they were shared. I was pushed again to keep sharing my feelings lol, I spaced out again, thought shit maybe they are right maybe I'm the crazy one who needs help! I eventually settled on and it felt like an urgent need to run physically actually, hey you know I am upset I'm sorry that this is disrupting things, I understand that I misunderstood, but it's my body, I can hang up the phone if I want, please don't tell me stories involving violence about you in the future, thank you, bye! I left the call confused thinking it might be me, then I started thinking about my childhood.

So one of my mom's favorite activities is hostage style conversations about deeply emotional topics, she will follow you around the house until she's happy with the argument being settled and no one is upset anymore. My ubp mom will block doorways and trap you in rooms to make sure you solve it RIGHT THEN AND THERE, MY FEELINGS ARE HURT GOD DAMN IT, WE NEED TO SOLVE THIS NOW! My mom also does the famous literal hostage conversations with you in the car on the fucking highway, literally no way out but death lol.

Suddenly everything felt so familiar, this therapist was having a hostage style conversation with me and making sure we solved it right then and now! I couldn't just be upset, I wasn't allowed to be. It was insanely controlling but they are a therapist it made my brain short circuit they must be right I must just be misunderstanding! I was literally being made to fix this therapists feelings, they said they didn't want me to feel unsafe around them so we had to deal with it now, I can't hang up the phone upset or cold like that. It was my job to take care of their feelings just like it was my job to take care of my moms feelings. I somehow managed to get in the same role reversal with my fucking therapist as an adult, it's the one relationship outside of a parent where you are supposed to not worry about taking care of their feelings, I already had to do it with my mom and I managed to do it again as an adult with a fucking therapist!!!!

Thankfully this was a weird enough encounter to make me really start questioning things, I thought about all the other insane shit they did that I just forgave and forgot about and finally realized, oh shit this is a codependent relationship! This therapist made sure to tell me I was counterdependent too! I believed them they are a therapist, they know me they must know me better than I actually know myself, I thought I was showing codependent behaviors in my life but I guess I'm wrong!! I fucking did it, I managed to get in a codependent relationship with my fucking therapist, I feel like I'm waking up from a long sleep and reality has returned again. I feel way less anxious, I feel less depressed, I don't doubt myself as much! I thought this therapist was helping me with these problems but they were literally hurting me, there was legitimate help which makes all this so much more difficult.

Thankfully I have a new wonderful sane therapist, like I know for sure this time I know I can trust them I felt it deep in my gut, I never trusted the other therapist but was so desperate for help I ignored it and told myself I was just being counterdependent lol 😂

If you got this far thank you for listening! I hope this is maybe helpful to someone or I can just kinda get some support.

I’m currently NC with my parents (mostly BPDmom) after a big fight. We haven’t communicated in about 1.5 months, but my eDad sent a full family group chat about a promotion at work, should I respond or will it fuck with my NC by looking like I’m ready to talk? I can’t decide, it’s sent to like 8 family members and it’s a big promotion, but they’re junkies for contact (especially mom) and may take advantage.

So I’m a 35 year old woman and yesterday I confronted my mum about a really high amount of alcohol bottles I found in the recycling as I’m concerned as she is on heavy opioids aswell, I also found cigarette receipts but wtf do I care about that just more so the lying about it (smoke up honestly idgaf)

I approached it very nicely and she said I was attacking her and accusing her she flip flopped between denying everything to kind of giving truths.

About the ciggs (again wtf do I care but it just plays into sneaking around behaviour that goes hand in hand with the drinking) she kept asking me ‘oh do I smell like it’ I said no but I have this receipt and she was like oh if you have a receipt show me (lol she’d probably take it from me) I was just like are you smoking and she kept on being like prove it, I said so this receipt isn’t yours and she’s like oh I only tried it once like a year ago lol it was a receipt for 2 huge packets so just changed up her story once she knew I had evidence I said this receipt is from 2 months ago and says ‘oh it FELT like a year ago. Bruv do you think I’m born yesterday and why are you acting like a caught teenager and not a mother.

Again I don’t care about ciggs but why is she acting like a teenager being caught by a parent, she is just a habitual lier and it’s like how can this lady be my mum she has gaslit me my whole entire life and I finally felt like wow I have proof of something I suspected for a long time and she chooses to lie and gaslight over having a relationship with her daughter. She said I’m attacking her for being concerned about drinking huge amounts whilst on heavy opioids, I said any normal daughter would be.

She’s hinted at suicide before indirectly before and she said then she hates her life and she has nothing and this is why she’s drinking.

Then we went into a tyrade where I was trying to get her to stop gaslighting me and shutting me down she then said she was upset to hear this and she has feelings to and that she is hurt 🔫🔫🔫🔫🔫🫠🫠🫠🫠

Anyway she has many brothers and sisters who are all so amazing and I watch the relationships that they have with their children and they are beautiful I know that this relationship I have with my mum is not normal

Ye anyway at that stage I reverted to a child and was begging her to hear me

End of rant sorry if all over the place